I see you, Tsu'tey

Chapter 38

Awa had no idea why she had been forced to come on this cursed hunting trip, much less why she had to be stuck to Tsu'tey on top of that. The wind was howling and the rain came down hard on the two, less than pleased, hunters. Awa who flinched at his every move and Tsu'tey who had more respect for maggots than he did her, or so she imagined at least. It was difficult to even try to force herself to imagine he held even a shred of respect for her with the way he kept on sneering and glaring at her. This hunting trip was doomed from the start.

The day's target had been a group of talioang - sturm beasts. Tsu'tey and her would be tracking the herd from one side, and the two other groups of hunters would be tracking two other herds. It was never a certainty that each group would bring anything back to the clan but it was a shared honor.

The two had been walking in tense silence for ten minutes with only the sounds of the forest around them and the heavy thuds from Awa's feet, breaking it up. She could count on one hand the number of times the two of them had been alone. Truly alone, and it never ended well when they were. Despite Atxa and Ngeha's speeches and scoldings, Awa struggled to not take Tsu'tey's harsh words personally. Dreamwalker or not, he had no right to treat her that way and she was tired of everyone trying to convince her just to take it - that he had a right to say what he wanted and do what he wanted and she was expected to keep a smile on her face and somehow convince him not to hate her. She was sick of it and she was tired of pretending like she wasn't.

It wasn't often that Awa wished she was anywhere but in the luscious forests of Pandora, but as her foot sunk into a deep, wet puddle of mudd she wished she was back at base, cuddled into a warm blanket, sipping on a mug of hot chocolate.

"Are you sure this is the right way?" She sighed.

Tsu'tey scoffed but kept on walking, mumbling curses under his breath.

"Are we doing this again? The silent treatment?"

"Kehe!" Tsu'tey snarled, twirling around to face her, his face twisted into anger. "You will scare the prey, dreamwalker."

Awa stared at him mutely for a minute before nodding , "right."

Once more, she cursed Atxa for leaving her, again. He knew she wasn't ready, and at this point Awa was half-convinced she accidentally offended him somehow and him leaving her with Tsu'tey was his twisted revenge.

There was a roar in the distance, too far to really tell what animal but too close for comfort. Not only were animals on Pandora big but the predators were also fast, particularly the palulukan. Any animal that put that much terror in the hearts of the natives was a nightmare in her eyes.

"I could swear that we've been here before," she mumbled, kicking a rock. "The tracks are gone, Tsu'tey. Maybe we should head back?"

He shook his head. "There's still time."

The green colors of Pandora slowly shifted to purple and blues as the sun went down. They were a couple of hours into the hunt but there still wasn't any sign of the prey, and Awa had a guess the reason for that was that Tsu'tey wasn't going to admit to her or him that he got distracted and lost the trail. She knew they weren't lost and that Tsu'tey could find the hometree even with his eyes closed, but being out in the forest during the night like this made her nervous. She wasn't a warrior like him, she barely knew anything practical about Pandora beyond what books could teach her, and maybe that's where it all went wrong. Her arrogance was what got her in trouble - maybe she didn't know as much as she thought she did.