by Harold Wall
herself to look away. She was just a masochist.
"Emerald," they spoke again, Emerald finally recognizes Sky's voice. "He's… he's gone."
"Don't say that!" Emerald snapped her arms flying up and balling into fists. "Don't say that." Her voice quieted as she brought her hands forward, concealing her face.
The moment my toes touched the soft wet sand, I pulled myself upright and got up, trotting over the hot sand to where I'd left my extra pair of clothes—aka, the slave clothes. I
went back into the cover of the dark trees and stripped the completely wet and possibly ruined tunic, and after tossing it over a tree branch to dry out, I pulled on the other much
coarser piece of clothing. "Okay, your turn," I called into the trees as I grabbed my wet hair and wrung it out. A few moments later Rogue stumbled through, a few twigs in her hair
and still smelling of sewage from our little tour of Alec's sewer system.
"At least one of us smells decent," Rogue mumbled, "Have I ever told you how much I hate the wild?" I took one look at her frazzled expression and the twigs in her hair and
laughed.
"I think I would have figured that out pretty quickly if you hadn't," I assured her, "besides, I don't appreciate the smell of the ocean—do you know how many fish poop in there?"
Rogue made a face as she headed out towards the ocean. "Thanks for telling me that right before I got in," She grumbled as she stomped away. I watched after her for a moment
before turning away and heading back towards our sorry excuse for a campsite, an amused grin on my face. At least we wouldn't stink of sewage—falling asleep with the smell of
sewage on our bodies hadn't exactly been pleasant for either of us.
Unlike Rogue, my newly improved senses helped me so that I was able to navigate through the forest easily without stumbling over branches and roots of trees. Therefore, reaching
the campsite took only a few moments. We'd spent the night in a tightly packed clearing that was dark even in the middle of the afternoon. In the center was a bed of leaves—our makeshift bed, since we didn't have room for anything other than food in our bag. To the right was a fallen tree that served sort of as a bench.
I headed for the bench and sat down on it, sighing as I did so and closing my eyes, trying to keep my muscles relaxed. Sleeping on the forest floor wasn't exactly as glamorous as it might seem—I couldn't tell you how many rocks I'd slept on. I could still feel the ghost of them jutting into my back.
The forest around me, like the Black Kingdom had when I first arrived, was completely silent. I couldn't even hear bugs moving in the dead leaves. Every instinct in my body
screamed danger, but I ignored the feeling. Here, I knew, reality was reversed—if I was hearing noise, we were in trouble. I kept my ears open for any noise as my mind reviewed
the rest of my plan.
Somehow, we were going to make it out of this forest. When we did, my first plan was to find the road and follow it to the nearest phone booth—I told Rogue we couldn't flag
anyone down, because they might be a Night Person whom we couldn't trust. Once we found a phone booth, I'd call Miles and get him to call Circle Daybreak. Then we'd wait for
Circle Daybreak to come for us, and then they'd take us back to the nearest Circle Daybreak outpost where we could rest. I'd wait for Delos to get word and come for me, and
Rogue would wait for them to fetch her mother and sister.
But before any of this could happen, we needed to keep low and keep from getting recaptured.
I wonder how long the forest is, I thought to myself—Rogue wanted to travel in the beach where there weren't any obstacles to climb over, but I refused to do so. Traveling in the
open made us easy targets, and I wasn't about to…
Suddenly a screech from the beach snapped me out of my thoughts and in one smooth movement I was on my feet and running back through the trees, dodging branches as I did
so. "ROGUE!" I yelled as I burst through the trees and back onto the beach a moment later and instantly took the scene in, evaluating and creating a plan as much as possible.
A few feet ahead of me was a particularly large mountain lion. It was halfway between me and Rogue, who was still in the ocean water, and it had halfway turned its body so that it
could look at both of us. It snarled and roared at me, but it didn't make a move to attack.
Shapeshifter, I thought—I knew enough about mountain lions to know that they waited patiently for their prey to come close enough for an ambush. They weren't animals who
enjoyed chasing their prey down.
"Stay there," I yelled, crouching into a fighting stance that had suddenly become natural to me, my nails lengthening into claws. I kept my eyes on the mountain lion who, clearly
sent to kill both Rogue and I, was having trouble figuring out which to attack first—vulnerable Rogue or easytogettobutbetterarmed me.
It snarled, darting a glance at Rogue and then turned back to me, resolve hardening in its eyes—it had chosen to attack me first, I thought dimly, my muscles coiling as I prepared myself for the attack that was sure to come.
It faced me now, coiled into a position for an easy spring. We kept our gazes on each other, watching for who would make the first move…and then it sprung.
I dove right as it flew through the air, twisting my body so that when I landed I faced it—I wasn't about to let it catch me off guard. The mountain lion landed and in a millisecond it
turned back around, its jaws opening as it let out a bonechilling roar. Faintly I could hear Rogue screaming, but I ignored her. What was important now was the enemy in front of me.
We slowly started to circle, our eyes locked, looking for a weakness in one another. It hissed a feral cat sound that made my skin crawl. I felt my fangs lengthening and I too
hissed. I arched my fingers, suddenly feeling the need to rip them into flesh…
And sprang.
The mountain lion tried to counter, but I was on top of it in a second, using what vampire strength I had left in me in the sunlight to pin it down on the sand. The great cat roared
with fury as it struggled against me, its claws managing to scratch my torso. I ignored it, knowing that without wood it couldn't hurt me permanently and made my strike, sinking my fangs through its fur and into its throat.
The cat screamed in pain as its blood flowed from its body and into my mouth. I knew that normally a vampire wouldn't attack another Night Person like this, but I didn't care. It
had threatened my friend, and I'd left our only weapon—a wooden sword, which was probably useless with a Shapeshifter—back at camp. So I had o other choice but to attack using
the only thing I had—fangs and claws.
I drank until it was completely drained; it's screaming and clawing finally going to a stop. I pulled away when the body had gone lifeless and wiped my mouth with the back of my
hand, feeling the new power coursing through my veins. I felt stronger than I ever had before…and wilder. Everything had gone into clear focus and slowly I turned to look at the
fully dressed Rogue who was now standing by me, staring down at the dead animal with wide eyes. "Is that….?" She whispered, pointing down at it reluctantly.
"A Shapeshifter," I answered her solemnly, "They're hunting us down." I looked up at her, my eyes serious. "You're going to have to cut the bath short—we're leaving as soon as I
grab the food bag."
The forest—already dark in the sunlight—was even darker at night. Even with vampire senses, I myself could hardly see anything. The forest was eerily quiet, and the only sound
was the sound of Rogue's panting.
The rest of the day had been rough—I might have moved faster if one, I knew where I was going and two, I was alone, but I refused to abandon Rogue. We tried to keep as silent
as possible, stopping every so often so that I could get a good listen for any kind of pursu
it.
The early afternoon's events, I could tell, had shaken Rogue. "Do you think they'll find us before we get out of here?" Rogue stagewhispered, her voice shaking.
"I don't know," I answered truthfully, pulling my legs up close to my chest. In reality, I was terrified as well. The cuts from the mountain lion had healed, but every time I stopped
to listen I expected to get attacked from above. "Go to sleep Rogue," I urged, trying to be as quiet as possible.
"But…but I don't want to!" Rogue cried, "I don't like being out here! When do you think we'll get out?"
"I don't know,"
"I want to go home Maggie! I want to see my mom, my sister…"
"And I want to see Delos!" I finally snapped, "I want to see my brother, I want to see Jeanne, I want to see my parents, my dog, my cats…I want to see my old friends again, I want
to see the members of Circle Daybreak at another meeting... Rogue, do you think I'm immune from all of this? I might be different from you now, but I'm still the same person I
was before! Heck, I wouldn't even mind eating a pizza!" Rogue had fallen silent and I could smell the saltytears coming from her direction. "Don't cry…I didn't…" I sighed, finally
giving up and sat back against the trees, looking up into the branches.
Never in the past six months had I ever cried. Don't get me wrong, I was depressed enough to sink into a corner and disappear, but I'd refused to cry. Crying was a weakness. I
didn't want to show Alec any weakness—showing him weakness would have been like letting him win, something I was determined to keep from happening.
But out here away from Alec, the need to cry and show weakness was like an overwhelming desire. The silence was overwhelming, bringing up the painful lonely months that I'd
tried to forget. Tears stung at my eyes, threatening to spill over…
No, I thought, not yet…hold on till its over. You still have to be strong for Rogue—she needs you to be strong.
The thought of Rogue made everything jump into focus and the need to cry right then lessened. And yet in the back of my mind I could still feel it there.
Slowly, I closed my eyes and started to quietly sing a random song, something familiar, more to myself than anyone else; "When you walk…through a storm…keep your chin held
high…and don't be afraid of the dark…" The words caught in my throat—I was surprised I even remembered it. Our school had performed Carousel a few weeks before I'd met Delos
and the song, though it had been one of my favorites in the entire play, hadn't been thought about since then.
"At the end of the storm, is a golden sky and the sweet silver song of a lark," My gaze snapped to Rogue at the sound of her voice, but she wasn't facing me—she was lying down,
facing a wall of trees. In the distance, thunder rolled, introducing the arrival of a rain storm. "Go on," Rogue prompted, her voice raspy. I could tell she'd been crying.
I paused, trying to remember the rest of the song. "Walk on through the wind," It was hard to get the words out—more than ever I wanted to cry, "Walk on through the rain, tho'
your dreams be tossed and blown. Walk on, walk on with hope in your heart and you'll never walk alone…" I stopped, slowly looking back up at the canopy of trees above us. I
could hear the rain drops start to hit the leaves above, and felt a stray drop hit my cheek. "You'll never walk alone…"
Two very long days passed without incident; all we'd seen and heard were our own footsteps in the mud and Rogue's heavy breathing as we trudged forward. We stopped often and
rested little, trying to keep moving forward though our strength was waxing cold in our bodies. Although I needed to feed once a day and the forest quite obviously had no animals
in it, I tried my best not to take any from Rogue—I didn't want to make her even weaker than she already was.
"The food supply is running low," Rogue informed me that morning as the sun cast rays through the leaves of the trees above us. My hands froze and I slowly looked up at her,
alarm showing on my face.
"How much do you have left?" I hadn't taken any of it—I hadn't needed it, and although I still enjoyed human food, I refrained from partaking in her food supply. Rogue silently held
the bag out and I took it from her, peering over the edge to look in.
At a first glance, there was plenty of food in the bag. But after reaching in and grabbing a loaf of bread, I could see the mold and bugs that were starting to get into it. I mad a face
and dropped the loaves on the ground. Both Rogue and I stared at it, watching the bugs scatter and crawl frantically over the bread. "Oh…oh no…" I moaned.
"There are a few pieces of food that might last me over breakfast…but…."
"No," I shook my head slowly, "all the food in there has been contaminated with mold and bugs…you'll just get yourself sick."
Rogue was silent, and I knew that I'd won this one. "But how are we going to travel?" She silently asked, and I could hear her voice starting to get a hysterical edge in it, "I need
food…and you need some blood…"
"No I don't," I shook my head and stood, "I can go a few days without it…" At least I hoped I could. I didn't quite know all the facts about being a vampire. Being human, you could
go a few weeks without food. But a vampire…I didn't know how long I'd last.
But my main concern was Rogue—being human, her strength waned faster than mine. And she already wasn't the type to go hiking through the woods. She was already about to
drop on her face.
"But…"
"I'll be fine—I'm worried about you at the moment."
Rogue was silent for a moment before she took a deep breath. "How far do you think we need to go?" she asked. I was still staring in horror at the ruined food in front of us.
"I don't know," I answered truthfully. I looked up and met her eyes directly, "Quite honestly, we might have been heading the completely wrong direction…or we could be going in
circles." I watched the fear rise into Rogue's eyes, but she didn't as much as whimper. Instead she slowly nodded her head and stood up.
"I think we need to get moving," She stated, her voice eerily calm. I slowly rose to my feet and started to lead the way.
We spent the next few hours, like before, trudging through the forest—the forest canopy was thankfully able to provide shelter from the hot rays of the sun, but that only made
everything into a wet heat. We sweat like crazy, our clothes sticking to our bodies uncomfortably. At that moment I wished I had a rubber band to pull my hair up and away from
my neck.
The entire time Rogue hadn't said a word, but I could hear her breathing become more and more irregular to the point where she was wheezing with each breath. Finally I stopped
and whirled around. "Stop Rogue—you need to rest."
Rogue shook her head, but she leaned against a nearby tree anyways, her hair falling into her exhausted, sweaty face. "If….if we stop now….we'll die…."
"You'll die if you don't get any rest," I insisted, my eyes scanning the area around us for a somewhat safe place to putt her. "I'm going to scout ahead, try to see if there's maybe a
stream at least, or something edible…"
"You're leaving me?" all at once, Rogue's voice was hysterical with fear. I shook my head.
"Only for a moment—I'll be right back. I need to find something that can help you keep moving…something to give you strength." I spotted a two treed that were bent over
sideways, crisscrossing one another. "Over here," I gently guided her to the trees and set her down under them. It was a little place, and if she stayed down she might have
somewhat of a good hiding spot. "Lay down and stay here…don't leave here no matter what happens." I ordered, standing up straight, "I'll be back for you, I promise."
Before Rogue could protest, I whirled and dashed off into the forest.
I searched for what seemed like hours, hoping and praying to myself that I could find a water stream or at least some plants that she could eat. But the more I looked, the less it
became likely that there was anything lifesustaining out here. Most of the plants were dead leaves and trees. Dead leaves didn't do anything for you and she couldn't eat a tree.
I stopped in mid stride and stood there, glaring down at the muddy forest floor. I'd failed her. I'd gotten Rogue into this mess, and now she was back there, dying and there was
nothing I could to do save her. Even turning her into a vampire would get us no where—she'd be out for days, leaving us vulnerable and even if we didn't get caught, there was no
way either of us would be able to find food. There was just simply nothing there.
We were doomed. And it was my entire fault.
Frustrated and resigned, I whirled around and started to trot back to where I'd left Rogue…
And then a fluttering of wings made me freeze and listen. I listened hard, so hard my ears began to ring. My heart pounded wildly in my chest, thumping erratically against my rib
cage.
And then I heard it again—the flutter of wings through the branches just a few feet away from me.
I instantly crouched, every sense going on alert as I slithered quietly across the forest floor, the damp leaves softening my foot falls. I wasn't alone—I could hear the branches
shaking wildly, but as my eyes darted around I couldn't see anything…
And then the branch shaking stopped and I heard a loud THUMP, indicating that someone had just landed and hit the forest floor. There was a grunt and then a few seconds later
there were foot falls, slow and deliberate.
It's looking for me, the thought flashed into my mind, and instantly I knew it was true. The way the creature…the person….whoever it was, was moving—it was looking for someone.
And I knew somehow that that someone was me.
Slowly I creped around, trying to get behind the figure, my heart beat drumming in my mind as I did so. I could feel my fangs lengthening and my fingers turning into claws, ready
to defend myself.
And then the footfalls stopped.