Chapter 9

Midnai

Farrow flew off and left me alone. The sun came up a few minutes later as I sat and recalled the bright sky and white clouds I had just been shown.

I heard a grunt of surprise as the butcher came out to see me standing outside with all this meat this early in the morning.

He opened the door and didn’t say anything. He looked half confused despite having just woken up.

“For the King and Queens banquet. From the Huntress.” I said nodded, and having given my message, left back up to the temple. I wondered if he realized that I was the new Huntress or not. Maybe he knew that Celentine wasn’t around. Maybe he did know.

I continued all the way up to my bedroom and fell dead asleep on my bed.

I dreamt of beautiful skies and feasts that filled my tummy, festivities that all had enjoyed. I walked out towards the fields to meet all my new friends, Equine, Aves, Moles. I saw the buffalo in the grass and watched as another Huntress stalked and killed her prey. I watched them take it home to cook it and eat it.

I woke up much much later and decided that it had been maybe a full day that I had been sleeping.

I went to the first room to see if there were any more instructions that I should have paid attention to. There was something. I stepped closer to read it.

The feast will be held in three days. The festivities will start at noon. The dinner will start at sunset.

Before the feast meet the King and Queen to be introduced to the village.

That’s interesting. I will be introduced to the whole village. I didn’t expect that.

I have three days. Maybe I can go exploring for the next three days. The northern parts looked interesting.

I packed a bag with a thick garment I found in the closet and some spices, some flint and steel for making a fire, and a few left over pieces of dried meat.

Hunger got to me before I had got to leaving so I went outside and caught a little bird, my last real supper until the banquet. Left overs and dried meat for now.

I left the temple and ventured west through the forest and into the fields again. After having been through this way before and racing an Equine I made it faster than half a day. I caught a glimpse of the fields and sat down on a branch to eat.

Roland came to the edge of the field and peered through the trees. He looked directly at me through all the obscuring branches. “I see you Huntress.”

“You have good eyes to see me from out there.”

“I know you, therefore I can see you. And I knew you were coming, would you like me to take you north to venture into the cold tundra of the arctic?”

“How did you know?”

“There are lots of things I don’t know being the watchman of our tribe, it is something that you learn, yet something you can’t teach.”

“Then let me on your back and we will ride to the north. I have some exploring to do.”

“Good answer.”

He let me on and we rode to the north.

“How did they like your hunt?” He asked.

“I think they liked it. I only just gave it to the butcher and the feast will be in three days.”

“Will you be there to enjoy it as well?”

“Absolutely! I wouldn’t miss a chance to meet my King and Queen and not to mention the rest of my village, and my family.”

“Then you must be excited to say the least.”

“I’ve barely seen my family since I was named to be the Huntress. My siblings must have grown like me, not just kittens anymore and knowledgable and able to hunt and kill like me.”

“Family is something you can’t be without.” He said.

The voyage north got colder and colder yet we made it there by nightfall. I jumped off of Roland’s back and thanked him while I put on my extra clothing. “I shouldn’t have more than a day out here before I need to get headed back for the feast.”

“I’ll be here when you need to come back Huntress.”

I thanked him again and looked out to the cold northern frontier. Lots of snow, steam coming up and out of the pools of warm water.

I only made it a few hours into the night before I decided that I should sleep for the night. I put my things down, and some instinct told me to dig a hole in the snow to stay warm so I did and curled up to sleep for the cold night.

I woke the next morning and had a vague thought about someone having been near me and being excited, but another one telling him to let her sleep.

I got up and took some dried meat of from my bag and started to thaw it out in my mouth as I ventured further north.

I came upon warm pool of water, steam was rising out of it and was continually rising into the sky. This is where the clouds are made, I thought to myself.

I touched the water and felt the warmth reenter my hand. Maybe a quick swim will warm me up.

I took off my coat and sank into the water, swimming back and forth. It was a large pool, deep enough so that I couldn’t stand in it.

A head popped up on the other side and started whispering. Another head popped up and speaking softly, too low for me to hear. I kept swimming and made it to the ledge that I had jumped in. Before I could get out they had swam right up to me and started talking to themselves again.

“You think this is her. The one we saw last night?”

“Of course she is. you see the color of her face?”

“But her body is a different color.”

“That’s just the clothing she was wearing.”

“Oh right. She wears clothes.”

Finally, I had enough of them talking behind my back and I turned around. “Hello,” I said, but before I could say anything more I was startled by their looks. “Nereids?”

“Yes.” He replied

“But no.” The other one said quickly. “We’re similar. We are merely messengers for the northern population. But I believe you had met our cousins elsewhere if you think that we are Nereids. We are cold Nereids from the north. We normally don’t come this far south, it gets too hot for us, though this pool is refreshing. But we had heard that you were coming and thought to venture out to meet you and make sure you didn’t get lost.”

“We’ll take you there right now.” The other Nereid said.

“Shhh. Don’t tell her yet.”

“Where are you taking me? And where do you think I was going?” I asked them.

“Fine,” he said, giving the other one a look. “I guess I’ll have to tell you now.” He looked around and seemed to think that we were being heard, so whispered, “Come back in, and bring your bag.”

I did so and jumped back into the water. They grabbed me and pulled me underneath. “Listen,” they told me, “there are things out there that may not want you or any other Xenos, or living creature to live. So be careful and follow us closely.”

The other Nereid seemed to have been conscious of me being under water. “Take her back up, she needs to breathe!”

“Not now, I don’t care if she needs to breathe, she needs to live more than she needs to breathe and letting her up now may not let her live again.”

“Don’t worry,” I said, “I can breathe.”

“You can?” They both asked in astonishment.

“I met the Nereids and the Pisces King in the western seas when I was a kitten. They gifted me with…something.” I smiled, not knowing what to call it.

“Good, I thought we nearly killed you ourselves.”

“Anyways, where were you taking me? I have to get back to the village and I only have a day out here before need to head back.”

One started thinking that over. “A day maybe five, trouble lurks above water, and if she’s still out there we will not let you back out here. Maybe down river where it may be safe.”

“What do you mean by trouble? The Ancients?”

“Shhh. Just as we knew you were coming this way, others may have caught onto your presence as well.”

They took me down and closer to the bottom of the pool, but there wasn’t a bottom, it just kept going down and down. They finally stopped and asked me for directions. “Which way was north?”

I pointed, normally keeping a good lock on my compass directions, and they pulled me off that way.

I might be able to breathe under water, but with water rushing past and into the eyes and pulling at your head and clothes, not to mention the below zero current that freezes you without you going into a solid ice cube, I passed out.

Soon enough, though I might not be able to tell you how long after, I awoke. It was all dark. The Nereids started to pull me up to the surface and I found myself back in the snow, yet there was nothing else, no hot pools of water, no fields seen off in the distance, there was nothing but snow on the ground and snow in the air blowing every which way and direction. It was a madhouse just looking up out of the water. I couldn’t see more than five feet in front of me.

“I think I feel better in the water than out here at the moment.” I told the Nereids. The wind would make me into an icicle.

“Sorry, this is as far as the water will take us, next is up the mountain and through the pass to take you to see the Queen.”

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“What Queen? The Ice Queen? I thought sarcastically. I can’t stand the cold and blizzards.”

“Oh, sorry, that’s just the normal weather. It should clear up soon.” One of the Arctic Nereids said as he snapped his fingers. “Probably not,” the other said, “for another thousand years or so.”

I came out of the water and started shivering. I couldn’t see and had to close my eyes so that the snow wouldn’t sting them. The Nereids pulled me off through the center of it despite my unconscious physical protests. It felt like it was taking five minutes per step. It was unbelievably cold. I couldn’t even dry myself after the swim, everything was soaked. Ice started forming on my fur where it wasn’t already being violated by snow, and probably my inside my bones. My teeth were chattering and I couldn’t open my eyes if I wanted to, they were frozen shut.

“You can open your eyes now Huntress,” the arctic Nereid said. “The storm has passed.”

I managed to open my eyes. I wasn’t where I was before. Now we were in a room with a fire and a bear fur rug in front of the hearth.

Just like last time, not an underwater cave but a warm room in blizzard country. I told myself to never follow Nereids, they take you past the limits and then you wake up somewhere, lost and insecure.

“Once you stop shivering we can take you to see the Ice Queen.”

“Yeah, you should stop shivering. It wouldn’t be polite. She’s the Ice Queen.”

“Either way you’ll stop shivering. Here take this.” He handed me a cup of hot chocolate. It was sweet and warming my insides.

A few minutes later I could stand up and finally got myself together to see the Ice Queen. I looked outside. It was getting close to sunset.

“I have to be going soon. I still have to make it back to my village in a day.”

“Don’t worry, time isn’t a problem, unless you want to make that journey again some other time, I suggest you come and meet her now. Look, you’ve already stopped shivering and your face has turned back to normal color, I hope.”

“I think red is normal.” The other Arctic Nereid commented.

“It’s usually the color of sunset.” I said.

“Well, we have a ways to go.”

They marched me out the door and I found that I had made it to a castle built into the stone of the mountain. I managed to look out and see nothing but snow. Blizzards off in the distance, and as we circled the mountain getting closer to the top I found that there wasn’t anything else to see outside besides snow and blizzards. I couldn’t even see the fields that I had come through, though I didn’t even know which way that was.

Staircase after staircase we made it to the top and found the Ice Queen. She was a plump figure with icicles for hair and a face that may have been that of a seal’s. I wanted to ask her if she was even a Xeno, but I knew no Xeno could stand this much cold.

“Dawn! My darling. So nice to see you! I’m glad we could finally meet, I’ve been watching you play around in the hot sun.”

She came in and gave me a hug, it stung with the bitter cold and left frost trailing down my fur. I started to shiver again.

“Come darling, I have something for you.”

She led me down a hallway and into a very heavily locked door with only one thing inside.

“So tell me Dawn, how has it been since we last met.”

I looked at her blankly.

“Never mind, we haven’t met before!” She laughed maniacally. “Here take this.” She handed me a dropper from the vial that looked like a large icicle with some sort of water inside, the only thing in the room. “Stick out your tongue darling.”

I did and she took the dropper out of the vial preparing to give me a drop.

“Did Poseidon do anything with you?”

“The Pisces King?”

“Yes, I mean you met him before and he gave you… never mind.” She shook her head. “That won’t affect anything. He does all this hocus-pocus and makes you do all of these things in that fountain of his. This is much easier.”

I realized that she still hadn’t given me the dropper.

“What is in this vial?” I asked accusatively.

“Just water.” She replied. “It will make you… you’ll see.”

She finally got the dropper out and put it on my tongue. “Funny, this is the last of it.” She looked at me like old ladies do when they think you’re up to something.

The weirdest sensations went through my body. I felt hot and cold at the same time, sweat and chills.

“There you go darling. This is my gift…”

I blacked out again and woke up who knows how long later. The sun was still setting, or was it setting again.

I was sitting in front of the fireplace again. This time it wasn’t lit, yet I was still warming up, or cooling down. All I ever was fire and ice.

“Enjoy your stay?” One of the Nereids asked. “As soon as you can walk we’ll get you back to the field. I know you had to hurry back.”

The room was spinning and I think another cup of hot chocolate would help. Luckily there was one sitting on the table beside me.

I downed it and another and decided that should be enough.

“Wow, that was fast, usually they take at least a whole night before they can walk.”

“She’s only been twenty minutes!”

They looked at me in amazement and gave me a small shove to make sure I could still keep my balance. I could, so they showed me along the way back to where I came from.

“Going back will be faster, we know how to get there.”

“As long as that monster isn’t still there. I could smell death just dripping off of it.” The Arctic Nereids said.

We made it, back to where I had started.

“I think you should be fine to go through the fields and back home. I can’t smell death now.”

“Thank you, you two, the cold wasn’t that bad coming back.”

“Of course it wasn’t. That’s was magic potions are for. I hope you enjoyed the trip.”

I didn’t say anything.

I wandered back to the fields to meet Roland, hopefully it wasn’t too late, but I’m sure he won’t mind.

The snow wasn’t biting like it did last time, but also coming up through the warm springs seemed to help. It was more an awareness than a feeling. I knew it was cold, but it didn’t seem to bother me.

I could see the low rolling hills of the lowlands and the jungle off to the west. Next, find Roland. I should be able to see him in a few minutes.

I increased my pace and made it there pretty fast. Roland was waiting. “What took you so long? Did you go to the other side?”

“No, but close, someone found me and had to show me the Ice Queen.”

He rolled that over in his head. “You didn’t go swimming there did you? Those hot springs tend to make one fall asleep and drown, or at best, hallucinate. I should have told you before I left you but I didn’t think Felines swim. You didn’t drown did you?”

“No, I can swim. And I’m here. No drowning.”

“Lucky. We best be off now, there were unwanted beasts here lately and I wouldn’t want to get caught up with them. They have a bad habit of scaring young ones like you.”

“I’m not that young. I’ve grown a lot since I first met Celentine.”

He laughed, “I believe that. I think you even grew since the first time I saw you, and that was only a few days ago. One really never stops growing. Until he does stop, that is. Then he doesn’t grow.”

I rolled that over in my head. Since when were Equine philosophic?

Roland took me up and we continued talking on our way back, I was surprised that he could talk just as normal even when he was galloping along.

We made it close to my entrance back into the forest. I was out far enough I could see my hill the Temple rested on. I could even see what looked like a little waterfall coming out from the middle of the hill. Such a beautiful place, my forest, my Temple, the beautiful planet of Xenobia. I can’t wait to see the eastern side of the continent, not to mention the City of Xenobia itself.

Roland had stopped suddenly and looked around. I turned too and saw a large dot in the sky. At that distance, inconceivably big.

“We need to go!” Roland said as he simultaneously charged off at an even greater speed.

The dot in the sky got bigger as it came closer. I started to make out it’s features. The wing span of one of the larger trees in the jungle, a large body five times the size of a buffalo and as it came even closer I could see the hind legs of a Feline and the head of an Aves. “What is it?” I yelled, asking Roland over the wind blowing past my ears.

He didn’t answer, he just charged on getting closer and closer to the Jungle.

The beast soared close above us. Roland stopped and flew off, tumbling into the long grass.

“Run!”

But this wasn’t my entrance to the jungle. I don’t know how to get back from here.

“Run!” He yelled again.

I ran and climbed up the nearest tree I could find.

The beast spiraled down and landed in front of Roland. At the same moment six other Equine came out of nowhere and shot the beast with arrows. It howled, no, shrieked like a tormented Aves. But it didn’t let up. The beast started picking off the Equine and eating them whole. Roland was safe so far, luckily, it was distracted by the arrows flying at it, blindly attacking anything that moved.

I had no choice, Ungu tingled between my toes. I climbed up the tree, waiting no time I eyed the beast and leapt.

It was very far down, but the wind pushed me forwards and onto the back of the beast. I landed and fought through it’s feathers and fur to get to it’s neck. Ungu making sure it left no step unfelt by it’s steely tips. I climbed up to it’s neck and with all the thrashing I troubled to stay on. But Ungu held tight, my claws grabbed onto feathers and found secure holds underneath.

The beast jumped through the air and we rose back to my initial height in the breadth of a second. I held on for dear life.

Ungu started moving, digging deeper and deeper into the neck of this beast.

She continued to rise, flapping her wings with power to topple a tree and I held on.

We rose to a point where it was just as cold as the snowy norths and she started gliding, calmly soaring through the air. The beast didn’t speak but I heard it voice. “Who are you to come down on me and kill? I am not to be killed, I kill.” It was a women’s voice, one which accompanied such a monster.

“I am Dawn, The Huntress of the Felines.”

“And who do you think I am Dawn?”

“Are you not a beast that came down to kill us?”

“Who, you and the Equine? No, I was merely watching and came down to say hello, until I got shot at.” She said slyly, enunciating the last words with such energy I nearly passed out.

I didn’t quite think that was the truth though. And she kept soaring, flapping her wing and taking the two of us higher and higher.

“Funny, you aren’t cold? Can you still breathe at this altitude? There shouldn’t be enough air for you to breathe at this height.”

“I can breathe, and I’m not cold.”

“We have met before. Haven’t we. It’s been a long time but one’s like you are rare. Knowledge of your type is nearly lost in our memory.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“There are one’s who still believe in magic and still put their spells on some. But I thought their magic was all used up, powerless and taken by the ones before you.”

“I don’t know of any magic.”

“Oh! But what a lie. And there are still ways to kill such mortals like you. For I am Midnai!”

She suddenly dove, straight down. The feeling made me sick, but Ugnu knew what to do I could feel the intentions.

She dove and I nearly lost all feelings. My sight blurred out. Falling at such a speed did that to one. I had time, and I was losing consciousness. But Ungu was very conscious.

One moment I was falling, the next, I was in the grass, panting with a cold sweat. Ungu was covered in blood and the beast was laying by my side, one eye gouged out, neck severed and the other eye open and staring blankly into the distance.

An Equine was shaking me, “Huntress. Oh no. Don’t die!”Others around me whispered to each other. “Is she dead?”

I moved around, still laying on the ground, trying to open my eyes.

“Yeah, she’s dead.”

I squinted at the Equine, still laying there, they were upside down. “Roland?” I asked.

Roland came charging from another direction. “Huntress, you’re alive! And you killed the beast!”

“I need to get back home.” I reminded him.

“Yes, but you just killed the Ancient. You know what this means? You saved us all and saved yourself, and the rest of the Equine. We will have a feast in your name and give you a whole Buffalo to yourself. Whatever you want, it’s yours. This has never been done. Not in the living memories of the Equine!”

“Yes, thank you.” I was a bit shocked, still laying on the ground, not wanting to move. Was it really such a feat? I’ve killed animals before. This wasn’t the same?

“We will have a party. No, a festivity. No, something better, we will celebrate until…until…we are free!”

“But I have a feast to get to. Next time I am in your lands we will feast and we will hunt together.”

“Dawn, you saved us.” Tears now rolling down his Equine cheeks. “No more fear.”

He picked me up and swung me onto his back.

The Equines were cheering long into the night.

The elder had made a fire and burned the beast until every last part of it was ashes and bones. The next day the chief would have scattered and buried the bones, singing charms and counter-curses to ensure no curse would wake this beast.

———

Roland too me on his back, circled the cheering crowd and took off towards the forest again.

Night was encroaching and I was afraid that I’d have to sleep outside again. I don’t mind, but home is a nice place to sleep.

“You said that she was one of the Ancients.” I asked Roland.

“Yes, one of the worst. She would come down on one when least expected, pick you up and take you off or most likely eat you whole.”

“But how did you know she was there?”

“I am the watchman for us Equine, I know when something is coming, it is something I have learned but something I cannot teach.”

“You’ve told me that before. But i need to know about the Ancients. Tell me more.”

“They are a nasty bunch of beasts. They are designed to kill, get rid of the Xenos one by one. There are more of them, each set to rid the world of one species. The Griffin, this beast you killed came to kill us. But she didn’t know our secret weapon.” He laughed. “You.”

“I was your secret weapon?”

“Well, you were here just at the right time, as fate has it, you were the one to kill the Ancients and that is why you are special. You had put your foot in the door of fate and changed where everything was going.”

“So fate had it that I was the one to kill the Ancient, and not it kill you.”

“That is correct. But why it came to kill us is not something I know. If it came to kill us because of our bad deeds and wrongdoings, I know not, or cannot tell you as those are only for Equine ears, not Feline.”

“Then the Ancients come for a reason. But this time she failed and I killed her. Maybe fate had it that way too.”

“True, our ancestors did not warn us of an ending, only the constant words to stay vigilant and not to look down. The Ancestors know when it will happen, they just never tell us and only let us live and enjoy our lives at the moment, when the day comes, it comes, there is no stopping it.”

“It would be like mourning the day that you die your whole life, before you die, even when you have fifty years ahead of you. All your life you mourn your future death.

“Correct. So that is the thing, even when death stares you in the face, you still live, up to the moment you rise to the stars you still fight, that is true, that is the warrior, the one who isn’t afraid of dying.”

“Thank you, Roland. I must not forget that and I will never forget you.”

“Here you go miss Huntress. Enjoy your feast.”

He let me off at the proper entrance back into the forest and I departed, back home in the twilight.