Stalk the Moon

by Jessica Lynch

  He drops to this knees, shoving his hands under the layer pressed against the cave’s floor. With a grunt and a huff, he shoulders the last of the furs, lifting them inches off the ground so that he can remove a flat bundle from underneath.

  Even with my improved sight and the torch flickering from somewhere behind me, I still can’t make out what he’s carrying. Whatever it is, he holds it carefully, arranging it in his arms before shoving the last of the furs away. He shakes, rearranging his cloak, then gets back to his feet. The move is awkward for the normally graceful Hunter due to the precious bundle he’s holding.

  When he heads back over to me, I see that it’s a worn leather wrap. Thinner than what our cloaks are made out of, the leather is a paler color. I have no idea what it is.

  He glances down at me, making sure that I’m watching him. After taking a deep breath and exhaling roughly, he holds the bundle out and opens it. There’s another stack of materials tucked inside, protected by the leather.

  One by one, he takes them out and lays them on the stretch of his forearm.

  A flattened hat. Weathered trousers. A grey vest a couple of shades lighter than the pants. A white undershirt that’s gone yellow with age.

  “What’s that?” I think of the care with which he’s handling them. They’re clothes, obviously. But— “Are those yours?”

  He nods, already placing each item of clothing back in its stack before wrapping the leather securely around it again. “You learn real quick how to fit in here. People in the Other don’t bother with real world fashions. Leather cloaks. Cotton shirts. Linen trousers. A tailored chiton,” he adds, gesturing at my dress with his chin. “But I couldn’t part with them. I guess… I guess I always thought I might need them if I went back.”

  “But you didn’t. Because you were stuck here. Just like I am. Holy shit. I’m stuck here.” Seeing those old clothes is bad. Hearing that Hunter once thought he’d leave is ten times worse. He hadn’t wanted to stay, and now I have to. “Oh my god. I’m never going home!”

  My knees fold beneath me. I drop like a stone, scratching my hands on the rough ground as I hit. The chill from the floor seeps through my cloak. I start to shake.

  I hear a thump, followed by a thud. Hunter’s purposely followed me to the ground after tossing his priceless bundle. Without a second’s hesitation, he wraps his arms around me, holding me close.

  I’m greedy. I yearn for his warmth, his comfort so I take it. This embrace isn’t about passion and desire brought on by adrenaline and the rush of a good hunt. This is intimacy of a different sort.

  He runs his fingers through my hair. They snag when they hit the braid so he starts over again. It’s so soothing. I haven’t felt this comforted since I was a kid and my mom used to hold me like this. I snuggle even closer, aching to find some peace. Just a little.

  “You’re not stuck. We’re gonna find you a way back. In the end, I didn’t want to go home. There was nothing for me.”

  “There’s nothing really for me, either,” I admit after a moment. I’m a little more settled, less panicked. It’s like his embrace sucked all of my anxiety out of me until I’m a pile of mush in his arms. “Well, except for Dudley.”

  His fingers stop stroking.

  “My cat,” I remind him.

  “That’s right.”

  The stroking resumes.

  “Can I ask you a question?”

  The man’s holding me, petting me, trying to make me feel better. I can’t deny him anything. “Whatever.”

  Hunter hesitates.

  “That means go ahead.”

  “Right. I was only wonderin’, if you’ve really got nothin’ for you mirrorside, what’s so bad about stayin’? This is where you’re supposed to be, otherwise you never would’ve passed through the mirror in the first place. You figured that out. I’m sure you have. But you’re fightin’ it. And I don’t understand why.”

  I move my head away from his questing fingers. Hunter takes the hint and immediately backs off. Under the weight of his heavy question, I need space. I need him to stop crowding me.

  Once I feel like I can breathe again, I pull my knees up to my chest, wrapping my arms around my legs. I rest my forehead on my scraped knees, hiding my face from him.

  “It’s… I don’t get this place. This Other.”

  “There’s nothin’ to get.” Hunter’s rumble seems to echo all around me. “It just is. The longer you’re here, the more the Other becomes real. Far as I’m concerned, this is the second chance I never would’ve had if I stayed on the other side of the mirror. Or if you had.”

  I lift my head, looking up at him. “I know you want me to stay. You haven’t been shy in saying so. But why? Why do you want me to stay so bad? What do you want from me?”

  He reaches out, plucking my chin. His touch burns against my clammy skin. “Not much.” One finger lifts up, stroking down the side of my cheek. It’s the softest touch. “Just everything.”

  31

  We decide to stay in the cave overnight. Disappointment saps me of the rest of my energy. I couldn’t go back down that mountain tonight if my life depended on it.

  After foraging outside of our cave for a few minutes, Hunter comes back and builds a fire for us. I can’t decide if it’s because he’s feeling the cold or if he wants something to keep him busy. It doesn’t matter. I’m just as keen to put some space between us. The ring around the fire pit nestled deep in the cave is perfect.

  We sit around the circle of blackened stones, swapping his canteen of water and munching on the bread and cheese Hephaestus packed for us.

  Something changed after we killed the boar.

  There’s a tension in the air that we’re both careful not to shatter. Apart from hushed murmurs over who should get to drink more—Hunter insists I haven’t had enough and I insist I’m fine—we stay to ourselves as the sun goes down.

  After he’s finished polishing off his portion of dinner, Hunter returns to the pile of soiled furs and separates the ones that smell the least like pee from the ones that reek. I guess that’ll be where we bunk. I don’t let the fact that he’s only making one bed freak me out anymore than I already am.

  Despite the fire and my cloak, a terrible chill seeps in. I start to shiver and, though I try to hide it, Hunter catches on. He grabs one of the furs from the good pile and settles it over my shoulders.

  “Thanks,” I tell him.

  He nods and takes his place across the fire from me. Grabbing his knife, he pulls something out of his pocket. The fire bounces off of the shiny metal. I recognize what he has once he starts buffing the boar’s blood off of the blade. It’s his silver mesh rag thing.

  I wish I could do something with my own weapon. I never used my own knife, and there’s not much I can do for a magic bow and arrow. So I keep my hands in my lap as I try in vain not to react to the way Hunter is openly watching my every move.

  I don’t let his silence fool me. I’m beginning to understand this man, his methods, and his motives. He’s not just being quiet. He’s plotting.

  Hunter’s still on the hunt. Only, this time, he’s hunting me.

  I watch the flames dance. The heat of Hunter’s stare is searing. Glancing up, I see the fire reflected in his gaze.

  I look away. “I have to find another portal.”

  “We will. I gave you my word.”

  Moving closer, I grab another piece of kindling and throw it on the fire. The flames lick at the wood, gobbling it up. The weight of the expectations in his eyes is making me twitchy.

  Don’t do it.

  Don’t do it.

  Hell—

  “It doesn’t have to be goodbye,” I blurt out.

  Hunter’s turns into a statue. Seriously. He doesn’t move. I don’t even know if he’s still breathing.

  I gulp. Good going, Noelle. Because I couldn’t find a better time to come down with a case of verbal diarrhea. Since I can’t take it back, I might as well finish it.

  Dr
opping my gaze back to the fire, I tell him, “I mean it. You could come back with me, you know.”

  When he still doesn’t answer me after a few tense seconds, I glance up again.

  Holy shit, he’s fast. I never even sensed him moving when he’s crouched down at my side. I give a jolt at how close he is all of a sudden. He steadies me with one hand and, I swear to God, I feel the spark through three layers.

  “I don’t want to say goodbye, either. But I can’t go with you.”

  “Sure you can. I’ve got the room in my condo. You’re a big guy, but you’d fit.”

  A pained look flashes across his face. “Darlin’, just to have you offer means the world to me. And I want to. More than anything. I’d give up all I have to be with you—but I can’t.”

  He says can’t.

  I hear won’t.

  I shake off his hand. His rejection hurts. It’s only fair that I get to share the pain. “I don’t get it.”

  “I can’t tell you about our story,” he says softly. “Maybe I can tell you mine.”

  I blink. Whoa. That kiss must have shaken him up more than I thought. He’s actually going to give me information about himself of his own free will? Pardon me while I die of shock. Where the scorpions and that monster pig failed, Hunter’s honesty might pull it off.

  I’m so caught off guard that when Hunter straightens and offers me his hand, I take it. He pulls me to my feet and removes the fur from around my shoulders. Carefully navigating his path away from the fire, he guides me over to the single pile of furs he’s set aside for us.

  They still stink like pee, but they’re also soft and warm and, as Hunter wraps me in his embrace before sitting down with me tucked cozily in his lap, I decide there’s nowhere else in the Other I’d rather be.

  “Comfortable?”

  “Mmm.”

  “I’m glad. Okay.” He clears his throat. I feel the vibration in his chest. “Well. First things first, then. I’ve, uh… I’ve got a confession to make.”

  I go completely motionless. My heart starts thump-thump-thumping. No. Not now. Not when I’m finally letting him back in. No more lies. No confessions.

  “My names not Ryan.” As if he can sense my distress and is expecting me to bolt, he tightens his arms. “I’m sure you’ve already figured out why I told you it was.”

  As if I could forget that reveal.

  “Hephaestus called you Orion. At first, I thought I heard him wrong, but...”

  “You asked me before if he embraced this place. It's hard. You come here, you know who you are. Then the instincts hit, the memories trickle in, and suddenly you're a whole other you. That's why we call it the Other. Because this is where you discover the truth. Some call it reincarnation, but I never held with none of that. Mirrorside, I was someone else.” His breath is shaky. His arms are trembling. “Here, I can't deny that Orion took control.”

  It’s amazing to have Hunter finally tell me something about this place. Too bad most of what he just said was total bullshit.

  “But he didn’t.”

  “What? Yes. Didn’t you hear me?”

  I shake my head. “No, listen. Because I have been. I really have. And this whole time you've been talking, you know what I hear the most? A Southern accent so thick, it's like drowning in butter.”

  “Noelle—”

  “Okay. Maybe I'm wrong.” I’m not wrong. “It’s true I don't know anything about Orion except he's a constellation up in the sky, and they named the cat in Men in Black after it— never mind,” I say when his blank expression tells me that I’ve veered too far out into left field. “Tell me, is Orion from Georgia?”

  I angle my head up so that I can see him.

  He looks thoughtful. “No.”

  “But Hunter is.”

  He exhales, his warm breath fanning the top of my head. “No. Jake was.”

  Jake. There’s such a wistfulness to the way he whispered that.

  “Was that— is that your name?”

  “Jacob Hunter.” He nuzzles his chin in my hair. “I wasn't fibbin’ when I gave you my last name. It's why I never minded you usin’ it. It reminded me of who I was.”

  “Who you are.”

  He huddles me close and I let him. I owe him this one. It’s my turn to offer him comfort, and I’m secretly pleased he’s taking it from me.

  After a few minutes in content silence, I give him the tiniest nudge. “Tell me about it. Please?”

  “You know how it started.”

  “With a mirror.”

  “Yeah.”

  Hunter goes quiet again. I wait because there’s a heaviness to this silence that was missing before. He’s not done talking. He’s just gathering his thoughts.

  When he starts again, I know I’m in for a doozy.

  I’m right.

  “One winter night, an old vagrant visited our family’s farm. After he supped with us, he sold his prized mirror to my pa for a dollar and two chickens. Mama liked it and kept it in the parlor room. I never paid much mind to it because a man’s place is workin’ the fields, yeah? And then the fever took Pa, and it stole Mama, and I started to sell whatever wasn’t nailed down to keep the farm runnin’.

  “I never even got it off the dang wall. Like a fool, I tripped and, instead of smashin’ it to bits, I bumped up against the frame. I managed to right myself before I toppled over but that’s when I saw I was missin’ a hand. It disappeared right through the glass. I figured if my hand could go through, so could the rest of me, and why not? I jumped, darlin’. And that’s how I landed here.”

  I can sense it’s taking everything Hunter has to tell me this so I don’t interrupt. But hell if that wasn’t what happened to me. Except Miss Former Gymnast didn’t catch herself in time to realize something weird was going on with the mirror. No, I fell flat on my face in the Other.

  I decide then that, if he ever asks me how I got here, I’m gonna leave that part out.

  “You know what happened then. I landed in the caves and I made it my home. Days passed. Seasons passed. Years passed, too. I… I never grew older. Time seemed to stand still for me. The face you see here is the same one I last saw reflected back in the mirror that brought me here when I was twenty-nine years old.

  “Since it didn’t mean nothin’, I lost track of the time. I met others. Hephaestus taught me the most. He explained the rules of this place. Suddenly, it all made sense. I never felt completely at home on the farm. My pa always joked I'd be the first Hunter who lived up to the name. The first time I held a spear or swung my sword, I came alive. I wasn’t simple Jake the farm boy anymore. I was Orion, a hunter. And fate picked me to come here to wait for you.”

  I was wondering when he was finally going to get back around to me.

  “Not me,” I murmur.

  He kisses the top of my head. I’m too wrapped up in him to dodge it. And if I could? It would be an act. I might not want him to know it, but I really like it when he does sweet gestures like that.

  Oh man. I’m so far gone, it’s not even funny.

  Hmm. Noelle Hunter. It’s kind of got a nice ring to it.

  “Yes, you. I’ve been waitin’ a long time for you to find me. I could’ve gone back, but I didn’t want to. No matter what story was gonna be told here, it was far better than what I left behind. No one had to push me through the glass. I jumped, and when I stumbled on a portal back and I had a choice—”

  I don’t have to say it. I do anyway. “You stayed?”

  “I stayed.”

  He takes my hand, lacing my pale fingers in his calloused, rough bronze ones. His hands are so big, so warm, and still so very, very gentle. He holds me like I’m precious.

  A girl could get used to that.

  “Wasn’t really ever a choice for me. Back in Georgia, Mama and Pa were gone. I could work the farm, but it wouldn’t belong to the Hunters much longer. I had no prospects.” With a telling look in my direction, he adds, “I had no wife. When the mirror found me—”

>   “When you found out how the mirror worked,” I correct.

  “No, darlin’. The path to the Other doesn’t work that way. If you’re meant to be here, the mirrors find you.”

  I can’t stop myself from thinking about the silver-haired man and his wife at the flea market. It feels like a lifetime ago. Had he known what the mirror could do?

  Swear to me you’ll use it.

  Oh yeah. He knew.

  Dick.

  Hunter’s brow furrows. “Whatcha thinkin’? You had a funny look in your eye just now.”

  I shake my head. “I was thinking about what you said, about the mirror finding you. That’s not what happened to me. Not really.”

  “Did someone help you cross over?”

  “You could say that.” When he starts to ask another question, I’m quick to cut him off. “No. Don’t try to change the subject. This isn’t about me. It’s about you. It’s about Jake.”

  The tiniest curl to his upper lip. His pale eyes shine. “No one’s called me that in a long, long time.”

  I promise myself that I will. At least for every time he calls me Noelle, I will.

  So, maybe like twice.

  Wait—

  A long, long time.

  Days.

  Seasons.

  Years.

  Suddenly, his ‘I’m an old fool’ comment comes back to me with clarity. At the time, I thought it meant he was in his thirties or something. Now I’m beginning to suspect something else entirely.

  A lump forms in my throat. I swallow past it.

  “How long have you been here?”

  Hunter dips his chin, burying his face in my loose braid. The rasp of his whiskers burns my cheek as he nuzzles me. I shiver and pull away.

  I won't let him distract me. Clambering out of his lap, I move until I’m kneeling in front of him. With his head still bowed and me rising up on my knees, we’re almost eye to eye.

  “How long?”

  He lifts his head. Our eyes lock.

  “I’m… I’m not sure.”