Huffing harder than even those humans had been doing earlier, I ran with all my might.

Honestly I was surprised I was still alive or not caught yet. I’d ran through a group of trees, and then up and over a hill. One that had led me to a thicker section of forest. Not just of trees but undergrowth. I was running through knee high grass and weeds, sometimes even through entire bushes and brambles.

I couldn’t hear my father’s pursuit, but I knew he was still behind me. There was no way he wouldn’t be.

I might have actually made this worse for myself by running… but…

Flinching as ran through some sharp branches, I tried to ignore the feeling of a deep cut in my right ear. The one on the side of my head. They were so much frailer than the ones on top of my head…!

Doing my best to not slow, I tried to formulate a real plan.

Honestly there was nothing I could do. Father would eventually catch me. It was inevitable. I shouldn’t have ran. But…

“His eyes,” I cried as I remembered them.

Those eyes had been clear. The intent behind them obvious.

My father had never looked at me with love or affection… but he’d never looked at me with such pure intent before. Hate, sure. Disgust even. But…

Wheezing as I leapt over a large root, I dared a glance behind me.

Seeing nothing but the forest somehow made my heart pound even harder.

Just great. He wasn’t behind me. Which meant he wasn’t just chasing after me…

He was actually hunting me.

What do I do?

He knew this forest like the back of his paw. Like his tail. From one mountain to the other.

There was nowhere I could run and hide. There was nowhere to go.

Returning home wouldn’t help me either. My grandmother, or mother, would protect me but only to a point. With father this angry and serious…

Not even they would risk his anger. Not for me of all the children.

I stumbled again, and growled at myself.

Get it together Rennalee!

At least don’t make it easy for him!

Maybe I can at least hurt him or something. Take an eye or…

Before I even fully regained my footing, I was knocked off my feet.

I heard my own yelp of pain, but then all I heard was ringing. Loud screeching, bouncing around in my head as…

Blinking blackness away, I rolled on the ground and felt the roots beneath me. The stuff I had tripped on earlier. They hurt. Why did the ground always have be to so uncomfortable?

Coughing, I groaned as I rolled onto my side.

“I can’t believe you actually ran. Maybe I misjudged you,” father’s voice was loud in my ears… but he sounded distant. As if far away.

Where had he even hit me…? My head was ringing, and felt floaty… similar to what I had felt earlier. While chasing those humans.

But yet…

A weird pain shot up my right arm, and into my chest.

Yes. Either he had hit me in the shoulder, or my fall had broken something.

“Father…” I groaned as I finally got my arms under me. I tried to sit up, to go to my knees, but didn’t have the strength yet.

Unable to stand up, or even push up off the ground, I wheezed as I tried to take a deeper breath.

Right before I could finish taking the breath, I was hit again.

I was finally off the ground again, but not thanks to my own actions. Father had kicked me. Right in the side.

Flying into the air, I felt my eyes bulge as I flew high enough into the air that I actually hit stuff. Branches and limbs, from the trees around us.

Before I could even comprehend what he’d done, I fell back down. Landing harshly into a very pointy and thick bramble.

The countless tiny spikes and thorns poked and cut as I rolled in pain, unable to gather the strength to pull myself out of the bramble.

He really was furious…!

“Don’t call me that. All that does is piss me off,” his voice cut through my blinding pain. Somehow his words cut deeper than the thorns were.

“Why…?” I groaned.

“Why? Because you failed. And this is the perfect excuse,” he said.

Excuse…

I knew it. So this had been a long time coming.

That meant it hadn’t mattered what I had done to those humans. Even if I had done the task flawlessly… although he might have spared me for now, this would have happened inevitably.

I’d find the fact I was about to be killed by my own father surprising… but honestly it wasn’t.

He’d killed his other family. His other children. And from the way the rest of my family spoke, such a thing wasn’t shocking or weird at all.

Yet it should be.

It really should be.

Other animals didn’t do this. Not to this level.

So why did we…?

But maybe humans did it too. That woman had attacked that man after all. To try and sacrifice him to save herself from me, per my father’s words.

Maybe this was just how the world was…

But…

I sniffed as I realized this meant…

I hadn’t needed to kill those humans.

There had been no point.

Rolling a bit, I pushed off the brambles and found the nearest path to freedom. It took a bit of crawling, and a little rolling, but I eventually got myself out of the huge bush of thorns.

Falling out of the bush, I landed on a root. One that was angled and flat enough that I actually took a moment to lie upon it for a moment…

I could fall asleep on this thing. It was perfectly sized and shaped.

“Don’t worry. I’ll tell them you died fighting. A proud death,” father said.

A…

Proud death…?

I sniffed as I looked up. To the man a few feet away from me. His tail was twitching behind him, brushing close to the thick brambles I had just rolled free from.

He’d lie about that? If so… what else does that mean he’d lie about?

Why lie at all…? It’s not like my family would care.

Fellisee might, but only for a short time.

Would mother…?

“I’m surprised you’re not crying. Maybe you’ve known this would happen, eventually,” father said.

“I hadn’t,” I admitted.

Maybe deep down. But I’d never acknowledged it. I hadn’t actually thought it possible.

I always expected a beating. But… death? To be killed?

Just… because I wasn’t strong?

Or because I was ugly…?

Were such things really that important…?

I coughed, and with a wince I felt a weird pain. In my throat. And after I took a moment to push away the weird pain, I realized I had coughed up blood.

A lot of blood.

Not far from me, splattering the root I had fallen on… was a bunch of gleaming blood. It was rolling down the root, filling in the nooks and grooves as it pooled and slid down.

“Look. Bleeding. Over a small kick,” he said with a scoff.

A pained breath made me wince as I looked up at the man who was speaking so heartlessly.

“A kick. From you. My father,” I said.

He frowned, and I recognized that look on his face as he tried to understand me.

He didn’t. So he gave up on trying. He sighed and shook his head, and looked away from me. To something off in the distance.

“Why couldn’t you have been more like the other one? At least she fights back,” he said.

Fights back…?

Did… does that mean…

If I fought back… would he stop? Would he stay his claws?

Was that all it took? Really?

Coughing again, I found it in me to gather some strength.

Well… fighting back, whether the right answer or not, sounded pretty good to me.

I doubted I’d accomplish much. We’d not even really begun and I was already broken.

My head felt weird. My right shoulder was screaming at me in complaint, even before I tried to move it or lift anything. My throat and stomach felt strangely hot too. Probably the blood inside me, trying to get out. I felt like I needed to throw up.

“I was killing them. I was hunting properly,” I said.

Father’s attention returned to me… and unlike before, I didn’t flinch because of it. I held his gaze as I stood up fully, and I didn’t even try to hide or stop my tail from twitching wildly in anger.

Really. Killing me over this. He really was just a mindless beast.

He’ll succeed, of course. But…

I’ll go for his eyes. My nails were sharp enough. And we were close enough. Even if he crushed my skull, I could still grab at least one. Then he’d never forget me. Never be able to forget the daughter he so cruelly abused and killed for no reason and…

“You really are stupid. I’m culling you because you’re not worth breeding, idiot,” father said.

My anger, which had been flaring up and boiling… promptly got doused.

Breeding…?

What?

Then I was hit again.

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Luckily this time, even though completely shocked and confused, I had reacted.

He had hit me in the face, with a fist, but I had intentionally collapsed and rolled back. I had actually tried to dodge, but hadn’t been fast enough… however even though I hadn’t been able to dodge it completely, I had been able to at least keep myself alive a moment longer.

Once again I was in the air. I didn’t last as long airborne this time, and landed back into the brambles.

This time I didn’t even feel or register the thorns dig into my skin. All I could feel was the burning pain in my nose.

He had actually hit me. Full on.

If I hadn’t moved, it would have killed me. It might even have already, and I was just dying slowly.

Had he caved in my face…? It felt so weird and…

Coughing, I tried to see through my blurry eyes. I was grabbing at my face, but could only feel flesh and blood. Why did my nose feel intact still…? Or was that not my nose at all, but instead a bone fragment or something?

“Heh. You actually cut me,” my father said with a scoff.

Cut him…? Had I? How? When…?

I sat up a little, and through the pain I glared at the man who had just hit me. He was staring at the back of his hand. Near his knuckles. The same fist he had hit me with.

Maybe I had cut him with a tooth or something.

“You’re a bastard,” I groaned a cry.

“Hm,” he nodded.

Rubbing my face again, I flinched at the sight of bright blood. I was bleeding horribly… but I didn’t feel anything too weird. I felt my nose still. It didn’t feel in the wrong spot or anything… and my teeth were all still there… so…

What had he broken?

“Really. I thought I had hit you hard enough. Maybe you weren’t as weak as we thought,” father said as he stepped towards me.

“Then let me live…?” I begged.

His snarl told me the answer.

With watery and pained eyes… I watched him draw closer. He was only a few steps away now.

What was I to do?

Attack again. Or rather, attack for the first time… but how?

He’d have to lean forward to grab me. Unless he grabbed me by the legs. Either way… it’d draw him closer to me. Put him in range. Plus it’d put one of his hands out of commission.

Or well, it wouldn’t be. My father could crush my leg with his grip alone. But… a leg for his eye. I could live with that. I had been willing to die for it earlier… so why not a limb?

Planning and preparing, I formulated my attack. The same as I would during an ambush, for any other creature…

I waited. In the thorns. Even as they dug into skin. Even as my tail squirmed beneath me, stuck in the thorns.

Father reached me, and then he held out his hand as he reached for me. It seemed he was indeed going to grab me by the heel. My right one.

Just try it.

Take the foot. The whole leg.

I’ll make you regret it and…

Then something hit my father.

A huge mass of darkness. Something bigger than him. Something bigger than anything I’ve seen.

My head spun as I tried to follow the huge shadow that carried father away. I was barely able to keep up with it. It flew past the brambles I was in… and then to the trees a distance away. Past the root I had fallen on earlier, and then passed the larger trees and leaving my line of sight.

“What…?”

Completely dumbfounded, I slowly sat up in the brambles. I tugged my hair and clothes out of the twines, and my skin free from the pointy barbs.

What had just happened…?

Father was gone. As was the thing that had hit him. But I could hear them. I heard shouting and…

Was that growling…? It sounded odd...

Had it been a bear? Surely that was impossible it had been too big. Too massive. Too fast…

And this smell. That wasn’t the smell of a bear…

“Little Rennalee.”

My head spun around, and my heart nearly fluttered into a thousand pieces as I found my uncle.

The older man sighed at the sight of me. His fur covered face looked pained and worried as he reached out for me.

Although confused, I was a little surprised at how I hadn’t tried to shy away from his touch. He grabbed me by the arm, and hefted me out of the brambles.

“Uncle…?” I asked quietly as he held me up for a moment as I found my footing.

“Hm. You’re hurt rather bad. I smell an organ in your breath. Can you stand?” he asked.

Gulping some nasty blood, I glanced down as I tried to stand on my own.

Yes. I could.

Before I finished nodding he let me go.

Uncle sighed. “It seems you’ve earned your father’s hatred,” he said.

I nodded again.

“Nothing too shocking. I’m surprised it took this long, to be honest,” he said.

I didn’t like how he had said that. He hadn’t said it out of worry or compassion, but rather…

“I had done my job. I was in the middle of hunting the humans. As I was told to do. He stopped me before I could finish,” I argued to defend myself.

“I’ve no doubt, little Rennalee. The ire you’ve earned is not of failure but desire. You should have learned how to please him. A fault of my niece, but what can you do?” he said.

Narrowing my eyes at my uncle, I turned a little. To see if I could now find my father and…

“What had that been?” I asked carefully. I couldn’t see them yet.

“Hm… my grandfather. So… you’re uncle, too,” he said.

What…?

I blinked as I tried to comprehend what he had just said.

“He doesn’t like you human types. So he never really shows himself. Come, let’s go see if your father is alive or not,” uncle said as he patted me on the back.

Watching him step around me, and head towards where they had disappeared to… I found myself wondering if I had actually died earlier.

Maybe this was all some weird dream. Something that someone has as they die.

My uncle didn’t give me any chance to ask questions. He stepped over the root that was still stained with my blood, and picked up his pace.

Limping forward, I flinched and nearly fell to the ground. Gladly I didn’t, but I did whimper as my tail wrapped around my right thigh in pain.

Jeez. A lot of things were broken, weren’t they?

And my uncle had said he smelled something on my breath. An organ.

Great. I wonder what that meant.

Following after uncle, I studied the way his tail and ears fidgeted. He was listening to whatever was happening beyond my sight. Likely a conversation… or a fight.

He was an uncle, but actually an elder. He was not my mother’s brother, but my grandmother’s. Technically he was a great-uncle but… he hated being called that, for some reason.

So…

If that creature had been his grandfather… then…

I tried to imagine the generations. The family tree in my mind was re-made, and I couldn’t comprehend it.

But it made sense.

The older one was… the higher they were on the bloodline, the more animal they were.

I had been the one born lacking the most traits. Even little Fellisee had more than me. As if I had been skipped over or something.

Uncle was like us in shape, but had more cat like features. More fur on him. His hands had paw pads, and his nails could curl in and out from them. His tail was also much larger, and thicker. He was more cat-like than even my grandparents.

Following him slowly, I groaned as I realized I was going to have to pick up the pace. Even if it hurt to do so.

Flinching through the pain I hurried. Stepping over bushes and roots, I followed my uncle around some trees and to…

Hesitating I slowed as I saw it.

A large animal. A creature beyond reason. It was glaring down at something on the ground, which I couldn’t see yet. There were bushes in the way.

“Don’t kill him if he’s still alive, grandfather!” uncle shouted as he broke out into a small trot.

Actually. Please do.

Although I wanted to hurry as well, I didn’t even try. And not just because I was hurting.

I couldn’t believe what I was staring at. It was obviously a huge cat… but… it was impossibly big. It was near a smaller tree, one that had its lowest branches within range for me to grab at, and the cat was actually tall enough and big enough to seem as if it’d be unable to climb said tree.

It was so big that it’d break the tree if it tried to climb it. That was how big it were.

And it was a relative of mine.

“How’d I go from that to this…?” I mumbled in confusion as I brushed through some bushes.

Finally bringing the whole area into sight, I found my father. He was stuck under a huge paw. One bigger than his whole chest. It was covering that very chest, and most of his stomach, and was pinning him to the ground.

He was wiggling, which told me he was alive.

Regretfully.

“You bastards. What… are the two of you that desperate? What the hell are you doing!” father growled at them.

The huge cat lowered its head and growled, and for the first time in my life… I saw my father shut up and go quiet, because someone had told him to.

Dumbfounded, I realized I was stuck. Glancing down, I found I was stuck in a thick bush. One that my uncle had walked through with ease.

Grunting, I tugged myself free and fell down because of it.

Landing harshly, I groaned as my whole body erupted into pain again.

That had hurt. Very badly.

As I slowly stood back up, I noticed my uncle and the large cat were staring at me.

Going still, I gulped.

“Hmph. She really is weak,” uncle said with a sigh.

The cat’s huge ear flickered… and I realized he was hurt.

Or well, had been hurt.

A huge scar ran from his head, not far from his right ear, and over his eye then down past his nose. To his mouth.

The fur on it was white. Pure white. A stark contrast to the dark black covering the rest of him.

Dark black…

I hesitated as I realized his color was different than my own. I was brown. Different shades of brown.

He was as dark as the night.

Honestly he was…

Walking forward, I tore my eyes away from the beautiful animal and to my father. He was snarling at me now, and trying to push the huge paw off him.

It was interesting to see that my father looked as if he was actually trying. He looked as if he was straining himself. He had a huge throbbing vein on the side of his face, thanks to the effort.

Yet the paw wouldn’t budge. Nor did the cat look bothered at all.

“You can’t kill family. Not without permission,” uncle then said.

I stopped again, and realized how matter of fact he had just said that.

He had said it in such a way that the only reason he had saved me, was to go and get that very permission.

“She’s my flesh,” father argued.

“Careful. My grandfather doesn’t speak, but don’t doubt his hate,” uncle warned.

The large cat, as if to make a point, let his claws loose. Huge white nails, bigger and longer than my arm, all unfurled and slowly approached my father.

With wide eyes I watched in wonder as my father quickly squirmed. He barely got his head out of the way before one of the nails hit the ground next to his head, digging into the earth.

I gulped.

“You’d kill me over her? You can’t kill me!” father shouted.

“Why not?” I asked.

Both my uncle and the cat turned to me. As they did I noticed my uncle frown at me… as if he had forgotten I was even here.

“We need his seed. The family can’t reproduce without him,” uncle said.

His…

I shifted on a foot, and felt sick. Was that really what was going on?

“Your fault, you stupid ancestor. Shouldn’t have hunted the rest of us,” father said with a spat at the cat holding him down.

My huge grandfather, or rather great-great-grandfather, hissed a growl at him. It was strangely deep.

Uncle then sighed. “What to do. Do you want to kill him, grandfather?” uncle asked.

Please do!

“Go ahead,” father said.

If you won’t… I will!

The huge cat then turned and looked at uncle. It purred something, with a low rumble, and then flicked its massive ears.

Uncle sighed. “Fine.”

Oh? Uncle could actually understand him?

Fascinating…

“Rennalee.”

I stood up straighter at being addressed and nodded my head… even before uncle turned to look at me.

“How many of those humans had you killed?” he asked.

“Two,” I answered honestly. I didn’t even try to argue that I’d have gotten the rest eventually. There was no point.

Uncle sighed. “Of course you did.”

“Was I not supposed to…?” I asked, hopeful.

“Of course you were. Humans are to be slain on sight,” uncle said as he looked back at father.

Oh… great…

“Her line’s a failure. There’s no point keeping her,” father said as he grabbed one of the cat’s huge nails.

The cat didn’t seem to care or notice, but it kept its eyes on him.

“That’s not for you to decide. We let you rule, not because you are the strongest but because we don’t care what you do. But you should know better than to break the rules,” uncle said to him.

“Your rules are why you’re fading away. It’s why you needed me. Your rules gave birth to those like her,” father argued.

I bite back words… as I realized something horrible.

This wasn’t a new argument. This was something old. Something they’ve all had many times. Likely since before I was born.

Just… what had happened? What was happening?

What was going on in this family? That I didn’t know about?

Or rather, did I even want to know…?

Uncle then turned to me. “Go home Rennalee,” he said.

“Huh…?”

He nodded. “Go home. Go with grandfather. You’ll receive your punishment and then we’ll all just forget this happened,” he said.

“But…!”

Uncle didn’t care. He turned away and looked to my father. “You and I will have a conversation. Be thankful it’s me and not my grandfather. Though who knows, maybe he’ll still choose to eat you,” uncle said.

I wanted to grumble a complaint but the cat then slid its nails back into its mighty paw. I went stiff as the cat turned away from my father… and looked to me.

Shaking a little as the huge cat stepped towards me… I realized I had horribly misjudged just how big he was.

I was nothing to him. Barely tall enough to reach his knee. His paw was bigger than me and…

The huge cat came to a stop before me and I felt ridiculous as I stared up at it. It was like trying to look at the sun, when it was in the middle of the sky.

Then, without warning… the cat bent down.

And before I knew it, I was being carried.

Dangling in the air, I resisted the urge to scream as I turned around. Not far from my head was a massive fang. One of pure white. It had slide into my shirt, and punctured a hole, and was how I was being carried.

It had ruined my shirt… but at least it hadn’t gone through me instead.

“Careful with her grandfather. She’s fragile,” uncle’s voice said as I was carried away.

Doing my best to not squirm, I felt utterly lost and confused as I was carried through the forest back home.

Passing trees, sometimes not even as high up as I was now… I realized the world was far wider than I knew.

There was a lot I didn’t know. And not just about my own family either.

I didn’t know anything about those humans. Or the world beyond these trees.

Or that which was carrying me now.

But something told me… I really didn’t want to know about any of them.

Since after all, I could barely survive what little I knew already.