"hurry up child!" yells a familiar voice.

"Mother?" I ask. This must be a dream. She's too lazy to come on adventures anymore. We're walking through the Nivla woods, and she's brandishing a long, sharp sword. I hold a long stick, a magic staff, and follow closely behind. I walk up to her, the overwhelming magic presence makes me stumble, using the staff to stop myself falling. I'd broken this thing when I was nine...

"Honestly," my mother sighs. "You are ever so slow! Speed up, you two!"

I turn around, to see a small pigasus (swine with wings). He is holding his head up high, ogling at all he can see, dragging his trotters. To think, Leo could be this cute! I pick him up under my armpit, and slither forwards, keeping myself up with the staff. I follow mother out the forest, and down the Emerald trail. The plains are a soft green, dotted by the moldy brown of the zombies, and the occasional traveler struggling to fend them off. I keep close to mother, who is on guard, her head turning side to side, looking for something. She gasped "there it is!" and ran at a skeleton with a key in it's hand. She threw herself at it, her coral snake tail flailing behind her, and began fighting. I would have watched, but a group of zombies came at me. I waved my staff, shooting magic at the monsters. I was about to win, but my mother barbarically sliced through them, and they disappeared.

I looked up at her: like me, she had red hair and green pale skin, but her features were sharper and her hair short and cropped. She was very powerful too: her and my father once went to Troms and back, without dying. I looked on in slight annoyance as she collected the loot from the monsters, cursing under my breath.

We continued down the trail; passing the item identifier and the powder merchant, as well as a bunch of weak zombies that my mother cut through effortlessly. I ran over to a magic staff that one of the zombies dropped, however after examining it, I realized it was broken. Leonard started to squirm, so I put him down, and watched him walk up to mother. He walked beside her, rubbing against her tail, and I realized I was lagging behind. I slithered quickly towards the two of them, and lost my balance midway. I could never really move in an upright position, but I forgot my gloves at home so I couldn't slither snake style. I slipped. I fell forwards, my tail flailing through the air, and landed on my hands, which immediately began to hurt. I groaned, and looked down at my digits. A big, deep, red gash, where I had landed on a sharp flint, was bleeding on my left hand from my wrist and all the way up my middle finger. Tears welled up in my eyes, and I began to cry. My right hand was grazed, and my magic staff had snapped.

"Oh dear, what is it now?" Mother said as she turned around. She rushed over and took a look at my hands. "My, my! That's deep! We better hurry to get to Ragni and get it healed!" Mother said, probably just bored of moving so slowly. She put Leonard on her head (he was small enough to hug her head and not get in the way) and gave me a piggyback, where I cried into her shirt. She sheathed her sword, and pressed herself against the floor, pulling her gloves on, and shot off. She glided quickly and smoothly- her hands helped her over the uneven road, her tail moved smoothly and elegantly. We reached the gates of Ragni, but the iron grid was down. My mother, now slightly ticked off, yelled at the guard on the other side to let us in.

"No way hosay, Ibele!" yelled the guard, who my mother apparently knew. She wasn't exactly on best terms with human towns."I'm not letting a poisonous snake in!"

"Look, just call Captain Ranol, goddamnit!" Mother yelled, showing him a middle finger. He blew his tongue at her, and walks off to presumably look for the Captain. Mother was stern, and very unfamiliar with the word 'no'. She stood there, pacing, unaware of how stupid she looked with a pig on her head. Minutes passed, and there was no sight of the captain. I sat on her back, quietly sobbing and looking at my hands, poking the wound. Finally, the gate opened. An old man, with graying hair and a circle beard, walked out to greet mother, only to be shocked to see her with a winged pig on her head, flapping it's wings in boredom. After an awkward silence, mother put me and Leo down, before saying, "Don't ask," and went into town with the general.

We followed her into town, gawking. Neither of us had seen so many people, and definitely no where near as many humans: we lived in a secluded part of a nearby providence to the east, populated mostly by lamias and other non-humans. My nose filled with the scent of crushed berries and herbs as we passed the potion store, and the smell of ink from the scroll merchant's. We took a left, down a busy street, full of wizards, archers, assassins and warriors all sorting their inventories, armor, maps and weapons. Some were chatting, leaning against the stone-and-wood rustic houses. It was so new, I almost forgot the pain in my hand.

We took another left. The exotic smells my itching nose had picked up almost disappeared, leaving me with the gentile smell of plants. On the right, there was a small field, full of carrots and buckwheat, that an old woman was tending to. She waved at my mother and the captain, before continuing to water the plants. In front of it, there was a small house with a bush on the roof. As we neared, I almost fell over again. There were two moderate magic presences, the sort you get from a curse, and an intense smell of wet metal.

"What is it with you today!" my mother exclaimed, flourishing with her arms. "Honestly, I've never seen a giddier child than you."

We stood at the door, and the captain knocked. I hugged mother around the waist, nervous. Leonard sat on my tail, hiding. The door opened slowly, and a pair of pink eyes appeared in the crack between the wall and the heavy door. They skimmed over Captain Ranol, and I tensed up. A waft of metallic air flooded out from whoever it was behind the door: he was the source of that fresh, nauseating smell. He then moved on to examine my mother. The moment his cautious eyes hit her, he sprung out the door.

"MRS. BELL!" yelled the teenage boy as he flung himself out the door, eyes sparkling and smiling widely, tackling mother to the ground.

"Off. OFF!" mother shooed him from her chest. When she fell I had let go, and mother was now being crushed by this armor-clad 12-year-old. He refused to budge, too happy to see her. He was beautiful: his hair was a creamy white and it skimmed his shoulders, and his skin was so pure, other than a deep gash that had parted him from his right ear. His armour was incredibly heavy looking: it was shocking he could even lift it. I heard the sound of feet coming down the stairs.

"Adrian, are you alright?" I heard a male voice call. The speaker emerged: he looked about 15, and looked very similar to the ball of happiness hugging my annoyed mother, but he wore a tunic and trousers. He looked at me, a shock hit his body. He grabbed the sword that hung on his back, and swung the blade at me, aiming for my neck with a horizontal sweeping motion. Amateur. With a smirk, I let my tail drop as I had seen mother do many times before. I slipped to the ground catching myself on my hands and-

I cried out, as I was quite literally rubbing salt in the wound. Mother had finally detached the boy and the Captain seemed very angry.

"ALISTER! How dare you!" he screamed. "What were you thinking? If she wasn't Ibele's daughter and didn't know that trick, her head would've come clean off!"

I sat on the ground, writhing in my agony. Everything was going wrong. Someone grabbed me by the wrist and helped me up. Still glowing, the boy who was squishing mother only moments ago asked me "are you alright?" I nodded, preoccupied with my bleeding hand, tears streaming down my face.

"You need to disinfect that," he said, poking the gash. I winced and followed him inside.
He led me to the kitchen. It was small, just like the house, and had a dining table in the middle. Pots and pans lined the wall and there was a cooker and a cupboard. How the hell would I get out?
"My name's Adrian," the boy told me, slightly muffled as he dug in the cupboard, throwing out dead mice, gardening equipment and old spears.  Eventually, he emerged with a bottle of disinfectant and a bandage. "What's yours?" he asked.

"Rinire," I whispered.

"Nice to meat you, Rin!" he beamed, spilling the potion on my hand.

I screamed.

---------------END ---------------

AN

Hi. Welp, this is awkward. Just here to say, I have made a concept of what I think Rinire would look like in (hopefully) the style of Overly Sarcastic Productions (a youtuber I like). Anywayz, without further ado:

AAAAAAA! SNAKE TAILS ARE HARD! (>w<)