Giants, it’s always giants. Ancestors protect us. The screams woke up me up in the middle of the night, the telltale fire of a giant raiding party outside; but what could a young girl, who hadn’t even undergone her rite of passage yet, do?
Nothing thats what, and thats what I always feel like, useless, deadweight, worthless. So I hid, just like the useless girl I am. When I left my hiding place the next morning with the rest of the survivors, I could tell this seemed to be different than other attacks, there must have been more giants this time, there were more Shoanti dead. My father and mother were fine, but the many young Quah didn’t have the blessing of their ancestors that night and couldn’t say that same. The attacks seemed to be getting larger, more coordinated, as if the giants were planning something.
Well I wouldn’t be useless anymore. This was the last time that they would attack my people; and so I trained. I worked day and night to beat my body, to learn the ways of my people when it came to fighting giants. When the day came for me to leave for the Wyvern Mountains and begin my rite of passage, I was eager. I had been waiting for this day for over a year now, ever since that night.
I left, took the spirit tea and began my journey, alone to the mountains. They said I would know what I would need to do when I arrived, that it was different for everyone. Well they couldn’t have been more right. I climbed the mountains and sat in silence for what felt like days. Just when I thought that I would have to leave my people, forever branded as someone who could not complete their trial and join their people, the mountain spoke.
“Move the mountain” it bellowed “Pick the mountain up, the earth where your people have bleed, my land, and move it”
“Mountain, I cannot, for I am not strong enough” I replied
“How do you expect to find the strength to face giants when you cannot find the strength to face yourself?” The mountain asked without a hint of shame.
“But....but that it is one thing, to move an entire mountain is impossible” the response stammered out of my lips.
The voice of the mountain replied one last time, “Move the mountain, and you will find your strength”
I was thinking of that night, the night that Giants decimated most of people, the night I hid under a bed, the night I hid in myself. All these years I was pushing something down inside of me, but now I gave into it. I screamed, the sound echoing off the sides of the mountains. I stood up, put my hands on the grounds and pushed with all of my might, screaming. I screamed and pushed until I passed out. When I awoke, I found myself lying in a giant crater in the side of the moment. Did I actually do that? Was it just a dream? While I may never know, I had passed my trail; and I found my name Kanontienentha “She Who Pushes Mountains”.
Kanontienentha, heard about the rise of giants around Varisia and has since taken off on a quest to see where she can help both Quah and non-Quah fight the rising tide of giants. Her secondary objective is to continue the goal of her people to unite the other Quah around a single tribe.
