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“Why would she need to impart anything to us, when we can all see it with our own two eyes?!” snapped the scratched sister.

“You don't belong here.” said the elder sister. “Get out.”

Hijil squeezed Bhima's hand, not wanting to look up for fear she would begin to cry, that the tears would tumble from her eyes, as unstoppable as any Jahuar rain. Not here. she thought, Not in front of them.

It had not been a mistake to follow Bhima here, but Hijil could feel the Alkidike's presence as a terrible, suffocating pressure. It felt like a storm, that electric tension in the air that came before something worse. It felt exactly like when her mother had been in her mood, a memory that returned with surprising clarity, though it had been over a decade since she had been forced to flee into the forest. It was not a pleasant memory, and it made the oppressive disdain – even of the few Alkidikes that had torn their home apart – feel all the worse. She had been right to come. She didn't want to be there anymore.

”Lets... go home.” she whispered.

Hijil leaned against Bhima, holding her like the anchoring force that she was. The Alkidike's jeer's would have hurt her more if she had been able to hear them over the intertwined beating of their hearts.

She held herself close to Bhima.

”Please...” she whispered.

Yes, they had done nothing. But sometimes nothing was enough, wasn't it?

Wasn't it...

Memories of wariness returned, and her mother's unpredictable storms. The glares of the Alkidikes were like the heat of an oven- all around. It was as if they knew what she had done to her own mother. Was she doing that, now, to theirs? She had done nothing.

Nothing is enough

No. That was ridiculous. Hijil hid in Bhima's arms and closed her eyes. She had done nothing to their goddess. She had done nothing to their mother. This sickness was not her fault, though she kept feeling that it somehow was. They did not know what she had done. In fact, even the friends among the crowd barely knew her.

She knew there was no convincing Bhima to go. Bhima would not let go of the issue. If Hijil left, she would have to do so herself, and Hijil was not going to do that. Not now.

“It has everything to do with you, Bhima!” It was a friend, an alkidike whose face was creased with anger and – perhaps – something akin to betrayal as she watched the couple, “Everything! How can you be so blind?!” Tensions were rising, and there was a glitter of weapons in the crowd. A few Alkidikes – especially those with children – began to back away, heading for the relative safety of the outskirts as the inner circle of the crowd began to boil with murmurs and activity.

“All right.” a greying-haired elder stepped through the crowd, standing squarely in front of the group of Alkidikes, “That's enough.” She turned to face them, her spear displayed prominently with its decorations, though she was likely to old to use it effectively, “All of you, disperse - back to your homes, or to whatever you were doing.”

There were protests from the crowd, although many seemed willing to take the advice.
“But they...”

“But...”

“They...”

“Enough.” the elder made a sweeping gesture, “You have made your points. Now go back to what you were doing.” she glared at certain Alkidikes in particular, “We will not react more than we have already.”

“But they are poisoning Aisha...”

“And she is your sister.” countered the elder, “So you will go no further.” She stood there, watching the crowd until, with much grumbling and agitation, they began to leave – the offending group notably staying together as they left, and glaring behind them at the couple.

Soon, it was just the Elder, Bhima, Hijil, and a few other Alkidike who, pointedly did not even look at them curiously...

The elder looked at them, her disapproval masked behind her official sensibilities. She knew better than her emotions. She knew her responsibility was to all of her sisters – even the halfbreeds. In her mind, she knew Bhima was right. In her heart, she 'knew' the other sisters were 'right' in their way. But she could not condone their methods, or battle in her town's streets. Sister, she felt, should not turn against sister, no matter how far removed they were.

So she held back her disapproval, her training and her maturity keeping it from being overt on her face. “You are no threat.” she said, placating. And she knew it, too. “Our sisters are worried about Aisha's illness, and they seek out threats.”

Hijil peered out at the elder, suspicious and wary. She was grateful, though, for the crowd's dispersal, the pressure around her easing to a level she could handle. For a while.

“I am... not a threat.” she said quietly, and would have said more if her voice had not frozen in her throat. “I'm not.” she whispered.

The Elder regarded her quietly. Honestly, she also agreed with the shifter. This pair kept to themselves, sold beads, and occasionally – she heard – babysat. Of the hybrid pairs in the town, these two were the least harmful.

But the Elder had a whole town to think about, a town brimming with tension. “It may be best if the two of you did not come to town for a while. Let our sisters cool their heads. When Aisha is back to health, it should be...” safe “better.”

“I didn't say you were” the Elder said diplomatically. Frankly, though, she knew that the tensions would never recede completely. It would be best if the hybrid pairs left for good. But such a fate was not something that the Elder would force onto someone who had done nothing wrong. Hybrid pairs, and their children, were not criminals. And she knew it. “And I won't force you to stay out of the town for any length of time. I can only hope that your reason will guide you well.” She turned away, “I am sorry for what happened to your home...” she hesitated, “But I must now attend to other business.” she gave them an Alkidike salute before moving on with purpose, leaving them to make their own decisions. She hoped they would choose the right one.

Hijil watched the Elder leave, nuzzled against the safety of Bhima. What the elder said made perfect sense, but Hijil had already been ready to flee and hide. It was what she did for so long, and a hard habit to break.

”We should go...” she whispered, leaning against Bhima.

And it was quite a mess indeed. Despite the basic cleanup that the two had undertaken when they had first found it, much needed to be done. The offending Alkidikes had been more motivated than thorough, but there were still far too many small things hidden in the underbrush, too much of their life strewn in the trees.

Few things were actually broken, and what had cracked or been damage in its impromptu exit from its rightful place in their home could easily be repaired. Repair would come later. Retrieval came first, than organizing. Turning their home rightside-in was a welcome task after the ordeal down in the town. It gave Hijils hands something to do, and her head and heart a chance to calm down.

They had finally cleaned up enough that they could go about some of their normal routines, such as feeding and grooming the kinfa, whose long and lustrous feathers needed care after their ordeal – and in general, as they molted and grew.

An idea, sparked by the hostility of the Alkidikes, bothered her throughout. Finally, she knew she had to ask. ”Bhima?” Hijil looked up from the squabbling, feathered chicks, ”What if they were... a little bit... right?”

”But what if... maybe I did something? Said something? Had a... a thought... about...” Hijil hesitated. ”I just don't want there to be any way I could hurt your mother.” too. ”I wouldn't want to do that to you. Or to her.”

Her. She meant Aisha, of course, but it suddenly occurred to her that her thoughts, her fantasy, could hurt Chike too in a different way. She gathered up the kinfa onto her lap, enduring their protests as she hugged them briefly before letting them go. They preened irately, as if she had ruined their growing feathers, but she knew that they secretly liked the contact. So did she.

She reached for Bhima's hand, her lip trembling slightly. ”So, I know you're sure.” and Bhima had turned certainty into an art form. And was usually right. ”I just want to be sure too.”

”I remember... Lassarra.” Hijil remembered Bhima talking about her, long ago. She didn't forget much from their early time together, simply because those memories had always been preferable to the other ones, the ones her mother had made. ”That was her name, wasn't it?”

Bhima made sense. She made so much sense. Surely, nobody, not even a tree, would choose to do something that made her sick. Even medicine made one feel better in the end – a plant that upset the stomach was taken when a far worse poison lingered in the stomach, and plants that made one sweat also cooled a fever...

Hijil's mind was not logical, but it was reasonable, and as she turned this idea over in her head, it began to make more sense than the anger of the alkidikes... so much more sense.

She moved closer to Bhima, leaning against her. ”Then maybe its the other way around.” she said, softly, questingly, after a moment of hesitation, ”If she's never chosen to make so many hybrids before...” which was an odd thing to say, but it was an odd idea overall, one that Hijil wasn't sure about yet. ”Maybe she is sick because of something else, and hybrids are a way to cure her...?” The other idea – that it was her fault, that she had done this to Aisha – still lingered, waiting in the wings in case her other idea remained unconfirmed.