Hunters and Prey, Pride and Shame

The pain was sharp, deep. A biting pang that clutched his stomach, left his spare chest so tight each breath required a force of will. Bright lights, like when Worm slapped him hard, danced across his vision. The world was a distant red blur at the end of a long funnel. Each beat of his heart strove to close it off, squeeze shut any chance that more pain, more humiliation, more defilement would crush the feeble flame that was himself, that was the boy Drägorîsh . . . the maimed and blighted boy, Drägorîsh. It was wrong. It was unfair. Why did they hate him so?
Huddled amidst a circle of jeering playmates, Drägorîsh moaned. Even as the blows and kicks turned casual in their effort, finally stopping as his tormentors grew bored, the young boy yet cringed at every sound, every blurred gesture of the world beyond his sodden vision.
“Are you all right? Does it hurt much?” The voice was young, and a girl’s.

Drägorîsh blinked and dragged his gaze up, past a pair of dirty knees falling below a ragged blue tunic’s hem, to a pair of over-large, brown eyes, their almond curves now wide with concern. Her mouth was tight with the indignation of his plight.

“I saw how they teased and beat you. That was wrong. It happens to me too.” She reached up to pull long strands of pale blond hair back, revealing a shapeless nub where her left ear should be.
Drägorîsh’s right arm slid deeper into the folds of his stained and disheveled cloak, involuntarily hiding his own maimed wrist – a calloused stub just shy of where a hand should be.
“That was wrong,” the girl repeated to herself.

“Who . . . who are you?” Drägorîsh used his sleeve to wipe the stream of blood and snot from his upper lip. Wincing, he drew himself into a sitting position, his knees drawn up against his chest.

“I’m Pia. I’m a palace scullion. That way I eat well.” She smiled showing crooked, stained teeth. The contrast between the symmetry of her soft eyes against the ravaged smile only added to her expression of honest concern.

Under the girl’s scrutiny Drägorîsh carefully rose to his feet, wincing as his body’s slight weight settled upon his left ankle. Someone had landed a solid kick there. Standing before her, his eyes were level with the top of her head. Bits of food, or something, seemed to be attracting the cloud of gnats hovering about her like a gossamer halo. Still, what beauty the gods had spared her shown in her gaze.

“I . . . I thank you for your kindness.” Drägorîsh winced again against his faint smile’s pull on swollen lips. He turned his head and glared into the alley’s shadows which had swallowed his tormentors. “Someday . . . someday I’ll make them pay. Highborn fools.”

“And you’re not?” Pia’s eyes widened, taking in the quality of his cloak’s cloth, simple but fine. “Highborn, I mean.” She flushed and dropped her eyes.

Drägorîsh shook his head. “I’m an acolyte of Drä.”

If she questioned the truth of his claim – they were of an age after all – Pia kept it to herself. Palace servants learned early to school their faces, showing little or nothing of their thoughts.
Feeling suddenly uncomfortable in the strange company of this kitchen girl, Drägorîsh dipped his head and abruptly retreated towards the alley’s gloom – in the opposite direction taken by his unruly persecutors.

“What they did.” Pia’s voice floated in the air like a chime’s sweet note. “It was wrong.”