Kannah's Story

Through the middle of a thick forest of oak and evergreen pine trees is a twisting river. Its water is cool, the current gentle and slow. If one follows this river deep into the heart of the woods, where civilization is virtually unheard of, one would find a hive. It is large, four stories in height, in a small clearing. The hive was once grand, but now is run down, many windows broken and walls crumbling, its roof rotting.

This is where Kannah lived for the first five sweeps of her life.

Twelve sweeps ago, a young troll girl, fresh from the caverns, was herded to this paticular hive, which was then a touch more suitable for living in. Pushing her along was a massive three-headed wolf. The wolf, her lusus, was easily the size of a human bus in its body, with its long legs adding to its height. Its three heads rested on graceful necks, each heading having a set of bright indigo eyes. Two sets of eyes held cruelty and hatred for the troll girl in their depths, while the third set contained kindness and compassion. The cruel heads snapped at the girl and made her stumble along faster while the kind one encouraged her to continue with gentle nudges of its nose.

The girl herself looked bewildered. She was thin, with deep black curls that framed a face that held great potential for beauty in the future. Her clothes were old, taken from another troll, a pair of black pants that were many sizes too big, along with a plain blask shirt that engulfed her skinny frame and threatened to fall off her thin shoulders. Her bare feet were bleeding indigo from sharp stones and sticks that littered the ground; her arms bled from the sharp nips the cruel heads gave her.

The wolf brought the little girl up to the third floor of the old hive. It didn't allow her to look around, instead herding her up to the library. It ushered her in and ordered the girl to close the door and not come out. She obeyed. As the padded footsteps of the wolf trailed away, the troll turned and opened a book, immersing herself in the pictures and letters.

Outside, the cruel heads argued about what to do with its charge as the kind one tried to intervene. The two turned on the one, blaming it for causing them to have accepted the wriggler. The two heads then took control of the body and stalked out of the woods, following the river and the faint scent of trolls.

Kannah was well into teaching herself the alphabet through picture books when her lusus returned. It entered the library and found the girl in the corner furthest from the only window in the room, surrounded by piles upon piles of picture books. She looked up at the sound of a growl and the rattle of chains.

Five trolls, all bigger than her, siezed the girl and pinned her down as she screamed and struggled. One of the trolls let her go; he was eaten by the wolf lusus on the spot. A sixth troll came up with a welding torch and length of chain. He welded one end of the chain around her wrist, despite her pleading. He then did the same to her other wrist and her ankles with another three lengths of chain. He hissed at her to hold still. Startled at the voice, she obeyed. He welded the fifth chain around her neck. Losing all will to fight, she lay limp as the troll welded the other ends of the five chains to the wall.

Their task done, the trolls fled the wolf lusus, who hunted them down and killed them.

Kannah lad limp for a while, then eventually shifted. She stood, unsteady with the heavy chains on her person, and walked the distance she could before the chains stopped her. She could only just reach the nearest shelf, perhaps five feet from the wall. She returned to her spot with the books and tried to pull the chains loose, to no avail. After a while, she wailed from hunger. The lusus didn't return.

Kannah immersed herself in the books she collected, teaching herself to read. A week later, when the light of the purple moon filtered into the library, the trolls girl had taught herself to read basic words and swiftly learning more. However, she was getting thin, starving and weak. The door was pushed open and the kind-eyed head of her lusus threw her a portion of raw meat. She crawled to the food and made short work of the food with her sharp teeth as the lusus left once more.

Kannah lived like this for five sweeps, chained to the wall of the library. She grew to be over five and a half feet tall, but painfully thin, just skin and bone. She was fed whenever one of the two Alternian moons went full, about every two weeks. She spent the rest of the time reading the fantasy novels she could reach or mimicking to perfection the sounds she heard outside of the window. Her mind was damaged from lack of care and social interaction, as well as the nightmares that plagued her every time she slept due to her lack of sopor and her fantasy books. She created an imaginary friend to converse with, using her talent of mimicking sound to give it a male voice. Whenever the drones undoubtedly came around, her lusus would destroy them and float the wreckage down-river.

One day, Kannah's lusus didn't come to feed her. She watched the full yellow moon and paced, her stomach growling. After another week, she couldn't stand the hunger. In a fit of adrenaline and hunger-induced strength, as well as her natural highblood strength, she broke the chains holding her to the wall.