The Collectors of Peyka

Chapter 10

We woke at dusk, just before the sun had begun its ascent. A subtle orange tinted the horizon and a bitter breeze swept through the valley. With fewer trees, Feywa was colder than Peyka, but I knew the type of heat that awaited midday. I didn't bother adjusting my furs. Instead, I accepted the cold while it was around.

I was grateful that it was Clionna who woke me. I'd had a fitful dream about the commander, but she woke me with a gentle rock and kept her distance. When I darted upward, my fist swung out in front of me. When I saw the old shaman standing by with a thin smile on her face, I calmed my rage.

"You can't do that. I could've injured you," I said.

"Yes, but you didn't." She shrugged and walked over to retrieve her walking stick. "Come now. Phelim likes to leave before the villagers rise."

We left the tent and I was surprised to find only a handful of men stood waiting in the village's circle. A mangy mongrel with mud-caked black fur stood by Phelim's calves. When it sniffed the dirt, debris plumed out with the sudden gust.

"So you use a hound," I said with a scoff. Back in Peyka, they used their strength and stealth to secure a hunt. Using a hound was almost cheating. "That doesn't seem fair."

"The hound uses us," Phelim said. He nodded at Clionna and she took his hands in her own. "Mother."

"Look out for one another, Phelim. Do well to respect our ways," Clionna said.

"As you wish, Mother." Phelim patted the back of her hand and she returned them to her sides. "I'll go where the elements guide us."

"Go. Before the children awake. Remember to walk with the elements."

It seemed rather dramatic for a hunt, but with it, we set off toward the forest.

The walk was awful. It was worse than the trek to Nordfast. It took us several hours to reach a spot where the forest thickened, and the calls of nature returned. My leg was already cramping, but I swallowed down the annoyance. If I would've let Phelim see me stagger behind, he would've only come at me with some redirected vengeance. Only, that time, we weren't in Feywa and I wasn't forced to show restraint.

On the way, I couldn't recognize anything. I believed we were heading east, but I hadn't been certain of my directions since I'd arrived in Feywa. I tried to remember various landmarks. We followed a line of mountains until we hit a stream. The stream trickled off into a chasm that disappeared into a jagged cliffside. The crag jutted out over darkness, and even when I squinted, I couldn't see the bottom. But after that, it was only trees and the occasional boulder.

Phelim took the point for the entirety of the journey while a red-headed man stood at his side, clinging to the mongrel's leash. Every few paces, Phelim would stop and we all grew silent. He'd close his eyes like he was listening. When he stood beside the hound, they'd begun to share the same qualities. When I tried to focus, I could hear the birds in the trees and the flowing of the stream off in the distance. Everything was much louder away from the village, but it felt like they were tracking something specific. Something I couldn't hear.

But Clionna said he didn't have the hearing. If the elements spoke to him, it had to have been in a different language. She said something plagued his soul, something that cut him off from the elements. Maybe it was the lives he had claimed for survival. Or I thought, maybe he was hiding something else.

I couldn't figure him out. The more I tried to consider his actions and his attitude, the more his image confused me. He was strong for his size- more agile than some of the collectors. He was trained in the ways of combat and hunting, but he worried about his people. Like Alayna always told us, "worry is the breeding grounds for deadly mistakes." If he was worried about his survival then, why was it so different, now?