Mistic Pets

Dark, brittle leaves skittered across well-worn ground and over a pair of bare paws. Chilled, their owner covered them with a thin cloth. The creature was a young white Braenon named Jesuvia. For seven months, she had been ill with a sickness currently unknown to science. This illness was becoming horribly burdensome. She had been diagnosed with the 'common cold', which is what they claimed it to be since her village elder had been diagnosed with such a few months before. But the elder died shortly after ailing.

To her parents' dismay, their newer village elder forced Jesuvia to leave. Her only hope for return was to last a year in the wilderness, with no help from the village. Luckily, two months into her exile, Jesuvia stumbled upon a white Nevermore. Without her newfound companion-who she named Nika-she would have surely perished long before. The bird brought her what food it could in the dying season, as well as supplying its warm company.

Trembling, Jesuvia loosed a cough and whimpered. Around her lay random clutters of snow-white feathers that had fallen in clumps from her wings thanks to her violent coughing fits. After the pain had subsided from the single cough, she looked to the darkening skies. The white Braenon had not seen the Nevermore in two days.

"Sweet Nika.. Where are you?" She rasped pitifully. The last of thirteen large, oddly ripe citrus fruits were almost gone. The white raven had brought them for her in a sling made of old cloth. The same sling had been left behind for use as a small blanket, which she had used to cover her feet. Jesuvia looked at down her weak form; her once-beautiful white fur was turning an unappealing sickly gray and there were random raw patches of red flesh all over her body.

Just as another fit consumed her, Nika returned. He landed nearby as the Braenon wretched up blood-coated stomach fluids. Her face was wet with rust colored tears. "Am I dying?" She whispered hoarsely The white Nevermore smiled silently at her and nudged what seemed to be a mushroom at her feet.

"Eat it.." the trees seemed to whisper. Nika nodded and placed his beak lightly on her shaking paws. Slowly, Jesuvia reached for the blackened umbrella-shaped fungi. Against her stomach's desire, she gingerly nibbled off the top of the mushroom. Her eyes widened and took another, bigger bite. Strength seemed to instantly flow through her weak limbs and her throat no longer itched like mad.

Desperately, she gulped down the rest of the mushroom, ignoring its bitter taste. Nika cooed his satisfaction as she hesitantly stood, testing her once-depleted coordination. "What was that, Nika?" She asked with a still-raspy voice. Magic couldn't cure everything..

The white Nevermore only smiled again at her and took to the moonlit sky. Jesuvia stared longingly into the night, feeling an urge to spread her wings.

She took a step and looked back at the clumps of beautiful, littered feathers. The now-gray Braenon experimentally flapped her battered wings, but to no avail. She was permanently ground-ridden. She knew her disease-stricken wings would never sustain her in flight. Mournfully, she looked towards the direction Nika flew. Towards home.

Just another five months, she thought. But would I, a Plague creature, be accepted at home?

The End. Or is it?