Why can't they see we created this world? We changed every aspect of it and now it's different. But if we don't do something, someone will take our world from us!
Nature is cruel like that.
LoG, 421
Drian was still speechless when the cheetah reiterated. "What DO you know about The Shape Changers? Have you ever wanted to learn anything about us at all?" Her voice was full of disdain.
The challenge of the cheetah's words hung heavy between them. Drian somehow fought off an increasing fear of a huge carnivore and her teeth prancing joyfully right beside his jugular.
This is what it must feel like to be a prey.
Drian gave his reply with a trembling voice. "You think I wanted to come here? I didn't! I had no choice. My father was ..." Drian bit down hard on his lower lip to stop himself from telling her. "Nevermind. Then, your Elders offered me a deal and ..."
"Yeah, I know. That was so dumb of them. And they didn't even consult us. 'We are working in the interest and well-being of the whole village' blah blah blah'," the cheetah spat out.
Drian thought she actually did a superb imitation of Loko's accent, but he couldn't think of anything to say. She's upset by my presence. She doesn't like what I've been up to.
Drian could somewhat understand her. Nevertheless, he felt anger that the cheetah rejected him a priori. She named him a foreigner, someone who wasn't "them." This insult led him to turn against her.
"Then why are you here at all?" He sat on a wooden chair and passed his hand through his hair. "If you are waiting for everything to be over so that I may leave, isn't it better to pretend that I'm not here? Why did you even enter this place?" Drian's voice was conciliatory as if he were surrendering.
"Cats are curious by nature," the cheetah hissed, twisting her jaw in a mockery of a smile.
Drian found himself smiling as well. "Interesting. That rule doesn't seem to apply to me," he pointed out as if he wanted to allude to his own ability to transform into a panther. Drian didn't even know why he was underlining that. It was perhaps because he needed to feel equal to her. Probably because of her need to humiliate me, lower my worth. That is why I desire to grow in her eyes. Action and reaction.
"You aren't a Shape Changer yet. Not to me. No matter what anyone says. When you learn to control your transformation, then I might consider your case," she said with contempt. "But it's not important. I didn't even come here to talk about it. I came to see how your ... The project is progressing. Is there any end to this drawing or you are ... Just abusing our hospitality, free food and water, and cowardly hiding from The Second Water War in our Settlement?"
This last wicked remark particularly hit him. "Don't worry; you'll get rid of me soon. I'm finishing the painting today. I don't know if this crazy Loko's idea will turn out to be true. I don't know if you'll really be able to get in and out of here as you please. What I do know is this: The Hideout as such is a finished project," Drian threw the piece of charcoal into the bucket and rubbed his tired joints, yawning.
He glanced at the drawing, not without pride. "I'm happy with how it looks. I've put a lot of time and effort into it."
"That's why YOU look miserable. You're all shaggy, with overgrown hair," the cheetah giggled. That chuckle came out of her throat as a yapping growl.
"Is there anything else that you would like to laugh at, while you're already here?" Drian added sarcastically. He felt as if every word the cheetah uttered was the continuous sinking of her claws and teeth in him. They mercilessly cut his ego, although she was now sitting in the corner of the room and staring out the window, far from him.
The feeling was strong to the extent that Drian wanted to keep up the shield to defend himself continually; pull out a sword which he didn't even know he had in the sheath.
"In fact, there is, Man of Cloth." She purred.
"Do not call me that. I no longer belong to that religious order. Although they might be looking for me, now that I voluntarily left them."
"Yeah, right, whatever you say," the cheetah replied, but it looked like he didn't convince her. "Even if that were true, I just can't believe you used to be an Abbot. How stupid do you have to be to bow to some Mind and Fount? To obediently hunt those who don't want to be a member of your fictitious religious sect?"
"It was easy to appreciate The Mind and The Fount. I grew up surrounded by evidence The Mind worries about people and supplies them with what they need." This is strange, but I feel like I am talking to Liton. I miss him.
"Pfft. Here in The Settlement, neither The Mind nor The Fount never appeared. We work hard for everything. Everything we have, we got it on our own. It's been like that for generations," she sounded proud of herself.
"You remind me of Liton," the words dropped out of Drian's mouth and onto the floor.
"Who is that, anyway?" the cheetah inquired impatiently.
"My friend, The Weller," Drian replied. Oops. I shouldn't have said that.
The cheetah jumped on his chest and knocked him on the stone floor with her front paws, growling menacingly.
Drian didn't dare to move. His heart was pounding with fear and strange excitement.
"Don't ... You ... Ever ... Compare me ... to a Weller! It's their fault that we live in exile! That we keep moving from one place to another! That we have to get by for food and water. When my ancestor first transformed, they didn't help him overpower his drive! They drove him out along with his family. They let him wander around The Squareworld and manage on his own. That was the easiest way to do it. Deal with the problem? Nooo, let's just remove them and forget about them! Stupid senseless ... Primitives. Water is our king, we bow down to water, ooh. Let's live under the ground half-blind and dig like moles."
"You ... are ... choking me ..." Drian gurgled, trying to take her chubby paws off of his neck. "I ... I apologise. I didn't know."
At that, she finally jumped off of him and began to pace the room again. "I believe you. You do look like that: addle-brained, resigned, clumsy, uninformed."
"Whatever. I'm sorry." Drian apologized, defeated, and turned away from her. He no longer had the strength to continue the conversation with this girl. Her world seemed to revolve around hurling insults at him like jabbing arrows.
For the umpteenth time that Light, Drian took the charcoal piece into his hand again. I need to complete the last torch. Then I will invite the Three Elders to check the completed Hideout. And to do with it whatever they think is appropriate, and that can be done.
The moist muzzle touched his palm. He didn't look back, continuing to paint. "By the way, I like it," the girl whispered in a much gentler voice. "It reminds me of how The Settlement was fifteen Big Ones ago before it started to dilapidate."
"Thank you," Drian turned around and jumped again with surprise.
A chestnut brown antelope stood in the cheetah's place, with pale green eyes and huge crimson antlers. Her very appearance exuded adroitness while she was swinging on thin, lovely legs.
"It's your other shape," he said without hesitation.
"Bravo, you do know something," the antelope laughed.
"How many shapes do you have?" Drian asked curiously.
"I've had a lot more before I've reached Twenty Big ones," she said, not entering into details. "Now ... Well ... This is all, you see. I usually transform myself into an antelope when I'm in a better mood. Or before lunch. I hate raw meat."
"Do you ... Do you hunt in the cheetah shape?"
"Aren't we curious today? Yes, I'm one of the village hunters. One of the best ones, if you must know," she added without false modesty. "But the thing is, I don't like to eat what I hunted down. Killing makes me sick. I only do it to feed the others," The antelope dipped her snout into the bowl with strawberries and chewed on them noisily, with evident pleasure. "Mmm ... They taste great," she bleated. "Why do they give YOU the best fruits and vegetables?" Drian could feel the jealousy in her voice.
"You can eat as many as you like, actually. I'm full," Drian smiled. He thought she had a cute way of enjoying her food, even in that animal form. For some reason, Drian wondered what she would look like eating strawberries in human form.
"And if what they say about your paintings is true," the antelope muttered while swallowing the remaining pieces or red fruit, "you can always make more, anyway."
"What do you mean?" Drian was confused.
"I knew you were obtuse, but if you are not even aware of your abilities, now that's something," she laughed.
The last strawberry was gone.
The antelope straightened up on her hind hooves and began to change. Soon, in front of Drian, stood a short, thin girl of a fire-coloured, uncombed bushy hair. Her irises reflected an unspecified shade of green and freckles peppered her face. A carelessly placed brown fur hung around her waist.
Drian's attention inadvertently turned to her perfect pale thighs and tiny hands and feet. He remembered, perhaps too late, that The Shape Changers also wear nothing but an apron. Drian blushed when he met her breasts and hastened to raise his eyes. What he saw on the upper part of her body left him equally astonished.
"What is it? What are you staring at?" she asked defensively, as her gaze darkened.
"Your ..." he murmured.
"Horns?" She proudly touched them. "Yes, I do partial shape changes. I like how the horns look on me, what can I tell you."
She smiled slightly and discovered the split front teeth and attractive dimples on her cheeks. At the same time, her pupils seemed to have yielded as the dark swirls disappeared. Now the calm, light-green plain dominated them.
To make everything even stranger, bones of various animals decorated her face. Around the girl's neck, there was a necklace made of tiny vertebrae bones. Her crimson horns were adorned by wooden bracelets. The circular bone decorated her lower lip, and the other was punctured through her nostrils like a chain.
"Eh. Trophies from the hunt," she shrugged.
Drian thought that this mixture, this amalgam of a girl and an animal, suited her. The girl's skin and face, animal fur and animal horns were like small streams that joined into an elusive river. He was amazed at the way her views reflected her mood. In front of him, there was a creature who had no solid, defined shape. It was constantly rocking and swinging, like a tree branch, giving a different image of itself time and again.
Drian wasn't sure if the girl blushed a little as if responding to his persistent staring, but she certainly tried to continue the previous conversation topic. "Loko and Bobo say that what you paint becomes a reality. So if you draw strawberries, here, in the real world, the strawberries will appear in The Hideout! We will be able to eat them!" she squealed and stomped her feet in delight.
"I'm not sure that's how it goes," Drian said cautiously, but she was already too deep in her musings.
"River? Did you draw a river? That's amazing! Then ... it means we'll always have water in The Hideout!"
"I ... I didn't do it on purpose. It was as if something or someone suggested to me I should draw ..." Drian went on but saw that the girl didn't even listen to him.
It was too late. Her expression had already become childish and conspiratorial. She grabbed him by the arm. Drian shuddered at her touch, surprised by the smallness of her hand on his big palm.
"Let's try it out! Oh, can we?" the girl shouted with glee, piercing him with expecting glance.
" I ..." he didn't know what to say.
What if it doesn't work? That giggly, overexcited girl almost managed to convince him it would work.
"Do you know any other words besides 'I'," she mocked him. "Well, you said it's finished!"
"Yes, but ..." You know, people claim I can create Paintings that later become real to the extent that someone can enter them. But I don't know what to believe in. I don't know if that's possible. And there are so many questions in me. Why do The Shape Changers know so much about me? Why am I able to transform? Who is Malik? What is my father hiding from me?
Instead of the salvo of confused thoughts that flew through his head, Drian only nodded. "Fine. Let's go. You won."
"Yayyyyy!" she yelled and dragged him forward.
For a split second, Drian thought they would slam into the painting, fall onto the floor and laugh together at all this nonsense. But then he sensed a familiar trembling in his limbs.
The canvas before them vanished.
They now stood on the square of what seemed to be a spooky uninhabited city while the torches he recently drew glittered around them. Hundreds and hundreds of houses loomed in the distance, and there was a bridge in front of them. The river was running between two shores, unimpeded, hurrying who knows where.
"I have never ..." the girl said, letting go of his hand and rushing towards the water, "I have never seen a river in my life."
Drian was sitting on the ground, breathing heavily. I still can't believe what just happened. "Neither have I," he whispered back as if scared to speak louder. Their voices echoed in the empty space. Drian then turned around. The stone room they came from was still there. A velvet veil separated it from The Hideout. This is just like when I entered my first painting.
Drian pulled away from the smoke curtain and followed the girl. She was already lying on the river bank, dipping her feet in shallow water.
"Mmm ... This feels so nice on my skin. It's indescribable. This feeling that you can soak for a long, long time. Without the constant fear of wasting water, because someone else might use it for drinking ... It's so liberating."
Drian stood above her, disarmed by her enthusiasm. Then he remembered something and his forehead furrowed. "You know ... Maybe I should tell you this. When I entered my painting last, a pack of wolves attacked me. Perhaps this landscape contains some hidden dangers. I think it's best for us not to move too far from ... The Veil," Drian finally named the curtain. "In fact, let's return as soon as possible."
"Oh, what are you afraid of? If something does attack us, we will simply transform together and defeat whatever appears. After all, I wouldn't dream of leaving before I bathe," the girl said slyly.
Then she took off her apron. Down there, she was shining with the same flames that burned on her head. Drian felt the heat gather between his legs. A moment later, she was completely immersed in the river. Only her horns and her stubby little nose could be seen on the surface.
"Aren't you coming in? The water is great! You should have a bath too!" The girl wrinkled her nose and plugged it with her fingers as if telling him he stunk.
Drian shook his head, unable to remove the smile from his lips. Then he peeled off his shirt and trousers. He didn't know how he found himself beside her. The only thing he knew was that he could not bear the distance created between them when he was on land. Drian couldn't suppress the urge to approach her. He stood silently in the water next to the girl, not knowing what to say.
She broke the unpleasant silence with her chatter. "Shall we swim further down the river? Let's go and see where it leads! Do you think there is a whole new world out there, or is the drawing simply ending?"
Drian opened his mouth to say it wasn't wise when the girl changed her mind.
"Actually, no. We can explore it better when there are more of us Shape Changers. You're right. Just one short swim and we'll go back so that everyone can get some joyful news," she laughed. "I can't believe this worked. We'll have somewhere to escape to during The Second Water War. Whatever you did, well done, that was amazing!" the admiration was present in her voice.
Pride swelled in Drian like an enormous balloon that was threatening to burst.
"Wait," she blurted. "I want to get drunk as well!" Her tongue quickly swirled over the surface of the water as she lapped at it. The childlike expression on the girl's face turned from an elated one to frowning one. "Why, I don't feel a thing. The liquid didn't seem to reach my throat. I mean, we can swim in it, but I can't drink it. Now you try."
Drian's attempt had the same result. He didn't even know what the reason was.
"Eh. It doesn't matter. This only means we will occasionally go out and go to The Market Squares in small settlements as before," she said with a hint of disappointment. "But imagine how awesome it would be if it worked! There would be no motive for the Second Water War. You could simply paint enough water for everyone."
"Yes," Drian said with regret.
"Well, don't be sad. We still don't know anyone who can create a new world merely by painting it. You will help us somehow. It's better than nothing, right?" the antelope rammed Drian playfully with her horns and sank his head underwater as through a game.
Drian resurfaced snorting, spitting droplets, to which the girl bent over laughing.
"Now I'm starting to believe you can turn into a panther. You do look like a big cat when you hiss and cough like that." She came closer and stared into Drian's eyes. "Whoa. Your irises are so yellow." she noticed, fascinated.
"Yours constantly change colour," Drian said without thinking.
"Nobody had ever told me that before." She laughed as she stepped out of the water, shifting into human female once again.
The sight of her bare back was even more enticing, and the underwater occurrence beneath his waist urged Drian to remain in the river.
Already stepping out on the shore and seeing he wasn't following her, the girl returned and bumped Drian on the shoulder with her fist. "Aren't we leaving? That's what you wanted, wasn't it?" She glanced at his torso.
Her breasts bounced up and down, and Drian tried to look everywhere else but there. She has crimson horns, crimson nipples, crimson hair and crimson mound. The contrast between the flame and the paleness seemed incredibly attractive to him.
Her contagious laughter echoed around the abandoned hand-drawn city. "You can look. I don't mind. Have you never seen a woman's teats before? You mentioned that you had a Weller friend? Didn't you go down there among them to enjoy the charms of friendship?"
How can I tell her that I did? That I saw many female breasts but none of them were so attractive at first glance as hers?
"Wait," she laughed yet again as her breasts kept bouncing. "I know ... Maybe The Men of Cloth prohibit you to lie with a woman? Don't tell me that you never ... " She licked her index finger with an innocent, casual movement.
"There is no such rule," Drian mumbled to his chin. He didn't dare to look up at her.
"But you have never done it. Admit it!" She could not stop laughing.
For some reason, she seemed even more tempting. Even more desirable. "I suppose you have," Drian muttered, trying to get out of the uncomfortable situation. How did we get to this conversation topic, again?
"Oh, that's how it is with The Shape Changers. We mate early, sometimes even in the animal form," she stated matter-of-factly.
This sent a flurry of strange images towards Drian's head, and he somehow deflected them.
The girl came closer and took Drian by the hand. She pulled him to the shore and threw him on the ground with inhuman speed. "You're funny. Do you know that? Funny and clumsy. Prude Abbot." Then she skillfully leapt on top of him, just like she did while wearing the cheetah shape.
Drian's hands clasped her breasts, but she shook her head in an "uh-huh" movement and placed them on her buttocks instead. She slowly swayed up and down on top of him, letting him determine the rhythm with his palms, sighing sweetly, her eyes closed.
The only thing Drian could think of was that no shade of red and orange he had ever used in his paintings could compare with the crimson flame that was now steadily burning within him, and all around him. It made him combust, become ashes and be reborn again from them. Shortly afterwards, her satisfying cry swept out of her throat like a glorified roar of an animal in heat.
Drian felt that she was closing around his hardened flesh, announcing her ultimate delight. It didn't take him long to reach his own. For a few moments, they lay together in silence. Then she got up, took Drian by the hand, and they both stepped out of the drawing.
Drian wasn't even sure what had just transpired. He was grateful to her for not speaking much. I wonder what she is thinking about right now. Probably nothing. She said it so herself: The Shape Changers mate regularly. I won't read too much into this. Or, at least, she shouldn't see I am reading too much into this.
Right at that moment, the girl turned to him "I'm going to hunt. I've lost enough time already. Just so you know, I did you a favour."
Those words pricked Drian. He almost said: "I don't consider time spent with you time lost." In the end, he merely nodded.
"By the way, what's your name?" She said casually, putting apron back on again.
Drian was still at a loss for words, staring at her shamrock-green pupils and her perky breasts. "Drian," he whispered, wondering if he was telling the truth. Who was he, really? After this encounter with her, Drian no longer knew. She transformed him in a way. Woke him up to the point of unrecognizability.
"Drian? What a stupid name. It's neither here nor there. It's if someone cut off the starting letter. Adrian would be nicer, for example," She jabbed at him, but her green irises glittered.
This time, he knew she was joking. "And yours?" Drian heard himself asking.
"Damona," she threw the name at him as if throwing a bone to a dog. Then she turned into the cheetah and jumped out of the window from the first floor without looking back.
Drian instinctively got closer to the windowsill. He escorted the giant spotted cat shape with his yellow pupils until her body completely disappeared in the dust that accumulated behind her. She just left, and I already miss her.
The flap of wings shattered his silent musings and forced him to glance upwards. The familiar claws clenched his shoulder, and his lips widened in an involuntary smile. "I see you're back," Drian nodded, his mind still absent.
"I see you met The Velocious Carrot." Malik quipped, cleaning his feathers, not sparing Drian a glance.
Drian marvelled at what he just heard for a few seconds. Then he shook his head and announced, "The Hideout works. It's time to inform The Elders."
Then both the man and the bird headed outside.