Sparrow
Salia could hear the baby crying in the next room. She knew mother had wanted her to take care of her little sister, but she was too scared. She drew her knees closer to her tiny body and tried not to sob.
"Please, please, stop crying, Jenna." She whispered to herself, the smallest of tears running down her cheek. "Please, Jenna, they'll hear you." She hoped beyond hope, that somehow the baby would hear her and stop crying.
Salia could still hear the sound of yelling. Sometimes she heard the clash of weapons, but those sounds were becoming rarer. She didn't dare come out from her hiding place beneath the bed to see if the fighting was over. Just out of her sight, Nana's body lay. Salia could see the blood slowly seeping towards her. When the Scary People had come, Nana had pushed Salia under her bed, but Nana didn't have anywhere to go, so the Scary People had killed her. Salia had heard Nana scream for a long time. Salia could still hear screaming now and then. The Scary People didn't look under the bed. Surely no one could fit down there. But Salia could, she was small and quick and the Scary People didn't see her.
Nana had told her not to come out of hiding until all the Scary People were gone, but Mother had told her only a month ago to take care of the baby when Nana couldn't. Now that both Nana and Mother were gone, who would take care of Jenna? Salia knew the answer to that; she would take care of Jenna. She would have to.
She was just about to come out of her hiding place and go to the nursery to get the baby, when she heard footsteps. She froze in place. She heard someone walk into the baby's room, and then Jenna stopped crying. Salia was a little relieved. That meant that the baby must be okay! The person walked out of the nursery and into the hallway. He walked towards the door of Salia's room. She could hear the man talking to himself. "Children!" he mumbled. "They send me after children!" he said some words that Salia couldn't understand.
Salia was scared again. This wasn't right! She'd never heard this man before. He scared her!
She crept back into her hiding place. She sat there shivering as the man started to open the door to her room. She heard other footsteps then. Someone was running towards the scary man. The scary man said those unfamiliar words again. There was a clang noise, like swords, and then something heavy hit the ground.
Salia backed farther into the space under her bed. She heard footsteps again. The new person walked into the nursery where the baby was and then just stopped. He waited for a long time before moving again. He walked back into the hallway and then opened the door Salia's room. He stopped again. Then he walked forward more slowly. Salia could see his legs now. He knelt down next to Nana's body.
"Oh no," he breathed, "Oh Nana, no."
Salia knew that voice! It was Adrian! Her big brother had come home. Now everything was going to be okay again.
She squirmed out of her hiding place and ran towards him. Adrian looked at her like she was a ghost, and she felt much the same way towards him, but the moment she grabbed his arm, he swept her into an embrace.
"Oh, Salia," she could feel his tears on the top of her head as he stroked her hair. "I thought that you were gone. Oh, my little sparrow, I was so afraid that they'd taken you."
"Adrian, what's going on? Who are these people? Where's father?" she sobbed into his shoulder.
"Hush, hush." He stood and picked her up. "Hold on to me Salia. We have to leave now"
She wrapped her arms around his neck. He'd gotten so much bigger. He was taller then father now. She noticed that he had a pair of swords across his back. She knew those swords! Ever since she had been so little that she could barely walk, those swords had hung above the fireplace in main hall. Mother had told her that they should never be taken down unless it was really important. She was going to ask Adrian about them, but then she noticed something else. "Adrian," she asked, "Why are Nana's cloths torn like that?" But he didn't answer, he just ran from the room, carrying her.
"Adrian, we should get the baby, Mother told me to take care of her." But he kept on running. "Adrian! We can't leave Jenna!"
"Hush, little sparrow, it's too late." She felt herself go numb.
He held her as he ran from the room and into the hall. Salia saw things that scared her. She saw one of her cousins lying in a red pool. She saw servants slumped up against walls with arrows going through their bodies. When Adrian ran through the study, she saw their father, lying perfectly still, next to the urn that held her mother's ashes.
She closed her eyes; she didn't want to see anymore. She was so scared! He ran for hours, out of the villa, and into the surrounding forests. At one point she was certain that they were being chased, but she didn't open her eyes. He ran and ran. Salia felt branches whip the back of her head as they fled into the night. Adrian never slowed. She never would have thought that it was possible for anyone to run for that long, but he did. He ran and ran and…
*******
She opened her eyes slowly, and her thoughts shifted into focus; brushing away distant memories. Her stomach rumbled with hunger and she tried to pull herself from her bed of leaves. She ran dirty fingers through the tangled mass of hair that clung to her back and neck, dislodging twigs and leaves, mud and insects. She inhaled, sifting through the myriad of scents.
Rain, trees, forest, wolf, deer... prey. She was hungry and she smelled prey.
She pulled herself into a crouch and observed her surroundings. Near by, her companion watched her, her own hunger mirrored in his animal eyes. He half closed his eyes to yawn lazily, displaying bright fangs. She didn't have any fangs like those, she needed other things to do her hunting.
She shifted through the mass of leaves on which she had lain, dislodging a pair of objects, their sharp edges hidden by worn casings. She pulled them both free. The metal beneath gleamed incredibly bright, one blade gold and one sliver, unmarked by time. Some fading memory suggested that such a thing was not natural, but as she tried to grasp at the meaning of the feeling, it flitted away from her.
She growled in annoyance, and her companion turned to look at her, questioning. He was hungry, very hungry, she could feel it, but he was waiting for her to decide that it was time to hunt.
She could wait no longer, she stood upright, sniffing at the air. The scent of deer came from the direction of the setting sun, so she followed it.
She walked bent over, the handles of her blades grasped tightly in her hands as she used her arms to support herself and keep her nose close enough to the ground to track the scent. Once she was certain where the smell originated, she took off at a run, her feet automatically avoiding broken twigs and dry leaves. Her companion followed, just as silently.
The familiar paths of the forest passed by in a blur. The light from the sun was waning and she felt her eyes adjust to the nighttime. The calls of insects and owls came from the tree tops and bushes as she continued on her way. The forest floor grew slowly darker. She was comfortable now.
She stopped for an instant. Just before her, the dimming light was filtering through the tree unnaturally. She tilted her head to the side and narrowed her eyes. Something smelled wrong.
As she watched, the buds on the trees burst into sudden bloom, the the flowers fell free, taking root in the forest floor. The trees themselves began to deform; their shapes shifting, becoming more animal. The air before her thickened and rolled onto itself.
She growled low in her throat. She had seen enough.
Forced to abandon the pray she had chosen in order to avoid the dangerous patch of wood, she took off in another direction, hoping to pick up the scent of a new prey.
When she did manage to catch the scent of food, it wasn't what she expected.
She heard voices, humans. Normally that would have been enough to send her running in the other direction, but she felt her own hunger, as well as her companion's, pulling at her. Light was seeping from between densely woven branches and underbrush ahead. She could smell smoke, human, and dogs. Her companion growled out his distaste for the intruders, and she had to agree.
She moved silently forward towards the human voices. Her companion stayed behind, crouching down into the shadows. Once she reached the outer edge of the ring of light, she scampered up a tree, careful to keep the light from shining on the blades she carried. Moving slowly, she stepped onto one of the tree branches. She brushed aside the leaves in her way as she slid her feet father out along the branch. She could feel it bowing under her weight. Once out far enough, she held still to watch them.
Her eyes scanned the group from her hiding place, now more motivated more by curiosity than hunger. She blinked repeatedly, her eyes hurt by both the sudden bright light and smoke. There were two male humans, and one female. They were all clad in the sort of things humans wore when they traveled, and all carrying weapons. The largest male was the oldest, the female, perhaps a decade younger, and the last male, yet another decade younger. They were singeing several rabbit carcasses over their fire. At their feet lay five dogs, smaller pathetic relatives to her companion. She could see why he disliked them so.
At the smell of food, now so close to her, she felt her mouth water. Charred or not, the meat was very appetizing and she was very hungry.
She tensed when she heard them begin to speak. Those sounds were so familiar, but she couldn't understand them. She knew they had meaning, but the memories were, as ever, out of her reach. She continued to watch them. Were all humans so large? She looked at the packs they had brought with them. Did they intend to stay?
No, she wouldn't let them. These were her woods, her territory. She growled. The humans didn't hear her, but the dogs did. They responded with their own growls, alerting the humans.
She slowly moved backwards along the branch, as the human female, the one that had been sitting closest to her hiding place turned to look up into the branches.
The males and female now exchanged more words. She used the sound of their voices to cover her movements as she stepped farther back. Then the female did something unexpected. The female lifted a big of piece of burning wood up closer to the branches. This startled the huntress, and she lost her balance, falling off the branch. She twisted her body mid-fall, careful to keep her weapons away from her body. She landed crouched on all fours in front of them.
The humans were now looking at her, their faces filled with confusion. One of them raised a weapon towards her and she growled at him, raising her own blade.
"What is it?" one of the males asked.
She inclined her head at the sound, unsure of what to make of it.
"I think it's a child." the female responded.
The female stepped froward slowly, offering a bit of meat, taken from the charred rabbits. The smell was tempting, but she wasn't willing to accept anything from these creatures that had invaded her territory.
One of the males raised an object she recognized as a weapon, a bow. He held it with both hands, pointing it at her.
"By the dragons! That's no child! Look at its eyes!" He held the weapon threateningly and she began to back away, ready to run.
"Casin! Stop!"
"He's right, it's some sort of wyld-spawned barbarian monster. Kill it now!"
At their obvious aggressive motions, she turned to bolt back into the forest and felt something pierce her shoulder. She cried out in pain but didn't slow her pace. She could hear the dogs barking at her heels, but her companion chased the retched things away.
She could feel her blood seeping through the hides she wore. In a panic of blind pain she stumbled to the ground, losing consciousness for a moment. When she opened her eyes again she could she one of the two males approaching her. She inhaled his scent. It was the one that had hurt her.
She held perfectly, deathly still, waiting until he was close. She felt him stop to stand over her, hesitantly, and then his eyes caught on the shinning blades of her swords and he was reaching down towards them, convinced she must have been dead. She held her breath, until he was just close enough.
Her eyes snapped open and she stared into his. His eyes went wide and she saw him begin to back up. She grinned at him and then lashed out with inhuman speed, her blade cutting through his neck and chest. He fell to the ground, unmoving as the smell of his blood filled the glade.
Her companion joined her then, stopping to sniff at her wound, and inspect the body. She turned from him as he began to gnaw on the corpse's leg.
She pulled herself to her feet, stopping to study the bit of sharpened wood embedded in her shoulder. She pulled it free, shaking off the wave of dizziness that hit her as her blood drained out of the wound. She placed her hand over the wound, only then stopping to notice the faint silver light coming off of her skin. Something about it pulled memories to her, from the very edge of her consciousness, but she couldn't quite grasp them. The feeling irritated her in its familiarity.
Human voices, and the barking of dogs pulled her thoughts back to reality. Her companion had interrupted his meal to grow at the approaching outsiders. There were more now, then she had seen. They had brought others with them. The revelation only strengthened her suspicion that they were planning to stay.
She turned to look down at him, signaling that it was time to go. He was reluctant to leave his meal, but complied nevertheless. Fearing that the dogs would be able to track her by the sent of her blood, she ripped a section of clean cloth off the man's clothes and used it to cover the wound, ignoring the pain that was already beginning to fade.
She ran back through the forest with her companion at her side. His hunger was at least partially sated, but she would never be able to bring herself to look at humans as meat. She would need to find something else.
She stopped near a familiar stream. Crouching down onto the ground, she dipped her hand into the cool water. As her fingers touched the liquid, the collected dirt and grime washed off, leaving them a still a darker shade of brown then she has remembered. She proceeded clean her wound as her companion went off in search of more food.
She felt shocks of pain lance through the injury as she bathed it with the cold water, but she paid them no heed. The injury would heal, and soon, she was sure of that. Hadn't it been that way since... Since what? It was something important, but she felt like she was grasping for the impossible.
She cleaned the blood that had come to stain her furs and hides, and pulled her figures through her matted hair. For the first time in... months, perhaps years, her filthy state was beginning to bother her. She straightened her back, and sat with her legs folded under her and her hands in her lap. Someone had once told her to sit like that, but she didn't know who. Seeing those humans had somehow brought back fading recollections. Yet they remained nothing more shifting shadows; dancing leaves that would be blown out of her grasp whenever she reached for them.
Dreams told her more than waking moments did, but like everything else, she forgot them quickly. She tried hopelessly to remember what she had dreamed of. Now she was certain it was important. She glanced down towards the blades she had carried with her.
They had been in the dream, but she wasn't the one carrying them. Someone else held them, someone she had cared about once. An image came to her of a tall young man, with short silver hair and blue eyes.
What had happened to him?
That question called up feelings of sorrow, anger, and loneliness. She felt water build up in the corners of her eyes.
A quiet whine made her glance up to see her companion, carrying a dead rabbit in his mouth and looking at her with concern. She brushed the moisture away, suddenly angry for letting herself become so... so human. She quickly shifted back into a crouch and banished her earlier thoughts as irrelevant.
She accepted the rabbit and quickly skinned it, eating the flesh raw while her companion watched on with concern in his eyes.
Soon she would have to relocate; to find new territory. If enough humans came, then they would not leave her in peace and they would surely hunt her for killing one of their own. She knew they could not head closer towards the dangerous tribes and places of shifting, unnatural forest. So she would have to go towards the sunsets.
She scowled. They would have to go to where the humans were more plentiful, but she had at least learned that it would be wise to avoid them completely. She would not let them find her this time.
She would stay away from the humans. She would not trust them, because to trust, was to be murdered.