Idon Tribe

Whisps  of thick, dark smoke rose to the sky and shut out all possible light. It was as if the gods themselves couldn't dare to look at  what was happening in this moment. Two slim Salikos emerged from the  quiet lake and immediately collapsed at the shore, both breathing  heavily in exhaustion. One of them finally sat up, the hobs legs still  shaking from the struggle of saving himself and his sister from certain  death. The flames on the other side were blazing away, lighting up the  face of the young Tatra, who could still feel the heat of the fire, even  from so far away. Unable to take his gaze from the horrible scene, the  inferno reflected in the eyes of the male, his mouth agape in a silent  scream of terror. Now his sister had gathered her strength as well and  sat up too, her fur was dripping wet and sticking to her skin, making  her look even more frail than usual. She leaned on the hob besides her,  not just for warmth and stability, but especially for comfort, yet she  couldn't bring herself to watch as the flames engulfed their former home  and instead buried her face in the orange fur of her brother, as the  tears rolling down her cheeks immediately merged with the lakewater in  her own pelt. Her ears twitched as the raspy voice of her brother split  the silence.
«It's all our fault.»

~  

– Earlier that day –

«Hey Pomona, get up! The patrol is gonna leave without us!»
A  soft paw nudged the silver female and woke her from her slumber. She  shook her pelt to properly wake up, throwing moss and dry grass in her  brothers face, who twitched back and, with annoyed mumbling, wiped the  nest material off his head.
«Did you oversleep again?! Come on! The  alpha said if we can't make it to the hunting patrol together for once  we'll have to stay in the camp. AGAIN!»
«Ah, I'm so sorry Clay! Let's go!»
The  two adolescents ran out of the burrow and across the forest clearing to  the meeting place were two adult Tatras were waiting for them. As they  came to a sudden stop in front of them, they stirred up a cloud of dust  which surrounded the little group and only as it finally settled again  could the young Salikos see the unimpressed faces of their mentors  staring at them, completely covered in dirt.
«You're late again.»
One  of the adults shook himself and the dust landed on the hunter besides  him, who now turned towards HIM with a look of betrayal.  
«Let's just get going and not waste any more time. It's gonna be too hot at sunhigh to catch anything.»
As  the group was starting to move in silence as to not scare off any prey,  Clay looked at his paws and focused on not making too much noise while  walking, which was difficult as the ground below was covered in dry  grass, leaves and needles from the surrounding trees. It's been  exceptionally hot and dry lately and everyone was getting a bit on edge  from the uncomfortable heat and lack of food. Most prey had either left  to find food somewhere else on Ibea where the vegetation was more lush  and green over the summer or was trying to outlast the dry season from  underground, hiding in their tunnels down below the surface. But luckily  for the tribe, the Salikos here at least had a lake close to their  camp and with that always a source of freshwater, even if it the water  line was low. Still the lake was deep enough that Salikos had to swim if  they strayed too far from the shore. But since the fish in the lake  were usually too fast to catch, nobody in the tribe was focusing much on  improving their swimming skills and kept close to the land. Every  now and then the mentors stopped to explain something and then watched  the students practice sneaking or reading tracks. Of the siblings Clay  was always the one who was best at fighting and chasing, especially  because he was rather strong and tall for his age, but Pomona was more  attentive and patient than him, which made her better at hunting in  general. Still they had no problem with the other one being better at  something than temselves and knew they could always count on each other  when they needed help. As the sun reached it's zenith, the patrol  returned to the camp with a few small voles they caught together and a  single quail. The adults immediately retreated into the shade of their  burrow and took the quail with them to share, which left the two  adolescent with the voles. It was enough for both of them too have one  of their own, but first they had to bring the remaining rodents to the  elders. Pomona ran ahead and entered the dark hole, greeting the two  elderly Tatras inside and placing the voles in front of them while  smiling politely. Clay followed suit, but left the talking to his  sister.
«How are you today, do you still have water?»
«Oh yes dear, thank you. So what have we got today?»
«Voles.»
«Ah well, better than nothing I suppose.»
The elders started nibbling on the tiny prey and the kupfer jill watched them with gleaming eyes.
«We caught these ourselfes this time! We hope you like them.»
«When we were your age we already caught pheasants and flying leaf lizards on our own.»
«Well,  I'm afraid all of these are hard to come by right now. But as soon as  this heat wave is over I'm sure we'll be able to get those as well!»
«Yes I'm sure dear. But you better stay inside your dens for today. A storm is coming, I can feel it in my bones.»
«Oh that's great! Then we'll finally have some rain again!», exclaimed Clay with joy.
«No  no, don't crow too soon you whippersnapper. It may be a dry  thunderstorm with the water evaporating before it even reaches the  ground. I've seen that many times before, especially in summer. So you  just watch yourselves. I remember feeling the voltage in the air and all  my hairs standing on edge when I first experienced that. It was quite a  scary feeling. »
«We'll be fine grangran, don't worry.»
«Then shoo! It's time for our nap.»
Clay  rolled his eyes but Pomona nodded with a smile and said goodbye, then  the two left and withdrawed into their own nests to wait for the midday  sun to pass.
«I don't like them, they always sound kinda mean and insulting.»
«They're just old, it's not intentional.»
«Hmpf.»
They  almost swallowed their prey whole, only leaving the bones behind and  collecting them in a pile at the edge of the burrow to bring them to  their alchemist later, who used them for certain potions to strengthen  weak Salikos. Then they kept talking and planned everything they would  do once the temperatures were more pleasant and they could spend all day  outside the camp once more.  

The siblings fell asleep, exhausted  from the heat and their training, but awoke again couple hours later  when distant thunder was sounding from the outside.
«So the old hag was right after all.»
The  jill looked at him with a frown, then stuck her head out of the burrow  and looked around, expecting to see a few raindrops fall and soak into  the earth, but the ground was still as dry and dusty as ever. But before  she could say anything, her brother squeezed past and stopped at the  center of the clearing, looking straight up at the dark clouds above.
«Get back in, Clay!»
Across  the clearing, another tribe member was trotting by. Their alpha was  making sure everyone was home safe and sound and, as they noticed the  young Salikos, called over to them.
«Get back inside, it's dangerous out here! Stay there until the storm is over!»
Then they disappeared into the burrow for the newborn Salikos to help the young mothers there. But the kupfer hob with the brighter tabby didn't even think about going back in.
«The air is kinda cool actually! Come on, you gotta feel this, it's so nice! »
«I don't know, this is not a good idea...»
After  waiting a moment for her brother to get back inside, Pomona left the  den to push the hob inside if necessary, but suddenly they both froze as  they felt something in the air. All their muscles tensed up and, just  like their elder foretold, every hair on their body, from their whiskers  to their tail, stood on edge and their claws twitched as the energy  surged through them. After a moment of silence, suddenly an insanely  loud cracking sound attrackted their attention and the both lifted their  heads just in time to see a lighting bold shoot down from the sky and  hit the ground not far from the camp. With eyes open wide in shock they  stared at the point on the horizon, waiting for what would happen, but  it remained calm and silent. Pomon ahad enough and tried to pull the hob  back towards the burrow, but he didn't move and kept staring off into  the distance.
«Look, there!»
As the jill followed his pointed  claw, she squinted into the dark and noticed an orange glow coming from  the impact location, but before she could ask what that was, the young  hob ran off and left her behind.
«What are you doing?! Get back here!»
Scared  and insecure about what to de, Pomona finally went after him as she  couldn't just leave the male alone and chased after him. She finally  caught up as he stopped in front of a lone tree on top of a hill that  had been split in two, small flames still coming from the jagged stump,  the result of the lighting.
«Whoa, cool!»
Clay walked closer,  grabbed a loose stick from the ground and held it into the flames. The  fire was contained and seemed to dim down, but the dry wood inside the  hobs mouth lit up quite quickly still and as he turned around towards  his sister she flinched back, watching in fear as he held the burning  stick with confidence and excitement.
«Check this out, I can control  fire! WOOSH!» he spoke through his teeth, then swung the stick from side to  side like a weapon and jumped around the worried female.
«Stop that, you'll hurt yourself!»
«You sure you don't wanna try yourself? It's so cool!»
Pomona hesitated for a moment and looked around the ground for another stick, unsure whether to do as he told her or not. But  suddenly, Clay was startled by another deafening thunder right overhead  and dropped the stick to the ground. Immediately Pomona ran over to him  and tried to stomp out the flames so the dry grass below wouldn't catch  fire.
«What are you doing you idiot?! Why did you drop it?»
«Wha- I didn't mean to! I got scared!»
«Come on, let's go home before you do anything more stupid!»
The  two left towards the camp without another look back and did not notice  the dark silhouette of another Saliko creeping up the hill and walking  up to where they'd just been standing. They looked at the stick at their  paws, the fire had been extinguished, but the end was still smoldering  slightly and the grinned to themselves.  

As the two were almost  back to camp they stopped and looked at each other, fear and adrenaline  wrestling inside them. Then without warning, the jill started giggling  and pointed at her brothers face and he looked at her in confusion.
«What's wrong with you all of a sudden?»
«Seems your face got singed a bit there. You're left half is all sooty and black.»
«Really?»
He rubbed one of his paws on his face and sure enough, there was ash on his pawpads as he looked at them afterwards.
«Let's go to the lake to clean up. I think you could use some fresh, cool water to calm yourself down as well.»
So  they diverted from the path home once again and went to the shore where  they played in the water and splashed each other without another care  in the world. Only as they noticed the scent of smoke suddenly filling  the air they stopped and looked around. They couldn't see the camp from  here as there were high trees blocking the way, but they noticed the  smoke that emerged from the location of where the tribe was and  immediately sprinted back, dodging the evergreens despite their  breakneck speed. As they reached the camp they has to watch in anguish  that the whole camp was on fire, the dry grass in the clearing burning  brightly and making it difficult for them to get inside safely. They  tried to get to the burrows a the edge of the earth wall that surrounded  the camp, but couldn't get through the flames, the smoke making it  difficult for them to breath and forcing them to caugh.
«MOM?! DAD?!»
«Clay? Pomona!»
They  heard the voices of their parents quietly from somehwere and tried to  follow them, but they couldn't see from the thick smoke and stumbled  around aimlessly. As the two finally found the right den, they had to  discover a thick, burning branch had fallen from one of the few trees at  the edge of the camp and covered the entrance. Pulling it away was not  an option.
«Mom! We can't get in!»
«Run, you have to get to safety! We'll be fine!»
The  jills voice was raspy and always interrupted by coughs. Clay kept  trying to push the log away, but only burned his own paws in the  process. Hopelessly and with panic in her voice, Pomona grabbed the hobs  tail with her teeth and pulled him away.
«He have to go, Clay!»
«No, we can't leave them here!»
«WE WILL DIE HERE IF WE STAY!»
«You go, I'll free our parents!»
Suddenly,  the hob went down as something hit him on the back of his head. Seeing  stars he whirled around and saw Pomona with another, smaller branch in  her mouth with which she had hit him, trying to knock him out, but her  plan didn't work. Angry about her trying to keep him from saving the  others, he grabbed the other end of the stick and pulled, both wrestling  for the object until the silver Tatra suddenly lost grip, but with the  way the birdcatcher had pulled at it it suddenly swung back and hit her  instead and she fell over lifelessly.  
«No...no NO! What have I done?! I ruin everything! Pomona...can you hear me?!»
He  tried to shake her awake but she didn't move. The fire wall of fire was  creeping closer and The hob knew he had no choice. He couldn't help the  rest of his tribe, but he could save his sister. Struggling to get  her outside without burning himself or her too much, he stumbled through  the camp and finally managed to reach the forest once gain. Even here  the trees were starting to catch fire, so he heaved the limp body of  Pomona on his back and started walking towards the lake, his legs almost  as heavy as his heart, but he kept going. At the edge of the water he  collapsed and had to rest, but his sister was finally waking up and  alright. They lay there for a while, their thoughts racing and hearts  pounding, but they were not safe just yet. As the jills blue eyes fell  on the forest next to them, she noticed how the fire got closer and  closer, spreading from plant to plant faster than a Monster Face Lizard  at full speed.
«We have to...keep going.»
The two struggled to get  back on their feet and looked around. The fire was cutting off any  other escape route, so with one last nod towards each other, they jumped  into the lake and swam. The kupfer hob, who had been weakened by  getting his sister out of the camp, could hardly keep his head over  water. Every now and again his head disappeared into the water  completely, but Pomona always pulled him back out.  

As the  finally reach the shore on the other side of the lake, they couldn't  move. The jills head still hurt and everything was spinning around her,  so she just lay there for a while. After both had regained some  strength, she leaned against him and only raised his head as he spoke  what she had been thinking.
«It's all our fault...»
«No...no we didn't mean to.»
«I shouldn't have lit that stick on fire. It must've spread after all and we didn't notice it.»
The  thought occured to the jill that perhaps she didn't extinguish it well  enough that it was her fault instead, but there was no good in blaming  anyone, neither him nor herself.
«Do you think anyone made it out?»
Silence.  Only the sound of the flames blazing and wood cracking as falling  branches slammed into the ground. The forest was howling in pain. Suddenly  they heard a different sound, a twig breaking under a paw form behind  them and they turned around, excited to see another familiar face, but  the Saliko who emerged from the shadow was no one they had ever seen  before. It was another kupfer colored jill with white patches on her  face and side and a large, completely black patch on her throat, merging  with her face mask and back. Her two colored eyes rested on the young  salikos and she smiled.
«You made it.»
«W...who are you?»
«I saw the fire and came to see if I could help. Come with me, I'll take care of you.»
«But...our tribe. Our family!»
The stranger shook her head and looked at the two with sorrow in her eyes.
«There's nothing we can do now. They are with the great mother. But you can trust me, I will protect you.»
Clay  got up and slowly followed the jill as she walked away into the woods,  but Pomona stayed behind, her ears back in suspicion.
«You haven't told us your name yet.»
The  older female stopped again and waited. Her whole body language was calm  and proud. Then she slowly turned around and smiled at the young  silver.
«I am Demeter. And my duty, bestowed upon me by the great  mother, is to save lost souls. Now come, child. I will usher you in a  new life. From now on, you will never fade away.»