AN: After doing some more research on Trigedasleng I have discovered that the clans are actually called other names than what I have named them in the story, namely, Tregedakru is actually a simpler Trikru, and the Ice Clan, which I have named Isagedakru, is actually called Asakru. However, I will still refer to the clans by the names that I have been using, just as it will be easier for myself. Perhaps one day I can go back and edit everything, but know that my names are incorrect, if you are following the cannon things I've been using (ie, Tregedasleng, most of which can be translated using this site I've been using: wiki/Trigedasleng_(language) (I have had to fill in the gaps with my own imagination). Sorry for the long-ass AN. While I'm at it, school is going to be starting up for me in the next week, so there might be a slight drop in updates. I'm doing my best to write several chapters in advance, but timewise I might get crunched later in the semester, so if there is a gap in updates, this is it. But worry not, they will pick up again at the end of december, if they drop at all. Lastly, thank you so much for keeping up! This was literally me being like 'heh, I work in a wilderness survival outdoor educaiton program and adore Lexa, lemme write this fanfictiction with my 'woods knowledge' and we'll see where it grows' and now it's close to approaching 30,000 words, and people actually read it! So thank you so, so much. And stay tuned. There's good stuff on the way :)
The morning awoke bright and early and the village was still mostly quiet, but in the sekon's tent, a ruckus was beginning to stir. Of the sekons, Lexa, Ophus and Yunto had all been chosen to accompany the geda attending the meeting that night. Lexa was busy packing her satchel for the next night. They were to leave by the time the sun had risen over the horizon. Lexa's hands shook as she packed away her meager amount of clothes and personal items. Costia sat quietly watching her. Lexa didn't want to look at Costia - she knew that she would miss her friend too much.
"You'll be back though," Costia said quietly. Some of the sekons were still asleep, though how Lexa knew not; Ophus and Yunto had gotten into a scuffle over Ophus stealing Yunto's shoes because he could not find his own.
"Tomorrow night I'll be back," Lexa said with a smile. "It's only a day and a half. We leave, we go to the meeting, we come home. That's all. The only reason they want me in the first place is because I was one of the witnesses to the reapers..." Lexa trailed off as Costia looked down. "I'm sorry," Lexa said, after taking her hand off her mouth.
"It's alright," Costia said. "I mean, it is the reason they want you. And that Anya is one of the best geda in the village. And that you're the best sekon in our class."
Lexa looked up, the blood rushing to her cheeks. "It's true!" Costia insisted. "You haven't started any weapons besides archery and spear, but you've started cavalry, and I've seen you during scouting - you can't miss a tree throwing knives and your aim with arrows is impeccable."
"Stop," Lexa muttered, but her heart was fluttering, the blood rushing to her cheeks. It was a feeling she hadn't really felt before - a kind of stirring in her lower abdomen, a chill down her spine, blood in her cheeks.
"You're redder than a tomato," Costia said, poking Lexa's stomach. Lexa laughed, collapsing into Costia's lap.
"I'll miss you," Lexa looked up. Costia's dark brown hair hung down, unbraided from her shoulders, tickling Lexa's nose. Her blue eyes met Lexa's hazel, her thin fingers twirling Lexa's curly mess, her other hand on Lexa's wrist. The two girls sat up quickly, the moment soured for a second, and then dissolving back into friendship.
"I'll miss you too," Lexa replied, and hugged her friend tightly. They were both small girls, but together they could conquer the world. Over on the other side of the tent, Ophus found his shoes and said goodbye to Reed while Yunto whispered a goodbye to the still sleeping Sanse and Alana. Lexa threw her pack over her shoulder and grabbed her bow and quiver. The spear she left by her things; she didn't trust her skill with it yet. The three sekons headed out just as the sky began to melt from blue to grey, the sun getting closer and closer to the horizon.
They made their way to the center of the village where Tohru, Anya, Ian, Conner and Juram were gathered. Tohru had decided to take three geda with him, and one healer, leaving Corin (the older and more experienced healer) with the village. The five of them had already packed up all of their things.
"Good," Tohru said, turning on his heel in a sharp click and walking towards the stable. The group of eight followed. Of the sekons, only Lexa had a horse, and though Juram was a senior member of the village, she had never found a horse to claim to ride, so of the geda she was also horseless. Connor and Ian had extra large saddles, and it was decided that because Ophus and Yunto had no experience riding, they would ride with their firsts. Despite Juram's lack of horse, she still knew how to ride, and so received an extra. After saddling up, the group headed out at a pace slightly faster than a walk. Once they were a distance from the village in the woods, Tohru in front kicked up the pace, moving to a canter through the woods. Lexa, riding behind Connor and in front of Anya near the back of the line, looked around. She knew immediately they were heading south. From Anya's lessons on the other villages, she knew they were headed towards the first village, and that village was on the coast near a sea, and it was a full day's heavy ride away.
The forest was deep, dark and chilly that morning. The weather was becoming chilly for everyone. Today was the equinox; summer was truly gone. The group rode in silence for the duration of the day, not pausing for anything but to let the horses rest for a few moments. Jerky was passed down the line when the sun made its way directly above them. The air remained chilly, though the rays of sun that made their way through the trees were warm and dry.
As Lexa watched, she noticed that the forest began to change during the afternoon. The trees began to thin out, becoming more widely spaced. The pines disappeared, replaced mostly with young deciduous trees. The bird calls, instead of being familiar the familiar tweets and whistles were replaced by different calls: high caws, long squeaks and soft twitters. The ground lost its springiness of the deep forest, instead becoming sandy.
Finally, as the sun was beginning to dip into the horizon and the shadows becoming long and stretched out, the forest opened up and Lexa stopped short. The largest expanse of water she had ever seen in her entire life stretched out before her. The ground was soft and giving, a whitish-yellow color. She turned to Anya, the question in her eyes. Anya gave a gentle nod of permission, and Lexa practically vaulted off Naya, joining Yunto and Ophus as they sprinted towards the water.
They stopped short as the ground turned harder and wetter. The water was moving - it would slosh onto the shore, reaching the edge of the wet ground, and then receding just as the next bit of water would slosh up. The three sekons were held in mesmer for several seconds, just watching the water, and then it was broken. Ophus reached his foot into the water and kicked up some of the water and Yunto, and the three of them promptly broke into a water fight, throwing water at each other.
As Ophus reached out to throw some water into Lexa's face, her mouth open in glee, a little bit splashed onto her tongue, and she promptly gagged. "It's salty!" she said in surprise. The others stopped as Lexa dipped her fingers into the waves, touching it to her tongue again, this time expecting it. The water was indeed salty; impossible to drink.
"It's the ocean," Anya said, and the three sekons jumped. "You're seeing the ocean for the first time.
"Why is it salty?" Lexa asked her mentor.
"No one knows," Anya said. "All we know is that we can't drink it, we can only swim near the shore, otherwise it becomes too strong and too deep, and we can fish all kinds of bounty from the sea."
"Why does it move?" Yunto asked, the energy from the water having faded and the three sekons once more entranced by the water.
"Long ago, people discovered it was the moon that made the water move," Anya replied, looking into the sky. "But we have forgotten how it works. But they are called waves. The water moves in waves. And the shore is covered by a soil called sand. It's tiny grains of rocks. You know what you can do with sand?"
The three sekons shook their head. "Sand can be heated, and once it becomes very, very hot it melts and becomes glass." The three sekons; mouths fell open.
"No way," Ophus whispered softly.
"Isn't it amazing what people can discover?" Anya said with a smile. "Now come. Your horses need caring, and we have a meeting to attend. Be prepared; this village is much, much larger than ours. And you'll be seeing sekons from every village in the Tregedakru tribe. There'll be kids older than you, as you're the youngest class. Learn from them; they have much to teach."
The three sekons nodded. Lexa looked back to the ocean. "Don't worry, Goufa," Anya said. "We will come back to the ocean again." Together the four of them walked back to the group of geda, who were busy in a fast and low discussion. Upon their arrival, the heda nodded to Anya and the group resumed their trek to the village, this time at a less hurried pace.
They walked their horses over a large mound of the sand (Anya said it was called a dune), and paused at the top of the dune. Stretched across the edge of the forest was a village, if it could be called that. It stretched as far as the eye could see, the buildings either very low to the ground, or up on large stilts, pitching them taller than Lexa had ever seen. The people of the village were in a bustle getting ready for the equinox meeting. Large fish were carried to and fro by several strong men each, even creatures that Lexa had never seen in her life, creatures with many legs, creatures with huge fins and tails, grey, pitted skin. Vegetables too were carried around; harvest season was upon them.
The sekons followed the geda silently, intimidated by the activity around them. Older sekons ran around, taller, stronger and faster. The people of this village had browned skin, much browner than their paler, whiter deep forest skin.
The geda led them to the stables, twice the size, no, three times the size of theirs at home. There they unsaddled the horses and brushed them down, turning them out in a large, cleared pasture behind the stables, filled with all sorts of horses. White, black, grey, blue, they all wandered in the massive pasture, munching on grass. With this, the group of villagers Lexa was familiar with met up with a geda of the village. An exchange of tregedasleng between him and the heda, and the eight of them were shown to a place to sleep that night. It was a shack of sorts, the slacks of the building cracked to let light in, and the floor covered in dirt to prevent sand from getting in all of your belongings. As it was, Lexa had already found sand in places she thought it couldn't get in. They set their things down, and the geda gathered together, leaving Juram to explain the evening to the sekons.
"Here is how tonight is going to work," the healer said, sitting with her feet folded into her legs on the dirt floor. "All of the geda at the meeting meet in an hour. This village is serving a large dinner, and then the meeting commences. The meeting lasts until it needs to, and then is concluded with the harvest festival, which we will not be staying for the duration of, only just the beginning. We need to be getting back to the village as soon as possible, and there is every chance the meeting could last a very long time."
The three sekons nodded. "Until that time," Juram said with a smile, "Anya, Connor and myself have given the three of you permission to explore the village. Learn something. The other sekons, being older than you, will have a lot to teach you. And of course, the ocean. There is every likelihood you may never see it again, and of course, you may return. So appreciate it, be grateful that you were able to come to this meeting. It's an experience you're lucky to have."
The three sekons stood up and raced out of the building. "Where do you think the other sekons are?" Lexa asked the other two. Ophus shrugged, Yunto responded, "Hopefully by the ocean. Let's go see it!"
They raced to the edge of the village to the shore, where the waves were busy splashing and sloshing onto the shore. With shouts the sekons tore of their clothing and sprinted into the water, despire the air being quite chilly. In only their underclothes the water was a shock, leaving the three of them breathless, but their bodies (more or less) adjusting to the freezing water after a minute or too. Lexa laughed as Ophus tried to slosh in deeper, but a wave knocked his feet out in front of him. As Ophus stood up soaking wet, another wave came, this time coming back to Lexa and knocking her to the ground.
"Let's go deeper!" Yunto yelled to the two of them. All three were raised by the rivers, so all three were strong swimmers from the pooling currents and rocks, but nothing was to prepare them for the strength of the ocean. At one point, Lexa was caught up in a wave, battering her and rolling her over and over until she thought she would drown, until she stood up on the shore, gasping. She looked up, and suddenly realized they were being watched. A small crowd of kids was watching them.
Ophus and Yunto came to a stop. The other kids stretched from slightly older to almost geda. One of the oldest girls reached down, offering a hand to Lexa. "Need a hand up?" she said with a smile. Lexa was paralyzed by her deep grey eyes. She shook herself out.
"Thanks," she said, grabbing the other sekon's hand.
"Come on," said the girl. "These sekons have the right idea guys!" And following Lexa, Ophus and Yunto's lead, she shook out of her clothing and jumped into the ocean. The other sekons followed, until the shore was littered with sekon clothing and the ocean was filled with sekons splashing in the water.
One of the older guys picked up Lexa like she was a sack of rocks, and threw her with all his might into the water. Lexa screamed gleefully as she hit the water, stretching her body out into a dive and coming up with a laugh. Ophus and Yunto's faces practically exploded with excitement, and the other sekons quickly grabbed onto them and threw them into the ocean. Only the youngest sekons could be thrown into the ocean, that is until two of the older male sekons teamed up to throw the sekon who had first joined them flipping through the air into the water. She returned the favor with a kick to their legs, knocking them into the water, though she forgave them with a quick smile and laugh.
Finally after several minutes of splashing and laughing, the sekons came up to the shore, putting on their clothes and drying off in the cold air.
"So," said one of the older sekons. "Let's get this straight. Who are the new ones to join our ranks of the tregedakru sekons?"
"I'm Lexa," Lexa replied, "And this is Ophus and Reed. We're under Tohru."
"Ah," he said with a smile. "If ever there was a heda, it was Tohru."
"So," Lexa said. "Who all are you guys?"
There were perhaps twenty sekons in total gathered, stretching from nearly geda to only a year above Lexa's class.
"I'm Rena," said the geda who had helped up Lexa. "Ten and nine. All of these other losers, they hope to be as old as me someday." Lexa could tell Rena was almost a geda. The way she held herself, it was practically written on her body. Her long, black hair was tied back in a loose knot at her neck, and her skin was a darker brown.
"Shof op, Rena," said one of the guys with a shove at her. "I'm Varse. And this guy, who doesn't say a word, this is Lincoln."
Lincoln nodded. His skin was much, much darker than any of the other sekons and his hair was shaved off. "Ten and eight," he replied. "Our heda is Indra."
"Lincoln's studying to be a healer," Varse said. "And he's one of the best we have."
"Remember, goufa," Rena said. "We're not the only ones of our class. Our classes are fairly sizeable. The only reason we're here is because our firsts were chosen to attend the meeting."
"I'm Niko," said another male sekon, marked by paler skin. "And this one over here is Rory. And lastly is Dichen." Niko pointed at another tall male, and a female sekon. All three were marked with paler skin, signalling they were from deep in the forest.
"Our heda is Salse," said Dichen. "And we're the furthest village. Our trek is three days. We just got here a few hours ago."
"We're ten and seven," added Rory, running his hands through long, dark hair. "And we're missing the ten and sixes; they live in this village near the sea, so they're busy preparing tonight. We'll see them at dinner. And there's seventeen of them, in case you were wondering."
Lexa nodded. "And over here," said another girl. Now the sekons were starting to get younger. While Rena and Lincoln and Varse looked like they were geda, these younger sekons Lexa could tell were still in training. "I'm Aly. And this is Willow and Kira."
All of the ten and fives were girls. They once again had the paler hair. The three of them had varying lengths of dark brown hair. Aly had hers cut to her ears, while Willow's was down to her waist.
And now the sekons were approaching the ages of Lexa. Their bodies still looked older, but they weren't quite as tall, weren't quite as strong, weren't as adult-looking.
"I'm Brooke," said one of the younger girls. "And this is Yan. We're ten and four." Yan had black hair and pale skin, Brooke was the first sekon to have hair other than brown. Her hair was some sort of light, golden color. Lexa was fascinated.
"We're second furthest," Yan added. "Our village is two and a half days away. Our heda is Garth."
"And over here," waved some of the younger sekons. "This is Dan, and I'm Mat. We're ten and three. Our heda is Bran." These two were shorter than the others, their brown hair was trimmed short.
"Ten and two," said another girl. "Oona, (here she pointed to herself), Darek (pointing at a boy next to her), Quinn (pointing at a second girl with short brown hair) and Jith (a second guy with hair down to his shoulders)."
"Our heda is Kyla," added Quinn.
And last but not least left two more sekons just a little bit older than Lexa herself, a girl and a boy. "I'm Jordan," said the boy.
"And I'm Eve," said the girl. She also had hair other than brown; hers was a curly red mess on her head. Her voice, soft and silky, added, "Our heda is Keeth, and we're ten and one.."
"And I'm Lexa," she replied. "We're the ten class, although I think all of us have turned ten and one at this point..."
"Yunto hasn't," Ophus said with a poke at Yunto, causing him to bark out a laugh. "He turns next month. And then Alana is still ten, and so's Gabe. But Alana's the last, and she's not until winter."
"So then," Varse said. "Now that we're all acquainted with each other, I think it's high time that we should be heading in. Dinner is about to start, and the highlight of our evening, the equinox meeting!" He held up is hands and waved them, and Rena poked at his side.
"Oh, shof op, goufa," she said. And just like that, a messenger appeared at the edge of the village, another sekon.
"It's time," she said, and motioned for the other sekons to come. The group stood up together, and suddenly Lexa felt a lot more welcome than before.