Whistle of Death

Samira

MENTIONS OF RAPE AND KIDNAPPING // PROCEED WITH CAUTION

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The rain hadn't stopped for days. The Southern Isles intense heat coupled with the torrential downpour created a very humid environment, perfect for the dry skinned beasts to the east but not for me. This weather was miserable.

I hadn't been able to properly train in days and I could practically feel my muscles shrinking with each passing minute. I was itching to get back to the dunes, back to my future. The sparse shrubbery covering the Southern Isles had become waterlogged, weighed down by the heavy onslaught of rain, and seemed to almost shrink under the incessant water pelting them from all directions. In this aspect I related to the drastic change the flora was undergoing at that moment.

Six years ago, my family was brutally slaughtered by the man who would eventually become known as the King's Taruk, and since that day I have been training every waking moment until I can exact my revenge. It did not bring joy to my ears when I heard that the Savage King had met his lonely demise, in fact I felt quite the opposite. Pure unbridled rage filled my heart during those few days after the King's death for I knew that the only man who had any claim to the throne was the very one that murdered my family. The pit in my heart only grew deeper as the people of Thetis celebrated this monster, naming him their Kvaltar and flocking behind him like a herd of helpless lambs.

I wanted to scream from the peaks in the north of all the atrocities committed by this sorry sack of skin that had the audacity to name himself the new King, but I held my tongue. To this man I was long dead along with the rest of my family, buried six feet beneath the sand, and I wanted him to keep believing that lie.

My family had once been a great clan, the Tybir they called us: Tamers of Beasts and all living creatures. We lived peacefully, coexisting with the humans and animals of the south, before the Savage King made my father bend the knee and pledge loyalty. The agreement was that our clan would provide tamed beasts for the capitol to use against rioters and vulnerable cities alike in return for a meager salary of food and protection, not that we needed any sort of protection.

We endured the King's cruel demands for the first three years he was in power, but it was not long before my father had had enough. He was barely able to provide for the family with every able-bodied beast being sent to the King's fortress, so during a secret family council held amongst the three clan elders the decision to uproot the clan and disappear was made.

The plan had almost come to fruition when the members of the family still loyal to the King betrayed the trust of their blood kin. It was not long before the thunder of hooves shook the Southern Isles and the King tore apart our lives. Those who betrayed us in the hopes of gaining the King's favor met the same fate as the rest of the Tybir clan, for there was no room for those who would betray their brothers in the Savage King's army. This one principle had always stood out to me as the King's only good quality.

My father held me in his arms as he passed on to the next realm, the only thing keeping me alive were the cork plugs he had shoved into my ears. I could not hear therefore I was spared from the reaper's clutch. I watched as Tariq, the target of all my ill will, walked calmly across our land, his lips pursed and his eyes void of emotion. The bodies of all those I held dear fell limp around him and as my father fell I went down with him. The sand cocooned me in a warm embrace that day as the love from my father's embrace slowly seeped out into the earth.

I had heard tales of Death's Whistler, but never before had I seen him in person. If I had met Tariq under different circumstances I might've thought him to be beautiful. He had very distinct features, a face one could not easily forget with his high cheekbones and sharp jaw. His eyes were a piercing stormy blue, like the waves that crashed against the cliff edges a little further south than the dunes, and his skin was a deep tawny brown like the flight feathers of an owl. He wore an expressionless mask but I could've sworn I saw the ghost of a smile dancing at the corner of his lips.