Eloy's Challenge

by Kara Timmins

  “They look like iron,” Eloy said.

  “They’re just as strong, but the shells don’t hold heat like metal.” Neasa seemed to notice Eloy’s confusion. “Here, watch.”

  She opened a pouch from her bag and took out a handful of dried tree moss and a lump of animal fat. She warmed the fat in her hand, mixing it with a pinch of the moss, and fit it into the shell saucer—a routine that looked like something she had done many times before. She finished by striking two stones; a small flame caught in the ball of fat and moss at the bottom of the shell cradle. The little bit of light made the surroundings less unsettling, but its radius was small, and the line from the light became a boundary for a false sense of security. The final step to the construction of the lantern was a cane-shaped hanger she attached to one side, which rose above the little flame.

  “Take this.” She gave Eloy the saucer and started on a second one for herself. “It doesn’t seem like much, but it’ll feel like a lot when we get inside. Hook it to the bottom of your bag to keep your hands free.”

  Eloy did as she said.

  She stood up and hooked the lantern to the bottom of her bag. “Now listen. Here are the rules. Stay focused. If you see something, tell me. Also, don’t touch anything. Some things in here seem harmless, and they aren’t. Got it?”

  Eloy nodded. “Got it.”

  Neasa walked on. “Good.”

  “Are you a trader like Gwyn?” Eloy asked as they started walking again.

  “I’ve never gone out on the trade route, if that is what you mean. I’ve come out here to the forest since I was young, though. Some of my earliest memories are standing on the edge, mesmerized by what could be just inside of the dark. I used to scream when my mother pulled me away. She was always in a panic when she found me there, but I never knew why until I got older. Most people in Valia don’t come into the forest. It’s not worth the risk for most. But children have a sense for otherness, and without any knowledge or appreciation of death, they have a tendency to reach for the strange.”

  “How old were you when you finally came in?” Eloy asked.

  “When I was around fifteen. Not long after my mother died. I knew nothing worse could happen to me after that, so I went.”

  “Did you go alone?”

  “I wish I could tell you that I wasn’t that crazy or stupid, but I was. Gwyn cut me off pretty fast. I don’t know how, but I think he knew I would be out there in the early morning. He denies it to this day, but I swear he was waiting for me. He went with me the first few days, showed me some of the plants that a few of the healers in town use. ‘Sure sellers,’ he said. I remember feeling so wild—so educated about the world—when I came back. I know now that he kept us pretty close to the safety of the border.”

  “Do you help him find his goods?”

  “I go with him when I can, but there are others in town that can use the extra skill and set of eyes too. Opportunities to come in always seem to present themselves. I like to think it’s the forest’s way of asking me to come back.”

  “Why don’t you travel the trade route?”

  “There are things in Valia that need attention during the long months the traders are away. It works, though. If there’s something I find in here of value, they sell it for me, and a portion goes to them for the effort. It allows me to come in and get things they otherwise wouldn’t be able to.”

  He waited for her to say more. He enjoyed the comforting effect of her voice—like something between the sweet richness of a lullaby and the deepness of a sleepy secret—but he didn’t want to annoy her with too many questions.

  “Be careful where you step,” Neasa said.

  Before the words had finished leaving her mouth, Eloy’s foot had knocked into something firm. His other foot swung wide to avoid hitting again what Neasa wanted him to avoid, causing him to falter on the wayward foot before steadying himself.

  “What did I hit?” Eloy asked.

  The swaying orb of firelight surrounding him caught the reflective, moist tops of the globular things that crowded the ground.

  “They’re mushrooms,” Neasa said, upturning one of the brown masses close to her foot to reveal the black ribbing underneath. The mushrooms covered the forest ground, bulging up from the earth and giving the area a diseased look.

  “They’re poisonous if you eat them,” she said. “It’s a painful way to go from what I’ve been told, but they’re not what I want you to be careful of. Watch.” Neasa crouched down and stayed still long enough for Eloy to wonder if he had missed something.

  “Okay, there.” She picked up a twig from the ground and ran the tip lightly across one of the mushroom mounds.

  Two speckled yellow-and-brown eyes opened and bulged out from their once-concealed sockets. A line below them widened to reveal the fleshy inside of the creature’s mouth.

  “What is it?” Eloy asked.

  “It’s a toad—completely harmless.” She smiled. “These little guys are scattered throughout this area. They’re pretty defenseless in a place that’s filled with more than its share of dangers, but they have the advantage of looking exactly like something that nothing in here wants to eat. Their population does well. There seems to be more of them every time I come here. You can eat them if you’re in a pinch, but I don’t like to. Something feels wrong about killing the things that are successful because they are clever instead of dangerous.”

  “I’m certainly not going to make the case to add them to our meals,” Eloy said.

  “What? Not appetizing?” She stood back up.

  “I would definitely rather have something from the dining house in Valia.”

  “How do you know this isn’t what you had there?” she asked.

  “Please tell me that’s not what I ate.”

  Neasa’s smile was in full glow of the lantern light. “Nah, too much work to come this far in for them. They’re hard to spot among the mushrooms, so it’s best to avoid stepping on any of them.” She moved on, her lesson concluded.

  They walked carefully through the darkness with a steady stream of light conversation. He told her about Francena and Corwin and some of the things that happened at the salt flats. She asked for details and propelled him into an almost complete recitation of what had happened. The farther they went, the more she changed from the firm-browed woman she had been the night before to someone more relaxed.

  During the lulls in their conversation, Eloy tried to ignore the smothering darkness. It pressed in around them like an entity without care of personal space. The warmth of the forest was like a breath on the back of his neck. Eloy blinked hard to try to make sense of anything beyond the boundary of their lamplight, but there was only absence. He could hear rustlings and snappings of branches. Eloy didn’t want to let the silence last long.

  “Would it be better if we didn’t talk?” Eloy asked. “Do we want to draw attention to ourselves in the quiet?”

  “From my experience, talking works to set ourselves apart. The forest is strange to us, but we’re strange to it too.”

  “That makes sense.”

  “More than anything, this place is unpredictable, so it’s best to do what we can to keep our minds sane when we can.”

  Eloy stopped walking.

  “Everything okay?” Neasa asked.

  “Yeah . . . I have to . . . ” He motioned with his thumb toward the forest.

  “Don’t go far. A few strides away, at most.”

  “I’ll be fast.”

  Eloy unhooked his lantern and held it out in front of him. A thick, craggy tree blocked his path after a few short steps. He rounded its trunk, using it to block him from Neasa. The glow of her lantern was still close. She was just a few bounds away if he needed her. Still, he kept his ears perked to any sound. He stood with his back toward the tree, hooked his lantern to his bag, and relieved himself. Once
finished, he retrieved his lantern and held it out again.

  Just as he started back toward Neasa, something caught his eye. Something in the cracks of the bark reflected the flame. He looked closer. Little flecks of color moved and danced as he shifted the light. He had never seen anything so beautiful. He stopped thinking about what he was doing. His fingers moved as if powered by someone else. The glittered substance felt sticky, not like hard stone, as he had suspected. Sap, maybe. He didn’t care. He wanted to collect it, keep it, stare at it. And then his fingertips started burning, and the burning started spreading. But not just the feeling of it, the actual substance was spreading up his fingers. The sticky matter was moving over his hand and up his wrist.

  “Neasa!” Eloy yelled.

  Tendrils were reaching toward his elbow by the time she reached him.

  She dove an arm into her bag and rummaged around. “Sit down! Don’t move and definitely don’t touch it with your other hand.”

  Eloy dropped down to the soft forest floor. His eyes filled with water as he fought to manage the growing burning feeling creeping up his arm.

  Neasa hovered over him and pulled a small pouch out of her bag triumphantly. She pulled the drawstring apart with her teeth and dumped a white powder over Eloy’s affected arm. She coated the glistening menace with the dusty substance and started rubbing it in. The goo fell off his arm in clumps. The burning stopped.

  Neasa stood up. “That should be enough.”

  Eloy was afraid of what he would see when he looked at his arm. Open wounds? Bone? He saw a few sores, but nothing they would have to turn back for.

  Neasa helped him to his feet. “I told you not to touch anything.”

  The shame made Eloy sweat. “I know.”

  9

  Neasa didn’t say anything else about the beautiful sap or Eloy’s encounter with it. Eloy’s arm burned as if it had been sunburnt, but he ignored it.

  After what felt like a full day of walking, they came upon a body of water that looked like obsidian. Neasa stopped and motioned for Eloy to do the same. The pond was larger than Eloy would have expected to find in the forest, but not so big that it would be difficult to round and get to the other side.

  “Are you okay with stopping for a rest?” Neasa asked.

  “Sure.”

  They sat on the mossy bank of the lake, grateful for the relief against the weight of their bags and the consistent force that came with regular footfall. Eloy recognized the moss as being the same as the kind Neasa added to their cupped flames and plucked at the dry patches. He held a piece of to confirm before putting it in the fire. The added kindle pushed the light out enough to see flits of movement in its wake.

  “This is a good place to stay for the night,” Neasa said.

  “It’s night? I can’t even tell. If you told me it’s been a few hours or a few days, I would believe you either way.”

  “It gets tricky. I try to listen to my body, and my body feels like the kind of tired that happens when I have been moving for ten hours. It gets harder to gauge the longer I’m in. As of right now, I can tell it’s night.”

  Eloy took a moment to assess his own state and found he felt the same measurable amount of fatigue.

  “Be still for a moment. I’m going to try to get some water.” Neasa crawled to the edge of the black lake.

  “Is there something in there?” Eloy asked.

  “There are definitely things living in there, but it’s just a few that we have to worry about. I haven’t seen any big movements, so I am pretty sure we’re okay. It’s always best to be on the safe side, though. If something does come out when I skim the surface, you should stay still.”

  Neasa put the empty container over the top of the water, waited, and watched. With no sign of movement, she dipped the lip of the vessel into the liquid. Eloy was ready to see the fluid inside come out clear, pigmented dark in the ground because of the absence of light, but the water came out the same inky black. Neasa returned to her place next to him with an exhale of relief and reached into her pack. The pouch was smaller than the one she had for the burnable moss. She took a small pinch and flicked it into the water in the cup. Eloy wanted whatever she put into it to turn the liquid clear, but it remained opaque.

  “It’ll be good to drink in a minute,” she said. “We’ll get more tomorrow before we start again.”

  “Are there any side effects from drinking water that looks like that?” Eloy asked.

  She reclined against a piece of fallen tree.

  “Not that I know of. If there is, it takes more than nine years to take effect.”

  “You’re sure it’s okay to stay here for the night?”

  “As fine as anywhere. There’s a pretty even spread of dangers here. The important thing is to stay aware.” She took a drink of the water and then handed him the cup. “Here. You’ll need to drink something.”

  He didn’t rush to take the cup. He was prepared for the earthy taste, but the tartness was unexpected and unsettling.

  “That’s the best reaction I’ve ever seen,” Neasa said. “You looked like a man trying to drink cattle spit. Here.” She handed him a piece of dried meat.

  “Cattle spit would probably taste just as good. This isn’t not-mushroom-toad-thing meat, is it?” Eloy said with a squint and a smile as he took the chunk of meat and handed the cup back.

  “No. That’s good old regular bovine meat from home. Enjoy it. Who knows what we’ll be eating in a few days? Probably something a lot worse than not-mushroom-toad-thing meat.”

  “Are you tired? I can keep watch first if you want to rest.”

  “I’m okay. You go ahead and take the first sleep.”

  Eloy finished his meager meal and laid his body down on the soft ground, his head on his pack. The tight foliage above made the forest warm. Like wool, it kept all the heat generated within. Not having to worry about cold through the night was a surprise comfort—a gift he hadn’t expected.

  “Thank you for helping me before,” Eloy said.

  “No problem.”

  “And thank you again for coming with me,” Eloy said. “I know there isn’t a whole lot of benefit for you, and I want you to know that I appreciate it.”

  She ran her upper teeth over her bottom lip and sighed. “You’re welcome,” she said.

  “Do you think you’ll find anything good to take back to Gwyn?”

  “I hope so. I’m going deeper than I’ve ever gone before, so I’m sure it will please both him and me if I come across something of value.”

  “Are you close with Critiko too?” Eloy asked.

  She picked at a rough patch of skin on the palm of her hand, giving it keen focus. “Why do you ask?”

  “You said he gave you the lanterns, and Gwyn seems close to Critiko and you seem close to Gwyn, so I made the connection. I know Critiko travels for trade too.”

  “I think everyone is close to some degree in a place like Valia. We rely on each other for things. But yes, I’m close to Critiko.”

  “He’s the only person I really know around here, but I realize now he and I never really talked about his life other than his love of Valia and trading.”

  “You could ask him.”

  “I could, but he’s not here, so I am asking you. He seems like a good man; he was good enough to give me shelter and food. And he introduced me to you and Gwyn. I was just curious to know a little more about him.”

  “He is a good man—you’re right about that. He works hard. I don’t see him very often because he spends most of the year out trading. He likes to trade up, as we call it. Meaning, after so many years out there on the road, he has met the right people, so he can take what he grows here, trade for something down the road, take that to someone who he knows wants it and trades for what they have, and so on. Eventually, he gets the items that can be sold for a fair amount o
f coin. It’s a trade tactic that not everyone can do. He has the personality for it.”

  “What about family?” Eloy asked.

  “He had a brother, Silvus, who died a while ago. Silvus was a trader too, but he didn’t go out on the trade with Critiko. Silvus got into some kind of fight one night with some people in one of the towns in a place not so different from the dining house in Valia. Critiko found his body and brought it back. Critiko doesn’t like to talk about him, understandably.”

  “Were they similar?” Eloy asked. “Critiko and Silvus?”

  “From what I remember, no. Silvus was a bit of a strange guy. He was quiet. Basically the exact opposite of Critiko. Silvus would just sit and watch everything go on around him, and when he did try to talk, he could never quite find the right words. He was nice enough. Everyone was surprised when Critiko came back with his body and explained what had happened. Silvus never seemed like the type of guy who would die like that. Trust me, I know the type of guys who fight after a night of drink, and Silvus wasn’t one of them.”

  “It’s sad,” Eloy said. “You would never guess by looking at Critiko that he lost the only family he had.”

  Neasa stopped scratching at her hand and picked up a dried leaf to roll between her fingers, looking down at it with a crease in her brow.

  “He’s not alone, though,” she said. “Critiko has others around him, but like I said, he isn’t around here very much anyway. I think he’s happier out there on his own, meeting his friends at every stop. The world can be mean, and time can take things we aren’t ready to give. Sometimes, we have to choose where to invest our feelings about the things we’ve lost. Critiko manages well enough. He seems to enjoy having you around. I know there’s an age gap between the two of you, but I’m sure it’s a comfort to him to have your company.”

  Eloy looked away from Neasa, trying to hide any sign of his embarrassing satisfaction. It felt like a silly happiness for a grown man to have, but the confirmation of Critiko’s approval was something Eloy hadn’t realized he had wanted or needed.

  “It’s a comfort for me too,” Eloy said, looking at her again. “I got used to traveling with someone. For a long time, I thought I would have someone with me all the way until I found what I was looking for, but it didn’t work out that way. So yeah, having Critiko on the last part of the trip here was great, and he’s been more than generous during my stay in Valia. I’m glad to know more about his past. It’s always good to know more about good and honest people.”