Chapter 4: Veseed

Well, it turned out that being stuck without any clothes to wear didn't take as much adjusting as I expected. When I woke up the following morning, the first thing I did was reach for my pants like I always did, before remembering that they were gone. I grimaced a little, but hey, I went fine without my clothes last night, so I got up and went out to face the day.

My discomfort pretty much ended there. I'd always expected to feel really embarrassed walking around naked in front of people, but somehow when everyone else is naked too and nobody is looking at you any differently because of it, all the sense of taboo just kind of bleeds away. It only took me about a day to generally stop thinking about it, and by the time another week had passed, I might as well have forgotten that anything called "clothes" existed at all. Going without my shoes took a little longer to get used to, though. Tramping around in the woods with bare feet wasn't the most pleasant thing in the world, but once my nicks and scratches healed and the bottoms of my feet toughened up I stopped minding so much.

I also soon found out that run-ins with things like churudi and krevasha on the hunts weren't all that common. Most of the time the hunts were pretty uneventful. Some days we'd find nothing at all; other days we'd come back with a large deer-thing or a few birds, or maybe some small mammals. Naturally, Shimara kept us up with our training to keep us sharp, and we always stayed on guard in the forest for anything that was higher on the food chain than us. And yet day after day we entered the forest and left without incident.

I began to wonder why this was, and for that matter, why the people didn't seem more worried about some of the things crossing the bridge into the village. As they explained it to me, most of the really dangerous things that lived in the forest tended to keep to the deep woods. Most things like churudi preferred to go for weak and vulnerable prey, and shied away from targets that could fight back. So as long as you weren't alone or unarmed, they usually left you alone. And as for crossing the bridge, they usually hunted in small packs and were smart enough to know that they'd be vastly outnumbered if they dared venture into the village.

As for krevasha, they preferred to keep to trees or underground caves; they didn't seem to like being exposed. And the trees they stuck to had to be big and sturdy enough to support their weight, which I hardly need to say at this point was considerable. Encounters with them were actually pretty rare. I would've expected there to be more of them than the people I asked about it seemed to suggest. I couldn't see something like that having a lot of natural enemies, so one would think they'd be able to populate more than they seemed to. The villagers didn't have much of an explanation for that, because nobody who'd tried to study and learn about them had lived to report their findings. If you were unlucky enough to run into one, your choices pretty much boiled down to fight, flee, or die bloody.

There were other things out there I hadn't seen yet that had to be watched out for, which the villagers told me had similar reasons for staying clear of the village. They still kept guards on watch near the bridge at night in case some churudi or something got bold and tried to go after some helpless villagers while they slept, but for the most part the village remained a monster-free zone.

One thing I still had to deal with was figuring out how I was going to get back at Shimara for burning my clothes. Of course, like I said, living without them wasn't so bad once I got used to it, but the last thing I wanted Shimara to think was that I was a wimp who wouldn't follow through on his promises. And I had promised, however nonverbally, that I was going to get her back for that.

Fortunately I didn't have to work on this problem alone. When Tekia found out that I was looking for a way to give Shimara a little payback, she seemed all too eager to help. A little overeager in fact, if I may be perfectly honest. And it didn't take long for her to pull Jazum into the plot as well. Apparently I wasn't the only one who thought the hard-assed Kemkuva needed to be brought down a peg or two.

Jazum was ultimately the one who came up with our big revenge plan. Shimara's house was one of the few in the village that had two stories all to itself, with doors both on ground level and on the upper level where all the elevated walkways were. It was a special house that came with her big job, and one of her special amenities was her own private little kitchen, which was why she didn't often join in the communal eating that most of the villagers shared. Part of her everyday morning routine involved an herbal tea that she prepared herself with herbs she always set out the night before. And as Jazum pointed out, this constituted a wonderful opportunity to give her a nasty surprise.

I was a little nervous about trying to sneak into her house and plant the surprise without waking her up; I could only imagine what she'd do if she caught me. Not to mention it was dark, and I wasn't really familiar with the layout of the place. The good news was that she slept upstairs, and her little kitchen was downstairs, so that simplified things a bit. The important thing was that I did find what I was looking for, made my swap and got out undetected.

Tekia had to wake me up a little earlier than I was used to in order to see the fruits of our efforts, so I was a little bleary when the three of us stood in front of her house. But the sight of Shimara suddenly bolting out of her house, choking and gasping on the so-called "burning leaves" I'd laid out in place of her regular tea leaves was totally worth it. And the way she glared daggers at Tekia, Jazum and me when she saw us standing there laughing at her just made it that much more satisfying.

Of course, Shimara wasn't one to back down. She immediately started riding me even harder in the training yard, and I started walking away in the afternoons with even more bruises than before. I eventually made her regret her fondness for using her practice staff when I coated it in some liquid adhesive one morning. The look on her face when she discovered her sparring weapon was stuck to her hands was absolutely priceless. Then she swung it at my head. I don't remember anything after that.

About two weeks after I started going on the hunts I made my first intentional kill. We were peering through the bushes at another one of those deer-things (which I'd learned were called pravak) as it munched on some leaves. One of the archers started taking aim at it, but Tekia put a hand on his arm to stop him, and nodded to me, indicating that I should take this one.

I looked back and forth between her and the animal, held back by uncertainty. But at her look of encouragement, I finally accepted. I raised my spear, making use of the careful aim I'd developed throwing spears at targets on the training yard. I took my time, waiting for my moment ... actually, I was still hesitating. Seconds ticked by while doubts held my hand immobile.

And then the pravak lifted its head, sensing danger.

My hesitation vanished. Before the animal could make a run for it, I chucked the deadly shaft. The animal had time to begin a running motion, but it was too little, too late.

I blinked, not fully able to accept that I'd just done that, but the next thing I knew the animal was writhing on the ground, trying in vain to get to its feet, fully impaled on the shaft of my spear. It was hard to feel any kind of accomplishment; all I could really feel as we stepped out of the bush was pity for the poor dying creature. But Shimara would allow no time for pity. "Hadas," she commanded, telling me to finish it.

Gulping down the lump in my throat, I drew my knife and stepped up to the squirming beast. I knelt down, seeing its eye looking up at me, pleading with the soft heart that civilization had fostered in me my whole life. But after a moment, I realized it was pleading with me to end its suffering. It was a plea I couldn't ignore. I bit my lip, and closing my eyes, I plunged my knife into where I think its heart was.

As soon as I felt my knife break through its flesh and pierce an organ, something inside me seemed to break with it. I was one person when I'd closed my eyes just then, but it was someone else who opened them. All the pity and guilt I'd felt just a few seconds ago had vanished. I withdrew my knife, and stood, holding it in front of me, watching the blood slowly run down the blade and drip onto my hand. I dipped a couple fingers into the blood and then made a fist. And feeling the blood of my kill running through my fingers, I knew that the hunter I had never known was in me had been irrevocably awakened, and the slacker that had spent his days on the couch scarfing microwaved pizza was dead.

Opening my bloody palm, I turned to see Tekia stepping up to me. Without either of us saying a word, I could tell she knew exactly what I was thinking. It was a feeling she had known before. She took my bloody hand in her own in a comradely power grip. We locked eyes, relishing the shared feel of our prey's blood between our fingers. We were hunters joined in the blood of the kill, and more than ever, we knew each other.

The mood in the village that night was one of celebration at my accomplishment, even more so than when I killed the krevasha. In a way I had completed a rite of passage, one that not even Shimara could in good conscience deny. Kezalo himself stepped forward to congratulate me personally. And more so than she had in weeks, Heleen seemed genuinely happy for me. I could tell that something was still bothering her, but the smile she gave me that night didn't feel so forced, and she was delighted to share the meat of my kill.

Still, I couldn't help feeling the dark cloud that Heleen was still carrying around her. I'd managed to avoid thinking about it too much, as she did her best to remain friendly with me, and I was spending more time with the other hunters. But the more time that passed, the more I felt agitated by the nagging wonder of what I'd done to earn her forced courtesy and fake smiles. I'd been living in Jivalika for two months by now, and I was finally starting to get comfortable with it, but I missed the Heleen I knew during my first month there. The one who would wake me up with a smile every morning. The one who would giggle at my bad pronunciation of Azakosian. The one who would hold my hand while we toured the village. Where had she gone?

Days later I finally found out. I remember it was one of those days when Shimara gave my hunting party the day off. On the outskirts of the village was a small waterfall that formed a little pool before feeding off to the river. It was a favorite spot of relaxation among the villagers, especially the children, and several of us were kicking back by it that day. There were plenty of children happily splashing around in the water, and Zeyla was showing off all the water tricks she knew for me, constantly trying to get my attention. Rokina, meanwhile, was sitting in the grass under the shade of a tree with four of her friends, including two boys whom I'd seen her with quite frequently. I'd been getting the impression that she was interested in one of them, but couldn't decide which one.

I sat on the edge and dangled my feet in the water while I watched Zeyla show off and Tekia swim beneath the surface, occasionally beckoning me to come in when she came up for air. For the moment I was comfortable where I was, and besides, I'd never been much of a swimmer. Meanwhile, Heleen knelt by the edge across the pool from me, absently swirling her fingers about in the water. I looked at her, thinking she seemed like she had something on her mind, and it was taking up a lot of space in her head.

"Clay! You look!" Zeyla called.

"I see you, Zeyla," I said, though if you asked me now I couldn't tell you what trick she was showing off for me right then. My attention was fixed on Heleen.

She finally noticed me looking at her and raised her eyes to meet mine, granting me a weak but genuine smile. I searched for something to say to her, and just had some words that I now can't remember on the tip of my tongue, but before I could get them out a shape exploded up out of the water in front of me, and Tekia threw her arms about me and yanked me yelping into the water with her. I came up sputtering, and found Tekia grinning wickedly at me as she held her head above the surface.

"That was a dirty trick," I chided her, though not without a playful smile of my own.

"Dirty?" she repeated. And after only a moment's pause she shoved a great splash of water over me. "You clean now."

"I'll clean you!" I shouted as I attempted to swim up and tackle her. But of course, like I said, swimming + me = not great. Tekia swam backward, laughing at my ineffectual lunges and grabs at empty water, through which I succeeded in not much more than just splashing a lot.

When I finally gave up trying, she floated there looking at me, raising her eyebrows as if to say, "Well? I'm waiting." So I just splashed her.

She squealed in surprise and splashed me back. And then I guess we were both seven years old again, having a splashing war. Then I felt an additional splash from behind me. I turned and saw Zeyla floating there, grinning proudly at the sneak attack she had gotten in. Fortunately for me, she was close enough that I didn't have to swim to get at her. I lunged and grabbed the little girl and lifted her squealing and kicking into the air, before throwing her into the water with a big SPLOOSH in front of Tekia, who shielded herself from the sudden spray while laughing hysterically.

As we all had a good laugh, I turned to look to Heleen to see if she was laughing with us—and found she was gone. My mirthful mood evaporated in an instant, and I quickly clambered up onto the shore and looked around, trying to determine where she'd gone. I'm not sure why; I mean, there was nothing particularly pressing, and I don't think I was especially worried about her or anything like that, but I just felt it was somehow important at that moment that I knew where she'd run off to. When I didn't see her, I turned back to everyone else and said, "Where's Heleen?" before amending, "Uh... Heleen ko?"

Jazum had seen her get up and walk off in a direction he pointed; he didn't see where she went after that. I offered him a quick "Valesa" as I hurried off in that direction.

It definitely took me a while to find her, as I headed into a dense maze of trees and plants. A few times I was afraid I'd gotten lost before spotting the edges of the village in the distance. But ultimately, find her I did. She was seated on a large moss-covered root with her back against the cushion of moss on the tree, her head hanging down, her knees up.

"Heleen?"

She lifted her head, showing me the pitiful look on her face. "Please, I want to be alone," she said, before her head drooped back down.

I had just about had enough of this. "Alright, what's with you?" I snapped, perhaps a little more vehemently than I meant to. "Ever since I started going on the hunts, it's like you've been only half there for me, giving me all these forced courtesies and fake smiles, and I'm sick of it! It's like I don't even know you anymore! What the hell is going on with you?"

Her only response, after a few seconds' pause, was to suddenly burst into tears. I immediately regretted my words, and dropped to my knees to look her in the face. "God, I'm sorry," I said, and attempted to take her into an embrace, but she pulled away from me. I sighed, and said, "Can you please just tell me why you've been so distant?"

Sniffling, she finally looked back at me. After a few moments of blinking tears from her eyes, she finally gave the hesitant answer, "Because ... I am afraid."

"Afraid of what?"

She paused again, trying to summon up her words through whatever was in the way of them. "Every time you go into the forest, I am afraid you will not come back."

I stopped to let that sink in. She'd been distant from me all this time out of fear for my safety? I didn't know what to say. If I'd had any idea she was that worried about me...

"Heleen, I know the woods are dangerous. Tekia and Jazum and the others face that danger almost every day, and it's my choice to face it with them. But that means I have all of them watching my back, so—"

"It is not only that," she cut me off.

"Well then what?"

This time it took her longer to get it out. "I ... I am afraid ... you will find what you seek."

"What? What do you mean?"

"A way to your home. When you enter the forest, I fear you will find a way to return to the place you came from, and you will disappear from us. From me. I am afraid you will leave me."

And as soon as those words left her mouth, she let loose the torrent of tears she'd been holding back in order to say that. I was stunned speechless. I simply stared at her, sitting in front of me, crying her heart out...

It was official. I was in love.

I leaned forward, gently taking hold of her shoulders. As she looked up at me, I cupped her face with my hand, using my thumb to wipe her tears away. I'm not sure which of us initiated the kiss, but the next thing I knew we had our tongues in each other's mouths. Her hands slid across my back as she enveloped me in her embrace.

It had been a long time since I had thought about the fact that Heleen never wore a stitch of clothing. But I thought about it then as I held her naked body in my arms, as I felt the skin of her back warming under my hands, as I felt her breasts pressing into my chest and her nipples beginning to harden. And at that moment, as far as I was concerned the total non-existence of clothes in her world was a wonderful thing.

And then we were lowering down to the ground. Heleen moaned into our kiss as she lay on her back, and her arm snaked around my neck. My right hand, which had been gripping her by the shoulder, began sliding down along her side, eventually coming to cup the curve of her ass, and her knee sprang up to hug my hip. I felt wetness on her inner thigh, and my now very stiff dick rubbed hungrily against the outside of her mound.

And then ... she just stopped. Her head rolled to the side, leaving my lips nothing but the corner of her jaw, and she stopped moving against me. "What's wrong?" I asked her.

She gently pushed me off her and rolled away, sitting up and hugging her knees with her back to me. "Heleen?" I said.

"I am Veseed," she said. "I am to become Farees. If I give my heart to you, and you go, I will be alone ... I must be stronger than this."

I didn't know what to say. So I said nothing. Eventually she looked back over her shoulder at me, and seeing my uncertain look, she finally got up and left, while I remained sitting there.

It was hard to know what to think. And I was still trying to work out what to think that evening when the hunting parties who'd gone out that day came back with a big haul of eight pravaks. The village was in a celebratory mood that night as most of them gathered to feast on the kill.

I would ordinarily have shared in the exultant feeling going around and spent the evening being chummy with Jazum and Tekia like usual. But I just kind of ate quietly, not really interacting with anyone. I didn't know what I could possibly say to anyone.

My mind was churning with things I had never really stopped to consider until now. All this time I had been doing what I'd been doing in the hopes of finding a way to get back home, but what would I be going back to? To sitting on my parents' couch, playing Xbox, and occasionally making half-hearted visits to Craigslist in hopes of finding some shitty entry-level job? To enduring my parents constantly reminding me of how useless and unmotivated I am, and watching everyone I know actually going somewhere with their lives while I go nowhere? When I got down to it, what did I really have waiting for me? Sure, I did kind of miss playing World of Warcraft, and I couldn't say I wasn't tempted to find out how things turned out on True Blood, but the big picture was not an especially pretty one.