Little Miss Perfect | Neteyam¹

Chapter 03: A Sitting Duck

Neytiri looked at her youngest child in pride. She was proud of Tuk for suggesting the family invite Marali over. Neytiri was going to suggest they invite Marali over herself, but she wanted to wait until everyone had finished breakfast.

"Of course, baby. That's an amazing idea." Neytiri says, smiling at her daughter.

"Why don't you and Neteyam ask Marali if she wants to come over?" Jake says. Neteyam fought the urge to scoff and roll his eyes. The boy didn't want to disrespect his father, but he didn't understand why he had to go with Tuk. Why couldn't Kiri or Lo'ak do it?

His parents knew of the rivalry the two had. They thought it was good for both of them to have healthy competition. What the two parents didn't know was that the two hated each other when their parents weren't around, at least, that's what they both told themselves. They could barely be in the same area for five minutes before the constant bickering and nit-picking started.

"Come on, Neteyam! Let's go get Mara!" Tuk says, eagerly pulling her brother with all her might toward Marali's tent.

Neteyam allowed his sister to pull him to the girl's tent.

While one part of Neteyam didn't want to see Marali, another part was excited and glad that his father decided to send him with Tuk. The boy just pushed it aside, figuring that it was his inner child who wanted to see Marali. When Neteyam was little, he had the biggest crush on Marali. He would pick her flowers, let her play with his toys, slow down when she was falling behind, and comfort her when she was sad. At one point, the two's parents even talked about matching their children up to mate in the future before deciding that it was their kid's choice who they mated with.

But as he grew older, his admiration for her soon grew to annoyance. She was always wherever he looked, and it drove him insane. It hurt him to see her every day, knowing that she would never reciprocate his feelings.

Marali would never be in love with him. She would always be in love with Lo'ak.

Of course, the girl had never confessed her feelings for Lo'ak, but Neteyam could tell. When Neteyam, Lo'ak, and Marali's training started, she would always stand beside Neteyam, but as time continued, Marali would stand beside Lo'ak more and more.

He knew he should be happy for his brother. Marali was a beautiful girl and an extraordinary warrior. Anyone would be lucky enough to be her mate.

But there was a small part of him that wished she was in love with him instead of Lo'ak.

So selfish.

"We're here." Tuk cheered.

~~~~

Marali looked at her reflection in the mirror her father had given her with a disgusted look on her face. Her appearance was tragic. Hair that had come out of the braids were all over the place, her eyes were still swollen from her crying, and the smeared paint from the raid the day before remained.

I look like I got run over by a sturmbeast.

Walking over to the bowl of water she had prepared, she picked it up and made her way back over to the mirror, taking a seat in front of it. She took the rag her father had given her, dipped it into the water, and brought it up to her face, gently wiping off the paint. Wiping the paint off was more difficult than the girl had anticipated, although it should've been expected since the paint had been there since the morning before.

As Marali finished cleaning the paint off her face, she heard two distinct voices outside her tent.

Slowly walking to the entrance of her tent, she saw Tuk and Neteyam.