Void Walker

Chapter Eight: Lost

Miklos poked at the suspicious sludge sitting in his bowl, and it shifted with a dubious squelch.

"What on earth is this?" he demanded.

"Vynax spider," Leo joked.

His two companions, Zen and Alistair, burst out in hysterical fits of laughter as Miklos's stomach rebelled. Luca tried to stifle his, but choked on a mouthful of cider instead.

"I'm not eating this!"

Rei reached over and smacked him across the head.

"It's stew. Eat up, stupid. We don't have anything else."

They glowered at each other from opposite sides of the table. Miklos put up a good front of holding her glare with a defiant scowl, but the mouse inside him ran and ducked for cover. It was like watching a storm brew right in front of him within her steel-grey eyes. To make matters worse, Rei had been casting prolonged, weary frowns in his direction as though he were a puzzle that she couldn't quite comprehend. Her expression was difficult to interpret, and Miklos couldn't decide if she looked frustrated, confused, or angry.

Thankfully, Leo came to the rescue.

"Meaties for veggies. Wanna swap?" He grinned at Rei with his sharp pointy canines and wild green eyes.

She raised a brow. "Yea, sure."

They exchanged portions of their food. To Miklos's surprise, Leo took the vegetables and Rei received the meat. When another odd-looking chunk was passed from one to the other, Luca intercepted it with a well-aimed stab using his knife.

"Oops." An instant later, he wolfed it down and flashed Rei a smug smile which she did her best to ignore.

The next few moments saw several of such exchanges between Rei's and Leo's team. It seemed that they were already well-aware of each other's likes and dislikes, for neither discussions nor arguments of any sort arose. Krea swapped her mushrooms for a couple of unidentifiable purple roots in Alistair's bowl. Luca exchanged his vegetables for Zen's meat. As it turned out, both Leo and Zen hosted - in Miklos's honest opinion - unhealthy obsessions for the limp black things which he thought looked nothing like vegetables, and he stared at them with a disgruntled expression.

Across the table, Rei pinned him with yet another frown.

"Eat," she scolded. "If you get hungry in the night, feel free to chew on your pillow."

In the end, he succumbed to her potent gaze, although he would have preferred to think it was on account of his growling stomach, and quite sadly: the lack of alternatives. So with a bated breath, Miklos lifted a spoonful of the gunk and clamped his lips over it. Six pairs of eyes watched and waited with suppressed anticipation. Just as he was about to complain through his stew about the indecencies of staring at others (hypocritical of him or not), his taste buds exploded.

It was nothing like what he had ever tasted before - in a grotesquely bad way. His first bite clouded his nose with a pang of sharp sourness, dissolving into unpleasant throbs of a bitter aftertaste. A detestable gloppy texture rubbed against his tongue. Instantly, he craved for the exquisite cuisines served back at home. He regretted the times he threw silly tantrums over perfectly good plates of pot roast, venison in broth, pastri-

Odd. The recollection of those experiences seemed empty, as though there was a void in some aspect of his memory which he couldn't quite place a finger on. Feelings of queasiness settled in his gut. The taste of the stew continued to burn through his tongue.

He swallowed, turned red, and retched.

"You'll get used to it," Rei assured amidst the unrestrained chuckles of his table-mates, save for Krea, whose eyes shone with concern as he struggled to maintain his composure.