I awoke to the smell of fire, something rare in Campu Non-ostile, or 'Camp of the Non-hostile.' I peeked through the small gap where the fabric of my tent is sewn together and saw no fire, no panicked people. Meaning only that the council member's were meeting, but why? It is not the time of the harvest, nor the time for season's changing, no traders where to come here for many days, so why had they had a meeting. I got up, dusting the dirt of the ground off, and pulling on my red fox skin dress, and crawled out of my tent.
I peeked into my father's rather large tent to find him missing, no surprise there. No he is not the chief of our people, only a mere council member. I headed toward the second largest tent in the tribe, the council's meeting place. The entire this was made of the spotted pelts of the sika deer sewn together using horse hair, a large beam, a former tree, held the tent up in the center, while many smaller beams held it up throughout the edges. I opened the only flap in the entire tent, and saw the council gathered near the support beam, a small fire in-between them.
I approached them quietly, walking on the balls of my feet as to not make a sound. I soon got the space in the edge of the tent, next to the council. I sat next to Dia, Chief Mikal's daughter. "What is going on?" I asked in a hushed tone. She looked at me, her gold hair shining in the glint of the fire, "An outsider, sent by the leader of the Village Hidden in the Rain, was sent to kill Father." My muddy brown eyes widened, "An outsider?"
No one had even tried to scale the mountainous wall that surrounded our tribe, getting in was nearly impossible. "Did you not here me?" Dia squeaked, "The outsider was sent to kill my father." The council separated, the meeting over. Dia quickly left with her father, my own dad just now noticing I entered.
"Cerbi, what are you doing here?" I smiled up at him and rose from my spot on the ground, I was curious." He smiled back, "We had an intruder, but true to the words of our ancestors we will not hurt him, no matter what his purpose was." I nodded, I have heard the story of our ancestors who moved to the Grass Village from Italy so many times I had it memorized. "He is of the shinobi blood," my dad continued, "we used our ancient powers to bind his chakra." He said the word with distaste. I nodded, peering around him to see the intruder.
He was asleep, but very well looking. Stunning silver hair framed his head, which slouched forward as he slept, his body very well toned, or at least what I could see of it, and his eyes...are closed. But something tells me his eyes will be as stunning as the rest of him. My father has wandered off towards the opening in the tent, before realizing I hadn't followed him. "Cerbi!"
I looked at him, "Yes Dad?" He smiled at me, almost nothing made him angry, except boys. Thank the sky he hadn't seen my gawking. "Come have dinner with the tribe tonight, you're seventeen now." I smiled, my dad actually trusted me not to embarrass him in front of the tribe. "I'll be there."
He lifted the flap and left. "Its about damn time!" I jumped at the sudden voice, and immediately looked at the only other person left in the tent. "What do you mean?" The prisoner, who is tied at the support beam, many seals placed around the ropes smirked. "Him and his council are annoying as hell! Wouldn't shut the fuck up about hostility and Italy and some shit like that?" I glared at him, he was talking about my father.
"Now, now Cutie," he said looking at my childish frame, unlike most of the tribal girls I hadn't developed any breasts or a curvy figure, "How about you come here and untie me." I glared at him harder, my face heating up. I could tell I was red. "No!" He gave me a look with his now open eyes, a beautiful violet color, "Come on Cutie, just let me go and I'll leave." I shook my head and turned heading towards the flap, "You will let me go sooner or later." I ran out of the tent, quickly heading towards my tent.
I grabbed my shroud made of the down of red-crowned crane down and a few things for lunch, before heading out towards the wall. There was a large red cedar at the edge of it, and if you climbed just right you could reach the top of the wall, but there was no way to scale down from the other side. At least not if you wanted to live. I reached the base of the tree and looked up, before securing my shroud and beginning my climb.
Unlike the shinobi, who I had been taught to hate, I was a slow climber, and by the time I had reached the top it was lunch time. I grinned, to me this was the top of the world, and you could see as far as the first tall towers of the Rain Village from here. 'Rain Village,' the words echoed in my mind and I shuddered, "I will not think about him," I said reaching into my small deer skin sack and pulling out a small orange, a Cutie to be exact. I shuddered again, 'Cutie.'
I chucked it and watched as it fell straight down, a barely visible splat on the ground below. I sighed, 'I must not let this get to me. Think about something else, like dinner tonight.' I smiled at the thought of me eating dango, ramen, rice, oranges, and everything else only the mature of the tribe can eat. "Yes that will be good." I sighed and leaned back onto the wall, it is very thick, like a bear skin laid flat out, and rested my eyes at the thought of food.
