Kingdom of Monsters - Empire of Sand Series

Chapter 1.4

The babe began crying again, and this time, her mother didn't hush it. Her relatives cried too:

"Where are we going?" Lunsa's aunt.

"Twin Rivers will not turn us away. We have living kin." A quavering uncle.

"So far?!"

"Twin Rivers is down King's River Road, behind the army!" Another aunt.

"We must run away, like Deep Riverbend," an old uncle said. "Follow them across the Stone Bridge, turn away from Blue Fin, and descend to Twin Rivers on the sunrise bank."

The elder listened while the villagers argued. Twin Rivers was far, half a moon's distance at a healthy young woman's jog straight down King's River Road, and nearly twice that far if they started their journey traveling to the Stone Bridge, away from it.

But the Deep Riverbend tribe passed before them like ghostly shadows, silent but for their labored breathing.

They had no choice.

"Blue Fin will never let us rest or hunt on their lands," an aunt repeated for a third time.

Lunsa's elder tapped his walking stick against the Hollow Tree, silencing them.

"Catastrophe forced our greatest-grandmother-ka from her rich homeland to begin anew at this blessed place." He patted the Hollow Tree, symbol of their flourishing rebirth. "Now, the kannen-a of our ancestors once more guide us from undeserved danger to a place of grander bounty. Once more, we shall replant ourselves and thrive."

He raised his staff. His solemn eyes landed on each of them, darkly shadowed in the purpling twilight, filling them with the strength of the Hollow Tree. "Let these old feet lead you to our new resting place. My tribe, follow your elder."

He struck off, intermingling with the Deep Riverbend tribe.

The rest of Lunsa's kin lingered around the Hollow Tree, speaking quietly, crying.

"Follow," the elder's call echoed. "The demon's fury arrives."

They scattered.

Children climbed the Hollow Tree and shook out the surprised compandas, stuffing the sleepy babies into travel bags and hanging the adults from every pack and person. Teens uprooted squash sprouts and half-smoked meats in the swiftly falling darkness, balled roots into blankets, lashed tools to bony bucardos, and herded shrieking peccari piglets. The adults gathered together their children, their blankets, their cooking pots, and their sacred carven ancestors' boxes. Torch stakes lit the night with unnatural desperation.

Lunsa rushed through her family's house, pulling out her old boots and throwing them back, tossing her mother-ka's bone pin into the bag and pulling it out again. Although she was lucky to have prepared for leaving, she had packed with the intention of returning. Exodus meant that whatever she left would be gone forever. She debated taking her grandmother-ka's wedding feathers, a fragile headdress made of delicate tiger-bird and iridescent blue morning-bird down. Her sister had left it for Lunsa to safeguard, believing it would not survive the journey. Lunsa wrapped it between her soft leather festival sash, the delicate bone beads tangling in the feathers.

Her companda watched from the rafters as she kissed her father-ka's strong posts and her mother-ka's faithful cauldron and her grandmother-ka's carven brazier.

Outside, the cries of her kin quieted as they obeyed their elder's sacred order, and the passing torch-stakes threw monstrous shadows up the walls.

Lunsa held out her arms for Asnul and made the kiss sound.

He watched her, unmoving, his eyes oddly yellow, his little body scrunched into the tightest roof corner.

"Asnul," she ordered softly, "come down."

He clung harder to the beams.

Fear sucked her breath. "Come!"

He blinked. The tremble in her arms and the shaking of her hands made him turn his face away.

She took a deep breath. Her heart did not wish to leave this place, and her companda always obeyed her heart. She called on her totem, the mouse sparrow, whose tiny beak separated the healthful seed from the poisonous bellflower, and she held out her arms again. "Asnul Al-Ansa Xi Heshnul San Ze, come to me now."

Summoned by the force of his true name,compelled by the gods and the spirits to answer, he fell into her arms. She hugged him tight and carried him from her house for the last time. They did not look back.