Skytrails

9-Cur'tik'match

Another sincha landed, a stone's throw behind the first.

"Well, I wish you luck in your hunting," Krii said with a smile. "I would offer you this j'nchaya here, but it is a gift for a friend."

The man smiled back. Not a friendly smile.

The second rider joined the first. Krii greeted the man and received a half hearted acknowledgement in return. The j'n struggled even harder in Krii's arms, forcing Krii to shift his stance to keep the thing from hopping down and skittering off to an immediate and certain doom from these Co'te hunters.

"Looks like the little one wants to leave his mother," the second rider said. The first man smirked. In the distance, dust billowed up in a massive cloud where the third sincha hit the ground. Its rider seemed to bodily smack against the animal's back and bounce almost off the thing.

Krii laughed a loud but unconvincing laugh at the man's joke. "That is funny, my friend. Implying, of course, that I am its mother because I am holding it. In truth, this one's mother was killed and it came and found me while I was sleeping, so I am taking it as a gift to a friend, as I was just telling your comrade here."

The two men glanced at one another. "Came and found you?" the first asked.

Out of the corner of his eye, Krii saw the third sincha waddling on all fours, the rider on top swaying from side to side with the unusual motion of the animal. Krii nodded. "Woke me from a peaceful sleep."

The riders looked puzzled. "Who are you, friend?" the second man asked.

The sudden change in temperament startled Krii, but he was happy to ride out a friendly current. "My name is Krii, of the Lin'n Dralii." He thought it best to leave his Kualii family out of this. The Co'te and Kualii Edain had never been friendly with one another, even in these times of relative peace.

"Lin'n Dralii," the second man repeated. The third sincha waddled toward them and stopped between the other two sinchas, who appeared to be sleeping except for a flicking open of one or the other's eyes every few seconds. The third rider slid off with substantially less grace than the first two had, but landed softly beside its sincha and straightened its clothes. The other two riders had not turned their attention from Krii.

"Can I ask what brings Co'te hunters as far north as the Pit'n Poa? Has the game all left the southern plains?"

The first rider spat. "We would be happy to be back in our lands which run with far more game than this rocky waste, but we are on cur'tik'match and cannot return to our lands until our leader's visions are fulfilled." As the man talked, the third rider approached and Krii realized it was a woman, and no Co'te woman either. Maybe a slave, but why would they allow a slave to ride on her own. She did not hold herself like a slave, either. She stood by the other two, head high, and stared at Krii as if she would just as soon slit his throat as talk to him.

"Greetings, stranger," Krii said to the woman. "Welcome to these lands." The other two riders stared off in the distance, at nothing in particular. They are embarrassed to be riding with her, Krii realized.

The woman continued to stare at him.

Krii nodded. "I see. Well, my friends, I must be on my way. The sun is moving and I move with it. Good luck to you and your visionary chief."

"Drek'n is no chief," said the first rider. "He is our prophet."

Krii cocked his head at this news. Who would have thought these buffoons would be in cahoots with such a famous individual.

"And highly renowned," said the second rider. "Have you not heard of him?"

"I have, actually," Krii said, once again adjusting his arms to keep the little j'n from jumping free. "You're right. He is widely known in these lands, and I'm sure elsewhere as well. Is it true he is gathering an giant war party from among all the nations of Kaalbriia?"