Disgrace
There
was so much blood in the air. Not a single drop of it was his. It was his
comrades’ blood that was starting to get on him. Except Sair didn’t even kill
them. There were too many enemies to even manage sneaking away, or trying to
escape with the lost warriors.
Somehow, one the fallen comrades
stood up, walking towards Sair ever so slightly. That was impossible. The dead
couldn’t walk. The other two had gotten up, and they circled around Sair,
murmuring something that he couldn’t understand. Although, deep down, the young
warrior knew why he was being haunted. It was because he was the only one who
survived. The young warrior looked around, trying to find a way out of the
circle of dead. There was none. The dead had come closer; Sair realized finally
what they were saying. They were saying his name.
***
Sair hadn’t
slept for at least two days. He knew that today was the day that he was going
to lose one of his brilliantly curved horns. He stroked them, knowing that he
would miss it. Walking out of his room, he could feel the coldness emanating
from his father. Sair couldn’t even meet the man’s eyes. Knowing that his
father was ashamed of his eldest son. Sair tried to meet his mother’s eyes, yet
she avoided her son’s gaze as well.
A giggle
tried to lift the heavy atmosphere, and then the little body that owned the
giggle began to pull at Sair’s tail that was sticking out of his tunic. “Big
bwotha what’s tha matta?” she said looking up at him with her big golden eyes.
A sigh
escaped Sair; his younger sister was too young to even understand what was
happening today. Picking her up, Sair said while tickling her round nose,
“You’ll understand when you’re older, Oinea,”
The little
girl began to squirm in Sair’s grasp, crying, telling him how mean he was. He
let her down and then their father spoke, “Get going. Uoldo is expecting you.”
Straight to the point, even as Sair’s father opened up his mouth, the young chimera
flinched at how cold his father sounded. Walking past his father, Sair
encountered his mother, who had gotten up and opened up the door. He looked at
his mother, yet she still wouldn’t meet his eyes. He wanted to press his
forehead against his mother, pat her on the head, stroke her soft hair, and
tell her that everything would be all right. This wasn’t the last time she was
going to see him.
As Sair
headed out the door, he grabbed his mother’s hand, squeezing it gently, and
continued to walk out the door. He didn’t look back to see if his mother was on
the ground sobbing, except his brilliant deer ears had heard it. He could hear
his little sister ask, “What’s tha matta Mommy?”
The young
warrior continued to walk, and with each step he took, Sair realized that he
was afraid. Afraid if he would be shunned for his entire life, for a year, or
for a day. It didn’t matter to him, being shunned was a fate worse than death
to his people. The young chimera continued to walk to the town square, hearing
his hooves click underneath him on the cobblestone. As a child, he loved this
sound. He loved it so much that he would just jump up and down to hear it.
Except now, it sounded as though the sounds his hooves made were empty, hollow,
as if even his childhood memories didn’t want to be near him.
Upon
reaching what was known as town square, Sair saw the General of what his people
called an army, and their men: warriors. “So, the disgrace of a warrior showed
up early, eh?” Uoldo laughed. The man was cruel and just, which was why he was
the one to who held each chimera of their tribe down if they disgraced the
tribe as a whole. How Sair wanted to reply to the giant of a man. Uoldo wasn’t
there; he didn’t know how many enemies there were. How Sair wanted to spit at
this man and hoped that it would land on his face. There were two people in
this world that Sair hated, and Uoldo was one of them.
Suddenly,
Uoldo boomed a greeting, “Zuid! Glad you made it early to for your son’s
special day!” The General hopped down and landed gracefully on his deer-like
legs and patted Sair’s father on the back. Uoldo continued to talk, “If I were
you I would have either killed Sair or kicked him out, show him what it means
to be exiled from our people.”
Except,
Sair’s father didn’t talk, he just stared at his own son. The stare started to
make Sair feel uncomfortable so much so that he felt like he had become a boy
again. He couldn’t meet his father’s stare, so he shyly looked away.
***
More and
more people of the tribe showed up, including Sair’s mother and younger sister.
Looking up at the sun, Sair knew that it was time to pay for his disgrace.
“It’s time to disgrace this warrior for his crimes against our tradition!”
Uoldo began. The crowd began to shout in excitement. Sair looked out in the
crowd, wanting to see his mother’s face, except she kept it hidden beneath her
bangs.
“This young
warrior given the name Sair at birth has disgraced our tribe. Disgraced our
dead! He came back from a mission with no horns of the dead, he was in a group
of three, and he was the only one who returned alive. Sair even left their
bodies back there to just be burned or disposed of wherever our enemy pleases!
With no horns how can their spirits kill their killer in the form of weapons?
How?!” Uoldo had excited the crowd and then Sair felt the man’s hoof on his
delicate back. With a simple shove Sair expected to fall flat on his face,
except, his father caught him . . . by the horns. “Now, as it has been for
generations, the father of the warrior will cut the horn!”
“There are
worst things than losing a horn boy,” his father said softly, “It will regrow .
. . just give it time.” Sair closed his eyes at his father’s kind words. Never
had he heard this before. Sair always hated his father; the man was cruel to
him. He never felt any love from that man. Never. Tightly shutting his eyes,
Sair fought back the tears as he felt the hand saw cut through his horn.
***
The next
thing Sair remembered was the crowd’s roar as Zuid held up his son’s horn as if
it were a trophy. Opening up his eyes, Sair realized that he was sitting on the
ground, head slightly tilted from the loss of the usual weight. Wiping his
face, he realized that he had cried. “Such
a brave warrior you are. Crying while losing something that will grow back,”
as he got up, he noticed that his father seemed like to be their for his own
son. To comfort him, except Sair rejected the offer coldly and just walked past
his father.
While
walking through the crowd he could hear the whispers. Some said that he
should have received a harsher punishment, perhaps both of his horns. Sair
simply walked past them, trying hard to ignore them. Except it hurt, they
didn’t know what had really happened. How his comrades haunted him for the past
few days. It had become so terrible that he started to lose sleep over it. The
worst part was that he felt like he couldn’t talk to anyone about it, they
would all just tell him that he had done the wrong thing. Except, he had a
little sister, someone who would want to be able see him every day.
Sair wanted
to walk around, maybe talk to his friends except they probably didn’t want to
talk to him anyways. So, he walked home and swiftly went into his room and
closed the door behind him. He crawled onto his bed curled up in a tight little
ball as his deer fur tickled his nose. “Maybe
I’ll just stay right here until my horn grows back,” Sair sulked. Slowly
the young warrior started to close his eyes and begin to take a nap.
***
Knock, knock. Sair slowly opened up his
eyes and stretched. It was strange that someone was knocking at the door.
Normally his family just lets him be. Sair was just going to go back to sleep,
except the knocking came again. It sounded louder; as if whomever on the other side
of the door was beginning to knock louder and louder. The noise was beginning
to become annoying. “What?” Sair said irritated.
The noise
stopped, and silence filled the air until a deep cold voice was heard on the
other side of the door, “Sair, can I come in?”
The boy
froze, his father wanted to come in? Whenever Sair locked himself in his room,
it was always his mother. He mustered up courage and said, “Y-yeah,”
The door
swung open, and there stood his father, who seemed to have rather compassionate
eyes at the moment. It confused Sair why his father was showing emotions that
he hadn’t seen. Watching his father carefully sit down, Sair tried to avoid
contact with his father. Except his father’s hand reached for the stumped horn
and gently rubbed his finger on it. “Your shame will soon be forgotten son . .
. your mother and I are proud of you . . .” Zuid began.
Sair looked
up at his father, not believing what he had just heard. Proud? How could his
parents be proud of him? He was a disgrace to the tribe because he went against
tradition. If only everyone knew that it wasn’t on purpose . . . he didn’t mean
to leave his comrade’s bodies behind. He didn’t even know what he should have
done in that situation. He was frightened.
Still, his
father continued to talk, “You do know the scar I have on my back . . . wasn’t
from a battle right?” Sair stared at his father, and then looked at the scarred
back. There was a perfect X, right in the middle of his father’s back. When
Sair was younger, he would always ask about it, wondering how he got it.
Eventually his father gave up and just never told his own son. So, Sair had
come to the conclusion that his father received it in battle.
Smiling,
Zuid continued, “I did something far worse than you, something that made my own
family disown me . . . I let my enemies live
I didn’t kill them Sair, I told them to leave. That was when Uoldo was in
my team, the kid looked up to me. Then, the bastard went and told my father,
who was the general at the time about what I’ve been doing.” Sair couldn’t help
but look at his father in surprise. Zuid never talked about his family, and
now, Sair knew why. However, Sair knew how bad it was to leave their enemies
alive, they would be able to lick their wounds and be able to reproduce. The
worst part was, was that they could give their leaders information about how
the tribe fought.
“Still, my
father had no problem bringing down the hot metal onto my flesh. I cried out,
no, I screamed as I felt it hit my skin. My father dug in with that piece of
metal so much, that this scar will never heal, it will always be with me, I’m
not even allowed to cover it.” Zuid said clenching his fist. Sair had then
crawled over to his father’s back and began to trace the scar as he did when he
was younger. Back then it was in admiration, thinking that his father was the
coolest man in the world. Now, it was in regret. He had no idea what his own
father had been through.
Zuid
sighed, and chuckled, “Ironic as it may sound, I met your mother day I got the
damn thing. I was left passed out on the stage, and when I awoke, she had
wrapped bandages around me. Hell, she even offered me a home. You should know
the rest . . .”
The young
warrior felt bad about how he had thought of his father before this
conversation. Sair had hated the man as soon as he saw other fathers giving
their children love. Sair was left there to wonder why he received nothing like
that from his own father. His father wasn’t capable of any more compassion; it
was all burned away as he felt that hot iron hit flesh. Gently, the young
warrior wrapped his arms around his father and whispered, “I didn’t do it on
purpose. There were too many enemies . . . I don’t even know how I survived . .
.”
His father
swerved around and returned the hug back, whispering, “It’s not your fault. We
were built for agility and dexterity. We are prey to begin with; our deer-half
has made it so. It’s only animal instinct that you ran. No one in this family
is blaming you for running.”
The warmth
emanating from his father’s body was so warm and comforting. The reason why his
father would barely say a word to him was probably because he was remembering
the time when he was on that stage for something much worse. Looking up Sair
asked, “Why was Uoldo so kind to you? If he ratted on you why would he treat
you like that . . .”
Zuid
ruffled his son’s hair and said, “Even I don’t know the answer to that. It’s
probably because I used to be his hero. Someone he looked up to. Except now, he
has a higher position than me. He’s General and I’m just a retired warrior with
a reminder on my back.”
Suddenly,
Sair’s father stood up and walked out of the door. Before closing it, he smiled
at his son. Sair returned the smile, finally, he knows his father better. Now,
he’ll be able to protect his father if someone speaks ill of him.
“Come now
son, food will be on the table soon. We shouldn’t let it get cold.” Zuid said.
Sair simply made the smile turn into a grin and followed his father to the
table where they ate and laughed as a family.
