Death In The Tall Grass (Ely)

[Xnnn]

Xnnn, of course, did not stop or even slow down as Elymas called after him. He was confused and afraid and could only think about putting as much distance as possible between himself and the man, until . . . until . . . Even in his alarmed state, Xnnn realized that his situation had just become much more precarious – with the new wound. When Elymas caught him up, and touched his shoulder, Xnnn felt defeated, and his will to protest left him. Being turned about by those gentle hands, he looked into the man’s face, not knowing what he might find there – or hope to find there. What he saw was . . . kindess, concern. These puzzled Xnnn that much more. But he was in no shape to run, and more than anything else, the feel of those fingers on his skin told him that Elymas did not mean him harm – not at this point anyway. When those hands dropped away, Xnnn felt less wary, more willing to trust. Besides, something told him that it would be helpful to have this man with him, for now. It might mean his death if he wandered off alone. Sit. Eat. These he understood. One arm crossed his chest to grasp his other upper arm in a gesture of hesitant self-protection and guardedness. But he slowly nodded his head. “Yes. O.K.” He replied, still in Zith. “Eat. But . . . “ He looked down and gestured at his own naked body – bereft of anything including food. He shrugged. “I don’t have any food. Do you?” In many ways, his life of servitude had left Xnnn very used to being totally dependant upon someone else to provide for his needs, as neglected as he had been during most of that time. He felt no shame in looking to Elymas as a possible supplier of a meal.

[Elymas]

Elymas gave a succint nod of his head and turned towards the closest reprieve from the heat he could see. He hadn't answered the question yet, but with the blood oozing along the young man's leg he thought it better that they sit first, talk later. The sea of grass wasn't exactly a retreat, but Elymas found a place where they could hunker down in the small patch of shade and take a deep, cooler breath. "Shade," he said, gesturing to the circle around them. He placed a hand on the young man's forearm, squeezed it reassuringly at the fright his word seemed to cause, and repeated himself, patting the darker piece of ground. "Shade," he said. He pointed to the sunlight dirt. "Sun." Again to their haven. "Shade." Elymas released the kelvic and shifted through his meager clothing, producing a dark lump in the palm of his hand. It might be hard to identify on sight alone, but it was the better part of a rodent that Elymas had managed to capture and roast on the fire he had indulged in the night before. The day had been a good one, and he had eaten the tough meat of the larger one split between that dinner and his breakfast. It wasn't even almost enough to keep a man satisfied, but it kept him alive. It kept him moving. Without hesitation, he pressed it to Xnnn's palm. "Eat," he said, first in Zith. One of a handful of words he could replicate with his very human tongue. "Eat," he repeated in common. He produced a makeshift waterskin, too, took a single drink, and passed it over as well. "I am Elymas," he said, stretching his legs out before him. His feet were in the sun, but he didn't seem to care. "I am running from Zith. Escape," he said, with a gesture in the general directon of Xy. "Who are you?"

[Xnnn]

Xnnn really had no idea what it meant to be who he was – or what he was, more precisely. He had been alone out in the grass for about two months now. And Kelvics were not really made to be alone. He had never had a bond mate – and had no idea what one was. His poor mother had been far too busy trying to keep them both alive and flying under the watchful radar of their Zith owners to be able to spend much time explaining such things to him. The less he knew, and thought about, shifting, the better, in her opinion. And she was probably right. Why tease the child with dreams of wild freedom? Why plant the idea that someday he might find a master that he chose to serve, through love and loyalty, in the head of a child who would be lucky just to make it to adulthood? Thus, as Elymas turned and walked away, Xnnn had no way to process the impulse that told him to follow, just as a few minutes earlier, his animal impulse had been to stalk the man in hopes of making a meal out of him. So, he simply followed, not knowing any better, but feeling inside an odd sensation that he had never known before. They quickly found a small retreat that was not in the direct sunlight. Once again, Elymas used that despised word – though it did not sound half as bad in common as it did in Zith. Perhaps because of his wound, and his sense of fatigue, or perhaps because of that odd sensation in his chest which he had no name for, Xnnn did not try to leap up and bolt, though his eyes widened in alarm again. Maybe the man was trying to tell him that Shade was coming. Xnnn watched Elymas’ hand gestures, frowning with the effort to try to understand. When Elymas left off and instead fished about in his clothing for something, Xnnn went right on studying the ground, looking for tracks, or spoor, or some sign of the Zith. The thought that Shade might pop up suddenly was frightening, but Elymas did not appear at all concerned. Xnnn’s eyes went to the man’s face, and he thought he must be extremely brave – or foolish. Of course, he did have a knife – but that would do little against an enraged, slightly psychotic Zith. Then another idea occurred to Xnnn. Maybe Elymas was just very, very clever or knew some secret that he did not. Perhaps this was why he faced a cougar with such confidence, and could sit here unafraid of Shade. Already, in Xnnn’s mind was growing that sense of hero worship that a kelvic would feel for its master. He watched Elymas through eyes that soon enough could look with love and devotion bordering on idolatry for the one they knew could do no wrong, though Xnnn had no concept of how things were supposed to be for a kelvic. For the moment, he simply felt . . . trust. For the first time in his life, he felt like this other being would not harm him, and that Elymas would take care of things. It was a unique sensation indeed. So distracted by this novelty was Xnnn, that the cooked rodent was in his palm before he even realized that the man had produced food. Without hesitation, without any thought that it might be impolite – for he had no concept of manners – Xnnn put the lump to his mouth and eagerly began to gnaw. His stomach roiled as the first mouthful hit, Xnnn barely stopping to chew as he was so used to his feline eating habits. Ravenous, he devoured the half baked flesh until there was nothing but the bones left. It hardly took any time at all – there was barely a mouthful for the starving man. Elymas looked on, without speaking, but still proffered the water skin, which Xnnn took readily enough and drank from with great satisfaction. With a small hint of greasiness making his lips shine, Xnnn considered his words before he tried to answer the man’s question. For some reason, he wanted very much to get this right, to please him. “Xnnn. I am Xnnn. From there.” He pointed, and if one had taken a compass reading and followed it, they would have come right to Xnnn’s former colony. He pronounced the name of the colony, for which, again, there was no real word. It was just a sound – a mute animal’s death scream, audible though to the Zith’s hyper senses. “And there.” He pointed this time with deadly accuracy toward the cave where he had spent the last year of his captivity. “There is . . . “ He paused, obviously agitated, but he forced himself to say the name, for Elymas. “There is Shade. Shade.” He said the name first in Zith, then he repeated the word the man had said several times now in common. “Very bad. Very, very bad.” The kelvic ducked his head and shook it. After a moment, he dared to look again at Elymas. “Elymas.” He said softly, slaughtering the pronunciation. “You are slave too? Zith slave?” He pointed at his own chest. “Me too. Slave. Escape. Not from Xy. From Shade.” Tentatively, he reached out and placed his hand on Elymas’ arm, looking directly into those bright blue eyes. Like the ones his mother had sometimes told him about. Eyes like the sky.

[Elymas]

Elymas cringed a little as Xnnn shared his name. So unfortunate. It couldn't have been intentional, could it? It sounded, rather, as if the boy had been neglected a name at all and had rather adopted a phrase frequently spoken to him. It was all so tragic, at least to the Benshira, who had gone to incredible, prayerful lengths in consideration of each of his own children's names. "Oh, I've been there," Elymas said of the colony Xnnn indicated, though he didn't try to replicate the sound. He had spent a lifetime without the Zith language, and so he simply could not form it well on his tongue. "When I was first captured. I was there, before Xy." The Benshira listened with an honest patience as the young kelvic went on, and it wasn't until he finished that Elymas stirred. He patted the arm atop his own, a comforting gesture, and leaned forward a little to stare into Xnnn's gaze. "Not anymore. We were slaves, you and I, Xnnn. Not now. Now we are free. We will cross the sea of grass, and get away from them. No more Zith." Elymas hadn't consciously adopted this creature he'd wounded as a part of his traveling party, but it was intuitive. Caring for others was something he did, he didn't pause to consider it. And he, after having gone far to lessen the chances that the young man would survive alone, could not possibly walk away. "Xnnn isn't a slave anymore. Not to Zith, not to Shade, not to anyone. Xnnn is free."

[Xnnn]

Xnnn listened, nodding, and the fact that Elymas had been in the colony where he himself was birthed left little impression on his mind. Many, many, and many had passed through that place. Some were brought as corpses already. Most were simply food on the hoof, so to speak. Zith came and Zith went, bartering and trading and purchasing the new and the old – those who for whatever reason survived more than a week or so. The prey turned slaves were purchased for food, purchased for labor, purchased for breeding – kept in pens, kept in homes, kept chained to a tree or locked in a cell or sometimes given great freedom by their owner. Xnnn had spent his first year in his mother’s company, as she once again, after his birth, was housed in a roofed but open structure surrounded by fencing with other females. A parade of males from different races and cultures were shoved through the gates and told to breed them, and the infants and youngest offspring still nursing or too young to really tend to themselves were laid on the ground as their mothers were serviced by such males. When he was old enough, Xnnn was taken out of this compound and put to work, part of a team of slaves who tended to the other slaves – those being kept primarily for food. Feeding and watering them mostly, and cleaning the emptied pens when a lot was taken off for slaughter or sale, to keep contagion down. Being Kelvic, Xnnn matured more quickly than his human age mates, but the Zith seemed either to not notice this (as was most probable as he was only a slave) or they didn’t care. He had been allowed to return each night to his mother’s side, and would curl up with her, if some male wasn’t already there, to take what comfort he could in her sad company. Though for a child born into such a place, Xnnn did not find his life to be so hideous – he only felt that he would like more food and less beatings. If Elymas had been a temporary resident of his old colony, that didn’t surprise Xnnn a bit. Even in the two years he had been there, surely more than a thousand souls had come and gone, in one way or another. So, he nodded in mute agreement with Elymas’ assessment. Yes, he was free. And if Elymas could prevent Shade from materializing up from out of the ground, then Xnnn could remain free. It hadn’t really occurred to him to go anywhere. He had simply been trying to survive. Where would he possibly have to go? But Elymas’ words sparked a memory in Xnnn’s brain. His mother had spoken of home – her home, the home of the horse people. Though in Xnnn’s mind, for some reason, this concept of home was very fluid – he had some mental image more of people than some set location. People who moved through the grass, mounted on horses – Xnnn had seen horses a few times, in the colony. They were such beautiful creatures. Removing his hand from Elymas’ arm, he patted his own shoulder and upper arm, where a strange set of tattoos blossomed over his tanned skin. “We will go to the horse people?” he asked, still patting his tattoos. “Through the grass?” He jerked his chin towards the north-east. “That way?”

[Elymas]

When the hand retracted, only to pat at the tattooed shoulder, Elymas followed the motion with his eyes. He hadn't missed the tatoos before, exactly, they just hadn't been important enough to stop and evaluate. Now he leaned a bit closer to peer at the dips and curves. It was eerily familiar. The marking of the Drykas people, he had been taught, as he lay and wept into the arms of the first woman he had been forced to breed with under the Zith. It had broken his heart, desecrating the bond he had formed with his beloved wife. She, the female slave, had been as frightened and miserable as he was. Somehow, in the weeks they were together, they had found some sort of comfort in one another. He was gentle, and kind, whereas most of the 'breedings' were violent and quick. They had kept one another warm at night, and she had told him stories of her people, tracing the outline of elaborate tribal tattoos and telling him what each one meant. He couldn't recall every word of her explanations, but he recognized them. His brow furrowed thoughtfully, his eyes a bit narrowed. Xnnn only confirmed his association when he asked, essentially, to go to the Drykas. "Drykas," he spoke aloud, giving the injured young man a word for the people he sought, a name. "You are Drykas? I knew one, once. In your colony. She told me that their city moves, always, and that it is impossible to find without an escort. It is all connected to a web, she said. I'm not sure I understand it, but I think it was something spiritual." Elymas shrugged one broad shoulder, and took a drink of the water Xnnn seemed finished with. He tried to smile, tried to keep things like, but he felt as if someone were walking on his grave. Strange. Too strange. "My home is that way," Elymas said, indicating the opposite direction. "If we go there, we will find it. It is not hidden. We will gather supplies and protection, and take you to find your people." Elymas was quiet for but a moment, and then he tacked on a seemingly unrelated question. "How long were you with the Zith, Xnnn?"

[Xnnn]

Xnnn considered, then nodded slowly. “Yes, Drykas. Perhaps that was the word.” So much of what his mother had told him was lost, driven out by the year they had spent with the misery that was Shade. “A moving city? Maybe – they had horses and rode. All over.” The kelvic moved his hand in a circular sweeping motion. He patted his tattoos again. “Drykas. My mother’s. She drew hers – on me.” When Elymas pointed in the opposite direction and spoke of home, Xnnn turned to look, almost as if he expected to see whatever place it was the man meant floating in the sky over the horizon. Protect? Xnnn looked again at this man beside him. That feeling in his chest, it only grew stronger. Yes, he would like to travel with this man. To protect him, and to have his company. He nodded. “Yes. We can find a home.” He shrugged. “Your home. I don’t have a home. I don’t know Drykas.” In reply to Elymas’ last question, Xnnn frowned. “Forever.” The question didn’t seem to make sense to him. Of course he had always been with the Zith. He had been born in that colony. But before his analysis of the question could take him further, Elymas spoke again, just as patiently as before, though his face looked a bit strained. “So you were born a slave? How old are you, Xnnn? Xnnn nodded, understanding a bit more now. Of course, Elymas had not been born a slave. He had been taken, like so many others. So he couldn’t know that Xnnn was born there, to a breeding female. Unsure of why Elymas would care how old he was, but wanting more than anything to oblige with whatever information he could give, Xnnn answered with his fingers, pointing to each one in turn. “Born in spring, Then summer, fall, winter. Then second spring, and summer, fall, winter.” For some reason he wasn’t counting on his thumbs. He put his fingers down and began again. “Then third spring, summer, fall, winter. On his second hand, he counted, “Now this spring – the fourth. And now summer.” “That is how old.” His expression was one of anticipation, waiting to see if the answer was pleasing, or not, or if there was another question for him. It was almost like a game.

[Elymas]

Elymas' voice was tight, his throat nearly refusing to admit the syllables when he prompted Xnnn to go on. "Tell me about your mother. What did she look like?" And the young man did, with the startling accuracy that only a child could manage, and the words made the vice around the Benshira's heart constrict more and more. It was too unlikely to be true, to impossible to consider, and yet the gooseflesh atop his arms and the feeling in his gut contended with that hopeful thinking. When Xnnn had finished, and Elymas had praised him off-handedly, he patted the tatooed shoulder and stood. "I've gotta piss, Xnnn. Excuse me a moment." He wandered off, though not out of sight, and did just that - though it had hardly been the motivation for his escape. He needed to drink in air that didn't smell of Xnnn, of his sins coming back to haunt him in a way he'd have never considered possible. He felt trapped in the worst way. Not that he didn't want to be responsible for the soul he'd injured, apparently in more than one way. But trapped in the ugliness of his reality, in the reality he had apparently created, again, and again. How many times? How many lives? He knew his purpose, he knew he'd succeeded, but perhaps it had been self-preservation that had caused him to gloss over those successes, to not dwell overmuch on them. Now, sitting behind him, waiting for his return, was a physical example. Something he couldn't deny or look away from. No more hiding. "Yahal, great Father of mercy and peace," he breathed into the rays of Syna. "Give me strength for this. You know the sorrow of my heart. I am not certain I can see the pain in his eyes and know it is because of me that he suffers. Protect him. Help me keep him safe, find refuge for him." Filled with emotion that ached, Elymas could no longer stand apart from his newfound companion under the guise of relieving himself. And so he took a deep breath, and then walked away from his struggle. Or, at least, walked back into a better guise of contentment. He smiled as he dropped back to Xnnn's side, reaching out to lightly pull his thighs apart a bit more, just so that he could check the bleeding, to ensure it had stopped. "I've never seen someone do that. What you do. Changing into an animal, or back. I've heard of it, but I had never seen it. Do you have a word for what you are, Xnnn?" Of course, Elymas had a title he'd always heard attached to the state of being, but he wanted to see the world from Xnnn's perspective instead of thrusting his own upon him.

[Xnnn]

None of this made any sense to Xnnn, but his kelvic self, dormant until this encounter, was shoving itself forward, not to be denied. He wished to please, and so he answered Elymas’ questions obediently, not even bothering to wonder why he would ask about his mother. In the company that Xnnn had kept to date, polite social conversation hadn’t been part of the fabric of day to day life. So he did not come to the conclusion that Elymas was just trying to be friendly with some irrelevant, unmeaning chit chat. Neither did it occur to Xnnn that Elymas might have known his mother. So many, many slaves had passed through the colony – and no doubt many such had done so before Xnnn came along. There wasn’t any particular reason to guess that this man who he had stumbled upon out in the tall grass might have actually known and remembered the woman that birthed him. And the concept of who his father had been was so vague that Xnnn rarely if ever even considered that there had been a male involved in his creation. Certainly he was aware of how males and females bred. How many nights had he lain a few feet away from his mother when one or another of the male slaves had coupled with her – willingly or not? Xnnn had some fuzzy concept that this was the way all children came into being, but he had never stopped, not once, to think – who is, or was, my father? His mother herself had been unsure and spoke little of it, her face always that much sadder when she ran her fingers through his soft hair and called him son and pulled him to her breast. So Xnnn had never asked for details. In his mind, now, Elymas asked his questions because for some reason he wished to know the answers, so that was enough for Xnnn. He had told the man without hesitation or pause about the woman who had brought him forth into their little corner of hell. She had been young – though to Xnnn that concept was a bit hard to grasp. She had looked always the same to him – he had only known her for three years. But others around the colony had told him that she was very young, and very pretty. Her hair was long, like this, Xnnn said, rubbing his hand on his lower back, right above his waist. It was pale, pale blonde, like corn silk, and she would weave it in elaborate braids, and her eyes were green, like leaves. She had tiny flecks over her nose and cheeks – freckles she called them, and pink lips, that seldom smiled. Very short, Xnnn demonstrated, by holding his hand only chest high, and very, very slender – he could poke his finger between her rib bones. But that was normal for most of the slaves that spent any amount of time at that colony. And in very great detail, Xnnn described each of her tattoos, tracing his own with his finger as he spoke, though he did not explain their meaning as Elymas had not asked. In fact, Elymas was now looking away from him, so Xnnn came to a halt, thinking perhaps he was done – that the man no longer needed him to speak. And indeed, the reason was clear when Elymas rose to go relieve himself. With no sense of modesty, Xnnn kept an eye on Elymas. He wasn’t curious. He was merely vaguely aware that he needed to know where Elymas was. For some reason that now seemed very important. When the Benshira returned and sat once again beside him, Xnnn felt relieved, and quite relaxed. He let Elymas look at the wound, which was already beginning to clot up. And, once again, Elymas’ question was a bit confounding to the young man. Xnnn frowned. He shook his head, but felt quite anxious at doing so. So he said, “I don’t know what you ask, Elymas.” It was the first time he had tried to tackle that name and he pronounced it very carefully. “I am Xnnn.” He looked at the man carefully. “I know I am not supposed to shift.” He used the Pavi word that his mother had used the one and only time he had done it as a child. “I won’t do it again, if you do not wish it.” His expression was growing a bit alarmed. “It’s wrong, isn’t it? To be like this?” In his limited experience, never having met a single solitary other kelvic, he had some sense that he was quite different. All he had was his mother’s stories – of a grandmother that supposedly could do something similar – she allegedly changed into a raven, though. But he had seen the confusion and fear in his mother’s face. So he had worn the leather strap about his wrist. Shaking his head quite adamantly, he rose to his knees beside Elymas, his hand going to the man’s shoulder. “I only did it to hunt – so that I could eat.” But he knew that wasn’t quite the truth, and in his growing regard for Elymas, he thought surely the man would know he wasn’t telling the whole of it. So he amended it to, “To kill Shade, and then to eat. Please – I won’t shift – I don’t have any leather, but I promise that I won’t.” His voice had taken on an animalistic whine and he practically pawed at Elymas' shoulder with his hand. “Don’t go.” He said in a rushed voice, as if he expected Elymas to jump up and run off, right then and there.

[Elymas]

It was too much. Almost cruel. Yahal, where are you?. Elymas' soul wept, but it only went on. The fright escalated in those wide eyes, the experience of pain and suffering easily visible in their pools of color. Elymas was too stunned by it to speak quickly, to cut Xnnn off in his pleading. And so the young man went on, his fright building, until Elymas felt shattered on the inside. "Xnnn," he breathed suddenly, sounding out of breath though he had scarcely moved. He reached up to clasp the tattoo covered shoulder closest to him. Then the other, and he pulled Xnnn to him suddenly. It was, at first, too awkward to be a hug. A sentimental, strong clasping of that bare body to his own chest. And then Elymas softened, wrapping his arms around Xnnn more comfortably, more affectionately. "You have suffered unjustly. I am so very sorry. No, no you are not wrong to be like this, to shift. Shift as you will, Xnnn. Be happy. You are in bondage no longer. I am not leaving. I will not leave you." It hadn't occurred to Elymas that this might unnerve the wounded kelvic. The soft place in his heart that lived only for his children had taken over and, though Xnnn was as big as he and with the appearance of a man, Elymas held him with a father's love, a father's fierce protective affection. After a moment he relented, but only allowed Xnnn to retreat to arms length. "Xnnn," he muttered with some disdain. "I will not call you that. You have value you don't even understand yet, and you are worth far more than a deorgatory slur of the Zith. May I call you something else? I will call you...." Elymas, with bright, earnest eyes, stared into Xnnn's face for a long moment, thoughtful. "Achym. It means... it means Yahal will protect you. He will establish you and care for you."