A Greater Lesson

Chapter 18: Negotiating

“Can you climb?” I yelled to Xik. 

“I can try, I’ve never tried before!”

I grabbed onto a branch hanging above me and let my momentum swing me up to the lowest layer of the treetops.  I held out my hand.

“Get up here!”

He grabbed it and tried to pull himself up, but stopped and just looked up at me.  I saw the look on his face, he had an idea; one that I wouldn’t like.

“You can climb.  I’ve seen you.  You might be better at surfing branches than you are running on land.  It’s you they want, not me.”

“No, Xik!  You’re coming up here with me!”  He let go of my hand.  “Xik, I’m serious! They’re coming, we have to hurry!”

“They want you, Rivka, as long as they don’t find you I’ll be fine!”

“No you won’t!  You don’t understand these guys!  They will kill you if you don’t give me up!”

“What if I don’t know where you are?”

 I looked at him with pleading eyes.  “I’m not going to lose my family again, Xik.”

He looked back.  “Riv, you have to hurry!  They’re gaining.  Run as fast as you can up there and stay hidden.  I’ll run down here and try not to get caught ok?  I’ll meet you somewhere by the next town by tomorrow if I don’t get caught.  Now hurry!”

I hesitated to move.

“Go!” 

I looked back to see Jerghund’s men approaching quickly.  I looked in Xik’s eyes one last time before I got up and climbed up a few levels.  True to his word, he bolted further into the jungle.  I’d seen Garis hurt him before.  I didn’t want to go through that again.  If I didn’t see him within the hour, I was going back.  And if I saw Kolan, I was going to kill him.

I ran alongside Roux for a few minutes before I heard Xik.  My natural instinct was to stop and go find him, but he didn’t want me to.  If it was Jerghund and his men he wouldn’t want them to find me, so I kept going, but the sounds continued.  I knew there was a struggle.  I came to a stop in the branches.  He saved my life.  He’d almost died, what, three times because of me?  If this thing got messy, I wasn’t just going to stand helpless.  I stopped and looked at Roux. 

“Stay here,” I whispered.  “Please, don’t let anyone find you.”

He laid down on one of the branches  and looked at me.  I had made up my mind, and with that, I made my way towards the commotion.

“Aghh!”  I tried to open my throat enough to keep breathing as one of the new members pulled tighter on the rope around my neck.  Jerghund had shown up with seven other men, the two who had been with him all along, and five new recruits.  I shouldn’t have been captured, not like this.  In my defense, I was greatly outnumbered and in the unfair struggle I had broken a nose and a wrist, but now I was compromised.  That rope had clotheslined me and been pulled over a branch before I even realized what was happening.  These guys were efficient.  I could only hope they wouldn’t find Rivka.

“I’ll ask you again, where’s the girl?”  Jerghund worked at me with his demonic interrogations.  He had a way of talking that even though you knew he wasn’t the most dangerous of the group, made you fear him.

I wanted to reach up to pull the rope away from my throat, but my arms were held tight to my body and they weren’t going anywhere.  I took in a deep breath and looked at him.  “I don’t know, we got separated.”