Skyborn

by Cameron Bolling

  “That makes sense,” she said, more of a mumble than three distinct words.

  “I’m just glad the earthborn don’t eat them. Some people think that’s where they’re taken.” Pahlo breathed a heavy sigh. “What a relief.”

  She supposed, if she looked at it that way, it did come as a relief that an eclipser hadn’t eaten her as an infant. At least she could find some solace in that.

  They walked on through the night until the dark cover of the night sky thinned and gave way to the light of dawn again. The sun had leapt fully into the sky by the time they made camp in a low range of rocky hills. Much to Oleja’s dismay, they saw no sign of food or water from which to replenish their stash of rations, which grew thinner by the hour. Oleja highly suspected Pahlo of hyperbolizing in his assessment of the supplies he brought with him from the raiders’ wagon, likely as a way to try to comfort Oleja and give her a shred of hope when she had none. It worked at the time, certainly, but now realizing that they worked with less than she thought almost made it worse altogether. If she had been aware of the extent of their supplies from the get-go, perhaps she’d have rationed it better. Now they’d need to make significant cuts the following day—and any day thereafter—until they found the means to restock. It felt like her life was a never-ending cycle of having too little, and she was sick of it. The mountains, with their promise of lush landscapes, abundant in water and wildlife to hunt, could not appear soon enough. If the prosperity she found there turned out to be another exaggeration, Oleja would be ready to rip her hair out.

  Undressing her wound brought only grim news once again, and without another clean bandage, she doubted more positive news loomed in her near future. Pahlo offered a cut of his robe, but Oleja denied him—she saw no sense in letting him suffer the heat for the sake of her leg, which needed more than just a new strip of cloth anyway. She knew well the heat that came in after cutting apart the robes, and she would not expose him to it unless it became necessary. Besides, his robe was by no means clean, and they could not spare the water to wash a strip of it to use as a bandage, which made the whole idea moot.

  She tied the old bandage back around her shin and crawled into the tent. Sleep did not find her as easily as the day before, however—a lot churned inside her mind, and silencing it all to give herself a moment’s peace created no small task. One thing above all kept returning to the forefront of her mind.

  Glory can be shared.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  By the time they both awoke, the sun hung low in the sky and dusk was rapidly sweeping across the land. Just as the day before, they rose, ate, and packed their things. Oleja didn’t even bother checking on her wound again. The pain she felt along with the swelling and redness visible around the edges of the bandage were clear indicators that she’d see nothing good underneath.

  The situation with their rations brought no reassurance either. Since their supply didn’t miraculously replenish while the two slept, their waking meal marked the first in a decrease of portions. The cuts weren’t too dire yet—not to the extent that Oleja reduced her own intake while alone—but she didn’t want to see them reach that point. Still, their water intake crept low enough that Oleja readied herself for dehydration to set in soon once again—if she ever even made it out of that pit during her short-lived period of false abundance.

  When they set off for another night’s walk, Oleja once again put her arm around Pahlo’s shoulders to steady herself. Her body seemed to be growing weaker—certainly not the progression she hoped for.

  In their path lay a range of hills taller than any Oleja had yet encountered, mere silhouettes in the darkness of night. They earned the title only by a bit, but the height difference was enough to take note of—especially given how much difficulty she had walking across even ground, let alone the gentler, lower slopes they had so far bested. It felt like a cruel joke that she should come to them now. Although, when she thought about it, her end goal lay within a range of hills supposedly rising up with an enormity surpassing any of these hills with ease, so perhaps it was best to bite her tongue and save her complaints for later when she had bigger hills to climb—quite literally.

  That was, of course, assuming they made it there at all.

  They had to. She wouldn’t accept failure, not after coming so far with the aim of finding refuge while working through her grander problems. She’d taken a gamble—heading for the mountains instead of back to her village—and she just hoped it was the right move. They couldn’t die out there, never even returning to the village. They wouldn’t. Regardless of Pahlo’s comments, she had to remind herself: death was not an option. Determination needed to carry her just a little bit farther, and then she could decide how to progress from there when the time arose. When, not if. She was going to get out of the desert if it was the last thing she did. And she really preferred it not to be.

  Before they reached the taller hills, the descent of the smaller range they camped atop lay before them. Typically, a descent allowed for a good easy walk before a more strenuous uphill climb, but not today. Not with her leg so swollen and infected. Every step down just added force to the impact, which sent fresh fractals of misery crackling through her leg. She winced each time, at first trying to hide them from Pahlo, but soon giving up on that ordeal as it only meant supporting more of her own weight with each step down, adding to the burning she suffered each time. The pain soon outweighed her pride. If Pahlo made any comment about her showing weakness again, she’d clock him in the jaw. Then he could share in the pain.

  Reaching flat ground that leveled off for a bit provided a brief oasis of relief in the valley between the two ridges, except that oasis still came with its fair share of torment. All too soon they headed back upwards, and the climb proved to be nothing short of excruciating.

  Oleja started to wonder if perhaps what she felt came from an aftereffect of the venom, or if truly the pain all stemmed from the infected wound. She expected it to hurt, but did so much agony truly come from just one wound? She had no way to know, and knowledge either way wouldn’t ease her suffering. For the moment, she just had to ignore the throbbing aches as best she could and make it to the top of the ridge.

  Climbing the slope became a slower process the higher they went. Though her leg still slowed them most, other factors began pulling against them as well. Dehydration closed its grip around both of them, and hunger complained in their stomachs. Weariness settled in over the previous day’s exhaustion. Pahlo never shrugged off Oleja’s weight no matter how tired he became. A thanks sat patiently on Oleja’s tongue, but she couldn’t push it out. Perhaps after she was well rested and nourished, she’d speak it, but in the meantime, fighting herself on the matter just wasted energy. Too many other wants and needs clouded her vision.

  When at last they crested the ridge, the sight before them made as good a shot of adrenaline as any. Below, a valley carved across the landscape, as sandy and dry as any of the others they’d seen. But beyond it, far in the distance, towered an immense wall of dark peaks. The low light shrouded many of the details but could not hide the enormity of the hills. They rose higher than the ridge they stood atop by ten times or more, and up close they promised to make the canyon wall look like a small step built for a child’s stubby legs. Oleja breathed a slow breath. She could hardly grasp the idea of something being so large. Surely the tops of the mountains scraped the very sky above them.

  Though darkness hung about the slopes, the upper pinnacles of the tallest peaks took on a light hue that reflected the minimal light cast by the moon. Oleja could form no explanation for what occurred there atop the mountains, save that the sky itself rested upon them in silver-white sheets, and if she climbed high enough, she too could touch it. No desire in her heart had ever drawn her with such force. She wanted to be at the top of the tallest peak.

  Her leg throbbed, bringing her back down to the ground. Climbing a single-story staircase would make a laborious task in her current state—best
to leave mountain climbing for another day.

  The pair began their descent with renewed vigor, knowing now how close the mountains loomed. They could reach them the next day at their current pace. If they both walked with health and full bellies, reaching the mountains by dawn could have made a reasonable goal, but doing so required a degree of spryness that neither possessed at the moment. They’d have to settle for reaching them the next day, though excitement made them long for it to come sooner.

  They agreed that a path downhill was more likely to bring them to a water source, and neither could deny their desire for such a meeting. Thoughts of water and their long-anticipated acquaintance with the mountains helped to quicken their feet, though Oleja’s wounded leg expressed no great joy about this new pace. Perhaps it came from looking ahead to the high peaks, or her lack of nutrition, or some combination, but Oleja’s mind grew dizzy as she stumbled her way down the slope of the ridge. A few times she called a pause to catch her breath and stop her head from spinning. Pahlo never protested, as he seemed to be experiencing a similar phase of delirium. They each took a few sips of water and ate a small handful of nuts from their food rations, then kept moving.

  In their descent, they reached a crevice cut into the side of the hill. The lip ran parallel to the top of the ridge and continued both left and right as far as they could see. The opposite edge continued down the slope to the valley, and beyond it, the mountains, though the gap stretched nearly ten feet across to the other side. In depth, it went perhaps twenty or thirty feet, though which end of that range Oleja struggled to determine with her mind so clouded. Climbing down and back up demanded an incredibly draining undertaking from two hungry, dehydrated—and in Oleja’s case, wounded—individuals. Not to mention time consuming; it could take them hours to complete the climb in their condition, if they could manage at all, and they couldn’t forget that somewhere behind them, Honn still scoured the desert for their whereabouts.

  Pahlo studied the crevice. “We could jump,” he said after making his final assessment.

  Oleja gestured to her leg with a questioning glare. Pahlo made a face to say he took the point.

  “Plus, I don’t think either of us is in the condition for jumping crevices right now. Even if we were in peak-condition, that’s a big jump.”

  “You’re right,” said Pahlo, returning his focus to study it again. A moment passed, and then he pointed. “What if we jump to there instead?” he asked, indicating a ledge around six feet below the top of the crevice but on the side opposite from them. “Then we’ll only have to climb up that bit instead of the whole thing.”

  Oleja sized up the gap. Still a big leap, but far more reasonable. The impact on her leg sounded like a nightmare, but she could handle it. She didn’t have any other choice.

  “I suppose that’ll have to do,” said Oleja.

  “All right. I’ll go first so I can help you across,” said Pahlo.

  Oleja scowled. “I’ll be fine, I can manage it.”

  “That’s okay,” said Pahlo as if he hadn’t even listened to her. “I’m still going first.” He gave the gap another once over, moving up and down the ledge as he pinpointed the best point to jump from, and best place to jump to. After making up his mind and preparing himself, he took several steps back, and then darted forwards. He planted one foot firmly at the edge and leapt, sailing into the air, rushing towards the other side of the crevice.

  Oleja was right—neither of them stood any chance of making the jump all the way to the other side. For a split second, she doubted that Pahlo would even make it to the ledge he aimed for. Her heart caught for a moment between rapid beats in her chest. But then Pahlo’s feet hit the ledge and he pressed his chest to the stone wall, clinging to handholds as he found his balance and steadied himself on the new ground. He grinned up to Oleja.

  “I made it!”

  “I can see that. You wouldn’t be speaking to me if you hadn’t.”

  Pahlo glanced down to the bottom of the crevice. “You’re right.”

  Oleja paced the edge, but she wobbled unsteadily on her feet. She sank down onto a boulder near the ledge.

  “You coming across?” called Pahlo, standing on tiptoes and looking over his shoulder to see her past the edge of the crevice.

  “Yeah, I am, just give me a second,” she called back. Her head pounded. Dizziness swept coiling clouds around her. She needed water.

  She allowed herself one sizable gulp—likely more than she should have, though with the mountains in sight it became hard to heed the knowledge that another day of walking remained before they reached the foothills, and who knew how much longer before they found a water source amongst the new terrain. The drink thinned the clouds just a bit. She wanted to take another, but reason stopped her and forced the waterskin back into her bag. She needed it for later.

  Planting her feet firmly in the dirt, she rose. “Here I come,” she called. Pahlo turned around, shifting so he faced back towards her. A wide spot of ledge sat just to his left. That was where she aimed to land.

  All of her gear felt heavy where it hung from her body. Her glider on her back, quiver on top of that, bag pressed against her left hip. Even her bow, slung over her shoulder, and the knife at her hip, tiny as it was, seemed to weigh as much as a great boulder. Her left leg shook as phantoms of the pain to come spiked under her skin. It was now or never.

  She dashed forward, the fastest she could recall moving in days. The ledge raced to meet her. Pain flared in her leg with every step, but she allowed herself to feed it only a wince and nothing more. The ledge got closer with each step. She prepared to jump.

  Her right leg found purchase on the lip, though it was by her design that her good leg served as the one with which she jumped. She bounded off the edge, throwing all of her energy and strength into the muscles in her leg, pushing off with everything she had. She forced herself skyward, but she only seemed to push the earth down.

  A crack rumbled through the air, followed a thunderous grating sound. The ground fell away just as she pushed off, absorbing all of her momentum and channeling it back down into the earth. She fell forward, momentum gone, plummeting for the bottom of the crevice.

  By some stroke of luck, her fingers caught the very brink of the ledge just where she aimed. She sank her fingers deep into the craggy surface, clinging to it with all the force of her life—which was precisely what lay at stake. She swung forward and collided face-first with the rocky cliff below. Blood sprang into her mouth. Sand stung her eyes. The sky-shattering grating still echoed above.

  “Oleja! Oleja get up!” screamed Pahlo, pure panic ringing in his voice. Oleja shook off the stunned haze and looked up.

  The ledge she jumped from had cracked and broken free; an immense chunk three-times larger than her slid and started to lean outwards. It pivoted as it caught on a ledge on the opposite wall—its arcing course aimed directly for where she hung by her fingertips, doomed to strike her with the force of a hill collapsing down, crushing the life from her.

  For a split second, the prospect didn’t sound all that horrible. It was the death she’d always been destined to face—the fate shared by all of her people, that which all of them confronted the fear of daily. It had claimed the lives of half or more of the people throughout the history of the village, her parents included: being crushed beneath falling rock.

  But then she snapped back into herself. She was Oleja Raseari, girl of the sky, and she was not going to be buried beneath some rubble.

  She kicked for a foothold and found one beneath her left foot. Grunting in pain, she used it to haul herself up, grabbing the ledge with her full hand, then two, then a forearm. Adrenaline filled her as she scampered up the side of the crevice.

  “Oleja!” Pahlo shouted again. A dark shadow passed over her head. She wasn’t quick enough. Her eyes pressed shut as she readied for the impact.

  A deafening crunch filled the air, a dozen cracking sounds like twigs snapping in a bonfire. Something drip
ped on her fingers. She looked up just as Pahlo howled in pain.

  He stood over her, crouched low, precisely in the path of the crumbling boulder which now pinned him against the wall. He pushed back against it with his full force, holding the stone against the opposite wall and keeping it from falling any farther. The only thing standing between the stone and Oleja was Pahlo’s body.

  “Get up here… quickly,” he croaked through ragged breaths. His face contorted in the truest display of pain she had ever seen upon any of her people as they toiled away, suffering in a million different ways with every passing day. She didn’t need him to say it a second time. Hands slick, she clawed her way up.

  The boulder scraped on the stone walls as it slid. Pahlo screamed again, his agony echoing in the still night air. Oleja was nearly at the top.

  Pahlo’s body crumpled as he lost consciousness. The boulder careened down, slamming against the ledge. A new crack sounded in the crevice, though this one brought with it a pain unlike any Oleja had ever felt.

  Her left leg—the same that had endured so much torment already—was crushed beneath the falling chunk of rock. It snagged her leg and pulled. Her body lurched downwards, wrenching her fingers away from their holds on the stone face. Ringing filled her ears, as well as a distant scream that sounded much like it belonged to her. The boulder cast her body aside as it shifted and fell. Freefall stole all of the weight that had been holding her down.

  The floor of the crevice returned it with a little extra just for good measure.

  She landed on her back, the air leaving her lungs in one quick gust. The world shook as the boulder crashed down beside her. Cracks split the ground under the impact, breaking apart the earth in one enormous crash. The impact surely shook the ground from the old ruined towers to the mountains and perhaps all the way back to her village. The sound echoed for many long minutes afterwards as Oleja gasped for breaths of the thick air, filled with a haze of sand and dusty debris launched by the quaking tremors of the ground.