Over Running Water

Miriya was exhausted. Men and dogs had been chasing her for days. Try to cure one ailing child get branded a witch. Well, at least that was half right. But not right to try to kill her for simply trying to help, damnit all. Paladins of Orath were zealots though.

She knew this land, had walked through it hundreds of years before the religion of the men chasing her had started. Hah! The upstart "god" Orath, just a pawn Saiser, the ancient who had chased her from her own homeland millennia before. He spread rumors about their kind, though.

If she could reveal herself, she could use those rumors to direct those tracking her. She'd have to lure one away somehow. Send them a message. Not a subtle one. During the day they moved across the land, tracking her by scent, losing her when she sank into the ground to rest.

During the night she moved away from them, trying to create as much distance on her two legs as the men could on their horses. Time to take a risk. Once night fell, she rose from where she had tunneled away from the entrance of her ground meld. Tasting the air, she found the men.

She could have made better time if she flew, but that required a meal. It had been some time since she had had one. Lack of a meal couldn't kill her, but it would make her weak, which in turn /would/ get her killed.

A meal. What a disgusting way to think about a living being. She had to think that way. She had to survive. If that meant looking at the men chasing her as food, so be it. She would do worse to them than that before this was finished. Before this was over she would feed so much.
"No," she thought, she couldn't let the hunger control her. The hunger was just as much a danger as the weakness a lack of food brought. It could cause irrationality. In that it was not so different from being a human, miss a meal, become irritable. But the hunger was worse. At the worst, you could fall into a fugue, hunting on instinct.

But the hunger was more subtle. It could push you to take risks that you wouldn't otherwise. Foolish things that made you easy to kill. Overconfidence and an inability to recognize risk. She had no choice now, they were at the point where they were finding her meld entrances.

It was untrue that they didn't breath. Or at least the perception that had come from that, that they couldn't for being something dead. Which was also untrue, but propaganda was a powerful tool.
So she breathed in slowly and began to meditate. She could see them in her mind now. That one. Going in the woods to take a piss. She had to act now.
Coming to, she carefully and quietly strode towards their camp. Careful not to break any branches, crunch any leaves, nor startle any animals, she grew close. She could see him. Urinating was not what he was doing.

Well, she might have more time than she thought. He seemed to be very occupied with what he was doing. It explained why he was so far away from the men's camp. She wondered, would a man want to die wanking? She wasn't a man, so she couldn't say. She knew she'd prefer not to.

But men always seemed a bit more worried about needing to do that. She had met plenty of women who loved to wank, but men often did it like they were getting paid to. Which they never were.
The thought made her laugh. The wanking man heard it and looked up. "Whozzat?"
"A lady," she replied coolly, "so you had better put your... parts away."
"I don't think I will, then, lady," he said with a gurgling chuckle. How pleasant. Oh well, a meal was a meal.
She sighed, "I was going to try to kill you painlessly, but your intention is /not/ appreciated."
"Now now, don't be like that."
Drawing her dagger into his throat, she growled with feline ferocity, "Just. Shut. Up. And. Die." And she thrust into him, and he began to.
Not wanting to waste blood, she worked quickly and removed the dagger, drinking from the hole in his throat. No rush of pleasure from the blood other than the feeling of relief from the hunger. The rush would come later, when she forced the battle.
Calling upon the language Puma had taught her, she yowled in the night. She could feel the fear that spread through the men in the camp.

Below her feet the man was dead, exsanguinated. Her biology allowed her to drink more blood than would reasonably fit in her body. She had often pondered on the volumes of blood the ancients drank, but always shook her head, disgusted. Best not to become distracted, though.

The yowl had done more than reverberate fear into the men hunting her. It spread through her body in waves, changing her. Her clothes and gear were now tawny fur, her arms legs, her hands and feet paws. She stood now in the form of the Puma. Yowling again, she turned and ran.

They would follow her and she could find what she was looking for. Her sense of smell, already powerful, was even more powerful in this form, unlike the actual Puma. She wondered how that was, but maybe it was another gift of the blood. Regardless, she could already smell water.

The river with the stone bridge. She remembered it. A good place to make a stand. Now that they knew what she was, they would grow confident from Saiser's lies, also knowing what would be ahead would be their undoing. The confidence she felt now was real, and she would ride it.

As she ran, she began to remember the chants for the water, for the power she would draw on there. Everything had power, but something about water made her kind more powerful, making the blood within more lively. Moreso than any of her kind she had met, she could control it too.

Even Saiser had less power with water. Actually, more than anyone, he had the least power with it, despite his power over blood itself. Her power over water gave her some ability with blood, but nothing like his. She didn't need that now, though. Just the power of the water.

And like that, she was sitting on the bridge, cleaning herself. The water respected cleanliness, it was the first part of the ritual to call on it. Then back to human form, the cleanliness of her feline form having carried over. Another mystery for another day.

She began the movements on the bridge, flowing like the water itself, invoking its power. As she moved, she listened to what the river said and began to speak its language, shushing her breath and clicking her tongue. Around her the water rose, unseen in the dark of the night.

Over her shushing and clicking, she heard the thunder of horses. Scythes of water swung out from above the river, reaping the men as the harvest they had sown by chasing her. Again and again, like grain on a sunny day felling, blood dyeing the river under the now risen moon.

Then it was over and all that could be heard was the shushing and clicking of the river and her. No, something else: a low rushing of the blood pouring into the river. All this death, for what? Because Saiser's Orathians wouldn't allow practice of medicine outside their church.

No time for that, though. She was tired from battle and knew how soon the sun would come now that the moon had risen. Peering into the river... it might work. If she could control the water and blood, she could shield herself from the light of the sun and drift along.

After all, just because she could breath, didn't mean she needed to. Time in the water would empower her further. When the next night came, the river would be clean and she would be more powerful that she had ever been. Maybe it was a sign that she had to fight the church.