The Hunt

Chapter 55: Hanna

Karter lets me sleep in his tent that night. He's the only exile here that I remotely trust, because he's young and friendly and I'm desperate. Besides Jonas, I've only ever really talked to Karter. Everyone else here is a stranger.

I don't sleep much anyways. I lay awake in the blankets, staring at the tent ceiling, restless. Jonas and I's argument replays in my mind over and over again, as if it's some kind of puzzle I'm trying to solve. None of it makes any sense. I'm trying to remember a time in our lives when he was like this; there must've been some kind of sign. He was always so carefree and lighthearted, I never had the inclination that he was dealing with something so intense. If only he had told me.

Stop it, Hanna. Stop thinking about something you can't change. Stop thinking about Jonas. He's dead to you. He's not the Jonas you're remembering.

In the morning, I wake up from a light sleep and forget where I am for a second. There's nobody in the tent with me, and a streak of glowing sunlight peaks through the open flap. I sit up and feel my gross, dirty hair settle around my face. Despite my swim in the river, I don't think I can ever feel clean while I'm out here. The morning chill starts to get to me, and I shiver, wrapping myself tighter with the blankets.

Suddenly, sunlight is engulfing my body; someone has come into the tent. It's Karter, and he's holding a bundle of clothes.

"Here, from the Prince," Karter holds out the bundle to me.

I look at them for a while, and then shake my head, "No, I'm not taking anything from him."

Karter gives me a look.

"No, I'll find something else," I stand up.

"Do you even see what you're wearing? That white city outfit has been through too much. Don't be an idiot, take them."

"I don't want favors from Jonas," I huff.

Karter sighs, "Alright, listen. I stayed quiet yesterday when the whole thing went down. Now I'm not gonna pretend I understand what happened between the two of you, I really don't. After your little talk, I didn't ask any questions, I didn't stick my nose in, nothing. I even let you latch onto me like a flea and offered to help you out a little. But if you start being stupid like this, it becomes my problem. I don't care about the weird drama you and the Prince have, you're gonna have to figure out your shit."

He throws the clothes at me. I catch them and begrudgingly set them down on my blankets.

"Did you hear me? Figure out what you're gonna do. Do some soul searching or something, I don't know," Karter turns to leave the tent.

"Wait," I stop him. He glances back at me with a sigh. "Can I have a weapon or something?"

Karter laughs a little, "Get it yourself. I'm not your servant."

He ducks out of the tent and I am left very pissed off. What did I expect though, he's an exile. The nicest one I've met, no doubt, but an exile nonetheless.

I take off the formerly white hoodie, now covered in grime and blood and holes, and strip everything left from the city off of my body. Except for my stone, of course. I keep that in my hand firmly and slip it into the pocket of my new jacket.

For the next few days, it's like I'm wandering through the dark with my hands out, fumbling for my surroundings. I walk through life blind, because it's as if nothing is recognizable.

In the military, I knew that place like the back of my hand. Everything about it, all the people and places and functions, was like a calculated formula to a math problem I had long since solved. It all worked like clockwork around me, coherent and routine and familiar. I had grown with it like I was its child, the hallways guided me and the walls comforted me, it gave birth to who I am today. Everything I understood was laid out in the grid of buildings and the functioning of the military machine. And most of all, up until this point, I had always had someone to lay down the path for me. I had Jonas to walk through it all with me, I had Garik to give me the instructions I needed, I even had Javaar to navigate the forest for me.