Yogurt 1 (Patreon)

At Megaplex this weekend, I gave a semi-interactive talk called "Let's Write a Great Story!" I hope that you were able to attend. It was a lot of fun.

Con staff came in during my talk and re-arranged tables which cost us a bunch of time, so we didn't get as far as I hoped, but here's what we'd decided to write:

A human girl name Yogurt who lives in a desert town above an extensive cave system. Magic exists but is rare. They live in an early civilization with limited technology. She will be falsely accused of stealing metal and transformed into a jackal. Written in 3rd person and told with tight storytelling (avoiding ridiculousness like blushing through fur or wearing a full suit over a fur pelt).

I drove home yesterday, so there wasn't a chance to work on it, but here's what I came up with tonight:

———

Shouts of surprise rang across the dusty sandstone, and the crowd began to back towards her, away from a party of guards with spear in hand and scourge whips tucked in their belts. They marched toward the black obelisk that dominated the marketplace center. One guard with big muscles and broad shoulders dragged a prisoner by his back greasy hair. “Ow! Ow!” he cried out. “Please stop! I’m walking as fast as I can!”

With a rough shove, the prisoner landed at the base of the black stone, cowering.

Yogurt grabbed her sister by the wrist and pulled her close. She doubted that Nabirye was in any real danger, but close-packed crowds made her nervous and Nabi meant the world to her, so she always treated the girl with the protective care that their mother had lacked.

“What’s going on?” Nabi asked, trying to peer around those standing before her. Though only seven years old, her infectious smile had already lost a couple teeth, but that just made her smile all the more-so.

“They’re punishing a criminal,” explained Yogurt. She put her hands under each of her sister’s arms and lifted her up onto her shoulders.

Yogurt had the same dark hair as the village’s other inhabitants—long and straight, parted in the center and hung over either of her ears. She had the same olive eyes and a slightly-curvy figure that was hardly uncommon in girls becoming young women, but it was her skin color that set her apart from the rest. Several tones lighter than everyone else, her face could best be described as tan, while those around her were dusky.

The nickname was ridiculous of course. Her skin was no more the creamy white of thickened milk than it was blue or green, but the difference between her shade and that of everyone around her was so dramatic that the name had stuck. Everyone knew her as “Yogurt” since before she had learned to speak.

“They’re not going to … kill him?” Nabirye whispered.

“I hope not.”

Magistrates handed out death sentences for a variety of crimes—murder for one, but others depended heavily on how much wealthier the victim was than the criminal. The bigger the disparity between the two, the harsher the sentence.

But that aside, there were still other ways to end up dead following judgement!

When a crime required more punishment than whipping but less than execution, the magistrates resorted to transformation…

“Sutekh el Chibale,” announced the tallest guard, “you have been found guilty of stealing metal from the king’s mines.”

“I didn’t do it!” protested the prisoner, but this earned him only a sandaled kick to the face.

Yogurt closed her eyes. The desert beneath Ezbet-Maks was riddled with mines, and the governor laid claim to every bit of metal that was dragged from them. Stealing metal was stealing from the town and punished accordingly.

“For this, you will be transformed,” continued the tallest guard. “May the prophet have mercy on your soul.”

Then all six guards grabbed the prisoner and half-helped, half-shoved him until he stood just above their heads, balanced atop the jet-black stone. The guards circled around the obelisk, butt-end of their spears raised to keep the condemned from leaping off the rock.

Then they waited.

No one knew what form the obelisk would select. Well, perhaps the mystics in the palace might be able to predict it, but to the commoners of Yogurt’s caste, the form chosen was just as mysterious as the rock’s transformative powers themselves.

The old man standing to Yogurt’s left stroked his grey beard while he studied the prisoner’s long face. “He looks a bit like a horse to me. Ten shekels on horse.”

Yogurt looked back and forth between the old man and the younger man atop the obelisk. Whatever the old man saw—or thought he saw—was lost on her. Would he really turn into a horse? That would surely be the best possible outcome the prisoner could hope for!

Horses were rare creatures this deep into the desert. They required expensive care and so were only ever owned by wealthy merchants or nobility. Then they were put to work, but pulling a chariot didn’t seem like a challenging task for such a large creature. Being well cared-for and given such an easy job hardly seemed like punishment at all.

Or perhaps he would be transformed into a camel? Camels were far more common, and the traders who kept them worked them far harder than they would a horse. If he became a camel, then he would spend the rest of his days hauling heavy loads across hot desert sands. Despite the similarity between the two hooved creatures, his future would be starkly different depending on which was selected.

But the obelisk could choose any animal, and some were far less desirable than horses or camels—a scorpion, a rat, an asp, perhaps? Yogurt doubted the guards would let any such pest creature survive.

What if he became a fish? she wondered. Would they let him flop around in the dust until he suffocated? Would they kill him out of mercy? Or toss him in the well? Yogurt gulped back her fears. Would he end up on someone’s dinner plate?

“Five shekels on a dog,” said another voice. “I think he’ll fight for the mayor’s entertainment.”

Ugh, that was a gloomy future.

Other voices shouted out their bets, but the prisoner’s sun-darkened skin was already beginning to pale. He teetered, he sunk to a squat, and slid gracelessly from his perch.

“Well?” asked Yogurt. “What’s he turning into?”

“I can’t see!” said Nabirye. She scrambled to her feet, and Yogurt helped balance her on her shoulders.

“It’s… It’s…” Nabi gasped. “A cat!”

The tallest guard grabbed the prisoner-turned-cat and held him high overhead so that everyone could see his brown-black-and-cream fur.

“That’s not so bad,” Nabi said as Yogurt lowered her back down. Gamblers exchanged coins, and the crowd began to disburse.

“So long as you don’t mind eating mice,” Yogurt said with a foul face.

Grain was precious in Ezbet-Maks, so the villagers hated mice with nearly the same antipathy as the mayor hated metal thieves. Without constant control, two mice could become thousands, and thousands of mice could wipe out a whole storeroom full of grain.

As a cat, the prisoner would be allowed to roam freely, allowed to eat as many mice as he could catch, but no one ever fed the village’s cats, no one pampered them. Only a hungry cat caught mice. Only hungry cats served the people.

“Bleah, mice,” Nabi said, sticking out her tongue.

“Yeah, yuck,” Yogurt agreed. Perhaps the homes that rich people kept were mouse free, but the same could not be said for the modest apartment that the sisters walked toward.

“Well, if it isn’t my little Yogurt,” oozed a voice to her left.

She gritted her teeth. “I’m not your little anything, Ottah,” she growled.

“How rude,” Ottah grunted. Easily twenty years her senior, he made her skin crawl. “So long as you live in my home, you’re definitely my little Yogurt.”

“We live in your home because I pay you six shekels every week,” she reminded him. “I owe you nothing more beyond that.”

“Six shekels,” huffed the older male, taking a moment to brush dust from his robes. In Ezbet-Maks, girls wore blouses and trousers, but even the youngest boys dressed in robes. “That is hardly a fee, hardly rent at all. It’s merely a token payment so you can feel like you’ve earned my roof over your heads. Six shekels is a charity.”

“Well, if my money matters so little to you,” said the older sister with a smile, “I will gladly pay you less.”

“There are far better ways to work off the difference between your pitiful handful of coins and the lovely apartment I let you keep.”

“Lovely apartment,” Yogurt laughed. “It lacks even a door that locks. We might as well be living under the stars, cooking our meals with a campfire.”

“Well, if six shekels is the … only payment I can expect from you,” Ottah said, stepping in front of the pair, “then you may well get your wish. I can rent it out to someone who would pay me twice the price.”

“And I could find a landlord who doesn’t make revolting suggestions the moment his wife is out of earshot,” said Yogurt, putting her fists on her hips. “Or do you suppose she’d like to know what you said to me yesterday?”

Ottah’s eyes closed slowly to slits. “Are you threatening me?”

“Are you threatening me?” Yogurt spat back. Ottah didn’t really frighten her. If he did kick them out of the apartment, he’d probably be doing them a favor. She didn’t really fear him physically either. There were always people nearby in Ezbet-Maks. If she screamed, a dozen different neighbors would peek in to see why.

The only thing Yogurt truly worried about was her sister’s safety. She didn’t trust Nabirye to be alone with her landlord for a moment.

———

Reviewer's link: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Ljp71atBFZXRdso6LGkHg-JYJTh9iK1Q7q1PE-r9hiY/edit?usp=sharing

Thoughts?