Prince of the Asad Chapter 2

For generations, the relationship between the Asad’s Chief Father and his oldest male son was traditionally distant, even cold. As the son came of age, the prospect that that current Chief father’s rule would end came closer and closer to reality, and no Chief Father took this lightly. Only once in their history was an elder son ever slain by his Chief Father; he himself soon met his end at the hands of his nephew for this crime, but it was an event that was burned deeply into their cultural memory. They knew that every Chief Father, proud and strong, would do all he felt necessary to hold to his power, and that each one, no matter how fair they were, had power and temptation to do horrible things.

Kiane's husband, Chief Father Munambe, was as strong and proud as they came, and fair enough to be universally liked by his people both publically and privately, though he knew his years were advancing while Hassan only got stronger and more willful, eager to take his rightful place. The two butted heads frequently, and while it was merely heated words at this point Kiane couldn't bear to see it escalate. Munambe was reluctant at first, both seeing this as an insult to tradition, but more importantly as a vote of no confidence in him. Still, his love for Kiane and his bloodline was greater than his love for tradition or even his own pride. “Very well,” he told her, “But if he blunders, he'll go on no more hunts; it is no use having our children go hungry for the sake of a social experiment.”

Kiane took offense at this, but said nothing; her dear son was no blunderer. He held a spear like it was an extension of his own body, and he could hide in plain sight from his quarry and come down on it in seconds. He had never hunted with such a large group, though. She had told him over and over again the part he would play, not moving until Andase had and working with her to intercept and bring down the gazelle. Still, he was just as proud as his father; he might get arrogant, think he could chase one down on his own. This would be a fool's errand; no Asad could outrun a gazelle, who moved with such amazing speed and graze that they were called the angels of the grasslands. Teamwork was the only way to effectively hunt them.

So far, everything went well. Hassan was as silent as ever, crouching beside Andase and following her lead as her eyes darted from beast to beast, looking to see which ones would be the easiest to subdue. Noting her facial expressions, the way her eyes moved, the tiny mannerisms most would miss, he could tell which gazelle to go for. He prepared himself to pursue, waiting only for his mother to bolt towards them.

And bolt she did.

The herd reacted a mere split-second after she gave chase, and once they were underway they moved as one beast. All, of course, except for the slow, the young, the weak and the stupid. They strayed behind or went the wrong way or simply didn't run. The slowest Kiane felled herself, her stone-tipped spear tearing flesh like cloth. Next, she coaxed the herd towards Soria and Anisa, who sprang like a spring-loaded trap, cutting into the center and claiming two gazelle each. The remaining ones ran blindly straight towards Hassan and Andase.

Still crouching, the two young hunting held their spears straight out, and two gazelles impaled themselves gorily on them, like horses in a doomed cavalry charge. Yanking the polearms from between the cervines' shoulderblades they turned their attention to others, Andase felling two more. Hassan ran in the midst of the herd, barely keeping up as he held his spear close to his side. He had one beast in mind; the gray buck named Archangel. 

Prince of the Asad: chapter 1

Dawn was breaking, and already the Asad, the prowlers of the grassland, were on the hunt.

Chief Mother Kiane hid herself amongst the rough brush, crouched low to the earth. A small woman, only just over five feet when standing, she nevertheless looked the part of a predator. Every tendon, every spring and sinew inside of her was at a tenuous rest, ready for the call to action at less than a moment's notice. Dark brown eyes scanned the plains ahead of her as she rehearsed the ancient strategy of her people in her mind.

A sizable herd of crook-horned antelope stood grazing in the distance. They too were on a sort of half-watch, lazily filling themselves up on the rich grass of the plains while at the same time possessing an uncanny alertness; if one of them even smelled the hint of danger he'd be on his feet and the herd would not be far behind them, running as a unit from danger.

Unfortunately for them, there were always a few who, due to weakness, stupidity or just sheer panic, failed to keep up with the group or broke off from them. These were the ones Kiane was interested in, and after her initial charge scattered these poor invalids and imbeciles, she'd pursue them.

She wouldn't catch them, though; she didn't even entertain the thought of doing so. No, that was a job best left up to her allies. About a good stone's throw away on her right were her sisters, Soria and Anive, concealed in the scrub, spears clutched tightly in their hands. On her left was her niece, Andase, who was accompanied by her own son, Hassan, the lone male amongst the hunting party. These four would wait until Kiane isolated as many as she could from the greater herd, after which they would bolt out to flank the unfortunate beasts, blindsiding them with an assault from their light yet deadly spears.

It was a tactic which had served them for centuries, one which her mother taught to her, and on down through the generations. All of her party had been trained in the art of the hunt since they could walk. Well, all but one.

Hasan, a boy of about thirteen summers, had never been on a real hunt before. The women’s council, who presided over the matters of hunting, was wary of the idea of a male accompanying a party. It was the women who stalked the game, not the men; they were to stay with the tribe, protecting them from their enemies and themselves. To take a man on the hunt would fly in the face of untold summers of tradition. Yet Kiane had been teaching the boy herself, at twilight, how to stalk, to chase, and to kill. He'd proven himself against rats and boars, and even fought off a hyena, and had been begging his mother to take him on a hunt for ages. With a little bit of persuasion, she’d gotten them to approve of him coming with the main party. Rasam was delighted, which in turn delighted Kiane, though she had had another motive for bringing him on her hunt; she wanted to save his life.

Books Books Books

I haven't done much of any writing since I reformatted, due to my writings being safely tucked away in my Gmail account. I have, though, been reading quite a bit. The book of the hour is TH White's The Once and Future King. I realized that it was just kind of, I dunno, wrong for someone who loves the broad scope of the Arthurian legend as much as myself to not actually have read all that much of anything, besides adaptations and condensations for children (Oh, and the films Camelot, Lancelot Du Lac, The Sword In the Stone, Monty Python and the Holy Grail,  Quest For Camelot and A Kid in King Arthur's Court, but I think only the first three count. The middle one, sorta, and the last two... no no noooo.)
It's gotten me thinking  the impact certain stories and characters have on culture. Probably more so than any character in western literature (Next to his fellow Brits Robin Hood and the relative youngster Sherlock Holmes,) Arthur has inspired thousands of adaptations, expansions, derivations, deconstructions and parody. The reasons for this, I think, are obvious; he's the quintessential tragic hero. He is noble, chivalrous, proud and trusting, almost all to a fault. The fellow players in his legend are just as iconic; the mysterious, wise mentor magician Merlyn, the valiant yet lecherous and slightly psychotic Lancelot, and the treacherous Mordred to name a few. All of them have formed the bases for characters and character types that still evolve.
Will this kind of thing continue? We already see it happening to an extent with certain comic book characters, but how far will it go? Will the relatively recent concepts of copyright and "intellectual property" hamper the development of mythii, characters and new concepts? And where do I, an amateur and relatively inexperienced writer, fit into all of this?
Alright, I'm done. Good to know I'm still good at making rambly posts.

I Figure I Should Take Up One Of These Again+ Computer Woes

It's been some time since I had an actual blog, and I think it would be decent of me to start one up again so I can share some writing and generally have a constructive place to do constructive things away from the noise and confusion of Facebook. So here we have it, the Words From The Man You Should Care About.
I write this from my noble computer, Vera, who seems to have a video card that is on the fritz. When the latest nvidia drivers for the card of its make (A 9800 GT) are installed, my system won't start; it will take me to the loading screen for Windows Vista, where greenish-gray dots appear in the background, but it won't go any further than that. When these drivers are not present, though, and just the standard VGA drivers are running, it will start fine. The dots still appear on the loading screen (And on the CMOS setup screen when I get into that pre-boot) but other than that windows starts and everything else runs fine; I just can use anything requiring Direct 3D, OpenGL or any of that fancy accelerated graphics hoo-hah the kids use these days.
So basically, I'm afraid that my video card might be dying, which puts me in a bit of a bind since I am unemployed and without money. Hopefully I can scrape along this way now as I wait to see if I can do anything. Help from my techie friends would be greatly appreciated at this point.