Seeking Salvation

White Woman

What had started as a mere myth and a rumor, grew into something so much more. And it all started so tragically.

Through the jungles and the shrubbery of their Hunting World, where the mighty warriors dropped off their prey to hunt them for trophy and sport, one of their own had been severely wounded by the creatures they were hunting and had managed to stumble through the greenery and find a river.

With labored breath and pain that was almost unbearable, the warrior continued to lumber precariously forward before collapsing upon the smooth rocks of the river's bed and laid there. Its blood slowly seeped into the water as it hissed slowly and closed its eyes, unwilling to take such a dishonorable death.

It laid upon the ground, a warrior revered for its hunting and quickness, slowly ebbing away from blood loss and the deep gashes upon its arms and chest. The sun was high and it closed its eyes against the rays, taking off its helmet and pulled it off of its face to reveal another deep wound upon its head.

And just when the creature thought it was time- that's when the 'deity' appeared, silent and curious as to why perhaps a warrior laid upon the river bank from which it procured its water. Slowly, the warrior opened its eyes and looked up to see a figure looking down on it. But the warrior did not have the strength to move and just stared up at the clear eyes staring back.

The figure moved and knelt to the warrior's side, upon the riverbank, and next to the river. Glimmering white hair danced on the window around tan skin before the figure broke eye-contact and began to fill small containers with water; seemingly unfazed by a dying warrior. And the hunter watched as this being turned to him and began to pour the water of the river into his wounds. Rinsing them of dirt and grime and his own blood, one by one, working up from the bottoms of his feet and stopping at his neck.

They produced a small container from somewhere, filled with a white substance and the hunter hissed warningly at the figure but they put some of the substance in their palm and began to mix it with the river's clean water. The Figure paused long enough to push his wounded leg back onto the bank and out of the stream, then took their free hand and took small amounts of the white glob of mush in their other tanned palm; then slowly dabbed the substance into every wound, just enough to cover it.

The Hunter sat up and growled before the figure pushed them back down with an elbow to make them lay down. The warrior did so and watched as the figure continued to push the white substance into the Warrior's wounds- all but the one upon their head. And the bleeding stopped. And the white substance pulled their gashes together. The figure placed the glop of white on the warrior's chest, upon his armor then washed their hands in the river's water before lifting up a container of said water. With gentle hands, they shielded the hunter's eye closest to his head wound and washed out that wound too, before setting the container down and using their spare hand to push the mush into their head gash, pushing it deep as the warrior growled and tried to focus not on the pain.

The Hunter focused on the softness of the hands. The gentle and almost non-existent touch. And the quickness. But he laid still as they took the glob and put it into the empty water container the Figure had, who got up a moment. As the Warrior's vision began to flicker in and out, the Figure lifted him up by the shoulders before kneeling and laid the Hunter's head in their lap to give them some comfort. Their fingertips soothingly stroking the warrior's head as it drifted off to, perhaps, it's final slumber.

But it awoke, many hours later, as the suns began to set. Alive and well, if not fatigued greatly, and his head still in the figure's lap, who watched him silently. The Hunter sat up slowly and the Figure watched, as he checked his wounds. The strange white substance had pulled many of his wounds almost completely closed, leaving very faint traces of its existence visible. The running of his fingers over his head proved this, as his large head wound was now just a bit larger than his fingertip, which the hunter double-checked in the river's crystal-clear reflective surface. The Hunter turned to the Figure, seeing now it was a woman.