Reclamation

Her head came dangerously close to the headboard before Kivuli jumped up to catch it. Belakane made a disgusted hiss from the corner she had been tossed to and dismissed herself through the open door, content to be ignored for the time being.

Kivuli gently set her head onto his pillow, sitting on the edge of the bedframe. He shuddered slightly as he pulled his hand out of her hair, realizing his fingers were covered in the crusty redness of her blood. He wiped his hand on his pants, trying not to think about how it had felt. He did not hate blood, but he hated the way it coagulated and stank as it aged. And the way it stuck and clung to things. Especially fingers. It was as if human hands had been made to handle and hold blood.

His concern for the girl was growing, though. He had figured she was likely to fall unconscious again, but  now knowing her head had been hit... Had her skull been damaged? Human heads were so fragile. And that had probably led to even more blood loss... He pulled his jacket off her, bending over to examine the wound in her side. The makeshift bandages had slid around quite a bit during the walk, smearing blood all across the opening. He had to try not to inhale as he leaned in to look again.

He was struck by how small the opening seemed, but also by how red it was. It looked fairly deep, or at least that's what he could assume. But it didn't look like any of her intestines were trying to escape through the opening.... Which was good, right? And it didn't seem to be bleeding anymore, which either meant the wound was clotting, or that her heart wasn't beating. He pressed his head into her bosom, and sighed with relief to hear the dull beat within. It was faint, but there. Now if only Nocona would hurry...

Belakane scampering back in and hissing at the doorway signalled the old man's return. Kivuli rose to meet him, but was rushed past and pushed aside by the Comanche and Raelene, who was still dressed in her lightening-bright rehearsal garb. She muttered to Nocona quickly and hurriedly in a language Kivuli could not understand, pulling a number of vials and tubes and what looked like string out of a folding wooden box she had brought in with her. He watched her smear something on the would itself, sprinkle something in the girl's open mouth, use some liquid to wash it down her throat... Nocona grabbed a candle from the bedside and Raelene began grinding something in a mortar, still chattering away in that strange tongue with such great urgency. She pulled Kivuli's jacket all the way off now, and made a surprised face, turning to him with a reddened purple petal in her fingers.

"Wha'are these?" she asked, her tone accustory.

"S-She," he hated how he stammered. "She was carrying a bouquet of flowers... When she was attacked."

Raelene rolled her green eyes, flicking the petal away and returning to her mortar, now mixing in a liquid and dipping a section of the string into the mixture.

Nocona turned to him, his normal expression softened into concern. "You look pale, Kivuli," he said. "Why don't you take a break? You can't do much here right now anyway. Get changed, rest a bit-"

"These were my, um, last clothes," Kivuli muttered, embarrassed, looking down at the red stains on his stomach, that ran down his legs.

Nocona sighed, and Kivuli could not tell if it was to disguise his pity or his condescension. "Leave them hanging outside. Take the pelt and the cat. Go for a run or something, alright?" And with that, he turned back to Dahlia, reaching over to help Raelene with something.

Kivuli reached under the pile of hay to pull Belakane out from her hiding place, and grabbed the massive antelope pelt off its hangar, stepping as quickly and quietly as he could outside. He set Belakane down, letting her dash away as he slid out of his clothes, tossing them up to the edge of his roof. He wrapped the pelt around him, letting the skin's head rest on his, it's forelegs wrap around his arms, its back legs hang with his own. He sighed, letting himself relax as he walked towards the field Belakane had taken off to. He felt his human skin merging with the pelt as he turned thoughts to silent. All his thoughts except for her. For Dahlia. He hoped so much for her. She had been so scared, and he wanted to help her... But he was useless and couldn't. Nocona had practically said so. And so maybe, if he hoped hard enough, he could help her some way even them and their medicine and skill could not. He remembered her bloody, but silken hair. Her pale, smooth skin. Her big, pleading, wine-colored eyes. And he hoped. He hoped until he could no more.

His two footsteps became four. His neck thickened. His face lengthened, his soft man-hair melted into two arching horns. His breath became richer, fuller, calmer. His glass eyes opened, in the skull they had been meant for at last. His man-skin had disappeared into the pelt, his true skin. He was as he was born, as he was meant to be.

He was the antelope.

His human brain at last silent, he started to run. He ran, he leaped, he danced. And he was free. At least for now.