White Ghost and the Poison Arrow (3 page)

Arella followed
the stream down to a small area surrounded by plants, weeds and
rushed. She picked up a large sharp stone and used it to dig up one
of the reeds from the shallow water. It came loose and when she
pulled it out, a large brown bulb hung from the bottom of the
bright green reeds. Arella washes off the grue bulb in the stream,
uses the sharp stone to cut into its flesh, loosening the skin, and
peels it. Inside the skin of the gure bulb, purple flesh can be
seen. Arella takes a bite out of the bulb and smiles. It tastes
like earthy apples, with a hint of spice. She has learnt from many
years of foraging which plants are safe to eat. Arella has spent
the last few years watching the animals that inhabit her homeland
dig up food and pluck it from trees. By doing this, and watching
each animals reactions, she has learnt what is good to eat, and
which plants she should avoid. The grue bulbs are by far Arella's
favourites, and they do a good job of filling her up. Just one bulb
and she no longer feels the hunger pangs she did before.

Before too
long, Arella can feel the heat and power of the sun beating down on
her. If she does not move out of its gaze soon, she will begin to
burn. This is a major disadvantage of her pale skin, and the main
reason she prefers the night. She moves to sit in the shadow of a
bank of rocks, leaning against them with the village to her left.
She can hear the children laughing and playing still, and can still
smell the cooking boar, but is far enough away from them to be able
to relax.

Far above in
the clear blue sky, Arella watches a couple of eagles play in the
thermals. They weave and dance, not moving their wings at all, just
effortlessly floating yet never coming down. The gradually move out
of Arella's view and drift off over the forest calling to each
other as they go. The sounds from the village have quietened down,
a sure sign that the boar is cooked and everyone is tucking in.
"Give it a minute and I will go get some myself." Arella sighs to
herself as she watches the world around her. A small green lizard
runs along the ground next to her, chasing a cricket that hops away
eagerly. The lizards green legs moving as fast as they can carry
its scaly body, kicking up small colours of dust as he goes. He
finally catches the cricket, and eats it with a crunch. Arella has
always loved watching nature at work, and the relationship between
predator and prey.

Arella is startled awake as a group of riders from her tribe
gallop past her at speed, causing dust and stones to fly
everywhere, catching the delicate skin on Arella's legs as them and
their horses go past. Arella gets up from her resting place, the
sun now on its way down. "Hmm, must have fallen asleep. I'd better
go see if there's any food left." She says to herself, doubting
that there will be anything left eating on the carcass
anyway.
"Wonder where they were going
anyway?"
She thinks.
"Must be going for an evening ride."
She stops, realising what it must have been.
"An initiation of course. When a new male member
of the tribe is born, another is promoted to hunter. That must be
it. Now it makes sense. Can't believe I didn't see it before. Come
on Arella, use your brain."

There is still
a little meat on the left flank of the boar, now a little tough and
cool from over cooking then being left, but it still tastes good.
Arella can taste the mud the boar rolled in, the fruits that he ate
and the fresh are he breathed and she chews the meat. It is just
heavenly. The village is now all but empty, all the men gone off
for the initiation, and the women and children gathered to tell
stories. The sun is beginning to set, and now sits low in the
sky.

"I think another long walk might be in order."
Arella thinks to herself.
"Maybe some target practice too."
She
heads back to her small tent, climbs inside and retrieves her
dagger. Arella then hooks in inside her right boot, in the special
leather compartment she sowed to them, hidden from sight but easily
accessible. It belonged to her mother, one of the few things she
has from her. The blade is sharp and cold, Arella can feel its
presence close to her skin, even though the leather, the ornate
handle only just visible at the top of her boot. You wouldn't see
it there unless you were looking for it.

Arella follows the stream down to the lake, and skirts along
its edge, just the same way as she had done the night before. As
she gets to the forest, she begins to feel her spirits lifting
again. It is an addictive feeling, being free and able to do what
she wants without others looking at her. To even exist without
anyone judging her feels amazing. Arella makes a pact with herself
as she walks through the forest.
"I will
learn how to live without my tribe. I will teach myself how to
hunt, and how to protect myself. Then I can feel free all the time,
not just when I leave the tribe on a night. I can wake up knowing
that I will not be stared at, or whispered about behind my back. I
will finally be free, and now is the time to do it. If I stay away
from other people, no one will be able to tell me what to do, or
hurt me ever again."
The more Arella
thought about it, the better the idea became. The practicalities of
it however were not quite the same. Once she got thinking, Arella
realised just how much she had to learn, but then again, others do
it. She was sure that she would be able to learn to hunt, and set
traps. She just had to watch others do it, then have a go
herself.

The orange glow of the sun can be seen through the trees and
bushes of the forest, and creatures of the night are beginning to
stir, just as those with dominion of the day are settling in for
the night to sleep. Birds are beginning to roost, while a nearby
owl hoots a wake up call.
"The forest is
always so alive, no matter where I go."
Arella thinks to herself.
"I wonder
why my tribe are so afraid of the trees. There is nothing evil
here, nothing that will harm anyone, and it is madness to think
that there is."

Arella walks until she finds a small clearing in the trees,
far away from the area she saw the other tribe in last night, and
sets up the targets. She uses brightly coloured leaves and pins
them to trees with the sharp needles of the boroana plant. Arella
sets up a dozen targets, all at different heights and of different
sizes then begins her practice. She takes the sharp blade from her
boot, pulls back and throws it at the first target. It hits, dead
on the mark. Arella smiles. She knows she has good aim, and never
fails to miss a target. She retrieves the blade and goes again, and
again until all targets have been hit.
"I
need to find a way to do moving targets."
She thinks to herself. Although how she will be able to do
this escapes her.

She sets up her
targets again, a dozen of them all in the trees. When pinning the
last brightly coloured leaf to a tree, Arella pricks her finger
with a boroana spine. She winces at the pain, but does not make a
sound. She heard something. Just a small noise, a crack of a branch
in the distance and a quiet thumping sound, but something doesn't
feel right. Arella takes this feeling and does the only thing she
can think to do, she sheaths her knife and climbs up the nearest
tree with low branches, hiding herself in the foliage.

High up in the
safety of the tree Arella listens, and surely enough the sound
comes closer to her. A small herd of fawn brown motto deer stampede
through, clearly spooked by something. They hit the clearing and
scatter slightly, a few go off to the left but most head under the
tree Arella is hiding in and keep on going. One of the males gets
his moss green antlers caught on a tree branch and panics slightly,
freeing himself in the struggle and shaking free leaves and
blossom, causing it to rain down on the ground.

Once they can
no longer be heard anymore, Arella begins to think about leaving
the sanctuary of her tree, believing that the deer were the sound
that she heard. She was wrong. Just ask she was about to climb
down, he came into view. A large beast with long black fur,
highlighted with a deep purple that shined and caught the still
orange glow in the air. Her eyes as yellow as the sun its self,
looked up at Arella in the tree. Her big paw padding along on the
mossy ground, making no sounds as she prowled, the end of her bushy
tail flicking as he smelled the air. The big cat was beautiful, and
the biggest creature Arella had ever seen on four legs. It was
bigger than a wolf by a foot in height, and looked powerful and
strong. Arella's breath caught as she realised she was staring
right at her. The big cat just watched on under her, under the
tree, never moving its eyes from her gaze. This cat was
distinctive. It had a large scar covering most of its face, and a
white patch of fur behind its left ear. Then quick as a flash she
was gone again. Arella has heard stories of cats such as this,
ancient auron cats, but thought they were all but extinct in her
lands. No one has seen one for over one hundred years, or so her
tribal elders have said.

"He could have easily climbed up this tree and taken
me."
Arella thinks to herself, still
clinging to the branch she was holding onto for balance just a
minute ago.
"Why did she leave me here? He
saw me for sure. Those beautiful yellow eyes were looking right at
me."
She pauses.
"Perhaps he was not hungry. Although if that were the case he
would not have been following the motto. And I wonder where he came
from, I thought they were all gone now."
These questions will stay on Arella's mind for quite some
time. There is no logical explanation why a creature with as much
power as an auron cat would leave something that was as easy prey
as Arella was just then, but he did.

Arella finally
climbed down from her tree, careful not to lose her footing and
fall. She took down all of her targets from the trees, put her
dagger away in her boot again and hid the target leaves away in a
bush where no one would find them. She then continued her walk
through the forest towards the clearing she saw the men from the
other tribe in just the night before. Arella has a pretty good
sense of direction, aided by the ability to follow the stars. This
is only the second time Arella has visited this forest, but she
feels as though she knows it well.

After another couple of minutes of walking, Arella finds the
clearing. She expected to see the men already there, practising
their fighting, but the clearing is empty. The sun has now gone
down, and the moon lights up the clearing with a bright silver
night. Another cloudless sky with moonlight and stars her only
source of light. She crouches at the edge of the clearing,
listening for signs of life, for the voices of the strange men, but
she hears nothing
. “I thought they said
that they would be back tonight.”
Arella
thinks to herself. “
This is very
strange.”
Arella knew it was a bad idea to
get her hopes up on this. There was no way these men would return.
Now she would not be able to learn how to fight.
“
Maybe I should go to their village, and
watch them from there? It can’t be too hard to find, nor too far
away. I’d bet anything it will be on the other side of this forest.
I would be able to hide in the treeline and watch them from
afar.”
Arella thinks to herself.

Just as Arella is about to walk through the clearing towards
the other side, she begins to hear voices in the distance. The men
are coming. She uses the time she has spare to get herself to a
good vantage point, high in the same tree she was hiding in the
night before. Once in the tree, Arella made sure she was hiding in
the shadows, and lifted her hood up over her head, covering as much
skin and hair as she could, and attempting to blend into the dark.
“
As long as none of the men look directly
up here and focus on where I am, I should be able to stay hidden
from them… I hope.”

An old man
enters the clearing first, followed by the four younger men. He has
long grey hair and a small scruffy looking beard, with a belly
slightly too large for his skinny legs to carry. His skin is
withered and old, the wrinkles plain to see on his red face. Arella
has not seen a man look this old, yet so far from death. He looks
remarkably healthy for one his age. "What more can you have to
teach us Ujarak?" Red Feathered man asks. He seems to Arella to be
quite full of himself most of the time. Almost like he already
knows everything, and nothing can be taught to him.

"Oh my child."
Ujarak says. "You know nothing of real life Nootau." He then fishes
around in a big bulky bag he carries over his left shoulder.
"Tonight we practice with these." He says as he pulls a strong
looking bow out of the bag. He then proceeds to pull another four
out and hands them to the young men.

"Bows and
arrows are very primitive weapons Ujarak." Says the smaller one.
Arella thinks his name is Doahte. "How do you expect us to defend
ourselves with these flimsy things?" He spits. He seems very grumpy
and shallow minded. Arella is starting to like this tribe less and
less. But if they can teach her to fight, it doesn't matter what
they are like. With that though, Ujarak pulls back the bow string,
knocks an arrow and fires it at Doahte, narrowly missing the top of
his head and sticking in a knot on an old tree just behind him.

"Young one, you
must learn. Not all fighting has to be done with your hands. You
must learn to use other means, and stay away from battle if you
can." He laughs. "How do you think I stayed alive this long? By
being safe." The others all howl with laughter at this. It is nice
to hear people laugh. Arella has missed that sound greatly. The
people of her tribe are far too serious to laugh at anything other
than her. "Okay then Ujarak, show us how to use these bows." Green
eyed Nashoba says.