Act 1 New folks
We crept like predators stalking the smell and sound of a battle that we thought would have ended quickly, yet as we stalked close and saw the fight, it was anything but finished.
What I expected was a battle of beasts, fighting with teeth and claws, against scales and a powerful tail. But no, what I saw was a handful of upright beaver like people, fighting desperately with wooden clubs and not the predatory weasels Vivi smelled. Is it a translation problem again?
"Everyone Volley!" I yelled as everyone threw their spears, and shot their bows as I did the same shooting at the giant 20 meter serpent.
The battle ended quickly after the second volley, as the beaver folks gathered and lined themselves against my warband as we approached, I looked around and there were many wounded and dying beavers, even those standing against us were wounded and bruised.
"Hail warriors of the beaver folks, we are friendly, I am Lazir of the Flame-sing clan please let us help." I told them as I lowered my bow and looked at their group, not focusing on one beaver warrior as none looked like a leader.
They looked at each other and nodded. "We accept rabbit folks."
I nodded and without me telling them, my warband moved to help the wounded and process the serpent as I stayed with the beavers. "Do you have a leader?"
I asked them, they were silent at that, before one answered. "Our Forewoman, leader of our exploration herd was swallowed whole by the Scale-devourer during our battle."
"Girls! Cut open the serpent's belly!" I said to the girls as I moved myself, using my stone flinted axe, to chop through the hard scale, and thick muscle of the snake.
It took us the better part of an hour but we finished, we gutted and skinned the serpent and pulled out the contents of its belly.
With my flames I brought back many of those who were already talking with lady death, and those less so I had my warband treat with their own flames, and the first aid that I have taught them.
We built camp to process the meat further, before going back to the Thorn village, and to speak to the beaver folks. "Thank you, warriors of the rabbit folk, without you our mission would have failed and us dead."
The forewoman spoke, she was a large upright beaver, tall enough to reach my chest with a great furred girt, her body reminding me of a muscled bean with stubby arms and legs, her weapon and her warriors were well made clubs of wood hardened by sunlight and of course they where without clothes.
"Why does your herd travel here forewoman?" I asked her as I was curious, I counted they neared 20 before their battle.
But now? There down to 15, many died from their bodies being crushed and swallowed by the serpent or too much blood lost even after being treated.
"We flee, Lazir of the Flame-sing clan. For more than a season we fled our herd lands up the Serpents river, we had planned to settle here but as we scouted this old forest. . . You saw what laid us low." Her face showed furry but I could feel her essence, and it was filled with sadness and fear.
"I understand, tell me where is the rest of your herd? I want to help but in exchange I want your herd to join my clan." She looked up and I saw confusion at first but then realization and hope, and then sadness again.
"There's no others. . .We are what is left of our herd. If your clan is willing to accept us then you can do whatever you would like with us." And then the forewoman stood as she offered her club to me as she bowed her small head in submission.
"I'm sorry to hear that forewoman. know that you and your people are welcome to be part of our clan." I smiled at her warmly as I held her shoulder and head.
I looked away from her towards the Serpent's skinned corpse with so much meat and bones, as I thought of how to improve the induction ceremony I made up to see if the magic in this world works like how the ancient religions of earth used to explain it.
"Now come forewoman, you and your herd should follow, and help us with the corpses. Will need it for tonight." With that done I walked towards the corpse and helped with the butchery as the beavers watched in horrified curiosity.
Act 2 Night
The night was dark, like every other night on this planet. The only light beside our bonfires were the small stars above, and the neighboring planets reflecting the light of the sun.
I'm still unsure why this planet had no moons, and I'm afraid of the effects of not having any moons, on an earth like planet. I looked up and focused on the ten brightest stars in the skies, the neighboring planets.
"Now please sing my clan, as we welcome our new members." I called too my clanmates, as they sang and I stood behind a pyre of blue fire larger than I was.
The organs of the snake and the remains of the dead beaver folks and the two lake rabbit folk women that died days ago were laid in a great ditch we made earlier. "With my fire I give your family rest."
With that said I threw a torch of blue flames into the ditch burning everything into white ash, and giving off white steam. And then I had our new clanmates cover the land back up with wooden shovels.
As my clan sang the fire song. " Fire on fire. . . never give in, never show fear." with the ditch filled.
"Now come forward, tell everyone your name and I will give you my gift." The first to come forward was the lake rabbit-herd leader of the forager.
"I am Lakeen, please accept my herd into your clan Lazir." She said kneeling, the newly buried earth.
Next to her was the forewoman of the beavers. "I am Wenlog, please accept my herd into your clan Lazir."
"Of course Lakeen, Welog, you and your herds are welcome." With that I placed my hand on their heads, as my flames burned into them and there herd behind them, as the fire burned into them, and they accepted my heat.
The night continued and as we feasted in celebration I ended up around the official and unofficial leaders of the clan, we sat around a small campfire.
"Tell us Welog, what happened to your land?" I was sitting drinking a wooden bowl of pine-leaf and pine-sap tea. The others drinking there preferred boiled drinks or juiced fruit.
I gave a slight side gaze to Axelia as she drank powderized roasted nuts boiled in water. . . I can't believe she and many of the other warriors that follow her, invented coffee, after only being exposed to my tea drinking culture I made up, to sanitize the water.
Is this what those early settlers felt when they saw the natives started using guns and horses only after a few years of them settling the new land.
"It was a flood, a great one." She paused, her hands shook as she told her people's story.
"Upper part of the Serpent's river, floods normally atleast twice and rarely thrice a cycle, but this one was different." I placed a hand on her small hands as her drink started spilling from her shaking.
My heat calmed her as my Inner flames burned hot, as her embers started to spark. And her shaking fear ceased as she looked up and gave me a forced smile.
"My people are 'used' to the flooding our ancestors long ago learned and my people mastered the art of dam making with wood and clay. . . but even with all our efforts this flood was too great to weaken and it destroyed our homes, our dams and us." With that she breathed out.
"Not all of you Welog, as some survived to pass your stories, and your dead would be reborn next cycle as promised by the Earth mother." The shaman elder spoke her mushroom tea finished and as she spoke one of the kits was already refilling her cup.
"Do you mean the Clay mother old one?" Welog asked, confused, as I was, as I thought my ability to translate their words was failing.
"The Earth mother, the one we elders go to once we take our last breath, to ask for children to replace us and to continue the herd." The elder shaman explained easily as if we were children under her guidance.
"It is the Clay mother. We call your Earth mother, the Clay mother, as the mother who our own elders or those that die early would need to go to so that they can be reborn, as the new children of our herd." Welog nodded, happy at being able to answer a mystery.
"Do you call the Clay mother, your goddess?" I asked her wanting to know if the beaver folks were different from the rabbit folks.
"No, she is an ancestor of the first of us beaver folks, which every beaver folk descends from, or atleast that's what the stories of our people tell us." I nodded satisfied, it was the same with the rabbit folk, the earth mother was their ancestor and not their god.
I can't stop myself as I gave a smile, as I learn more of their culture and how I can shape them. I imagined a people that would never need to make gods to explain the unexplainable, but have a pantheon of ancestral stories explaining everything you need to know about the world.
"Please tell us of your Clay mother Welog, and I would tell you all of myself, of the spirits I've met and of the Earth mother of the rabbits." I was happy as the night went on exchanging stories, becoming closer with each other with roasted food, and our preferred drinks.
"The Clay mother, as I told you, was the first beaver folker. as she was among the folks of the herbs, the first herd guided by the light of the Lightbringer." She had become less tense and relaxed as Welog spoke the story of her primeval ancestor.
"My ancestor, the Clay mother, was called by the other folks as the Bridge builder. As she was the reason many river serpents and drakes did not stop the first herd as they roamer." The story continued telling of the exploits of the Clay mother.
"And then after her 60th cycle, her once dark brown fur had become aged and grey, The surviving folks cried as they moved on the dey. As she died and the clay she loved ate her breathless body, after the first dark season she was reborn with brothers and sisters, who looked like her."
Act 3 Conversation
It's been a few weeks since the clan induction ritual, and I have been exploring the forest land cummoning with the spiritual.
In this moment though, I speak with an old pine tree as I spoke to someone I know.
"Tell me, Forest Father, is my request alright? Can my clan manage your forest, and do to you and your children, as I explained of the magic of forestry." It took me a while to find a concentration of his spirit, it was rough as this season of earth blurs my sight of them and they become less sentient, and more spread.
Even now it was noticeable how slow this portion of the forest father was, barely able to follow my words for him, and everything else that I've said.
"Do what you must fire-child Lazir, and I will observe, if what you say is true then you have my blessing. but if not, I would banish you and your clan from my forest and in the arms of another earth spirit." I nodded agreeing with the forest, And promised to not turn him into a morrest.
"Can you tell me of your children, forest father? I have met the apple, the thorned vine, the walnut, and the willow. . . but are there others? And can I meet them?" The forest stirred at my question.
"I have many other children, some much, much older than the daughters you've met and tried to bond with." I felt the trees around me peering deeply into me trying to learn of my intention.
"Is bonding with them offensive to you Forest father?" I asked as many of those I tried doing so felt it deeply personal.
"No fire child it is not, it gladdens me that some of my children can bond with folks, but know that you mustn't have so many bonds with you, I worry for your sake more than my own children." That shocked me as I thought the Forest cared little about our relation.
"Why would it be a problem? Having many spirits binded to me?" I was confused as I haven't had any problems but I am new here and it's best to ask the wise.
"Do you not feel the burden of so many on your soul, Fire child? For a folk to be bound with a spirit, is to share your essence with them. Your memories, emotions, magic and wisdom." The essence of the Forest father in the old pine tree dispersed and then concentrating on another one and I followed as he continued to speak.
"Many of the spirit talkers of the folks can only take one spirit and even the greatest I've met was only able to be binded with 3 of my children. . .even so she would complain mightly of the weight of it, she was powerful even in her elder years, but that weight made her daily life miserable." I nodded, not understanding fully what this weight he was trying to tell.
"I hear your warning Forest father, I would not over burnden myself for the sake of power." I felt the trees shifting their branches, as I felt him nodding in approval as I moved and leapt over root patches.
"I know, I have felt your essence for more than season now, fire child. I know you are not power hungry like the cursed." There it is, another thing I wanted to know.
"Have you seen what I've done to the curse? Do you think I'm curing their curses?" What I did to the cursed, were all experimental, so much so that if I was still back in the star federation, and done what I've done to these alien life I would have been demoted low.
The forest was silent to my question and then I felt the Forest father's essence thin again, but it did not contrate near me.
"Damn, I need to look for him again." That was my muttering word as I looked at a tree.