Centuries

Chapter 3

"No. It's too risky the price wouldn't be worth it." the Darkling said it was clear he was angry about something. I just needed to figure out what.

"You are young, you know nothing about what you will have to do to win a war."

barely recognized the General's voice

"You have no idea what I know." the Darkling sounded calmer than he did before but that only made me worry more.

What was going on? What price could possibly be so high that someone who would tear their country in half and kill thousands of innocent people wouldn't pay? The rain pattering on the tent made it hard to hear the rest of their conversation. Eventually I gave up and fell asleep. When I woke up the next day the rain had stopped. I went to find Kate who was trying to get a fire started to cook breakfast.

"Hey can I sit with you?" I asked awkwardly

"Yeah of course can you stir this while I keep this flame going?"

I stirred what I hoped was oatmeal when I noticed that Willow was walking over to us. I wondered if she knew anything about the conversation I overheard between the Darkling and the General.

"Are either of you going on the patrol later today?"

"We're mapmakers so we have to so we can look for anything that might have been different from last time."

That was certainly new to me. The last time I had been in this area was hundreds of years in the future. I didn't know why I was surprised that I'd actually have to do work. I was pretending to be a soldier so of course I would.

"Oh good so I'll know some other people there." Willow said I really should have thought this out more but I was committed now.

"I'm going to go find Aleksander." Willow announced.
it was a common name hopefully she was looking for someone other than the Darkling.

"What patrol was Willow talking about." Kate laughed

"You really are clueless. There's reports of a group of Fijerdans to the north and we're going to find out if they are true or not and we need to look for new paths and evidence they were there with the trackers."

My heart sank thinking of if I were in different circumstances I would look forward to this. To Mal. I refused to mourn him. He wasn't even born yet and I had hundreds of years to figure out how to save him.

Willow came back to our spot with the Darkling close behind her. I was tempted to make up an excuse to leave but without the Darkling's trust I would get nowhere. He was drinking coffee and I noticed he looked really tired. I didn't know exactly how late it had been when I heard him but it must've been pretty late. He sat next to Willow and she put her arm around his shoulder.

"And yet you were wondering why people would think we were lovers." the Darkling said but he seemed perfectly fine with her affection

"Are you?" I blurted

"No he's not my type." Willow answered.

I didn't question them any further. Kate apparently knew Willow and they were deep in conversation. Which left me to talk to the Darkling. I knew I should say something but he wasn't saying anything either so we just sat in silence.

"I have to go do some last minute planning for that stupid patrol."

The Darkling finally said.He was just getting up when Willow asked

"Wasn't General Janazain supposed to do that?"

"He's a lazy piece of shit and I don't trust him so I just did it myself." So insulting his superiors was something the Darkling always did.

"Alina, we need to go to the cartographer's tent to get some supplies before we go." Interrupted Kate

"Wait you're a mapmaker?" the Darkling asked

"Yeah" I said hesitantly

"That's weird, I didn't think there were any new mapmakers that arrived."

This wasn't good. The Darkling was smart and he could easily catch on that I wasn't supposed to be here. I'd rather that than him figure out that I'm a Sun Summoner, since the fold wasn't created yet he wouldn't need me to expand it so there was nothing stopping him from killing me.

I didn't like that I would need to hide my power but if that's what it took I would do it. Kate and I gathered pencils and paper to draw anything new I didn't know what I was going to do since I hadn't been in this area at this point in time before.

When we left I was surprised that the area we needed to patrol actually seemed pretty peaceful. There were huge pine trees surrounding us and I could hear a river running near us. In total our group was about ten people as we trekked through the forest I noticed nobody seemed to be trying to be quite

"Won't the Fijerdans catch onto us?" I asked the Darkling

"We want them to know we are onto them if they are here so it doesn't really matter."

We looked through the forest for about an hour but the rain seemed to wash away any evidence of anyone being there. I heard a loud crash that made everyone jump. There was a tall and blonde man trying and failing to hide behind the trees.

"Keep him alive for interrogation." the  Darkling ordered.

I didn't want to think about what being interrogated by the Darkling would be like but I drew my knife and followed the soldiers who were getting ready to attack.

"This is too easy." Willow muttered.

She was right. Something was off there should be more than one person in the group and he couldn't have given himself away that easily. As if on cue I heard a gunshot behind us. Everything was a blur. The first thing I saw was one of the trackers go down. the Darkling lashed out with the cut and missed cutting down a tree that barely missed us instead.

"He's just unconscious," shouted a corporalnik that was tending to the soldier that had fallen.

"They must want us alive." I said to no one. Another soldier charged from behind the trees

"Alina! Move!" Kate called at  me I jumped out of her way just in time for her to send flames at the Fijerdan and light him on fire.

I wished I could blind one of them with sunlight; things would certainly be easier. The Darkling was back to back with Willow and summoning shadows that were creeping around us and scaring the
remaining soldiers away.

For now. We couldn't go back to camp the way we came without leading them there. They must have known it existed for them to be that close but it was still better they didn't know the easiest way to get there.

The Darkling cast light shadows around us as we hiked deeper into the forest. It was just past noon and the summer sun was beating down even through the trees. Kate and I had given up sketching out what we thought would be useful since there were clearly Fijerdans in the forest. Suddenly the Darkling held up a hand to stop us.

"Do you see anything," I whispered to Kate. "because I can't."

"Look to your right there's branches moving."

I did but I couldn't tell if it was an animal or an enemy. The Darkling cut the tip of the tree off probably to lure out what or who was hiding. I had my knife ready but I hoped that I didn't need to use it. Another Fijerdan came running from the opposite direction the Darkling was looking.

It took him a second too long to notice and a dart hit his arm. The last thing I should have felt was worried but I rushed to his side.
"You okay?" I asked, 

whatever was in the dart was working fast and he didn't have time to answer before he lost consciousness.