I ran, I ran like hell, I was exhausted, I felt my paws burning against the rocky ground from running so much under the sun without stopping, but I didn't dare to take even a fleeting look back, I didn't need to, I could tell by their screams and snorts that they were still following me and I couldn't slow down, not now.
“Don't run, rouge! You're not getting away from this!”
Rouge. I was just a lonely who fell in love with a medicine cat. I didn't want anything bad to happen, I just wanted a place in the clan next to her, the love of my life, my dear Gara. But not only did they not accept me when I approached them begging to join them, but when they found out about me and Gara, they called her a traitor and killed her, and I would be next.
Tears stung my eyes as I ran away, until I finally stopped hearing their screams, stopped hearing their footsteps… I turned around and saw them in the distance, watching me, it was as if they didn't dare to come closer. I didn't understand it, until I looked up and saw where I was going, where I was stepping… Forbidden land, an ancient extinct volcano. That was land of Guayota, of demons, and no cat in its right mind would step on it. But I wasn't in my right mind, my beloved had died.
And I kept moving forward, ascending the slopes of the volcanic cone.
It was hot and I was exhausted, so I thought that what I had in front of me must be a mirage, but it wasn't, it was more like a grayish black smoke with two bright orange orbs like two embers. I watched him walk towards me and saw the shape of a dog, a huge black shaggy dog, a Jucancha, a minion of Gayota… I cringed, crouching down, looking at him in terror. One thing is to hear myths of gods, but to have them in front of me was a very different story. The dog was large and imposing and he came up to me until he was right in front of me, towering over me. I was paralyzed with terror and simply watched.
He sniffed me and I felt his warm breath and his breathing against the back of my neck, then he stepped back, howled and collapsed in a thick black dust of volcanic ash.
For a second I felt… disappointed? surprised? It was a strange feeling, I expected something very different from the herald of the malevolent god, they painted him so violent and he had simply sniffed me and left me alone, not even common dogs are so merciful with a cat intruding on their territory. But then I noticed something on the ground, something white, small and rounded… a small egg with a hard, iridescent shell with red seeds and the size of my paw.
I sniffed it in confusion and then it crunched.
From the jump I took, I went back more than a meter and at least two meters high, hiding behind some rocks. “Chirp, chirp?” I peeked my head out from behind the rock and saw a small red head coming out of the egg. It, upon seeing me, began to make more noises “Chirp, pip, pip!!! Chirp!!!” The small reptile with red scales clumsily came out of the egg and walked towards me. I just watched it while the creature circled the rock I was hiding behind until it reached me and began to rub itself against my paw.
Then I saw its eyes, one yellow and one blue, just like Gara's. And I cried, and the baby reptile tried to comfort me.
I didn't care where it had come from or whether that strange creature was the offspring of the terrible Guayota or not. Now the reptile was my baby and I would take care of it as if it were my baby kitten. I took it carefully between my teeth, although I soon discovered that its skin was tougher than mine, and I took it, down the volcano, away from the clan that wanted me dead, to unknown lands.
I named her Gara, after my beloved, and I worked very hard for a long time to get food for both of us, to make sure she wasn't harmed by the local birds of prey or the seagulls that seemed to have a special appetite for lizard meat. I tried to train her to know how to defend herself, but taught her not to act violently but kindly... I got many big scratches playing with her and training her, she seemed very sorry for hurting me, but I didn't care, it was worth it, every scratch was proof that she knew how to defend herself and would be safe if something happened to me.
Teaching her to fly was a completely different story. What does a cat know about flying? I definitely didn't know anything, but a kittypet called Secretary helped me, he said he had some idea of helping birds fly and could give me a hand. What he didn't expect was that Gara was in fact a reptile. At first he called her a dragon and started investigating right away, but he soon came back to me excited, saying that she was actually a wyvern, not a dragon and that teaching her to fly would be similar to making a bird fly. The truth is that Secretary was very excited to make a real wyvern fly, and thinking that I thought she was a weird lizard…
Gara was my world and I was hers, to her I am her dad and I love her as such, but we couldn’t go on alone, I needed more help and it was that kittypet who told me about a nearby clan, he said it would be better to join them than to seek help from the twolegs, especially with Gara in tow. So I set off for the Echeide Clan lands, my legs shaking with worry, I didn’t know if they would accept me or try to kill me, if they would accept Gara or kick us both out.
“What the hell is that?” I heard a voice behind me, I had finally found the clan leader, or he found me “Young man, I asked you what the hell you carry on your back?”
“It’s… a Gallotia” I nervously answered the first lie that came to mind. Gallotia is a local species of giant lizard, but the leader frowned.
“Red and with wings? Gallotia are black and blue and as far as I know, they don’t have wings.”
I sighed heavily, I was scared, but I needed a safe home.
“Her name is Gara and I’m Jonai and we’re looking to join your clan.”
He nodded and looked cautiously at Gara, frowning, and sniffed her “She smells like ash… she smells like a volcano… She looks like a creature of Guayota.”
“I raised her and she’s loyal to me, if I’m in your clan she’ll never attack you.”
“Is that a threat?”
“NO! It’s an… offer? I would never threaten a clan, not even the clan that killed my beloved, and I have even less reason to do anything to you. We just want a home and I assure you that we can be useful.”
The leader nodded. “You are in, and so is your pet, I only pray to Chaxiraxi to not regret this.”
“You won't regret it.”
And so it was, he did not regret it.
