Last Light

Chapter 1

"Come, Kayla." The voice of the forest whispers into my ears as the wind tangles itself in my hair. A grin extends across my face as the joy of being needed by the forest again sets into eager fingers. A vine extends itself towards me, allowing me a handhold as I climb the nearest Cenella.

 My heart leaps with every step, the branches bending and allowing me access to the next tree as they show me the way. I begin to wonder if one of the muglo babies had grown ill and that was why the forest had called on me again. Or perhaps it's a baby towlsit that needs taking care of again like last year. 

I smile at the thought. It's sad when a mother towlsit decides that she can't feed all of her chicks and has to kick one out, but that also means that the forest will call on me to raise the chick until it is old enough to be on its own.  

I'm surprised when the trees lead me past Mt Colgan, a marker that I seldom pass because of the closeness to the Palace. I push the start of panic down and  turn my focus back to my footing on the moss-covered branches.

"Here," the voice whispers again, the wind curling into my ear and then back out before fluttering off through the leaves. 

The Cenella's vines and leaves surround me in a gentle cocoon. I reach my hand out and touch the bark of the tree, my fingers seeping into the warm moss that covers it. 

I look up through the branches and can just make out Petra in the morning sky above, her shattered form looming across the sky and out of my vision. I shiver as if she is watching me, waiting for me to inch my skin into her light. She would just love to taste my flesh again. 

It has been twelve years since the asteroid shattered Petra. I was only ten at the time, but I remember how chaotic everything became after that. People started screaming as the light that filtered through her shattered form began to burn their skin. 

I had been outside with my father at the time, learning to shoot a bow and arrow. I remember the sting of her light and the sting of tears that tormented my eyes. The light that we depended on had become toxic to us. We began calling it the Last Light because we thought it was the last light we would ever see.

I shake the thoughts out of my head and take a deep breath of Cenella scented air. I look around, not seeing any creatures in need of helping.

 "Why here?" I whisper, begging for its warm voice to answer back.

In reply, one of the Cenella's vines begins to wrap itself around my waist. I tense, preparing myself for the small form of a mother muglo to come charging out of the branches at me. 

But instead of an animal, the large Cenella leaves part so that I can see a boy, the first Zantonian I have seen outside the Palace gates since mom died. 

What in Zelma does he think he's doing? 

The boy's brown hair is swept sporadically across his clean, white face, causing him to have to push it out of the way multiple times as I watch. I look down at my own skin, caked with at least a month's worth of dirt and grime. There's no way he's from the Palace. They wouldn't let someone so...weak... out here alone. Even if he is, why would he want to be out here during Visible Petra? Even the corches rarely come out during Visible Petra.

The boy rises from his seated position at the base of the Cenella tree. I suddenly see that he has a notebook in hand. I can't remember the last time I have seen paper and a pencil. Probably since Ty left.  An ache in my heart begins to grow as I try to shove it down, gripping the green vines tightly as I push out the memories. 

The boy begins muttering to himself, leaving the notebook at the base of the tree before he crouches down and digs in the dirt. I lean out from my perch in the Cenella, curiosity getting the best of me as he takes out a metal object and sticks it into the dirt. His eyebrows raise as if he is surprised and then he quickly writes something down in another journal. He begins to mumble some more and I lean out even farther, hopeful that I can catch his words on the wind as it blows past. 

A moment of panic settles on me as I watch the boy walk towards the exposed area in the clearing, light bleaching the dirt at the edges of the Cenella shadows. But the boy stops just at the edge of the shadowed area and crouches down once more. I let out a breath as the boy pulls out the metal object again and sticks it into the ground where the Last Light touches. I can see that he is being very careful not to let his fingers inch into the light. 

My eyes continue to wander to the journal at the base of the tree. It's been over eight years since I've read anything, and even then it was only the books that Ty had brought with him, but I'm sure I can still make out enough to figure out who this is. 

The Cenella vines release me, instantly understanding what I am about to do. I make my way around to the tree where the boy's notebook lays, it's owner still mumbling to himself about the dirt. A vine drifts out of the leaves to allow me something to hold onto as I make my way down to the forest floor.