Leroh had always suspected that he was a cowardly piece of shit, but as he stood by the kitchen door and looked out the keyhole at the horrifying scene taking place before him, he finally understood just how completely he had failed at everything he'd ever been entrusted to do.
Teela lay dead on the ground. The Mantis had taken her.
A shudder racked his body and Leroh held in a whimper of sorrow. He feared to make a sound and draw her attention. Despite his paralyzing terror and anguish, he remained still and watched.
It had all happened as quickly as he'd ever been warned it could be. That very morning he'd heard of her coming to their town. So when the small woman had entered the tavern and awoken a feeling of strong unease in his gut, he'd known. Her appearance was inconspicuous enough to not immediately draw attention, but that day he'd kept a special eye out for the red mouth and apathetic demeanor she was known for, and tried to be wary in the event that she might stop by for a meal, exactly as had come to pass.
Not that he'd feared himself or his family in danger. It was well known what her choice of prey was, and he'd always made sure to stay well out of her reach. Easy enough to do, he'd thought. How could he have foreseen that she'd take little Teela? And why had she?
The Mantis had finished with her kill and now stood motionless, looking at his sister. Her body remained sprawled on the filthy wooden floor of the tavern, arms lifted halfway upward as if she'd tried to protect her head but found she lacked the strength to reach. The tangle of her heavy black curls and the warm brown linen of her skirts fanned across the ground.
His little sister. His responsibility. Dead on the planks of wood she'd helped to sweep for most of her short fifteen years.
He'd left her alone to die.
His breath started coming in short, desperate gasps and Leroh pushed a hand flat on his chest in an attempt to calm his heart. He could not give in to the sadness just yet. Hold it in until she's gone and then you can run upstairs, he promised himself.
As he continued to watch in silence, the monster that had ruined his life studied Teela with undivided attention. Then, to his dismay, she crouched low and slid a slim arm under the back of his dead sister's neck, the other hooking under the bend of her knees. With seemingly no effort at all, the Mantis lifted her body and carried it out the tavern door. Not a word or glance did she spare for her standing spectators, and then she was gone.
Unbidden, his knees gave in and Leroh slumped down on the tiles of the kitchen floor. The realization that he'd allowed this to happen brought him to a protective position with his knees raised and his arms encircled around them, his head tucked tightly into the safe space in the center. And then he wept.
Teela had been a burden to him, or so he'd told himself when he was feeling particularly self-pitying. It had become clear that she was to be raised mainly by him when their father and main pillar of the family died defending the business during a raid. Leroh had only been a boy then, but his sister was three years younger, and female, and so he'd taken charge.
Their mother was not a nurturing woman, and she'd had to focus most of her attention on keeping the business afloat when their main provider had abruptly been gone. So onto Leroh had fallen the weight of responsibility of little willful Teela.
Always running around and getting herself into trouble, always asking questions and sneaking into places where she had no business poking her nose. And despite knowing that whatever consequences she brought upon herself would inevitably fall on his shoulders, she had seemed to care about that outcome of her forcibly acquired freedom in no way. But he never took pleasure in imparting discipline, no matter how much she'd pressed him for it.
And so his days had been an upward battle to avoid neglecting the girl and failing in his duty to his parents, and to preserve at least a piece of life for himself.
Well, the scales had at last come to a tipping point.
His father had wanted him to take up the mantle of leadership after him, to protect and tend all that he'd worked for and loved. His mother had needed his help and trusted him with the family's means of livelihood and the well-being of his sister.
And now she would be eaten. Suddenly Leroh could not breathe.
The thought hadn't occurred to him until that moment. The Mantis would eat Teela, suck out the insides of her head and consume the power of her spirit like she hadn't been a person. The memories of her life and past, her pain and joy, her likes and dislikes, the very essence of her being she would devour for its energy as if that had been her sole value.
The sound of steps reluctantly approaching from deeper within the kitchen brought him back to the reality in front of him and Leroh's head sprung up in alarm. His mother had likely heard his breathless whimpering and finally come to see to the issue herself.
"Always causing trouble, you. Always some problem," her tired, angry voice called as she made her slow way toward him. "What is the matter now?"
He fled.
He could not face her. Before her frame had even poked around the bend in the wall, Leroh was gone.
She was looking for his little sister, he knew, and he refused to let her find him and the news that he'd left her to get killed and eaten instead.
He crossed the entirety of the tavern, noting in passing that the remaining customers had gathered around the two men's bodies that lay sprawled on the floor. Some were speaking softly, but most of the people kept quiet and processed the reality of what they'd witnessed with solemn faces. When he reached the entrance, Leroh decidedly wiped his shirt sleeve across his face to clear away the tears of sorrow and guilt and stepped outside.
He'd recover Teela's body for proper burning if it was the last thing he ever did with his miserable life. He'd not face his mother empty-handed.
The wooded area that surrounded the town would do fine.
She thought of riding Otto there but decided against it. It wasn't that far and the girl was but a wispy little thing. It would be more trouble to retrieve her stallion from the inn stables than to just carry her in her arms. There was also something about bearing her lifeless body in such a way that felt meaningful to her. It was right.
As she made her way toward the edge of the forest through the charming dirt streets of the little town in the outskirts of the capital city, Mantis observed her surroundings. It was a closed community. Traditionalist, in the best sense of the word. They persisted in keeping themselves away from the grasping hands of the deities, and didn't surrender their stance despite the hardship that came with it. The child she carried, held motionless against her chest, had likely led a very comfortable life, or as comfortable as the inhabitants of the secluded kingdom of Yriaa could get in present times. She'd been free. In a state of constant wariness, and limited in many ways, yes, but free.
Teela was her name. It was what the rough-mannered young man that currently followed her down the street had called the girl back at the tavern. He was now doing a poor job of remaining inconspicuous, but she paid him no mind.
Some of the local folk watched her shyly as she passed them, and a few men gave her unfriendly looks, but all was well otherwise. They knew of the Mantis, she thought with relief. She'd leave them in peace soon.
A red flower flung carelessly across the middle of the dirt path caught her eye and she looked left and right in consternation. It unsettled her greatly when she also noticed a scrap piece of home-spun cotton fabric, dyed red with fresh blood, draped atop a cart wheel to her left. There was no one in sight nearby that could have placed it there. Perhaps it had been thrown from a window on the second story of the building fronting the street. Move along. Nothing you can do about it.
The forest was a forest, and that was enough. No need for it to be overly lovely, which it was not. She was not there to admire the vegetation. There were five souls crowded inside of her, and the urgency with which her body begged to relieve the pressure could not be ignored. The headache from the memories was torturous, but the heavy weight of the souls swirling in her chest and straining to escape was nearly unbearable. She had grown more tolerant of the painful sensation with the years, but it could disable her nonetheless, proportionally to how many currently inhabited her.
Once she judged she'd walked deep enough into the woods, Mantis lowered the corpse of Teela down onto the earth and grass of a small clearing. She made sure to position her arms tidily folded atop her ribcage, and smoothed her curly black locks down a little. She might have been sleeping. A little girl sleeping.
"I want my sister's body back." The young man spoke from behind her. "Intact."
Mantis turned around to look at him. He was hiding behind a tree.
A long silence stretched when she didn't offer a response. She turned back around and stood to take a few steps away from the girl. When she heard the brother moving toward Teela's corpse, Mantis spun again to look him up and down, not sure if she was dealing with a very brave man or a rather unintelligent one.
He was crouching beside his sister and had stretched out his arms to attempt to pick her up but, at the sight of Mantis's shaking her head no at him, he froze.
"But—" he stuttered. "I'm taking her home!"
"Not yet."
"You can't have her! She didn't do anything wrong!" He stood and tried glowering at her, but he was having trouble looking at her face. Not that much of it was visible with the draping fabric covering most of it.
Mantis took a deep breath and sighed it out. "Sit over there. I'll give her back to you shortly."
"I won't let you eat her! She didn't do anything wrong!"
At that she lowered her hood to reveal her eyes as she bore them into his. He fell down, startled, but didn't look away from her.
"I'm not going to eat her, you moron." She bit out the words and turned around again.
Facing the trees, Mantis took a deep breath and closed her eyes. After a few moments, she went to her knees, brought her center down low onto the earth and placed the heels of her palms on her clavicles, arms crossed and hands flat against the pulse points on her neck.
Then she quietly recited the old language words she had uttered countless times before that would summon the Goddess Ombira.