Symmeran Wastes 2

Okay! More writing! First Contact is one of the situations I like writing about most but it can be so tricky to get right.

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Ayrsir glanced at Rohomes, who, still holding his knife aloft, shrugged.

“Oh, uh, ashaniek um purubtiven,” the demon mumbled to herself, “um, okay.” She then reared up on her knees and folded from the middle down into a deep bow, though provocatively, her tail remained raised. “Please, allow me to show you my hospitality.”

When Ayrsir didn’t respond, the demon looked up, the glass over her eyes tilted askew. “Is that correct? I just need you to understand, I have no intention of harming you, so if you can, please put the knife down.”

“It speaks our tongue,” Rohomes said into Ayrsir’s ear. “What do you make of that?”

Ayrsir wasn’t certain. He did not expect a demon to adhere to mysa custom, even in the form on a trick. Her words were awkward, though he couldn’t help but read sincerity in her eyes. She reacted with fear over being threatened with injury—something that Ayrsir was uncertain was in the nature of demons.

“I think we should humor her,” Ayrsir said. “At least, for now.”

“It wants us to drop our guard,” Rohomes said.

“Yes, I can tell,” Ayrsir said. “But I’m uncertain having our guard up or down would matter all that much. She is neither armed nor hostile, provoking her may do us worse.”

“She’s still a demon and three times our size!”

“Tell me, Brother, do demons bleed?”

Rohomes tilted his ears and thought about it for a long moment. “As far as I know, they’re not made of flesh. We may find for ourselves if we can slice her open.”

The demon spoke up. “L-look, we’re at an impasse here,” she explained, her voice returning to shaking even as her ears were perked in inviting attention, “But I’m not a demon. I’m called a ringel. We’re mortal just like you.”

“The Edicts don’t speak of ringel,” Ayrsir said.

“I don’t expect they would,” the “ringel” said, “I’m from very, very far away. Look—do you need proof?”

“Let me see you bleed!” Rohomes said, waving his dagger before him.

“Okay,” she said. “But don’t cut off anything I need. Would the back of my forearm be enough?”

Rohomes faltered in bewilderment.

“What?” Ayrsir asked.

“I didn’t expect it to agree,” his friend said.

Ayrsir sighed. “Then I shall do it. Ringel, show me your arm and we will determine the truth of your words, but try to strike us down and you will know the wrath of Domour!”

He was, of course, bluffing. Rohomes was right, this ringel could overpower them if she wanted to, but that was what was so intriguing. She didn’t. She held out the back of her arm, laying down upon her bed and stretching it away from her body.

Ayrsir’s ears perked. Leaving Rohomes behind, he climbed up the trailing sheets off of the edge of the bed and, realizing how incautious he was being, stood a respectful distance away from the demon.

She didn’t seem real, by which Ayrsir thought, she seemed too real. If she was a demon, then seeing her here, with all the details of her fur, her face, those intelligent eyes, were not at all like anything that Ayrsir had imagined of a demon. The most the Edicts said was that the monsters were enormous in scale, in the range of hills or mountains. The ringel was big, but she’d still have fit inside a mysa tent.

“I’m not making any sudden moves,” she said. “Please, satisfy your curiosity that I am mortal.”

Ayrsir took a deep breath and approached, kneeling down in front of the long dark-furred arm before him. She didn’t smell unusual—animal-like, perhaps, but in no way unnatural like a brimstone cavern. He almost hesitated in raising his blade, looking up at her to see if she would retaliate. He judged the marks on her arm—and then, after too much hesitating, thrust his dagger down into the meat of the arm.

“OW!” She cried out, yanking her arm away. “Daimak ay! I wanted you to slash it, not jab me to the bone like a piece of meat!”

Ayrsir backed up, his dagger ripped from his paw. Rohomes cried out, scrambling to the bed, though tripping on the way there, delaying his rescue. However, the ringel did not strike out at Ayrsir. She plucked the dagger from her arm and tossed it onto the sheets in front of him.

Blood coated the blade.

“Ah, sorry, I’m sorry,” she said, wincing and twisting her arm inside her wrist. Blood oozed out from the wound, darkening the strange color of her fur.

Rohomes had made it up to the edge of the bed and stopped at the same sight.

“Do you believe me now?” She asked, more agitated but keeping her voice even and calm. “Do you want to inspect the wound? Please, let me clarify, I do not want you to put your fingers there.”

“I believe you are flesh,” Ayrsir said. “Brother?”

Rohomes snorted. “I would assume this some kind of demonic trickery, but… you seem to be an actual creature. Very well. But my paw shall be on my dagger the whole while.” He then jumped back down to the table below and sheathed his own blade while muttering to himself.

“My apologies,” Ayrsir said, gathering up his blade, wiping it, and then re-sheathing it. “I seem to have stained your sheets.”

“Eh, not the worst fluid those have endured,” she said.

“Would you like me to bandage it for you?” Ayrsir offered, though uncertain how much cloth he could offer her beyond his cowl, and it would have been rude to remove it inside someone else’s abode. Demon or not.

Not demon, he told himself. She’s proved that much to you. Why is it so hard to let go of that thought?

“No, I got this.” The ringel reached into a cabinet at the bedside and opened up a square-shaped chest, only to pull out a thing that he could not place: some instrument that fit into her paw with a nozzle on its end. She placed it near the wound on her arm and pressed down on the trigger, ejecting a pile of dun white substance there. She pressed down on it, and wiped away the excess, rolling it about in her fingers.

Ayrsir wasn’t certain what he was witnessing, other than that the wound was now padded over in white.

“This is a form of bandage,” the ringel explained, returning things to their case. “It sterilizes the wound and will seal it back up as it heals.”

“I see,” Ayrsir said, not sure what she meant by “sterilize” (literally she said, “rot-proof”). Was it blessed? He asked for clarification, though not knowing how to phrase his question, said, “How did you come about to know the mortal tongue?”

“Oh, lost tribes and civilizations have interested me my entire career,” she said, returning the gear to her cabinet. “Your dialect of Old Symmeran was my specialty. I didn’t think I’d have the opportunity to use it outside of the classroom!”

Ayrsir narrowed his eyes at the outsider. The words she used—”civilization” (literally, “governed-society”), “career” (”long-task”), “classroom” (”speaking-house”)—he’d not heard in that context before. Was she making them up? Striking out at words and hoping to make sense of them? What did she even mean by “Old Symmeran”?

“I don’t understand most of what you said,” Ayrsir mentioned.

“No, I suspect not,” the ringel said. “My teacher was more loose with the language, had to invent ways of saying things I suppose you don’t have the full context for. By all means, if my words are not insufficient, we can come up with something new.”

“It seems strange to me,” Ayrsir said. “Given that words are sacred, how you may invent them anew.”

The ringel blinked. “Oh… I suppose that’s true, that you have likely not experience much in the way of new things for the past thousand years. Language must seem quite fixed to you.”

“The traders have their language and we have ours,” Ayrsir said. “I am not unfamiliar with the concept, but the traders’ tongue is not what we speak. We speak only the pure language of the Edicts.”

“Yes, but you still understood me when I said I was a ringel,” she said, placing a paw on her chest. “That’s something new. That’s all language is. Affixing words onto things they represent, same as names.” She then blinked, staring forward. Then she slapped herself in the face. “I forgot to introduce myself!”

“No, allow me,” Ayrsir said with a sweeping bow. “My name is Ayrsir, after the prophet. And my apologies for the firebrand nature of Brother Rohomes.”

Rohomes, down on the table, was gorging himself with the fruit. His ears turned red with a blush when their eyes fell upon him, but neither paid him any mind.

“And you?” Ayrsir asked.

She put a paw to her chest. “My name is Roheveron Falix, but everyone just calls me Fal.”

“Fal,” Ayrsir said. His ears brightened into a smile. This whole situation was strangely entertaining, and he couldn’t place why. Speaking with an outsider was usually a tense situation, but something about Fal’s manner was altogether calming and intriguing.

“Good to meet you, Ayrsir,” Falix said.

“Likewise… Fal.” He pursed his lips. Most female he even knew he would address as Sister, but that seemed wrong, given she wasn’t a mysa or even of the Edicts. “Now, since that is out of the way, I mean to ask the purpose of your presence here. You were blocking the path to our well, and we figured you were out there.”

“Oh… that well is yours!” Falix exclaimed, paw to mouth to cover her embarrassment. “I’m sorry, I drew some to refill the RV’s tanks. But you are welcome to use all the water I took, I am not keeping it from you.”

“I appreciate your hospitality.” Ayrsir bowed again. He didn’t know if he needed to be this polite, like he was speaking to an elder, but he would have rather erred on the side of caution now.

“As for why I’m here, my university’s xenoanthropology unit’s primary focus is on isolated tribes. I came down here to gather information for my thesis on how Mysatec’s climate shift is pushing out traditional societies.”

Ayrsir blinked, uncomprehending.

“There’s a lot to unpack,” Falix said. “It would take ages to explain. But I am here primarily to learn from you.”

“Learn from us?” Ayrsir asked. “You mean… learn the Edicts?”

“Oh, that, yes,” Falix said, “But more than that. I’m here to learn how you live and subsist in this environment, your customs, your mannerisms, the things you value and prioritize, the way you view your world.”

“But you already understand our tongue.”

“Yes, but there’s so much more besides! Fortunately, we’ll have time for all of that.”

“What do you mean?” Ayrsir asked. “I apologize for the rudeness, but I cannot stay here. I have to return to my people by sundown with the water we promised.”

“Oh, I know,” Falix said, ears perking up. “We’re here for the whole season!”

Ayrsir tilted his head, uncertain he heard the ringel right. “…we?”

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