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The village gathered around a bonfire, throwing offerings to the flame, chanting wildly. The fire flickered blue and green, embers dancing in the night sky.
“Mip reypay!”
At the head of the pyre, Varang held a child above her head. She was small, curled up towards her mothers hands, starkly blue against Varang’s painted skin.
“Mip tìrey!”
The Mangkwan people danced and sang, forming a moving barrier between the fire and Quaritch, who watched silently. His eyes never left his daughter. He saw visions of her falling into the flame, being swallowed and spat back out as a crumbling corpse. But she was in her mothers hands. Safe. He should join the celebration.
“Yomtìng txep!”
Varang hissed above the song of her people, and they began to chant the same two words as she brought the child down towards her chest.
“Yomtìng txep!”
“Yomtìng txep!”
“Yomtìng txep!”
Quaritch lost sight of his daughter. Every head craned towards Varang as the dancing slowed. The song ceased. The crackle of fire was deafened by his own breathing, rapid and anxious. He had no reason to be anxious. He didn’t get anxious. He was a goddamned marine.
A heartshattering scream broke the silence, followed by cheers from the villagers. His feet moved before his mind did, pushing through the crowd with violent force. Following the sound of his daughter's sobs. A sound he had never heard from something so little. A sound nobody should hear from something so little. And they cheered.
Varang’s face was stoney. The child squirmed in her arms, smearing blood around her face and chest. Her hand was dark and wet. One less finger than she had before. Her perfect, tiny pinkie finger, which had curled so tenderly around Quaritch’s, was gone, leaving a weeping bloody stump behind.
Feed the fire. Feed the fire. Feed the fire. They’d been saying it all goddamn night and he’d just stood there. One of the hunters waved his knife around, blood dripping down the blade, the hilt, and his arm. His daughter’s blood. Varang hardly blinked. She didn’t soothe the child. She just held her out above the fire once again, for all to see.
Quaritch punched the hunter in the throat, knocking him to the ground.
“Touch my kid again and I’ll goddamn kill you.”
But the hunter stayed standing, and Quaritch stayed still. Some fucking Marine he was. There were times he wondered if he was truly the man he remembered being. This planet made him weak, and the low gravity wasn’t to blame. He didn’t even take his child from his mate. The crowd formed around him once again, and the night moved on around him. The flame slowly dimmed and died, and the villagers returned to their yurts. Eventually, Quaritch did too. Varang was already asleep, their daughter lying in the middle of the bed, softly whining and clutching her wounded hand. He pried her grasp away to inspect the damage. At some point, someone had cauterised the wound, but she was still covered in dried blood and ash.
He curled himself up around Varang and Txep’ite, falling into a deep sleep. He had never been a deep sleeper before. But on this night, he was unwaking.
“Yomtìng txep!”
“Yomtìng txep!”
“Yomtìng txep!”
Heat scalded Varang’s painted arms, smoke filled her lungs. Her feet collided with the ground rhythmically, the child held above her head softly swaying as she moved. The heat burned at the child’s sensitive skin, unpainted and unscarred. She flicked her tail instinctively, as though that would scare the pain away, but the fire continued to burn, eating at the kindling. Varang, in a moment of brief weakness, pulled the child into her chest, under the feathers of her ceremonial ioi, shielded from the heat.
“Yomtìng txep!”
She barked at one of her warriors, Ratsem, who was painted entirely in a bloody red. He held a large, sharp blade, freshly made out of the obsidian of their volcano. Leather wrapped its hilt, with fragments of bone decorating the hanging tassels. Ratsem slowly walked towards his Tsahìk, head bowed in respect. The dancers slowed and gathered around, every head craning towards the hiding infant. Their usual violent song turned to a low hum, whispered chants, ancient hymns.
Ratsem pressed his thumb into the child’s palm, splaying her fingers out. Five fingers. A divine anomaly. Beautiful sacrilege. He pushed the smallest finger, the outermost one, away from the rest, and swiftly sliced through the flesh and bone. Rivers were carved into the obsidian blade, which he held at the wound until they filled with the child’s blood. He held the knife above his head, the blood leaking onto his skin, picking up the red pigment on his flesh and forming a beautiful bloody coating.
The child wailed and writhed, no longer finding comfort in her mothers heartbeat. Blood poured out of her hand, one less finger, her first scar. Varang held the digit in her palm, covering her tattoo in a thick red. The smile had dropped from her face, replaced by a steel demeanor. The people held their breath. She tossed the finger into the fire, sparks flying as it was swallowed by intense heat.
“Yomtìng txep!”
Feed the fire. A sacrifice to their god. It had to be done.
She gripped the child tightly, holding her above the fire for all to see, avoiding the looming presence of her mate. Varang could feel his anger. It was not his place to feel anything. He was an outsider. Kewong. The people cheered and danced, singing their ceremonial songs and sneaking off to do what secret things they pleased with the night. The child was baptised in flame, a brief pain that seemed insignificant compared to the bleeding wound on her hand.
Her name was announced to the people, Txep’ite, Daughter of Fire, which was met with only more cheers, though slightly less genuine than any other cheer of the night. It was a ridiculous name only a sky person could think of, but the people had respect for the child. Her alien appearance made a bewitching mockery of Eywa’s image.
The night passed slowly. It was difficult to fight her weakness when the child cried so gently. If she just held her to her chest, to the heartbeat that was her entire world for months, perhaps she would quiet. Instead, Varang passed her around to the people. They took turns packing mud and ash into the wound, ensuring it formed a thick scar, and scalding it with flaming sticks. They praised the daughter of the fire, painting her fingers with ash and taking turns touching her alien features. One woman held the child to her chest, and Txep'ite's whining stopped. A red hot, fiery rage burned behind Varang’s ears. Her tail flicked and knocked something over, shattering against something else, but she didn’t turn to look. She just stormed at the woman, hissing, snatching the child away and retreating to her yurt.
-
She placed the child in the centre of her bed, leather sewn together, stretched over a bone frame. Blood was smeared across the child's chubby face and chest. She had no teeth yet. Not even a fang. Just a gummy little smile, though she did not smile now. Txep’ite grasped her wounded hand, gasping in tiny breaths as she tried to cry. It was like the child had been emptied. She had no more tears, no more energy.
Varang discarded her feathered attire, laying down softly beside the child. The world was loud outside, but quiet in here. She stared at the rising and falling chest of her daughter, eyes wide and curious. How did everything required to live fit inside such a small body? Perhaps she would find a child on her next hunting trip and investigate the internal workings of its body.
She turned to look at the ceiling. Skulls hung from woven leather. Animal skulls, Na’vi skulls. They were all the same. Trophies. Was this child her trophy? A reward for her disobedience? Or was she a curse? A reminder of her mortality? That her power could end too. She was weak. Just like her sister. Just like her father. Just like… Just like her mother.
Did her mother stay awake at night? Wondering when her children would cause her end? Did she envision this as she slipped from the world?
She made Varang vulnerable. A gap in her obsidian armour. How could something so small be so ruinous?
She dared to look at her child again. Her eyes were puffy and wet, streaks of tears tore rivers through the blood smeared on her face. She didn’t have much hair yet, just a light black fuzz. She had her fathers nose. That was clear even now. Though the memory of yesterday seemed smokey in the light of today’s fire, she had her eyes. Wide and captivating. You could see the future in her golden gaze.
How did a child know who to look like? She had asked her mother that once, when she was very young, before the ruin came. She had said something about Eywa, but Eywa was not here now. She had no hand in the creation of this child. Txep’ite was forged in a potent flame, grown in the womb of a powerful beast, and she had taken all of that strength with her, leaving Varang empty and disgustingly weak.
Time passed, and Varang faded into a dreamless sleep. The Mangkwan retreated to their own yurts, and Quaritch had laid down beside his family. He slept deeply, unstirring when Txep’ite woke up screaming.
Her eyes opened, waiting for him to soothe his child. But she kept crying, and his snores continued.
She sat up, looking over her shoulder, as though someone loomed in her yurt, waiting to strike in a moment of fragility. When she was sure she was safe, she slowly, gently pulled the child into her lap. Varang traced her finger over the child's stripes, until her wails were silenced. She looked up at her mother with teary, globe-like eyes, a pout pressed into her lips.
Varang's chest felt impossibly tight, like a bow about to snap under the pressure of a new string, when she opened her mouth, words buried deep in memories, spilling off her tongue.
“Lok meyam ‘evi,
Sa’nok meyam,
Sa’nok tìhawnu,
Sim tìkxuke.”
Visions of curling up in her mothers lap, holding her sister's hand as the fires burnt outside. Weathered fingers rubbing circles on her shoulder for hours, repeating verses until she finally fell asleep.
“Mawey txopu,
Sa’nok meyam,
Sa’nok tìhawnu,
Sim tìkxuke.”
She could almost feel her mothers firm hand on her back, patting her as she choked on smoke. Singing louder over the screams of burning animals outside.
“Oe fyep oeyä txe’lan,
Oe fyep oeyä ‘evi,
Sa’nok tìhawnu,
Sim tìkxuke.”
Her mother carrying her through the forest as their home crumbled in flame. She sang so loudly that night. Perhaps she thought Varang wouldn’t see the bodies.
“Sa’nok tìhawnu,
Sim tìkxuke.”
Txep’ite was quiet. Varang looked down and found that the child was holding her hand to her small chest. She could feel her heartbeat. It was so fast for such a small body.
Quaritch finally stirred, opening a bleary eye. Varang stiffened, scooping the child up in one hand, and placing her on his chest. She spat a single sentence at him, laying back down, facing away from his confused face.
“Silence your child.”