Daniel stared at the harpy with wonder then looked down in thought as he considered the possibility of adding another monster ruler to his quota. He turned his eyes back to the harpy as she watched him with hers being hidden behind her bangs then smiled a little as he stepped closer.
“Doku, do you think you could let me speak to your sister?”
“Speak to her? About what?”
“About joining our cause. I want to talk to her about us living together in peace.”
“But, Daniel. We already are living in peace with you,” Doku pointed out with a shrug. “Harpies wage no war, especially against humans. We wish to be good wives for you and already do find husbands to mate with.”
“Then surely she would wish to stand with Daniel when he visits Rockhelm,” Kroanette reasoned with a hopeful smile.
“I don’t understand. What do you mean?”
“We need help with getting the queen there to realize peace with monsters can be possible,” Daniel explained. “We’re gathering support from as many monster rulers as we can to stand with us as proof that we can coexist as allies. Yours would be another race we could have standing with us.”
“Oh,” Doku said before looking down with a saddened expression. “See… the thing is, harpies… don’t go to Rockhelm, Daniel. It’s much too dangerous to fly near there, we would be hunted and killed by humans if we did. There’s no chance we’ll find husbands there, we only find potential mates in The Outerlands or smaller villages, places where there aren’t so many armed fighters. She wouldn’t want to go there, I wouldn’t even want to go there. It won’t end well for us.”
“She would be going with us, she’ll be safe,” Daniel assured her. “We’ve already gotten support from an ant girl’s nest, the giant butterflies of Flairwood said they would help, the witches of Rystone said they will if we bring more with us, and we’re on our way to Kroanette and Clover’s homes to speak with their rulers in hopes they will side with us as well.”
“I don’t know…” Doku worriedly said while turning her head away.
“Doku, please,” Triska implored as she hopped down from the caravan and approached the harpy. “The alpha witch of Rystone said she would only stand with us if we bring five monster races to Rockhelm. We’ve gotten two already with the ant girls and giant butterflies, we’re hoping to get two more with the centaurs and elves, and your race would be the fifth. Please, Doku, it would be of the greatest help if you could do this for us.”
“If you really wish to talk to her about it, you can,” Doku softly said. “You’ll be safe in Red Peak, my kin won’t hurt you or fly you away to rape, Daniel. But… I’d better not go with you. I would just mess up any chances you have of talking to her, I know I would.”
“Doku, please stop being so critical about yourself,” Daniel insisted.
“It’s for the best if I don’t go. Besides, I need to help Cilia find her home first. I promised her after all,” Doku continued as she looked down to Cilia, the tiny fairy showing a small smile at her. “I don’t want to be a burden to the rest of you, I’ve already caused enough trouble being here.”
“You saved my life,” Triska praised as she walked up and gently held her hands on the harpy’s shoulders. “You helped me come back to my family. I’m thankful I met you and that you came here. Please know that I don’t see you as a burden or a failure.”
“Thank you, Triska,” Doku softly said before she backed up and looked behind her. “But it would be better if I wasn’t around you all. It sounds like what you’re after is very important, I don’t want to ruin it.”
“Please come with us,” Pip begged. Doku looked down to see the two fairies frowning with watery eyes. “I like you and Cilia. Can’t you stay longer? Please?”
“I don’t want to say goodbye to Pip,” Cilia said holding Pip close to her. “She’s the only other fairy I’ve ever known.”
“Cilia…” Doku softly spoke while holding her wings close to her chest.
“We’re good girls, aren’t we?” Cilia asked worriedly. “Shouldn’t we help them? It sounds like you can help them. We should be good and help them.”
“I can’t do anything more to help them, and they don’t need me anyway. They know where Red Peak is, if anything I would just slow them down. We should just let them be.”
“No,” Pip and Cilia whined while holding each other.
“Now now, please don’t cry,” Doku nervously insisted. “You know I can’t stand to see you cry, Cilia. Please don’t.”
Squeak hopped a few times and squeaked while waving to the harpy, frantically trying to say something while the group watched her trying in vain to do so.
“I’m sorry, but… what?” Doku asked shaking her head.
Squeak face palmed and squeaked in frustration then jumped before quickly rushing over to Falla and again squeaking in urgency at her. The butterfly watched as Squeak hopped up and down in front of her while pointing towards Doku then Daniel while squeaking something anxiously.
“What’s she saying?” Cilia asked.
“Perhaps if she would hold still so I could translate I would know,” Falla dryly said.
Squeak halted and fidgeted her hands at her sides before Falla carefully held her head and positioned their antennae together. After she did the ant girl quickly squeaked at her while glancing over towards Doku, the harpy watching them with confusion as Falla listened to what Squeak was trying so desperately to say. Once she heard the full message she smiled amusedly and turned to Doku while Squeak did the same with her hands held together in a pleading manner.
“She wants to know if you could stay a little longer, and use your magic again to lift her and Daniel’s spirits like before. When you do that she’ll be able to actually talk to Daniel with words.”
“With words?” Doku repeated.
“She can only squeak, that’s how ant girls normally talk,” Specca explained. “But when you took us to that spirit plane she was able to talk with real words, we could understand her and actually hear her voice.”
“Well… I… um…” Doku nervously replied while lowering her head again. Everyone watched as the harpy kept her gaze down at the ground, or at least assumed so as her eyes couldn’t be seen to know if she was looking around at them or not. After seeing she was still indecisive about the matter Falla cleared her throat to draw her attention again.
“You know,” she casually mentioned. “I was thinking about what you said earlier, about how your sisters find husbands to be with, but that the men don’t really love them for who they are.”
“Um… well…” Doku slowly replied before falling silent again.
“You get to have daughters and a family, so long as you work your wings to the bone to please the man and give them everything they want. You settle for that life since you can continue your race, and you accept being used by the humans with a reluctant smile on your face. Isn’t that right?”
“It’s… not really that bad.”
“We have a similar setup back home,” Falla admitted, crossing her arms and looking down with a distant gaze. “My sisters lie through their teeth to get a man. They’ll tell the humans anything to get them to be their mates. Promising them wealth, power, and even immortality if the man is foolish enough to believe it. The men don’t really love us, but they’ll give us their seed as long as we say the right things to entice them.”
“You deceive the humans to get a mate?” Doku worriedly asked.
“Yeah, we do. And I can honestly say it sucks. Especially when you know what it’s like to actually be loved by a human.”
Doku looked over towards Daniel for a moment then to Falla as she and her sister smiled a little at her.
“I used to think as long as I got a daughter out of it, it didn’t matter what the man thought of me,” Falla confessed with a shrug. “Turns out I was dead wrong. I have a man who loves me for who I am, not caring what I am. My sister and I both have what no other giant butterfly does back in Flairwood, and I p
romise you that having a man genuinely love you makes all the difference in the world.”
“You really love them?” Doku asked Daniel.
“I do. I would fight to protect them, and I would even die for them,” Daniel answered with a nod.
“Even though they’re not human, you truly feel that way about them?” Doku wondered, with Daniel nodding again to that.
“Does any other harpy have that in her life?” Falla questioned, earning a silent look from Doku in response. “Wouldn’t your sisters, yourself even, prefer to have humans that love you for who you are?”
“Well… that does sound nice… but…” Doku softly replied before looking down.
“It’s not you harpies that need to change, it’s we humans,” Daniel reasoned. Doku turned to him curiously as he showed remorse and slowly shook his head. “By the sound of it your race is already wishing to be allies, it’s the humans that need to treat you better. And we will. That’s exactly the case I’ll make with the queen in Rockhelm in your defense. You and your race deserve husbands that will truly care for you, not those who would take advantage of you for an easy life.”
“Trust us, you want this,” Falla assured her.
“Being loved for who I am makes me so happy,” Luna agreed. “You deserve to be happy as well, Doku.”
“Daniel… you would really do that for us?” Doku slowly asked. “Do you think… that my sisters could have husbands who actually love them for who they are? For what they are?”
“I know they could,” Daniel promised.
Doku looked down to Pip and Cilia, the two fairies nodding eagerly at her, then over to Squeak as the ant girl nodded with a hopeful smile and hands still held together, then to Triska as she stepped back and nodded with a gentle smile on her face.
“Well…” the harpy slowly said as she looked around at the group. Her gaze stopped on Clover as she was the only one so far that was remaining silent and keeping her eyes down at the ground with a dull expression on her face. The elf glanced to her then looked away with a scoff.
“Do whatever, I don’t care. Just choose so we can get going already,” Clover snapped, then pointed to Daniel with an accusing stare. “And just as a reminder you still have to take me home, like you promised. We’re not heading way the fuck south to see her sister or whatever first. Take me home so I can end this crazy journey with you people.”
“We will,” Daniel said with a weak smile. “A promise is a promise, Clover. We won’t go back on that.”
“What do you say, Doku?” Specca asked curiously.
“I’m not sure,” Doku hesitantly replied. “Such an idea as humans really loving us even though we’re monsters… it’s so hard to believe. And I did promise Cilia to help her find her home first, I feel like I need to honor that before doing anything else.”
“We can still look,” Cilia reasoned with a giggle. “Wherever they go we go, and wherever we go we can look for my home.”
“My home too, right?” Pip asked her.
“Of course, we have the same home.”
“Yay!” Pip cheered before they hugged each other.
“It appears Cilia wishes to stay with her new friend,” Kroanette mused with an amused smile at the two fairies. “Please don’t make Pip cry by taking her away now.”
Doku sighed as she watched Pip and Cilia giggling and holding each other then turned to Daniel with a worried frown.
“Do you honestly believe that things could change for my kind?” she asked while walking closer to him. “I want them to have great lives with real families, but I fear the humans won’t see that because of what we are. If I get my sister involved in this I could risk ruining everything for them. Promise me you won’t let us lose what we have now at the very least.”
“I promise, Doku,” he assured with a hand gently taking hold of her wing. “We’ll get my kind to treat yours with the respect and care you all deserve. With all of us making our voice in Rockhelm we’ll bring about great change, together.”
Doku slowly turned her head down towards his hand then around at the girls, all of them waiting for her answer while Cilia bobbed up and down energetically in her bosom.
“Well… I guess… if I won’t be a burden to you… and Cilia can play with Pip some more… maybe I could-”
“Oh my god, SHUT UP ALREADY!” Triska shouted out, with everyone looking to her in surprise while Doku squeaked and quickly clung to Daniel’s chest shaking in fear. A long while of silence passed as Triska froze in place with a stunned expression before she slowly looked around to seeing everyone staring at her in disbelief. Even Pip and Cilia popped their heads out from between Doku and Daniel to the side to look at her with curious eyes as Triska shook her head and hands before her with a nervous frown.
“I am so sorry,” she softly pleaded before looking down and holding her hands over her face. “I wasn’t talking to Doku, I was talking to her.”
Daniel shook his head at his mate while the other girls watched her with dull stares then looked down to see Doku trembling while keeping her face buried in his shirt.
“She wasn’t talking to you, Doku. Sorry about that.”
“Triska,” Specca sternly hushed. “Please keep your conversations with Kitten inside your head, especially when Daniel is brokering a peaceful truce with a monster race.”
“She won’t shut up,” Triska groaned while hitting her head.
“Now you know what we’ve gone through with you before,” Alyssa flatly reasoned.
Triska took a deep breath then looked towards Doku with remorse, seeing the harpy’s head turned slightly with one of her yellow eyes peeking out from under her bangs watching her nervously.
“I’m sorry. Please continue, Doku,” Triska insisted with a weak smile.
Doku shakily nodded then turned her head up towards Daniel while he gently held her by the wings.
“Okay. I’ll help you however I can. I hope I don’t disappoint you.”
“You won’t disappoint us, Doku. Thank you very much.”
“Can we get going now then?” Clover demanded with a loud groan. “You all can go to her hometown later, you still have to take me home first, remember? The sooner you take me home the sooner I can leave and be done with all this bullshit.”
“Believe us,” Specca dryly commented. “We want to get you home just as much if not more than you do.”
“What about our plans to go to Stonegate in search of Ember?” Kroanette asked looking to Alyssa. “We were about to set off in search of her before Kitten came along. Isn’t that our next priority?”
“Stonegate?” Doku squeaked. She quickly held her head against Daniel’s chest with a whimper as all eyes turned to her. “Why would you want to go to that dreadful place?”
“We don’t want to,” Daniel explained. “But we’re looking for someone special to Alyssa. Her daughter is somewhere in The Outerlands, and we think someone in Stonegate may have seen her or knows where she may be.”
“Your daughter?” Doku asked looking towards Alyssa.
“It’s a long story,” Alyssa softly said as she became worried about her missing daughter again. “But we have no leads as to where she is, and Stonegate is the best place where monsters might gossip about her. We were going to drop by and see if anyone knew where she was then get the hell out of that city as soon as we could. It’s the only place we know of to start looking for her.”
“Your daughter is missing? I’m sorry to hear that. How awful,” Doku sadly replied with a frown.
“I hope that bad witch didn’t get her,” Cilia worried while ducking down low into Doku’s bosom.
“Bad witch?” Specca repeated.
“Yes,” Doku answered, turning her head towards the horizon with a look of concern on her face. “Last night we were resting under a nice tree in the woods. It was so peaceful and quiet, but then she came through the area. Her and two others.”
“Others?” Triska asked. “There were more witches out there?”
“I believe they were. We saw such strange lights and objects flying about in the shadows. We didn’t see the other two clearly, only heard them shouting at the witch they were apparently after, but we did see her very well. She used her magic and destroyed everything around her, it was horrible. I remember the dying screams of the two girls that tried to fight her.” The group watched with remorse as Doku shuddered and lowered her head.
“I don’t know what they were fighting about, but I’m certain they didn’t have to die. I’ll never know who they were or their names, but I felt so bad for them. They sounded to be in so much pain, the poor dears.”
“Doku, I’m sorry,” Daniel gently said.
“A witch did that to them?” Falla questioned.
“Yes, we saw her,” Doku confirmed. “We saw her before we ran for our lives out of that forest. I don’t think she noticed us, at least she didn’t care to chase after us, she just… just…”
“Just what?” Luna worriedly asked with a frown.
“She burned everything down,” Doku remorsefully explained.
“Burned?” Triska carefully repeated.
“Fire was everywhere,” Cilia nervously recalled.
“Everywhere?” Pip asked softly.
“Everywhere. That bad witch was making everything burn around her. So much fire. So much fire.”
Slowly everyone turned to Alyssa as she stared at Doku with wide eyes.
“What did she look like?” Alyssa softly asked.
“She appeared like a young girl, as witches always do,” Doku answered while keeping her head lowered. “Bright orange hair, dark and scuffed clothing, and her face had a large scar on the right side. The poor thing, she was so angry about something, and she looked to have been through so much.”
“Oh my god,” Specca quietly said before Alyssa started to shake slightly, the witch dropping her staff and holding her hands over her mouth as her eyes started to water up.
“That’s Ember!” Kroanette exclaimed.
“What? That’s the one you’re searching for?” Doku asked looking around at the group.
“That’s her,” Triska said while stepping closer towards the harpy. “That’s Alyssa’s daughter.”
Chronicles of Eden - Act VII Page 23