StarFall (Completed)

Ch. 14 (part 2)

The dark was fast approaching, and we were all scattered about. It had been close to three hours since I attempted to fulfill Miller's request--attempted being the keyword.

My finger followed along the paper I had written the letters of the Fae alphabet upon. At first he'd memorize the letters, then I'd have him write them out on a new piece of paper. Now I pointed to complete words for him to read out loud.

"River?" His tone was soft, and shy.

I nodded. "That's correct, Mr. Wynden." I pretended to shift a pair of glasses on my nose.

He chuckled. "Do I get a gold star?"

"Oh, sorry, I'm all out of gold stars." I smiled.

"Okay, let's try a few more words."

I stretched. "Miller, let's take a break, we've been at this for hours. What's so special about this book anyways?"

"That's the point, I don't know what's special about it. Krumb let me take it for a reason though, I'm sure of it." Miller stared back down at the paper.

Had Krumb? I know he told me these books would be of some use to us, but was there really anything that important in the book? Miller seemed to think so, and who was I to discourage him?

"I think you have enough by now to pick up the rest on your own. Just keep reviewing it, and I dunno, try translating a page of the book. I'll look over it later. Sound good?"

He didn't look up right away. "I guess."

I stood. "Good. Now I need to move around, my lower half is falling asleep, and if I don't wake it, I'll just end up joining it." I grinned, and walked off.

Madison sat with her bare feet in the water, she still looked upset. I hadn't seen Bobby in about an hour, he said something about going to look for food. I looked back at Miller working hard to learn as much of the Fae language as possible before I went off into the forest in search of Bobby. I didn't like it, but I couldn't just let him go off and die, I had promised to get us all home, alive.

The sun overhead had reached a low point in the sky, and the night had risen. The forest was dim, but not impossible to make my way through. I moved through the brush of the forest, cautious in my search for Bobby. 

"Bobby?" I called out, but not loud enough to draw any unwanted attention. There was no response.

I edged closer into the thick of the forest, vines of various colors hung from looming trees that draped over the path I walked on. How had he hoped to find anything to eat here? Most things we've already met were more likely to eat us than to be eaten.

"Bobby?" I pushed an over-sized leaf out of my way before being flung to the ground. "What's the big--"

My words cut short by the screams of a strange, bird-like animal. Yellow in color, it had no wings, but long legs with sharp talons. The creature stood over me as I laid on the ground. A large mess of feathers stuck out all over its head. It appeared to have orange stripes, and a long, wispy tail. Its pointed beak poked at me as it squawked. Soon the strange, tiger-striped-bird ran past me.

"Don't let it get away," Bobby said as he ran closer to where I laid.

I wasn't sure of what to do, but I jumped to my feet and did my best to keep up. The bird darted like an arrow through the forest. Its sharp talons gripped the wood of trees it clung to before pushing off in bursts of speed. 

Bobby caught up to me, and ran past. "Move it, Summers."

I tried to catch my breath. I hadn't planned on running my ass off to catch some tiger-looking, big bird wannabe. I should just get back to the riverbank. My stomach growled in protest. My idea of food may have changed, but Miller, and the others still needed to eat. And apparently, so did I.