Dimokre Chronicles Book 1: Crossed Paths

Chapter 4 - Don't Ignore the Shadow's Trail

Sarah stayed put for a few minutes, wondering how she'll be able to do this on her own. Her feet pointed to the direction she needed to go, but her eyes watched where he ran off, past the purposefully broken branches and caught fur. After a howl or two, she sighed to herself and walked on. She hoped Michael was right about the healing pond.

A half an hour of dull, painful walking inched by, until Sarah heard running footsteps. Gasping, she dove behind some brush and laid flat on her stomach. She curled into a tight ball, pushing herself carefully under the branches. She carefully lowered a dead branch and nearly had a heart attack, seeing army uniform pants tucked into muddy combat boots. She silently drew in a deep, slow breath and waited.

More boots came. They stopped at the sound of a distant howl, and they all darted off the same way they had come.

Sarah waited a few more minutes, just in case they could hear her or randomly came back this way. Then, she pushed herself off the ground and double checked that the coast was clear. Air slowly returned to her lungs, and she trekked through the woods, taking special note of the north-facing moss on the tree trunks. She hoped the mossy trees were ones that couldn't move. She rested against one for a moment, absently touching the moss as she stared down the path she needed to go.

This Huntress woman really took a toll on the forest.

Her leg ached, imploring her to sit down. She glanced at the ground, but her eye caught onto a mud glob oozing out from a hollow log. It stopped when it sensed her. This time, the mud's clear layer had a brown shimmer instead of gold. It inched towards her. Now that she knew to actually look for the creature, she had to admit: they were pretty easy to avoid. She stepped away from it, and after a moment of thought, decided to grab a few sticks. Just in case.

Sarah proudly detoured around the mud spirit, but was so focused on avoiding that one, she walked right into the second. She gulped, freezing. The mud firmly attached itself to the soles of her shoe. Okay, what did Michael do? She shifted her sticks to one arm. One twig fell in the process, and it sunk into the mud. Okay, not that.

She jabbed most of the sticks she collected earlier in a fence around the mud. The mud around her shoe still concentrated on spreading instead of hardening, so she knelt uncomfortably down and managed to swipe some nearby branches. After breaking them apart, Sarah had plenty of stick ammunition now. She mimicked the pattern Michael did, as best as she could.

Breathe, Sarah, she reminded herself of Michael's words. Almost there.

The mud realized what she was doing and clenched tightly onto her legs. It strained to climb up higher, and some globs around her feet even spread up in the air like a gloopy tentacle, trying to suck up the stick into itself before she could use it as a weapon.

It didn't try to move, probably because its attacker was also its prey. Or maybe it just knew better than to try running into her fence. It kept clenching, and she kept stabbing.

Finally, it did its one last squeezing warning, and she clopped her mouth closed. She stabbed it on its highest point, which at that moment was on her knees, and squeezed her eyes closed.

Mud splashed on her cheek and slid off, and she knew it was done. She peeked one eye open, then the other, in time to see globs of mud begrudgingly seep into the ground. Just as before, even the mud that seeped into her socks and sneakers had faded away.

Sarah plopped on the ground, panting for a moment, but she couldn't stop smiling. Pride and a feeling of hopeful independence swelled inside her. She stood up and stretched before continuing in the direction she hoped was north.