The Primeval Era-Chapter 137: The First Night

<The First Night: A Child’s Memory>

Kato had seen his mother and father go to sleep.

They went to sleep under the hooves of beasts, their bodies disappearing beneath a tide of fur and muscle and thundering feet. He had screamed for them to wake up, but Uncle Mwenye grabbed his arm and Uncle Tafari lifted him onto his shoulders, and they ran. They ran until his throat was raw from crying and his uncles’ legs shook with exhaustion.

His parents did not follow.

The running lasted a very long time.

Kato did not know how many hours passed because the sun blurred when you couldn’t stop moving. He ate scraps that his uncles shared with him. He slept on Uncle Mwenye’s back while they walked through dark forests. He woke to see the same endless plains stretching toward horizons that never seemed to get closer.

Many others ran with them. Other children whose parents had gone to sleep. Other uncles and aunts carrying those too young or too injured to walk. They formed a long line of tired people moving toward something none of them could name.

And then the Ancestor descended from the skies.

He was brilliant.

Blue flames surrounded him, and a pretty lady with shining wings flew beside him. The Ancestor looked much younger than Kato’s parents had been, but his eyes held something old and knowing. He floated above them without any wings at all, blue flames flickering beneath his feet as he pointed toward the horizon.

He told them to go toward his home.

His voice was kind but strong, and when he spoke, everyone listened. Even Uncle Mwenye, who never listened to anyone, nodded and followed the direction the Ancestor had pointed. They walked for more hours after that, but somehow the walking felt easier. The Ancestor had given them a destination. The Ancestor had given them hope.

---

The home of the Ancestor was more wonderful than anything Kato had ever seen.

Walls of crimson and blue rose from the earth, pulsing with light that seemed alive. A mountain stood behind the tribe, massive and ancient, and coiled near the walls was a serpent so large that Kato couldn’t see where it began or ended. He should have been scared, but Uncle Tafari said the serpent was a friend, so he decided to believe that.

Then the Ancestor appeared again.

He came from the skies riding a beast of gold and blue flame, a creature with nine tails and wings of white-gold feathers and a crown of light floating above its head. The beast was larger than any hut Kato had ever seen, larger than the great halls the elders sometimes spoke of, larger than anything that should exist in the Lands.

The Ancestor flew down from the beast’s back, and the walls began to move.

Kato watched the walls reach out toward them like arms welcoming children home.

They stretched and grew and wrapped around all the tired people standing in the plains, pulling them inside a perimeter that expanded with each passing moment. When the walls closed behind them, Kato felt something change. Warmth radiated from the barrier, sinking into his exhausted body and making his legs stop aching. The tiredness didn’t disappear, but it became bearable. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝒆𝒘𝙚𝓫𝙣𝙤𝒗𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

He was inside now.

He was safe.

The old Witch Shaman appeared next.

She had sharp yellow teeth and eyes that seemed to see everything, and she carried a spear that glowed with the same colors as the walls. Her voice crackled like fire when she commanded the adults to start cutting trees and building huts. She pointed here and there, assigning tasks.

Uncle Mwenye and Uncle Tafari joined the work parties immediately.

They told Kato to stay close, to not wander off, to help carry small branches when he could. He did as they said, watching the adults transform raw forest near the mountain outside the tribe into the beginnings of homes. The sound of axes and the smell of fresh-cut wood filled the air as day slowly turned toward evening.

While he carried branches, Kato wondered about his parents.

Uncle Mwenye said they would not be walking with him in the Lands of Stone anymore. He said they had joined the Ancestors above, that they were watching over him from wherever Ancestors went after they stopped walking. Kato didn’t fully understand what that meant.

Would his mother and father be opening their eyes again as Ancestors?

Would they be able to see him from up there?

Would they know that he had made it to safety while they had gone to sleep?

He didn’t have answers. His uncles didn’t have answers either. But maybe answers would come later, when he was older, when the hurt in his chest didn’t feel quite so big.

---

As the sun descended, Kato grew far more curious about the Ancestor Tokoloshe.

He watched the massive golden-blue beast that the Ancestor had been riding fly across the sky toward a mountain. Not the large mountain already standing near the tribe, but another one. A mountain that seemed to have risen from the Lands of Stone just to give the Ancestor’s beast a place to rest.

Even mountains obeyed the Tokoloshe.

Kato decided that was very impressive.

The Ancestor himself remained in the tribe.

Kato saw him discussing many things with a powerful old warrior whose bones seemed made of something harder than stone. Their voices carried across the growing settlement, though Kato couldn’t hear the words. The pretty lady with the vibrant wings also talked with the Ancestor late into the evening, her expression serious and thoughtful.

Sometimes the Ancestor would wave his hand, and walls would grow, or huts would take shape faster than they should, or food would appear from storages that seemed too small to hold so much. Everything the Tokoloshe touched became easier.

Everything he looked at became safer.

When nighttime truly came, they didn’t hear the wild roars of beasts.

The sounds that had haunted Kato’s since his parents went down, those terrible thundering calls that promised death, were absent from this place. Instead, there was only the crackling of a large bonfire built at the center of the tribe, flames dancing orange and gold against the darkness.

They were given food.

Real food. Hot food. Food that tasted like something other than scraps eaten while running. Kato sat between his uncles and ate until his stomach felt full for the first time in days. Around him, everyone was so tired that relief was the only emotion left. Some cried softly. Some stared at the flames without seeing them.

Maybe their mothers and fathers had also joined the Ancestors, just like his.

It was okay.

Kato decided this while watching the Tokoloshe speak with the old Witch Shaman near the bonfire, the pretty winged lady standing nearby. The Ancestor looked tired too, but beneath that tiredness was something magisterial.

With the Ancestor Tokoloshe here, maybe everything would be okay.

He looked powerful enough.

Kato finished his food and leaned against Uncle Mwenye’s side, his eyes growing heavy as the warmth of the fire and the safety of the walls wrapped around him. For now, he thought he might be able to sleep without nightmares.

Tomorrow would bring more work and more questions and more sadness about what had been lost.

But tonight, he was safe.

Tonight, the Ancestor watched over them!