Well, here's the next chapter...sorry for the long wait! Thanks to Jade TeaLeaf for her encouragement and advice. This chapter is dedicated to you.
A scarred-looking female otter stared at the plain white ceiling worriedly. Her husband's missions never took this long! Something must have gone wrong...but what? She shuddered as she recalled the last time he failed, although the set of claw marks were the only remaining evidence of it.
"Mama, where's Daddy?" Inquired a little female ottermaid. A perfect replica of her appeared by her side and chimed in,
"Yeah! You said he was on a mission again!" The older female otter, Skann, cringed slightly, but answered in a convincing tone,
"Um, he'll be back soon, nothing could go wrong." In truth, she was also trying to convince herself. The two otter twins, Aetis and Luftin, sighed as the settled comfortably onto their mother's lap. Absently, she stroked them while thinking about all the changes. Todar had been offered a higher position that allowed his entire family to move to a better place...they had gotten a better house and all those things. Before, they had been slaves, dirty, scrawny, and weak. Now, they lived in a two story house with three bedrooms, one for her and Todar, another for Aetis and Luftin, and then the third one which was just a spare for when Todar's Aunt Jedidiah and Uncle Jeremiah came to visit. Skann sighed at the memory of those two, then went back to retracing her life. There was a clean kitchen with a quaint little room for the twins to play in...another where they - she and Todar - just talked. That place just had a rug made of mouse fur, a soft cream colored couch, a few interesting paintings and a glass table. There was also a fairly decent sized bathroom that connected their - she and Todar - to the twins room. Those were the times she considered a miracle...Skann was completely unaware that she had zoned out until a tug from Aetis brought her back.
"Mama, dere's a fewwet at de door! He says for you!" Her speech was still slightly clumsy but her mother could still make out the words. Mama, there's a ferret at the door, he says he wants to talk to you. Skann sighed as she stretched, yawned, then trotted over to the door. Sure enough, a burly looking, tattooed ferret was there, along with a devilish looking lynx who held a whip. The ferret handed her a note, which she took hesitantly. Her eyes skimmed the page and the more she read on, the more blurred her vision became because of tears. It stated everyone of her worst nightmares. Todar was dead and they were to return as slaves. Todar had received the offer a day after the twins had been born, so they had never felt the brutal sting of the whip. The ferret tapped his footpaw rhythmically against the ground, making it clear that he was getting impatient. Skann got the message and immediately called over the twins, who looked up at her in confusion.
"Mama, we going ta huh?" Skann sighed as she petted Aetis's head before replying,
"We're leaving, we're slaves now." Aetis and Luftin both looked at her quizzically but she shook her head, signaling that she would say no more. The twins whined but inquired no further. The ferret led them to the slave compound, a fair-distanced walk from their former house. At one time, Luftin cried out because of a sore paw but Skann shushed her effectively. She knew too well what would happen if a slave complained.
The sight that met Skann was gruesome. All the woodlanders in there wore tattered rags for clothing and were scraggly-looking. Most looked like peppermint candy canes, they were covered in so many red stripes. In the back of the slave compound was a pile of bones, topped with skulls of dead mice, squirrels, otters, and even the occasional ferret or fox. The lynx shoved her and the twins into there, then shut the door noisily. The clanging noise it made caused the other slaves to turn around and stare at them with unnerving, bloodshot gazes. A weary-looking gray mouse introduced,
"Welcome to the realm of pain. And the last ticket boarded for freedom just left." He pointed at the locked door. A dark brown fox noticed them and growled,
"No time to chit-chat, get to work!" Skann lowered her head submissively and ushered her daughters away. The fox glanced at them again with his dark eyes and mumured a few calculations. Then, he closed his eyes.
"Miftka, things just got complicated..."
:-:-:
In the shelter of the slave tent, Aydin hugged her knees close, tears forming at the corners of her eyes. Several darkly colored spots on the dirty ground beneath her suggested that she had been crying for a while. The squirrelmaid wailed mentally as pangs of homesickness swept over her. This was natural; she had never been away from home for so long. More thoughts of her home came flashing back. Her twin sister, Linzle, who seemed forever optimistic, even when their home had been burned up...her mother, Orula, who made the best treats ever...her father, Ibel, strong and wise...memories of her favorite times came flooding back along with those thoughts, forcing more tears to spring up to her eyes. Once, Orula was teaching her to bake honey-drizzled scones...the stove accidentally exploded when Linzle thought it was funny to shove one of her rocket experiments in there. Aydin whimpered softly, shaking with tears and fury as she remembered her family could still be alive if Todar hadn't burned down her home and that she could still be free if it weren't for Salgrine putting her on a short leash! Suddenly, something tugged on her paw and Aydin whirled around to see a small, dark honey brown colored she-ferret, who put a paw to her mouth, effectively shushing her squirrel for a few moments. Then, the ferret yanked her out of Salgrine's domain and into the woods. There, she let go of Aydin, who was about to say something but stopped immediately when the ferret raised her paw.
"First off, I'm Kiwia, you're Aydin. Good, now we know each other. And second, you're here...for reasons currently unknown, at least for you," Kiwia announced. Aydin stared at her for a moment, processing the information. Finally, she nodded, then murmured,
"Duck." Kiwia looked at her in confusion but did as bid. An arrow whizzed past, just narrowly missing her left ear. Kiwia picked up the arrow; it had landed just a few inches in front of her. The ferret studied it carefully, then cursed before taking Aydin's paw and fleeing.
"Tehal," was the only heard part of her explaination for the abrupt changes. The rest was lost on the wind.
Very short chapter and a very cheesy one too, and I'm sorry, but I'm having a minor writers block so...yeah. Well, R&R!