Thistlepouch Doorringer stared the way she’d come as the sun gently peered across the endless sea. It was beautiful, she supposed, the soft colors of the sunrise, the sparkles and reflections painted on the water. Quite possibly one of the most beautiful things she’d ever seen.
Thistlepouch didn’t care.
She couldn’t stop staring behind her, staring at the only land she’d ever known. Staring at the only land, maybe, that existed -- though it’d long since disappeared beyond the horizon. The vast, eternal expanse of sea and sky scared her a little, made her feel small and helpless. She tried not to think about it; she pictured instead what would be happening in the land she’d left. Her parents would still be asleep, of course. Her brother Mudstomp likely had his pillow over his face in denial -- or would, shortly. Only Coinbright, her hair not long gray and her eyes with the playful sparkle that loved life, would be up at this hour, teasing Mudstomp and pulling the cloak away so he’d have to scramble to his feet and chase after. Pretty, pretty Coinbright, so freckles, and never once vain about it. Thistlepouch wondered how long it would be before somebody discovered her note. She hoped they would understand. If only she could’ve given them all one last hug, told them how very much she loved them. Hopefully they’d know anyway.
Banished. The word rang in her head like a death knell. Nobody’d banished her. She’d not done anything wrong. Nothing but being born without freckles and never developing any, and her hair not turning proper gray when she came of age. Freak. Freak, freak, freak, though everyone was too polite to say it out loud. Except that one, who’d cruelly pointed out she had no. . . no freckles. And Mudstomp, defending her honor, had started a brawl, and the magistrate had proclaimed that next time he’d be banished, the closest thing to a death sentence. She couldn’t let that happen to him. He’d protected her honor; the least she could do was give him the chance to live. With a teary sniff she wondered if it really was true that elves and humans and gnomes and dwarves and all that were only imaginary. Probably -- else why would they not have come to visit before now? No, there really wasn’t anyone else out there, and she’d probably die of thirst in a few days. She laughed mirthlessly at that, to die of thirst surrounded by water. But it was saltwater and undrinkable. At least she wouldn’t have to live forever away from her people.
So occupied with morbid thoughts, Thistlepouch didn’t notice the ship’s approach until a massive shadow engulfed her. Gasping, she stared in horror at the gargantuan construct emitting harsh, guttural sounds nothing like language she knew. She wondered if perhaps this was punishment of some sort, thought vaguely that she should try to get away, but could not move. She felt sudden sympathy for squirrels and other such small animals that fell prey to carnivorous birds.
A huge, misshapen beast leaned over the side and yelled something at her.
“I’m sorry,” Thistlepouch replied haltingly in All-Speak. “I can’t understand you.”
Some commotion Way Up There, then a hefty rowboat lowered (what a huge ship, to carry other boats with it!) and rapidly advanced. Thistlepouch put on her politest face, though her insides quailed. There was more than one of that awful thing, grotesque in its hugeness. And they didn’t look friendly. Or even polite. She wanted to run -- but where? She could swim just well enough to stay afloat, and she couldn’t go home even if she could swim that far. The. . . things. . . lashed their boat to hers, and two stepped aboard. Her boat was small; they towered over her, well more than twice her height. She couldn’t believe any living being could grow to that size! A scream seized in her throat as one reached for her; she scrabbled to get away as rough, meaty hands grabbed her. She wiggled and bit and gagged at the taste of stale sweat and tar. Beautiful colors and pinpricks of light exploded before her eyes as something large and blunt clomped her on the head. She heard someone whimper. She supposed it must be her -- she couldn’t imagine any of them sounding like a small, frightened, hurt animal -- and wondered at how distant it sounded.
She didn’t remember much after that.
* * *
There was that whimper again -- only now it sounded more like a moan. She blinked groggily and raised her head to see dim forms and a dank enclosure. It smelled horrible -- dirt and filth and sweat and blood and excrement and stale, splattered food that likely hadn’t smelled good to begin with. “Larta. . . ?” she asked, fuzzy, then remembered that they might not understand her language. She switched to All-Speak, patchy from having never been used except for lessons. “Where am I?”
“You okay, elf child?” she heard a oddly accented concerned voice, female, ask quietly from the shadows.
Elf child? I must’ve gotten hit harder than I thought. “My name is Thistlepouch Doorringer, daughter of Fireglow and Rainsplash, sister to Starfyre and Mudstomp and Coinbright.” The litany wasn’t necessary; she doubted anyone would recognize the names or associate them with a family of traveling salespeople. But she said it anyway, to remind herself, for comfort. For a sense of normalcy. “And I think I’m all right. Except I might be hallucinating.”
“I’m Mica,” said the voice. “Human,” she added, as an afterthought.
Thistlepouch’s eyes flew wide. “Hu- human?!” she squeaked. “Bu- but -” The world as she knew it tipped frighteningly on its side.
“Thistlepouch Doorringer,” a gruff male somewhere to her left noted. “Don’t sound like no flaming elf name. Don’t sound like no bloody elf, either. Hera’s tits, listen how she talks!”
“Oh, and I suppose you would be the expert?”
“Shaddyap, elf.” It sounded like an epithet.
“My name,” said the elf -- elf! -- self-importantly, “is Bob. Half-ogre.” That sounded like an epithet, too.
Elf. Ogre. Human. Next somebody would tell her there was a gnome somewhere about.
“No offense,” Thistlepouch offered timidly, “but the -- ah -- half-ogre? -- is right. I’m not an elf.”
“Then what are you?” asked a cultured, tired-sounding voice to her right, echoing the question she’d asked many times as a child:
Ti dwarva gonna dwarva le huma gonna huma, sa gonna tai? -- “If dwarves are dwarves and humans are humans, what are we?”
Tai gonna kita, her father’s voice whispered in her head. Their people had no name. Why name yourselves if you were the only ones to exist?
She heard her own faint, disbelieving voice say the words in All-Speak except the last word, which she did not know. “I am kita.”
I am real.
Disclaimer: An epic story was started
with the cration of this chapter.