Soulwoven: Exile

Chapter Four

~4~

Ninety-seven days before the destruction of Nutharion City

Flames leaped from a pile of brush and driftwood in front of Cole. Two rocks, one sharp and black and one round and gray, lay at his sides. His hands were raw from gripping them, and his arms were sore from knocking them together. Fine grains of metallic sand wormed their way between his toes, suspended themselves in the mess of hair on top of his head, and clung to every inch of him. His dripping-wet clothes were laid out on the sand.

He wondered what Yenor had in store for him next.

It had taken three days to reach the shore. Three days of waiting until Dil found the right soul to channel and then struggling through the choppy tides between the rocks. Three days of drinking stale rainwater from pools and eating tiny crabs and seaweed above the thrashing, violent sea. Three days of wet clothes and three nights pressed next to Dil’s body.

He ran a hand over his face. Those nights—those nights had been wonderful and terrifying. The warnings of his mother and the leering grins of his friends had warred in his mind with the soft, warm reality of Dil and her body and her breath and her desires.

What’s going to happen to us? he wondered. Out here, alone in the wilderness?

He knew more or less where they were, and it wasn’t a comforting thought. The easternmost Aleani villages lay hundreds of miles west of them. East and south there was nothing but wasteland. There was a chance they could make the trek through the foothills and mountains of Aleana unaided—Dil was good at that kind of thing—but he couldn’t help but worry. The mountains on the horizon looked big and sharp, and he’d never climbed anything without following a path before. Wandering around with no food, no shelter, and no weapons but his knife and her Wilderleng-ing wouldn’t make for an ideal first try.

We’ll grow up fast, I guess.

Dil, hugging her knees to her chest across the fire, seemed more comfortable than he was. She flashed a brief smile and picked at some sand between her toes.

Cole held his hands in front of the flames and let the fire heat his palms. His skin was dry and cracking from being wet and salty for too long, but at least he was finally warm. He smiled. Yenor’s eye, it felt good to be warm.

He heard a loud crack in the woods.

The smile fell from his face.

A deer, he thought while his heart hammered.  Or a squirrel. Something harmless, something small.

But when he heard another crack, it didn’t sound small and harmless at all.

He rose and grabbed his knife from the sand. The woods stood dark and unknowable in front of him, a wall of long-needled trees stretching from shadow to shadow.

His knife shone in the firelight, and he stood naked and small before the wild and waited.

He heard another crack. Then a rustle. On the other side of the fire, Dil crouched with her eyes wide and golden, her ears pricked forward, her hands curled like claws.

Cole looked back at the woods. As he focused, he began to hear quiet shuffling sounds. His heart beat faster.

Be small, he thought. Whatever you are, please be small.

He saw the eyes.

They glowed pale yellow in sets of two at about the height of his chin, catching the light from the fire. They didn’t shine like Dil’s. They looked dull, sunken, and dour.