Chronicler's note: Before Thaelia was settled, the empty grasslands had been occupied by a sparse population of fierce feline predators that we now know to be highly intelligent and civilized. They roamed the immense, grassy plains in family groups called tikus, groups that rarely exceeded five in number: the parents and three singly-born young. Although predatory, the great beasts needed little food to survive because their systems used the food they ate so efficiently. As a result, they were not greatly feared by the other inhabitants of the plains and lived in reasonable harmony with the fleet footed chivas and placid burris. Over the long centuries, they occupied a necessary niche in the harmonious plains life.

The endless battle between the humans and thatz waged on, and in the intelligent animals grew a hatred of all things human. Lone travelers and even small groups of humans were discovered to be horribly mutilate, with an occasional carcass of a thatz discovered nearby to give evidence to the culprits. Organized hunts after such massacres only intensified the mutual hatred. The attacks and answering hunts continued, and the stories about the mutilations and cruelty of the thatz became legends which perpetuated the hatred." HISTORY OF THAELIA, Vol. VIII.)

~~~~~~~~~*

Karinna shivered in her sleep as the cool, evening breeze wafted across her face and caused the flesh to rise on her partially protected arms. She turned her face away from the breeze, and her nose twitched as something tickled it, causing her to awaken with a start. In the process, she knocked her ankle painfully against a small rock and cried out in agony. Not only bringing herself fully awake but rousing the sleeping cub as well. Karinna froze, and an involuntary whimper of sheer terror escaped from her throat as she stared at her surroundings.

On both sides of her and at her feet crouched a total of six huge, black, menacing thatz; and it was the fur of the seventh one laying by her side that had tickled her nose. She was further blocked in her attempt to move away by an eighth, lying just as close on her other side. Immobilized, surrounded, the crippled Karinna could only watch with mounting horror as one of the thatz, the largest of the group, rose to its full seven hand's height.

She was unprepared for the slight twitch at the back of her mind and the gentle voice that she seemed to hear in every part of her body. "You have nothing to fear, human. As you have done no harm and some good to our small brother, we will do not harm to you."

The sinking sun was rapidly throwing the small clearing into shadow, and Karinna was only able to make out the outlines of the thatz and their glowing eyes. Another puff of breeze made her shiver again, and the beasts on either side of her inched in even closer, causing her to whimper in fear again. The cub, which had jumped from her lap as she awoke, climbed back into it and up on her chest before curling up again and purring loudly. Her mind twitched again. "Have no fear, I say. You have too little fur, and we only seek to warm you. We would not harm one who brings aid to our small brother, even though they be human." Karinna's hand flew absently to stroke the tiny bundle of black fur on her chest as if in protection.

"We watched your actions. And although we do not understand your motives, we voted to come and offer aid in return." The two thatz at her sides rumbled softly, and the cub's purr became low and soft.

Karinna removed her left hand from its prison under the cub and massaged her temples. "I must be dreaming," she muttered to herself.

Again she felt the strange twitch in her mind. "If you are indeed understanding us, then you are definitely not dreaming." Karinna started. "We are quite real, and you are quite awake."

Karinna shook her head in disbelief and tried to pull her legs away from the furry hulks crouching at her feet. She only got so far before another jagged rock made her bite her lower lip to keep from crying out again. The pain, however, made her certain that she was indeed awake and not dreaming this outrageous event. The cub lifted its head from her chest, stopped purring, and gave a growling rumble with an uplifted tone at the end as if a question. Karinna petted it in reassurance. "Don't worry, Shima," the endearment came naturally and seemed a fitting name to give the cub, "it's just my ankle."

No sooner had she stopped speaking than two of the beasts instantly bent forward to sniff at the injured foot. Karinna scowled in thought as the thatz rumbled back and forth at each other. One of her eyebrows lifted as an idea occurred to her. "Mind-Speech?" she asked herself, unaware that she whispered the word at the same time.

Her mind twitched. "The human term for this is very descriptive. It requires special effort for our minds to reach out to yours. It is well that we now know for certain that we were successful and were understood, since we can understand your thoughts only when you speak them aloud." The huge beast at her feet laid its front paws down in a stretching action, and its mouth yawned widely. "This is indeed a momentous occasion, to have communicated with a human!" The other thatz rumbled in agreement.

Karinna warily relaxed slightly and decided to give the strange information a test. "You do not mean to hurt me then?" she asked quietly, speaking the words slowly and clearly.

"No indeed," came the gentle voice in her head. "We came only to observe and question."

Karinna looked from side to side and gazed at the two thatz. "Can you all understand me?" she asked. The thatz at her right shifted slightly, turned its great head to look her straight in the eye, and a different voice sounded in her head. "We all understand you, human; but it was for our leader Grrai to make the first attempt at contact."

Karinna frowned in confusion. "If that is so," she started slowly, "why did the cub not speak to me as well?" She scratched the cub behind the ears, and its purring grew a shade louder.

"His thought processes are simply not organized and developed well enough yet to converse with his own kind effectively, much less tackle the complicated task of communicating with a human," Grrai's gentle voice explained.

Karinna's stomach rattled noisily, reminding her that she had not eaten since long before dawn. Being careful so as not to dislodge the cub, she reached for the bundle of food that had been placed between her knees. As she unwrapped the loaf and cha, she remarked to the group surrounding her, "I'm afraid there is not much here; but if you are hungry, I am willing to share what I have." She waited, but not even the cub made a move for the proffered loaf in her hand.

"We do not hunger, human," said a third voice, "and we do not understand what “share” means either." The thatz to her left turned its head and focused its glowing eyes on Karinna's face. "This is what was meant by saying we come to observe and question," it continued. "Nourish yourself, by all means, and please explain “share.”"

Karinna chewed on a piece of bread thoughtfully and swallowed before beginning to speak. "Share means... well... to share, to give part of what you have to one who has none. You all," she gestured with the skin of cha, "share your body heat with me now and warm me with your fur because I have none. I offered to share my food with you because I see that you have none."

"What reward do you receive from this “sharing?” You do not answer Mwram's question," a fourth voice sounded in her mind. Karinna shook her head and swallowed quickly.

"The reward you receive is the satisfaction of knowing that you have helped someone in need. True sharing expects nothing more. After all," she paused a moment and looked around her, "what did you actually expect in return when you shared your warmth with me?"

"We were not sure what we could expect in return. But to continue the thought, you were sharing when you divided your food with our little brother?" Grrai's voice held a note of puzzlement.

"Exactly. By the looks of his mother I knew he probably would need food." Karinna took a final sip of cha and broke one more piece from her loaf before tying her bundle together again. She then gazed into the darkness at the spot where she knew the body of the dead mother thatz lay. "What will happen to the cub now that its mother is dead?"

Grrai's answer bore no hint of emotion. "His tiku - his family unit - is dead and, although some of our actions can be described as “sharing,” our traditions do not provide for the care of orphans. He will most likely die of starvation and exposure unless he can care for himself at this young an age." The glowing eyes narrowed in the darkness, and Karinna could almost see the wide yawn. "It is the Law that assures the survival of only the strongest of our species."

Karinna threw her arms around the cub protectively and cried, "Why do you warm me; if you are going to leave him to die when our conversation is finished, I suppose you will do the same to me? Why not just tear me to pieces now, like you usually do to travelers you catch alone?"

The third voice, which had been identified as Mwram's, interrupted her tirade with even-toned reason. "In the first place, we cannot break age-old traditions without good cause. If the mother was injured or sickened and died, there must have been a weakness in her and any dependent young; we must not allow that weakness to spread any further into the bloodlines. We do not seek out travelers for sport, as most humans do us. The land is large, and we would willingly live peacefully with humans if humans would live peacefully with us. And finally, why do you concern yourself with the welfare of a cub who could have been your killer had he but been a little older?"

"I am a Healer among my people," Karinna choked out. "The traditions I follow do not allow me to let anything helpless or sick die slowly when there is no reason." She relaxed her hold on the cub and sniffled.

A fifth voice, deep and resonant, said, "I am called Vrrow, and I do not understand. Your inaction for your own benefit makes no sense. If you are a Healer among your people, why do you not then heal yourself and rid yourself of the pain which troubles you?"

Karinna lowered her head. "For the same reason you cannot care for your “small brother,” Vrrow. A Healer is bound by the Laws of her Gift, and must use that Gift only to serve others and never herself. Besides which, it is impossible to be objective when examining oneself, and it is possible that greater injury could happen. Finally, by the Laws of my profession, once a Healer uses the Gift on herself, she loses the ability to focus that energy outward and so loses the Gift forever." Then Karinna raised her head and her eyes flashed angrily. "Since I will die here, I will, however, care for your “small brother” to the best of my ability; even more especially because you will not!"

The thatz all about her began rumbling and growling in the direction of their leader, who shifted nervously in the moonlight. Karinna felt at the back of her mind the now-familiar twitch. Grrai's voice sounded disturbed. "Your words open to us a new way of seeing, and your intent causes us much confusion. We must discuss this among ourselves - this concept of caring for others that humans seem to value so highly. We will speak of these things again, human."

"I'm not going anywhere," Karinna stated tiredly and without emotion, "and my name is Karinna, not 'human."

"Rest then, Karinna. We do not leave you to die yet."

~~~~~~~~~*

As the evening deepened into night, Karinna would rouse from her fitful sleep to relieve the dull aching in her muscles which had stayed too long in just one position. At one point, she noticed that all but the four thatz involved in keeping her warm had disappeared into the shadows cast by the light of the two moons, and the four remaining animals seemed to be asleep. Since there was nothing else to do other than wait, Karinna closed her eyes and fell rapidly back into her disturbed sleep. After many more such awakenings, she awoke fully in the dim green shade of dawn to the sight of not only the original eight thatz sitting around her but several others further back. Grrai's voice sounded in her mind. "You seem more rested now."

"I've slept better," she admitted as she sat up straighter and ignored the slight jab of pain. "You were gone a long time."

"The discussions I spoke of were long and complicated; your ideas and attitudes were difficult to explain." The huge head turned briefly in the direction of the beasts behind him. "Some decided to return with us to hear your words for themselves and to question further."

"More questions?" Karinna thought with a touch of annoyance. Aloud, she asked, "What do you wish to know now?"

"You must realized that you are the first opportunity we have had to communicate with one of your race," stated a new, deeper and richer-toned voice. From the distant group rose the hugest thatz Karinna had seen so far. As it approached her, Karinna could see that its muzzle was silver, and its eyes glowed slightly dimmer than did those of the others. "I am Wrrowya, human-called-Karinna, and am judged the wisest of the group gathered here. In order for our race to survive, I must learn and understand the actions of your brother humans."

"As I told Grrai last night," Karinna replied, "I am obviously not going anywhere. I will try to answer your questions, as there is little else I am able to do at the moment."

"Why does your kind hunt mine?"

"I could ask the same question of you," she shot back, startled. "As children, we all hear of how travelers have been brutally killed by your kind." She thought for a moment. "We fear you because of this, and any animal who has been hurt or is badly frightened will fight back."

"The humans who hunt us are not injured," the deep voice insisted. "They are healthy humans who come to our hunting grounds with the sole purpose of killing at least one of the circle."

"True," Karinna admitted, "the hunters have not been physically injured. But a traveler, even a lone one, usually has a family or group of friends who are hurt by your killing him." She placed her hand on the sleeping cub on her chest. "Was not this small brother of yours hurt by the death of his mother?"

"Death comes whenever it wills and by any means it chooses. It is an absolute fact that we all must accept

both we of the circle and you humans. How can you justify more death with pointing out a previous one? Death justifying death is unreasonable."

"Humans feel a traditional obligation to a dead person's family, and that tradition in this case requires the survivors to hunt down and destroy the cause of the death, be that cause human or otherwise. This way we hope to prevent other deaths."

"What do you mean by “obligation?” Is it like your “sharing?”"

"No, of course not!" Karinna ran her hand over her face as if that would help her clear her thoughts. "An obligation is something that must be done, is expected and hardly ever questioned. It can be a result of sharing, but in this particular case it is not. It is something that the society expects and very often the person who has been harmed desires."

"I do not understand. This sounds like a situation that arises in your kind frequently. Do humans then also kill other humans?"

Karinna sighed. "Unfortunately, yes."

"In that case, if one human kills another, then is it an “obligation” that the human-killer be hunted and killed?"

"Exactly, if at all possible. Needless death must be avoided at all costs, and letting a known killer run free only invites more killings."

"Then the reasons behind these hunts, barbaric and shameful as they are from our point of view, are now understandable. Humans kill us because we have killed humans. And yet, if the truth be known, we kill only to protect ourselves when attacked."

"I'm sure that's what many of the travelers thought they were doing too." Karinna looked the immense thatz directly in his glowing eyes. "Remember, they had been raised to fear your race from the very start."

Wrrowya turned and growled for a few moments at his fellow thatz, and then turned back to the girl. "Then the problem is a circle that must eventually end with either our small numbers being killed off by your kind, or your large numbers being killed off by us. If humans fear us because we fear you because you kill us because you kill our kind, there is no end until one of our species is eliminated completely."

Karinna shook her head while the cyclical words were straightened out and understood, and then she returned her attention to Wrrowya. "Then the circle must be broken. You must stop killing humans."

There was a long silence, then the entire group began rumbling at each other. Finally, when the noise had subsided, Wrrowya said slowly, "That would solve nothing."

Karinna leaned forward, mindless of the cub that tumbled from her chest with an astonished yelp. "If your numbers are truly as small as you maintain, then the cycle of killings must stop, or your species will not survive; this much I understand. The problem you see as a circle must be broken somewhere." She absently comforted the disgruntled cub, which then began sniffing in the direction of the food bundle.

"Your thoughts are idealistic, Karinna. Humans will still fear and attack us, whether we do or not." The girl nodded as she quickly untied the bundle, tore a small piece from the loaf and gave it to the cub.

"In all honesty, I have to admit that there are some humans who truly enjoy killing and find hunting thatz a suitable outlet for their violence. They would be the ones who would be hard to convince that their actions only continue the violence. But certainly, if word could get out to the human leaders that the thatz would stop killing if the hunts were to cease would help your cause." "A tree does not grow from a seed overnight, and neither will the fear humans bear toward us disappear overnight."

Karinna took a small sip of cha to wash down the meager mouthful of bread she had allowed herself. "Were I but able to bear your words to my people, perhaps I could convince some of them to the truth of what I say and bring your problem closer to a solution. But as it is..."

"I doubt your words would be heeded, much less believed, Karinna, as much as I have come to respect the spirit in which you make the offer. Do not be offended, I do not mean that I doubt that your would do as you say. However, I do doubt the reception your words would receive."

Karinna shrugged. "The question is academic, because I can't go anywhere as it is. My life, like that of your small brother and his mother, ends here in this clearing; any good that might come of your message being heard will die with me and never be known to anyone."

"Unless . . ." Wrrowya's voice trailed off as the rest of the thatz began rumbling in a questioning tone at him. He rumbled and growled back at them, and then returned his attention to Karinna. "Do you think that if one of us were to go with you to your people, your words would be given any more consideration?"

Karinna frowned. "What do you mean?"

"Humans kill us because they fear we will kill them first, is this not so?" At Karinna's answering nod, Wrrowya continued, "Then, if other humans could learn from first-hand experience that we are not only intelligent beings but that we have no desire to kill, it would make a difference?"

Karinna fed the final morsel of bread to the cub. "I cannot promise anything for anyone else besides myself; but perhaps, just perhaps, it might make a difference. Which of you would be willing to come with me into the world of humans?"

Wrrowya made a coughing sound that gave the distinct impression of a chuckle, and his voice in her mind sounded lighter and almost pleased with itself. "The individual I have in mind would solve the other problem that is of such concern to you. The cub you just fed needs a home and care that his own kind cannot provide if he is to survive. He would be the ideal choice, since he is already loyal to you for having fed him."

Karinna tied the rest of the meager bundle of food up again. "I would be more than willing to take the cub with me, but I still cannot go anywhere with my ankle as it is. How do you suggest I travel?"

Wrrowya turned and rumbled a question to the rest of the assembled thatz. After a lengthy discussion, the rumbling ceased and Wrrowya's silvered face and glowing eyes were again turned on her. Karinna folded her hands in her lap expectantly.

"It is the consensus of the group that you be given the opportunity to return to your people with the cub, and perhaps convince your leaders of our wish to end the killing. To do that, however, requires us to break with our ages-old tradition of allowing Life to follow its own path."

"I don't understand."

Wrrowya's voice was even and unemotional. "You must be healed and aided on your journey until you meet with other humans."

It took several moments before the import of his words had reached Karinna's mind. Her mouth dropped open, and she gaped in surprise. "Heal me?" she stared unblinkingly into the glowing eyes before her. "You can do that?"

Grrai's voice commented softly. "We have the ability, yes. But you cannot imagine what a serious break with our own Laws such an act constitutes. Only the question of the survival of our species could possibly justify our decision."

As Grrai finished speaking, the whole group of thatz came forward to form a solid wall around Karinna. Even the cub, small as he was, clambered off her chest and positioned himself in like manner between two huge adults. Karinna could not look in any directions and see anything but glowing eyes. Her cheek was brushed by the softest of breezes, which grew stronger and stronger as each moment passed, until the wind whistled around her violently. The dust rising in the wind soon obscured everything but the line of glowing eyes. Karinna clutched her cap tightly in order to prevent it from being ripped from her head in the gale. Impossibly, the wind grew stronger until she had to tuck her head under her arm to protect her eyes from the driving, stinging dust. The roaring in her ears made it impossible to hear even her own thoughts. The naked force of the still-rising wind began rocking her back and forth, as if trying to carry her up and into the spiraling maelstrom of dust and leaves above her.

Stronger and stronger the wind blew; louder and louder it roared. All sensations were driven away until Karinna felt herself to be almost a part of the insanity of the wind. She finally threw her head back and screamed in terror, and the wind selfishly snatched the sound away at its source so that Karinna didn't know if she had made any sound at all. Even through her tightly-closed eyelids she was blinded by a tremendous burst of light the echoed like an electric shock through her entire body and made each extremity tingle.

Immediately the wind died away as if it had never been there in the first place. "STAND!" Her mind winced back at the intensity of the command. It was then that she realized that her ankle no longer throbbed.

Karinna's eyes popped wide open and focused on her ankle, which was no longer swollen, but had regained its normal size and shape. Experimentally, she wriggled her toes, but with no pain.

"STAND!!" came the command again, and Karinna rolled onto her knees puppet-like, anticipating agony and almost missing its absence. She placed her good foot under her and pushed herself almost erect, barely managing to retain her balance by catching herself with the foot that she wanted to favor. She stared down at her two feet planted firmly and painlessly on the ground, and then she took a few steps within the circle of thatz. Unable to put her thoughts into words, she gazed around the circle with brimming eyes.

"There are many hours of light left in this circle of the sun," Wrrowya's voice inserted itself quietly into the tumble of Karinna's thoughts. "You have strayed far from the human path through the forest. We will take you as far as we dare without being seen. From that point on, you and our small brother will walk a separate path from that of the circle." Silently the circle of thatz disintegrated; several individuals, including the cub, walked over to the corpse of the dead mother thatz. The adults each took hold of the mother's hide in their mouths and pulled her laboriously back into the den, the cub watching silently.

From the mouth of the den came a puff of dust that signaled a cave-in somewhere inside, and through the cloud appeared the adults. The cub opened its mouth and gave voice to a keening whine that made shivers run up and down Karinna's spine. His mourning complete, the cub came back and rubbed up against Karinna's leg. As if of one mind, girl and thatz turned to climb the embankment and find the human road.

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