The Great Hunt

THE MORNING WAS at it's earliest hours. The sun far from rising and the forest entrance lined with fire torches.

The drummers hollered loudly as the women chittered in joy.

Villagers and children at the back line clashing plates and spoons together.

The hunters at the front lines, the third line, the spear bearers, bare chests decorated with black paint ,uniformly digging their long, red marked spears into the ground.

The second line, archers, quivers overflowing with red feathered arrows and bows drawn, their exposed backs lined with black drawings.

And the first line, the leaders, in long fur coats.

By the left, the Great mother in a black and white fur coat, matching her packed graying hair, and matching gray hanfu, a young hunter beside her holding her bow and quiver of gray arrows.

By the right, the Fuelhr, a black quiver hanging over his long black, fur coat, with matching black sleeved upper wear and cotton trousers, his hair packed neatly in big long braids.

On his right hand a long black spear and left hand a shiny black bow, carved neatly on it, a raven.

Hanging on his waist, a black sword, at the top of the sheathe, a tally, a half moon carved unto it.

Three lines of of paint on his face.

At the center, the Fuelher, brown leather quiver with brown feathered arrows hanging off her long, brown fur coat, underneath it brown leather pants and sleeveless upper wear. Her long brown locks braided in tiny and beautiful twists and packed backwards.

Her brown fingerless gloved hands held a brown spear at the right, and a smooth, brown bow with a brown bird and flowers carved unto it.

Hanging off her waist, a brown sword, a half moon carved unto the tally dangling off the top of the sheathe.

The completing piece to that on the Fuelhr.

Brown skin paint over her eyes and black lines drawn down her face. She stared into the dark forest, waiting for the Great mother's speech.

"The Great hunt of the Tai tribe" she shuns the cheers "I've been able roto live long enough to participate in many"

"The sacred hunt that starts our sports festival, that runs day and night, dusk till dawn, for three days, begins today!"

"We shall depart and come back to our children with more than enough to make them proud of us, and we shall return to a feast, the feast of the year"

"Just one rule!" the Fuelhr shouts

The cheers explode, beats intensifying as they itched to hunt, stomping their feet in rhythm. The sound loud enough to wake a hibernating bear in the cave, and that it did.

The Fuelher raised her bow to the air, eery silence running through the village and forest as dawn set over the forest line, her loud voice completing the Fuelhr's order

"Hunt anything that moves!"

The shouts erupted as she took off into the forest, the Fuelhr right by her side and the lines of hunters running behind them, the villagers chasing after and stopping by the forest entrance as their Great mother moved into the forest at her pace.

She led the hunt, her betrothed a few meters behind as they raced through the forest jumping over logs and sliding past trees.

A herd of deers ran for escape, their long horned leader far ahead than others. She nocked and arrow, aiming fast and releasing the bowstring as the brown arrow flew right past the herd and into the horned deer. She made the first hunt, the hunters all following up to shoot and spear down the herd as they dispersed into the forest in all directions, taking down all and everything in the way.

The Great Hunt commenced.

The hunt continued, and when their Fuelher gave the order to hunt anything and everything they saw, the hunters took every single word of her order to heart as they wrestled a bear.

Multiple arrows stuck on it's thick, strong, fur coat with spears being poked at it as it struggled, attacking the group of hunters in defense with it's sharp clawed arms.

It threw off a hunter trying to hold it down with a large spear, it's razor sharp claw cutting through another's arm as it managed to free itself from the ropes and spears of the hunters, closing in on them when a spear shot right at it's chest, slowing it down as the hunters cheered, their spear- less Fuelhr and their Fuelher closing in as she jumped high, the Fuelhr shooting an arrow into the arm that rose to claw her down as she barely avoided it, digging her spear into it's head as it collapsed, her on top it and her fur coat long gone as she pulled out her bloody spear from its damaged skull.

The hunters sang as the great mother approached the group, stopping in front of the Fuelher, her dark, scrutinizing eyes running down the exposed and bleeding skin of her exposed shoulder.

"A wild boar" A'yin answered the unasked question to why she was injured.

"I am hurt too mother" the Fuelhr points out the cut on his arm "Just in case you did not notice"

"Oh quit the pity party Yang, you're not of importance now" she brushes her son off, turning to his betrothed.

"Where is your coat child" the great mother glared sharply

"It was restricting and getting stuck in the bushes, it did nothing but hold me back" A'yin replied defiantly

"I still have mine on" the mother stated "And your betrothed has his around his neck"

"Where is your coat child?"

"That is because you're not doing any running but walking at your pace and I'm doing the hard, fast work" she defended

"Where is your coat!" the question came off more stern

"I lost it somewhere in the forest..." she was cut off

"Where is your coat!!"

"We are still moons from winter, and the sun is still bright in the sky" A'yang watches the interaction between his mother and his betrothed in amusement

"Where is your coat!"

A'yin sighs in defeat, dragging the Fuelhr along with her "You win great mother, I will find the cursed coat since that is what you want"

They walked through the forest, their hunt long abandoned in search of the 'cursed' coat. He walks silently behind her grumbling figure, his eyes trailing along her parted hair, revealing the tattoo trailing down the back of her neck, over her shoulder and unto her collar bone before eyeing the cut on her shoulder.

A'yin was frustrated with everyone being wary of her when the cold approached and not being able to do what she was best at.

She kicked a a tree in annoyance, immediately regretting her decision when the pain jolted up her leg like poison from a snake's bite, she yelled in pain, sitting on a tree stomp.

"Curse the winters! I hate the cold!"

He sat beside her, ripping the hem of his upper wear and slowly wrapping it around her bleeding skin, his long fingers grazing the sensitive skin as he talked lowly

"I know what you're thinking...

"A'yin, they don't think you are weak on winters, they only want you to be strong enough to be their protector through other seasons, you could just think of the winters as your vacation, or hibernating period"

"I am no bear" she cut off, a smile tugging on her lips as she watched him tie the last knot around her injury.

She gets up, walking forward in the forest "but with all the worries the clan puts me through all year long, maybe I do deserve a vacation, although it would be better if you weren't around me" she mocks, A'yang laughing in response

"You don't mean that"

"Found it" she declared, pulling the brown fur coat off a branch and ripping it in the process, sighing.

"Mother made you that" A'yang pointed out "She will be pissed"

He stops beside the dead wild boar, crouching "It looks like the search team hasn't gotten to this part of the forest to pick up the hunt"

"But something else has" A'yin whispers, running her finger on the large paw print beside the dead animal.

"A'yin"

A growl beside them sent them sprinting as a large, white Bengal tiger chased after them.

They ran through tight spots to create distance between them, looking at each other smiling, even through the imminent danger, their eyes speaking.

"You're bait" the Fuelhr states, smoothly grabbing a branch and swinging up a tree.

"Certainly, I am bait" A'yin shouted, the tiger closing in in her "I only agreed to be bait, not tiger meal Yang, hurry up"

The Fuelhr took a curl of rope underneath his coat, knotting the end and swinging it at the tiger.

The knot caught the tiger's neck, slowing it down long enough for her to bounce off a tree and flip backwards, the tiger clawing off her coat right before she dug the spear through it's body and into the ground.

She pulled her ripped coat from the claws of the tiger, examining it's paws as her partner approached

"Good, you survived"

"You don't sound too happy about that" she replied sarcastically

"we now know what animal has the prints beside the boar"

"No!"

"This tiger's paw size doesn't match the one I saw" she lifted it's bloody limb.

"The print earlier was, bigger"

A roar shook the entire forest, birds flying out of the trees as the Fuelhr and Fuelher stared wide eyed at the white, giant tiger that jumped off a tall tree, slowly stalking towards them.

"Curses!" They whispered in sync

"We killed her son!"

"And it seems she wants an 'eye for an eye' ".