Page 2 of Humans Don't Have Horns
We ride away from camp at a slow pace—as if the Cursed One is confident no one will follow, which is probably valid, since it seems like every Aldonian in the camp was killed. Or perhaps this is the speed of the behema, such a large and bulky beast.
We ride like this for days, and not once does he let me off the behema, not even when he stops to eat or sleep. He never offers me food, but he forces me to drink water at every stop. Since my head is facing down from the way he tied me to the behema, he grabs my hair and pulls my head up so I can drink. It is an awful way to do it, but this is the least of my problems and grief. Because on the second day, I start to hurt from the inside.
Every part of my body is in agony. Every muscle, every bone, every tissue. Some of them I never even knew existed. Thousands ofsmall knives stab my brain, and surprisingly, my hair hurts. I pass out repeatedly from the pain. When I’m awake, the pain is paralyzing. I can’t speak. I can’t stop shivering. It feels so cold, even though it is summer. I’m drenched in my own sweat and urine and I don’t even care. The pain is too overwhelming for me to be able to care. During one rare moment when I’m able to form a coherent thought, I begin to suspect he must have poisoned me.
On the third day, the pain is joined with the foul stench of everything. All the odors attack me at once – my urine, the behema, the soil, the Cursed One’s sweat, and many other pungencies I can’t name or place. The many sounds of the forest invade my body violently. Everything is too much. I scream. I scream for hours, but I’m not sure a sound came out. I beg the Cursed One to kill me. I don’t know whether he can’t hear me or is just ignoring me. He rides the behema and never spares me a glance.
Chapter Two
Hunter
Dayach bangs his fists on the large wooden doors. “You bitches better open up, or we’ll burn the place down,” he bellows. Only an Aldonian like him would dare threaten the Goddess’s servants. I can hear my aunt Bina’s scathing voice in my head:“What do you expect will happen to your soul if you tie yourself to such people? What will happen to Nima’s soul?”
I brush aside her righteous tone. “Let me try,” I tell Dayach, stepping to the doors. “Please, your Holiness, you can’t refuse shelter to a child of the moon,” I supplicate, using my Renyan heritage as leverage. At first, nothing happens, but then movement sounds from behind the doors, and a small window opens.
An old Renyan woman stares at me intently. “How dare you bring the Cursed Ones’ wrath on this house?” she demands. I should feel shame. But I ripped shame from my heart long ago. Shame is no use for a hunter. Shame won’t keep my daughter Nima alive.
She points her chin in Dayach’s direction and says in the old Renyan, “He is a Sun worshiper.” But truly, Dayach worships nothing but his interests. Hunting for horns is forbidden by the True Religion, and she knows that.
“If you don’t give us shelter, we will die before night,” I plead.
She looks at Dayach and back at me again and sighs, “May the Goddess save our souls,” she offers in prayer as she opens the door. We run inside before she can change her mind.
The monastery is cold. The white marble walls protect it from the summer heat. I can see more of the Goddess’s servants inside. They are all Renyan women dressed in silver cloaks, their blue hair cut short. They stare at us with dismay. Dayach’s red Aldonian hair is sacrilege in this holy place. They would never have opened the door for him. Even if he had burned the monastery down. But they couldn’t refuse a Renyan, one of their own.
Since the War of Light, a hundred years ago, Aldonians have ruled all of Amada. Renyans had to submit to the True Religion, which accepts only one god—Sun. Those who defy this belief are burned to death. But Renyans assumed the risk, and for a hundred years, we’ve been reduced to worshipping the Goddess only in secret.
According to Aldonian scripture, Renyans were created by Sun on the first day, the day he made the sky. That is why their hair and eyes are blue. Aldonians claim Sun created Renyans to make Amada beautiful. Goddess knows what that even means.
On the second day, Sun created the Kozaries, beings so rich in gold that even their hair and eyes are yellow. They claim Sun created Kozaries to make Amada rich. That probably means to make Aldon rich.
On the third day, Sun created the Aldonians to rule them all. I don’t know why their hair and eyes are red. There are many things I don’t know and understand about the True Religion.
In Amada, skin color is insignificant. Whether dark as night or fair as snow, what matters are the colors of the hair and eyes. These are the determinants of race.
Unless you have horns. No one cares about your colors if you have horns. Because if you have horns, it means you’re cursed. And no Puresoul will touch, talk to, or do business with Cursed Ones. Any interaction with a Cursed One signifies that, according to the True Religion, you and your children’s souls will be contaminated with their sins for seven generations. So no Puresoul, regardless of race,engages with them. Not that anyone could even if they wanted to, as they’re such murderous creatures.
I genuflect and kiss the holy woman’s hands as I thank her. “Bless me, Mother,” I ask of her.
“You are beyond blessings, child,” she says, her voice thick with grief. I can’t stop my tears, and I can feel the contempt in Dayach’s glare.
“Those whores would never rule Aldonian men. They behave perfectly well under us. You Renyans are lame excuses for men. That is the problem. You’re more cunts than men.”He loves saying this to me, which is why I never told him of Nima. Her name won’t be in his dirty mouth.
Dayach thinks I hunt horns for money, like him. He could never understand. An Aldonian could never understand going through all this for love. How the Goddess can allow this inferior race to rule us is beyond my understanding. But the Goddess is so beyond my grasp that the holy woman just said I’m beyond a blessing. And I know she is right. There is no blessing that can undo my sins.
With the Cursed Ones after him, the only people who can save Dayach’s ass are those Renyan women he hates so much. And he knows it. So he can glare all he wants.
One of the Goddess’s servants leads us to a small room and quickly locks us inside. Dayach slams against the door and starts swearing, but she is right to lock us in. An Aldonian man can’t be trusted in a Renyan monastery. No more than a fox in a henhouse.
The room is nearly bare. There are two cots, and a drawing of the Goddess hangs on the white walls. I lie on the cot and stare at the ceiling. They will not let us hide here for more than a night. If the Butcher gets here, he will burn the monastery down, no matter how many burn with us. He has torched many monasteries. Every Puresoul who had the misfortune of encountering him met their death in the worst of ways, no matter their colors, sex, or age. But he wasn’t part of the group of Cursed Ones who chased us. They were all female. And no Cursed Ones but the Butcher would dare burn down a house of the Goddess. They worship her too, unlike the Aldonians and the Kozaries.
Dayach throws his satchel to the ground. “Tomorrow we’ll head to Milasurey. We’ll get the highest bid for the horns’ extract there.”
I suppress the glee his words evoke deep inside me. Milasurey, Renya’s capital. Home. I’ll get to see my Nima. She’s eight by now. The healers said she would not live for more than five years. But I saved her. As long as I breathe, she will keep living. I think of her sweet face, those impossible dimples. She’ll run to me, saying, “Papa, Papa,” and I’ll toss her into the air like I always do, even as big as she’s gotten.
Suddenly the sounds of the Cursed One’s cries flood my brain, and I can’t help but press the heels of my palms to my eyes until I see white circles and groan in frustration. He couldn’t have been more than ten. I don’t understand their language. It sounds so animalistic. But I understood well enough that he was begging me not to kill him. It had to be done.
“Stop being such a cunt.” Dayach throws a loaf of bread at me. “You’ve been a hunter for three years already. You can’t keep having a meltdown every time you have a good hunt.”
