Brother, Sister

These lands are crawling with humans. They hate us, hunt us, enslave us, and yet we can do naught but cower under their shadow. Their eyes are keen, seeing in color. Their ears are sharp and hear even faint sounds. But their noses are dull, and if it weren’t for that our race would have been exterminated long ago.

         I’m told we typically have white skin, bright like fresh winter snow. Our eyes are grey, blind, but we are not unseeing. A bear may stand before us and we do not see its fur, the breath from its nose, nor the sharp claws it wields. What we see is movement. As it sways, raising its head to roar then dropping down to the ground to charge—--these motions are visible to us clearly, like a pattern within static.  We know where you are based on where we can smell you from. We know your age, your gender, whether you’re afraid or angry, and whether we need to flee or stay still, all from your scent.

         We rely on our noses. Humans have a distinct pheromone that neither beast nor Ozlah possesses, and we’ve trained ourselves well to fear it. We smell them from a distance and flee as our lives depend on it. Though, while we survive off our ability to smell sweat and wheat-drink, beer I think it’s called, we have no actual noses to speak of. The center of our face is flat, with two long slits we use as nostrils. We can close them while swimming, but there is little need for that in this country. Rivers here are more like creeks, hardly a fish within them.

         We have no hair and we have no need for it. Our skin is thicker almost by two compared to the races of humans, and we can stand colder temperatures before desiring something to cover ourselves with. Besides this, with no vision there’s also no need to be attractive.          

         All in all, we look like humans. We have the same bone structure, excluding the nasal bones, and we could speak the same language if anyone were willing to teach it to us. Perhaps our fingers and toes are longer, better suited for slashing prey and digging holes, but does that make us monsters? Perhaps our skin is pale, but does that make us less than human?

         We Ozlah have no home. Our ancestry is lost. Our beginnings are forgotten. We wander where we can, mate when we can, raise what children we can, and survive for as long as we can. Some of us band together and form little colonies that reside in ruins or over-taken watch-towers or bandit hide-outs. In all honesty, we are quite a force when we are armed together, standing up for ourselves.

         …But slavers have hound dogs. Their noses are as good as ours whilst having sight as well. Our numbers are waning. Desperately and sadly we make children only to see them perish before our eyes. My parents died fighting for the chance that I and my sister would make it safe. They named us, Ni’ri for “hope” and myself(put in his name here if you have it. It sounds like his name is myself.) for “fortitude”. Their hopes of our survival will be fulfilled, at any cost. Keeping my sister save has always been my primary goal. Not to boast, but I’m rather good at it.

         Of course, I have an advantage. The Ozlah are divided, biologically, into two separate sub-races: low and high blood. Low bloods, poor things, are like bumbling humans with sharp claws—desperate for survival but rarely able to keep it for long. However, these weaker versions work much better for pet slaves. They don’t put up a fight like us high bloods.

         My father told me that our skin is what the humans call “black”. We blend in with the night and with the shadows and this—even if we didn’t have our abilities—would make us strong enough to survive. But being high-blood comes with other perks. We possess a weapon against the humans which they could never wield against us—our very bodies.

         My father was a man of blood. He could make it thicker to stop bleeding or make it thinner when he got headaches. Once he even poisoned a man by biting him and putting his own blood into the mans body. My mother was able to block out pain, completely, or become incredibly sensitive to changes in temperature or touch. I’m a man of bones. I can grow them, any shape size or density even, out of any place on my body. The older I get, the stronger and smarter I am with them. My sister was born with a head of hair, a strange thing for us, and as she grows she’s learned to manipulate her skin and nails, as well. I’ve never understood how the three were related. But she protects herself well enough, when I’m not able to.

         In any case, I’m here to tell you my story. Now that you know who I am and where I’m coming from, I can continue. This is the story of me and my sister, our desire to survive and protect one another.

         But mostly, it’s the story of how I failed to protect her. 
 



         The day my parents died, I became a man. I bore a mans responsibilities—providing for my younger sister—but I was held within a child’s body. I hadn’t even reached puberty, yet I was forced to trudge the forests with my infant sister, learning how to take care of her on my own. I tried to copy what my mother would do, singing her songs and repeating words over and over to her. Sitting at the bottom of the shallow river to rinse filth off the both of us. I did all I could to keep her from crying. I fought off a boar at the age of ten, the fight having taught me a new technique with my bones. I’d been able to fire off thin, narrow slices from my wrists like darts, but from that interaction I’d learned how to make them thicker, like a dagger. They stuck out from the bottom of my wrists, slender but dense, past my fingers. I punched the boar in the stomach, stabbing through its gut and killing it in the single stroke.

         As Ni’ri grew, I was able to learn more. When she was able to walk, or at least fumble around on her own feet, I spent my time improving my aim. I’d shoot barbs from my wrists at the trees, trying to hit the same spot twice or trying to shoot them as fast as I could while still being accurate. I had days upon days to practice, months upon months to perfect. But even with nearly a year of practice, I still couldn’t fish. Looking into the water, trying to see the fish beneath it, was deliriously confusing. For you, I imagine it’d be like holding a semi-transparent cloth in front of yourself, and moving it back and forth. Then putting another semi-transparent cloth behind that one, and moving it at a different rate. By the time I decided where the fish was, it had moved.

         Meeting the Quemaat was a blessing. The only race of man which doesn’t discriminate our kind, smelling like mud and wind just as we do, watching the forest-dweller spear fish and learning from him provided me and my sister with many more fish than before. Trying to shoot them with barbs was impossible, but after growing a long bone-spear, the task was finally worth the effort.

         We were surviving. We bore into the ground like tree roots, determined to make it through, facing and overcoming all odds and enemies fate was throwing at us. Even running for our lives, I was confident we would make it. The sounds of baying hound calls neared closer and closer yet, but we would get threw alive. I knew it.

         At least I thought I did.

         I remember realizing they would inevitably catch up to us. Ni’ri was six, her legs still too short to run well enough or leap over fallen trees. I pulled to a stop, grabbing her arm and taking a breath.

         “Into the trees,” I told her. Each night, we slept in the boughs of the trees. I’d put my back against the trunk, legs hanging on either side, and she’d sit in front of me with her back on my chest and head on my shoulder. It was safest.

         “I need you to help me up,” She said as I started to walk away.

         The hound splashed through the small creek, the water still was wet on my own feet. They were too close, so I turned from my sister and ran into the trees, toward them. I’d find them before they found her.

         When they were close enough to see, I crouched over and screamed at them. An instinctual trait of some sort, howling in such a manner was enough to scare off small wild animals or make wolves think twice about attacking. But these were hunting dogs, and a few slowed their pace but none stopped.

         I desperately shot barbs at them. Some stuck into their skin, I could smell the blood, but there wasn’t enough force to make them stick through the muscles. After a minute of flailing I could hear the hunters voices shouting from the far distance and realized these were treeing dogs, meant to scare prey up a tree where the hunters could come and easily finish the dogs.

         I switched from barbs to daggers. I remember being certain that if their dogs were dead, the hunters wouldn’t try to kill me, wouldn’t have a chance at finding Ni’ri. Blood ran along my arms as the daggers cut through my skin on their way out, I lunched at the nearest dog wildly. It backed away faster than I thought it could, and I almost couldn’t regain my balance. I used my failing inertia to swing around to another, which also backed away. I swore. There was no way I’d be able to kill the dogs if I couldn’t get close enough.

         They bayed, and I noticed two split up from the pack.

         “Ni’ri!” I shouted, harnessing a rush of adrenaline to throw my arm in an arch, letting go of the dagger and sending it through the air, into one of the dogs. It squealed and fell to the ground.

         I heard the sound of nails on bark, and the hound howled instead of barking madly—it had found her tree. I roared, leaping full over one of the hounds and charging in toward the one alone. It turned as I crashed through a bush, slicing my legs on the thorns. As it leapt away, to the side, I turned to follow, and found the two hunters with their dogs.

         I didn’t know their words, but their tone sounded frightened. I smelled death on them, but it was tinged with a familiar scent—raccoon. The two men whistled, walked backwards, and spoke. As they did so, their dogs followed, still barking madly. I watched them go, carefully. I remember standing there so long that Niri called my name to be sure I was alright. I’d been listening for them, and waiting for the wind to blow in the right direction and bring me their scent, but it wasn’t, so they must have been far enough gone.

         I turned to the tree, digging in with my nails and hauling myself up. I grabbed the lowest branch and pulled my weight onto it, breathing slow and even.

         “You’re bleeding.” She said. She was so young, her voice so soft and high. What a terrible thing for a child to have to worry over.

         “My daggers.” I said. “And a thorn bush.” I gestured to her. “I smell no blood on you. How’d you get up?”

         “I wore extra skins.” She said. “I didn’t really get any scratches.”

         “Let me feel,” I asked, holding out my hands.

         She put her arms into my fingertips and I felt all along them, and her hands as well. Indeed, there were no scratches. “I’m sorry for leaving you.”

         “It’s okay.” She took her arms back, and I got into a more comfortable position on the tree. She waited for me to finish, then leaned against me. “Don’t do it again.”

         I remember wrapping my arms around her, a hug with more warmth than I’d ever felt. “I’ll always come back for you.” I said. “I’ll keep you safe no matter what.”

         “I know.” Was her reply.

         Letting her down has always been my deepest regret. 
 



         That was dark. Let’s change the pace.

         I recall once, after a successful afternoon of fishing at the river, Ni’ri wanted to become a fish. I was eating mine, but she stroked hers like how I would stroke her hair sometimes. Soft, slow, precious.

         “Don’t play with your food.” I warned her. “There’s hardly enough fish in the river for us, we shouldn’t waste any by letting it rot in our hands.”

         “I’m not playing.” She insisted. “The scales feel funny, don’t they?”

         “I never noticed.” I said through a mouthful. “Eat already.”

         She did as I said, but after another minute she continued. “Do you think I could become a fish if I really tried really hard?”

         “No.” I said.

         “But what if the scales are like a fishes skin? Can I make little scales like they do?”

         She had a point, at least. “Maybe if you grow fingernails out of your skin all over, but that sounds strange.”

         I watched, and it looked like she’d plucked a scale and was rolling it between her fingers. “They’re not like fingernails though.”

         “Toenails, then?” I suggested.          She just laughed at me.

         She finally ate, but even as we continued on through our forest, she carried the fish and felt its scales. Eventually I told her to throw it away, or bears would come after us. She sighed before tossing it into a bush.

         That night as we sat together to sleep, she leaned away from me, silent.

         “Are you alright?” I asked.

         She hummed positively, too focused to answer. I realized she was trying to make the scales, and so I left her to it. Hours later she woke me, shaking my arm and whispering, “Pi’ta! Pi’ta! I’m a fish!”

         I was awake instantly, and she ran a fingertip across my arm. There was a stubble on it, and after inspecting closer it did indeed feel just like a fish scale—and not at all like a fingernail.

         “Well done.” I said. “But just because you have scales you can’t breathe underwater.”

         “I know.” She said, fascinated nonetheless.

         “Actually it might make a good armor, if you could sprout them across your whole body.”

         “Yeah…” She said, mystified.

         “But we’ll try that tomorrow, alright?”

         She hummed, leaning back against me.





         Of course, the happy times never last long enough. The next time we met humans I was sixteen and she was only eleven. But these were no ordinary hunters, they were slavers.

         It was raining, and I’d learned at a young age to hide during the rain. It killed any sense of smell and its constant motion was deliriously confusing. We usually hid in the trees, soaked, but happened to be near a cave when the weather turned. This specific cave was tall enough that I could stand under it, thankfully. We sat side-by-side at its rear, trying to stay warm. I smelled nothing over the wet of the rain. I saw nothing other than its chaotic dance. I heard nothing over its thundering patter.

         One second we were fine, the next, boots were stepping into the cave and the voices of man were clear enough to be heard. Ni’ri inhaled in surprise, and the men stopped. I think they were as surprised as we were.

         There seemed to be two, and one leapt towards us with a roar. Ni’ri was smart enough not to clamber into my lap with fright but rather to get out of my way. I stood, and went to launch myself at the sound of his voice but was stopped when the other mans sword hilt struck me in the side of the head. It didn’t even hurt, really, just made the world spin around. In the distance the water danced outside the cave and made a rather confusing background for a dizzied Ozlah trying to find a man he couldn’t smell. I was blind in the whole sense of the word.

         I heard Ni’ri shriek at the man, and he grunted. The shriek turned into a frightened scream, and the scream turned into my name. “Pi’ta!” She cried. I could hear her claws raking against his leather jacket. “Pi’ta it has me!”

         I wanted to go to her, I was in the motion to come to her aid. Everything played out differently in my head. Instead, mid-step, I was struck with the hilt of the sword again. Three times. My hands were instinctively trying to find a wall as my brain wrestled with the idea of standing upright. His knee pulled into my gut making me spit unintentionally, crumpling and falling on my flat face onto the cold ground.

         Ni’ri’s voice cracked as she screamed for me. “Pi’ta! N-No!”

         I remember breathing. I could hear the sound of my breath, in and out. It was ragged and slow. I remember saliva drooling out of my mouth as my head spun circles. I remember my sisters voice, screaming and crying all at once. I had to save her. I had to.

         My hands found the floor and I tried to get up. A boot hit my sides and back a few times. As I lay crumpled, the boot set itself on my back between my shoulder blades, and held me there. The weight made it hard to breathe. Thunder cackled in the background, ominously. The man was saying something to me, but I couldn’t hear him, nor did I care what he had to say. But through listening to him talking and the thunder laughing and my own ragged breathing I realized something I couldn’t hear anymore. A silence, amidst all the noise. A silence louder than all the noise.

         I felt, literally felt, my heart racing at the realization. I could feel fuel pumping through my veins, raw energy surging through my body as I twisted my arm back, popping it from the socket and grabbing his ankle tight. With an animalistic roaring I grew the bones in my fingers as fast and straight as I could. They pierced his skin, sliding through muscle and imbedded into his bone. He screamed, and pulled away. As he yanked his foot away I was dragged with it. I disconnected the bones as quick as I could, leaving the spikes sticking out of his ankle like a piece of jewelry.

         Standing was easier, now that my head wasn’t spinning or being hit with a sword.

         Back on my feet, I heard the sound of his sword being pulled from its sheath and I realized I didn’t have much of a weapon to fight him with. I acted on the first idea that came into my head. Putting my hand at the back of my neck, I grew a thick and long bone out of one of my vertebrae. It was too long to be a sword, but too thick to be a spear making it an unwieldy weapon. It wasn’t great, but I’d like to see you do better making a weapon out of your spine.

         Blood dripped down the sides from when it pierced out of my skin, and I quickly connected it to my wrist bone to be sure I didn’t lose my grip. The man mumbled something, something that sounded frightened. I dove for him, swinging the sword randomly in a vengeful fury. I leaped and stepped forward when I felt the need, where the man stepped carefully and slow. I struck at him haphazard and desperate as he blocked my advances clean and precise. I screamed and shouted as he stayed quiet and almost calm.

         As soon as I realized that I was no match for him with a sword, I realized how to beat him. I came in with a wide swing from the side, a horizontal slice which he blocked with his sword vertically. As the two made contact I broke the sword from my wrist, continued pressing toward him, and punched in at his gut with a dagger from my other hand.

         He inhaled loud and shallow, and I made a mace at the end of the dagger all through his stomach, then pushed him out of my way. I jumped over his body and out the cave, where I could hear the other man struggling. Even over the heavy rain, I could smell his blood.

         “Kevat!” I swore at him, all rage and no rationality. I rose an arm, ready to tackle him and punch his face in, when my world shook and crashed.

         “Pi’ta!” Her voice was so sweet it nearly made me cry. “I’m holding him still, he tried to stuff me into this wagon so I’m not letting go!”

         I found the corner of the wagon as the man started screaming. “Let him go.” I said.

         He collapsed with a splash, shrieking, getting to his feet then running into the forest at full speed. He slipped and fell again, but continued nonetheless.

         “Ni’ri.” I called. I didn’t notice the rain, I didn’t notice the mud on my feet or the blood on my own hands or bruises on my ribs. I only noticed the hiccups as she tried to breath and cry simultaneously. I followed the sound, gathering her up in my arms. We held each other tight, both sobbing.

         “I cut through his coat and dug into his wrist as deep as I could, I was so scared.”

         I walked through the forest blind, stumbling, slow. “I have you.” I said, reminding myself as much as her. In those moments, I didn’t care how heavy she was, or sweaty or dripping with human blood. I just held her as she wept against my shoulder, and cherished her.  “I have you. You’re safe.”