Earth’s Children 3 Trilogy

Their world is slowly returning to the Ways it once was before the Rebel attacks that killed off the
Children of Nature. Hungry for Mother Nature’s Power, they had almost succeeded in killing her
children and their bonded Protects, those she would pass on to each clan while they searched for the
source, the Nullahnaco.
They lost though. For the 5 remaining Childs and their Protectors returned, and once more, the cycle
of Mother Nature continued. Their Brothers and Sisters continuing on.
Keru Ayla Nehele, the Nullahnaco (of all Nature), Child of Nehele Clan, giver of hope. Survivor and
Reviver of their world.
The Rebels were gone. Too late, did they realize that just because they were out of sight and sound,
did not mean they were no more. And the one they seek once more, will suffer for it,
Yet the power of Faith and Love in each other, no matter the horrors, the pains, will always live on

They sit in the cozy hut with their big blankets wrapped around them and a fire warming them from
the cold blizzard winter outside
They were having a sleep over with their siblings Jai and Jami of Dagodan ‘the J Twinlets’ just like
Keru and Robby were forever ‘the little ones’, and with Kitchi clan and Ocoee nearby that generally
banded them from being their usual troublesome pack activities; confining them to their hut with
Coban and Ella, but that never really stopped them because known as Nature Children, we were by
nature curious, adventurous- and mischievous. Adado Ayule as their mother and Youngers called
them, and of course the Nullahnaco Keru.

Robby and Keru were wrapped in the one bundle of blankets on the ground against their bed while
the Twinlets had the other blankets around them on the opposite side of the fire
Keru leans against Her Protector, Robby while they continue laughing as their Child Carers Ella and
Coban come in looking suspiciously at them, making them chuckle deeper at them. They all shout
out “paranoid!” and point at them
“Oh come on Ella, don’t turn into a Kiowai” Keru grimaces. Kiowai her eldest sister- Eldest and Chief
Nature Child, was always so suspicious of them, then again they were the Youngest of the Nature
Children Youngers.. She was also born of Kitchi Brave Clan, a Fierce Warrior Tribe. You didn’t want
Kiowai angry- or her husband Tylan angry.
No one liked being caught by fire, the element she belonged to. You couldn’t break through it like
water, or hide from it like wind. Her Spirited Away brother, Amaroo apart from Keru had belonged to
Spirit, and Keru was the only Nature Child able to wield Nature element, though all Nature Children
had affinities to it. As a nature child, Nature protected them if danger was presented. A natural
instinct to protect what belonged and what belonged to them.
“And Coban not another Ocoee” they all groan together at the thought “he’ll probably be waltzing in
any minute” Jami looks expectantly to the door. If they thought Kiowai was bad, their Brother
Ocoee, the bear lug grump- teddy bear of their family, was all the more so. Kiowai was a small
mouse with a whisper to Ocoee’s charge- strength and bellow routine.
That’s what big brothers were for.
“That’s okay; we’ll get him like last time” Jai jumps up already planning with a devious smile playing
on his lips, the master mind of their little family gang pack. The tricks they had played on him- and
the rest of the Youngers were always fun, particularly remembering their last game of ‘hide and
seek’ where they had temporarily separated as usual but never far due to Bondment sickness, and
they ‘hid’ from the Youngers while they ‘seeked’ as they had from a young age. Ocoee complained
they were the worst combination in history. Period and that Jai and Jami were impossibly the
makings of their deceased troublesome brother, Amaroo himself in two bodies; easily taking over at
their young age because though he had more practice and experience having dealt with Amaroo and
Tala, they were never masterminds and trickeries like Jai’s scheming and equally Jami’s sneaky mind.
Ocoee was no match for them and their gang, but they all enjoyed it no matter how angry and
serious Ocoee and the Youngers and Carers would get; “kids were kids and Nature Child’s were
Nature Child’s” as the Elders would tell them.
Then running through the forests whether it be their game or their instinctual natural selves, they
would suddenly appear and the chase would begin as they would scoop them up or pick them up by
the scuff depending if they used their earth elemental forms, sigh and speak “got Keru” other
Youngers usually Kiowai, Tylan or Ocoee himself would say before Elementaling of their element
they belong to, away; winning.
They would see each other always though; having ‘adventure days’ with them or sometimes with
their kids where the youngest of them would show them some tricks around that the parent
Youngers would shake their head and frown on them but always their loving familiar intimate smiles
followed, or their hugs and kisses, even if they had fights or would lock them up ‘for their own good’
it always followed with a hug and the smile and a kiss.
Our family. Our strange special and precious family.
“I think we should let him soak in the loss for a little longer, if we are to be faithful to our role model
Aroo-roo” Jami jokes putting a pledging hand over her heart
Robby beside Keru puts his arm around her and squeezes before kissing her temple lightly making
Keru smile and happily lean against him again as she watches the Twinlets and their innocence. The
Twinlets were part of a growing young family that had been born after their arrival back to their
world, absent of the dangers that had once plagued their homes and lives from the Rebels. While
Robby, Keru and the other four- now three Nature Children Survivors of that perilous time, had not
been so fortunate.
Even so, after years, they were still here. Each day there were smiles, each day new life and the cycle
continued. A world they had helped saved and were a part of.
“Nah, let him off the hook for now, he’s been stressed out as it is with his own twins Amaroo and
Lully, and Wollem, let alone Brelick and Aloiki” Keru states mercifully. Once upon a time, before Keru
and Robby had been born, Ocoee had solely made his job to watching and stressing over just
Amaroo and his Protector, a year older than him. It had taken nearly a long 20 years for the Great
Mother to give birth to another Protector, Robby, followed a year later by Keru. Then the great
Rebel pillage, the near extinction of Nature Children. Now it blossomed, and poor ol’ Ocoee had too
many siblings let alone his own kids, to grumble worry and watch over. He still enjoyed it though
Robby adds to the discussion. “Its winter though so the games on hold till it warms up at least- truce
for now” he states and once again Keru looks to her protector who was just as cunning and
mischievous as the rest of them unlike her other memories of him when he was stressed, over
protective and possessive and always worried
‘I was not’ he tells her defensively through the bond
‘Were too’ she retorts smiling ‘and you know it. You were a grouch’. Like all protectors of that era
were, whereas now, like the Twinlets, Jai’s protector Jami was just another play mate. Robby had
been Keru’s play mate and best friend once too, always playing around with her, go on adventures
before the attacks. Like the other three Youngers, they had had too many times to count where their
lives had nearly be forfeited. As a protector, to have you Child in that situation, was like a mother
and her new born. Unacceptable. It had scarred them; it wasn’t something you got over with a flick
of a wrist. After all they were protectors, solely of their other souls, their other halves. They were
also their mates though. And like time, they slowly began to heal.
In response he turns her head and heatedly kisses her lips; the twinlets too busy planning their
summer games and trickery
‘Only coz you put me in a bad mood’ he jokes ‘you’re the one that always seemed to live in the healer
rooms because you were too self-sacrificing and selfless’
‘Okay, okay- shush’ she dismisses him quickly not bothered to go into the now 3 very eventful,
adventurous and dangerous lives they’d partially had ‘you could have been nicer though on the bus
rather than creeping me the hell out of my skin’ Keru finishes with a statement that made him groan
and roll his eyes at her while shaking his head; she would never let him forget that. As a protection
mechanism, when the Rebels had attacked and pilgrimaged, the last five surviving Childs were sent
away and for further measures of safety, their memories locked away in their minds for fear the
Rebels would find them. Reborn into families across the alien world. The Protectors along with their
two Carers, were also sent, this time to find them. Eager to make the connection to be re-bound,
Robby had found her on a school bus and kissed her, believing the physical connection would be
enough. It had frightened the spirits out of her and ended up with her in hospital for running across
the road from him and getting hit by a car. It had taken a longer time than expected, but eventually,
with the rising dangers of Rebels slowly finding the five final Children of Nature, they had re-linked,
found the other Youngers and returned.
Keru leans further against him, sighing. And she couldn’t have been more happier or grateful her
Protector had come for her

With the moon shinning bright and aluminous through their window, Keru watches it’s steady rise,
meeting Jacy’s white friendly and always watchful face, always reminding her of Amaroo and his
protector Tala, reminding her of the orang-utans and when they had met then shifted forms that
first time, all the trouble they had gotten themselves repetitively into together- in both worlds,
remembering the sunrise and the black leopard Amaroo had promised her when they would return,
for she had only been six years old when she and Robby had been sent away. She and the Youngers
still kept to that natural troublesome adventurousness and curiosity as was their reputation as
Youngers, though never as good as Amaroo- the legendary Amaroo. Jai and Jami were coming very
close though, Ocoee’s almost permanent scowl as evidence; and they were only 12 and 13.
Amaroo and Tala were with Mother now though, helping, nurturing and watching, getting into new
unknown troubles and mischief along with their brothers and sisters before them.
Keru lay against Robby’s back now staring at it while he continued chatting and listening to the
Twinlets and her mind, and watching the ‘fruitnut on a stick’ cook as ritual in the fire on a blizzard
winter’s night.
Keru forgot about this though as her marks, unique to Nature Children as symbolism of their
elements and nature they belonged to, glowed. The moon seemed to grow bigger and bigger, and at
this it changed; no longer was it completely white, only the outside glowed with its beauty while
strange yet familiar horror warnings began making themselves known and heard in her mind as Keru
saw un-faced and fuzzy shadows and running with jerky movements of panic, fear and desperation;
time was running out, the dark blacks and bloody red’s foreshadowed like the screaming cries of
different people and creatures making her mouth taste of its salty death taste and caked in mud dry.
These images and sounds repeated blurry and grew faster and faster in her mind; it was coming
soon, something, and it was dangerous and inevitable. Suddenly the last images as they race
together into one it turns into someone running with blood and burns and bareness as the image
speeds up.
Keru jumps abruptly off Robby’s back looking away from the window and moon but as she turns, she
finds him asleep along with Jai and Jami lying alongside each other. The fire was already out and the
even breaths heard around her and from the next door room told her they were all sleeping.
Confusedly, Keru looks to the window again hesitantly but this time finding the moon no longer high
in the sky, instead moving back down readying for its own slumber. Looking to Robby’s watch she
seeing it was four in the morning; 5 hours later from the last time they had looked to the time
meaning she had fallen asleep like the rest of them
Thinking, Keru slides quietly out from under their blankets and shivers on the edge of the bed at the
icy chill that touches her. With that Keru shifts finding herself a warm fur of a snow leopard cub and
stretches out before wandering slowly and quietly out of the hut into the night to wait for the soon
approaching morning. The ability unique to Spirit bearer Youngers alone
She wanders out looking around at her Nehele village that flourished like the rest in their world,
listening to the peaceful quiet that seemed to whisper eerily to her now, Keru shifts again into her
favoured small gibbon form then with her agility she jumps to one of the many trees and climbing it
high, she then sits on one of the rooftops of the huts huddling into herself from the cold wind and
waits for the sun to greet her with its warm rays and happy face in greet

***
Robby wakes slightly in the night feeling a chill race through his body and opening his eyes to the
snow leopard cub. When they had first arrived back home to Mother Nature, they had been at the
ages of their rebirths, 18 and 19 and progressively gotten younger until they had been six and seven
again; like the others, the ages they had been when they had left. The elements a Younger belonged
to, didn’t ripen inside them until they reached at least sixteen at the youngest, so once they had
returned as mere children again, they could no longer elemental through the land as their family
could, however Keru still had the ability to use Spirit and change shape.
The snow leopard trotted quietly to the front door before disappearing with a glance to him with her
emerald green eyes. ‘Go back to sleep’ Keru whispers gently to him and still heavily induced, he
obliges by lying back down, his eyes already closed but wondering thoughts robbed him of sleep
After a while of quiet with no movement except the slow even breathing of his little brother and
sister huddled beside each other on the warm ground beside the out fire, he sits up and a curious
face and putting a jacket on he strolls outside quietly looking for his Nature Child.
Robby looks up to the roof top seeing a small brown gibbon gazing in anticipating greet for the sun
that would appear in her line of sight in half an hour’s time. Keru was still though, like her thoughts,
like her small troubled body that sat hugging itself ignoring the cold wind of the frosty winter’s
morning. Robby didn’t intrude though, just watched his little Nature Child as she watched for the sun
At moments rise, Keru moved and started singing her call then made her way to the tree after a
while of warming up and enjoying its presence.
‘Wake Jai and Jami up, I'm going to Bree then from there I will go to Paco and the other Youngers
and meet you at Dagodan okay?’ she states suddenly making Robby blink in surprise but by the time
his mind could function properly to ask why she was already gone from sight
‘Why, Keru?’ through the bond he asks while heading back into the hut.
Once upon a time to Robby and the other Protector survivors, the idea of their Nature Children
traveling alone was not even thought of, it had been inconceivable. Even when Nature Children
when Wandering, it was together. Yet with the dangers gone, there was no need to be so overly
protective.
‘We need to all talk. Something’s going to happen’ she says to both him and into the others dreams
‘I’ll see you soon okay?’ she smiles in his mind then continues on ‘it’s annoying not able to elemental
everywhere huh?’ he jokes
‘Right now- yes’ she states grimly

***
Jumping, Keru holts as Camira appears from elemental travel in front of her with a smile
“Morning little one, how about we do this a little faster?” she states and Keru gratefully nods and
they go straight to Paco. All Youngers were connection, not as sensitively as Protectors to their Child,
the older Youngers would have known she was coming though.
“Ocoee, Coby” Keru knocks on the door while Camira goes to Tehalin for Stephan and Bree
They both sit up half expecting her but not her reason or her mood. The smile kindly and sit up
rubbing their eyes “morning little one” they both greet as usual and Keru smiles and takes a few
hesitant steps inside the room and whispers hoping not to wake the twins up; only 5yrs old
“I'm sorry to wake you up-“
“Don’t be” they both interrupt
Keru smiles lightly “I need to speak with you all urgently so if you could please meet me at Dagodan
that would be great. Camira has gone to Bree and Robby had the Twinlets and Kitchi, I'm going to
Wallemi now for Aloiki and Brelick and I’ll see you there” she smiles and before they speak she
disappears.

***
Heading the urgency they get up immediately and get ready
“I'm gonna go and get Keru and at Wallemi, I’ll meet you there?” Ocoee kisses his protector who
nods and they both disappear
Ocoee arrives as Keru picks up Brelick then Aloiki into an affectionate hug kissing their noses
“morning you three, thought you might like a lift” Ocoee states and eyes narrow suspiciously as Keru
jumps; she hadn’t done that since Tsu’gi Creature of the darkness 12 years ago…
Keru quickly smiles and nods, then sighs “I never used to have to ask for a ride”. She was nearly
seventeen which was when she had come into peak with her elements last time, right now when
danger was possible, she was no longer patient.
Ocoee grimaces and walks over giving her a warm hug like the big brother he was “not for too much
longer Keru, you come into peak in a year’s time so don’t worry” he reminds her and again grows
suspicious when he doesn’t receive a canny or any reply “let’s go” she states and as he picks up
Aloiki and Keru picks up Brelick, they depart and arrive with Tylan and Kiowai with Robby, Jai and
Jami who were still wiping their eyes
Ocoee watches subtly as Robby walks over and gives her a long quiet hug, just standing with her
while the others of their family talked and greeted the morning. He looks to Kiowai meeting her
similar gaze; watching Keru and Robby with a sinking feeling. The Nullahnaco Youngers, a rare
precious gift of hope given to them by Mother Nature when they had feared, after waiting for
twenty years, they would not come. Throughout all the dangers, the youngest of their era had been
the most vulnerable, always targeted.
“Um…” Keru began looking to the ground unsure and uneasy; anticipating their reactions
They wait patiently but Keru doesn’t speak but then she looks up meeting their eyes all except Aloiki,
Brelick, Noara and Kiwi then squeezing her eyes shut they all freeze as the images cross into their
minds quick and fast taking only a few seconds before disappearing and then slowly, they meet
Keru’s hard eyes. She half smiles and shrugs “I’m not very good at talking and I wasn’t sure of how
else to explain” watching them warily
“Something’s gonna happen and I don’t know when or why or how, but it’s coming” she looks up to
meet their eyes again “I thought I should let you know” she tells them honestly
Robby immediately spins her around, his eyes stern “and you’re not holding anything against us right
Keru?” he asks harshly and Keru shakes her head and breathes out. It was well known Keru Nehele,
his Child, would if she thought it would help them. “No. You all have a right to know this because I
also think it’s directed at us”
Robby’s eyes remain firm “I promise” Keru vows earnestly with a small smile and Robby removes his
hands to beside her waist
“You didn’t…” Camira subtly points to the 2 youngest pairs and Keru shakes her head ‘no’

***
Separating, Robby puts warm comforting arms around her crossed ones. “You’re worried,” he
observed solemnly. “Is that why you were out there this morning” he whispers in a soothing tone to
her ear, making Keru lean back into him and Robby in return tightening his hold on her and then
placing his chin on top of her head.
Robby sighs, closing his eyes for a moment. He leans back, taking her hair out from her pony tail as
he felt her head becoming a little tender.
‘it’s called a hair ache’ she edits him and he smirks.
‘yeah, okay’ he replies, putting the headache prone blue elastic band around his wrist before leaning
his head down. He nuzzles her neck, breathing her in. “Come on, Kiowai has ordered us all to Kitchi
clan by dusk. We’ll head home, grab some stuff. Kiowai said she would grab us in the afternoon, till
then we’ll just relax. Okay? ”
“Okay” she replied, pecking his cheek.

***
In late Afternoon, Keru went for a walk with Jai and Jami nearby in the edge of the forest slowly,
around the edge of Kitchi Clan. Keru kicks absent mindedly a rick on the ground while they stroll
aimlessly
“Keru, why are you sad?”
She looks up with a strange expression then back down “ I feel… funny… something’s…” she fades
unsure of how to explain her expectant confused feeling of anticipation from the warnings “it’s
strange…” she manages as they continued walking

***
Walking through the full moon light purposelessly while brushing past the trees and past the
creatures of the night that flourished around them, the Twinlets close nearby wandering when
suddenly the elementals react almost violently, circling forcefully into them but zooming into Keru.
They all throw their hands up from the sudden strong tornado force, seeing the wind whip closer
into Keru; separating her from the others who were all shouting with surprise.
Soon she was captured in an elemental ball of water, wind, earth and a glow twirling around her and
pushing in on her and down forcing her to her knees like tight unbreakable chains trapped her
painfully and she cries out with it and the fear.
Jai had Jami protectively under him holding her to the ground to prevent her from being thrown off
by the strong hurricane force that overwhelmed them all whipping harshly at them trying to push
them away, all while they could only glimpse at Keru as she cries out with the terror and pain
buckling to the ground through the aluminous elements and glowing and the wind that lashed at
them visibly as it let off and continued to build its energy
“Keru” Jami shouts out but it is barely audible over the strong overpowering thrashes of the
elements, eyes squinted shut. Jai struggled to keep hold of her and himself to the ground gritting
their teeth with determination pinning them both as the storm impossibly grew
The pressure suffocated and pressed on her; compelling her elemental states as her marks, the
Youngers and the Totems all shine glaringly in response to Keru the Nullahnaco in distress and the
then followed by her vinal pattern making her scream agonized; too young to wield such power all
while the elemental prison grew with intensity and closer and closer pushing with pressure, crushing
hard into her to the ground covering her crying face with her two hands with the vinal marks now
covering her whole body.
One her knees and bowing with her head in hands with the force of gravity and the elements vigor
while glowing gloriously with a beaming light shooting up in the air with a scream of Keru’s own and
the twinlets nearby; making her disappear into the bright ominous bright gleaming light, with
screams echoing, growing distant and indecisive until the light no longer exists, and Keru, is no more.

Keru feels the elementals fade and lift the harsh suffocating pressure from her, Keru listens to the
calming breaths and her slowing heart beat in her chest then around her. It was quiet with the sound
of no animals or the wind, of Jai and Jami and the forest. Hesitantly opening her eyes, she smells
alien.
Her dream warning invades her mind harshly then though but this time as it speeds up at the end of
the screaming, thrashing, desperation and running, the person grows closer before falling injured
and terrified into the dark unknown. The person turns and shrieks in a hollow raw terror, eyes of
emerald green, skin though crusted with blood it was golden brown like her hair only lighter. It was
her
Looking up from her crouched panting position she looks inquiring to a lamp post on the edge of a
street that she now sat in the middle of, then beside the lamp post were… houses, not huts or the
hammocks that she remembered, not the clan villages.
Disorientated and terrified in the unknown place of a suburban area, Keru quickly searches for
familiarity with wide frightened eyes feeling the strong Bondment sickness wrack her insides with
knowing. She calls out for Robby while her wide anxious panicky eyes seeking desperately for
familiarity “Robby!” she calls then picking herself up she runs
Keru looks to the sky; the only familiar thing to her now but even then it was different. She could see
no stars and no moon; instead it was covered over with clouds of a brewing storm and tinted an
orange colour from the steel works that worked 24 hours a day.
Keru then realizes this was her old world, the world of her second cruel upbringing with painful
memories she had been able to forget about until now.
Running blind, she suddenly falls over as she runs into a couple of teenagers. She shakes her head
from the fall and looks up with fear alert in her eyes skittishly but she falters as she meets her gaze
with a familiar dark brown curly boy with blue pure eyes
“Ayla?” he asks bewildered frozen in place
Ayla. That was her name when she had been reborn in the sister world, with her two younger
brothers, her mother and her dog. Keru’s mind races and fatigue takes over as her adrenalin leaves
her empty and worn out “Tyson?” she replies wearily to her youngest little now- big brother as his
face grows blurry and her mind fuzzes and recognizing the feeling she welcomes it from over the
pain and fear and Bondment sickness; dropping not too far to the ground.
Tyson picks his sister up numbly and dazed who looked the same to him as 12 years ago the last time
he saw her when he was only 5, then she had disappeared into a dream after they got a phone call
saying she had died. His 2 friends Georgia and Nate walked home with him to his brother Dylan’s
house and his wife Rachel; both 26 and Teddy who was unusually old; deaf, blind, toothless and
incoherent but the only thing left of their sister, and finally his niece Lully who was only 3 now but
instead of calling him uncle, he called her his big brother. Their mother had left them then shortly
died by the time Tyson was in year 8, but his older brother Dylan and wife, Rachel were already
married by then and they had both insisted ever since Dylan moved out a year before for him to stay
with him
“Ah, Dylan, we’re- er- back” he states hesitantly as he walks through the doors with his collapsed
young old sister in his arms
Dylan comes around and drops his coffee and favourite mug to the ground at her sight. Tyson
winces.
Grimacing, Tyson starts. “She just ran into me at the shops and collapsed” he explains to his gaping
brother
Tyson continues in with the help of Nate and they put her onto the couch. Tyson feels protective of
her suddenly as Nate stares at her longer than liked.
“Nate…” he warns and Nate shakes his head from his goggling at his sister and steps back, his eyes
still on the couch though making Tyson step in front of his view instinctly.
“Okay you two, would you like a lift?” Dylan asks wanting them gone. They smile “it’s alright Mr.
Wattle, we’ll see ya later Ty” they wave and leave
Dylan turns to Tyson who shrugs, than they turn to their out cold sister who hadn’t aged a year
“Is it me, or is she younger than you remember her?” Tyson asks. She had been nearly eighteen
when she had disappeared.
“Younger. Definitely” Dylan nods
They stare at her for a long moment, then Rachel comes down the stairs and gasps at their sister,
looking to a framed picture of them all at the beach together taken 12 years ago and yet she looked
the same
Dylan goes to her and gives her a reassuring hug while Tyson grimaces “I just found her. It’s
definitely her though” he states
Dylan sighs and picks her up “I don’t want her down her by herself” and takes her to their guest
room beside Tyson and Dylan/Rachel’s room with an on suite and safety.
“I’ll stay in her room, you two can go to bed” Tyson states though knowing Dylan would hardly be
sleeping, he nods and Tyson lies beside her on the side of the door; knowing his sister’s reactions
and instincts; anticipating them
***
Jami whimpers as the event ceases and aftershock take control, she rolls into his and her Child, Jai
sits up pulling her with him looking dazedly to where Keru was no longer, the only evidence of her
existence being the marks where the elements had circled into the ground and where it was both
wet, windblown and burnt with vines wielded in the area in a subtle circle where she once was only
second before.
The Youngers then appear in the scene looking to them all immediately reaching Jai and Jami helping
them up then following their gaze to the only evidence left.
“What…” they started
“She said she felt something funny was gonna happen” Jai dazedly speaks
“She got a feeling” Jami adds numbly
“Then this tornado wrapped around her like the elemental glow but everything. Then all the marks
on her and us started glowing and the storm kept growing and”
“She was screaming and it tied her down and then…”
“Keru disappeared” they both finish while the Youngers follow on in their minds
“But where did she go!” Robby asks urgently pacing
“Robby!” she cries out ‘Robby!’ he pauses hearing it and looks searchingly around. She was in the
middle of a black road and a single orange light shone, a lamp
“A lamp?” the others ask then realization dawns and they all gasp. To their surprise, Kiowai takes off
into elementals away from them and Tylan “Kiowai!” he calls outraged and surprised, but she was
gone from his grasp. He presses his hands to his temple pained from her and the sudden Bondment
pulling
Robby transfixed in Keru’s mind still; unable to break free because the Bondment sickness made
them cling with survival instincts together
A dream of the same warnings flicked through his mind; the inevitability and closeness, the
desperation and fear and screaming, then a single face comes into his mind as Keru turns and runs
falling with a cry
Then Keru abruptly stands and runs through the night unknown; along, frightened and unable to
contact him and the others Keru! He calls desperately to assure her but she doesn’t hear. She
couldn’t feel him at all. They were so far apart and alone and frightened
Suddenly she runs into a familiar face “Ayla?” “Tyson?” then she collapses as does Robby into
nothingness of pain, confusion and distress; the Bondment sickness pulling at them.
“Robby!” Tylan catches him and Robby feels his hand on his forehead

***

Kiowai runs fast and obliviously through the forest to eventually find herself at her village’s gates.
Not stopping she heads straight for her hut where her son Obey was looking after his little sister
Raiya. She pauses before taking her small little daughter into her safe arms with Obey beside her
“What’s wrong?” he asks putting a hand onto her shoulder. Fresh hot tears travel down her eyes
again, then holding little Raiya close asleep “Keru’s gone” burying her face in her daughter’s wavy
light brown hair “she’s gone again” she mumbles, envisioning Keru trapped in the elemental’s
chained to the ground, her head arching up with a cry of pain then curled into her hands as she
disappears, to the other world, alone with no protector no Youngers no Carers no family, vulnerable,
lost, defenseless with no abilities. Her little precious sister, who had saved her from the Rebels when
they had both been caught and locked into a scientific laboratory, who had helped her find her
Protector and husband Tylan, linked them, taken a bullet for her. Her sister she had promised at six
years old when the rebels had finally attacked the Nehele village all those decades ago that she
would come for her, would always protect her. After all the battles she had fought to survive, to help
them all survive through the years and dangers. And now she was gone from all of their reach. Their
hope, was out of all of their reaches.

***
Carrying Robby still unconscious, Tylan enters Kitchi clan anxiously then slower, to his hut to find
Kiowai curled on the lounge with their young daughter Raiya only 8 with her wavy hair sorrowfully
reminding him of Keru; of that little tiny ray of hope that was born after 20 years of waiting, longing
and fear that she would not come, and now she was taken from them all and Robby. Robby who lay
unconscious in his arms, and his distraught Nature Child who lay on the lounge clinging to her
daughter with Obey eyeing them with concern.
Tylan meets his eyes gloomily “Come on then Obey, I’d think Takonem and my granddaughter Era
will be wanting you back around now” he smiles to his son who returns it easily “do you want some
help?” he asks eyeing Robby then Kiowai “No, it should be fine, you go home and get some sleep” he
tells him
After a moment he stands “Keru’s gone?” he asks with a sad expectant tone. Obey and Robby had
been born months apart, and a year later Keru. With low births at the time, the three had been close
friends. Tylan looks down trying to contain the sudden emotion he felt rile up in him. Taking a
moment to compose himself he replies “Yes, she’s gone”
“Is there any way you can get her back?” Obey asks with an urgency plead, his eyes pleading with
hope and desperation.
Because she had brought hope to their lands as well. A hope they hadn’t known they had needed.
And then again and again after that.
Tylan looks down again, his eyes wet with tears and shakes his head slightly biting his lips with
doubtfulness and uncertainty “I don’t know” he whispers, his eyes close in anguish “I really don’t
know” looking to Robby remembering them as babies, remembering his first year alone searching
for her like no other Protector at such an age, seeing him babble explaining something to them while
he pressed his little hands and body to the totem stones, seeing him hold baby Keru and sneeze at
the same time, seeing him point to her and say “found her”; his one of first words; first being her
name. Tylan couldn’t fathom seeing Robby when he would wake, to see his eyes, to share his
tortured Bondment sick mind and broken heart.
Tylan lays Robby onto one of their many beds, hearing him mumble restlessly as he lies him down
and puts the blanket gently onto him. Watching Robby, he seemed like the small young child again
with his familiar frown he carried for his first year, seeing him asleep lying unconscious in this room
again.
Tylan then moves back downstairs to his sleeping Nature Child and daughter, picking Raiya’s little
body up first and into her small cozy room and bed, watching as she curled and sucked her thumb
still with a similar frown on her face to the rest of them which Tylan smoothens out with a brush of
his fingers, then kissing her forehead and walking back down the corridor, he moves finally to
Kiowai, her stress and anxiety radiating from her almost. Tylan sits beside her and kisses her cheek
while brushing her hair back and then taking her hand in his he lies down beside her on the lounge
facing her and falling deep into sleep
***
Keru wakes hearing a hushing soothing voice, then she realized it was because she was crying; her
heart felt as though it was slowly dying as it burnt through her painfully from the Bondment sickness
like her mind. She was tossing and turning with the pain and steady hands were on both side of her
holding her in place “sshh…”the voice says again and slowly she opens her eyes to the blue eyed,
dark haired boy Tyson. She gulps stifling her vocalizations then with a distraught hiccup.
Tyson’s hands only loosen like his face
“Ah Ayla? What’s happening?” Tyson asks; he was always an outspoken child, always asking
questions like she “why are you the same as I remember you from the fire?” memory reminds her of
that event and Keru frowns Ayla, Ayla… that was my name here; Ayla she recognizes then
“Do you know where Robby is?” she asks in a whisper of a voice. Tyson’s face fills with confusion
again “Robby?” he was only 5. Tylan had been only five the last time she had seen him.
“The boy, the one I… stayed with” she states with a slow memory trying to remember all those years
ago.
Dylan then appears as he knocks on the door making her jump and he eyes his sister with concern
and an affectionate smile before walking and sitting on the edge of the bed “I remember Robby, is
that who you’ve been with?”
Keru nods rocking “don you know where he is?” she asks again looking like the vulnerable child she
felt like. Dylan and Tyson look to each other grimacing sympathetically before returning gazes to her
“Ayla why haven’t you aged?” they ask quieter and she eyes them
“If I explain you will think I'm crazy. It is a very long story crossing 3life cycles” their eyes remain the
same but through her words they grew some recognition “does it have something to do with you
tattoo mark?” Tyson asks and Keru gasps moving her hands to her forehead “oh shoot, I haven’t got
cover up” she states a little frantic
Dylan puts a hand to her knee and she reflexively jerks “it’s okay, Rachel has some” he said with a
smile
“You’re married?”
“Yup” he smiles smug almost then Tyson eyes her and rolls his eyes making her smile
She sighs “it might be easier if you ask the questions and I’ll answer best I can” she states wary
“Does it have to do with the fire too?” Tyler adds quickly. She smiles at him, remembering his bubbly
baby face. As the Nullahnaco, she belonged to all nature, including fire. When their house had
caught alight when the Rebels had found where she had lived at the time, Keru had gotten her
brothers and cat out of the house unscathed because she had been able to repel the fire- for a
period of time. Being so young, she hadn’t been able to control fire and she had gotten burned from
it as well. Her brother had seen it though and they had promised to keep the secret. They had, and
they would now she decided.
Keru nodded in response
“Why haven’t you aged?” Dylan asked first.
She puffs out and lets out a small nervous laugh “this is a big one” she states they remain firm
“Okay, remember I said 3 life cycles? This is my 3 rd, my second was with you when we were younger
and the fire and my first was in a completely different place altogether with Robby and my siblings
and Carers and clans” she starts and they are gaping at her. Staying on topic “I am what’s called a
Nature Child, Robby is my Protector that I am bonded with and Ella and Coban are my Carers, my
siblings are like me also like me except I am what is called a Nullahnaco because I belong to all of
nature, meaning when I come of age, wind, fire, water, spirit and earth elementals are with me
unlike the others whom belong to one or two elementals.”
She lets them take this in and remind them of the fire and her glow “that’s called the elemental glow
and when the fire fell onto us and didn’t hurt us that was the first fire elemental” she explains and
waits for them before continuing
“my first cycle, I was born and lived until I was 6 but an evil came upon us and the Nature Childs
were sent here for protection where they were separated from their Protectors and Carers and
Siblings for precautions until they would be found again, that was my 2 nd cycle as I was reborn here
but not genetically and stayed until I was 18. Afterwards we seeked each other out until we found a
way home and stopped the evil, then during 2 years, Robby and I began growing younger and after
another event we turned back to our true age of 6. 10 years later where we are now, yesterday I was
taken from my home and my protector and put here. It is by coincidence that I ran into Tyson from
the threat”
The boys take a while to absorb and comprehend this “so your 16 now then” Tyson states finally
then smiles “I'm older than my big sister” he states smugly and she smiles “ah, but in a way, I would
be more than 30 by now if I had remained on my 1 st cycle” she states
“And you don’t know where Robby is now?” Dylan asks concerned
Keru begins rocking again with pain in her face showing, her eyes closed “he’s not here, he is home
with my clan and family and I am alone” she tells him
“You aren’t alone, you may be different by blood but you are still our sister” Dylan states truthfully
“It is not safe. I am a threat.” She states to him matter of fact “well considering you are on 16 and
without your protector, you are in our care for now until we can sort this out and get you home”
Dylan tells her with an authority that made her look to him curiously. “Don’t give me that look Ayla,
you listen to me. I don’t care what you say, you’re staying here and listening to me” he tells her
sternly
“You said bonded what does that mean?” Tyson asks
“Protector and Child are bonded through the heart the mind and the soul. We are a part of each
other, can feel each other and talk through the connection in our minds. There is a thing called
Bondment sickness. When we are separated, we grow ill from it. The longer the distance, the more
dangerous it gets. It is as though you are a soul in two bodies, once you are separated you are
beginning to split. The connection seeks each other out and we grow more and more vulnerable
with it” she shakes her head distressed and agonized “he is so far away I cannot connect with him, I
cannot feel anything but pain and anguish and the growing sickness. We feel each other’s pain
though; it grows as it is the only way to connect us together through desperation. If he is injured, I
bare his marks, if I am hurt, if I am injured or sleep, he bares the same fate” she meets their horror
eyes “if I don’t not reconnect with him again and remove this Bondment sickness we will cease it is
that bad. It is killing us” she tells them
“You are going to stay here Ayla. Robby and your Siblings won’t let that happen, they will find you.
Until then we need to keep you safe. You will do as I say, do you understand?” Dylan asks her
fiercely
“Do you have another name to Ayla?” Tyson asks
“Keru, Keru Nehele, Nature Child of Robby” she whispers before she suddenly faints
“Does that mean she fainted, or Robby?” Tyson asks Dylan who glares at his little brother

***
After breakfast and still nothing while not letting Kiowai out of his hold, they hesitantly move up the
stairs to where Robby slept quietly. Opening the door though, they find him no longer asleep and no
longer there “Robby?” Tylan calls out hastily moving further into the room ‘Robby’ he calls out for
him searching through the bonds finding nothing, alarmed he looks to his Nature Child who warily
returns his panicked gaze and they rush out taking Raiya with them and Elementaling to Nehele Clan
to find him not returned to his home clan either and no one to have seen him
‘Is Robby with you, have you seen him?’ they both urgently ask the other Nature Youngers who jolt
up in hysterical panic and moving their children to Kitchi, they frantically search for the one young
miracle Protector of theirs, unable to deal with the loss of both a Nature Child and a Protector. No
one could find him though despite their desperate pain filled cries of his name that filled the air and
earth and water around them, through the trees and grasses, through the villages, people and
animals

***
Robby wakes in such pain he thought was not possible to be alive while the only word remained
imprinted to his mind heart soul and tongue begged and pleaded and cried out desperately for the
one that could put them all at rest. Waking with fierce determination through both of their pain,
Robby’s face held only its hunt for her, his search for her. Quietly, he runs out of the Kitchi clan and
does not stop as he travels to each village, each stream, tree, cliff and mountain searching for Keru
in any way possible to somehow find her and bring her back to him. That is all that mattered. Not his
thirst or hunger and not his need for sleep and rest, nothing stopped him for the 3 days that he ran
with the speed and stealth of any protector and searched; nothing contenting him until he found
some way of returning her to him, back to her rightful place beside him no matter the cost.
On the fourth day, he returned to the totem sacred place where he was drawn like the other places
and weeping, he listened and prayed and begged through their connection and to their mother
nature for this was wrong and unnatural; Child and Protector were not meant to be separated so.

***
Searching relentlessly with such raw fear that ate at them all, fear of what had become and what
was becoming of the precious and miracle Child and Protector they do not breathe and their hearts
do not restart as they find Robby where they had once found him on his first year. At the totems he
had his face to the ancient scripture totem listening to it, his mind held nothing, spoke nothing, felt
nothing that they could cohere. It was as though he was the babbling baby child again that spoke an
unknown language that no one understood but his partner who was lost from them. Taken from
them leaving a whole in their hearts, knowing only that she was in the other world they could not
reach, not knowing what was happening to her, not able to feel her or protect her or secure her with
them, and it was the hardest off all things to accept, that such a terrible thing could occur; that a
precious Nature Child Younger- their little one, would be taken from her home, family and most
importantly her protector. It was worse than losing their brothers and sisters to the rebels or any
when they perished because they knew they had returned to their Mother, they knew where they
were but for Keru, sweet, little, precious Keru was lost, utterly and completely alone and separated
from them all.
Just then, Robby’s marks glow followed by the totems then followed by theirs; flashing in
recognition and they alertly watch. Robby begins talking in the ancient tongue to Keru; his longing,
his sorrow, his pain and his irrevocable need for her by his side; to protect her, to love her, to keep
her safe and secure by him and to end the bonding sickness that threatened to destroy them
Kiowai steps in front of them letting go of Tylan battling tears and moves to him slowly at the totem
rock
“All will be well little one, we will have her back again” she whispers only to him as she then fold him
securely into her motherly arms keeping him close to her eyes closed with her face pressed into his
cheek and sharing his pain, Kiowai eases it from him. Slowly then, the marks fade and Robby’s hands
accept her support as they lift up and wrap around hers that were tight on him
Kiowai begins singing softly and gentle into the wind, its affect soothing on them all as the trees
begin swaying in rhythm and the clouds thin out with its calming affect like the earth. It was the
ancient song they had learnt as youngen and Camira joins in then melding her voice to the tunes and
soft lulling that calmed the seas and the rivers and the waterholes. It was of hope and their deep
connections to one another and the earth “…that the trees with flow with the life of the sea, as each
wave travels like the wind and a soft flame, like the rain that gives us life, as our bare feet walk on
the rich soil. We breath, we cry, we weep, bring up hope that we stay and continue and grow, bring
us hope the land continue like the endless waves of the sea, like the endless strand of the wind, like
the always falling rain and the rejuvenating flame with the earth and nature apart of all…” we sang
in hope, with sorrow, with pain of our little sister’s takings from us “… as the gentle precious seed of
life is blown from us through the wind to a desolate place out of our reach with no rain, no sun, no
air and no love …”
They sang of hope “and one day it shall be returned to us, with the rain and sun, with the air and the
love, and once again the seed with be nurtured”
At the end of their song, Kiowai picks up Robby whom they had put to sleep and as Tylan took him
into his arms once again, they all silently travel back.

***
Tyson to school, Rachel to work and Dylan babysitting, Keru stays in her room where he had locked
her in while he had need to go to the shops. Keru trembling from the Bondment she fearfully sits at
the door with her ears on it listening skittishly, knowing her being here in this old world was set up.
It knew she had been separated from the others and whether it was for her or for her family at
home she did not know, the others had said she would be the target for being the Nullahnaco
though and for Robby, she would not let them take her until she saw him again nor would they let
them touch him. Somehow she had to get home, to Robby, to her family, to her clan where she
belonged. Closing her eyes, Keru travels through her memories once again of Robby with his arm
around her tight and protective beside her, his smile and his fierce eyes, then taking a deep breath
she opens her eyes and focuses for the danger she knew followed her; her body could feel it.
Keru’s heart stops as she hears the door creek open then two slow quiet and confident steps into
the house. It was not Dylan she knew but Keru remained frozen listening with terror in her. She
needed Robby so badly, she was so alone, so utterly alone with no elementals, no Protector, no
family, no familiarity. She was dead.

***
Robby’s eyes un-focus at the words ‘she is dead’ that echoes into his mind and he stands facing the
ground, then his Protector marks shine as he hears a door creek open from behind an upstairs door
and the confident quiet footsteps that walk in and analyse before they make their way up the stairs.
Keru’s frightened breathing was faster than her heart, her body trembling viciously she steps back
from the door and looks desperately around. There was nowhere to hide or escape though, only the
locked door in front of her and standing fisted, terrified and determined she waits as the footsteps
stop like the shadow in front of her locked door then shake the door handle. Silence greets them
before the door is suddenly kicked open and simultaneously a dart is shot from the masked man
with a bag in his arms at her making her instantly drop to the ground
Robby drops simultaneously with her feeling the dart prickle his neck and the weakening substance
enter through his trembling body.

***
Dylan arrives home to find his front door open and races inside “Ayla!” he calls desperately and
seeing the house and shoe marks heading upstairs where the walls were menacingly torn with a
knife up them, he runs up the stairs to see wood debris shattered around her room and her door
kicked from the outside and lay broken on the ground inside her room. Beside her bed the blankets
had been pulled down as he presumed she had fallen. “Ayla!” he calls again with fear, then calls the
police, Rachel and picks up Tyson.

***
It is dark now and Keru looks around her; defensive, tense and skittish. Her breathing was coming in
panicked pants and her eyes shot edgily around her expecting an attack. Her body naturally
trembled now with equal pain and fear from her unknown threat who took her here and from the
Bondment sickness that ached through her. She could not remain still though, her body would not
allow it as it grew hysterical from her long separation from her Protector completely cut off from
him all except for the reminding Bondment sickness that told her none other than that she needed
her protector and that they were bonded. Nothing else but the pain she knew they both felt grow
and build inside them as the hours past them. Her mind continued to seek out Robby’s from instinct;
calling him to her desperate for him.
Keru unthinkably suddenly darts off running away through the forest needing to escape, needing to
find Robby but knowing he was nowhere near or beside her like her mind alluded itself to. Tears
streaked her face as she ran but hearing pursuing steps she turns suddenly to face it. Suddenly a net
envelops her knocking her to the ground with harsh impact while her mind remains dazed at the
horrible familiarity. Harsh hands grip her up from the ground making her meet green icy eyes of
hatred while capturing her eyes into Dr Karigan’s before a needle is plunged into her throat making
her grunt at the pain it brings.
Dr. Karigan had been one of the searching rebels of the sister world who had found her and Kiowai,
then taken them from family, told them they were dead while they had conducted experiments on
them.
She had thought like all of their world, the Rebels were all gone now after the Great Tsu’gi of
Darkness had been defeated and they had once more, returned to the Great Mother into their true
forms of animals. Apparently, that wasn’t the case.
As the anesthetic travels through her body, Keru holds herself stiff and glaring into his eyes with
disbelief and determination before her body uncontrollably slumps and drops as Dr K throws her to
the ground with his ruthful smile of victory playing across him

Keru wakes with Dr K crouched in front of her strapped body “Good morning Keru Ayla, how nice to
see you again” he states with his menacing eyes. He had been her doctor, had hypnotized her and
Kiowai, taking their wills and freedom from them, nearly killing them.
“I am flattered by your words sir but I do not reciprocate them at all.” She tells him flatly and
truthful, her voice polite and formal, just as they had been forced to do at the labs, in fear he would
harm them worse. Just like she feared now.
He smiles only wider “do you know where you are Nullahnaco?” he asks. Keru watches him while
she quickly orientates herself around the area and gasps remembering this was the first time she
had been taken by rebels; from school and into this house where the machine… her breathing grew
more pronounced and she immediately began struggling glaring feverishly with hatred at the man
who only smiled in front of her. The machine that Rebels had created to drain the elemental powers
of Youngers in their world, killing them off down to only five Youngers, the machine, they had
strapped her to and nearly killed her with
The machine that had taken Amaroo’s life.
“Before you managed to destroy Felix and our clan, myself and others were sent back in order to
recover some tools of ours.” Felix had been the Rebel leader before he had been freed back to the
Great Mother.
He continued. “When we reported back only a few months ago we were quite upset that you had
destroyed out plans”
“I am not yet of age” she and her Bondment sickness offers. If she wasn’t of age, they could get the
power from her, or Robby
They all merely laugh at her “That does not matter my Nullahnaco, not at all” Dr Karigan caresses her
face making her growl and rip her face away
“But Tsu’gi no longer reins you!” she screams with no control only the need to escape the machine
she was tied to. No elementals and no protector could save her though
“Yes we recovered our master’s destruction where it were once of decay now nothing but smelling
of the fresh putrid stench of your touch Nullahnaco” he growls
In a softer voice she tries, “we can free you though, like Felix and-“ Dr Karigan slaps her hard making
her cheek bruise and where his metal rings had grazed, they left scratches on her- and Robby
She screams in rage at him “let me go!” she cries. The Bondment sickness desperation reaching out
once again making her shake
Dr Karigan stands and turns to the machine switches where the others also stood watching with
death in their eyes
Keru hears the machine start at the touch of their fingers to the buttons and suddenly, she grows
calm no longer moving and struggling.
Her heart rate slows like her breathing and her eyes blink easily as if she were merely sitting on the
ground beside Kiowai in Canada with her Siblings when they had gone to find their final sibling
Camira. It was as if she were sitting around the fire again, as if she could hear wolf howl in the
distance like before. Closer, the chats and soft laughs of Amaroo and Ocoee while seeing Robby’s
protective eyes watching her casually, glistening in the shine from the steady warm flames.
In her mind, Keru is merely watching the flames now. She is alone with it and the fire is dancing
gently with its intricate red and orange with white. It is warm and cozy while Keru simply sits with
her hands beside her watching it curiously and easily. She takes a deep soothing breath and closes
her eyes as the warm engulfs her keeping her close, tortured screaming curdles could be heard
around her now
Keru opens her eyes meeting Dr Karigan’s who was obviously not enjoying her calmness. He liked to
see the pain and fear, the struggle he caused.
Doctor Karigan’s smile still remained knowing that he brought death with him to her though. To her
and Robby. Meeting his eyes evenly she then simply loosens her whole body, feeling her limps and
fingers, her chest and lungs relax as she closes her eyes once again and leans her head back against
the machine that itched for her death as it began draining her.
It didn’t take very long, as she watched the fire it began to soften and slow, it began to shrink slowly
until she was huddled into herself arms around her legs and rocking with cold, feeling her face no
longer with colour as it too, was drained away from her. The fire growing smaller and smaller as she
watched, but she could no longer bare to watch it, no longer bare to think of the wolf and Canada,
the night sky and northern lights, the laughter. She was too cold now
She feels hands wrap around her shoulders then travel down to around her legs holding her close.
Robby’s face tucked into her neck from behind and he kept her in a protective warm embrace while
the fire continued to dwindle and dwindle until it was no longer warm ash that glowed with the
amber shades left behind while they listened to the multiple screams, cries and shrieks of the dying

***
Robby kneeled down out of breath in the early morning in Kitchi clan, panting as if no air could reach
his lungs. He was against the bed with one hand on it to lift him while the other was on the ground
preventing him from falling over
Tylan and Kiowai were suddenly there with arms around him, followed by Ocoee and Camira.
Their voices were echoes “Robby…” it fades “Robby… Open your… eyes” slowly he manages to
comply only partly as he continued to slowly open and close them growing cold and incoherent,
feeling his body drain into nothing.
The other faces of his siblings were there now also he noticed but only one he seeked and called
“Keru…” he mumbles
He was falling limb and his body trembled with the cold and of Keru. Eyes closing “Robby, open your
eyes!” Tylan commands, he doesn’t comply though feeling his body relax in his and Kiowai’s arms,
listening to his slowing heart and breath as they even out quietly “she’s going” he speaks
The others shook their heads watching Robby disappear from them
“What is happening to him?” Jai and Jami ask crying. Ocoee and Coby were already preoccupied with
Aloiki and Brelick who were struggling in their arms crying to grab the Twinlets also. Camy and
Stephan did
“Robby’s not feeling very well”
“Make him better then! Get a healer!” they scream at him
They patiently shake their heads at them “only Keru can heal him” he tells them “Keru is very sick
too though. The bad people that took her are hurting her too much” Stephan tells them through an
emotion voice
“They’re rebels.” Kiowai suddenly realizes aloud. They all stare at her “they can’t be Kiowai, Keru-“
“They are Rebels. They are draining her.” She shouts louder in a furious voice “how-“
She shakes her head at them “They are rebels” meeting their eyes “they have more than one
machine that drains and not all returned here. Including Dr Karigan” she tells them putting
everything together
Robby drops then “Robby! Robby!” they shout at to him

***
‘Robby! Robby!’ Keru lifts her head up still feeling Robby’s arms around her, cold also.
Keru turns on him, his eyes remaining closed “Go back!” she shouts to him with the energy that
remained in her “Go back Robby!” she cries with tears in her eyes.
She lifts his face up and harshly forces her lips onto his with desperation “Wake up and Go Back!”
she tells him “don’t die, don’t die, don’t die. Please don’t die” she chants
She suddenly screams and grabs her chest as if something stabbed her, dropping to the ground
wincing “Robby! Go! Please!” she tells him looking to him. His eyes open and simultaneously, he
disappears and she screams with the pain in her chest, finding herself still strapped to the machine
that was no longer on and a needle pulled out after being plunged into her chest
Her eyes were dazed like her body. Unable to focus herself, someone takes the restrains off and lifts
her up then in the same movement throws her into a metal wall and she collapses to the ground.
This time she knew Robby would not feel it because she made sure of it. He would not die because
of her.

***
Robby opens his eyes again blinking profusively on the bed beside Kiowai “Kiowai” he whispers and
she hugs him fiercely “They are Rebels and Dr Karigan” he confirms her and she nods then he adds
“and I cannot find her. Not even the Bondment sickness lures me” he weeps and Kiowai stunned
holds him all the more tighter crying and mourning with him
‘I will not leave you. Wait for me’ Robby hears and he sobs louder and harder at his Nature Childs
voice he yearned to hear beside him. His heart wrenched it seemed into two.

***
‘My protector, my Robby’ Keru sobs hard feeling the broken bones of her sides, her head thumping
hard, feeling her and her protectors pain. She dreamed of only him, for the one day they would
return to be together once again. And they would. With all their heart and soul they would
“Robby!” she calls as soon as she is able to move her lips, her body still stiff and paralyzed like her
eyes as she lay strapped and in a bag
They stop and she cringes away from the light she had grown unaccustomed to then to the hand
that moved towards her; sealing her mouth shut before lifting her up once again
‘Keru…’
‘I'm here, I'm here’ she replies trying to calm her protector’s immense pain she had created in him
Keru sobs “I'm here…” bound and strapped and gagged, I'm here.
Keru is put to the ground then and she readies herself for the light again but finds it is dusk. Looking
around, they are in a circle around her. Keru can’t move though, still so weak and pained. The rebels
held and spoke the ancient language, then the forced elementals swamped once again; forced into
their bidding which she promised she would free. Chains strapped her suddenly down and she cries
out in the gag then further as her marks are forced to glow then her vinal glow.
It was the ritual of seizing and it was only strong enough to force the Nullahnaco because they would
need all elementals for it and they had her elementals in control after draining her and Robby but
because she was underage she could not fight back. This prison was a trap, a curse and
indestructible. They had the full advantage and she had none like her siblings.
As the prison cell envelops stronger and stronger, applying pressure into her the glow begins again
and they once again leave.
Simultaneously they arrive to their new destination, yet she is still in the prison; still chaining her
down and circling her with her marks still glowing in their control and her nose bleeding
Dr Karigan walks to her smiling then forcing her eyes to him, “You are no longer in control
Nullahnaco” he tells her then with his permission the elementals diminish away and Keru shaking
with fatigue collapses to the ground energy drained still remaining on the verge of the danger. By
keeping her so low, they had optimum control over her and from whatever else they had done to
her; able to control her elementals, her state and her marks after being able to take her from Robby
and capture then contain her fully.
Keru’s heart jumps as she realizes where they were; back home. Finally. Her mind travelled through
the situations though because it didn’t make sense to her.
They separated her from the others when she was unable to use her elementals, they must have
allowed her out of the elemental chamber she figured, or they didn’t have as much control on her as
they did now. The needles maybe? They drain her and Robby nearly completely to death then
another needle, and now they were back…where they could completely control the elementals, her
apparently, and kept her well drained and energy drained. It didn’t make any sense to her
They had wanted to get her separated… to get more control of her after taking her abilities? What
were they planning to do now that they were back and presumably succeeded.
Then Keru remembered her warnings, of screaming and crying and inevitability and running. She
remembered because then, she heard the screaming and crying, she also so smoke.
Keru sat staring as she forced herself to her bottom and feet; her knees to her chest and her hands
tied behind her back then strapped all together; they were taking no precautions
‘Robby’ she calls with no reply and not connection, only both of their Bondment sickness ever since
the draining; her yearning and knowledge of him being close and yet so out of reach was burning her
so deeply her tears burned her eyes and her face and her gag tasted more salt than blood. She was
so worried for him, it had grown worse since the machine had almost ended their lives, after she had
sent him back, after she had kissed him and her heart was stabbed- the needle! She remembered in
the labs Doctor Karigan had injected her with something that made it hard for Robby and her to
commute to get her out.
What had the need done?! She worried hysterically. It was obvious they had done something to her
though as the they stood there and the Rebels smug, that no one realized they had returned; no
realized they even existed.

One of the big men dragged her from behind away from the scene they had just created. Not caring
for them, she struggled knowing it was useless; she only desired to make herself as difficult as
possible to their plans
“If you do not behave we will finish Nehele off first, and you will be the one to destroy it” Dr K’s
threat immediately stilled her and her eyes wide. He smiled victoriously. Keru watches and listens to
the screams and smoke as they moved in the opposite direction away. Looking around, she realized
it to be Dagodan clan and her heart wrenched for them. They arrive at the now reconstructed rebel
village of white moon valley next to the village- and no one had ever noticed. There were only 4 huts
though; there were only a very few left, and yet Dagodan was burning down and the screams were
not mistaken for anything but.

That night she was chained also, inside of one of the huts alone where there were no windows and
only the bolted door where the only air was from under the door. She breathed slowly and begged.
Please, please, please… help me, please Keru pleads the elementals that were in control of by Dr K
She spent the night in deep thought and drifting with her fatigue but when the sun rose as she saw
the light shine at the bottom of the door, she grew an idea
‘Desperate times call for desperate measures’ she tells herself watching it then taking a deep breath
she shape shifts into a gibbon; unable to change into a worm or her elementals she improvised with
what she had. Instead, she could only change into the symbolized creatures. The sister cheetah and
leopard of the great plains, the gibbon of the canopy and snow leopard of the alps had been Amaroo
and Keru’s favourite.
Then as loud and true as she could, she sang at the door pleading someone would hear it, though
knowing their location was isolated severely she kept singing and calling until she could no more.
Hearing the doors open beside her, she runs to the chains and shape shifts back then as the door
unlocks and Rebels barge in they see nothing different and grunts back out. Keru sighs in relief and
listens with desperately whispering I love you, I love you, I love you… to her Protector, knowing he
would not hear her though

***
Tylan and Kiowai didn’t not leave his line of sight as they watched him hard and wary knowing he
and Keru were the strongest bound of Nature Youngers that were ever encountered. Keru was gone
and they feared for him
Jai! Jai! Where are you! Jai! They all suddenly hear Jami cry out in terror
Jai!!! She calls again desperately. They were already there though and paused at the sight of history
repeating itself. Of the great pilgrimage. Smoke and flames rose high and wide around the village
while there were people running away screaming while others carried flames and through it on the
huts. Some had women and children dragging them with knives before brutally cutting them and
watching them drop lifeless down with the smile they recognized as the rebel like their marks, then
they fled
Grabbing Jami then Robby hastily, they run while Tylan looks for Jai with fear “Jai” he calls ‘Jai’ they
all call searching. No one was left though.

***
Camira hugged Jami fiercely when suddenly she squeezes out of her hold and into the bushes
disappearing “Jami!” she calls out with surprise before taking after her
“Camy!” they all call after her then
Camy manages to slimly follow little Jami until they then find Jai kneeling and watching something.
Jami hugs him fiercely and he reciprocates with a quick kiss before telling them to be quiet. They all
kneel down and watch, waiting to see what he did
Keru is dragged out by chains from a bolted room unmoving then further down to the river bed
where she is dragged in, pushed underwater then dragged back out and thrown into the bolted
room again. The rebels walk off then.
“Right” Jai says and stands. Camira quickly grabs him and Jami then elemental away to Stephan who
instantly grips her tight and shakes her with the twinlets in her grasp “You stupid women, don’t
ever-“
“Keru” she breaks out and everyone stares at her dangerously while Tylan’s hand tightens on Robby
who tries shrugging it off and looks to the ground, never speaking.
They whisper harshly “what about Keru”
She hesitates and looks to the twinlets in her hands that also hesitate then look down. Camira sighs
and looks away also. Keru was dead and a trailing tear ran down Camira’s face as did Robby’s who
quickly wiped it away and tried shrugging Tylan off again. Tylan tightens in response “Robby…” he
warns. Robby merely looks down not responding. It had been a week since he had spoken; since he
had woken
Tylan sighs then glares at Camira who grimaces apologetically before they continue on their way “we
need to keep alert now if rebels are back…” Tylan fades and pauses again, looking to Camira and the
Twinlets who grimace ‘then Keru is?...’ Camira hesitantly looks up to meet his eyes
They stare at her for long time before Tylan comes to his senses and looks to Robby and curses
“Where the hell was it” he growls searching for Robby who was no longer beside him or in his grip

***
Robby arrives and sits watching with his heart vulnerable at the knowledge of Camira. He flinches
hearing young girl’s muffled tortured scream that was pained beyond belief from one of the small
huts that had been rebuilt. It reminded him too much of Keru, is cry he could imagine coming from
her lips and with his name. Unable to withstand the cries, Robby bulks and runs back, his heart was
too sore for this. He ached numb and empty with tears down his face for his should to be rejoined
once again, the face of Keru always emerging into him. He drops to the ground tired and drawn

***
Keru cries out as she is strapped to the machine again and the draining painful and slow. Tears raced
down her face violently and fresh. Her fingers and toes were spanned aching for freedom and her
back ached as far away as possible as the machine forced more and more out of her “Robby!” she
cries in her gagged form pleading him to save them both.
They drag her out again after her fulfilling of her duty role into her lock up room where the
elemental chains latched her down with the metal ones cuffed on her legs and wrists, preventing her
change of state. Keru cried and cried
Adado Ayule, my precious Adado Ayule. Do not give up on hope little one, never give it up for help
will come to you, stay strong you have battled for too long. Rest, all will be well my cherished child.
The words of her Mother Nature travel through her and Keru sleeps
She dreams of her Robby again. So close to her. He will find her, my protector will find me as I search
for him too.

Dr K enters in the night, his plan in attack. Keru pulls uselessly at the chains and glares at him “It is
your time to shine Nullahnaco. Let us pay a visit to your Clan” he tells her removing her chains from
the hut the big man once again grabs her in his arms this time and walking behind the others, they
travel to Nehele. It want Nehele they were heading to though because as they reached the
mountains and began climbing through the hidden paths from different angles, they were heading to
Paco clan, where Ocoee and Coby were from.
The warning horns were sounded and throughout the land they were sung aloud in alert. Keru was
carried now hidden with a group that were still unseen in one of many mountain gullies near to the
village with forest abundant like the rest of their land.
Listening she feels the shift as the Youngers elemental arrive making Keru suddenly uneasy. She
begins struggling in the big man’s hands who jerks her roughly in warning and glares with his
ferocious eyes to her. Keru fiddles with the chains that trapped her hands but it was no use; the
elemental chain could only be removed by Dr K but she continued the struggle feeling edgy and
anxious not knowing what they were planning or why they had brought her

“Ah, it’s always nice to see old friends Meeko” Dr Karigan greets as he walks up with a few others
beside him. Keru and her group were only a few meters away from him but angled on the hidden
part of the slope obviously waiting their queue.
“You Murderer” Keru hears Kiowai shout out and could imagine Tylan grip her close hiding her
behind them like the other protectors standing in front of everyone with the warriors around the
whole village wary and alert.
“Now, now let’s not be hasty” Dr Karigan states in a bored even voice reminding her of Felix, she
could see the smile on both of their faces. She involuntarily shivers.
Keru hears gasps and the people become wary as other groups make themselves known along with
their weapons then looks up to see the storm she had noticed when they had left brew
“What is your business here” the Elder Gwareb asks gruffly. He was a great warrior and leader
Dr K answers easily and throws his hands up casually “just to talk” with his smile still broad and
knowing
“Leave this place. You are not welcome” Screams are heard suddenly and Keru’s gut clenches as
then her group move up with her behind them all behind the big man’s back out of sight for now.
The others look to their group edgy and careful. Her group just stood there with smiles on their faces
unthreatening like their stance with their hands behind their backs
“Now will you listen?” Dr K asks amused. There was no reply and with that Keru is gripped tighter
around her neck making her grunt and gasp for breath involuntarily in her weakened state as she is
then revealed; thrown beside them all between them and Dr K, on the edge of the cliff but full view.
Keru lies gasping for air and the pain her eyes tightly closed for control, her crushed bones burning
her. Aware of everyone watching her, not for the Rebels benefit, Keru slowly forces herself up by her
elbow and broken side to meet her family’s gazes who stood in one protective line strong,
dangerous and fierce at the rebels with and Childs behind.
Keru instantly finds Robby who was beside himself. She watches in torture as he turns away
distraught rubbing his face to contain his self; distressed before turning back to face her. Keru
winces as she keeps herself partially upright. She could not keep the pain and torment from her face
and eyes.
Keru was the first to look away, ashamed at herself as tears streaked down to the rebels amusement
watching her as she was gagged chained and contained along with the elemental grip preventing her
around her wrists. She didn’t want them to see her like this.
She heard her tears drop to the ground beside her, then the rumble of the thunder above them in
warning
“No- don’t you touch her” she hears Robby growl rough with no use, alerting her of the man’s
shadow that comes towards her. Keru leans away glaring but he easily grabs at her chest chain and
shirt and pulls her off the ground meeting her gaze with his own glare while she leans as far away as
possible keeping her eyes the same. Tylan had Robby’s wrist tight in his iron grip hand only watching
Dr K; the leader
“Why have you come” he asks this time in an even measuring voice
Dr K smiles and as the big man walks over with her, he caresses her face again and she shivering
snatches her face away angrily then looking to the ground not wanting to meet Robby or the other’s
eyes, by doing this though she is suddenly alerted to the high proximity of the cliff they were now
standing on, and she was closest. Keru stiffens and her hands instinctly reach to grip the man’s hands
for fear of falling but the chains the big man kept hidden from everyone prevented her to move like
the rest of her body. Her eyes were wide though and expectant as she continues to stare down the
deep cliff.
A sudden tingle of grim anticipation rushes through her as she continues to look down it.
Dr K smiles meeting her gaze with a knowing gaze like the man before returning to the watchful
others stepping forward
“Now I understand you met our master while we were away, along with diminishing the rest of our
clan. Now that hardly seems fair” Dr K builds. Keru swallows closing her eyes and clenches her fists
together feeling his power building, feeling his control growing. She forces her marks at ease not
drawing attention to herself as she continues to shiver listening
“… It hardly seems fair, that a mere child should wield such ability that Tsu’gi and your ‘mother
nature’ should only have…” he continues and Keru grunts with the strange pain building from him in
her, the gag hiding it though. Her heart was accelerating tight in her chest
Keru takes a desperate breath and looks to the big man speaking through the gag “We can free you
like your clan, like your brothers-” she squirms as one of his hands come to her throat cutting her off,
the others still by her strapped chest
Dr k continued, ignoring her “you took away our home, our master, our leader; our power from us. It
is only fair that we do the same to you. Let this be a lesson to you all on who is the strongest, for we
captured to Nullahnaco” Keru cries out and her body recoils from the pain, then her marks glow as
expected by the rebels. From the view, they saw the totems all shine in recognition.
“N-o-o… Don’t” she sobs in a trembling desperate voice, her voice breaking with her tears. Her body
trembled viciously while Keru attempted to keep herself in control.
She stretches and pauses as her vinal mark grows on her- not Robby. The needle prevented the
connection so that he wouldn’t find her, find them. She was choking still under the grip while Dr K
commanded Wind elemental to swarm around them showing his immense power he took from her
multiple times.
The Paco clan screams in terror as do the 4 Youngers (Protector and Child).
Dr Karigan suddenly wraps wind around little Kiwi, and then one of their youngest, was in Dr K’s
hands hanging over the cliff face. Everyone screamed and Keru snapped
Keru shifts into a leopard and growling loud she digs her nails into the big man’s body forcing him to
shout and drop her, but Keru’s front feet were bond by the elementals and in the same instant she
jumps shifting Gibbon and bites Dr Karigan’s surprised hand that held little Kiwi.
All of the elements were pressing fiercely around them all threateningly now; they were out of
control as fire raced and danced between them separating the rebels from the Paco clan, the water
spiraling around the village and mountain storming with the hurricane winds and the earth rocked
underneath them
Dr Karigan falls to the ground beside the cliff with Keru and Kiwi on him. Keru shifts menacingly into
a leopard again; her feet bound still she snarls at him and using her head knocks Kiwi away who rolls
and looks to her “Keru, your feet” he tells her, referring to the glowing golden binds Karigan had
created. The rocks shake again like an earthquake and they all freeze. The rocks begin cracking
Dr Karigan then grips Kiwi who screams before the rock face falls. Keru goes with them but quickly
grabs hold of Kiwi and takes the impacts of the rocks. She growls as they hit the rocks one by one; as
they smash against her already broken side and hears Kiwi cry out- breaking his arm. Landing on top
of her on final impact, Keru licks his face before standing up growling at the pain in her. She quickly
shifts and Kiwi helps her by pulling quickly off the gag and trying to untie the ropes, the chains would
have to be later. The lighting flashes revealing the glow of Dr Karigan’s hypnotic eyes glaring at them
as he storks towards them
Keru snarls with a loud threatening hiss, looking to Kiwi he nods and hides behind her. Her eyes dark
and loathing to Dr Karigan, the one that brought them all such pain and sorrow every since 12 years
ago, then within 2 weeks, he had done it all over again to them worse than ever expected;
remembering Robby’s torn face like the others that believed she had been dead, to see Kiwi’s little
body taken from the safety of the Youngers

***
“Will you listen now?” Dr Karigan taunts as another group emerge with cruel smiles with hands
behind their backs, then hearing a grunted gasp Robby and others face them waiting as then to their
horror and disbelief the group reveal a girl in chains and shackles with a gag preventing speech, a
bruised dirty face with cut legs that were tied tight to her chest and hands behind her back. Her
ankles in tight chains were red with scabs and lacerations and her body hung almost lifeless that
other than her gasp, she would have seemed dead. To Robby’s horror making him stumble but
luckily caught by Kiowai, that as the girl he remembered he had heard screaming was thrown in
between the two groups close to the cliff and pant lying crumbled and trapped on the ground with
pain covering her whole body, he realized it was Keru. She winces and using her, what looked broken
shoulder and arm, she forced herself up to a more dignifying position before sorting out his eyes
with her pained and anguished eyes of torment, her green pure eyes that had been needlessly
tortured and separated from them all. Robby turns away trying to calm and contain himself rubbing
at his face with strain and distress before turning back sorting her eyes desperately; the whole week,
he had thought she was dead with the Bondment sickness severed to different unknown shattering
pain. Meeting her weak, vulnerable and pained eyes, she was alive and all his. He hadn’t lost her
‘Keru!’ Robby calls distraught as she looked away from him with tears of shame of herself. She didn’t
hear him though ‘Keru, come back’ he begs but again she did not hear him and he watched his
pained Child’s tears drop to the ground with sorrow and anguish. The cruel man made a move
towards his child but as he readied to pounce, the protectors blocked him in and Tylan grabbed his
wrist. She heard him that time though and she backed best she could away as she was picked up
then taken to Dr K. he snarls but Kiowai covers his mouth as Dr Karigan touches her face that
belonged to him only. He did not touch his Child. He was proud to watch her stubborn determined
streak as she whips her face away from him glaring but again away from him and their family. She
stiffened though as she saw where she was standing though and his gut clenched.
Then so quickly Kiwi was thrown and taken into Dr Karigan’s hands as he tells them he controlled
Keru and the Nullahnaco abilities, then Keru shifts and lands with her leopard legs bound by the
elementals making his gasp with hatred at this cruel creature but then as she jumps to save Kiwi, the
elementals grew out of control; the fire separating them from Keru and Kiwi and Dr K and an
earthquake began then before he knew it, Keru and Kiwi were thrown down the cliff face with Dr
Karigan away from them, hearing their cries of pain that scared themselves into their minds
permanently.
‘Keru, are you okay?’ he asks. He had not spoken, seen or heard of her for 2 weeks and it was a
strange alien feeling as he remembered why that was so.
He received no reply again and desperately, he needed to hear her voice, to have her in his arms
again, she would not speak though
He switched to Kiwi who was alright and as Keru shifts he quickly takes her gag away that was dirty
and infected with blood, dust and debris, then to her ropes; not the chains or the glowing elemental
bind that he could not remove. Then the lightening provides first light and the eyes of the hunter;
the murderer seeking their deaths.
As Keru shifts again and hisses with such emotion and anger in defense for little Kiwi it was
frightening, Kiwi nods as Keru looks to him and hides while she moves forwards after attempting to
break the elemental bind, towards Dr Karigan as the lightning flashes again revealing their
surroundings and threat. ‘Keru wait, don’t engage, wait’ Robby commands her desperately she does
not hear again as he battles to protect the Younger nature Children from the elemental’s Karigan
had unleashed and from the threatening rebels that attacked and sort them all out to kill the rest of
the Nature Children and the Paco clan; they were not succeeding though.
‘Little Kiwi, tell Keru not to engage for me. She’s very sick’ Robby tells him gently
Kiwi nods “Keru! Robby says not to en- engage coz you’re really sick” Kiwi tells her but screams
suddenly and clenches his eyes closed as Dr Karigan strikes at Keru with a knife they had not seen
while Keru in sync pounces at Dr Karigan snarling.
She jumps to the side to dodge a deadly wound as it instead goes into her from leg while she bites Dr
Karigan’s shoulder and throws him to the ground harshly. As she moves in front of Kiwi again she did
not limp. She stood and waited for Karigan to stand again while his eyes remained focused on her
while he lay.
Suddenly fire elemental circled them close together, startling Keru as she jumps in surprise.
‘There’s lots of fire and Keru is inside it with the bad man’ Kiwi tells them explaining
Robby turns to Stephan; all have been listening “we need to get her out of it” Robby states and
Stephan nods. With that, Camira swirls herself into a dance to catch the swirling water that tunnels
around them, then she pushed it like a waterfall over the cliff face to where they were
Kiwi screams again and they hear Dr Karigan shout with rage; not expecting it
Kiwi ducks beside a rock and covers himself from the water falling “Keru! Look out!” he cries out as
then Dr K and Keru look up from the flames as the waterfall simultaneously lands on them and
catching them while it removes the flames and they fall further down the cliff landing on the ground
this time
Kiwi looks over carefully and calls out “Keru!” in his high pitched voice for his sister watching as the
lighting reveals them on the ground away from their reach standing and circling with water like arms
beside Dr Karigan. He strikes at Keru with it and she agilely maneuvers from its hit
“Go Keru!” he cries out in cheer from the rocks as he climbs his way down ‘Kiwi don’t go down you
might fall, stay where you are’ Tylan orders and he nods then anxiously watches Keru fight with ‘the
octopus man’
One see through arm lands on Keru then squashing her to the ground. Kiwi stands up holding the
rock ‘oh no’ “Keru! Keru! Get up!” he orders her thinking of how Tylan did it but to no prevail, the
octopus arm stayed on top of her
Kiwi watches and begins crawling down the mountain again when he sees other leopards and black
cats come out and surround the bad man hissing and growling. Tree vines stood and swayed like
snakes and the water seemed to fall apart and sink into a puddle beside Keru like the rest of the bad
man’s octopus arms. The cats circle and stand in front of Keru
‘Robby are the cats gonna eat Keru?’ Kiwi asks scared for her, pausing on the rocks
‘No they’re her friends. Stay where you are though, or you’re gonna be in big trouble mister’ Robby
warns and Kiwi obediently ducks down watching hesitantly ‘are you sure…’ he questions
Kiwi was a funny character, so sensitive and sweet and shy; definitely a Child of Nature not a
Protector. Noara’s my Protector Kiwi defends
Robby chuckles for the first time in two long eternal weeks yes, Noara is your protector
“Hey, where did Keru go?” he asks aloud and Robby was instantly beside him taking his hand with a
frown as the lighting reveals everything for the split second again
“Hm… I'm not sure…” he tells him then looking at Kiwi, he pulls him onto his back and they crawl
down the mountain to the ground “Tylan’s gonna be cranky” he warns Robby
“I thought you wanted to help find Keru”
“Yeah I do” he reaffirms “Okay then” and they race off with the speed of a Protector
“Keru” they both call knowing she didn’t have the mental bond “Keru” they call again following the
leopard foot prints
They hear a loud snarl of a leopard and follow carefully, finding Keru the one snarling shaking her
head viciously while stamping backwards hissing more like a Jaguar while trying to scratch at her
face
Then she shifts and falls to her chained self as her vinal marks then fade away with the totems and
the storm as she suck in the elementals that were created by Dr Karigan that was no longer a lost
child but a falcon as he sores free again. Kiwi and Robby turn knowing Keru was right beside them to
see her work as the Paco mountain flow with birds that fly away; back down into the trees and travel
far and wide
Then their attention turns back to Keru. As she lies down to rest with her face in her chest and
knees, Robby slowly puts Kiwi down ‘stay here’
‘but-’
‘just stay here for me’ Robby whispers to Kiwi again anxiously as he moves around to Keru’s face that
was profusively bleeding, her eyes closed still in her multiple binds.
Robby kneels in front of her slowly then hesitantly hoping she wouldn’t shrink back from him, he
puts a gentle hand on her head feeling the rush of the connection from the Bondment sickness face
and tingle them into the one soul, one heart and one mind again making him sigh with relief.
She doesn’t respond so he puts more pressure on it and brushes her hair away from her face. He still
had her blue elastic from the last night two weeks ago and gently ties her hair loosely up before
brushing hair and arm again.
Ripping his sleeve off, he wipes her face of the blood gentle and caring like his other hand that
brushed her hair and arm. Her tired eyes slowly opened to him and Robby smiles “hey…” he says in a
soft soothing voice touching her cheek.
She smiles softly at him in return then Robby very slow and timidly lifts her up from the ground,
pausing each time she winced until her face smoothed out as much as possible before he kept going.
Then he just held her there gently waiting for her to calm again for him to take the chains off “um,
Robby” Kiwi’s little shy nervous voice interrupts as he crept forward looking fearfully around in the
dark.
Robby smiles “come here, it’s okay” Kiwi smiles and sits next to him close leaning into him then
tentatively touching her hair then eyes her hidden chest “um Robby” he tries again
Robby looks to him as he lifts Keru up again slowly to take the chains off her, who winces and
tightens her legs into her chest again, Robby looks to him “um, the bad man” he starts and
cautiously reaches for Keru’s hidden stomach then before revealing his hand finishes “he had a
knife” showing his hand with blood on it from Keru’s hidden stomach then looks to Robby’s eyes
gloomily
A tear surprised Robby as he then tucks her head under her chin and rocks wrapping his arms gently
around her to warm her broken body up.
“Robby, what are we gonna do” Kiwi asks worried like he
“We’re gonna stay close to her and keep her warm then wait for Tylan and the others. Do you want
to call them?” he asks Kiwi in a calm voice he nods
‘Um Guys, Keru’s bleeding lots, can you please come and help up please?’
‘Robby’s still with you isn’t he Kiwi? He’s okay?’ Tylan’s voice asks in a harsh tone making Robby
laugh ‘yeah, I'm still here, I didn’t do anything don’t worry’ he tells him ‘I'm keeping Keru in the…
binds until you can help us to a healer okay? It’s keeping the pressure on the stomach wound’
‘Everything’s alright here now, we’ll be there in a second’ and within a few seconds they were all
there around them
“Keru, is you’re side broken?” Robby asks and Keru nods then holding her tight, Tylan takes his
shoulder and they Elemental to Kitchi Clan straight to the healer
On arrival in the Healer Cabin Keru immediately coughs up blood “Oh God” Robby murmurs’ holding
her still, the sight was unsettling for him making him have to look away.
She had been dead to him for 2 weeks now, then to see that… he shakes his head determined. She
was going to be fine. She was alive, this always happened when she over did it with the elementals,
he reminds himself
She had already collapsed while the blood continued to come out of her mouth. Robby held fiercely
to her forcing the image and thoughts from him. She stopped and Robby finds he was on the bed
wrapped around her with his head secure in her neck holding her close despite her broken bones. He
didn’t lift his face till his tears were dry away
“Come on, let’s get her healed. Now be very careful moving her around” Robby very slowly moved
further onto the bed then slower, he lies her down then the healer had blood into her before with
Robby and the Younger’s help after healing the rest of her wounds quickly, the removed the chains
all except her binded elemental arms which they would worry about later and quickly heal her
severing stab wound in her stomach. Then she almost looked normal again
“She doesn’t need a wash anymore coz Camira’s waterfall scrubbed Kiwi and her good” Ocoee jokes
lightly and Kiowai glares playfully “you know what? You’re turning out to be a bit of an Amaroo” she
states “which one? Our brother or my son?” he smiles
“Both. They are Both as bad as each other” Kiowai taunts. Coby looks to her meaningfully “hence the
name”
Robby was lying behind Keru supporting her because of her arms. They hadn’t been able to break
the elemental binds but they were worried so because the way she was binded it was breaking her
bones; putting too much strain on them being unnaturally held so
To their surprise Keru ways with her eyes suddenly opening they emerald green and she sits up
making them edgy “ah, be- careful...” Robby says overprotective of her, she continues moving
though and squirms free of him briefly; having Robby frowning uncomfortably at the sudden and too
soon separation. Squeezing her mouth and eyes shut she manages to tuck her legs up and her arms
under herself to bring them in front. Her hands hand been tied like that for 2 weeks though and it
was unnaturally painful to have them in normal position and she shivers from it. Robby instantly had
hold of her and back into his lap while she stares at her arms quivering
“Don’t try to bend them yet” Robby warns in her ear and she doesn’t. Keru looks to Tylan’s stern
face as if reading her mind like no one else could at that moment in time and she grimaces to him
before closing her eyes and concentrating. Tylan grabs her though and she jerks back from the
sudden touch meeting his stern but apologetic eyes who then shake “don’t do that yet” he tells her
Keru simply nods, not attempting to talk yet, feeling her throat burn and ache still like her body.
Apart from her arms, her legs were the worst having them bound to her chest bent for so long she
was sure it would hurt to walk again just as it did to have them straight or have pressure on them
Keru looks only briefly to her sibling’s sympathetic eyes before looking away embarrassed and
ashamed. She didn’t want them to feel sorry for her and oh how she wished she could elemental
away from them all, heal then come back as if nothing ever happened to her.
She sighs, that would never happen because it would never be forgotten and there was going to be
no way possible either Robby or I will be separated again. Being there now in the healers again, safe
in Kitchi clan with her siblings felt surreal, like it was her dream again with the fire and Canada
listening to them all chatting and laughing, listening the howls, to the sparkling stars and full moon,
feeling Kiowai’s arms around me like Robby’s were now like his eyes and soul and heart; all hers. It
didn’t feel real, it seemed a dream.
They were all watching her though, no because she had done something stubborn or funny or telling
a story, it was because she was dead to them; taken from them all, from her home. She had died to
them and she had come back with the worst of her injuries that scarcely looked like her anymore.
Their look of pity and sympathy, their saddened compassion and sorrow as they watched Keru as if it
was her last breath, as if she would disappear into thin air without a trace again, reminded her that
maybe it wasn’t a dream after all.
Robby’s chin was on her head again while she continued to turn away and refuse meeting eye
contact. Then Keru closed her eyes and slowed her breath so that it was even and soft like her heart
rate; that was one thing she had learnt in her lonely horror nightmare. She learnt to seem invisible
even more than she had before. Keru could hide herself inside of her; she learnt to live inside herself
with her memories and mind and ignore reality in times of my tortures. She tried right now and
found it unnerving; reminding her of it. She felt the elemental bind on her wrists again; the only
thing that bound me to those memories and to those 2 weeks.
I concentrate while the others believe I am asleep. My marks shine and Robby stiffens and I know
they can’t stop me know as I continue then keeping my eyes shut I murmur in the ancient tongue “I
free you, release you binds. Twirl with the Wind above us and through the trees, Swirl and sway with
every gentle wave, ripple and drop of Water, dance and rejoice with the flames and grow, nurture
and travel with Earth and our Mother” then I fist my hands tight and with a jerk, the binds that
wound around my fingers hands and wrists broke and were free of their duty.
Without looking to the angry voices of Tylan and the others, without turning my head to face them
like the true coward I am, like the vulnerable child that runs and cries for the safety of their loved
ones arms wrap around them, like the scared weak and shameful being I am, I turn away and I ride
with the wind over the lands, I float with a single wave, I weave a single seedling into growth and I
dance and twirl with the rebirth of a warm fire flame as I once again attempt to remove the fowl
impurities off my Mother Earth in White Moon Valley where I remove any trace of the machine that
took me apart, the hut I was chained to and shared my blood tears. I burn away the stench of the
lost children’s touch and replace it with nurture as I walk bare and place my hands deep into the soil
and enrich it, feeding and nurturing it with its nutrients and warmth, with the droplets of rain that
flavor and soak it deep and thoroughly like my hair, like my Nehele clothing, like my hands and my
feet, like my face.
A great and beautiful storm comes and I lay facing it as it pours down on me curling like tendons
around me; locking me in place as a part of the earth, a part of the rain and the clouds, a part of the
seas and rivers, a part of the soil and the trees, the wind and the threads of life. A part of one all-
together. I close my eyes and savor its welcoming home touch warming me through and washing my
pure once more.
I listen then to the trees sway and the wind and flames dance and the water ripple at each drop of
the rain. It sings to me like a soft alluring hum that rises deep and fulfilling inside of me. Then I hear
the ancient song of hope, of the elements, of the connections, of hope and love and loss, all winding
together growing us close and strong. I hear Kiowai and Camy singing through the winds, I see them
all at the totems. Robby is with them and he is searching for me. I give him a kiss and then I wake.

Keru wakes and looks to the high roof of the healers room then shivers as she looks to her still
painful stretched out legs and arms to see them wet like her dripping hair. A droplet lands on her
nose and looking up nothing else is there. Keru tests her hands and arms, flexing her fingers slowly
then faster, twisting her wrists around which hurt a bit more, then to her elbows. Sucking in a breath
she bends them and the pain is considerably worse and stifles a moan at it. Keru realizes she still in
Robby’s hold as he moves beneath her from her pain and shifts. Keru silently curses. He would feel it
all now and biting her lip she tries blocking as she bends her arms again. He doesn’t move this time
but it takes a lot more energy from her and she blinks the fatigue away
Determined she bends it again with her legs; getting them used to the natural normal sensation of
moving again
A water droplet lands on her cheek this time but as she once again looks up, she finds nothing, the
dampness was bothering her though and she brushes with her hands to wipe it off but freezes as she
realizes that as she wiped over, the water immediately reseeded away, leaving her clothing and skin
dry where she touched it. Amazed, she continues brushing over her whole body. She had water
affinity back
Keru is stunned still then before she begins laughing though her nose was bleeding, then sneezes in
sequence with Robby and holding her nose to stop the bleeding she couldn’t help but continue
laughing. He sits her up as he wakes with a questioning look and she just continues to laugh easily as
she lays her head against the wall where he placed her carefully and watched her with a look
between concern and humour.
“Okay…” he starts unable to help but smile at her. He notices her hand on her nose and passes her a
tissue which she willingly takes, hiding it as she quickly puts it to her nose not allowing him to see it
was bleeding
“Why is your nose bleeding?” he asks hearing her thoughts and she grimaces and continues giggling
with utter euphoria.
Her Protector was with her again, safe and sound. With her
The others walk in with the same expression as Robby, her eyes glistening at them
Robby trying not to laugh though knowing her thoughts.
Looking as if she were crazy they ask Robby, “ah, what did the healer give her?” and look back to
Keru.
Robby kept his hold on her, not willing to take a hand off her as she continued laughing. She had
both her hands on her face and her legs tucked up into her with her arms folded. Robby frowns “You
know weren’t supposed to have your arms folding yet” he reminds her and she surprises him with a
glare before she starts laughing again.
Suddenly Ocoee joins in unable to stop himself while Keru closes her eyes and presses her head into
the back wall letting the laughter and strange joy ride through her fully
“I think she’s lost it” Kiowai states smiling at her fondly
“Well considering what she went through…” Tylan stops as Keru turns her glare onto him and stops
laughing. He had the decency to look chagrined. Kiowai was glaring at his open speech too.
She continues to stare at him with her hands on her mouth and nose, then she moves one hand
away and with a swipe, they are completely drenched from head to toe. Approving of her ability and
their astonished faces she folds her hands and legs then waits to meet their gazes
Her heart rate was up again and her breathing was harsher than what she would have liked, her eyes
remained the same though and as they individually met her eyes she speaks “I am well aware of
what happened. I don’t seek your pity or your sympathy. I don’t need nor deserve it” Her eyes flash
like her marks and she suddenly blanches and turns her head listening to something familiar and
unknown
“Keru…” Robby’s worry brings her back and meets his eyes then the other concerned ones. In that
instant she takes a deep calming breath then suddenly she goes into her elementals which they all
join. Knowing this, she drops them off stopping midway in the middle of the forest, making them
stumble then jumping quickly into the trees and shifting; easier to move she elementals again alone
She runs straight to white moon valley feeling suspicious and edgy as she paces around the area she
had healed last night, searching for a stir. Her breathing in pants she looks around watchful and
paranoid
Keru turns to the river and running over to it she submerges herself in it shivering at its cold touch
then holding her breath she dives under and searches with her hands until they meet a silver
bracelet that dances with the sun ray’s reflection. Keru screams and struggles at the sudden hands
that pull her up and she gasps for breath as she is dragged out “Let me go!” she screams fiercely but
the hands become arms and remain hard around her lifting her out of the water ‘easy, easy,
nothings here. No one’s here sweetie’. Eventually realizing who it was, “Robby! Wait-“
“No” he shakes her fiercely and eyes seemed back and cold as ice making her shiver again “No” he
repeats and she ducks. The others eyes were just as fierce behind him “can I get the-“
“No” she looks to the ground then turns to look to the river before jerked back then sighs “can you
then please” she asks and he pauses and sighs himself. Hugging her he whispers ‘what is it’
‘My brothers gave it to me- I stayed with them for the first night before they…’ Keru shakes her head
removing the memory and he kisses her forehead and strains to smile making her face grow in pain
“no, don’t” he whispers and soothes out her frown with his thumb “I’ll go get it. Stay. Here” he tells
her harshly and she looks down and his warm hands slide out from around her waist making her
shiver. She did not care if she died of the cold suddenly
Robby was in the water and in her mind forever, he finds the trinket and walks back out the water
with the bracelet in his hold marveling at it before putting his arms back around her and placing it in
her palm “it’s lovely” he tells her “now dry off- you’re not going to be catching death from the cold”
reminding her of their link once again and she nods looking at her bracelet again brushing her fingers
over it remembering her brothers hoping they weren’t stressed looking for her
She frowns again and kneels to the ground burying her hands into the soil frowning in concentration
“what happened here” Camira asks wandering over to the huts that were only ashes now with trees
grown in their place and grass covering the area as if it had all been a bad dream. Keru’s bad dream
They all turn back to Keru who was concentrating in the ground still. They eyed her with concern and
her eyes instantly snapped open to them. They eye her warily “You did this?” they ask disbelieving
Keru storks over to the debris huts straight to her hut and her chains that lay there still tethered to
the left over plank of wood. Instantly as she glares at it and tightens her fist, it catches a dangerous
flame and she watches it burn away in front of her, smelling the last of the blood singe away from
her memory like the metal that melted away into the ground where it belonged. As she loosens her
hand, the fire extinguishers then as she lifts her hands lightly and slow soil covers it with grass and a
channel of intricate vines conjoin together over it before she places her hands down once again and
a tree grows.
Keru stands and everyone watches in awe as then it begins raining. Hard. Eventually she turns and
says “nothing happened. It was just a bad nightmare” she states and they grimace
Keru starts clenching and unclenching her fists and her breathing grows regard and harsh and she
shakes her head jerkily in angry movements to force her memories away that were burnt into her
Robby moves to her and she backs defensive throwing her arms up and across herself “No. Go away.
I don’t want this. I don’t” Robby ignores her and grips her into a restraining hug holding her there
with silent pleads she’d be okay. Her anger almost instantly diminishes and she cries hard. Two tear
lines travel down Robby’s face in response to both of their emotions that would always be tied
together
‘I'm so sorry Keru… I'm so sorry’ Robby continues to tell her over and over willing his guilt and pain
away; to stop torturing him so
Keru grew more and more distressed it seemed sobbing into him; her emotions all catching up to her
finally ‘don’t say that… please, please I beg of you, please don’t say that’ Keru eventually pleads into
his chest. He hugs her to him again and kisses her hair and her cheek I'm sorry
Keru lets out a half hysterical laugh and pulls up then putting her head on his shoulder lightly you’re
not supposed to say it again she laughs again
He warily smiles please don’t go into you laughing fit again he asks. She chuckles quietly and nods
resting her head into him again after he pulls her up and kisses her hard on the lips and tucks her
into him again looking up eyes open to prevent any more tears.
Lifting her back to their feet he smiles and lightly chuckles giving her a piece of material “your nose is
bleeding again” holding it to her before her hands slowly and prickly pained reach to take it from
him “thanks, I'm destroying your winter tops now”
He shrugs “Ella loves making clothes, besides its more important for what it is now than it is a top.
You’re my first and only priority” he whispers to her smiling and pulls her along back to the others
who were watching the 3 youngest pairs playing in the river and welcoming the rain into their
mouths. They all smile to them “so when did you do all of this?” Camira asks dropping a large rain
ball onto Stephan who gasps with surprise. She snickers “last night” Keru confesses and they all sigh
“sleep nurturing again Keru” Kiowai and Camira mock. Keru laughs then with a turn of her hand
water and wind coil around them before splashing them and returning to the earth. Keru smiles and
Tylan and Robby glare at her disapproving “okay new rule for you” Tylan stands “as soon as your
nose starts bleeding, no using elementals”
“And no elemental travel by yourself-” “-any of you” Tylan adds again meeting all of their eyes
They all nod except Keru “if we ask permission and tell you where we are going?” she compromises
The Protectors all roll their eyes at her and Tylan answers “maybe”
Keru puts her hands on her hips “most likely?” she rephrases
“Keru…” he warns with a smile. She looks to the sky innocently as a ray of sun burst out and over her
only for a second before she quickly removes the clouds all together while they all laugh at her “now
that, was such an Amaroo con its unmistakable” Ocoee laughs “great minds think alike” Keru shrugs
at him and as he makes his booming laugh she pounces on his back and they fall into the river
laughing “Keru, get out of the water” Robby tells her with authoritive. As Keru laughs and climbs out
she mumbles under her breath “Mother help me Amaroo”
Robby abruptly pulls her into his arms “I heard that Keru Nehele” he says in a low voice and
everyone laughs hearing it
“Over protective”
“Yes I will be and I don’t care how much you complain or what you throw at me whether it be a
pillow, a shoe or a fire flame” Everyone laughs again at them and continues as she adds innocently
with a flash of her eyelashes “I would never throw a fireball at you, my sweet protector”
He smiles amused and playing along “unless I knew it was coming” he adds and she nods “unless”
she agrees ‘but you love me more it’
‘Oh?’ he kisses her sweet and quick on the lips ‘irrevocably so my precious, precious sweet Keru’
kissing her quick on the lips again
Keru places her forehead against his reaching onto her toes ‘I missed so’ she tells him breathing him
in deeply ‘and never again, my love’
Keru smiles but serious making her seeming her child like vulnerability that he had only seen in her
mind a few times … as she rocked on the bed in the unknown alien world ‘do you know where Robby
is?’
‘Promise’ she asks
‘I promise with my heart and my soul and my mind to you. I will never break it for if I do I will shatter
into millions of pieces. We will never feel Bondment sickness again. It is done for us. Never again,
that is my promise and my word to you my Nature Child’ Robby tells her earnest and honest as ever
She kisses his chin and hugs him again. Water like a balloon pops over him and he looks down to
Keru who for her sake, was lucky she was dry and smiling “I'm dry and my nose stopped bleeding”
she tells him “so I broke no rules” folding her arms victoriously
‘Adado Ayule, my precious Adado Ayule… come to me my Child, my precious Nullahnaco’ Keru turns
around to face the forests allure with a willing slow smile as she steps away to follow.
Robby’s gentle hands slowly tighten on her but says nothing as he follows, the others staying as they
followed the familiar voice
They reach a tree that was dead but yet was filled inside and out with life; vines and trees wrapped
possessive and protective around it, a huge python sat in one branch while other fox squirrels, an
owl and geckos resided on and through it. Robby marvels at it until Keru smiles to him “This is part of
mother tree spirit” she tells him, then her marks shine and she fades into the tree
“Keru!” he calls startled and steps forward until his marks also glow including the vinal marks
‘Do not fear my Protector son, your Child is safe kept in me. I will return her to you soon; I would not
dare separate you so my precious Nullahnaco Children, you are my precious and cherished. Do not
fear’ the voice soothes him and a part of his child for all eternity, Mother talks to them
‘Adado Ayule, you have done so well my child. Your spirit and you’re will are strong little one. You are
a pure joy in which none can take from you. Do not forget that little one. You are home again and
you are safe. You will not be taken from your Protector again my Child.
‘He is in so much pain…’ Keru speaks
‘As are you my child. The lost ones you know as Rebels were tainted by the Monster of the Shadows.
They seeked to corrupt you and your protector also little one; and they nearly succeeded. But I tell
you this; you will never be lost to me, nor any of my precious children; as is all life I give. Death is not
the end, but a new chapter. Do not fear death, but do not pity it, instead when it is your time,
welcome it with warm hearts with you and your partner. We are never separated, we are all joined
all connected as you noted last night little one. Pain fades with time while Love grows with it as does
wisdom and experience. Grow my dear child, love, live and grow.’
‘They look at me so differently now Mother…’ Keru sighs
‘They are filled with awe for you my child, not pity, they think you strong my child, not weak, they
think you brave my child not cowardly. You have brought the land hope not the hopeless, just as you
and Robby did soon your arrival; 20 years of wait they did. 20 years of hope that faded and faded like
the light itself until it was grim and dim. You are more cherished more loved and more treasured
child. More than you will possibly be able to understand and comprehend. Their fear is what you see
in them child. They fear for you for they had feared they had lost that one ray of hope that
brightened them to existence once again after 2 decades of longing and pleading.’
‘You Child, give them strength, you child give them courage, strength and spirit, You child, give them
hope. To think you would lose such a needing, precious thing, is what you see in them Adado Ayule.’
Their mother’s lips touch her forehead once more
‘I am always with you as are you siblings my Child, as are the wind, the water, the fire and the earth
that you belong to as does Robby. They flow through you, as do they flow through all of my children.
Rejoice my child for you are home, rejoice my child for you are safe, rejoice my child for you have
been missed, loved, yearned for and will never be lost again.’
With that Keru drops out from the tree as she had last time and steady loving hands were already
around her kissing her cheek, her eyelids, her nose and her lips. He had been there with her and
Mother
‘And you my dear pure rare and only Child, must rest’ he tells her and she sighs in comfort as he pulls
her into him, into his warm damp chest in which Keru takes a deep soothing breath with her fists
clinging into and keeping her tight in his chest and stands and carried her as if she were as light as a
feather and as delicate as a single strand of flower as they walk back to the others. They elemental
and Keru feels as she separates into the 4 different elements before rejoining into one with Robby at
the Gates of Nehele where Ella, Coban and the Village wake her with their joyous cries and laughter
and rejoicing, making her laugh and roll into Robby embarrassed.
He smiles and goes to put her down when she suddenly clings harder ‘no don’t- they’ll attack me!’
she tells him and he chuckles ‘I wouldn’t let them harm you Keru, trust me. Nothing with harm you
again. Do not fear my precious flower’ but as he puts her down to her feet and she suddenly sways
at the pressure of it making her wince then the hands reach she shifts gibbon and jumps onto his
back he half chuckles half sighs then pulls her around to his chest again as they walk through until
they reach Ella and Coban. Keru jumps off him to the ground instantly shifting into a lemur none but
her had seen then in the same movement jumping up into Ella who hugs her fiercely like Coban.
These were her Carer parents. “We missed you little one, we feared for you so” Ella tells her with
tears. Keru snuggles into her closer missing her too and her crazy eccentric village clan and her over
protective possessive protector, her parents and all too caring and intimate and knowing 14 siblings
Robby snatches her greedily back “you bet we all are” he answers yet again her hidden thoughts
kissing her fuzzy hair “Now you, are going to bed now” he tells her sternly walking with the Carers to
the hut. Keru excitedly runs in and through the whole large hut in leopard form and shifting gibbon
as she swings her way around also. She rests contently at the top of the roof where it had wooden
panels she could lie on as if a tree branch. She eyes Robby as he comes in after her “Keru, come
down” he calls her and she smiles at him making him raise an eyebrow to her
“Are you already challenging me?” he asks amused
Never my wonderful almighty protector
“Are you mocking me then?” he laughs and shifts gibbon swinging up to take her instead. Keru
laughs at him ‘definitely’ before jumping down and shifting leopard running but to her surprise she is
picked up by her scuff already by him who laughs and flicks her nose “I’ve had plenty of experience
with you, you’ll have to learn new tricks and thank Mother Amaroo isn’t going to be teaching any to
you” he jokes carrying her into their room and closing the door
“Perhaps not” she tells him shifting and lying beside him on the bed suddenly very tired and closing
her eyes
Robby lifts her up with gentleness and nuzzling his face into her side while his arms coiled around
her affectionate possessive and always protective ‘my sweet, precious Keru’ he chanted as if he were
the luckiest person in the world
His lips found hers tender and desperate, melting Keru deep down and longing; relinquishing the
remains of the Bondment sickness and the horrors of the past 2 weeks, singeing it all away and
rejoining them back as one welcomingly, burning away their torments and pains, their sorrows and
anguishes all into oblivion then changing back into their love and passion, their desperation and
need and initiation of the Bondment connection being strengthened into no longer just thousands of
Granite and Diamond materials but of Mother herself. Tying them irrevocably together once again
only stronger
Robby had tears in his eyes and Keru stops to kiss them away “Hey… sshh” she soothes and comforts
him knowing his thoughts
‘That was far too close for me Keru. Far to close; I had lost you, for 2 weeks I had lost you’
‘For two weeks I prayed and cried for you too Robby, it was too much and yes, it was far too close. I
thought I lost you too. ever since I saw you holding me in the fire, when you turned cold and frail, I
thought I lost you and I called you and tried to find you but I couldn’t and I was…’ Keru doesn’t finish
‘Tylan and Kiowai would not let go of me they feared I would… and I felt I…’ he takes a deep breath
and Keru kisses him harshly again her own tears mingled this time ‘I saw you in the fire and as the
fire went out you grew still and cold like Ice. when I returned, I could no longer feel the Bondment
sickness and I feared you’d saved me again at your own expense like you always did’ he says harshly
‘I'm not leaving here without you and if you so choose to, then I will follow you. No matter what my
Protector; forever and ever, we will never be apart.’ She mimics him holding his face to hers
“I love you so dearly” he whispers, his eyes hungry and she smiles sweet and tender to him wrapping
her legs around his waist pulling him closer “and I love you my precious gentle over protective
Robby. I love you so dearly” she replies kissing his lips and deepening it as she presses against him
and lies down
“Sleep my precious Nature Child, sleep close to me, my precious soul” he whispers ‘I am glad you
are all mine my love and I have you in my arms once more for always’ he adds
Hugging him close feeling his heart beat and his heated hands on her back Keru closes her eyes as his
fingers trail up and down her lulling her to sleep ‘always’
‘A promise is a promise and I shall never let you go’
‘Never I you, I trust you for always my Robby’
Robby’s arms constrict and his mouth presses into her mouth deep and fully as does his body ‘mm,
for always my little Keru’
Robby brushes her with his fingers then tracing down her body soothingly, forcing her muscles to
relax under his touch. Her breathing evens out further while she breathes in his musky scent on his
chest and arms around her. Keru falls asleep in his trusting arms not fearing the shadows or the eyes
of Dr Karigan in the lightning, not his knife, not even the machine, because her protectors arm were
wrapped tight and secure around her like his mind and heart, and like their soul trapped together for
all eternity as it was meant to me.
For always and eternity His Child and Her Protector, their Sibling Younger and their Carers with their
Clan and their land; their Mother.