— 𝐭𝐬𝐲𝐮𝐥 —

𝗺𝗲𝗲𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴𝘀 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗴𝗿𝗲𝗲𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴𝘀

𝐍𝐄𝐓𝐄𝐘𝐀𝐌 𝐋𝐎𝐕𝐄𝐃 𝐇𝐈𝐒 𝐅𝐀𝐌𝐈𝐋𝐘, he really did, every single one of them.

but he had to admit that his brother knew how to get in his nerves better than anyone else.

him,kiri and lo'ak had been walking in the forest, tuk still to young to come with them and opting to stay at home with spider.

it was one of the few times that their parents had let them and they didn't waste their time as they had ran into the woods without a second thought.

time passed and kiri wandered away like always, following 'the call of the trees' ,as she liked to call it.

lo'ak remained with him, and they spent their time joking, pushing one another.

they started to play fight, something that they both liked to do a lot, and they both rolled on the ground as they tried to win over the other.

neteyam was the oldest, and that made him stronger then his younger brother.

they both knew this but it didn't stop lo'ak from acting like the baby he was.

in fact, when neteyam pushed his body on the ground happily saying 'you're down' as lo'ak was blocked from moving, his younger brother didn't esitate to find a way to win.

he moved his focus, looking behind his brother's shoulder , his eyes widened as a scared expression appeared on his face.

"t'herkaya!" he almost shouted.

neteyem felt his heart drop, his parents told stories about the tribe almost every night but he didn't thought that he would've really meet one of them.

he turned around as he quickly got up, a knife already in his hand.

only some moments passed as he looked around before he realised what had happened, what his brother had done.

lo'ak broke into a fit of laughter and neteyam turned around just to see him getting up from the ground, his hands still on his stomach.

"are you dumb or what?" scolded him the big brother as he walked towards him giving him a slap on the side of his head.

"relax, it was just a joke" replayed lo'ak, a smirk on his face as he swatted the other's hand away.

"they're dangerous, why can't you just listen to our parents for once?" kept on going neteyam as he did some step towards his brother, his fear quickly becoming anger as he didn't want his brother to see him scared.

lo'ak nodded, rolling his eyes at his brother antics.

"yeah sure" he pretended to listen before he looked at neteyam right into his eyes "i'm not gonna hear this again"

he walked away, leaving his grumpy brother behind.

"whatever" he told himself as he turned in the opposite direction, walking into the woods.

his arms hit the leaves to move them out of his sight, but he kept looking down as he replayed the 'argument' in his mind.

"why does he always have to joke about it?"

"can't he just take something serious for once?"

"i can't believe he walked away like that"

"why does he have to be so annoying?"

those were some of the phrases that he was saying as he unconsciously walked deep into the forest.

the silence around him brought him comfort as he finally felt like he could say what he was really thinking about.

"maybe i took it to seriously" he added as he rethought about the events of moments before and his own words.

suddenly a sound echoed in the silence.

a branch breaking.

his head shot up, his eyes wide.

"lo'ak?" he called the name, hoping that it was another one of his jokes.

no answer.

suddenly he noticed how dark it was, the silence turned from comfort to fear as he realised that he had walked too far in.

he didn't dare moving even if his heart was screaming at him to do it.

but neteyam had always listened more to his brain.

so he kept still, breathing slowly to not make any sound.

then he felt something move behind him.

he turned around, nothing.

that sound again, he moved his head towards the point, still nothing.

but he felt something inside bringing him towards that place, was that what his sister felt when she 'felt eywa call her'?

no time to think about that.

his ears were down, his shoulder stiff, his hand was ready to took again the knife that was held on his thigh.

his feet made him slowly move towards the darkness that was head of him.

without warning something jumped out of that darkness.

something big.

he almost fell down screaming before he realised it was just a pa'li.

"stupid horse" he grunted as he held his arms away from his body to balance himself again.

he followed the animal with his eyes as it speeded away.

"for a second i thought you were a-" he started to say before his voice broke.

his eyes met the end of an arrow, and behind that arrow, holding the bow, was someone that he had been told to stay away one to many times.

"-t'herkaya..."

he couldn't believe it, the girl was standing in front of him her hands on the bow as she looked at him dead in the eyes.

her skin almost blending with the background of the dark forest.

her face held no emotion and he knew that if he did one wrong move he would've been dead.

neteyam wanted to scream, he wanted to ran away, he wanted to scream at his brother for leaving him in the forest.

he slowly brought his hands up.

he wanted to say something, he wanted to beg for his life, he wanted to find a way to stay alive.

but then, she did something that he could've never even thought off, she moved the arrow towards the ground.

she let the tension of the bow go, her eyes still on him.

he moved his focus from the ,now armless, arrow to her face; she could see that he was confused and she slowly walked backwards.

her eyes not moving from him and her hands still on her weapon almost as she expected him to attack her.

how could someone even think of attacking one of them was something that neteyam would've never understood.

he blinked and she vanished into the darkness of the forest.

he let out a deep breath before the realisation hit him and he started to ran, he followed the paths he had done before, hoping to find someone still there.

suddenly an hand caught his arm, he turned his head, in his mind only all the ways that he could die as he thought that the girl from before had changed her mind and had decided to go after him.

he let out a sigh of relief as he was met with his brother's face.

"where were you?" he asked him, not even waiting a second.

neteyam wanted to tell him everything, he really did.

but he surprised his own self as he found himself hiding everything.

"found a pa'li" he murmured.

"thought you found those annoying" lo'ak said, making it sound almost like a question.

the older brother took his arm away from the younger's grasp before shrugging his shoulder.

lo'ak looked at him for some seconds before he copied the action.

he turned, doing some steps as he motioned to neteyam.

"c'mon, is time to go back home!"

neteyam remained behind for some seconds before he shook his head, trying to cancel the memory of the strange meeting away from his mind.

what he didn't know was that those eyes that were hunting his thoughts were still watching him as he walked away, still talking to himself.

then the darkness covered those eyes away and no sign of the presence of a t'herkaya could be seen.

on the other hand, you were really good at it.

ꕤ ꕤ ꕤ

a/n:
first chapter is a go!!
after i watched the way of water my obsession for avatar came back and i couldn't contain myself.
so now you have this :))
hope you like it like always <33

-sa :)