Anwar's Saga

Bayu and Dackla gently swept back the door covering and peered inside a small room. They saw their son, Anwar sleeping peacefully and gently slid the hide back into place, smiling.

"Just a few more days and he will begin the Choosing, my Love," Bayu said quietly, sliding his arm around his wife's narrow waist. He looked deeply into her dark eyes and held his shoulders proudly.

"I know," Dackla replied. "It seems like only yesterday he was born, and now he will become a man." She ran her hand over his bald and tattooed head lovingly.

"Mother's regret, my Love?"

"Yes. He is our only child. And soon, he will not need his Mother."

Bayu stroked her long dark hair back from her face. It was rare for him to see her with her hair flowing loose outside of their shared chamber, and he was quite enjoying it.

Dackla smiled at him and let him enjoy the experience just a moment longer. Then she pulled a long thing bone from her pouch and wrapped her hair up with expert skill. "Wouldn't want to cause a stir."

"Scandal is not something our family needs right now, but I always look forward to the private moments when you may be free with me, my Love."

"As do I, Husband. AS do I."

Bayu and Dackla moved through the corridor to the combined common area and cook station of their home. She spooned out two bowls of stew and took a chunk of flatbread to the eating hides. She sat beside Bayu and handed him his bowl. As he began to eat, she tore the flatbread in half and presented him with a piece. They say in reverent silence as they ate their morning repast and watched the rest of their family, hard at work processing last night's kill.

Bayu had once been a fierce hunter. In his prime, he was revered almost as much as Anwar was. Though his age wasn't such that he would have typically been retired from active hunting, an accident had robbed him of that privilege some five cycles ago. His left arm had been irreparably damaged, and he could no longer use most weapons with any degree of real competence. His sole job now was to train the young to do it instead.

Dackla had a reasonably simple existence as Bayu's wife. Her only real role was to help Bayu's Mother with cooking and cleaning chores for the family. Annahka was teaching her how to cook from whatever food they had on hand. The key was to use or create recipes that yielded high amounts of food and were long-lasting. Before Annahka could achieve full retirement, Dackla would have to create her own unique recipe and present it to her. If judged true, Dackla would take her place as chief cook in the family.

Today, however, Dackla was distracted. The runic Council had only allowed her to bear one child. It was disappointing, but the Council had been firm about this. Most women in her generation had only been allowed one child each, in fact. Dackla often wondered why that was, but questioning the Council's decision was not something to be risked. Challenging the Council and losing had only one punishment. Banishment.

Dackla waited for Bayu to finish and took his bowl and stone spoon from him with a smile. Bayu stood and stretched his. He leaned down and kissed her forehead lovingly and headed off to the main cavern for his day of training. Dackla watched him depart for a moment before standing herself. She collected the bowls and spoons from the wall basin and took them to the washing station.

Water was scarce in her world, so, over a large hide bin of fine sand, she took each piece and scrubbed it repeatedly with the sand until it was clean. She then used a thin hide to remove the grains of sand left behind from each dish and stacked them neatly. When all the morning dishes were clean, she began taking them to the cooking station to be placed on shelves carved into the wall. Thus, they were ready for the next round of small meals.

Annahka immediately inspected the dishes and then nodded her approval to Dackla. Dackla then stood silent, waiting for her day's instructions.

Bayu made his way to the training area of the main cavern. As he approached the young hunters all hushed and scurried into place to await him. It was a great honour to be taught by the Mighty Bayu and these young men treated it as such. Bayu was grateful for their respect. It was a large group he was training this cycle and without it, keeping the men focused would have proven a most difficult challenge.

Most of the group had mastered the common weapons quite easily and now it was time to begin to teach them the scripts they would need to personalize their favourite weapons. Learning to imbue power on an object using scripts was one of the last tests of the young hunters. after that, they would be challenged to augment their weapon or even to build a brand new weapon in order to pass from trainee to full hunter.

In his day, Bayu had opted to make a brand new weapon. He worked hard, many days and nights before his creation was complete. He tested it and refined it for many more and then finally had presented it to his father, the trainer at the time for approval. It was a unique distance weapon which is something the Oclaar People had never really had before. It utilized a carefully bent bone and thin sinew to hurl long, thin spears at a foe or beast. It was a fast and proficient weapon and had helped the hunters take down bigger and bigger game over the cycles. The entire clan had been incredibly impressed and the elders themselves had helped him cover it in simple but appropriate scripts.

It was the weapon of choice of his only son as well. Anwar was thoroughly skilled and frighteningly accurate with the Bent Bone. In fact, Anwar would be joining the training arena for a demonstration later that day. It was always an exciting day for the Father and son team to show off to the young hunters. This would likely be the last time that Anwar would be able to do it for a time, however, considering.