by M E Wolf
A few experience a low state of being, and some rare ones experience a violent savage nature inside themselves usually brought on by some trauma that happened close to the first use of the herb. The second case is the reason for the cage. This day Alexandra will experience one of those two. The L’art’o before this day have never allowed a Dochani to partake in this event, and legendary tales of the times before the existence of the L’art’o mention it in their tales. It is said that one was transported to another time, and was found to be dead a month later with markings of an ancient beast that had devoured everything but his bones.
Alexandra waited while listening to the sounds of the elders, and then the savage priest, and his acolytes smoking the pipe in turn, and then the footsteps of an acolyte walking towards the cage that she was in far from where the others were smoking the pipe. A moment later and she could see the pipe being passed to her from above. She accepted the pipe, and smoked it for a long time, and passed it back to the acolyte. The last remaining light was taken away when the opening above was covered with more banana leaves, and then some dirt.
CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE
After a very long time she was running through the forest with the wind passing over her thick course hair that extended all over her entire body. At first she was thirsty, and just knew that there was water far off to her left. Judging by the amount of moisture she felt on her nose it had to be a lake, a fresh water lake.
Darting towards it she felt her powerful hind legs burn with the force of her run. Tire, she would not. Sense and feel this she could. The moon was high in the sky above the trees, and she raced it to the lake, howling all the way there. Fun, and free, without the hurt she felt in humanoid form she pranced, and danced about trying to catch her tail.
Lapping up the water in the lake, she could see her reflection. Alexandra had to be ten feet tall at the shoulder, covered in course hair from head to tail, black as the night sky, and crystal blue eyes with a long snout. The nails on her padded paws looked sharper, and larger than the grizzly bears that she had seen in the books she read in the town, Bannian.
Between fifteen hundred and ten thousand pounds she considered herself to weigh in this form, but with all the hair, and the fact that she was light on her feet made it hard for her to really tell. After drinking her fill, she felt hungry. Alexandra fed on the many animals that were no match for her hunting prowess. She practically swallowed them whole. Bones, fur, and clothing she ate without a care to what it could be as her hunger urged her on. It all did not seem to matter to her as she ate whatever was too close to her mouth. Blood dripped from her teeth as a strange energy flowed through her body and darkness was about.
CHAPTER THIRTY SIX
It was like an infinite number of tiny fingers were being passed over every inch of her flesh. Once her eyes adjusted to the lack of light the strange energy started to make her skin itch, and she could see sporadic lines of light in many shades of blue, green, and red bouncing from point to point in all directions imaginable, and unimaginable. The energy surpassed her being, and her essence in a realm of transcendence.
Small impulses of energy cascaded around her with the randomness, and look of lightening in a freak thunderstorm. One moment she was lying on the ground with these energies flowing through, and around her, and the next she was suspended in the air by these energies. This was a new experience to Alexandra and it made her feel strange. She was overwhelmed by the sensations that were caused in her flesh by these energies, and wondered if the smoking of the pipe caused them.
The sensations and lights did not last long. A moment after she was in the air with the lights, and lightening like effects there was a thunderous bang, and she fell to the marsh below. Alexandra looked around her, and noticed that she was no longer in the cage beneath the earth within the white circle adjacent to the tribesmen. She was not even on the planet Sevle anymore.
Gulping in some water she realized that she could not get to her feet due to her feet not touching bottom. It was at least twice as deep as she was tall, she surmised. Before she could sink further into the watery marsh, and take more water into her lungs she found that she would have to swim out of the marsh. Alexandra could not see the land that she desperately wanted to get to. Unfortunately, she never learned how to swim, and there was no time to learn now.
She never really had the opportunity to learn, and never had the need. Sure she read some books on the subject, but if her earlier experience with swimming failed so badly what was to say that this would not be the same. Since theory was the only information she had about swimming she would just have to try her best. It was so long ago or seemed so as every violation of her body felt like it took a hundred years off of her life.
Why does it feel so bad when there was no penetration, because I almost lost something so great so many times, and filthy hands touched, and violated everything else? Fight the fight until death, no surrender, and no retreat. The memory was so harsh it brought tears to her eyes, but within her was darkness brooding within shadows of her thoughts. Trying was the only thing that she could do at this moment.
She prayed, even this she was sketchy only because what was prayer if only it was to just ask for help hoping that there were no sharks in this place. The book regarding swimming she had read told her that the first thing in swimming was not to panic, and kick out with your legs like the frogs do. Alexandra did this, and to her amazement this action assisted her in keeping her head above the water in the marsh. The moment she stopped doing it she would start to sink, and thus came to the resolve to kick her feet out continuously.
A few times her head went under water, and in gasping for air she took in water, and that was when she realized that she had to do this kicking of the legs continuously until her head remained above the water consistently. Now that she was successful in keeping her head above water she had to figure out, or remember how to move across the marsh.
Alexandra did remember Gordon Hawthorn, the author of the swimming book, saying that in order to go forward she would lay on her stomach in the water while she kicked her feet, moved her head from side to side to breath, and swinging her slightly bent arms and hands over her head and into the water over and over again. He had said that that was the fastest, and best way to start swimming if you were in the middle of nowhere, and needed to get to dry land.
She tried this, and was happy that it was getting her across the marsh at an alarming rate. Alexandra found that she had to keep pace or sink, and was still sore from what had happened on Sevle to her. Every muscle in her body twitched with agony, and they were in the early stages of cramping. Rest was desperately needed, and she did not see it coming for a long time. The sun was bright, and shiny when she had started, but had long since gone down. It was now night-time and approaching the pitch-black of darkness. Her only guide was the light of the moon, she felt as though the moon was calling her for some reason, and even it looked to be going away soon.
A primal howl escaped her humanoid lips, which was more of a long whine even though her call was answered by many other disparaging howls possibly at the loss of the moon. She shivered, and continued swimming with tears in her eyes at the thought of what may be lurking within her being. Crying she was, but was too tired to realize, or even care why she was crying. It was cold, and wet, and Alexandra was really tired not only from swimming but also from her ordeal in the captivity of the tribesmen.
Knowing that she would die if she stopped she put her tiredness aside, and continued to swim towards a shore that at this point seemed to only be a dream. The sun came, and went too many times for Alexandra to count, and the moon came, and went as well. Each time the moon arose in the night sky she would howl to the point that she howled whenever the moon arrived on the scene without thinking or even subconsciously thinking it, she just did.
She continued to swim with only the fear of dying to sustain her. It helped that the water was fresh, and the grass, and lily pads were edible. Unfortun
ately, she had no time to sleep because sleep meant death. Thinking was impossible by the time she could see land so to swim, eat, and drink was all that she could do. Once on land her thoughts came flooding to her, and tiredness overcame her as she realized that she was swimming for the past fifteen years. She passed out shortly after she began walking, or stumbling, on the land.
CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN
Alexandra awoke in familiar surroundings. Opening her tired eyes she could see a young tribesman, and a shaman standing over her. The swimming was most likely a dream. Her muscles still ached fiercely, and she had some new muscles in places where she had no, or little muscles before, and she still had the taste of blood in her mouth from that nightmare before the dream took place.
Was it really a dream? It seemed so real to her. Her muscles were also very lean, and she was naked except for the thin linen shift she wore. Looking around she was in the tent that she had come to live in when she first came here.
“Alexandra we waited for you to ask us to let you out of the cage, but when we looked in it you were not there. You were somewhere we don’t know for at least fifteen years, and you have been asleep for about two years since we found you. Now that you are finally awake there are many chores that you must do before you will be allowed to partake in the next celebration which will take place six months from now.
“Judging by when you came to us seventeen years ago you looked twenty, it would be just after your thirty-seventh birthday right now. Even though you still look twenty, if not a fitter twenty than when you first came to us and that means that you have been gone for at least fifteen years, which is astronomical to say the least. You have a lot of catching up to do. This is Jentus he is one of my acolytes. He will show you what you must do. Go with him.”
Alexandra was puzzled about how she could have been away for fifteen years. That would account for her new size and it would also make her on her way to about three hundred and sixty-nine or more years old. She could not believe that she only had a strict diet of lily pads and water for the past fifteen or more years.
It would be hard to eat any flesh of any kind especially the flesh off of another Sevlin or even worse a Dochani like herself. Thinking about what would be in store for her for the next six months brought her back to reality and it was then that she realized Jentus was now shouting at her.
“Alexandra! Mutt! Maggot!”
“Oh! Uh! I am sorry, Jentus. What do you want?” Alexandra said with a smirk lined with a bit of bitterness from remembering what had happened to her on this planet via this tribe as though it was only yesterday.
What she said had come out more like a snarl than the bitterness that she felt right now. She bit her lip with a grimace to stop herself from crying. Her despair seemed to get to Jentus and his impatience at waiting for her melted from his face too quickly be replaced with shame.
Jentus sniffed the air between him and Alexandra, “The shaman had warned me of your stench, but all that I can smell is lilies and fresh pine cones. I do not understand how you got away with not doing any of the stuff that the typical slaves do and now they want me to train you to hunt. Their request for you not to wear clothes is pathetic.”
He reluctantly closed his gaping mouth when he had realized that he had left it open while he stared in her direction as though his eyes could move blankets.
“I am hard pressed with containing myself and I am sure that no one would do anything to me if I did lay hands on you, but that is not me and besides you are only what at least thirty nine and look twenty, too young for me. If it is hard for me being the most devout of the shaman’s professed acolytes it will be very hard for the others. I suppose that is the reason I was asked to train you.
“We will be away from the camp for the next six months in order to train you in the arts of hunting. Mind you, it won’t be till you earn that by real hunting that you will really become a hunter.”
Alexandra looked at Jentus and figured that he was about forty or older. For a Sevlin he was in good shape for that age,
“I was in another place far away from here. I think it was even another planet. I think I ate lily pads and drank fresh water all of the time I was there. I swam in a marsh most of the time that I was there. How old are you?”
Jentus had a perplexed look on his face as though he was bothered by his age being known and his brows were furrowed, his eyes were focused intently on Alexandra,
“Teleportation? Are you sure it was another planet? Or was it just another place on Sevle? I have heard that the other Dochani have experienced this, but they were found dead. How do you account for that?
“Are you sure it was not a dream despite smelling so nice? I am fifty-two, but what has my age to do with your training?” Jentus looked frustrated and angry like he needed to go to the washroom real bad.
“Jentus, it had to be teleportation. Of course it was another planet. Yes, I am a Dochani and I happen to still be alive, a real Dochani.”
She blurted out not meaning to mention the fact that she was a real Dochani.
“I just don’t know how to account for that. I don’t know how to account for much these days. My body is always sore inside and out and I just try to stay alive. Thank you for saying that I smell nice, but it was not a dream because I show all physical and mental signs that it was very real, as real as you and I talking or shouting here right now.
“You’re fifty-two and I am what I am. If I told you how old I was, you would not believe me because it seems, like all Sevlin, you have made up your mind already. Sometimes I don’t even believe it myself, but I am here. What was that crack about the ‘I am hard pressed with containing myself and I am sure that no one would do anything to me if I did lay hands on you, but that is not me and besides you are only what at least thirty-nine and look twenty, too young for me’ because I don’t like it?
“Are you not supposed to train me in hunting instead of looking at my body? And one thing, are you gay?” She turned her back to him and covered her face with both hands as she began to cry for the first time after what had happened.
Jentus stepped back just in time to let Alexandra’s hand fly by his face without making contact,
“Ah! Come on! I was not the one to do that stuff to you as I was away on a hunt. I was just trying to have some fun just now. Twenty is a fine age and some consider it to be when a girl is a woman, but I am fifty-two for crying out loud. In all appearances you look twenty even though you were here for five years, were gone fifteen years and slept for two years, which is twenty-two years. Thus a total of forty-two but I cannot see passed your gorgeous twenty year old body at this time, I am sorry. I cannot see enough woman in you at this time.
“Well, if you did not stop to talk to me, we could have been on our way already. Let’s go, we must get some equipment. We also need to get you some clothes and no I am not gay. Some here are, but not me. I prefer women, but will eat anyone regardless of their preference. You will be a hunter soon and hunters must wear clothing.”
CHAPTER THIRTY EIGHT
Alexandra and Jentus continued to talk as they walked. She did not pay any attention to where she was going and was only following Jentus with the thin blanket wrapped around her trying not to trip on the trailing end on the ground. She was aware of how the large trees were starting to block out the sky above. The intricate weave of the leaves of the trees, the wind blowing through her hair and walking through spider webs all intrigued her.
It was hard for her to explain why she loved nature so much, she just knew that she did. Looking up into the sky only made her long for the moon. Her mouth watered and her tongue licked her lips of their own accord within the moment she had glanced at the moon and she did not notice, but Jentus did. He tried to ignore it, but it was hard for him to do so.
Having a spider web sticking to her flesh and getting intermeshed with her hair made her feel good that she was alive. The feeling of sand and mud between each and every one of her toes was phantasmal fo
r her and gave her a strange feeling of oneness with the ground beneath her feet. It also helped her stay fused with reality. Reality to her was that which was real or had the effects of what was real. Lately she was not sure of her surroundings and smoking that pipe did not help matters much.
CHAPTER THIRTY NINE
After walking with Jentus through the trails, over mountains and hills and going passed many types of very tall trees they stopped at a building. The building had a roof of wooden shingles that looked like it had seen much better days. Wooden shingles looked to be rotting and some were missing. A strange moss was growing on the walls and various places on the roof.
The door of the building looked new and so did the sign above it, which read “Hunter’s Tackle and Garb”. Jentus turned to Alexandra and spoke,
“Alexandra, this is where we will get our equipment and some clothes for yourself. Every once in a while we will have to come back for more equipment. For now we will get you the basic equipment. I will be using equipment that is different from yours, but don’t worry because what I give you will be sufficient as it will be your first time hunting.
“I will teach you the basics of the sword and hand axe as well. We hunters need to defend what we hunt. By the time that we are done you should be able to forage, hunt and defend yourself efficiently. We should also have a successful hunt to provide for the ceremonies of your becoming a hunter. It would look good for your transition from being a slave to being a hunter.”
Alexandra was happy, for once in the last twenty-two years, that she would be able to defend herself and hunt for her own food by the time that the celebration and the smoking of the pipe came about. She wondered how she would feel wearing clothes after such a long time of not wearing any. It would probably feel strange and uncomfortable, but at least the males of whatever society she was in would not be looking at her in strange ways that they often did.