Tales from Wampaandina

A Fantasy adventure set in the continent of Wampaandina where humans have been infused with the souls of animals and have adopted some of their physical attributes.

Chapter 1

I don't ever remember my head hurting this much. Actually now that I think about it, I don't ever remember my head hurting. In fact, I don't remember anything at all. That worries me.

It's not that I can't think of my name that concerns me, but the fact that since I'm just starting out, the splitting pain in the back of my head might actually be very slight. What if it's just a little headache and because it's the first pain I've ever felt it just seems severe. Maybe I'm a huge pansy!

I sure hope not, because it really does hurt.

The floor beneath me hits a bump and bounces my sleeping body up into the air. For a second, I consider that I might be a bird, but after further consideration I deem this idea unlikely since I don't think that birds have much internal dialog. Who really know though, maybe they do.

First my body, then my head reconnect with the floor and the pain in my head doubles with a blinding flash. I open my eyes and exclaim,

"Akay!"

"You talking about me? You're Akay!" comes a childish reply to my outburst.

Akay, I think, that's my name I guess; it's not a very nice name.

I look up towards the source of the voice. I gasp as I see that the voice belongs to the most beautiful girl I have ever seen. Of course, she is the only person I have ever seen, but I don't focus much on this detail.

she is leaned over me her glimmering auburn hair sticks wildly out of her chullo. Chullo, I remember the name of her beanie with dangling yarn from the ears, but not who I am. That seems foolish so I make a note to re-prioritize my memory cataloging paradigm.

The angel above me blinked her enormous bewitching eyes that were somehow both light and dark, intense and playful.

"you okay there?" She asks with a smile.

Her smile is breathtaking. I can't resist smiling back.

"Yes, except my head hurts," I say, "What's your name?"

The beautiful girl's smiled turns into a frown. Her pecan colored skin scrunches together around her Eyebrows.

"You don't know who I am?" She asks confused.

Her voice sounds almost pained.

"No, should I?" I ask.

The beautiful girl frowns and says nothing. I sense that my not remembering her name makes her uncomfortable. As a result, I feel a twinge of guilt in my stomach. In my defense, I also didn't remember my own name until she told me.

"Do you remember your name?" She asks as if reading my mind.

"It’s Akay, you said so just a second ago."

She shrugs, "yeah..." Her voice trails off.

"Where am I?" I ask as I sit up.

Observing my surroundings I see that I'm in a big metal cage with wheels. The road is rocky and lined with large evergreen trees. There are two men in bright blue tunics and bronze armour dragging the cart with ropes on their shoulders. I'm amazed by how fast they run especially whilst dragging a huge metal box with two people inside.

"Why are we in this box?" I inquire of Chitu. She glances around.

"We're captives. Those two Rabber bafoons up there are taking us to Rabberton to be sold as slaves." She spits.

Well, that sucks. I don't remember having any other occupation, but being a slave seems like a downgrade in life.

"We're not going to be slaves though," she continues quietly even though the noise, of the Rabbers running and the wheels hitting stones, is thunderous.

"Together we can escape."

I look at the cage again. It is made of crisscrossed steel. I knock on the metal. It reverberates to the tune of "I'm very sturdy steel".

I look skeptically toward Chitu.

She, sensing my doubt, winks.

"so what do you say Akay? Should we break out? "

I look to the front of the cart. The Rabbers are tall and fast and they carry razor lined whips.

I doubt I can outrun them, and without a weapon, fighting seems perilous. Maybe a better opportunity will present itself.

"I'm in", I say, after all what's life if you don't live it once in a while.
" so how do we do it? "
Chitu smiled mischievously.
"We do it, by having a few tricks up my dress."
I frown and look down at her dress. It’s very ornate featuring pink and blue stripes and lots of beads. By the time I make eye contact with the angel again, she sighs exasperated.
"That came out wrong she said, I meant this." As she speaks, something behind her moves. It looks like a big furry snake. I realize from context clues, that it is a long tail attached to her body like a monkey.
"You have a tail?" I say more than ask.
Chitu nods proudly. "That's right", she says, “I’m Monatha, people of the monkey."
My mind is blown as I look at Chitu's tail sway back and forth behind her head. I'm not repulsed, rather I'm mesmerized by it.
Chitu snaps her fingers in front of my face.
"Hey stop staring at my tail... You're weirding me out."
With effort I drag my eyes away from her extra appendage.
“So how does you having a tail help us escape from this box?" I ask.
"Because," she begins, "it means that I can reach both hinges and pull them out simultaneously. I just need you to lift up on the door and take the weight off of them."
I consider her plan. I look at the door that she mentions. It's a huge steel grate with thick bars and solid metal plates.
"And what's plan B if I can't lift the giant door?" I ask skeptically.
Chitu giggles out loud.
"#NAME# Of course you can lift it; you're Osuri, dummy!" She exclaims.
My spirits soar as she tells me this. I can see the admiration in her eyes. I'm an Osuri!
Something occurs to me. I have no idea what it means to be Osuri. I ask the angel.
She slaps her own forehead exasperated.
"Osuri! Bear-man! It's your species, #NAME#!" She exclaims, "Look I'll explain everything to you, but first, we need to get away from these Rabbers before they drag us out of this forest. All you need to know is that you have the s strength of a bear"
That seems fair so I nod.
Chitu then points to the metal door.
"Okay, lift the door up."
Eager to please this girl, I stumble to my feet and move over to the back of the cage. I stick my thick burly fingers under the bars. Chitu climbs up on the grate ready to pull the pins from the hinges.
"Lift", she whispers urgently.
Time to find out about this bear strength. I dig my feet into the floor and hoist the door upward. My neck and shoulders shudder under the tremendous weight, but they do not give out. After only a moment, Chitu removes the pins using her right hand and nimble tail. I know instantly that she has successfully removed them because the heavy for behind to fall outward. I can see the ground coming at me quickly. I slip my fingers out of the grate so that they ate not crushed between the steel bars and the dirt road below. Chitu apparently has the same idea, except she jumps up and wraps herself around my torso. Despite everything, I smile for just a moment at the embrace.
That smile is only temporary however, because as soon as the door hits the road, my head explodes in white flashing pain and I involuntarily cry out.
Chitu doesn't let me have even a second to rest however. In a flash she is on her feet and dragging me toward the tall pine trees to the south of the road. She deftly maneuvers over and around the boulders and shrubberies between the road and the edge of the forest. I am not as graceful as she is and find myself tripping over even the smallest of the bushes.
We can hear the Rabbers yelling behind us.
Chitu reaches the base of the nearest tree and scampers up the trunk using nothing more than tree bark to support her. In only a few seconds she reaches the lowest branch which is over a dozen feet up. I hesitate, skeptical that I could climb like this monkey-girl.
I remember what she said about me being a bear man. What was the word she used? Osuri?
Bears can climb trees right? I should be able to make it as well.
With newfound confidence, I leap towards the trunk of the tree ready to dig my inhumanly during fingers into the bark.
My foot catches on something, however and I fall flat on my face before I even reach the tree. My head again bursts into a starting ache.
I hear laughter behind me. The Rabbers have caught me. Four of them stand around me, i glance behind me and see the other two chasing after Chitu, who is swinging from branch to branch and tree to tree. I look at my feet and see that one of the metal lined whips that the Rabbers carry is wrapped around my feet.
"Thought you could escape, did you?" The Rabbers with the whip around my feet asks contemptuously.
I nod and say, "Yes. We were going to lose you in the trees."
The Rabbers laugh.
"Stupid oaf!" The ranger closet to me spits, "you can't escape from Rabberohn. It's your destiny; all species were made to serve the hare lord."
In spite of myself and the situation I can't help but to giggle at the mention of "hare-lord". What if he was bald?
This angers the Rabbers near me.
The biggest man who is apparently their leader hisses, "we'll teach you to respect the power of Rabberohn, and that little she-monkey too."
One of the men behind him snickers, "it'll be a lesson she won't forget".

I feel my pulse rise as my temper flared. I yank my feet out of the lasso and jump to a standing position.
"You won't lay a finger on her!" I growl.
The laughter stops. The alpha steps up to me. He's taller than me but thinner. I estimate that I could snap his bones without much effort.
"You want another beating, Bear? I already knocked you out once today," he threatens.

My heart is now racing furiously.

With a grunt I lunge forward swinging my left fist at the alpha's head. He isn't there when my punch should have struck him. Instead he's five feet away. I jump at him again, but he quickly dodges out of the way and somehow appears behind me striking me with his whip again. This time it’s my back that is torn by the whip.
I hear a woman scream in the distance.
Chitu!
The big Rabber laughs,
"It sounds like my boys caught up with the little monkey."
I growl and lunge again, but the alpha is long gone before I reach him. I feel the whip on the back of thighs this time. I can tell that I'm bleeding.
"You're just too slow Osuri, you don't stand a chance." He mocks.
I try to hit him several more times much to the amusement of the surrounding rabbets. I end up exhausted and losing blood and find myself falling to my knees.
"That's right bear, learn your place; kneel before your masters."
I can get my own heart beat and my lungs feel like they could burst, yet all I can think about is Chitu and that scream I heard.
"You're the Masters of poop!" A voice taunts from above. I look up just in time to see blur of girl and tail fly on top of the Rabbers. Chitu lands on one of the smaller men and her momentum flips him backward. He screams loudly as she holds onto his arm with her feet, which I can now see have thumbs like her hands. The Rabbers arm is bending out at the wrong angle. Chitu pulls the fallen man's bronze sword. The other Rabbers leave me forgotten and swarm after Chitu. It's three on one, but Chitu is up to the challenge. She isn't as fast as they are, but she's swift and has more appendages to fight with.
One men attempts to run behind her, but she catches his neck with her tail. She is whipped around, but the man stumbles and falls to the ground. Another tries to stab her with his sword while she is still shining, but she deflects the lunge with her sword, the attackers sword is then pushed down directly into the side of God fallen comrade.
Horrified, the man releases his sword, Chitu capitalizes on the opportunity by throwing her sword high in the air and jumping up while leaning back. She locks her legs around his head and throws herself backwards forcing the Rabber to flip forward. Chitu deftly swings out beneath the men before he slams his head into the ground rendering him unconscious. She reaches up to catch the sword that she threw, but the last Rabber, the alpha, doesn't wait. In the blink of an eye he slams into the still air borne Chitu. His momentum allows him to carry her almost 10 feet before he slams her back into the trunk of the pine tree that I had tried to climb. She grunts with the impact. The Rabber takes a step back and draws his bronze sword from its leather scabbard. He then lunges at Chitu assuming the sword for her heart. Not a second too soon Chitu raises her feet and catches the alpha's hands.
Before I know it I am on my feet and running at the Rabber yelling at the top of my lungs. He ducks before I can hit him with a wild haymaker. Between his dodge and the struggle with Chitu he drops his sword and instead is forced to draw his whip.
I yell and jump at him determined to get at least one punch on him, but he anticipates it an easily zips around me. He flashes the whip but is too close for it to sting, instead it simply wraps around my torso and biceps. That's when I notice a second cord protruding from the end of the whip. The alpha grabs this cord and yanks it backward. This causes the metal lining of the whip to extrude away from the leather skin of the whip and form into little blades. The weapon the Rabber holds now looks like the B*****d child of a serpent and a porcupine.
A scream erupts from lungs as the shock of what has happened reaches my brain. The whip which is wrapped tightly around my chest and arms is now lined with little daggers, many of which are now more than an inch inside my flesh. The pain is horrific. Warm blood seeps down my body on all sides. My vision blurs. I feel the knives retreat inside the whip and the whip falls off of my covered in my blood. I don't remember the fall to the ground. I can barely hear. I see Chitu attack the alpha again. His limbs flap in unnatural angles. I close my eyes.
"Wake up we have to go. Did you hear what I called them? I said they were masters of poop." Chitu says excitedly.
I'm not moving anywhere. That much I know.
"Am I going to die?" I ask.
She looks down at me.
"No, it’s just a cut."
"Just a cut? I have more blood outside my body then I have inside!"
"Don't be dramatic,"
"I see a light!"
"It's the sun; don't stare at it or you'll go blind."
I realize I am in fact looking at the sun so I close my eyes and then pass out.

Chapter 2

A tear rolls down her face and falls to the ground. It leaves a clean streak on her dirty cheek. I see it. I must be the only one who does, because the other children keep laughing. How can they not know that their jokes make her so sad? She doesn’t like it when we laugh about they way she talks; that’s why she’s so quiet all the time.

Something pinches my finger. I open my eyes. A bright green lump of feathers stands on my wrist. It pinches again. I shake my arm to move the feathers and see what is on my hand. The lump squawks and flaps its deceptively large wings. When it turns around, I can see that the lump of feathers is really a bird with long green feathers. It has two circles of yellow around its eyes and a patch of red on the top of it’s fluffy head. I watch it flap its wings as it lands only a foot away. It has a certain goofy grace. It lands with its feet on a taught vine that leads toward me. I attempt to sit up, but can’t. A quick glance down toward my navel reveals that I am tied to this log. The bird squawks again and I look at it. It c***s its head to the side looks down at the vine on which it stands. I follow its gaze, and trace the vine back to its source. One end of the vine has been lashed to a branch in the log. The other end appears to stretch all the way around me. In fact, it is the vine that is keeping me bound to the log. It is a log isn’t it? I roll my head to the side and look down.

“Akay!” I cry.

I am not lashed to a log, but to a huge branch of an enormous tree. The drop to the ground is dizzying.

“Akay” a nasally voice in front of me echos.

I turn my head and see the bird staring at me with one eye. It lifts a taloned foot, and I notice that its sharp talons have sliced through part of the vine. The vine seems to stretch a bit further now.

“Stop! Yuqoy!” I swear.

“Yuqoy.” The bird repeats.

“You watch your mouth”, I say to the flying ball of fluff, “you’re not in enough danger to use language like that.”

“Yuqoy” it says.

“Fine, go ahead, just watch out for your-”

It’s razor sharp talons twitch and the vine snaps.

“-feet.”

The world turns and I’m plummeting down to the jungle floor. This is a terrible way to die, I don’t even remember who I am.

A green and red blur swings from a branch flying towards me. An involuntary gasp is forced from me as my fall is halted. Something has caught me at the waist and prevented me from falling to my death.

“Be careful, dummy.”

Its Chitu's voice. When I look up I see that she is holding on to a smaller branch with both hands. She has me suspended with her tail wrapped around my waist.

"Sorry," I wheeze.

Chitu gently swings my me to a branch large enough that I can easily sit on it without immediate fear of falling again. A huge sigh of relief escapes my mouth.

Chitu flips down so that she is sitting with her legs swinging from the edge of the branch. She's so comfortable here on this death-trap. I guess thats part of what it means to be a Monkey person. Monatha, that's what she called it. I'm an Osuri, bear man.

Chitu was talking. I hadn't realized that I'd stopped paying attraction.

"You need to wait for your wound to heal before you start swinging around."

My wound? Akay! That Rabber and his bladed whip!

I look down at my chest and see a that my shirt has been torn and converted into a really long bandage. I pick at it with my fingers. I gulp at the mess of flesh and stitches underneath. As if seeing it made me remember that it hurt, I cry out in anguish at the searing pain.

"You have 112 stitches. I placed them all by myself."

The uneven and jagged stitches were not something that I would take credit for. I'm not sure if it's the nature of the cuts, but the way she has stitched my chest and back closed makes the skin bunch up at odd sections giving me an overall lumpy look.

What is going on?!

I repeat this thought aloud. My voice is a bit louder and more frantic than I'd hoped.

"Relax, " Chita says soothingly,"I told you that'd I'd explain everything didn't I?"

She plucks a stitch playfully. I can't help but wince at the sharp pain.

"What do you want to know?" she asks sitting with her back against the trunk of the tree.

My mind goes blank. I can't think what to ask. Sometimes when you know nothing, that includes not knowing what you don't know. That's just confusing.

Chitu seems amused at my silence. She rolls her head back. Her spiked red brown hair bounces slightly. This angel has saved me twice now. Three times if I count helping me to escape the cage. That's a question!

"Why did you save me? " I ask.

Without missing a beat she responds,"because I'm a great person."

I can't argue that she's a great person, though she does makes a poor surgeon.

She continued to speak, "I'm just going to start from the beginning. Your name is Rek."

"I thought it was Akay?"

"I was just messing around you. You're Rek, an Osuri from the eastern Sierra. Your people are children of the bears gifted with their strength. My name is Chitu, I am a Monatha from the central jungle. My people have the spirit of the monkey. That's why we're so smart."

Though it didn't give you any superhuman dexterity, I think with my fingers hovering over my wounded chest.

"Why were we in that cart? "

"Hold on, I'm getting to that, I was traveling through your lands as Puriyp-"

"what's that?"

"it means wanderer and it's the oldest tradition in all of Wampaandina. When someone doesn't fit in, they can abandon all their possessions and be a Puriyp traveling through the land until you find purpose in life. Most people will share their food and homes with Puriyp for a time, though it's been outlawed by the Rabber emperor Rabberon. "

From what I know about this Rabberon character he sounds like a steaming pile of Akay.

"why would he outlaw wandering?" I ask.

"He outlawed harboring Puriyp. Too many run-around slaves were claiming to be Puriyp. The law makes it easier to catch them I guess."

"And why were we going to be slaves"

"I'm getting there, be patient, akay"

"Sorry-"

"So I was traveling through your lands dressed as one of your women, when I saw you. Now you were on Sasanyan-"

"Sasanyan? I swear you're just making these names up."

"Your people named them, not me. Anyway, you were on your Sasanyan, which is an Osuri coming of age ritual, when you were attacked by 6 Rabbers. I heard your cries and came to help fight."

"I was crying?"

"Don't worry. They were like battle cries, bear, you know very masculine."

"Oh that's good I guess."

"So, I'm always game for bunny-bashing, and when I saw them beating up on you, I went to help you fight them."

"And you lost?" I ask. But she's so good at fighting

I would have been fine, except your clumsy bear hands accidentally punched me when I wasn't looking. It slowed me down enough that the Rabbers were able to tie me down long enough to throw both of us in that cage."

I cringe when I think that my hands punched an angel.

"err, sorry..." I say apologetically.

"Its okay, I'm over it." She says matter-of-factly, "it happened, and you can't change it."

I gulp and nod. We're quiet for a moment. I try to break the silence.

"So after, I... After you got captured, then I tried to save you and got hit in the head? That's why I can't remember anything?"

Chitu pauses briefly as if choosing her words carefully.

"Yup." She finally responds. She can be strange, I think.

"Well", I say, "what do we do now?"

She points at my wounds, "as soon as you're healed, I'll take you back to your village, and then I'm off to see the abandoned castles!"

"The what?"

"The Abandoned Castles, #nickname#, they're the ruins of a city and temple where the ancient men lived hundreds of years ago-"

"Hundreds of years ago?"

"Thousands of years ago, they-"

"Wait was it hundreds or thousands of years ago?"

"I don't care, you choose."

"Your story is losing historical credibility."

"Do you want to hear the story, or are you going to keep interrupting?"

"Sorry."

"Good. A long time ago, men and women lived without any animal spirit inside them. They were pure humans. They knew how to make all kinds of dark magic including how to escape death.

In their temple on top of the mountains, they took animals and sacrificed them using the animal life force to extend their own lives. They were able to live for a really long time doing this, but the spilled animal blood cried to the spirit of the earth for justice. The earth heard them and cursed the humans, and all their descendants, to carry the spirits of the animals they had deprived of bodies inside their own bodies. That's how my people came to inherit the souls of monkeys, and how your people harbor the ancient bear spirits."

I cocked my head to the side.

"It just sounds like a legend that old men make up to tell their grandchildren."

Chitu shrugs, "think what you want, I'm still going to see the ruins. I want to see the place where the Makipura happened. Before you ask, it's when the animal spirits first entered the bodies of men."

She looks dreamily off into the distance. She leans on my shoulder and closes her eyes.

"Can you imagine it Rek?", she says obviously imagining it herself.

One of her hands wraps around my back and her other hand rests comfortably on my chest. Ive only been awake for a grand total of about an hour that I remember, but the way she's holding me didn't seem like a way you embrace a stranger.

" um, Chitu," I begin, "did you and me... Were we?"

She jerks back,

"No!" She blurts, "don't even dream it. You're Osuri, I'm Monatha, its not even possible; we’re different species!"

She turns away with an exasperated groan. Despite, her indignant attitude, I'm not convinced. The way she stitched my wounds, and the way she wrapped her arms around me, there was definitely something more to this story. I am at least pretty sure that I am in love her. Of course, I don’t have a lot of experience with well, anything, but I think I love her. I feels right.

"I'm going to go find some food," Chitu says standing on the edge of the branch. You should sleep, you need to heal so that I can take you back."

She jumps off of the branch and plummets ten meters down before she swings on a smaller branch from the next tree over. She continues swinging on branches and vines until she's out of sight. Is there anything she can’t do? ...well you know,besides stitches.

Birds chirp strange jungle tunes around me. With Chitu gone, I suddenly feel vulnerable and weak. Somehow when she’s around, I seem to forget about the huge gash around my arms and torso. Now, however, it’s all I have to focus on and I find it difficult to concentrate on anything but the ache and burn.

Chitu said I should rest.

I actually do feel very sleepy. I crawl into an indentation in the jungle wood and close my eyes.

I’m not allowed more than a few minutes of sleep before being rudely awakened.

"Yuquoy!" The nasally bird voice shouts into my ear.

Akay bird! I think.

I jump and attempt to swat the bird away. In my surprise, I forgot to grab onto the branch and I felt myself slip off of the edge. I dig my fingers into the bark, but it just chips off and once again I'm falling to the ground.

Akay, I'm such an idiot.

I was much lower to the ground this time, but with my poorly stitched wound, the fall will assuredly kill me. A blur of green and brown rushes toward me. I hear a scream echo in the trees. I realize that I'm the one screaming.

Is that really what I sound like?

I hold my hands out futilely. Just before I collide with the ground, a bald head looks up at me with a mix of shock and terror on its face.

It hit the man who had been crouching on the jungle floor only a split second later.

I feel the stitches burst free. Blood begins to flow again. The man I crushed, groans and shoves me aside. He stands up and curses. Looking disdainfully at me laying there bleeding he mutters "Bleedi' Osuri-". He then realizes his own pun and begins to chuckle. My hearing fades. The edges of my vision begin to blur. This is it. Shouldnt my life flash before my eyes? Maybe it did, its just been so short that maybe I missed it.

I roll my eyes over to where the bald man is standing. He looks panicked. His chest is bleeding from a deep jagged cut.

"Hey", I wheeze, " you have a wound just like mine."

The man waves his arms in panic and then turns around and moves out of my view. A few seconds pass like hours before I begin to feel something funny.

It starts as a tingling in my torso, but quickly evolves into a searing burn across my chest and back.

Wow, I think, dying really hurts. I at least hoped I’d pass out first.

I see only white and I can't hear myself scream, though I'm certain that I am screaming.

What is happening? It feels like my flesh is melting. After a few seconds the pain ebbs and my vision and hearing return to me. I explore my wound with my fingers, its wet with blood, but there is not sharp pain as I rub my fingers over it. Craning my neck, I look down at my body torso. The blood was left over from before, but the wound itself had closed and was now a puffy pink scar. It was a gnarly scar, and it made me a little queasy to see, but at least I wasn't dying anymore. That was a definite improvement.

I sit up and look around. I'm still dizzy, but my vision is sharpening. I get my first good look at the bald man. He is tall and thin. He has a narrow face but a wide nose. He wears some kind of embroidered skirt, the fabric looks soft. His top is bare except for some jeweled bracers on his forearms. I noticed that his wound has also stopped bleeding and is scarred like mine. He is furious.

"You cursed bear! Why did you jump on me while I was enchanting?"

I blink. I have no idea what to say.

He continues yelling, "you idiotic Osuri trash! Tell me were you planning on soul meshing! Do you even know what that means!"

I shake my head afraid to speak even though I'm fairly sure that I could crush him without much effort. He's just so loud.

"See! This is why the Rabbers rule! The other species are too stupid to know where they're going much less overthrow a foreign empire!"

He exhales sharply.

As he yells, I feel my own frustration rising.

"Well I didn't want to fall out of the tree! Its like I saw you randomly crouching in the jungle and thought 'hey maybe I'll jump off of a really high branch and tackle him'!"

The bald man's nostrils flare.

"Well look what you did! You almost killed me!" He points to the scar on his chest that mirrors my own.

"I didn't do that!" I spit.

"Of course you did, you fool. When you crashed into me I was doing magic so our souls got intertwined. Anything that happens to you also happens to me! Look!" The bald man pinches his own side and winces. I pause unsure of what he's doing. A few seconds later I feel it. A pinch in my own side. Its not very strong, but it's so unexpected that I cringe.

"See!" The man yells, "we're connected!"

I'm seething. Why is this dumb man so angry? It was a simple coincidence. Wait! Am I angry because he's angry? I don't like the way it feels.

I decide that I need to make him smile. Lifting up my right arm, I use my left hand to scratch my side lightly.

The man is mid sentence of an insult when he snorts. His eyes widen and glare at me, saying: don't you dare.

I just give him a toothy grin and continue to tickle my own side.

It starts slow, first he begins to twitch as if moving away from the imaginary fingers that are tickling him. His face turns red as he tries to contain his laughter. I don't relent and then begin to tickle both of my sides. Of course, I don't feel it the same way he does since I'm the one doing the tickling.

The bald man's mouth explodes open and high pitch laughter spills out onto the jungle floor. His particular brand of laughter is so unexpected that I can't resist joining in the laughter.

He sounds like a little girl!

"Hehehe ha ha ha he he, I'm going... hehehe to... ho ho ho... kill you..."

He can barely speak he's laughing so hard, it hardly makes his that sounds dangerous.

By now, I'm also laughing riotously. I think our invisible connection helps his laughter to transfer to me.

"You can't... Bwahahaha!", I manage to blurt, " be-because you'll... ahah hahaha... die too... Hahahaha.". This is the first time I've heard myself laugh. Where the bald man giggles in a high pitch that rises and falls like a happy melody, my laugh comes in short extremely loud bursts, like nearby thunder. controls that I have only two states: not laughing, and full volume.

We both collapse to the ground in heaving laughter. I laugh so hard that my sides hurt. I can't even continue to tickle myself. After a minute of lingering laughs, the bald man sits up. He looks like he wants to yell again so I raise my fingers to my own side threateningly.

He inhales sharply as if I had just held a knife to his throat.

He doesn't yell, but he still looks upset.

"Don't ever do that again, Osuri, its not fitting for one of my position to laugh like that."

"You mean giggle like a little girl?".

He ignores my comment.

" you forced me to burn a precious enchantment. I was saving that ring of healing for a battle, not for a jungle accident. I expect to be compensated."

He says trying to keep his voice under control.

"Healing ring?", I ask, "that's how you did this?" I point to the puffy scar that looks like an enormous boa constrictor around my upper body.

The bald man rolls his eyes and nods.

"Are you really that stupid? How else would you heal so quickly. Only a Tortug's magic enchantment can heal such a wound so quickly.

"Tortug?"

The mans face wisens and begins to shout

"You stupid mountain dwell-"

He stops abruptly as I bring my hand up to my side.

"I woke up yesterday and I didn't remember anything. Not even my own name." I explain, "please, tell me who and what you are."

The bald man frowns. He looks to my fingers and decides that its best to comply.

"Well bear, I am Tor Yifa, alpha of house Zela, and now honorable member of the Casadores."

Well that didn't help much. I have no idea what any of that means.

As I look at Tor Yifa, I notice that his torso is covered with tattoos. Also starting at his ribs and on top of his shoulders, thick scales form a type of protective shell.

"You're a turtle man aren't you." I ask.

He looks incredulous,

"I am Tortug, he says proudly, we are the children of the great Turtles."

"Does everybody have some kind of animal spirit inside them?" I ask.

Yifa rolls his eyes again before nodding.

"How else would we survive? Do you think humans without animal powers could live here in the jungle? They'd be eaten by jaguars or anacondas within a year."

I shrug. I guess that makes sense. Chitu did talk about a time when there were just people though didn't she? Her story did sound ridiculous though.

"Well Tor Yifa of the house of turtles and hungry member of the cast doors,"

I hope I remembered that right.

"what do we do now?"

Chapter 3

The jungle is not dark, but I can't see the sun or even more than a few meters in front of me. White mist envelopes Tor Yifa and me as we walk back to Yifa's group. At times, I looks like I am walking towards a wall of mist just a few steps ahead of me, yet with every step the wall is the same distance away from me.

I would have liked to wait for Chitu to return, but this turtle man insisted that his traveling group could help us separate our souls, but that they were on the move and if that if we didn't find them soon they would leave.

"They'd leave you behind?" I had asked.

"The members of the casadores possess a highly attuned sense of professionalism; the mission means everything to us. The loss of a member, while truly unfortunate cannot deter the group as a whole from accomplishing its goals." He responded.

"So this group, the Casadores, they can undo our soul mesh?" I asked.

Yifa shook his head.

"No you foolish bear, only Tortug magic can break this connection."

"You're a Tortug aren't you? Why don't you just do it yourself?"

Yifa took a deep breath as if trying to control himself.

"Soul meshing is not a field of expertise in my repertoire. We need to find a Tortug trained in meshing to safely separate our souls."

"So why do we need to find the Casadores then?"

"Because" he began, "neither you nor I are familiar with this region. My commrades however, have traveled it nearby and will most assuredly know of a magically inclined Tortug with the requisite skill that we are searching for."

After deciding that we would search for the Casadores, we started traveling in the direction that Tor Yifa indicated.

A wave of air rushes past my head. I see a pile of green streak past me just before I hear the familiar,

"Yuquoy!" The parrot landed heavily on a nearby stump.

Yifa shudders after hearing the bird's profane call.

"How vulgar! Rek, you're sure that bird is not in anyway related to you?"

I laugh.

"I taught him say that." I say proudly, as I reach out my hand to the bird. It pecks midly at my finger and then as if deciding that I'm worthy, it hopps up on to my arm and walks until it stands perched on my shoulder.

Yifa shakes his head.

"Of course you did. What was I thinking? What else would an Osuri teach a bird to say?"

He's trying to insult me, but I just laugh again.

The bird seems content to rest on my shoulder even while I start walking so I continue to follow Yifa.

"Hey Yifa," I say trying to start a friendly conversation.

"I am Tor Yifa to you bear"

"I thought you said your name was,"

"Yifa is my name, but you must address me by my title which is Tor"

"Why?"

"Only a Tortug of sufficient rank may use my name by itself. All others are obligated to referer to me as Tor, or Tor Yifa."

I nod as I think about it.

"Okay," I say, "I'll call you Tor Yifa."

Tor Yifa nods his approval.

"But" I continue, "you have to call me Bear Rek"

Yifa laughs condescendingly, "please boy don't joke, you know that's not a real title, and Osuri don't even have a proper nobility."

I shrug, "fine then Yifa it is."

My companion sighs, but doesn't try to argue. It's probably beneath someone of his station to argue with his inferiors. He sure was strange and arrogant. I wonder if all Tortug are like him.

"So Yifa," I say emphasizing his name, "what were you doing all alone in the jungle? If your mission is so important, why weren't you with your group?"

"That's none of your business Osuri!" Yifa snaps.

Akay but he's touchy.

"No need to get upset, I was just asking. What were you doing that needed so much privacy?"

Yifa snorts in derision.

"You weren't..."

Yifa glares at me.

"No," he says flatly.

"You were!" I declare gleefully, "You were recycling dinner! But why would you go this far away from your camp? You must really make stinky-"

"I did not come out here to defecate you barbaric beast!"

"Then why just tell me, or else I'll think that you're lying and you really just came out to make a deposit in the earth."

"I-", he pauses, " I was practicing my enchantments. That is all that I will tell you."

I frown at him. I still think that he came to poop. If that's what he was doing when I fell on him does that mean that he didn't finish?

My train of thought is lost as we step through a mess of leaves and bushes and see that the area in front of us has been cleared of trees and brush. Stumps as wide as I am tall stand just a foot or two from the ground. The clearing is maybe a hundred meters in diameter.

The sight is jaw dropping. After walking in tight jungle quarters the open air feels welcoming and frightening at the same time. Yifa is silent he wears an expression that I can not identify. I turn back to examine the clearing.

"Akay, akay." Says the bird on my shoulder.

I look at the green parrot. He's leaning far forward to look around me and directly at Yifa. I follow his gaze and stop when I see Yifa frozen in fear with a sharp rock being held to his throat.

I freeze.

"What do you want vermin? Money? I don't have any, but what I do have is my brothers in the cazadores. Harm me and I promise you that they will avenge me."

Wow, I think, he may be arrogant and whiny, but he's no coward.

A familiar mess of hair pops out from behind Yifa. He can't see her and remains perfectly still but I am surprised to see that a smiling Chitu is holding the rock. She winks at me and then changing expression entirely she become intense and threatening.

"Your brothers?", she hisses, " your brothers that were camped here, but that packed up and left you all alone?"

Yifa says nothing, but its obvious from his face that Chitu's words had struck a vein.

"What are you doing with the Osuri?"

Chitu demands.

“just taking him to see a few of my associates so that we can resolve an issue...”

I feel sharp pain on my throat as Chitu jabs the rock into Yifa’s neck. I gasp at the same moment that the turtle does. Bringing my fingers up to the pain, I feel something wet. As I examine my fingers I realize, with a start, that they are covered in blood. Its not life threatening at this point, but bleeding for no apparent reason is disconcerting.

Chitu squints as she sees the blood trickle down my neck.

"Hey Chitu, it's fine, Tor Yifa here is helping me find someone who can undo a spell on both of us." I say.

Chitu digs the rock in deeper which forces me to gasp again.

"Oh really? A spell?" She's talking to Yifa still, "I wonder who could do such a thing? Aren't Tortuga the only ones who can cast spells?"

Yifa whispers obviously trying to move as little as possible to avoid cutting himself further on the rock in his neck.

"It was not intentional, the idiot bear fell on me while I was practicing my enchantments."

Chitu was growling again,

"Then fix it or else the jaguars will eat turtle meat tonight."

The rock moves further into his neck. I curse.

"Stop! Anything that you do to Yifa happens to me too." I exclaim pointing to the bleeding wound on my neck.

Chitu narrows her eyes doubtfully. She does ease up on the rock however.

Repeating herself she hisses to Yifa,

"Remove the spell!"

"I can not! Its not my field of study. I'm afraid that it's simply beyond my abilities."

"Of course it is," she coos mockingly, "and the only way to fix it is to go to your casador buddies..." She turns to me.

“Rek do you know who the Casadores are? Do you know what they do?”

I shake my head, Yifa hadn’t told me what it was that he and his group did other than the fact that their missions were very important.

“They’re bounty hunters for Rabberohn, Rek. #nickname#.” she spits, “if they find you, an Osuri, here in the jungle, they’ll think that you’re a either a rebel or a runaway slave and you will executed without a second thought.”

“But he’s not a Rabber,” I say confused, “he’s a Tortug.”

Yifa begins, to speak, but Chiu presses the stone to his throat again. The sting that I feel, while not extremely painful is still very threatening.

"He's a Casador, they're even worse than Rabbers because they are mercenaries that have sold out their own to serve Rabberohn."

Yifa's face scrunches up in dissatisfaction, but he doesn't speak.

"He's not your friend Rek; he will betray you as soon as he takes you back to his group."

I sigh.

"Well what do we do then? We've got this soul mesh thing between me and him. We can't just let him go what if he gets eaten by a panther, then I'll die too."

Chitu bites her lip, face pensive.

"I will not harm you, I promise it by the spirit of the turtle. We just need to find a tortug who specializes in these kind of enchantments!" Yifa interjects.

Chitu's eyes light up.

"Lyko!" She exclaims.

Both Yifa and I start at the outburst.

"What?" I ask.

"Lyko," she repeats, "he's a tortug doctor in Monarcawasi. He can fix this."

I glance at Yifa who shrugs as if saying: it's worth a shot.

Chitu drops the rock that she had been holding to Yifa's throat and cartwheels away from him clearly excited about something, as before he mood appeared to change instantly. Yifa falls to his knees and begins to gather moss to apply to the cut on his neck. As he holds it there, I feel it sting sharply.

"Ow," I complain, "what are you doing?"

Yifa gives an exasperated moan before answering.

"The moss cleans the wound. It prevents it from festering allowing it to heal more quickly.”

As he continues to rub the moss on the cut on his neck I feel the pain begin to ebb. Several moments later, the pain is reduced from sharp biting to mere annoyance.

Together, Yifa and I sigh. We share a glance and then Yifa looks away as if embarrassed by our link.

I don't understand this guy.

Chitu swings from a branch and flips to the ground.

"You're awfully excited," I note.

Chitu nods eagerly.

"I grew up in Monarcawasi! We're going to get to see Warmi!"

Not remembering anything sure can be tedious.

"What's a warmi?"

Chitu giggles, and then explains.

"Not what, who. Warmi is the woman who raised me as a girl."

Oh that makes sense, I guess I wouldn't have known that even with my memory intact.

Chitu doesn’t wait around to answer more questions. Instead, she darts away, jogging through the clearing of trees. Every few steps her step becomes extra bouncy conveying her excitement.

Yifa opens his mouth and starts to sigh in exasperation. Partly because, I feel a little bit frustrated as well, though mostly because I think it’s funny, I sigh along with him. He glares at me. I can’t help but let a snicker escape as he turns to follow our monkey-girl guide.

We jog to catch up to Chitu who continues her brisk jog. After a quarter mile, our jog turns once again to a walk. I am not tired, but my breathing is heavier than I would like it to be. A quick glance at Yifa cheers me up, his face beet red and his panting scares away a flock of birds that we pass. Chitu is breathing deeply but she doesn’t seem to be strongly affected by the running.

“I guess turtles really are slow,” she says jokingly to Tor Yifa.

Yifa struggles to respond between his heaving gasps for air.

"Tortugs... Are.... Long-distance.... Travelers...."

He coughs while inhaling. I cringe at the painful sound.

After a few long moments, his breathing calms down just enough to let him speak clearly.

"We are not built for running."

Chitu observes Yifa's ragged condition.

"Clearly " she says pointedly.

"I can walk all day without resting, but do not ask me to run again."

Chitu just smiles and continues walking.

As I look at Yifa, I wonder why I am not affected by the run the same way yifa is. After all, when we first met and I was soul meshed with him, he grew a would just like mine. If we are physically linked should I be just as tired as he is?

"Yifa", I start, " why am I not as exhausted as you are? You know with the soul mesh and all?"

Yifa looks up disdainfully.

"You and I are linked, and whatever happens to you, happens to me too. That means that when you and I both run, I experience the drain of both my run and yours."

I c**k my head.

"Don't you get it? It’s like I'm running for two people."

"But why am I not as tired as you are?"

"Stop boasting about it and rubbing it in my face. The soul mesh conveys external influence. So when I run, I cannot access your Osuri strength or stamina, just the strain of your knees and legs pushing against the ground. And you, don't feel my exhaustion, just the strain that comes from moving my weight while running. Your bear strength makes it easier for you than me."

I nod slowly. I understand. I think. I don't feel what he feels inside, but I actually experience everything that he does.

"So I react to everything that happens to you as if it were happening to me?"

Yifa smiles,

"I suppose that it's not impossible to teach an Osuri."

What he says is incredibly insulting, but I think he means it as a compliment, so I smile back.

We continue walking in silence behind chitu for several paces.

"You never told me how me falling on you caused a soul mesh to form."

I say hoping that Yifa doesn't reply with another snide remark.Thankfully, he now seems more at ease speaking to me, perhaps even a little eager to share what he knows.

"Well," he begins, "I was practicing enchantments on this sea shell encrusted belt."

He points to a sparkling belt around his waist. It looks as if the shells had been crushed into a powder before being mixed into a glue to cover the belt. The shine is beautiful.

“What were you trying to do it?” I ask, intrigued.

“Nothing too complicated, I just wanted to give it the ability to repair itself and to adjust to fit the wearer.”

That’s interesting. I can feel my own belt, made only of rope, slowly sliding down with each step.

Yifa eyes meet mine after tracking my gaze down to my belt.

He shakes his head.

“I’m not a wandering magician peddling tricks, so do not even entertain the idea.”

I shrug. Akay, he’s touchy.

I attempt to ignore Yifa’s remark, though his arrogance causes me to close my eyes and ball up my fist.

“Besides that rope would be impossible to enchant, it’s entirely too common.” Yifa continues.

I continue walking along the trail. Walking with closed eyes, however turns out to be a poor idea because almost immediately I trip on something and fall to the ground.

My hands sting from the impact and Yifa curses before I get the chance; he obviously feels the same pain. A small, but aggressive growl emanates from below me.

I lift my self to all fours and Chitu scowls at me.

“Yuquoy, stupid clumsy bear.” she hisses quietly.

I open my mouth to respond, but her hand shoots up and covers it. With a quick hand motion she gestures to Yifa to hide. He nods and after squinting down the trail to see what was coming our way, he dives into a leafy bush just off the trail.

Chitu shoves me with her hand still covering my mouth into the same bush. She then joins us in the party shrub. We lay in silence watching the road. After a few seconds I began to see shapes through the Jungle mist. They are jogging briskly toward us. I hold my breath as they get closer. There are six apes of men holding clubs and axes all bouncing up and down at the same pace. The men don’t have long monkey tails like Chitu does, but it’s easy to see the simian attributes in their faces and the way their arms hang just a few inches too low.

They pass by without so much as a glance toward our densely populated bush. we wait for a minute until they are out of sight and earshot before Yifa speaks.

“Those were Monatha! Why are we hiding?” he hisses.

Chitu plays with a strand of her messy dark red hair before responding.

“Those were Gor-Monatha, and I can’t be seen looking like this! I’m not presentable!”

“I think you look perfect.” I chime in.

Chitu and Yifa roll their eyes in unison.

“What?” I ask.

Ignoring me, Chitu stands up.

“Come on, there’s a nature bath just up the road.” She starts walking further down the road before Yifa or I can get to our feet. Scrambling, we chase after her. Remembering what Yifa told me about our soul link, I do not push myself this time, instead jogging lightly toward chitu.

After only a quarter mile, our monkey guide turns off the road and into the jungle brush. I push my way past the branches and leaves to follow. I gasp slightly something gashes my arm. I look down and see that it has begun to bleed inexplicably. I frown and look behind me at Yifa, He has caught his arm on a thorny branch. cursing he painfully removes the thorns and continues walking while ignoring my gaze.

Despite the intense initial pain, the cut is small and stops bleeding very quickly. I now move more carefully through the shrubbery to follow my companions.

after walking for a minute through the bushes I find that both Chitu and Yifa have stopped and are looking at something in the ground.

“You must be joking you daft monkey-” Yifa says incredulously.

I walk up close to them and find that they are looking at a pit of dark mud in the ground.

“It’s very clean mud.” Chitu says unphased by the looks that Yifa and I are giving her.

“Wait,” I say, “That’s your bath?”

Chitu nods and then drops to her knees at the edge of the mud. She runs her fingers through her hair before dipping it into the mud. Yifa gasps. He is apparently horrified that anyone, even a Monatha, would intentionally cover their hair with mud.

I guess it’s their culture I think.

I kneel down beside Chitu and lean my head toward the mud as well.

Tor Yifa sighs again.

“Rek, don’t do everything you see the monkey do; she’s obviously mad.” he says with condescension dripping from his voice.

“You’re just mad because you don’t have any hair to wash” Chitu retorts.

Yifa snorts and walks away muttering something.

I get my head next to the mud and find that mud has a slightly bitter, though not unpleasant aroma. Hesitantly, I look toward Chitu who had now removed her hair from the mud and was coming through it a small wooden comb that she had inexplicably produced. When she ran the wooden teeth through her mud covered hair, large globs of mud fell off and left her hair a dull black color. Though, now smooth and orderly, I couldn’t help but think that mud black was a step down from her natural reddish brown color.

She sees me looking at her and nods toward the mud.

“Go ahead”, she says.

I sigh and lower my head so that the hair on top of my head is submerged in the warm mud.

That’s actually kind of nice, I think. The mud provides a kind of tingling sensation to my scalp.

Is it getting warmer? The mud is hot. It’s burning my scalp. I whip my head out of the pit and begin to claw the mud out of my hair. Its not burning anymore, but it begins to itch terribly. I fumble with my hands to squeeze all the mud out.

“Itchy?” Chitu asks.

I grunt in response still trying furiously to get it all out of my hair.

“Yeah, it used to itch a lot for me too until I got used it to it.” she says smiling at my effort to get the mud out. I find myself furious that she is so beautiful while letting myself suffer by adding this itchy mud to my head.

In the distance I hear Yifa yell my name in frustration. He must be feeling the itch as well. I try to pull off the mud, but it's already drying and sticking to my hair.

"Why didn't you tell me that it burns your skin?" I say in exasperation.

Chitu giggles and shrugs.

"It was funny." She says, "but your hair is already black, so you didn't have to wash it."

I grunt in frustration.

"Isn't the point of washing your hair to get rid of the dirt not get more of it?" I ask.

That's all I have so far