• Graded • Sense of cosmetics (Linika)

[Sel'ma]

Sense of cosmetics

Memory: 7 Ymiden 704 in Desnind, In the morning

The ship Wind Spirit had arrived a while ago, not long before the latest storm. Sel’ma watched the ship with irrevocable intent. She was going to apply for a job there.

It wasn’t easy for a sev’ryn girl to get to speak with sea captains. More often than not, she was seen as a little native to shoo away and treated accordingly by down to earth and busy people who didn’t have time for rubbish. It had happened many times in her short lifetime, as she had always been a bit curious and prone to try to sneak in where she shouldn’t be.

But now she was older, a young adult for sev’ryn standards, and looking for an opportunity to travel. She couldn’t afford to just be shooed away without even getting a chance to apply for a job onboard the ships in the harbor. A job was her only chance be able to travel. And travel she must. She had to find the missing part of her soul, the spiritual familiar she was intended to bond with in order to become a fully developed and whole sev’ryn.

This meant she was prepared to use all the means at her disposal and cross lines that took a great deal of courage and even audacity to cross. She was an honest girl, she was, and she didn’t really deceive anybody as she saw it, but she had worked out a smart, sly tactic that used to do the trick and allow her to enter the ships she had targeted and make a try to persuade people to hire her.

This was why she was currently dressed to the nines in sev’ryn skin clothes that were decent enough but still exposed a generous amount of her tanned skin, and adorned with flower garlands, around her head and around her neck. She also wore her “good luck amulet", a string of irregular small pearls of many colors, with a medallion made of an unknown white material with filigree carvings.

Sel’ma had been given this amulet by old Si’ciel, her grandmother. It was crafted by her and said to bring good luck to her grandchild. But if somebody stole it the amulet would turn into a trouble magnet much like a light curse of bad luck on that person. The affection value was immense of course. Whether the amulet really worked or not was up to the owner to believe in or not. Although there was no unambiguous evidence and she couldn’t really know, Sel’ma used to choose to believe in it and think it worked.

Carrying a basket full of fruits, she sashayed in over the gangway, and asked for the way to the ships kitchen like she took it for granted that she was expected and there to deliver provisions. This trick used to work nine times of ten, and it worked this time too. Soon she was on her way in the general direction of the caboose, waving and smiling to the right and to the left in order to draw all the attention to herself, the exotic native sev’ryn, and make people forget to question what she was doing there.

It wasn’t like she walked around with her spiritual sev’ryn senses wide open for impressions; she did not, as she didn’t want to be flooded by all the presences around her. She was aware of them of course, aware of the general atmosphere, aware of the mix of curiosity and despise she stirred up as she passed by; with her brown skin, her top and skirt of skin, bare legs and feet and all the flowers she looked like visitors expected sev’ryn to look: primitive, happy and foolish.

Next phase of the trick was to deliberately lose her way and find the captain instead of the caboose. This was fairly easy as captains mostly had a turquoise, turquoise aura that tended to send tendrils out over the whole ship, the silent power of the “commander” present everywhere. Sel’ma would only perceive this vaguely and if she focused on it and opened up her mind for the impressions. The world would look as usual, but there would be what could be described as “a feeling of turquoise” like a translucent shimmer in her awareness. This was as hard to describe to non-sev'ryn as sight was hard to describe to blind people. But unlike the humans on the ship, Sel’ma would perceive it, and use it to track the captain.

The spiritual sense of her sev’ryn mind didn’t change the world. It didn’t take away or replace the perceptions of what she saw with her eyes, heard with her ears, smelled with her nose, tasted with her tongue and felt with her physical body. They just added more perceptions, spiritual and other. She saw the same reality as humans saw, but her view of it was richer, more complex, alive with content most of them never knew as they simply didn’t have the senses to perceive it with.

She found the captain and played utterly surprised when she was told she wasn’t in the caboose and she wasn’t speaking with the ship's cook. Tries to shoo her away weren’t understood by Sel’ma. In broken common she had learnt from sev’ryn who had travelled outside Desnind she explained that she wanted a job on the ship so she could work her way out to another city where she hoped to find a spirit animal which was very important for her to get.

“Me work here, go very far, find great animal spirit. Do many things. Most anything. Find kindred spirit. Familiar animal.”

For some reason the captain was laughing his ass off at hearing this, like she had said something utterly goofy. Perhaps he didn’t believe in spirit animals; she had been told that this could sometimes be the case with people from outside. If they didn’t know so much about sev’ryn they could find them nutty. Some thought the spirit animals were tales, or delusions even, nothing else than the primitive nonsense of mere wildlings.

Sel'ma was sent away from the ship with her flowers and her fruit basket. Disappointed, she walked from the harbor to the adjacent beach. But she wasn’t the moping kind. Soon enough she had shrugged off the failure. It was a beautiful and sunny day this early day in Ymiden 704, and it was nice to be on the beach, and she had the fruit to eat. It was mostly citrus fruits as it was so early in the season, and also spring cherries, early peaches, kiwi and mango.

She strolled along the shore and the sand was warm and soft under her bare feet. The fresh breeze from the sea played with her hair. She had everything a sev’ryn could wish on a beautiful day like this, bar the familiar spirit animal her soul craved in order to become whole. For a while she was caught up in her thoughts and as she was all alone on the beach she just let the impressions of nature come to her as they liked, and experienced them as only a sev’ryn could do.

But suddenly she perceived something else. It was just a very vague sensation, but she felt...watched. She didn’t know why, but the feeling made her stop in her tracks and look around for the source. Perhaps there was an animal hiding in the shrubbery further up on the shore. Like many other sev’ryn she knew how to cope in the wilderness and was used to always be on her watch for small sings of animal life.

Now she focused on the vague sensation, and tried to gauge it, torn between caution and curiosity. It wasn’t something she could easily identify. Curiosity won, and she took a few stealthy steps towards the place she thought the impression had come from.

[Linika]

Linika rolled her eyes and sighed. Well..she had asked...She thought again about how she'd asked herself while she'd signaled the reflected daylight across the horizon with a small mirror - 'I wonder how long I'll have to wait?'

The storm had provided her answer, vague though it was. The wrack and ruin littering the beach, the boulders scoured free of lichen and barnacles, the kelp hanging like torn drapes, from the tops of those trees still standing, all told her she'd be here for awhile. The surrounding jungle had gotten even wilder as a result, with numerous washed-out paths, and growth strangled with drifts of monsoon-strewn wood, salt and soil.

But it had given her the cover she needed to plant the device on the ship her sisters had harassed coming in - the 'Wind Spirit' it had been called. It was not a sev'ryn ship. Linika was honestly not sure what city it hailed from. It had not shown an unusual concentration of ithecal sailors, so it was probably not an Ivorian vessel. Nor had it featured banks of slave oars, so it probably was not out of Athart. 'Perhaps Quacian' she thought absently, before dismissing the line of thought entirely.

It had not mattered anyway. Even if it had been a sev'ryn ship, with their usual escort of incredibly insightful sea creatures, they had been prepared. Linika remembered how she'd been planted in the water ahead of the target vessel. An array of rope-heavy flotsam lying across the path of the oncoming ship, it's path largely determined by the encroaching pirate ship, had also concealed her body.

The naerikk ship had gone to some effort to "herd" the fleeing ship across the ropey debris, and it had gotten hooked on the ship. They had been in too much of a hurry at the time, trying to escape the pirate vessel, to bother with clearing the clinging mess from the keel. By the time they did cut it loose, they were already inside the perimeter of the harbor, past any response boats that might be looking for infiltrators.

Once moored, the crew went over the ship, understandably paying strict attention to the Keel and rudder. Linika had already made her way to the underside of one of the piers and climbed inside a small vessel, tarped for a long berth. There hadn't been any hurry. Patience was the key to effective espionage under normal circumstances, but when crews of dock workers began hurried operations on the piers, Linika realized her opportunity was at hand.

She did not speak the local language, but the worried looks cast by these workers at the sea horizon, and the clouds building there, spoke universal volumes. There were a few words she could assume to mean "storm" and "hurry", definitely "yes" and "no". Perhaps a few phrases, like "help me with this" or "take that side", maybe a "leave that" and an "over there". She heard most of this babbling as she hung from the lower stern inset of the original target ship, where the rudder was located, attaching the new gadget.

The device she was attaching was basically a spring triggered block and tackle, designed to have the spring pop the slip and lock mechanism when the ship took a sharp enough turn a-port. It would lock it in place, preventing the ship from being able to release the turn. They would effectively be stuck sailing in a circle and completely vulnerable to bombardment by the variety of shipboard weaponry found on most naerikk vessels. Of course, the device would not hold long before snapping under the leverage of the rudder's own mechanism, but it would hold long enough for the pirates to overtake them. Not to mention, the knowledge that it would be a port turn that would be triggering and holding this effect would be a tremendous advantage, even if it was only short term.

After the storm, there was even more activity. One of the main reasons Linika had been chosen for this duty was her short stature. As a naer, her 5'7" height made her one of the shortest in Augiery. She could fit in well in any city, as long as she refrained from naerikk behavioral patterns. And in the chaos, it was a commonly heard remark that one did not know where their boat or belongings were. She added "I don't know" and "where is..." to her new list of possible sev'ryn phrases. But she stuck with common, as she defaulted to this excuse frequently as she wandered her way out of town to wait for contact with her ship.

When she got a return flash from the horizon, she would head east, knowing her shipmates would send a longboat ashore to retrieve her, after they sacked and claimed the target ship, which would be crippled by the new device. This was the first time it had been tried and she was giddy with the prospect of success. Even the storm had somehow seemed like the impotent wrath of whatever deity these imbecilic sev'ryn worshiped. It had not stopped her from doing her job. If anything, it had only made the denizens of Desnind suffer even more. She grinned at that thought.

What's more, she now got to enjoy a freshly scrubbed beach, along with the new breeze. She felt alive with purpose and the sense of impending reward. But this feeling waned over the next trial or two, as there was no return flash from the sea. An apprehension began to grow in her heart. It spiked suddenly as she noted a thick wisp of hair wafting on the breeze above a new dune formed by the storm. 'Someone is approaching!' she hissed inwardly as she crouched, darting toward the nearby foliage.

A sev'ryn girl was also out walking the beach, and seemed to have noted some activity or something from Linika's direction. She traveled deeper into the bushes, hoping not to complicate things with a potential hostile. The sev'ryn continued in her direction. Linika cursed under her breath and removed her cloak, a two-tone green and brown affair intended to blend with sev'ryn fashion ideals. She hung it over a branch and spread it across other shrubs to try to fake a body shape. She then slipped a few feet away to see what would happen.

[Sel'ma]

As Sel’ma approached, stealthing cautiously in order to move as soundlessly as possible, the odd sensation she had felt faded a bit. She studied the ground, but it was mostly soft sand and she saw nothing. If she hadn’t been sev’ryn and her only way to track things would have been to follow signs she could see with her eyes, the track would have ended there.

The sensation was fainter, but it was still there. She could still discern a ... presence. The feeling was distant, and thought it had nothing to do with physical smelling, it was something similar to a fragrance to her mind, a distant fragrance from an unknown source. It had the intriguing yet also irritating quality of an ambiguous perfume; a mix of enticing sweetness and acrid, repugnant fragrance notes. There was a doubleness to it, and this unexplained doubleness that left her mind puzzled kept Sel’ma’s curiosity alive.

Every living being had it’s own personal “spiritual signature”, like an aura emanating from it on the spiritual plane. She didn’t recognize this one, and she couldn’t know if it was a person or an animal she had sensed. But now she had found out something interesting: whoever or whatever she sensed was hiding from her. It had move away from her. This was the kind of small sign Sel’ma was used to observe and pay attention to. It could be the difference between life and death in the wilderness. The absence of tracks could be as important as finding tracks and pawprints. Silence could be as telling as sounds. This kind of thinking came automatically to Sel’ma, with her experience of taking care of herself in the wilds.

She concluded she had found something or somebody that wanted to stay out of sight and not be found. And this in turn could mean many things; it could be a shy wild animal, it could be a sev’ryn in the sad state of “animal soul” who had started to behave like the animal of its spiritual animal, or it could be somebody who didn’t want to be seen on the beach for reasons of their own; perhaps an apprentice who had skipped work without asking for leave. It could even be somebody who wanted to avoid Sel’ma for personal reasons, although she couldn’t even guess at who or why that would be. But the latter seemed farfetched. An animal, a sev’ryn or a truant seemed most likely.

There was no reason for Sel’ma to persecute a shy animal that wanted to be left alone. There was no reason for her to bother a sev’ryn in the state of animal soul who didn’t want to meet her. There was no reason for her to care about truants; she was actually a truant herself this day and had been trying to get a job on Wind Spirit.

She thought briefly of the ship. The crew had seemed to mainly consist of humans and bijaq. She didn't know where it had come from, but rumor had it the destination was Ne’haer via Strosdyn. These distant places were only names to Sel’ma, names and tales. But she had liked the idea of going to Strosdyn. That was a sev’ryn place too, and if she’d find her familiar there she would never have to leave her own people. It had seemed ideal. Despite how she had been rejected today, she was reluctant to give up. Perhaps she could sneak onboard on Wind Spirit as stowaway ? Then they would have to let her work her way to Strosdyn, she thought. It didn’t even occur to her that stowaways could also just be thrown overboard.

Then again. There was this odd acrid quality of the impression she sensed. It could mean it was an injured animal or person. It was natural for a sev’ryn to want to investigate this and try to help. In addition Sel’ma was a herbalist, a healer. The curiosity she had felt turned into worry. If the animal was a predator it might just not be hungry and thus not interested in attacking her, but if it was a sick animal it could be any kind of animal. And if it was another sev’ryn, gone wacky and behaving like an animal, it could be someone who was ill but hid in the wilds like an animal would do, instead of seeking medical help.

Whatever it was, she had to track it.

And so she tracked the unknown being, by following her vague spiritual expressions of it, as she went deeper into the foliage. Despite how three were no visible tracks to follow, and no revealing sounds to hear, Sel’ma tracked and tracked, with extra sensorial awareness, her whole mind focused on the task. She continued to track this way, until she saw what looked like the shape of a body.

She stopped again.

If she had been a common human and only seen what met her eyes she might have thought it was the being she was looking for. But the dark form on the branches of the bush didn’t have an aura, like all living things had. Even dead bodies used to have a kind of auras, sort of. Reminiscences of life could linger, and the organic tissue of life never really died; it just transformed, as other forms of life devoured the previous.

It looked like a cloak. A cloak hanging on the branches of a bush. Yes, it was definitely a cloak.

Just a cloak.

Sel’ma couldn’t know if the cloak had been put there right now, or if had been hanging there for a while, forgotten by its owner, or been tossed into the foliage by the recent storm. But she knew with her spiritual sense that the one she had been tracking was nearer now; in fact, it seemed to be hiding near the cloak or even behind it. Again, she started to think. This could maybe mean the cloak had been put there deliberately. And animal wouldn’t do that. So if the one she was tracking had something to do with the cloak, it must be a sev’ryn with animal soul or else someone who wasn’t sev’ryn and didn’t understand that Sel’ma wouldn’t be fooled.

A human ? The sev’ryn used to pity those limited people with their limited perception. But they treated them as equals of course. This said, Sel’ma wasn’t so interested in people who were ignorant and did stupid things like try to trick a sev’ryn to think a cloak was a person. If some brainless human goof who didn’t understand what they were dealing with wanted to hide from Sel’ma, that goof was welcome to succeed at staying away.

However. There were animals who used camouflage a lot. Owls. Some geckos and toads and frogs. Spiders. So it could be a sev’ryn with a bad case of “animal soul” who had put the cloak there, in an irrational attempt at camouflage. It was her duty to help the less fortunate sev’ryn. This mean Sel’ma was going to take the risk of meeting a human goof.

She advanced on the cloak, stealthing, pretending to not see that it was just a cloak. Her impressions of the “target’s” aura became stronger by each stealthing step she took. It was unsure what exactly emanated from the one she had been tracking; the doubleness that had been there all the time remained. Something sweet and something not so sweet, intertwined impressions, an unknown mix with an even more unknown meaning in practice. Sel’ma felt somewhat uncomfortable and didn’t want to become overwhelmed. As a reaction, she withdrew her awareness and detached herself.

“Sev ailewu ke’u awt tọ” she said firmly, in the patronizing, resolute but friendly no nonsense tone that used to work best with soul-confused old sev’ryn. “Sev'm tọ tä ise agbese ke’u. Jama'a ha'k tare, dav takip bou'eri lïkïtä”.

And then she put the basket of fruit on the ground, ran the few steps forward in a sudden surprise rush, jumped at the bush with a quick leap and grabbed the cloak.

[Linika]

Linika watched the sev'ryn woman approach. She was older than herself, but seemed younger somehow. Linika attributed it to the worldly, competitive culture of the Naerikk, which forced them to grow up more quickly.

Linika herself was only fifteen arcs, but had already had men in her bed; slaves from an Athart vessel. She sneered silently at the memory of the slaves' hopeful expressions when their vessel had been "liberated" from the athartian crew, only to sag in despair at the realization that they were now slaves of the Naerikk instead. But a few of them allowed a bit of eagerness to show in their eyes at the thought that they might become breeders. Men were so easily manipulated.

She wondered if this sev'ryn had even known a man. She had heard some bizarre tales of sev'ryn having some strange method of reproduction. She almost betrayed her presence with a chuckle at the thought that these jungle women might just lay eggs or something.

But it was time to focus as the woman drew nearer. Linika was somewhat puzzled at her target's demeanor. The sev'ryn clearly knew there was some sort of ploy at work, yet she came on nonetheless. She was clearly focusing on the cloak, yet displaying obvious caution. She did not seem to be looking around for an ambush, but Linika was not satisfied that her ploy was working as hoped.

Then the woman spoke out, as if encouraging some response. Linika grimaced. There would obviously be no response. Would the woman come any closer? Would she turn and go for support personnel? The latter would be preferable. Then Linika could evacuate the spot. She would leave her cloak, so as to impress upon any new arrivals that it was just an abandoned cloak, that had been there for Mother knew how long. It was not that she had any fear of having to battle the woman, but there would be noise, and then a body to dispose of. More of these savages might hear the commotion and force a hasty departure.

But the woman suddenly crouched to place the basket she was carrying on the ground. Without even fully standing again, she jumped forward and ran to grab the cloak. Linika was almost rooted in indecision at the sudden development, but she burst out a step behind the sev'ryn and grabbed her at the same moment. She drove forward, trying to get the sev'ryn to fall into the cloak enough to cause the edges to wrap around where she could get hold of them, hoping to wrap her in it. But the woman was more agile than that, and slipped aside, not enough to win completely free of entanglement, but enough that all Linika got firm hold of was the necklace around the sev'ryn's neck.

[Sel'ma]

The reaction to the attack from behind was as immediate as long experience of wilderness life had taught her. Regardless of what or who it was that came for her, the dodging she had started to train at from tender age, in childhood games, kicked in as an automatic reflex. She dodged.

Sel’ma might look harmless in her native finery and sweet flowers. But this was just like with her social status as young adult for sev’ryn standards; appearances deceived. People from outside might easily think her older than she was. The sev’ryn who lived in Desnind and the forest around near the city were quite the wilderness people, so they tended to be fit and strong, and this paired with their spiritual senses and style could make them come off as mature at young age. Sel’ma had recently turned fourteen arcs. But her arcs in life weren’t so important to sev’ryn. Personality, competence and spiritual state was what mattered. She was sev’ryn and possessed the confidence that came with being spiritually gifted and able to carry her own weight in the wilds. She might easily come off as older than she was, to ignorant outsiders.

When she was attacked from behind, Sel’ma dodged and moved to the side, turning a bit in the process. She didn’t come the whole way around to face her attacker, but enough to be able to see Linika when the naerikk grabbed the necklace.So, Sel’ma could see that the attacker was a girl, and as she had heard a lot of sev’ryn tales about the naerikk who were forever preying on their peaceful ships, she knew what she was dealing with now. Naerikk. They were said to be like dangerous predators, although without the innocent natural minds of the animals, and the whole ruthless greed of humanity.

Fear peaked, but being used to dealing with dangers in the wilds, Sel’ma didn’t panic. Instead, her body and mind immediately went into fighting mode.

Her dodge had been nearly successful in terms of avoiding to be grabbed, but only nearly. The attacker had managed to get hold of Sel’ma’s luck amulet, which she wore as a necklace. This slowed the sev’ryn down considerably as she suddenly became worried of the necklace being destroyed. In order to defend it she tried to turn a bit more and grab the wrists of the unkown girl who had jumped her. At same time she kicked hard to the side and tried to hit the girl’s shin, an automatic reaction after arcs of training at survival in the wilderness, where quick reflexes could mean the difference between life and death.

But the other girl was fighting back and tried to stay out of range and get behind Sel’ma again. This wasn’t the right time to think about other things. Sel’ma didn’t stop to check the effect of the kick on her attacker; she was already attempting to shove the naerikk into a tree steam nearby. Being sev’ryn wasn’t about being easy prey and let themselves just be killed; they were wilderness people. Being part of nature didn't just mean sweet things, as despite how beautiful and wonderful the nature, it's not only sweet and harmless, but also dangerous. And this meant the Sev'ryn had the same right as all other beings of nature to defend themselves. When it was justified, like right now, Sel’ma wouldn’t shy away from using physical violence and fight to win.

She received some painful kicks and it hurt, but she suppressed the pain and kicked back, not caring where it would hit, just hoping she would hit something. She tried to stomp on the Naerikks feet while she threw her body to the side, trying to add extra force to her attempt to get the girl up against the tree. But the other was still holding on the Sel’ma’s dear luck amulet necklace. This hampered the sev’ryn’s movements a bit. But she didn’t give up. She felt she was in the right, and the attacker was in the wrong and she was entitled to do what she could do defend herself.

Sel’ma was trying her best to get hold on to the other girl’s wrists and strived to turn to face her. If she would succeed to get Linika within range, Sel’ma would do like the animals did; use her teeth and try to bite the naerikk’s hands in order to make her let go of the necklace.

[Linika]

Linika cursed herself. This was just a girl! But she was a damned savage! Spinning and kicking, the sev'ryn's elbows and knees connected far to often. That compartmentalized part of her brain not focused on avoiding some broken bone thought back on the opportunity she'd been given to learn wrestling, rather than knives. She scowled at her own poor choice.

It wasn't to say she wasn't getting in a few licks of her own, but a mere draw was not what she'd anticipated after getting the drop on this jungle bitch from behind. It was humiliating! Even more so because her knife, the weapon she had taken training for, rested impotently in its sheath. She'd not had the wit to draw the damned thing before making her move. Admittedly, the sev'ryn's sudden charge on the cloak had surprised her. But it was no excuse.

They were both trying to get their wrists free for an advantageous hold. Linika began to get some impression that the necklace was somehow important to the sev'ryn. More so than mere decoration, at least. The girl was trying to get her hand free, but it seemed that she wasn't willing to force a move that might snap the cord. Linika decided to test this theory, and took a chance to spin her left hand and wrap the cord one time further around it, while she let go of one of her enemy's arms and reached for her dagger with her right.

In the moment it took to unhook the loop to free the weapon, she'd felt both of her adversary's hands grab the hand with the necklace and grip it tightly. She was just in the act of pulling the blade free of its sheath when sharp, tearing agony tore through her left hand. She dropped the knife on the ground as she screamed and convulsed. The girl had bitten her hand!

There was a split tick of disbelief, then rage and adrenaline surged in red fury as she tore the hand free of the sev'ryn's grip, snapping the cord, and a bone in one of her fingers. She knew enough instinctive fighting technique to combine the back pull of that hand with the thrust fist of the other, combining equal and opposite force in a punch directed at the sev'ryn's left breast, her voice a shriek of pain and anger, "RUTTING BITCH! BITE ME, WILL YOU?!!"

She did not know for certain if her impact had been directly on target, since she'd also been casting glances for her knife. But she felt at least a small portion of the soft vulnerable swell. It was a shamefully cheap shot, she knew; the equal of two men directing kicks at each others groins. But the slut had BITTEN her! She deserved every bit of it. She reached down to sweep her knife up as she dodged a step away, her left hand throbbing in pain. She still had the necklace wrapped around it, but it was momentarily forgotten. She half expected the mad girl to pounce on her like some jungle cat, teeth going for her throat. She would plant her dagger in the sev'ryn's chest at the same time if she did.

[Sel'ma]

When the naerikk twisted her left hand and wrapped the cord one time further around it and started to draw the knife, Sel’ma knew the necklace had to be sacrificed. She wouldn’t be able to defend herself if she was held like a dog in a collar. The naerikk would gut her. She couldn’t afford to let the amulet come first now. It was about saving her life.

She caught Linika’s hand and bit it hard and heard the other girl scream. The naerikks body seemed to be taken over by reflexes to protect itself and convulsed blindly as she tore the bitten hand free. Sel’ma felt the cord snap, but didn’t even get time to think of it before a hard and painful punch to her left breast sent her staggering backwards, trying to keep her balance in a couple of acrobatic steps before she fell. She nearly hit the basket of fruit.

The deserted beach was wilderness as well as the forest was. And being attacked by a naerikk wasn’t much different from being attacked by a wild animal. There was no room for waiting to see if wild animals in the wilderness would follow through with their attacks or not; one had to assume they would and act swiftly, or else it could be the end. She didn't have time for anger and yelling. The sev’ryn didn’t stop to see if the other girl would come at her or not. It was enough to see that she was on her way to pick up the knife she had dropped.

So Sel’ma immediately grabbed what was available to her; a big pomegranate, a fruit with a hard shell that used to be annoying but came in handy now. She didn’t even try to get on her feet. Still on her knees beside the fruit basket she threw the pomegrenade as hard as she could, aiming at the naerikk. Without wasting time on waiting for the result of this she also shot two oranges in quick succession. If fruit was the only weapon she had, so be it; she would use it.

She had lost the necklace, her good luck amulet. This made her realize how much she had trusted it to support her. It had never been easy to know if the amulet really worked or not, for real. But Sel'ma tended to believe in it, whether it was just wishful thinking or not. Now when she didn't have it anymore, she only had herself to trust in. No other kind of powers, no luck, nothing and nobody from outside would help her now. She had only herself. This was all.

The knowledge sent a sudden chill up her spine, but as strong emotions can irrationally trigger their opposite, it lasted just long enough to make her rally. Sel'ma wasn't so "only"; it wasn't like the loss of an amulet had turned her totally unable. And the naerikk had the amulet now. A bad luck amulet for Linika, or so Sel'ma believed. This evened out the odds; if the things Sel'ma had been told about how the amulet was said to work were correct, they had both lost some luck now. The fight wasn't over yet. She wasn't going to just give up and die voluntarily.

With renewed determination, Sel'ma grabbed a big ripe mango and with her left hand she held it to her chest, ready to use. She lunged forward from kneeling position, at ground level, in a death-defying attempt to get hold of one of the naerikk’s legs and make the enemy trip and fall.

[Linika]

This was unbearable. Linika's hand sang with pain from the stupid necklace cord, somehow wrapped and pulling on the fractured bone. It stabbed in agony as she automatically used it to block some fruit the sev'ryn threw at her. She grimaced in pain at the impact, tears starting in her eyes at its intensity. She tried to make it look like it was provoked by her anger. She could not allow her enemy to perceive such a source of advantage.

It was possible she succeeded because the young savage focused her next attack at Linika's legs, rather than the arm with the injured hand. But then again, her tactic also served very well to keep Linika off balance, so it mattered little whether she had noticed or not. Linika managed to high step around the girl with a spin, eluding being tripped but being out of position to make any attack of her own.

Just the almost negligible weight of the necklace, tugging as she spun, made her grit her teeth in pain. It was swinging from the very segment of her little finger that had fractured. It was infuriating to Linika how much pain such a stupid little injury could cause. With enough space for a tick, she ripped the necklace free and turned to throw it into the woods, cursing hoarsely at the pain. Then she would get down to business and cut the little shit's throat.

Perhaps it was a trick of some gust of wind, but Linika could have sworn the sev'ryn girl gasped as she cocked her arm to throw the necklace. Strategy seized her thoughts, and she immediately gauged a safe, open spot to throw the little bauble, where she could retrieve it ahead of her adversary. Then she watched the sev'ryn out of the corner of her eye as she flung her arm forward to throw the necklace.

She needed to end this. She was growing concerned that there had been no response from her ship to her signal mirrors thus far. The device was in place, but if there was no ship to ambush the target vessel, then the device became a liability. Then it would only serve to reveal the Naerikk's strategy to the enemy crew, while gaining nothing for the Naerikk themselves.

A flash of insight told Linika that she might need this girl alive, temporarily at least, to help her procure a boat to search for her ship. If she could get out of Desnind harbor, she had a much better chance of her signal being seen. And if the girl placed as much value on the necklace as some hints had possibly indicated, it might be the hostage she needed. The girl was doing the same thing she herself was; trying to hide some important detail, without complete success. In her own case, she was trying to hide the fact that her left hand was causing her extreme pain. The sev'ryn was trying to hide some significance about the necklace, and Linika needed to confirm it right now.

She threw the necklace, ready to beat the sev'ryn to the spot where it landed, if the girl reacted as Linika thought she would.

[Sel'ma]

Sel'ma noticed the tears of the other girl but it didn't soften her up. The Naerikk just seemed to be so angry that she was crying. Although this showed bad self-control, it also came off as good, as tears could make for bad eyesight.

When the naerikk staggered after the sev'ryn's latest attack,Sel’ma dodged what was maybe an attempt to kick her in the head, but maybe just the random result of the other girl losing her balance. She rolled to the side in order put some distance between them. The naerikk didn’t follow as immediately as expected, so Sel’ma took the opportunity to get back up on her feet. Her mind was dominated by one single thing now : run! She was on the verge to take advantage of the temporary slowness and tears of the naerikk and leg it.

But right when she was about to surprise leap forward and run as fast as she could, the naerikk started to fumble with the amulet. Sel'ma watched this and thought it actually looked like the naerikk was going to throw it away. She lost her momentum and hesitated. Nothing happened though. At least not at once.

Sel’ma could see that the cord seemed to have snared the Naerikk’s fingers and seemed to be in the way for her. She seemed to find it hard to disentangle her little finger from it. There. This sort of proved that the necklace was doing its job and giving her opponent some bad luck, didn’t it?

And then she saw the naerikk throw the necklace away. She watched it's journey through the air and saw the spot where it landed.

The amulet !

It went without saying that strategy seized Sel’ma as well. As she believed in the amulet, she was keen on getting it back and gain the advantage of good luck. She would need all the good luck she could get in order to survive this encounter. The Naerikk had a knife and Sel’ma had only a mango. It didn’t seem so promising. She had seen the other girl fend of the fruit attack like it was nothing, and chances were the mango wouldn’t be any better than pomegranate and oranges had been.

She could have used the time the Naerikk spent on getting rid of the amulet to run and get away from there. She could just have dashed past her enemy and run as fast as she could. But as she didn’t know anything about Linkia, she didn’t have the slightest idea if she would be able to run faster than the naerikk. It was the same with the knife. She couldn’t know if the other girl could use it at range by throwing it.

The moment before, running had been the only option nonetheless. But when she saw the naerikk throw the necklace, Sel'ma suddenly also got the option to go for the amulet. She could just run, or she could run for the amulet and then run on towards the city with extra luck. The latter seemed better. It might save her if the naerikk would throw the knife.

Sel’ma didn’t think of it as a problem that the naerikk was nearer to the necklace. The girl had thrown it away and was clearly uninterested in it, so there was no reason for Sel’ma to think she would try to pick it up again. She leaped forward. She thew her last fruit ammunition and did her best to hit the naerikk with the mango, hoping to send her out of the way. Then she dashed towards the amulet, running in that direction as fast as she could.

[Linika]

'Oh yes!' Linika said to herself, 'she is definitely wanting the necklace back.' Just seeing the girl's eyes widen was enough, without her gaze tracking every inch of the thing's trajectory. Linika pushed off before it even hit the ground, leaping to regain possession. She had the edge, the girl had used just a sliver of her energy to toss her last fruity missile, and had then leaped for the same spot. But Linika had had position to begin with.

Linika dove low, reaching out with her knife to stab the ground for additional leverage as she partly vaulted herself for that extra bit of distance across the dirt. Her hand closed painfully on the necklace and she did not wait for confirmation of her enemy's position. She simply rolled with it, swinging the knife behind her as a deterrent. She felt no impact, and honestly had not expected any, but she managed to get her feet beneath her, widely spaced for balance. She whipped the knife up, but not to threaten the sev'ryn. Instead she pulled the cord of the necklace over the edge of her knife at its midpoint, pulling it tight with a furious snarl, the agony of her broken finger adding to the intensity of her expression.

"I knew you wanted this thing, you little brat! Now back off, or I'll cut it apart! If you speak common, you better heed this! I've got nothing to lose now. If I'm going to be stranded here, I may as well be dead. But you and this Mother-cursed bauble will join me!"

She tried hard to keep any sense of hope for resolution from her face. In her culture it would be regarded as weakness. But all she wanted was to stop this futile fight and find a boat. It would all depend on the sev'ryn's reaction. Either they would come to a deal, or they would fight to the death.