The Encounter (Partially Non-Cannon)
So far the Baqnor(move from youth) had been treating Yanga well. She had passed the first three tests presented to her with flying colors and she was looking forward to an easy hunt across The Preserve. She settled the kâbo veltin(knife), rope and water flask on her person and when it was time for her head out she did. It took about three hours to pick up on the trail of her chosen prey. Another three almost uneventful hours later and she knew she was getting closer, the tracks and other signs pointing to her getting closer and closer. She began to slow down, pulling her kâbo veltin free and flexing her fingers around the hilt. Her ears stood tall, tail low and swaying slightly in anticipation.
She probably should have gotten nervous the instant she spotted the enormous, strange looking print that suddenly covered the tracks of the feline species she'd been tracking already. It looked almost canine in nature and she couldn't ever remember reading about something /that/ big being in The Preserve. With a shake of her head she passed it off as a fluke and continued onward without seeing any more of the big tracks. Yanga finally got good sign that she was getting even closer, pausing to inspect a freshly clawed tree, and continuing on quietly.
When she finally caught the flash of striped and spotted fur through the dense brush she slowed even more, senses alert, tail down. Creeping along in more or less a crouch in order to fully use the available cover, she got closer and closer. Ten dâya, nine, eight, pause and hold. Seven, six, slow down it's looking around. Five, fou- SNAP! Almost too late she realized her mistake. The female big cat turned and took off, the larger male with her charging Yanga from off to the qaktoro's right and catching her tail in his huge mouth as she attempted to leap away. She screamed and blindly took a swipe at the cat's face, getting him to release her but not without leaving her tail more or less hanging on by a few strips of skin.
Falling over on her backside she took her tail in hand, holding tightly just above where it had been bitten to keep it from bleeding out too badly and scrambling backwards. She didn't get too far before a dark shadow shot over her head, out sizing the male feline by far. Sharp teeth snapped down, easily crushing the skull of the great cat in it's jaws. Darker than the voids among the stars, back lit a brilliant purple with matching eyes, the enormous canine looking creature most absolutely definitely wasn't supposed to be here and yet here it was. She could only stare, open mouthed, as the dâ dâya (roughly 12 feet) tall creature turned on her, blood painting it's muzzle and eyes seeming to stare into her very core. '
Get Up!' Something spoke to her, but not out loud, and she only too hastily obliged, only just barely staggering one way and then the other to avoid the rather regal looking cream, gold and silver colored and blue-grey and white colored canines of smaller size but absolutely same species that had shown up.
She turned around, watching the trio of creatures. They were true predators, bigger than anything she'd ever encountered, and she suddenly felt very small, very insignificant. The cream one, glowing golden beneath it's fur, approached, nose sniffing at her tail and after a long moment the cream and the black flickered and rippled, the bioluminescent light beneath their coats shimmering in mesmerizing patterns. They were talking, she caught on after a short moment, talking about her? Maybe. She gently bit down on her tongue, her ears folding back and her tail forgotten for the long moment it took for the pair of creatures to come to some sort of conclusion. The cream one looked her in the eye, golden glowing eyes reminding Yanga of the sun. '
Go. Now.' More weird words in her head, understandable, familiar yet different from the first. She turned and obliged.
Gripping her tail tightly she sprinted until she couldn't and loped from there until she was forced to stop. Panting hard and now out in the open she stopped to suck down some water. The end of her tail she cut free with a whimper, it was a loss anyway. She tore up part of her umatli (kilt) and wrapped the stump of her tail as tightly and securely as she could and doggedly headed for the far side of The Preserve. She was hungry, dehydrated, exhausted, bloody, weak and without evidence of a successful hunt by the time she reached where she needed to be. She just barely managed to keep her head up and her eyes open as she was meet by the wapoin'aka (doctor) and wapoin'as (tenders) waiting there for her. The look in the eyes of her twin's, otherwise impassive, face threatened to cause her to break down in tears. She'd failed. Failed her family, her house, the clan and most importantly her twin.
She didn't remember collapsing into Alpin's arms, but she did remember waking up at one time or another, babbling about what she'd seen and after an extensive search of The Preserve and no evidence of the glowing canines were found it was put up to her being delirious from blood loss and pain. "Do not speak of this again. Please tia âtoma?" Alpin would beg her when she was more lucid, his fear showing through in that quiet and private moment together. Yanga acquiesced, stowing the memory away, changing her story to something slightly more believable. She might be given another chance when her tail healed for there was one test left, that of endurance, and she intended to make up for her failure in The Preserve, determined to prove she was still just as capable as any Qaktoro.