Lost Bloodline 5 - Chapter 7

Chapter 7

After spending the winter in relative isolation, it was good to get out and stretch their legs again. While Koda’s goals at the moment were rather dangerous ones, given that they needed and wanted to find out more about the baron’s forces and try to evacuate people, that didn’t prevent his group from having a bit of fun.

Arthene and Finna both were bouncing with energy after spending a night sleeping out under the stars. Which resulted in a few pranks being played that resulted in a game of chase across the plains while they headed south a fair ways before curving west.

Samira stuck close to Koda, allowing Calandra and Sienna to chase and gambol about with the two incarnate spirits. The caracal woman was quieter than usual, her tuff-tipped ears twitching every so often while they ran. From the serious look on her face, Koda was sure that Samira was lost in thought about something.

“What’s on your mind?” he asked Samira as the day wound onwards.

Between Calandra’s wind magic speeding their steps and the greatly improved strength from their encounters with the trolls previously, they were covering vast distances without too much trouble. So talking while running wasn’t nearly as much of a sin for Koda’s group as it might normally have been.

Samira’s ears gave a rapid twitch and flick before she blinked and looked up at him. Her tail lashed the air behind her for a moment before the lost expression she’d been sporting faded into a soft smile.

“Just considering all that is to come,” Samira said as they bounded through the long grass along the sloping side of a hill. “The legends my people have shared and collected over the centuries tell of heroes and their exploits, both large and small. I have been wondering where your goals will lead you, and what parts we all might play in them.”

“Safety and security are my main goals,” Koda answered without hesitation. “You all are my family, and I will fight to protect that with my last dying breath if need be.”

Samira studied him for a long moment, her intelligent eyes sharp while her large feline ears wiggled like fuzzy radar dishes for a moment before she answered him.

“Yes, but safety and security can mean many different things depending on who you ask. It might mean remaining in hiding, and a slow rebuilding of strength, or it might mean some kind of bloody rebellion to overthrow a corrupt chieftain.”

Samira’s words were straightforward, but Koda felt a thrill run down his spine.

He’d considered it, when he sat alone watching the flames dance in the hearth while the winter storms raged outside. Thera would recover given time, but that would also mean that attempts to conceal her existence would only work for so long. Koda knew that, eventually, someone was going to find out about her. The word was spreading fast through the tribes of the plains, traveling with those that did not follow Golieas on this world or one of the other gods.

We aren’t going to be able to stay in hiding forever, but what sort of timescales are we working on? Koda asked himself, turning his attention inwards for a moment. Samira is right, there will be a boiling point where conflict erupts. But will it happen in my time? Or my children?

The near-physical thump against the inside of his chest made Koda stumble and nearly fall. A deep growl from within the shadows of his soul told him just what his bloodline and ancestors thought of this being a problem for his children.

“If trouble must come, let it come in my time, so that my children can live in peace,” Koda murmured aloud and the growling presence within his chest relaxed. He felt that power, which had been rising up in anger, settle once more. But closer to the surface this time.

“What was that?” Samira asked perkily, her voice breaking through the shadows that hung over Koda’s mind and he gave himself a firm shake, turning to smile at her.

“Oh, just a quote from my old world. A sentiment that I can agree with and understand wholeheartedly.”

“That you’d rather suffer through hard times to spare your children?” Samira asked, her eyes sparkling with a mixture of curiosity and pride, as if she already knew the answer to her question.

“Yeah, that about sums it up,” Koda replied.

Samira’s smile grew wider and she gave a little hop-skip then jumped at him.

Reacting on instinct, Koda snatched the smaller woman up midflight and pulled her into his side. Samira, clearly having planned this, wrapped both her arms and legs around Koda with even her tail getting in on it by wrapping around his right forearm.

“I am so proud to call you my mate, Koda Aegisclaw. As are all of us,” Samira purred happily, rubbing her cheek against his as he held her, his pace not slowing beyond a brief stutter-step to ensure he didn’t fall over from having to catch her.

“Then I’m doing something right,” Koda replied, feeling his heart surge with love at the affectionate attention of the caracal woman.

Their lips met in a kiss a moment later, and Koda wasn’t sure if the contented growl that rippled through his body originated from Samira, himself, or the ancient bonds of his sleeping bloodline.

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“That… is a lot of bones,” Koda murmured thoughtfully as he stood on the rise overlooking the massive field of the dead in front of them.

“That’s what graveyards usually have,” Arthene replied smugly, crossing her arms under her full bust and tilting her head to one side. This sent her mane of messy brown curls bouncing over one shoulder and bumping into Koda.

“Yeah, but how is this okay?” Koda asked with concern as he studied the massive ravine before him, and the piles of skeletons it contained.

It was late on the second day since they left Silverstone valley. They’d begun to curve to the west in order to get ahead and stay ahead of the baron’s forces potential path when Arthene had urged them along a different route.

The bear spirit had refused to explain, but within ten minutes of the course shift, Finna had made a quiet oh noise and then joined Arthene in urging them along.

Now they stood on a ridge overlooking a broad section of plain between two sharp ridges. The bone-strew ground was thick with ancient remains scattered in piles. Many of the bones had the scars and marks of predation on them, with cracks showing where they’d been gnawed open to get at the marrow, but Koda couldn’t spot a den or burrow to indicate that this was the trash-heap of some predator.

“What am I looking at,” Koda asked finally, blowing air out through his nose.

“This is a graveyard of the woolly rhino,” Arthene said with a flourish and a grin. “They migrate through the area and their elders that do not fall to predators come here to die.”

“Really?” Koda asked skeptically, turning his attention back to the mounds of bones.

The piles were disorganized and haphazard, but he spotted several large skulls that looked like they’d fit the bill for what Arthene was describing. He’d not seen a ‘woolly rhino’ before, but the plains were vast and he knew there had to be many animals that he’d never seen before here.

“They do,” Samira piped up, bounding forward with a grin. “The woolly rhinos travel a vast circuit over the course of a year. They graze heavily and are basically always on the move. My old tribe would hunt them once a year when the herds would pass by. Their hides are thick and the dense fur makes it even harder to bring one down. Especially since they protect each other from predators.”

“So what, they just travel in this big circuit and then when they pass by this area they drop off any of their elders to let them die?” Koda asked in disbelief. “I know there are stories back in my old world of some animals that did that, but they were mostly myths.”

“There is a watering hole on the other side of that cliff,” Samira said with complete confidence, turning and pointing to the cliff on the right side. “I don’t know about greenery, but with easy access to fresh water here, I’d imagine that it became a habit for any of those who couldn’t keep up with the herd to simply remain in places like this. There are likely four or five of these graveyards along their normal path. Places where their elders separate and either are preyed upon by natural predators when they weaken, or just pass with age.”

“Huh,” Koda muttered, glancing back down over the scattering of bones and dry earth of the ravine’s bottom.

The sight should have disturbed him. That much death all in one place should have felt awful, and the smell should have matched. But instead of making Koda’s skin crawl, he just felt peace in those ancient bones. Even the ones that showed the marks of predators on them.

“Can you feel it?” Finna asked him a moment later and Koda twitched, fighting back the urge to scowl. He had felt something, but the sound of her voice had broken him out of it.

“Let him focus, Finna,” Sienna urged quietly, and Koda took another deep breath before closing his eyes.

Sinking into the echoing darkness that was his internal world, Koda reached out with his senses. Within a handful of seconds, he felt the thrum of energy through the land in this place and recognized it for what it was:

A place of power, a nexus of energy within the earth, and a source of energy that he could access.

But unlike the other locations that surged with elemental power or roared with life from ancient leylines, this area whispered with the quiet peace of a long journey’s end. The fact that this ‘journey’ it described was life into death didn’t matter, as death was a part of life. It was necessary and not something to fear, after all.

In this place, thousands upon thousands of creatures had laid down to find the end of their journeys. That action, coupled with the calm acceptance of the cycle, had imbued this location with a deep well of calm power that Koda could feel resonating just below the surface.

“How?” Koda asked, his eyes popping open and glancing towards Arthene and Finna curiously.

“How could we sense it when you didn’t? Or how does a place like this come to be?” Finna answered his question with one of her own when Arthene just bounced on her heels with a wicked grin.

“The first part,” Koda answered with a roll of his eyes at the excitable bear spirit. “I can tell how it formed and what sustains it. Also, would it be wrong to claim this place?”

“I think that the restful dead here would be pleased to offer their strength to the Beast Queen,” Arthene said before Finna could speak. “It won’t harm the place, as it has been happening long enough that the energy and its purpose has soaked into the land.”

“But will it harm Thera?” Koda asked pointedly, wary of channeling energy tinged with death to his goddess.

“No,” Finna said firmly, her long lapine ears standing straight up before one fell to the side and kinked halfway up. “Death is a part of life, and with how close Thera came to a final rest, this will help her build up to prevent such a thing happening again.”

“What Finna said,” Arthene chuckled, taking a half step forward and wrapping her arm around Koda’s shoulders to haul him headfirst into her tits. “Also! There are materials here that I can make use of! I want to teach your other mates more of my bone-crafting, and there are plenty of fine specimens below!”

“That isn’t disrespectful?” Calandra asked, the dwarven woman having come up behind them to peer over the edge and into the mess. “I know Koda got those boar tusks as an offering from one of the tribes, they make for good ivory for scrimshaw work. While they aren’t ivory, rhino horns can be used for some scrimshaw work too. If it's not disrespectful to take the bones to work with, then should we gather some horns too? Even if we don’t use them ourselves, we might be able to trade or give them to any tribes we run into out here.”

“No,” Finna said firmly in response to Calandra’s question. “Though it is good of you to have asked. This place does not hold restless spirits that might take revenge. Even then, they would not harm you as Koda’s presence would pacify them anyway.”

“What?” Koda asked in surprise, pulling his head back out of the trap that was Arthene’s bosom before blinking rapidly. “Wait, you mean like with the stonecrackers, right?”

They’d told Finna the entire tale of how they’d defeated the trolls and helped lay to rest a nest of the dead stonecracker leopards, so she understood the comparison immediately.

“Yes, much like that. You would be able to make peace with and either send them on, or bind them to you to help in the future. The spirits that rest here would rather continue to sleep than be pressed into service, I’m sure.”

“Well then, we should see if any of their horns are still good,” Calandra said with a grin, bumping her hip into Koda’s and sending him face-first back into Arthene’s breasts. The dwarf and the incarnate spirit shared a grin and a wink while Koda pretended to struggle in his ‘prison’ for a moment longer before Arthene finally released him.

“So are you going to claim this place like the others, Koda?” Sienna asked while Koda pretended to gasp for breath to recover after nearly being suffocated. Something that made Arthene grin and Finna roll her eyes.

“Yes,” Koda said, letting the act drop with a smile. “Just make sure you don’t try and pack too much. We just set out and we’ll be gone for a while.”

“Oh, I plan to hand these out to the tribes we run across,” Arthene said with a grin. “No reason to hoard them. You all already have better weapons than can be made with these bones. Mine are infinitely superior to those of these herbivores. But they will be sturdy enough with the proper treatments to function well as gifts.”

“Same,” Calandra said with a nod. “If we come back through here on the way back to Silverstone, then maybe I’ll get more. But two or three of the larger horns would give me something to do when it’s not my turn while we are in camp.”

The bawdy grin and wiggling eyebrows that Calandra sported told Koda exactly what she was thinking at the moment, and he just rolled his eyes.

“Fine, why don’t you go with Arthene and see if she can help you find some good ones,” Koda said with a wave of his hand.

“Can I come as well?” Samira asked immediately, turning to give Arthene a cute look.

Rather than answer the caracal woman, Arthene instead bent and scooped both her and Calandra off the ground, one in each arm. Samira let out a surprised squeal while Calandra cursed and nearly thumped Arthene over the head with her axe-handle. But before Calandra could decide to protest, Arthene stood with each woman on a shoulder.

“Come! Let us see what treasures lie within these old bones. I’m sure that their owners would be pleased to travel the plains a few more times, especially if someone else does the walking for them,” Arthene proclaimed with a laugh and began trotting down the steep side of the draw in front of them.

“I’ll stay with you, Koda,” Sienna murmured, sidling up to stand beside him. Finna didn’t respond aloud, but matched Sienna on his other side while smirking down at Koda.

“Suit yourselves. Let’s see if Samira was right about that pool. I’ll do the ceremony there if possible, to make the shrine more welcoming,” Koda said with a firm nod.

The three of them followed the ridge around while Arthene’s group dove into the piles of bones with a will. Koda noted as they circled the boneyard that, despite the enthusiasm that all three were showing for the work, Arthene, Calandra, and Samira all acted with respect as they worked through the bones and sought out ones that would work for their needs.

Samira’s words were correct, and near the mouth at the far end of the ravine, Koda found a shallow cave that housed a broad pool of water burbling from a crack in the rocks. It pooled in a shallow dish of worn stone before trickling down into a thin stream that wound further south into the hills.

Just as they’d said, the grass on the far side of the ravine was lush and green, obviously well nurtured by the spring water. Several small stands of trees clung close to the stream’s waterway as well, providing cool shade and shelter for the animals too.

Koda approached the spring carefully at first, wanting to be cautious in case there were any of the woolly rhinos lurking about. But a quick scan of the ground near the water confirmed no signs of tracks to indicate the presence of an animal.

“Right here?” Sienna suggested, gesturing towards the ground at the edge of the water.

“No,” Koda said almost immediately. The sensation of power running through the earth had guided him this far, and he felt it drawing him into the spring.

Finna watched silently from her position behind Sienna, her expression unreadable as Koda stepped into the spring.

The shallow water was icy, coming up from within the earth like it did. But Koda let his instincts guide him across the shallow pool to the far side.

There, he saw a shadow in the rocks shift and it revealed a large, flat stone that rose several inches above the water. The ledge was out of sight from the shore and he knew that it was what drew him along.

Sloshing over to stand in front of the flat ledge, Koda bowed his head and reached into his spirit to draw out the totemic claws once more. The ceremony to claim a location for Thera was simple enough, and he completed it with only a few small gestures. A cut to his hand and sprinkling his blood over the location was all it took for the power in his bloodline to claim the strength within the spring and the graveyard.

Koda felt a brief surge in the ground under him, like a breeze stirring grass against his legs, and then the icy sensation of the water rolled up his calves and thighs before sinking into his torso as the blood droplets he’d scattered over the stone ledge vanished in bursts of ruby fire.

Hot sun beat down on him, while grass tickled his belly. The lowing calls of his herd surrounded Koda and brought peace as they all conversed. Pounding rain and driving snow hit him next, but the warmth of the herd kept him safe. Snarls of predators came from all directions, but the herd stood strong together.

But as time whirled past, Koda felt his limbs weaken, and his eyesight grew dim. The herd helped him, guiding him to fresh water and grass, but he knew it cost them.

So, for the betterment of the herd, he left them behind. The peace of this place, and the faint memories that hung about it in the scents of his ancestors, calmed his concerns at being alone. But it was only for a short time, because soon the great herd that held all who came before him welcomed Koda into their numbers.

As the cold soaked into his bones, Koda felt lighter for it, the chill numbing aches away as the bellowing cries of his ancestors called him to join them as the herd ambled off into the sky.

A flash of ruby fire before Koda shocked him back to awareness as a thickly furred hide flashed into existence on the ledge, followed by a simple stone bowl that settled on top of the hide.

A vision? Koda wondered.

The lowing calls of the horned ancestors echoed from his memories, but that was the only answer they gave. Koda felt the potential within his bloodline give a matching call, and slowly, the power of the land began to amble in its steady pace through his soul into the place that connected him to Thera, following the connection of kin and ancestry to their source.