by Amy Richie
“The woods?” She turned to look at the forbidding sight.
“Maybe we should meet back at the council building first,” I heard Tiny suggesting in a hollow sort of voice. “Maybe the others found something.”
I already knew though, my heart knew.
Chapter 17
I knew my only chance of finding Dais was to break free of Constantina. She would only slow me down with her delicate ways and her constant worry. Unlike me, Constantina wasn't used to hard work and the idea of her running through the muddy forest was alarming. I couldn't take the risk of her falling and getting hurt—not when I had to use all my energy and wits to find Dais.
Drawing in a huge lungful of air, I ducked behind the tree I had been eying earlier. It easily hid me from the view of anyone looking for me. Sure enough, I heard my name being called just a few minutes later.
“Rani!”
I held my breath and crouched low to the ground.
“Did you see where she went?” someone screamed.
“She must have went back to the council building,” came a reply.
“Should we all go?”
There was a general murmur of agreement. I didn't hear their footsteps as they made their way back to the council building and away from me. They had all done the best they could to help find Dais, now it was up to me.
And I would never give up, not as long as I was still walking around—nothing would stop me from finding him. Not anything.
Certainly not a group of people who had shunned us aside for as long as Dais had been alive. No matter what Constantina said now, it didn't just erase the fact that she had wanted to send us both to the Americas on the day he was born with blond hair and green eyes.
I still remembered that day.
I shook my head quickly to dispel the fresh wave of memories that would only slow me down. The only thing I could do now was move forward. Keep moving until I found him.
Moving just an inch at a time, I twisted my body so I could see around the large tree trunk to where the others had just been. In the distance, I could just see them filing back to the council building where they assumed I was waiting.
I scowled lightly at their retreating backs. What would they do when they didn't find me? Would they start searching? Or maybe just stay there and wait for me to come back? But what if they did come looking for me? If they found me out here hiding, they would make me go back to the council building with them.
That’s not going to happen, I decided with a firm set of my jaw.
Taking a deep breath, I pushed myself away from the bark of the tree and set out at a quick pace away from the others and out into the unknown forest.
The going was slow. I had to pick my way over tree roots and duck around low hanging branches. The storm had knocked some of the branches on the ground too, so I was continuously having to change my path to go around them. There was also the darkness to contend with, here in the trees the shadows were darker than normal.
“Dais,” I called softly, cupping my hands around my mouth. “Dais, are you out here?”
On the path directly in front of me, a small animal scurried from under a fallen tree branch and darted behind another tree. I gasped and backtracked several steps. I didn't even know what the creature was called—Dais would have known. He knew all about these woods. He knew what creatures hid here and the best place to get wood for the fire. He had even learned to use an ax—a tool Marcus had brought to cut the wood into small pieces.
The corners of my eyes stung with emotion, and then, very suddenly, I was blinded by tears that filled my eyes. I tried to stop them from falling, but it was too late. Stumbling forward, the tears started leaking from my eyes and streaming down my face at an alarming rate.
It wasn't that they didn't let me cry on Ortec, it was just frowned upon. I was a servant of Ortec, lucky to have the position they gave to me. As I was often reminded, I could have been sent to the Americas, but they let me stay. I should be grateful and not go around with tears on my face.
“It will just make everyone uncomfortable,” Constantina had snarled at me one day when she caught me moping my face in a small closet.
I knew she was right and I did try not to cry. Sometimes, I couldn't stop it though. It was a good thing no one was out here with me now. What would they think to see me running blindly through the dark trees with tears falling as fast as the rain above me?
“Why are you crying anyways,” I croaked out loud. “You don't know if he is hurt. He's just as likely holed up somewhere out of the rain.”
There was no reason to think the worst had happened. As I half walked/half ran, I tried to convince myself that he was fine, that he would come back to the council building as soon as the rain let up.
“Why did he go without anyone else?” I groaned, stopping to catch my breath. I bent forward until could rest my hands on my knees, taking great gulps of air through my sobs.
Where was he?
What if he really did get hurt last night?
What if he had to sleep out in the rain last night, all alone and scared?
I dropped down to one knee, the pain in my chest almost unbearable. I never realized how much Dais meant to me until that moment when I thought I might have lost him. How was it possible to care so much for another person? How had he come to mean so much to me? So much that I knew I wouldn't be able to go on walking if something terrible had happened to him.
I sucked in a breath and pushed myself back up. I will find him, I told my wild thoughts. I will find him and take him back to the town. We will be okay; we always were okay.
Chapter 18
A large tree loomed suddenly in front of me, looking strangely proportioned and frightening in the dim light of the early morning. Deciding it was best to go far enough around the tree so I wouldn't get tripped up by its roots, I took a sharp turn to the right. This new path had its own hidden things to trip me though, and I soon found myself on the ground anyway.
My legs flew out from under me, my foot having been caught inside a hole that I didn't see. My breath left my lungs in a soft whoosh. Above me, the trees were swaying and bending in the wind. Every once in a while they moved just right so I could catch a glimpse of the cloud heavy sky above them.
“You need to get up,” I told my panicked brain. I needed to get back up and keep looking.
What's the use though, a voice hissed in the back of my head. It was a nasty voice that I had tried my whole life not to listen to. I was having hard time shooting that voice down as I lay there in the mud with the rain splashing across my face.
I wasn't going to find Dais. He had probably been washed out to sea. It wouldn't be the first time something like that had happened. On Ortec, we were warned as children not to go too close to the water. The ocean was hungry, constantly searching for all the people who had survived the Great Wave.
Before the Great Wave, human kind had treated the earth badly. They had taken from the soil and never put anything back, until finally it broke. The oceans fought for revenge and tried to kill every single human. It didn't succeed though. Some humans survived, and now the water was trying to take them one by one.
How many times had I heard the story while I was growing up? We were told from a very early age not to go near the water—don't even put a toe inside it. We were growing careless now, setting up our home on this tiny island where the water was just a few miles away. It was impossible not to go near it.
Now, Dais was paying for that. The ocean had taken him.
My breath rushed into my lungs in a great shuddering gasp.
There was a tiny spark of something trying to flare to life in the back of my mind. A tiny little voice that was demanding me to get up off the ground, even if I couldn't find Dais. I could still go back to the council building.
But why?
What was the point of going back to the council building without Dais? Losing Cyrus was bad enough, horrible even. Going on with living while I knew I
would never see Cyrus again was only bearable because I knew I needed to care for Dais. That's really all I was now, all I had been for a long time: the mother of Dais. I didn't want to be anything else.
I turned my face, letting the tears run off my cheek and mingle with the mud I was lying in. I’m not going to get back up, I decided. I was just going to lie there and let the ocean take me too. Somewhere in my head I realized that I was too far away from the ocean for it to take me, but the ache in my heart was louder than the voice of reason.
“Dais,” I whispered into the mud. “I'm sorry I didn't try and find you last night. I'm so sorry that you have a mother who is weak.”
The sobs that came out of me were like nothing I had ever made before; they were the sounds of something wounded. I had heard them before though, twice. Once when Shona's baby had been born dead and another time when the same thing had happened to Angelina. I understood that pain now, understood it so much more than I ever wanted to.
“Dais,” I choked again, inhaling water and something worse. “Dais.”
My eyes slid closed, defeat making me more tired than I ever remember being in my life. If I just let myself lie there, I could easily fall asleep and maybe never be found. It would be so easy, much easier than forcing myself to stand up and continue my blind, useless search. No one is here to tell me what to do either, I thought defiantly.
“Mama!”
“Yes, Dais,” I whispered to the wind that was pretending to be my son. “I hear you, I always hear you.”
“Mama,” I heard again, this time a little louder and more clear.
My heart flipped over in my chest and then thudded into overdrive. Was it possible that it really was Dais calling to me? Had the ocean given him back to me? Was that possible?
Chapter 19
The air was coming in and out of my lungs too loudly I couldn't be sure what I was hearing. I, of course, wanted to hear Dais, but I knew enough about the world to realize that you didn't often get things just because you desperately wanted them. I took a deep breath and held it in, straining my ears for any kind of sound that wasn't the wind ripping through the tree tops fanned out above me.
“Mama!”
My breath came out in a loud whoosh from my lungs. There it was again. He really was calling to me. “Dais,” I called back weakly, raising my head to scan the area all around me. He wasn't there; it looked the same as it had before I fell: wet and muddy. Only this time, I had mud streaked hair laying across my face to contend with, making it even harder to see.
With a grunt of effort, I rolled onto my stomach and pushed myself up onto my hands and knees. Using the tree for support, I regained my balance and got up off the ground. I only stumbled forward a few steps before I fell again, my face sinking into the soft mud.
I didn't stay down this time. I immediately got back up and wiped the mud from my face. Dais was still alive; the ocean hadn't washed him away. Hope flared to life in my beating heart.
“Dais,” I screamed. The sound ripped through my throat, burning on the way out. “Where are you?” I called again, feeling the scratchiness but ignoring it. “Where are you?”
“I'm here,” his child-like voice called above the wind. “I'm over here.”
The hope that had flared back inside had given me a whole new sense of determination. He was alive, and I would be able to find him. The island wasn't that big, after all, and if I could hear him, that meant we weren't that far apart.
“I'm coming,” I promised. I was fairly sure my throat had been sliced wide open by the power of my screeches, but what was that when I really thought about it? It would heal.
My feet slid around in the mud as I rushed forward, following the sound of Dais calling out to me. Suddenly, the path in front of me was blocked by a tree that had been knocked over. It was hard to tell if this storm had been the culprit or if a storm long ago had blown it down.
It hardly mattered. I inwardly scolded myself for letting my mind wonder about something so trivial.
Not wanting to waste any more time, I vaulted myself on top of the fallen tree and jumped down to the other side. Lucky for me, it wasn't a large tree.
As soon as I cleared the tree, the woods fell away to reveal a large span of sharp rocks. Just beyond the rocks, the ocean opened up and went on as far as I could see and way beyond that. Giant waves crashed against and sprayed water up over the rocks, all the way to where I was standing with my mouth hanging slightly open.
How far was this from the shore where the barter man docked? It couldn't be far, but I had never been here—I didn't even know there was a here. A giant cave jutted out away from the ocean. And there, standing on the rocks in front of the cave, was ...
“Dais!”
“Mama,” he called back, waving his arms way over his head.
My heart lurched, causing my feet to move at the same time. The sudden movement wasn't very smart though I realized half a second too late. The rocks were extremely slippery from all the extra water from the rain and the giant waves the storm had caused. There was no chance for me to stay upright on them when I rushed forward like I did.
I slammed down between two small, but pointed, rocks. My hands shot out automatically to try and break my fall. It was hard to tell if that was a better choice than the rushing forward on wet rocks.
The skin on my hands were frayed and bleeding, making it difficult to prop myself back up into a less awkward position.
“Are you okay?” Dais called. “Hold on, I'll come help you up.”
“No,” I held my bleeding hand in the air to stop him from attempting the dangerous journey over to me. “I'm fine. I can make it on my own.”
“Are you bleeding?” he called, clearly not convinced that I was fine.
“Not much.” I wiped my hand along the thighs of my pants. It was a good thing Constantina had made us all start wearing our pants for the freezing season already, otherwise my legs would have gotten cut up too. As it was, there was a spot on my knee that was cut open, but the rest of my legs were unharmed.
I scrambled up, wincing past the pain in my hand as I pushed myself up.
“How did you get over there?” I grumbled in a low voice, not wanting him to hear me and think he needed to help again.
Fighting my urge to run to Dais, I was forced to take my time over the rocks. I watched the ground, careful with placement of each foot. At least he wasn't far, at least I could see him, at least I knew he wasn't dead. That was worth a torn knee and a few scrapes on my hands.
Even though it was slow going, I made it to Dais in one piece—almost.
“I was worried about you,” I told him, my lips moving into a smile. “I thought the ocean took you.”
“I was trying to wait for the rain to stop,” he explained. “And then I fell asleep.”
“How could you sleep out here?” I asked, incredulous. “It must have been so cold and scary.”
Dais shrugged. “I should have just come home.”
Without thought, I pulled the boy close to me and wrapped my arms around his small body. “Doesn't matter,” I choked out. “I found you in the end.”
“I wasn't lost,” his muffled voice complained. “You worry too much.”
I chuckled lightly, but didn't let him go.
Chapter 20
“Do you know the way back to town?” I asked Dais loudly, shouting to make myself heard over the roar of the ocean and the wind.
“Yeah,” he nodded, his bottom lip still jutting out slightly. “I was waiting for the rain to stop.”
I craned my neck back to take a good look at the sky, immediately getting a face full of water that stung my eyes. “Let's go in there,” I pointed behind Dais to the opening of a cave.
“We can't,” he shook his head until his blond curls flopped in his pale face.
“Why not?”
“Let's go around.” He pointed out a path of rocks that led up and over the top of the cave.
“I want to get out o
f this rain.” I took a step toward the cave, holding tight to Dais to be sure that he was coming too.
Once we had ducked inside the cave and gone back a little ways, the roar of the storm faded enough for us to talk without shouting to one another. “We can't stay here,” Dais said as soon as I stopped to catch my breath.
I pressed my hand tight against my chest. “Of course we can.” Why couldn't we? This was a perfect place to wait.
Dais shook his small head very quickly. “We should go,” he said again. He turned away from me toward the mouth of the cave.
“Wait,” I called out, “can't we just wait here? It's bad out there. What if the ocean washes us away?”
“It won't,” he scoffed. “It's not alive, it can't get us.”
My mouth fell open. Is that what he really thought? Had I failed him so badly that he wasn't even afraid of the water? “Yes,” I spat out angrily, “it is.”
Still shaking his head slightly, he remained silent. He just stared at me with those same narrowed eyes I had watched for nine years.
“Are you hurt?” I asked after a moment.
“What?” His top lip snarled up at my question.
I almost laughed out loud at the gesture I knew so well. “Come over here and let me check you.”
“Check me for what?” He crossed the few steps that separated us even as he asked with that same snarl.
“To see if you're hurt.” I pulled his arm out, inspecting it for cuts or bruises. There was a small place just above his elbow where the skin had been rubbed raw, but other than that, he seemed whole and perfect still.
“I'm fine,” he pulled his arm away from me. “But we both won't be if we stay here in this cave.”
“Do you come here often?” I asked, looking around at the rocky walls and dirt floor.
“I've been here before,” he shrugged, “but not during a storm and not at tide.”
“The tide's coming now?” I squinted back toward the mouth of the cave as if expecting to see the water flowing in.