Don’t call me that. “Perhaps if you ate less at supper....”
“Why didn’t Mamae teach me to run like she taught you? If Asha’Kadashi really is as hungry as Mamae said, surely she’d just eat us both.” My panting elf for a brother danced lightly around, feigning punches as high up my body as he could comfortably reach.
Oh, not Asha’Kadashi again. “I don’t know, Val. Maybe she thought Asha’Kadashi would spit you out.”
“Why would your Shemlen ass taste any better than a sweet, juicy elf like myself?” Varalen bent over and wiggled his posterior so violently that he almost fell over, laughing.
Sweet, juicy and so stupid. “Call me Shemlen again and I’ll kick your sweet, juicy ass to Asha’Kadashi myself.”
“OK, I’ll be quiet, Shemlocks. Shem, Shemmy...”
“Keep your voice down, brother, I mean it.” The clammy forest morning might have been swallowing our conversation nicely but this wasn’t a risk worth taking.
“Oh, big Shemlen is so scared.”
As Varalen’s hand started to dance towards my hair, I slapped it away. This kind of childish teasing, once daring and fun, had taken on rather a more audacious, and thus perilous, quality of late.
“Shemmy, Shem, Shem....” I punched him. Not hard. Hard enough to knock him to the ground. Shock alighted his face momentarily and then he was up, kicking at the vulnerable parts of my body with practiced precision. I punched him again. Again, he went down.
“Stay down, brother.” My warning was ignored. He sprang to his feet and landed a sharp kick to my throat. Tiring of this time honoured dance I feigned injury and gestured for him to stop.
“Oh. Letting me win the fight, are you? Poor baby will cry to Mamae’s grave? In case you haven’t noticed, I’m not a child anymore.” Varalen turned abruptly and resumed his wiry trot towards the Spirit Grove. He was graceful in a way I could never be, ribbons of sunlight catching his golden hair.
Still believe in Asha’Kadashi though, don’t you baby brother? “Oh, Varalen. Wait for me.”
In the Spirit Grove, Varalen was lying face down on the forest floor, mossy soft, with knees bent and feet raised, kicking rhythmically. He looked uncomfortable. Trying to catch a whiff of the memory of Mamae’s cookies, probably. Only my brother could think about something as ordinary as food in a place this beautiful, with its thousand shades of green, lit by a thousand splinters of light.
I always used these visits to conjure a simple visual image of my mother, because without practice remembering, her beauty would fade just as surely as the beauty of this place would remain for a thousand years. On this day, however, Varalen’s teasing had ruined my concentration, my mind returning again and again to that one bedtime story which had been no ordinary, merry hunting tale.
“Come closer. Your story is a quiet one. Your story is a frightening one and your brother mustn’t hear it.” Together on Mamae’s bed we lay side by side as her words softly enveloped me. I was young enough to have brought a doll to her bed with me.
“If you listen carefully to the night’s whisperings, you might hear a warning wind. When Asha’Kadashi come, sweet, juicy boy must run, when Asha’Kadashi come, sweet, juicy boy must run.”
My hands had unconsciously reached up to cover my ears and prevent entry to these uncharacteristically frightening words but Mamae caught them. Then she smoothed my hair back down, a familiar and comforting gesture. “Just listen, my boy.”
“Deep in the forest lives a fearsome mage. High in a tree she has made her house but she often moves it and it is hard to find. Our clan sends hunters out, in secret, to catch her because she is very dangerous. Sometimes the hunters return, sometimes they don’t. Sometimes they are eaten alive.” I remember feeling very cold and Mamae drawing me closer.
“Many say that the mage isn’t really evil, just mad. Her people don’t like magic so they cut out her tongue. Where she came from, the food was rich, heavily salted and dripping with animal fats. She is lonely because they also sent her away but what she really wants is to be able to taste something delicious and fat laden one more time. This is why she won’t eat the roots and berries found in our forest. Not even cooking a Halla can satisfy her now.
So she takes little boys. Like you. Since you were a little boy, I’ve been teaching you to run. This is why. But you are a big boy now and you need to know these things.”
I was horrified. “Mamae, is there any way to stop Asha’Kadashi wanting to eat me?”
Mamae appeared to think for a moment. “Well, it is said that Asha’Kadashi doesn’t think kind boys taste very nice. Or boys who are brave.”
“Mamae, is Asha’Kadashi an elf like us?”
“No, child. She is Qunari.”
“What are Qunari?”
“Qunari are big, their hair is white as winter snow and their eyes are bright. They are almost never seen in the forest, but it is said that Asha’Kadashi makes other Qunari look gentle.” I stifled another shiver.
“Mamae, do I have Shemlen ears?” Again my hands reached up and again Mamae stopped them.
“Your ears are a special secret. They are hiding in your long hair. You mustn’t show them to anyone.”
Mamae told me the story of Asha’Kadashi several times that week and it became less frightening with each retelling. On the night that she died, she didn’t see Varalen sitting quietly outside of her door listening too. Father hadn’t had the heart to send him to bed.
Parathari was stirring a thick, bubbling soup when I arrived home from the Spirit Grove. Varalen would no doubt have gone straight for a bowl and helped himself if he hadn’t met up with some friends playing ball games on the way back. I still couldn’t work up much of an appetite for my step-mother’s cooking. It was difficult to pinpoint exactly why her food didn’t taste right, not sweet enough, too sweet, simply not seasoned by my own mother’s loving touch, I suppose.
She glanced up as I walked through the kitchen. “Nice day outside?” Her smile was, as always, a curious mixture of polite and some other sentiment I couldn’t quite put my finger on. I nodded. “Your hair is getting so long. Would you like me to trim it or perhaps braid it for you after lunch?”
Touch me and I run. “Thanks, but I like it the way it is.” Be kind. Asha’Kadashi doesn’t think kind boys taste very nice, remember. Parathari shrugged and returned to her cooking. Sometimes I thought she was genuinely trying to look after me like a mother. Other times I was convinced that she knew about my ears and was seeking to expose me. One thing was for sure. The day she touched my hair was the day I left this tent forever.
The afternoon passed otherwise uneventfully. There was always something to be done in my father’s workshop, crafting, mending or bartering for services. When night fell and my brother still hadn’t returned, however, someone had to make comment.
“Is that boy of yours trying to avoid his chores again or actually lost this time?” Father didn’t seem to know how to react to Parathari’s harsh words. Just tell her to be quiet. Although Varalen was often absent these days, I could tell he was becoming concerned. He shifted awkwardly in his chair, painstakingly moving his ruined leg to one side.
“I’ll go and look for him.” Arguing about my wayward brother wasn’t going to find him and I was sure he would be close by, smoking elfroot behind a tree or chasing after a girl.
“I think that’s a good idea.” My stepmother was speaking for my father more and more often but he didn’t seem to notice. “Not that that boy couldn’t stand to miss a meal. He’s too fat for an elf.” Avoiding her eye and gathering my hunting equipment, I lightly embraced Father’s increasingly frail frame and stepped out into the night.
Before I found Val, one of his friends found me. “Val’s gone.”
Gone? “What do you mean, gone? Gone where?” The small elf was blowing on his fingers and hopping up and down to keep warm. The camp seemed otherwise deserted and the fact he had come to me instead of an Elder suggested mischief. The fact that he wasn’t wearing proper clothes for nightwalking suggested he hadn’t been home yet.
“We heard a voice calling from the forest. We all went to see but Val got lost.”
Lost? Val? How is that possible? “What did this voice say?”
“It was calling the word ‘Asala’ over and over again. We wanted to see who it was. The last I saw Val was near Serpent’s Ridge.” Pushing the elf aside I started to run.
Tracking Val in the dark was difficult. My eyes had never been as keen as the others on hunts. I also didn’t want to call out and alert some malign creature to my presence. It was more dumb luck than skill when I eventually reached a clearing and was confronted by a frightening spectacle. My brother was pressed face down into the undergrowth, his arms strung up behind him, held down by some kind of enormous person. Bright eyes flashed angrily towards me and I noticed the giant’s hair was as white as winter snow.
“I have told this elf that I am not called Asha’Kadashi, human. He also seems to think that I am a woman. Can you talk sense into him?” His voice was deep and rang out across the darkened, misty valley.
“Let him go.” Warily, but showing sincerity, I reached for my hunting bow and sidestepped a little closer.
“Tell him I am not called Asha’Kadashi. Perhaps then the fool will stop trying to kill me.”
I paused to weigh up these words. Although quite possibly Qunari, I couldn’t be sure this creature, clad in a very heavy coat, wasn’t female or a mage. It didn’t, however, seem to be trying to eat Varalen, or indeed harm him in any way other than to restrain. Then I remembered one very important detail. “Val, Asha’Kadashi doesn’t have a tongue. This creature surely does if it can talk.”
Val’s body went limp and the Qunari released its hold. “Thankyou, human.”
“Don’t call my brother human.” Val really was a fool. The Qunari swatted his feeble attack aside with the back of one of his vast hands. He cast me an inscrutable look and then he was gone.
After the incident with the Qunari, life returned to normal for a while. Val and I were closer than we had ever been. Perhaps it was because I was prepared to fight for his life that he teased me a little less. Perhaps the way he acknowledged me as his brother, despite my Shemlen ears, made me a little more tolerant. Perhaps our face to face encounter with a real Qunari had made Mamae’s story about Asha’Kadashi seem a little less real.
When six human mercenaries arrived to take me away, I was mending my father’s good chair, and childhood fears were far from my mind. Without ceremony, one of the men approached and reached for my hair, pulling it aside to reveal my ears. It was so unexpected I didn’t even flinch until I saw a small group of boys from the camp, including Varalen, following at a short distance. Perhaps their ears had already been checked.
“It is the Bann’s wish that you are raised in the Chantry, boy.” The Mercenary was clad in leather armour. He didn’t bother to draw his weapon. “You’re coming with us now.” He cast a wry glance towards the other men. “Seems to me like he’s almost done growing. Hard to find, this one.”
Beating those men in a fight would have been impossible. Behind them, some hunters were gathering. I wasn’t sure how much protection I could count on now, but I suspected warriors of this calibre would draw more of my clan’s blood than I cared to be responsible for, anyway. Stepping forward, Varalen echoed my thoughts. “Run!”
So I ran. I ran faster than when I was running from the threat of Asha’Kadashi or training on the heels of my mother. I am still running as I tell you this story, with only the clothes on my back and the Toolsmith’s hammer I was using to mend my father’s chair. I don’t know where I am heading or what I will do when I get there. I doubt I could find succour with any other Dalish. I could go to a city but what is there for an elf but segregation and servitude?
Modifié par Firky, 27 mai 2010 - 11:04 .
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