A girl with short, blond hair stands in a forest surrounded by tall trees. Her hair is layered, leaving the top part blond. A strip on the left, equal to the right, is Grey; the back underneath the blond is black. Her eyes are dark slits and her mouth is small, I guess she's agitated. She has no pointy ears so she isn't an elf, nor a Reynard neko like me. That only leaves one answer to what she is.
This girl is a human.
But even for a human, she dresses funny. She wears brown shoes and jeans that go from black at the top then fade to white at the bottom. She wears a white belt, and has a white shirt-maybe long sleeve, hard to tell- that is cut off on the bottom at an odd angle. Even from here I can see her belly button. From her elbow to her wrist is wrapped in this cloth-type thing. And finally around her neck is a scarf of dark red that reminds me of the blood that flows out of a newly made gash in a rabbit who is taking it's last breath.
Okay, bad metaphor, but I'm getting better at it. A few yards away is where I have hidden in a large patch of berry bushes. The berries are poisonous to us nekos, but only if we eat them. I was hunting a rabbit and lost it when she showed up pulling this brown thing with her. It looks like her, with two arms and two legs, but it wears no clothes. The head is just a ball of old cloth wrapped tight over something that smells like wet leaves. She had put it on a stand and started hitting it with these balls of flames. My eyes widened at the balls of light that had appeared out of nowhere. I just want to touch one, but my gut tells me not to, so I don't.
The girl steps back to look at her handiwork, flames bouncing around on the palm of her hand. I move slightly, shifting my weight a little and move a little closer. She didn't seem to hear me. Good. The human-doll-thing is a smoking thing that smells now like a birds nest caught in a forest fire. I pull my leg up and flick my ear, listening more intently now. It amazes me how much this girl is fascinating. And knowing that I come from a different race than her makes it all the more fun to watch.
I take another step forward and she turns in my direction. I freeze and stare at her, watching the fire change color to a deep purple that hurts my eyes.
Her gaze seems to freeze over and I feel cold lick up the back of my pelt.
"Whose there? Show yourself!" I freak out, not sure what to do and the flame starts to pulse.
"Now!" the word is harsh and loud and makes me cringe. I lay my ears back flat and back away whimpering. The girl takes a step back before cautiously coming forward. The flame starts to diminish and I scramble to keep the distance the same, running to hide behind a tree.
Terror fills me and I start to shake. I don't know why but the way she looks terrifies me and all I want to do is get away. She's like a predator who found its prey. I hear a gasp and peek out to see her staring straight at me. I blush.
My voice quavers as I speak, "W-what do you want?"
She edges closer and I move back. The girl smirks and that starts to scare me even more, the fire finally dispersed, but that doesn't mean she can't bring it up at a moments notice. Only now do I realize that her eyes are amused and she chuckles.
"Are you trying to play hooky with me?"
"What is hooky?"
"Its kind of like hide and seek."
"Hide...and seek?" It is so hard to understand what she's saying. It sounds like "hayde un seak".
"yeah," she nods, "One person hides and the other tries to find them."
What she says finally clicks and I smile a little at her, remembering something similar to this game of 'hooky' which is like 'hide and seek'.
"So...it's like fox and rabbit?"
The girl gives me a blank look and I sigh, "I guess I can explain... the fox sniffs and tries to find the rabbit. When we do, we get to take it home and eat it...I was...you know.." I clear my throat and hope she understands what I'm trying to say.
When she doesn't say anything in reply, I continue, "We hunt the rabbits and fish for food. They run and hide and we have to get them by sniffing them out."
YOU ARE READING
The Reynard
FantasíaLets see... This one is about a Reynard neko who encounters a human with incredible skill. But with the trouble of his kin being on the brink of war with the elves, will this mysterious human become his closest ally or his worst enemy?
