- `,˚.⋆✶—. ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ ⟡ ݁ . ⊹ ₊ ݁.—✶⋆˚.ˎˊ - `,˚.⋆✶—. ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ ⟡ ݁ . ⊹ ₊ ݁.—✶⋆˚.ˎˊ

CHAPTER ONE: 2150

VARANG WAS BUT A GIRL when her world was changed completely, the woven mat of reality pulled out from under her feet. It had started slow—subtle alterations which led her to doubt her once unshakeable trust in the Great Mother, setting her people at the edge of things. On the outside.

First, her Sempul was banned from the leiokoaktay tsawlultxa, unable to speak amongst the ay'olo'eyktan of other clans. This weighed on her Sa'nok—the insult shown to her muntxatan, leader of the Mangkuan. Varang tried to throw her energy into her lessons, but no matter how long her hands worked with herbs or how her ears perked at another story from her Sa'nok, her heart simply was not in it. She felt abandoned. Betrayed.

If only she knew what was to come.

The morning had started like any other, a symphony of chirps and screeches from the forest, ikran flitting through the towering boughs of Kelutral. In truth, the monotony bored Varang. She longed for something different, something new and exciting. And maybe that had been the cause of it all, in some way. How fervently she had wished for change.

As Varang traipsed along the riverbank, the earth shifted beneath her, threatening to send her to her knees. The creatures of the na'rìng scampered away, gentle trills quickly morphing into cries of fear. A great boom sounded somewhere far off, rolling over the land like the most vicious of thunderstorms. Varang stilled, sucking in a sharp breath as the light of the pxetsawke was quickly blotted out, casting the land in darkness. But it was far too early for the eclipse. Varang spun, her yellow eyes anxiously scanning the sky.

A column of smoke rose above the na'rìng, stretching from the mountain’s peak like a gangly limb. Terror clawed at her heart, wrenching its way through her ribs and up her throat, falling from her lips as a scream. Varang tore through the brush, lungs burning, clumps of mud flying up as her feet pounded the earth. She had to get home; to find her soaia, be amongst her people. They would know what to do—Sa'nok would guide them.

And as she neared Kelutral…all that surrounded her was chaos. Stones rained down upon the Mangkuan. First, no bigger than pebbles one might find within the stream. Then, larger shards, like those children used to pelt one another. They bounced off of the mossy floor of the na'rìng, the sides of marui, the tops of heads. Children screamed. Women wailed. Everywhere, her people ducked under coverings, arms folded over themselves, desperate to protect their soft flesh from the hail of jagged stone.

Varang held her hands over her head, shielding her eyes as she wove through the panicked crowds. No one paid her any mind, all too focussed on finding a way out as the shards became interspersed with volleys as large as the boulders within the river. Varang watched as one pummeled a man just beside her, sending him sprawling, caving into his chest like the claws of a palulukan. Her ears flattened as a cold zap of lightning tore through her veins. “Sa'nok!” Varang called, ducking beneath the safety of Kelutral’s twisting maze of roots. She skittered about, frantically searching for her Sa'nok, her tsmuke, Sempul.

“Ma'tsmuke!”

Varang turned to find Makara, her yellow eyes wide, fire reflected within them. She whirled, heart leaping to her throat at the sight of flaming stone flying through the tsray, setting marui, pa'li, and Na'vi alight.

Makara’s hands settled over Varang’s shoulders, squeezing. “Have you seen Sa'nok?” her older sister asked. Varang faced the girl’s wild gaze once more.

“Kehe,” she huffed. “I thought she would be with you.” Her words were nearly drowned out by a renewed chorus of screams and shouts. Varang was desperate to block out the din, trying her hardest to focus only on her sister before her, their shared task of tracking down their Sa'sem.

The uncertainty etched across her sister’s face did nothing to quell Varang’s panic. Shaking her head, Makara sputtered, “No, no, she said—”

“Tsakarem!” a voice rang out. The girls spun around to find Wukula, one of the clan’s young taronyu, sprinting toward them. “Za'u, nìwin. It is your Sa'nok.”

They did not waste another moment. The trio sped through the underbelly of Kelutral, vaulting over skidding boulders, ducking beneath flaming boughs. “Nìwin!” Wukula urged once more, waving them on. He lifted the frame of a toppled marui, though only enough for both girls to scramble through the opening. “Just ahead!” he called from the other side. I will find another way.”

Varang’s fingers circled Makara’s arm, tugging her through the black clouds of smoke. Flames licked up the ancient wood of their home; Kelutral would be completely engulfed in no time at all. “Sa'nok?” Varang yelled into the darkness, burning totems lining what was once the great hall like macabre sentinels.

“Maite,” croaked a weak voice. Varang’s heart stilled; she would recognize that gentle tone anywhere.

“Ma'Sa'nok!” she cried, blindly racing through the flaming debris, headed toward where she thought she had heard her mother’s voice. There, slumped in the corner, leaning against a creaking wall of wood, was her Sa'nok. Varang and Makara stumbled before her, their knees sending up puffs of dust as they lowered themselves at her side, each grabbing hold of the woman’s hands. “Daughters,” she rasped. Soot layered her lovely face, now twisted in agony. The substance blotted out the faint shimmer of her tanhì; in the darkness, her pale eyes seemed to assume an unnatural glow. As her breathing slowed and her eyes shuttered, Sa'nok murmured, “Look after the people.” She drew in one last halting breath before her grip over her daughters’ hands loosened, her head lolling to the side.

“Kehe,” Makara gasped. “Kehe, Sa'nok, rutxe.” She shook their mother as if she would suddenly rouse and tell them what to do, how to escape the fire raining down from the sky. But Makara would be their Tsahìk now. After a life of training and testing and watching, she should know what to do.

Should she not?

Yet as Makara curled over, folding in on herself with grief, any faith Varang once held in her tsmuke disappeared like sand sifting through her fingers. If Varang left her sister to her grief, she—or both of them—would surely be buried beneath the crumbling corpse of Kelutral. The wood would not hold much longer, its groan sounding much like a scream as it buckled beneath the weight of utter destruction. No, Makara would not be the one to get them out of this death trap, to lead their people to safety. And considering that Sempul was nowhere to be found, either…

That left only Varang.

The girl let go of Sa'nok’s hand as Makara continued to wail, “Rutxe, ma'Eywa. Help us!”

Varang’s lip curled back at the foolish plea, gazing at her sister with unfettered contempt. She realized something in that moment. Something which suddenly seemed so blaringly obvious that she wondered why it had not been a truth acknowledged since the dawn of time. “Eywa is not here, tsmuke,” Varang rasped, pushing to her feet. Her sister looked so small beneath her. So…weak. The Great Mother had abandoned them—all the Mangkuan. No, not quite, she realized. For abandonment meant that Eywa would have been presiding over them in the first place. And clearly, with their Kelutral tumbling around them, filling Varang’s ears with the awful sounds of devastation, the Goddess had no intention of intervening. “She never was,” Varang hissed, grabbing hold of Makara’s arm and dragging the girl to her feet.

Somehow, Varang managed to lead them to safety. They cut a wild path through what little remained of the na'rìng, eventually catching sight of a small group of Mangkuan huddled around their Sempul. It was there, on the bank of an ash-choked river, that Varang made a promise to herself.