Kamili

Hunting grounds

Outside Zubela

I lay in the quagmire bow in hand, waiting for my prey to come in view, with bated breath, I count the seconds as they near us. Madi laid beside me, breath held back, trying not to breathe in the scent of the locust beans scent that smothers my body. We had been tracking our quarries for an hour now. From the forest all the way to the swamp where they come to feed.

I stare at the doe innocently grazing on a soft patch of grass, occasionally nudging the buck by her side; beside them was a sizable calf. Its maroon-brown glossy coat a stark contrast to the seven matching snowy teardrops on its forehead. Such beauty and grace in a world that deserves none, I regard the snowy white coat of its mother, it would fetch a reasonable price, less than its actual worth but enough to cover necessities.

That is the way of the world now. Death. Survival at all costs. It means that we would live another day without hunger, surviving another day to see dawn I notched an arrow and let it fly with a distraught sigh, echoed later by the heart-rending bleat of the calf as both its parents were brought down by our arrows. It made for the trees disappearing.

Another beauty wiped off from the world by my hand. And I would do it all over again if need be because that's who I need to become. A killer. I avoid Madi's penetrating gaze as he made his way to his kill, inspected it before putting it out of its misery. From the ground, I pulled the arrow free and gave the doe peace with a flick of my dagger at its supine, elegant throat.

"We should head back before night falls."

I nod at Madi and dragged my kill to the waiting cart tied to his horse. And mount mine, with a flick of my rein, I start forward carefully behind Madi. His form impressive sitting atop the horse. I snort, gaining a cursory glance from him.

"Nothing," I urged Namia forward with a little pressure of my knees. He would have been what they call model-material, centuries back, tall with the muscles that molded against his body armor, the agility of a sprinter, he was graceful like water flowing over rocks. On a sculpted face, sat a proud, strong nose that looked to have been broken one too many times, something that I knew resulted from our rigorous, merciless training as hunters and countless fights. Dark, flashing, warm eyes, full lips, a stubborn chin with a cleft. The obsidian glass piercing in his left ear doesn't detract from his looks, in fact, it makes him more appealing to the opposite sex.

The poor boy doesn't even notice he was happy to bumble along in life. I recall the day he got his piercing to convince me to get my ears pierced for the first time; it was when we were just rug-rats, and he got mercilessly teased for being a girl, but he overcame it in that gentle, quiet way of his. People like him don't deserve to live in this hell we call our world. But who does? Even the worst of us don't deserve it.

I gazed at the beads that adorn his neck, wrists, and ankles, the same ones on mine, only mine was more elaborate, it even formed part of my body armour that covered my vitals made up of precious, hardened Arkor -beads found in Arkor mountain somewhere far from here. In the colonies, all the way to the Hinters, they are more valuable than even food supplies. Beautiful, silver, and red markings in swirls of ancient calligraphy of a long-lost tongue, the very cradle of our language, symbols given life in glass-like beads symbols that are part of our everyday life. The art of making them long lost through time, so is the power to harvest the gifts they have within them. Etch on my forehead were the images: one of a sun, a shield, bordered by twin lightning bolts, marking me as one of the Kendulusu tribe. To people, we are a savage tribe, I would not blame them because we do everything with an astounding passion.

Love, hate, and fight.

When I asked Mama what the symbols meant, she had said: Being Kendulusun is the greatest gift there is, that we might be the answer.

When I asked the answer to what, she had said, When the time comes, you will know. That was all I could get from her. She wouldn't say another word more on the subject, apart from the cryptic message that fell from her lips. No one saw it coming. No one was prepared for the incoming Armageddon some centuries ago. I ogled the suns through the goggles protecting my eyes, it keeps me from getting the blinding curse courtesy of the two supernova suns glaring down on us, the ones that were lowering too fast for my liking.

Sunlight's our ally now, a foe to the darkness that comes, death riding on its wings. Spreading tendrils out, bringing with it, a war we have to fight every single night. It makes us dread it like nothing. Every child knows the risk of living in our world, and to cherish every sunlight, no matter how fleeting. A hair-raising screech had me spur my horse faster. An early riser probably caught the scent of our kills.

Damn it! I thought that the Locust beans paste's going to mask my scent, one of Calla's endless experiments, it just isn't helping, my whole body itches in this damn, scorching heat, I could feel it flaking off of me with the amount of sweat leaking out of my pores. It had made Madi complain the whole way to the hunting grounds at how much we both stunk like something taken straight down from the sewers of hell.

My skin prickles more, I scratch my arm and catch Madi smirking at me with a look that says that he's enjoying my scratch-fest. I will kill Calla when I reach home. If I reach home. I wrinkle my nose and stare at the suns again. Anxiety swamps me, I wonder if we would make it.

This is bad, we are running out of time; I share a worried look with Madi, then spurred Namia to run even faster. Leoe matched her pace for pace despite carrying the bulk of Madi and the cart. I lithely turn in my seat, grab my bow, and cover us. Praying to everything that I hold dear that it would be enough if attacked. Our hunting fortress looms closer, I spur Namia faster, clamping my knees hard on the sides of her belly. This is the game we play with death, every time.

We play it knowing the price that would be asked of us, a tithe we all dread and welcome, a thing that keeps us fed and alive. With the knowledge that it will cost us a date with death, but I knew what I was signing up for when I agreed to come on this hunting journey so far from town.

Mama is against it. But I can't stand the thought of another season without having proper food on the table, God knows Calla needs a little bit more meat on her bones. And I needed a little bit of adrenaline running in me, just picking a reaper or two behind the safety of high walls wasn't much experience for a huntress.

And the weekly quotas the granary gives out isn't enough, if I hunt I can keep the other half of my catch, the rations could barely keep us afloat for a whole season.

Everybody has a contribution to make. It's what kept us alive, from crumbling like so many settlements out there. Another screech had me gripping my glass amulet in the shape of a falcon in flight, praying that we would be on time. I pat Namia, reassuring her, she knew what to do. I have trained her for this countless of times. And being laughed at by my peers.

To them, a girl needn't fight, she just needs to pretty herself up, choose a mate and pop out a couple of rug-rats. Leave the fighting to the men. Only a select few of us want to be huntresses, to me they are the wise ones, a world like this needs more fighters than it has. What happens when there aren't enough fighters to save us? What happens when the suns don't shine anymore? What happens when they grow into something more than what we are used to?  And as the eldest, I have to be the man just like Papa made me vow that fateful night that bred the family's heartache.

   Kamili, you protect them no matter what! He had said the night we were attacked, I could still see his extraordinary, gray somber eyes so, like Calla's, he knew that we would never see him again, that night Calla was born, I could never forget it. Because it was the night that an exodus of Reapers, the likes we have never seen before flock to our town trying to get in, killing everything and anyone that stands in their way, that night that we lost papa forever.

He never came back, not even as one of the awaken and join their ranks. That night I had my first kill, and some part of me was lost since then. Nothing was the same ever, it was the night I saved Madi's life and that of his mama; we stuck like glue after. He taught me everything he knew despite my slow, clumsy self.

Bits and pieces were missing from that night, and every time I try to remember, this sudden headache just rears up. It's like a part of me doesn't want to remember that traumatic night.

I don't blame that part for not wanting to remember. No one should remember such things, and once summon up, you would never be the same.

Three years later, his Mama died of sun-sickness and lethal, chronic malaria. We grew closer in his grief. I was his sole companion, the envy of so many girls, even his pledge mate, the beautiful out-of-the-world Buma, who I knew had everything a girl would wish for in this nightmarish world, only the best for her.I swallow my grief and forced my body to focus on surviving this sunset.