Sanguine

Monument to the Fallen, October

As the month waned, they gathered in circles, the circles rotating widdershins around the monument, sentries posted, security as heavy as refugees could make it. There’d not been a huge massacre of their kind in years, and some of the younger ones couldn’t remember one in their lifetime, but their lives were so long that many recalled the original Twofold War, the fear and desperation that drove them from their homes through the strange holes in the fabric of reality and into the arms of another war and near-annihilation. They had only wanted to survive; women and children, instead, were killed for being too different, not human enough. They gathered here to worship and pray to Corellen Larenthein, their private worship while publicly many of them paid homage to the Human god Pelor. Today, the center of their ritual was their Daughter, Tessla, who was attending Pelor School for yet another year; she waited for the Full Moon before having yet another Blessing ritual, designed to protect her from human influences.
Skirts twirled, though many were shabby and torn; voices raised in prayer, though many were weak or ill. So many, too many, had died in the past year alone: died of sickness, lacking knowledge of the region’s plants; died of burning for the crimes of practicing their magical gifts where others could see; died of stoning for the crime of loving a human man or woman. Protection, then, would be given to any child of Corellen who left the Fold and entered the society of the humans; protection against not only their violent crimes against the Elven people, but also against their violent and hateful mindset. It was sad when one of their number was killed; sadder still was when one of the gentle, earthly, fragile creatures took up human weapons for the sake of destroying the rest of their people. It happened, though; most often with half-elves, but it happened.
The recanting began – the eldest among them remembered clearly that day, five hundred years prior, when they realized that the war against the Drow was lost, that there was no hope of survival. The Drow had risen against the prevailing society, destroying much of the elven architecture and intent on destroying their way of life as well. The fear with which they had huddled inside their ornate houses, the feeling that they could not trust their own generals to protect them, had given way when a few scouts, thought lost to Drow raids, had returned bearing remarkable news: Corellen had given them a way out! A hole had opened up, and through that hole was another world – a world in which there were no Elves, only a funny, tall, squat creature called Humans. Of course, they had since learned of the existence of other races, and in some of the Fey they had found what seemed to be distant kin, but at the time there were high hopes – certainly nothing could be as bad as facing the imminent invasion of the bloodthirsty Drow?
They were wrong. The humans, fearful of their lives, had deemed the masses of families a threat, and declared war upon them, slaughtering most of them and scattering those who remained. There was hope that in surrounding countries some of their kin had found solace and peaceful lives, but there was rarely if ever any word, and many had chosen to stay put. Like their distant kin the Fey, they had taken to an existence in the woods, living mostly in and around large trees, hiding from the humans and their settled villages. The elves had one thing going for them – almost infinite adaptability. Entire civilizations had been formed underwater as elves by the seashore developed the ability to breathe water – within a generation, they had mutated into a totally different subspecies. In these chaotic times, there existed elves who had gone through multiple changes, even developed whole new subspecies, as the humans called it. The high Elves, the Grey Elves, the Wild Elves, the Wood Elves, even the Dark Elves, or Drow, though they hesitated to admit it and did all they could to avoid that particular mutation. It was too painful a reminder after the Twofold War.
The Elves never did understand the savagery of the humans. After all, not only did they torture the foreigners to death for the “blasphemy” of possessing their magical gifts, they also burned their own people alive for the same crime – or even for suspicion of the crime, even when there was no proof. Magic was a force of Nature – why on earth would they reject it so utterly as to kill those who had been blessed by it? Their priests were the only ones allowed to perform miracles – was their god really so jealous as to punish his own followers for their natural talents? Many of the elves who lacked talent could pass for human if they were careful, and with the assistance of magical items, this became easier; still others, however, refused to try at all, refusing to associate with the barbaric humans and their primitive, backwards customs.
Tessla, however, was the pride and joy of her tribe, the Grey Elves. She was clever and nimble, and made good marks in her classes, yet hadn’t incurred the wrath of flaming mobs yet – she stood a good chance of passing in human society, and perhaps could be an inspiration for the younger girls of the tribe. She was studying to develop her natural Talents, which came to her through Corellen’s will; furthermore, she didn’t take nonsense from anyone, holding fast to the doctrines her tribe had taught her. She was, in a sense, the perfect specimen, bringing credit and favor to her tribe.
After the ceremony, she mounted up on her horse, riding out under the moonlight. She enjoyed the nighttime, the feel of moonlight on her delicate skin, the warmth of the horse beneath her thighs, as she rode, bareback and man style, towards the school. With any luck she’d be back before they missed her – and in time for the morning’s exercises, in which she could get a better view of the cute female butts that teased her. Not that she’d ever admit it, or let it throw her off; no, it was merely that human men were far, far beneath her, and the women were, in any event, better formed, with the curves being smoother and the lines more pleasing to the eye. She’d never understand what they saw in human men, with their thick hair in unsightly places and their overdeveloped muscles. Not to mention their unsightly genitals – no elven male would be so large and aggressively shaped. It didn’t suit them.
Still, it’d be nice to get some action. Mortals were not made to be celibate, any more than wolves or felines were. Eventually, the need to procreate arose. It was nothing to be ashamed of, not like the humans painted it, but it would be nice to have someone with whom to alleviate the urges. Perhaps it was time to do some research into the human courtship rituals and mating patterns. Perhaps one of the smaller, thinner human females, the ones who more closely resembled her people, would not disgrace her too much if she attempted to court. After all, she would not taint the bloodline of her people by procreating with a human male; she merely wished to alleviate her passions and loneliness for a time, that was all. Surely her people would understand.
By dawn, she had arrived at the temple, returning the borrowed horse to the stables, pausing to groom, feed, and water the animal, whispering thanks to it for giving its body to her for her use for the evening. She patted the horse’s neck and fed it a little sugar before moving inside, bypassing the cafeteria – they had never understood her religious dietary restrictions, and she had tired of fighting them about it. She would be alright on little sleep – her classes were not so demanding that she could not easily catch up within a few days, and on that Pelorsday she knew her classes would be especially light, given that they were expected to gather in the temple. She refused to attend, as she always had, and they gave her leeway – she was one of the best students in the academic classes, after all, and that granted her a number of favors above and beyond what other students were allowed. Still, she wasn’t protected from the stares and whispers that followed her as she passed in the hallway, headed for the library; she ignored them by sheer force of will. She knew who and what she was, which was more than she could say for any of them. What did it matter that they stared? Let them stare. Some day they’d stare at her with envy instead of hatred in their eyes.