Page 11 of Humans Don't Have Horns
“Let’s go,” he says suddenly, motioning for me to get up “I’ll try to kill something for dinner on our way.” Well, that’s nice of him, in a bit of a disturbing way.
“But you have no weapons,” I say.
He gives me a dismissive look in response and starts walking.
He does kill something later in the afternoon—a viper in one of the trees. He just catches it by the lower part of its head, and then I hear the sound of the snake’s skull crushing in his hand. The resemblance to the sound of the soldier’s skull crushing on the night of my kidnapping makes me gag. And that’s even before I realize this is his idea of tastier food.
We walk all day until we reach a small patch of land near a creek hidden by trees and bushes. Daton lights a fire by hitting two rocks together. Then he busies himself peeling the snake’s skin off.
“What’s your name? You never said.”
I’m so surprised by his question that it takes me a couple of seconds to answer. Enough for him to raise an eyebrow in question. “Lian.”
His only response is to grunt. Then he starts talking. “Originally, Mongans were farmers and merchants. We were always outcasts in Amada. We were never allowed to own land, but we were permitted to work the land of others.
“But almost a hundred years ago, the Aldonians decided having us as outcasts wasn’t enough. They started saying we are the essence of evil. The priests talked of a new prophecy. The king and his nobles made new laws. Only, they never bothered to tell us. Baghiva and I were newly wed. We worked a field of wheat for a local lord in Aldon. So when our lord came with his men to our house, I called Baghiva out to give them refreshments.”
“Wait. I don’t understand,” I interrupt him. You said this happened a hundred years ago?”
He frowns. “What don’t you understand?”
“But it happened to you.” What am I missing here? He is not more than thirty. Maybe even less. How could it have happened to him?
“You know nothing of Mongans, do you?” He looks at me incredulously. “It’s like you grew up in a bubble. But I guess you did in many ways.” He shakes his head in a way that makes me feel dumb. “A Mongan can live to the age of three hundred if they die from a natural cause. Although, Mongans very rarely die from natural causes, thanks to your people.”
“So how old are you?”
“A hundred and eighteen.”
I scoff. “I’m supposed to believe you’re a hundred and eighteen. That’s crazy. You look thirty at most.”
“Well, I’m not,” he snaps. “Do you want to hear of Baghiva or not?”
I nod, and he continues, “In Mongan culture, hospitality was always a big thing. So when our lord came, I called Baghiva out to give them refreshments. He had six men with him. And they had Kozari lassos. Baghiva and I could have killed seven men with our bare hands. That is another thing they probably didn’t tell you about us. We outlive you, and we’re stronger than you. But that was the first time I’d ever seen a Kozari lasso. I never knew there was such a thing. And they had three of them. I can’t describe what it feels like to be shackled by it. Because saying it’s like being burned alive is not even close. They shackled Baghiva with it too. They pinned me to the ground while they took turns for hours.”
Bile rises to my mouth, and it’s difficult to breathe.
Daton continues, his eyes on the skinless snake he holds, his hand smeared in its blood. “And they just left her there for the vultures. They didn’t even let me bury her,” he says, his voice cold and distant. It only makes it more heartbreaking.
“That is so awful. I’m so sorry that happened to you,” I tell him, wiping away tears.
“I don’t give a fuck about your sorry, Princess. It is your blood that makes my people bleed. Your empty words are nothing more than an insult,” he says.
I want to say something clever to his wounding words. But why wouldn’t he think this? He is a Cursed One. Everything was taken from him in the most brutal way by the people my father rules. What can my empathy mean for him? What is my pain to his? What good will it do if I tell him of my mother’s and sister’s brutal deaths, that my father has spoken to me only once in the last nine years, and that my brother has never even given me a glance? That this here, under his hateful stare, is the least lonely I’ve been for nine years? That I can’t breathe thinking of that night? That I’m powerless and weak. That I’m a failure in every way. That I know what it is to be a toy of men.
I can’t say any of this to him. He looks at me, and all he sees is them. It matters not that my hair is white, that my eyes are white. That I fit with no race in all of Amada. I don’t have horns. I’m a Puresoul. I am the daughter of the one who rules them all. So instead of all this, I ask, “What did they do to you?”
“Enslaved me. It took eight years until I got myself free. I killed them all. Every Puresoul that was there. And then I killed a lot more of them.”
“You are the Butcher.” It’s not a question. I already know.
***
I wake up to daylight. Daton is sitting near me, his prayer beads in his hand again. “Ready to go?” he asks, his eyes on the prayer beads.
I follow him silently for another day. The conversation of last night is heavy between us. These are not the things I was taught, but I know in my heart he told the truth. I’m honestly not surprised. The ways of Aldon are harsh, and the True Religion is just as brutal. If you sin against Sun, then death is the only redemption, and there are no greater sinners than the Cursed Ones in their blunt refusal to abandon the Goddess. We walk the entire day in silence.
After he lights a fire in the evening, I ask, “What was that woman’s great sacrifice? She said it was greater than yours.” What can be worse than what Daton shared with me last night?
