by Jason Letts
“I see,” Sierra said, glancing inside the open archways to the cool interior of the temple. Inside, they saw four rings of seats encircling a stature of Stram the Eternal, covered in hands and looking at the ceiling with hands upraised, appearing to hold up a modestly sized planet suspended from the ceiling.
“The circles are for eternity,” Dedrick whispered. The people inside were all seated and concentrating on the statue in the center. Sierra brought the boy closer so they could look for the scavengers they’d set out to find. While most looked like normal Madorans in light brown fabric, a trio a short distance away wore darker clothing with leather straps and pockets.
“Is that them?” Sierra asked. Dedrick gave a hesitant nod and accompanied Sierra to an open seat a short distance away. She wanted to watch them for a moment to get a sense of what they were about. Two tan men sat next to a woman of dark complexion who must’ve been three times as wide as Sierra. Her jacket left plenty of cleavage exposed, and her breasts must’ve each been as large as Sierra’s head. All three of the scavengers leaned back and regarded Stram with consistent disengagement.
The man to the left swallowed and seemed to have a dry mouth. Sierra’s eyes widened and she leaned in when the man reached over into the expressionless woman’s cleavage and withdrew a bottle of booze. Transferring the bottle to the other hand, he reached in again and produced a glass, which he poured some of the brown liquor into. After polishing off a drink, he smirked and reached over again, but the woman slapped his hand, snatched back the bottle, took a sip, and redeposited it between her breasts.
Sierra smiled. This woman seemed like the exact kind of confident, practical person that she wanted to meet. Sierra and Dedrick waited another twenty minutes until the group got up from their seats and prepared to leave, and when they did the pair hung behind them as they nonchalantly moseyed down the road.
“Should we just go up to them?” Sierra asked Dedrick, who shrugged back at her, but when she looked up the large woman was walking down the street alone. Looking around, she couldn’t figure out where her companions had gone.
They continued on, getting closer as Sierra considered how best to convince her to travel into the WildLands, until something shiny on the sandy street glittered in the sun.
“Coin!” Dedrick squealed, reaching for the copper disk on the ground.
“No, don’t!” Sierra shouted, suddenly panicked, but it was too late. Fishing line attached to the coin pulled Dedrick left toward a shady alley mostly concealed by mounds of trash. Dedrick let go of the coin before losing his footing, but he fell right into the arms of one of the men before Sierra could pull him out. The other man was in there too, and Sierra’s heart got trapped in her throat when she realized the large woman was behind her, blocking her escape from the alley.
The woman, an angry scowl on her face, and the men were all shouting, and Dedrick squirmed and rattled off an incomprehensible response. Sierra put her hands up, trying to convey that she was harmless.
“They want to know why we were following them,” Dedrick said. Sierra needed to put all of her cards on the table, or the prolonged misunderstanding could have irrevocable consequences.
“Tell them I’m looking for someone to travel with me into the WildLands to find the home of the dragons!”
Dedrick’s translation didn’t seem to calm them.
“You’re lying!” the boy translated. He was held tight, but they weren’t hurting him. All of a sudden, the woman took Sierra’s hand, spun her around, and began to search her, presumably for weapons. When she tapped the pocket on the side of her thick cotton shirt, the sharp cry it emitted startled her. Nemi crawled out of the pocket and took to the air, fluttering and barking.
The mesmerized faces on the scavengers were more reverential than anything she’d seen from them in the temple. Dedrick got loose and went to Sierra’s side.
“Tell them I made a promise to bring this dragon back to his home in the interior and nothing will stop me from getting there, but I need help from people who know the wilderness,” Sierra said to Dedrick.
Once he’d communicated her message, the scavengers started to laugh. It puzzled Sierra, who suddenly found herself being pinched and poked by the large woman taking up much of her field of vision.
“This girl is nothing but skin and bones. She wouldn’t last one night on Iyne’s Land of the Damned,” Dedrick said for the woman. He’d shown such a knack at translating that he sometimes managed to convert language as if he were the speaker, but Sierra didn’t have much of a chance to appreciate it because of a flicker of defiant anger blooming within her.
“I’m going to make it. I’m tougher than you realize, and more than anything I’m determined. I have a map with the exact location I need to get to. When I set a goal for myself, I do not fail,” Sierra said, glaring back. The woman’s laughter subsided to a smirk.
“Is that so? Will you be singing the same tune when you’ve been walking on those scrawny legs for a full month, when you’re eating nothing but roots pulled straight from the ground, when we’re camped on a narrow ledge staring eye to eye, shitting not one foot away from each other, when your pretty face catches the attention of the nomadic clans who carry you off while we’re sleeping, tie you down, rape you three dozen times, and leave you for the animals to eat?”
Infuriated and insulted, Sierra unleashed a vicious roar as she pushed at the woman’s large stomach. She slammed the heel of her fist against thick leather armor and drove an elbow into an unguarded stomach. The woman made no motion to defend herself from the attacks, and neither did she budge an inch from where she stood. She said something to her companions, resulting in another round of laughter.
“She must’ve gotten some sand in her vagina,” Dedrick translated.
Sierra let her arms drop to her sides and took a step back, but she was still steaming. She’d never been so confronted with her physical weakness as she was now, and nothing she knew about computers, statistics, or commerce could help her against these scavengers.
“I’m not just the skin on my face. Now are you going to help me or not? Name your price,” she insisted. Nemi settled on her shoulder and waited.
The mirth dropped from the woman’s face, and the group of three gave her a more scrutinizing gaze. As much as the entire situation had been an embarrassment, it had shown her that the group had everything she lacked. They’d known they were being followed and quickly turned the tables, showed they had a sense of humor and even a bit of playfulness, and they were even carefully considering her in their own way. If they’d immediately said yes without any sort of a struggle, that would’ve been more worrisome than anything.
Without words, the woman and the two men came to an agreement and nodded. As the group’s leader spoke, it became obvious what she wanted was not simply an amount of money. The thought of poor scavengers who didn’t want money intrigued her, though she wondered what they could possibly get from her, and whether it would be something too dear to give away.
“We’ll take you to this place on your map, bony girl, and we’ll even make sure you get back in once piece, so long as you don’t take in any sand around your dragons. But there’s something we want in return, something we’ve wanted for a long time,” Dedrick translated.
“All right. What is it?” Sierra asked, starting to get nervous because of the intense look on her face.
“I know the sound of the language you speak, but I can’t understand it. There’s only one place you can be from. You have to promise you’ll take us with you to Cumeria. I want to stand in the bell tower looking over the Ristle market at the skyscrapers and feel I have the whole world at my fingertips.”
The ragtag team produced lighthearted smiles, but Sierra took a step back against the wall to consider if she could possibly deliver such a thing. They had no idea what they were asking for. After the fall of Bracken Energy, Cumeria was imploding into civil war, with the premier families, the mountain towns, and the gover
nment fighting it out against each other. What would they think when they reached a bell tower and a market in shambles?
What was worse, going back to Cumeria would pose grave risks for Sierra, who had been banished and exiled along with the rest of her family. She could never return again without running the risk of being caught and killed in a fleeting show of power by whoever happened to find her.
But what if she broke her promise to them? It was possible they’d turn on her and kill her, leave her somewhere to die, or sell her to one of the nomadic clans. Were these risks worth keeping her promise and bringing Nemi back home? Sierra already felt like it was too late to back out, especially when she’d told her father she was going and he’d swallowed his resistance to it. In time, maybe these people would understand that Cumeria was no longer the magical, rich land they’d been told about.
“It’s a deal. I’m Sierra,” she said, gesturing to herself and then extending a hand.
The woman knocked away Sierra’s hand and wrapped her up in a hug. Smushed against her breasts, Sierra could barely hear Dedrick’s translation.
“I’m Razi, and this is Maglum and Hinkalo. We are Razi’s Raiders.”
After being released from the hold, Sierra was left with the need to catch her breath and the impression that Razi’s Raiders would be about the best company she could ask for on her journey.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” Sierra said. “Let’s leave at the beginning of the next cycle.”
“Why wait?” Dedrick translated for Razi. “But you should know it’ll be tough on the boy as well. There’ll be no toys for him to play with out in the WildLands.”
Sierra shook her head.
“Oh, Dedrick won’t be coming with us. He’s staying here.”
Razi’s eyes widened and Maglum’s mouth dropped open when they heard that.
“But how are we supposed to talk without this boy?” she asked.
Sierra put her hands on her hips.
“We don’t need to talk. All we need to do is find a way to this dragon’s home.”
When the time came to leave, Lowell and Tris accompanied Sierra and Razi’s Raiders to the west edge of town, where the crest of the hill looked over what seemed a limitless expanse of brush forest, some bogs, and then the arid mountains in the distance. Sierra could tell both of them had deep misgivings about her departure.
“If you don’t think I can make it, just say so,” Sierra said to her father, who ran his hand through her hair.
“You’re the CEO of Bracken Energy, and even though there’s not much to the company at present, there’s nothing you can’t do,” he said, making her believe he really meant it.
Nemi leapt from her shoulder and landed between the tall gray ears of a donkey hitched to a wagon full of supplies. The donkey appeared uneasy about it and assumed a slow trot, meaning it was time for Sierra to leave whether she was ready or not. There was so much more she needed to get through to her father.
“I’ll come back and find a way to get us out of this horrific plan,” she said. Lowell smiled and wrapped his arm around Tris, who had broken into tears.
“The real plan, sweetheart, has always been to get you into a position where your brilliance could shine over all of Iyne. There’s nothing I won’t give up for you,” he said.
“I just wish your fatherly support didn’t border so close on masochism,” she said.
“Tell me about it,” Tris agreed, giving Sierra one last hug. Every goodbye seemed to put her through the rack, but she’d need to get over it in order to do what needed to be done. Sierra had never considered her mother a particularly strong woman, and certainly not ambitious, but she’d changed in Madora, and she would need to muster more strength than Sierra possessed to play her part.
“You’re putting yourself in the path of a bullet. The only thing worse than getting hit is to flinch,” Sierra said, pursing her lips.
“Sirra!” Razi called, adding a heavy accent and subtracting a vowel sound from her name. They were already a short distance down the path leading away from the city.
“Keep your eye on them,” Lowell said.
“I know, Dad, never trust anyone.”
“That too, but I meant never leave their sight. I’ve heard stories about the Plagrass wilds, and none of them were good. Prove yourself worthy of their trust and respect, and they’ll match you for it.”
Sierra nodded, slung a small pack over her shoulder, and took her first steps along the long dirt path stretching out before her. It curved after a few miles to a sizable pool, and from there they’d be traveling on infrequently tread terrain.
It wasn’t a good sign that Sierra was already out of breath after catching up with Razi, Maglum, and Hinkalo, who sauntered easily alongside the cart while chatting and laughing. The temptation struck her to ride in the back of the cart, but Sierra opted to heed her father’s advice to tough out the walk and try to impress her companions with her not-quite-awful stamina.
The three raiders took an immediate interest in Nemi, as everyone did, but few were so willing to engage with him. Hinkalo, the taller and younger of the two men, had a knack for replicating Nemi’s cries and goaded the dragon into screeching back in forth in a nonsensical conversation. Razi’s hearty laugh was infectious, and Sierra found herself grinning as Hinkalo and Nemi made faces at each other.
Their antics proved a great distraction from the bright sun and the fatigue of the long walk, and before Sierra knew it they’d already reached the freshwater pool, one of many that supplied the city with its drinking water. Seeing dozens of naked bathers and women washing soapy clothes made her question whether she’d ever be able to drink the water again, and she vowed to boil and strain every drop of water they carried in the cart.
As the path wound around the side of the pool, Maglum elbowed Hinkalo off the edge and into the murky water. The pleasure Maglum took didn’t last long, because Razi came up behind him and knocked him off the path. When Sierra caught Razi’s attention next, she stifled the urge to hide behind the cart and instead took the challenge to be the last woman standing. It was a fool’s fight, but Sierra got in one low shot to the thigh before Razi lifted her off the ground and threw her clear over the two men.
The cool water enveloped her, as did the smack against her back from landing in the water. She came to the surface, crawled back onto the path with the others, and prepared to continue on until she noticed a small fish puckered against her ankle. A surprised yip escaped her lips, and in an instant Razi produced a thin blade she used to deftly smack the parasite away. Although the red mark on her ankle was uncomfortable, small occurrences like this gave Sierra the impression they were looking out for her.
At the end of the cycle they made camp in a bushy grove, creating a small fire out of dry sticks they found and relaxing nearby on fluffy patches of moss. The group spent some time examining the map, but Sierra found herself left out of the planning as well as the idle chitchat. A strange feeling of loneliness came from being around intriguing people she couldn’t communicate with. Sierra vowed to make an effort to learn at least a few words of Madoran, whatever they could manage to teach her.
The following day proved less eventful than the first, leaving them with little to do but walk around slimy, leech-filled marshes while watching the sun slowly sink in front of them. Sierra felt anxious about being out in the wilds at night, especially when so many creatures seemed unafraid to rear their heads in daylight. Once a cycle they had to search the cart and clean off little furry rodents that liked to gnaw on the wood.
After two cycles of walking, the exhaustion had already started to sink in. The padded leather shoes she wore were starting to bother her feet, and the bright sun left her feeling drained. When it came time to set up camp, finding dry firewood required yet more walking, and the four of them scanned the area for any accessible sticks or logs.
Keeping the cart in sight, Sierra followed a steep hillside of bare rock with water trickling down the s
ides. It suddenly struck her how beautiful the place was, with so many shades of green and brown. But the most beautiful part of it was an exotic flower growing by a great boulder.
“Wow, come look at this,” Sierra called to the others, who were wandering around. She crept closer to the flower, which had long petals of orange and red speckled with black spots. She examined the flower and found that it swayed from left to right, as if a soft wind she couldn’t feel brushed against it. There was no doubt it would have a spectacular smell, and Sierra bent over to try it.
“Sirra!” Razi shouted, and Sierra twisted her head to look at her companions trampling through the brush toward her. She’d barely turned her neck when she felt a prick against her earlobe. She tried to jerk away, but out of the corner of her eye she saw that the flower had bitten her and wasn’t letting go.
More troubling, a low growl rumbled from nearby, making Sierra think there was something behind the boulder. Then the boulder’s surface seemed to twitch and shift, until it rose from the ground and turned to open into a scaly, gray-shelled lizard. Alarmed, Sierra grabbed at the flower and struggled to pull it off, finally falling back on her ass and scrambling to get away.
“Nemi sol!” Sierra called to her dragon, hoping it would arrive before the lizard’s protruding mouth full of sharp teeth chomped into her.
The stone lizard took a hulking step forward but stopped when Razi and the others arrived, poking steel blades at its softer underbelly. The lizard slung an arm at Razi, knocking her back against a tree and onto the ground. But Hinkalo and Maglum kept up the attack, slashing at its tough joints. Nemi settled on the creature’s head and pecked at its eyes.
Something must’ve gotten through, because the lizard unleashed a pained roar and plenty of black blood from its hip region. Sierra had only peeled away the flower petals pricking her ear, freeing herself just as the hulking stone lizard slipped on its own pool of blood and collided with the ground. The flower, an appendage of the lizard, snapped a few more times before withering and lying still on the ground.