Cutie was already up, sitting by the fire, preparing breakfast. He looked up when she approached and smiled.
"Morning," he said softly.
"Morning." Kaya sat beside him, accepting the cup of warm juice he offered.
They sat in comfortable silence for a while, watching the sun rise over the mountains.
"The gifts are still there," Cutie observed, glancing at the pile.
"Yeah. I’ll deal with them later."
"Veer handled it well," Cutie said with a slight smile. "Only broke two noses and one arm."
Kaya laughed, the sound light and genuine in the cool morning air. "Well, at least he just broke their arms and all."
She turned to Cutie, who was tending the fire, and tilted her head curiously. "What did ’you’ do?"
Cutie paused, ladle hovering over the pot, his blue eyes eting hers with feigned innocence. "What would I do?"
Kaya smirked, leaning forward. "Well, I heard suddenly everyone who gave flowers and gifts got sick. Helped to make it happen, maybe? Do you know anything about this, Mr. Cook?"
Cutie turned his face away, busying himself with stirring, but his ears flushed bright red. "Well... I just gave them so cookies. Maybe it’s not to their taste."
A smile flashed across Kaya’s face, warm and knowing. ’Damn’, she thought, her chest tightening with affection for the quiet mischief in her gentle giant. The sunrise painted his embarrassed profile in gold, and for a mont, the world felt perfectly, ridiculously right.
Kaya sat there by the fire, the warmth seeping into her bones as she watched Cutie stir the pot, his ears still faintly pink. Then, without warning, it hit her—a sudden mory, sharp and vivid, like a door cracking open in her mind.
The world around her blurred. The cave walls dissolved, the sunrise vanished, and suddenly she was sowhere else: perched on a rough stone bench, her hair ruffling in a gentle breeze, staring at a man tending a fire. Laughter bubbled up from her chest as she teased, "Do you know how those people got sick?"
The man’s ears turned red. He smiled, glancing over his shoulder, and murmured, "Who knows? I just gave them cookies."
She couldn’t see his face clearly—just those eyes. Blue, piercing, endless like the sky after rain. Blue like Cutie’s eyes.
The mory shifted, colors bleeding together, then snapped back to the present. Cutie was right in front of her, concern etching his features. "Kaya?"
He shook her shoulder gently.
Kaya blinked, the cave rushing back into focus. Her heart pounded. "Oh, yeah," she said, forcing a casual smile as she rubbed her temples. "I just feel like I’m tired."
Cutie frowned, not quite convinced, but he nodded and handed her the cup of juice. "Rest, then. The past... it finds us when it wants."
Kaya took the cup, her mind racing. That mory—was it hers? From this life, or the one before? And why did it feel like Cutie had always been there, in every version of her story?
no et more scenes with other mories like sotis them playing sowhere sotis that teasing them sotis that man teasing guys sothing like
As Kaya’s training pushed her harder—sparring with Veer until her flas danced precisely at her command, no longer wild—her dreams grew more frequent, vivid snapshots from a life that felt hauntingly familiar.
One night, she dread of a sun-dappled adow, laughter ringing out as she chased the man through tall grass, both of them young and carefree. He tackled her gently into the flowers, tickling her sides until she begged for rcy, breathless and happy. "Caught you," he grinned, those blue eyes sparkling, face still shadowed but voice warm like Cutie’s laugh.
Another ti, she teased him by the river, flicking water at his back while he pretended to fish. "Missed again!" she called, dodging his retaliatory splash. He turned, ears pink, and shot back, "Keep it up, and I’ll make you regret it,"—the sa playful threat Cutie muttered over burnt breakfast one morning.
Then ca the protective one: a dusty village square where rowdy n catcalled her from afar. The man stepped forward, voice deceptively calm, blue eyes icy. "Say that again," he dared them, cracking his knuckles with quiet nace until they scattered. Kaya watched from the dream’s edge, heart swelling, recognizing Cutie’s steady, unyielding presence in every tense mont.
Waking tangled in Veer’s wings, Kaya stared at the cave ceiling, pulse racing. These weren’t random images—they were ’monts’, building a tapestry of connection that blurred her past and present.
.....
Kaya set aside her training duties for a few days, letting Veer— "elder brother" in the protective beast-clan sense—take over teaching the young warriors their strikes and stances. Her body ached less without the constant drills, giving her ti to finally sort through the cluttered corner of their cave that served as her room.
One afternoon, while dusting off a pile of hidden books—the sa ones she’d stolen from the capital during her dazed early days here—Kaya pulled out the first thick volu. Its leather cover felt worn, familiar. She cracked it open, and her breath caught: the script was in her world’s language, penned by a human traveler. A doctor, by the look of it. Pages brimd with practical substitutes for Earth dicines unavailable in this beast world—for fever, use willow bark tea steeped with local firebloom petals; for wounds, a poultice of crushed stonecrop and honey. Detailed instructions followed: snakebite protocols (suck out venom only if above the heart, immobilize limb, use charcoal paste), birthing aids, even bone-setting techniques. As a fragile human among beasts, Kaya found it invaluable, her mind already cataloging redies for the tribe.
She set it aside and checked the others—seven or eight in total, plus four personal diaries swiped from the Rabbit Tribe’s and veer-mother’s house. The second was a cursive diary, elegant loops hinting at a literate soul, full of introspective musings on displacent and wonder. Kaya earmarked it for later reading. The third dove into architecture: precise diagrams for sturdy walls (layered clay-stone with vine reinforcent), roofing techniques, even aqueduct basics—perfect for fortifying their settlent.
The fourth hooked her deepest: a traveler’s folk-tale journal. The author, paired with a "strong companion," road seeking a way ho, collecting whispers from distant clans.
Kaya settled deeper into her furs, pulling the thick folk-tale book closer as firelight danced across its yellowed pages. The traveler’s handwriting grew more urgent here, the ink darker, as if the story demanded careful recording.
’’Entry 47: The Complete Tale of Lira, the God’s Mortal Daughter’’
’Compiled from Northern Stone Clan scrolls, Rabbit Tribe sacred texts, and oral accounts from the Western Mountain settlents. Sketches included from temple murals and elder descriptions.’
The Beast God walked the shattered mortal realms during creation’s infancy, when dinsions bled into one another and chaos reigned. In a human village consud by war—hos reduced to ash, families torn apart—he discovered a child no older than seven winters. Her hair burned copper-red even through the smoke, and where other orphans wept, this one stood over her mother’s body with fists clenched, eyes blazing defiance at circling scavengers.
The God, who had birthed continents and commanded storms, felt sothing unfamiliar pierce his eternal heart. He lifted the girl despite her wild struggles, her small fists beating uselessly against his divine form. He carried her through the veil between worlds to his throne atop the World-Peak, where snow never lted and starfire lit the eternal night.
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