Sneak Peek
It's been a really long time, so I wanted to update just a sneak peek.
"Lesson number twenty... to be taronyu." Ree'ahn announced airly, thinking of how he would plainly convey teachings of the bow that had been ingrained in him at an age he could hardly remember. Teaching would've been difficult enough if he were responsible to instruct young children, but to teach three imposter Na'vi from an entirely alien planet was a challenge that was becoming harder by the day.
"You mean hunter lesson nineteen," Tanner mentioned aloud to the Widebow-toting Na'vi leading them between slumps of interlocking, dripping vines of the Omatikayan forest. Tanner's heel slipped on a slick, fat leaf before he quickly righted himself.
Victoria corrected under her breath, avoiding Tanner's pitfall, "twenty-two."
"Someone needs to keep count! It's lesson nineteen!" Tanner called back.
"No, twenty-one!" Sky yelled from afar as she caught up to Victoria. "'cause remember nineteen was--!"
"It does not matter!!" Ree'ahn shouted, swiveling sharply to the group lagging behind him.
His three students paused in place with cheeky expressions on their damp faces as Ree'ahn's outburst echoed in the canopy above their heads.
"Keep numbers if you want. For me, I am finished." Ree'ahn said lowly. He stood in place and inhaled the moist air of the forest that was near the central falls, where the faint sound of laughing and splashing nantang centered him in the present.
Ree'ahn continued before them, "to be taronyu, to know the way to catch an animal is very good, but the good lessons are when many taronyu hunt as one. Tsu'tey, si Piral, si Itoyo--we are all one when we choose to hunt in group."
"How often do you guys hunt? Once a week? Biweekly?" Sky asked.
Ree'ahn looked surprised about Sky's question about something as routine as a hunt, and then he seemed perplexed about what she meant by the inquiry. "We hunt together many times...if we are hungry?" He paused to ensure if he had answered her as she had expected him to. From her silence, he wasn't sure.
"Real smart, Sky." Tanner chuckled faintly. He cringed when Sky's elbow spiked his ribs.
Ree'ahn continued to the habitat of gazelle-legged yerik in the thickest foliage of the forest andresumed the class's instructions. "Today, we will work as one, and we will take this small yerik." Ree'ahn gestured to the hexapede in his sights with a soft forward turn of his head. Victoria, Tanner, and Sky all watched the unsuspecting hexapede gently change its footing as it grazed on a new patch of foliage.
"You are not ready for a mother yerik," Ree'ahn explained. 'it is too big for you, but to take one of her will be last test."
"Ree'ahn, um, we don't really have any weapons," Sky spoke up. "You're kind of the only person here with a bow?"
"This I know," Ree'ahn said, looking to Sky's perturbed eyes. "I will make the killing shot. Hard part...is to get yerik in one place to not move. For this you all help me."
Ree'ahn went on, "yerik are fast and have good ears, I think to even hear your own heart. This will not be easy if you do not remember to be with no sound."
His students nodded, looking at the unassuming yerik as it roamed in their vision.
"Today we think like one mind, and move like one body. This kill you will take to this night's meal. If today you fail," Ree'ahn said with squared eyes on each of them. "we all do not eat. I like to eat. Do not put me in sleep with no food in my stomach."
Victoria gave an uneasy look to Sky as her stomach grumbled faintly. The two women both noticed they hadn't eaten breakfast.
The next words came much easier to Ree'ahn, for he repeated them many times during his lessons with Sky, Victoria, and Tanner. "Do you understand?"