Dryad

Herd

The forest became darker and obscured from most of the daylight. The centaur lowered me to the ground and let me regain my composure, although I noticed that he was looking at me as if he was ready to grab me at any moment if I tried to escape. He said something and seemed to expect some kind of answer from me, but my lack of talkativeness only made him nervous:

-You don't speak our language?-obviously, but continue:

-The fairy addresses you as a human. They rarely, if ever, come here. Most don't live long enough to find out much about us.-well I'm glad to hear that.

I shrugged my shoulders at his question. It's certainly awkward to explain my situation to him without my voice and my translator, and it should also be taken into account how terrified I am right now:

-Are you talking at all?-as if he is nervous about my lack of reaction, although I'm sure he's pleased with the fact that the abducted person isn't swearing at him for a change and yelling at him for his lack of manners.

The trampling of other horses made me even more worried. That's the herd I've been missing. A few centaurs appeared and everyone was curious to see what the blonde savage had brought with him, but he stood in front of me and wouldn't let them get close. After all, I am his catch.

One of them stood out from the herd - the biggest one, and it seems to me the oldest one, with a dark gray background and white spots. Why does he look so angry? Furious horses are dangerous, especially when they carry weapons. They only exchanged a few words, which after a few moments turned into a very loud exchange of informations. I got scared and tried to stay behind the young centaur who was persistently trying to chase the older one away from me.

I really thought they were gonna kill each other, and right now I can't lose the only person I know that understands my language and can take me back. I took one of the apples hidden in the pot and threw it at the older centaur's head, which stopped him for a moment and confused him, but also angered him, and I got questioning and horrified looks from the others:

-What's the matter with you?!-the blond one addressed me:

-You want to die?!-I wish I could, but something doesn't let me die.

The older centaur shook his head – he got through without any harm, but it's not up to him to forgive me for this kind of attack and now it's up to me to take the beating. I stood by the centaur's front legs, hoping that it would somehow help me (although I'm sure he would give us both a beating, so there's not much hope in that) and just waited to see what would happen.

Suddenly, a child's voice was heard and a small gray centaur jumped from somewhere and crawled under the older centaur's feet, preventing him from walking. Only his head and front came out of cover and stared at me full of curiosity. They exchanged a short conversation that didn't specifically calm down the big angry savage, if anything it seems worse to me, but it was as if he had given up the attack anyway:

-You will survive. Surprisingly. Apparently now we tolerate violence from other people's side as well.-so much surprise in his voice with a hint of relief because he will not take away his hard-earned goods:

-But at least this time the little brat served something.-someone doesn't like children.

The other centaurs retreated although I could see that there were those who wanted to come closer to me, but nothing came of it. The blonde kept me to himself and waited for the others to leave before we followed them:

-You will be safe with us. We will take care of you. Klarissa, is it?-I shook my head, still scared:

-Horace. Just stay close to me and you won't have any problems with others. Except maybe with a little savage. Life is easy when your father is the head of the herd.-I feel jealousy.