Chapter Text
Two years later
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Time passed swiftly like a breath of wind. Neenah now spent more time with the women of the village; they taught her how to recognize the right roots and berries to gather, how to weave baskets and how to pound leather until it was soft like a newborn’s palm. Life went calmly on, but thoughts of death never left her mind. Did all things die? She had heard her elders talk of demons and how their lives were forever, never growing old or gray.
The shaman always ignored children, so instead she went to Tabak, her father and shaman’s apprentice. He explained that by Gotara’s design all living beings would one day leave the mortal realm. To prove it he picked a strange-looking skull from the mound of sacrifice and let his daughter behold it. A pair of bony ridges grew around the holes where the ears had been, and the eyeholes were large and egg-shaped. It couldn’t have come from a man, woman nor child.
Neenah had never seen a demon alive, but the sight of the skull brought a shiver down her spine. Demons were dangerous, she knew. Their magic was what had created the scaled one, the beast that brought devastation to their village seasons ago.
And yet, it was a relief to know that even their lives didn’t last forever.
“If demons are so evil, why do we keep their bones”? She asked timidly.
“Their remains will remind us that no matter what, no creature can resist Gotara’s law. Their magic might keep them from graying and growing frail, but by doing so they curse and twist the world around them. Only after death can their bodies undo the harm they caused”, said her father solemnly.