Sacrifice

by Underwood, Patrick

  “I'm not sure… don't really feel any stronger. In fact, I feel weaker in this b— than I used to before waking up here. I tested the wood out and it felt solid, but maybe it had a flaw I was not aware of.”

  “Then how did the dagger and hilt almost go through the pig's neck? These beasts are known to make strong leather from their skin.”

  “Honestly? I am as confused as you, but it will have to wait. I am going to field dress this kill so we can transport it somewhere and camp for the night. While I do that, could you dig a pit so we can bury what we leave behind? Then, look for another stick for me so we can carry the thing when I am done?”

  “Yes, I can do that.”

  “Thanks,” I said as I pulled out the other dagger I had and got to work cutting up the animal that would feed us tonight.

  “And ready to go, you up for this?”

  “The Chosen have some boosts in strength with their power, strengthening us more than a man of our size would normally be. While it does not give me an enormous advantage, I should be able to carry my end for a time.”

  I smiled. She was fairly tiny, “Alright, on three. One, two, and threeeee.”

  I lifted by myself, the unexpected weight difference making me stumble for a second.

  “Crap… uh, why didn't you lift?”

  “Oh, was that what I was supposed to do? I did not understand what you were talking about.”

  I set the pig down and was about to cover my face with my palm before I realized I still needed to wash them. “Fine, yeah I should have expected that. I’m so used to you by now, I forget we have different backgrounds. I need to wash off my hands anyway,” I said, going for a water bladder.

  “Oh, here…” She jumped towards me in her excitement and grabbed my wrist with her left hand and pointed to it with her right finger.

  She closed her eyes just for a second and a stream of water sprayed out of her finger and hit my hand like a water faucet.

  She grabbed my other hand and did the same thing, and soon my hands were clean.

  “That's handy. Can you always summon water?”

  “Well, umm, no and yes. I am not that powerful and only have an extremely limited reserve. Like I said, I am better at healing and internal magic. With the external, it uses up my power rapidly. When I poisoned that man back in the clearing, it drained me and that is why I collapsed… I did not say anything at the time, but my threat to you was a bluff. I had nothing left,” she said, some shame on her face.

  I laughed. “Well, I believed you, so when you need to, you can be plenty scary.”

  This got her to laugh. “I have never been what I needed to be. My mother is… was strong. I have always been afraid and quiet.”

  I put my arm around her. “Hey, none of that talk. You are a strong beautiful woman, and I think you are about to bloom into your best… And make an excellent towel,” I added as I used the back of her shirt to dry off my hands.

  “Stop!” she said and laughed, turning and pushing my hands away. “I have been living in filthy undergarments for days! Use your own shirt and leave mine alone.”

  We laughed, the byplay feeling good. Knowing we might get some actual food soon felt even better.

  “So, you can use your water to hurt people? Can you turn it into steam or something and burn them?”

  “No, I have power over the water. But I do not have the power over the states the water assumes. I can manipulate steam to a degree, but I cannot change the temperature of it to make it into water unless I move it so fast that it cools on its own. I would need the fire element for that. My roommate could add or remove heat from my water. Oh, I hope Susan is alright. She was in the battle line when I ran…”

  She drifted off for a second.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “I… just can't believe I forgot about Susan. She and I were… close. Best friends and… more.” She turned red again.

  “Lovers?”

  “Not… no, not really. I could never have men around alone, so we kind of… experimented? With each other when we were alone. It is common among the Chosen to prefer a woman's touch to that of a man. I… find that I prefer the man's, though a woman's also pleases me.” She brought her eyes up to mine.

  I resisted the urge to kiss her… if only barely.

  We had work to do, and we could relax later. I still wasn't sure if I should let it go any further.

  I let the subject die for now and changed it. “Ok, I think we should head up those hills and see if we can find another traveler tree for some shelter and cook this pig. I hope we have enough distance to spare a night to eat and recover.”

  Tyla smiled. A small look of disappointment crossed her face for a second, but she still nodded. “Ok, let me guess. This time when you count to three, you want me to pick up at the same time?”

  “Yeah, that's how that works.” I smiled.

  “On three, one, two, and three” this time we both lifted, and it worked as planned. “Put the stick over your right shoulder and I will put it over my left, that way we can use one hand to keep it on our shoulders while we walk—” I was about to point to the tree line in the hills when a sudden urge made me point in a direction ninety degrees to my right towards a tight canyon in the hill's leading much deeper into mountains. “That way?”

  “What?” Tyla asked, confusion on her face. “Why that way?”

  “I… don't know, that pull I have been having got really strong and wants me to go there.”

  She glanced at the canyon, then back at me. “Lead the way.”

  I smiled inside. Her trust in me and this nonsensical feeling felt fantastic. Even if it was probably a bad idea to walk into the obviously dead-end canyon where we could easily get trapped if our pursuers caught us. Rather than listen to my own self-doubts, I just nodded back to her and said, “alright, let's go.”

  “Is that a cave?” Tyla asked as we rounded a bend in the canyon.

  “I… uh, think so. It's not like any cave I have seen before. It looks more like a door.”

  As we approached the opening, the rounded hole in the solid rock was lit from an illumination coming deep from within the cave.

  “That is definitely where we are supposed to go though, I can feel it.”

  “If you think that is best,” Tyla said.

  I looked back at her, “You stay here, and I will go inside.”

  “You are not leaving me out here alone with a dead pig.”

  My response was simply a raised eyebrow.

  “Every scary story my older sister told me started with a kid staying by themselves in a secluded space or separated. I would rather get mauled by the scary monster with you than by myself, thank you.”

  I chuckled. “Do any of them involve a man in a mask with a knife or something similar?”

  “Actually, a man with a sword and a fiery skull for a head. He removed the heads of the little girls who did not stay in their homes at night.”

  “Really? That actually supports a theory I have,” I said without thinking.

  “What theory?”

  “Huh? oh… It's hard to explain but has to do with where all the humans came from. I think we have the same origins because that is a story we hear in my land as well.”

  “You will tell me your secret one day, right?” Obviously not believing my cover up.

  “I honestly don't think you will believe me, but I will later.”

  “Promise?”

  I sighed. “Yes, but for now, let's check out this cave. Keep the pig with us but keep a hand on your dagger and we drop it and run if anything too big jumps out… but I feel we will be safe in there. At least it looks well lit.”

  “Ok.”

  We walked inside and followed the straight path back into the cave. “What are these crystals?” I asked.

  “It's Panzite, a rare crystal that provides illumination on its own. Precious and rare, we might be rich if we can extract some without breaking them. They store magic currents whic
h make them glow. How it happens I am not sure, but they can also lose the magic if improperly handled.”

  “Could you use them as storage for your magic?”

  “You can, but it's… complicated. They store little, and extracting it is very inefficient and may not be compatible with the Chosen's power.”

  “Ah, ok,” I said.

  We walked into a large room at the end that looked more like a temple than a cave.

  “Ok, someone has definitely been here before. That hole in the ground is big enough for three or four people to fit in and looks like it used to hold water based on the drains that come from the wall. Even has a place you can sit.”

  Tyla nodded. “I think this is a temple to the gods, or at least one of them. There have been rumors that some gods used to have sanctums in the world, but they are exceedingly rare and only spoken about by the elder races and in fables.”

  “So, we stumbled upon a god's temple in the middle of the mountains?” I said, looking at her dubiously.

  “I am just guessing. I do not honestly know what this is.”

  “Well, this hole is too big to fill up by ourselves, but it would make an awesome hot tub,” I said jokingly. Of course, it fell flat on my company.

  “What is a recreational bath? You mean like a bathhouse?”

  I sighed and shook my head. This world magic was almost perfect, but occasionally something slipped by that got lost in translation. “No, uh… It's a tub you fill with hot water and relax in, fantastic on sore muscles.”

  “I can see how that would be nice. I love a hot bath myself and am desperately in need of one. If your muscles are sore though, I can help with that.”

  “I really keep forgetting that you can do that. I may take you up on it later, but first let's start a fire to cook the meat and… see that basin over there? Do you think you have enough power to fill it with water so we can at least wash clothes, then bathe without wasting our drinking water?”

  “I can do that!” Tyla said happily as we put the pig down on the ground and started making this into a temporary home.

  “This is definitely a hearth right here in the center. I think I can go back out and get some firewood and we can cook here. Maybe I can find something to use as a spit roaster.”

  “A what?” she said, having finished filling the water basin. Sweat dripped down the side of her face from the exertion.

  “Uh… might be easier to show you if I can get something that might work. Have to find something that will hold the pig up and we can spin it. Okay, let's go back out and see if we can find what we need.”

  Hopefully, we could stay here for a day and recharge before getting back on the road.

  12

  Bonds

  “That should do it, just have to keep turning it now that it's mostly coals.”

  “I have seen something like this before at my mother's estate. I never knew what it was called.”

  “It's a spit roast… well, as close as I can get to one in the woods. My strong suit was never the survival side of things. I’m just kind of winging it here. But we just have to turn it so the meat cooks evenly, so if it's stupid, but it works, it isn't stupid. Right? You want to clean up and wash your clothes as best you can while I do this. I can look away while you do.”

  “Umm, sure, but it will take a while for the clothes to dry.”

  “Yeah, it's going to be awkward, at least it's warm enough in here with the fire. I will look away as much as I can.”

  “No, it's something we will have to deal with. I… do not mind if you see me without clothes.” She said as her face flushing.

  Smiling, I said, “Yeah, we really can't avoid it. A dire wolf ruined my one change of clothes. Still, I will focus on this, and you can get clean. Make it the least awkward as possible. Then we will switch off and just… adjust and adapt I guess.”

  She nodded and went to the back of the room with the washbasin. I heard her disrobe and place what little clothing she had on the ground. I did my best not to turn around.

  “We need to get back to civilization at some point and get supplies. We can't last much longer like this. Is there any place safe to go?”

  “I don't know anymore. We can go to the Riven Hold if they have not fallen. Their Matriarch was with my mother, but she had left her eldest daughter behind. We should be able to find sanctuary there for a time. There are also many small towns and villages we can hide in.”

  “Do you know what this Seir wants?”

  “We do not know what any of the Demigods want besides power. In the west it is said that they gain power and then war between each other as a sport. We had hoped that they had no interest in humans or the gods protected us. But we were wrong, obviously.”

  She stopped what she was doing after she said this, causing me to look over to see what was wrong. I caught an eyeful of her perfect ass bent over the basin where she was washing her hair in the water but had stopped. I pivoted my eyes back to the pig, a surge of blood going to my groin.

  Not helpful there, buddy, I thought, while looking down at my crotch.

  I watched out of the corner of my eye as she finished washing her hair, using the small bar of soap that I had in my bag along with some twigs that you brushed your teeth with using this jar of minty tree sap, which made morning breath slightly less of an issue, at least.

  Redoubling my efforts to not peek, since my little marine was now at full attention, I knew he was going to make my own bathing later as awkward as possible. I thought I had grown past such concerns in my youth, but I was living through them again.

  I sighed loudly.

  “Are you fine over there?” Tyla asked.

  “Yeah, just remembering something I thought was behind me.”

  “Like what?”

  I snickered. “Oh, nothing… How are you doing over there? There going to be enough soap?”

  “Plenty. I am almost done, then you can bathe, and we can wash our clothes last.”

  “Okay,” I said, closing my eyes as I turned the pig by hand, trying to count numbers backwards from one hundred.

  “Finished, your turn.” She said, surprising me by standing right next to me, eliciting a small jump. “Did I scare you?”

  I could hear the chuckle in her voice.

  “Uh, sorry. Had my eyes closed and did not hear you walk up.” I glanced at her nude form and noticed the fire was not putting out enough heat diverting my eyes back up to her own. I was fairly sure from her smirk that she had caught me.

  “It’s fine, Derrick, get used to it and it will be less awkward, at least I hope.” Her own face was still a little red, to be fair.

  Nodding, “Yeah, it’s awkward. I am not used to it, but we will adapt. You are quite beautiful, though…” I drifted off, not knowing what I was going to say.

  “Thank you. I will take over the turning while you clean up. How long should this bull-pig cook?”

  I snickered at the name. “Uh, about an hour for every ten pounds, I guess about thirty pounds, so let's say three hours?”

  I let her have the sticks I tied together to use as a crank and went over to the basin, disrobing from my meager shirt and pants.

  As I took my pants off, I thought I heard a gasp and turned to see Tyla looking away from me, but her hair was still settling as though it had whipped around. I smiled at this. At least I wasn't the only one sneaking glances.

  Clean and with our clothes drying near the hearth, we finally sat down next to the fire to enjoy the pork from the pig.

  “It smells fantastic,” Tyla said, her mouth watering.

  We had finally adjusted to our nakedness and could look one another in the eyes again.

  Mostly.

  “This stone should be ok for serving. Wish I had more than one plate though, we will just eat with our fingers off it, together.”

  She scooted up right next to me, so that our exposed thighs were touching each other, and I sat the plate down in front of our knees with the freshly carved m
eat.

  Tyla picked up a sizable chunk and blew on it while I did the same.

  She put the food in her mouth when it cooled. “Oh gods, I was so hungry.”

  “Don't eat too fast, it will make you sick. We should have enough to last a couple of days before it goes bad though. Wish I could smoke it or turn it into jerky. Hell, we don't even have salt.”

  I stopped to eat my own. She was right, this was damn good.

  We just sat there and ate for a few minutes before I finally brought up what I wanted to say.

  “So, about my past. I'll tell you, but you might think I am crazy.”

  She pushed her shoulder into my side. “I won't, I… trust you. Completely at this point. I probably shouldn't, but I do.”

  “Well, you may still think I am crazy, we will see,” I said with a laugh, as I pushed her back. I hope it was not the stress of the situation, but I would swear I was falling hard for this girl.

  I thought I knew the difference between lust and love, but the lines blurred again now that I was younger again.

  “Alright, so I told you I woke up in the forest, right?”

  She nodded.

  “Well, let me tell you about the last memory I had before I woke up there….”

  I told her my story. Her eyes widened further and further as I went. She never interrupted me once, whether she did not know what to say, or just was shocked. I couldn't tell.

  Eventually we finished eating, and I stood to put more logs on the fire, finishing my story.

  “So, my first memory of being here was that dire wolf coming at me in the clearing.”

  “You actually came from the world of the ancestors?”

  “I think so. I can't prove it, but I believe it to be true, yes.”

  “And who were the beings in the… Ships?”