The Tribes of K'haren - Completed

Prologue

'Quickly, the man pulled his sword and raised it high. He shouted at the huge creature in front of him but the dragon didn't heed him at all. Then the man ran towards it ...' the storyteller waited to make sure he had the attention of all the children sitting around him. 'In the blink of an eye, the dragon turned his head and roared at the man.' The old man roared and his audience appeared to be happily frightened.

Nume, a young girl, didn't really listen. She knew the story and although the enchanting voice of the storyteller usually captured her as well, she just didn't feel like listening that day. Nume looked at the man so he wouldn't notice that she was currently daydreaming about flying up high on her own gseirut's back in the middle of the night. Of course she knew that wasn't realistic, she'd never have a gseirut for herself and also, they didn't fly at night because their eyes didn't really work in the dark. But Nume had always wanted to fly up to those shiny little stones in the sky to take one home so she could look at it from close up whenever she wanted to.

'... and the knight came home as saviour of all phraio. He became our first Great Leader and ever since, his offspring has ruled and guided us safely throughout good and bad times.' the storyteller went on. Nume looked at her friend Kran who looked quite bored. Of course he did, she thought. He must have heard that story a hundred times before, as all future Great Leaders did.

When Kran noticed that she was looking at him, he smiled helplessly. She could read the words 'get me out of here' as if they were written across his face. Once he looked away again, she quickly poked him in the side. He turned around and gave her an angry but still amused look. The storyteller began telling another story about a former Great Leader.

Nume sighed and stared into the fire that crackled in the middle of the circle formed by the group. Then she felt a sharp pain on her right side. She glanced back at Kran angrily. In that moment, everything turned silent. Of course, the storyteller had noticed them. As always. Whenever Kran did anything, somebody was sure to notice and whenever she was there, too, somebody was sure to blame her for it.

'Nume, don't you like hearing about the great deeds of our Leaders?' the storyteller asked.

'Of course I do, sire.' she replied quietly, lowering her head.

'Then do be quiet, if you please.'

'Yes, sire. Of course, sire. Forgive me, sire.' she mumbled.

It took a couple of minutes until the storyteller once more had to interrupt his monologue because of the two children.

'Alright, that's enough, you're all going to bed early, thank your friend Nume for it. Maybe you can teach her how to behave.' the man spoke angrily.

Nume glanced at her friend desperately and she could see how sorry he was but that didn't make it any better. Sensing the angry and disappointed stares of the other children burn on her skin, Nume felt as if a huge fist were squishing her insides. As if they didn't know very well that it had not been her fault! Nume got up and walked away quickly, now all she wanted was to get back home and sleep, hopefully never having to get back up again.

She had nearly reached her tent when she heard the voice of an older boy around the corner. He was making fun of her. Any other girl would have been sensible and would have gone home anyway, but not Nume. She was proud and couldn't let that pass so she ran around the corner and boxed the boy in his stomach.

He sank to his knees and his two friends standing next to him stared at her in disbelief. The boy got back up on his feet and jumped at Nume heedlessly. He threw both her and himself to the ground and Nume cried loudly. They rolled around on the ground and hit and kicked for what seemed to be hours passing by.

The boy's friends just stood and watched, still unable to believe what was going on. Then Nume could hear Kran's voice.

'Stop it! Let go! You will hurt him!'

Him? The word sank into Nume's mind. Him? It took another moment until she realised she was sitting on the boy, pushing him to the ground and hitting him with her bare fists.

Moments after she'd got back up and stumbled a few steps over to her friend, the boy's father climbed out of one of the tents. He was the tribe's breeder, the one to look after all their gseirut. The man stared at the scene and before he even helped his son to get back up, he started shouting at Nume, insulting her and waking up everybody.

'Stop it!' Kran shouted back at the man. The breeder hesitated. 'She didn't do this to your son. That was me. I had to defend my honour after he said I would make a miserable leader.'

Everybody stared at Kran in disbelief. Obviously, everybody knew he was lying. But you couldn't just run about the place stating that the grandson of the Great Leader was a liar. So the breeder took his son's hand and pushed the boy inside the tent, telling the others to piss off, shouting an apology to the Great Leader and his whole family, just so everybody heard it.

// Hello there and welcome to The Tribes of K'haren! If you liked this chapter, don't forget to give it a vote and comment below, thank you very much!