The Darkling Tide

by Travis Simmons

  “Go back, go back!” Abagail called. She grabbed Leona and pulled her forward. “We need to get to the other side. We are in the center of the lake.

  “Ok,” Leona said, clutching her knife tighter. They started walking as quickly as she thought was safe, but if they slipped they were goners. “Abbie, what do you think it is?” Leona asked. She tried to hide the fear in her voice.

  “I don’t know,” Abagail said. She was getting really sick of the word darkling, but in that moment she couldn’t help but wonder if that’s what they were facing. Though she refused to say it aloud.

  The stone directly before her listed to the left, floating out away from the rest of the bridge creating a gap. Abagail flailed her arms awkwardly to keep her balance. Leona grabbed the neck of her cloak and pulled her back. Abagail stumbled backwards but caught her footing on the slimy bridge.

  “We are back here,” Rorick called. “We are off the bridge and going around now.”

  “Ok,” Abagail called, but her voice was shaking so bad she could barely make any noise.

  “What are we going to do Abbie?” Leona asked. She was tight on Abagail’s back, almost clinging to her sister, but just shy of actually touching her. She peered around Abagail, watching the part of the bridge that was drifting away.

  Abagail swallowed and studied the distance between them and the next part of the bridge. “Alright, I’m not sure what’s going on here, but I think we can make it if we jump.”

  “What if we don’t land right?” Leona asked. “What if one of us falls into the water?”

  “Then the other one will fish them out,” Abagail said. She really didn’t like the idea of falling into the water, so she would have to make sure it didn’t happen.

  “What if both of us fall into the water?” Leona asked.

  Abagail scoffed, mainly because she didn’t know. She didn’t think they would be able to clamber back up onto the slick bridge if they fell in. “We’re wasting time, let’s go.”

  But as they started backing up to get a running start, the next portion of the bridge drifted away to the right. The gap between the two sections of the bridge grew wider.

  “What now?” Leona asked.

  “We will have to turn back,” Abagail told her. “There’s no way we can make that jump.”

  That seemed to be what Leona was waiting to hear. Her younger sister turned back and started walking the way they came.

  Off in the distance Abagail heard something splash. She looked up so fast her neck caught and fire spread through her muscles. She groaned and rubbed the burning spot. But when she looked out across the lake she didn’t see anything, just a ripple from the direction of the noise.

  “That’s unsettling,” Leona said.

  “Just a bit,” Abagail agreed. At least the lake was no longer dead calm.

  “Was that a person?” Leona asked.

  “Where?” Abagail wondered, stopping to look around her. She tightened her grip on her sword.

  “That came up out of the water and created the ripple?” Leona asked. She hadn’t moved any further yet, and Abagail really thought they didn’t have time to stop and wait.

  “Keep moving,” she urged. She nudged Leona slightly to get her moving again. As they were walking, segments of the bridge close to the shore they’d came from started drifting away too.

  “We will never make it,” Leona said. She picked up her pace and soon they were nearly running, moving as fast as they could on the slick bridge. Abagail knew it wasn’t smart, if one of them tripped both of them would go down, but there was no way to make sure they got to land other than hurrying.

  Daphne fluttered out of the sky and meandered in front of them, leading them through the darkness.

  Soon there was no more bridge and they stopped.

  “What’s going on?” Daniken called from their right. Rorick and the elf had seen the bridge scattering and they had stopped to watch the two, but there was little they could do.

  “There’s no more bridge,” Abagail called. She cast a quick glance behind to see the bridge had drifted apart behind them as well. There was very little section of the bridge left.

  Leona pressed back against her sister as yet more stones of the land bridge pulled away from in front of them. They were now crowded on two stones, and Abagail was sure at any moment those stones might drift apart as well.

  “What can we do?” Rorick asked.

  “Nothing,” Abagail called to him. “Unless you can fell a tree and make another bridge for us before these stones drift apart.”

  “Is that possible?” Leona asked, her voice quivering with fear.

  “Highly unlikely,” Abagail told her.

  She had barely finished speaking when their two stones started moving, drifting away from each other in the murky green water. Abagail crouched low so she didn’t lose her footing.

  “Stay calm,” she told Leona. Her sister was standing straight as a board, her shoulders raising and falling as she gasped for air. Her terrified eyes were locked on Abagail. If only Abagail could stay calm too.

  “You killed the warrior, just remember that, you can face a little bit of drifting land bridge,” Abagail told her. She tried to make her voice sound as calm and unconcerned as possible.

  But her words of reassurance seemed to work on Leona. Her sister nodded and looked around her. The problem was, at this point, Abagail highly doubted this was a land bridge at all.

  The segment she was on drifted to a halt. She pushed to her feet trying to ignore the odd movement she felt in the stone beneath her feet. Like muscle moving, she thought.

  “Alright, how close are you to the edge?” Abagail called to Leona.

  Leona shouted, and before she could call Abagail’s name a large green shape blasted out of the water behind her, wrapped its arms around her, and dragged her back beneath the surface of the lake.

  Abagail didn’t waste any time. She leapt into the water feet first, and started kicking with all of her might toward where Leona had gone in.

  What was that thing? She wondered, looking around for Leona. Daphne’s frail light bloomed above a spot in the distance. Abagail hoped the pixie was trying to show her where her sister had gone under.

  It had looked almost like a human, but green, like the algae or moss covered stones they had just been on.

  The lake was clogged with weeds and waterlogged driftwood. It was hard to see where she was going, or what might lay before her.

  Arms grabbed her from behind and Abagail started fighting against the powerful grip they had on her afflicted arm. She grabbed the sword with her left hand, the hand she was horrible at using, and stabbed out at what was holding her.

  It looked human enough, but somehow rotting, like it had been dead for far too long. Its eyes were murky and glazed with death, its hair was missing in more spots than it was growing, and its teeth were a horrible shade of green bordering on black.

  It leaned toward her with its mouth open, but before it could lock it’s maw on any part of her, Abagail stabbed up through its head.

  The creature lurched backwards, and then its bottom half came into view.

  A fin? Abagail wondered. It was like some kind of horrible mermaid. The creature stopped moving immediately and started sinking in a cloud of black blood toward the bottom of the lake. Its grip hadn’t loosened on Abagail’s arm though. As she pulled the sword free of its head she yanked her arm away from the monster.

  The creature’s grip on her arm took her glove with it.

  Her afflicted hand bloomed in the darkness of the water with a cold black light of its own. Abagail couldn’t explain why it seemed to glow, nor did she have time to think about it. She spun toward where Daphne’s light bobbed above the water, and pushed closer to where Leona had been taken under.

  Monsters floated all around her now like dead bodies in their underwater grave. None of them seemed to move of their own accord, only drift on the currents of the water.

  To be sur
e, as she went Abagail stabbed out at the ones in range, puncturing their brains. They didn’t fight her, just sunk to the bottom of the lake. She truly wondered if they were alive at all.

  Then, through the mass of bodies, she saw Leona struggle against the grip of the creature behind her. She was stabbing out behind her with her knife, warding off the creature’s attempts to bite into her. Occasionally her attacks hit home, sinking deep into the monster and producing a blossom of black blood.

  Abagail had made it in time. The creature hadn’t started eating Leona yet. Abagail would have sighed in relief if she could, but just then the creature reared back its head, opened its mouth and was about to take its first bite out of Leona.

  Abagail surged forward. She wasn’t going to make it in time.

  Daphne chose that moment to attack. She surged under the water, and blasted her purple light into the creature’s mouth, and then blasted back out of the water. The monster let out some kind of high pitched wail and shuddered away from Leona.

  Her sister was fast. Leona spun around, slashed out at the rotting creature, cutting deep into its throat. Blood surged forward into the water. But Leona was already kicking toward the surface.

  Abagail followed suit. They crested the surface at the same time, gasping for air.

  “Start swimming toward that bank,” Abagail said, indicating the bank behind Leona. It wasn’t far away, and if they didn’t meet any more problems they would make it in no time.

  But it was too much to ask for. As Leona was dragging herself up onto the bank hands burst from the surface of the water and grappled with Abagail. They pulled her back under. There were mouths and fins and hands everywhere.

  Abagail felt the first polluted bite on her leg and she screamed out in pain, taking in a mouthful of water at the same time.

  She gripped her sword and tried to lash out, but the bodies were too close, and her swing was hindered.

  Another bite followed, this one on her side. There was nothing for it. She was going to have to use the darkling wyrd.

  This time it took little more than a thought before her hand was humming with power.

  The monsters slinked away as soon as the power came.

  She could use that to her benefit. All she had to do was swim to the shore now. Just the presence of the wyrd was driving the beings back. But they had attacked her, they had dragged Leona down and were going to eat her until I showed up.

  Abagail struck out with her sword, the weight of the water not allowing her to take the head of the monster, but she did land a blow that sunk deep into its neck. The monster shrieked and raised webbed hands to her bleeding throat.

  Abagail kicked forward, urging herself toward the shore. She stabbed at heads here, and swung at monsters there, but they gave her a wide berth and she didn’t strike any more killing blows. She turned back toward them once she’d reached the bank. The monsters crowded close, keeping just far enough back that they couldn’t reach her.

  She could attack them with the wyrd. She might even be able to end them all, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to do that.

  The decision was taken away from her.

  Strong hands yanked her from the water and into the frigid winter air. Rorick pulled her away from the edge as deadened hands splashed out of the water after her like crocuses in the spring pushing through snow.

  “What was that?” Abagail asked, careful to keep her hand away from everyone. The humming of power was lessening.

  “Nix,” Daniken answered. She stood at the edge of the bank, her eyes dark. She rapped on the moon scepter once, and aimed a bolt of silver light in the water where the nix were congregated. Abagail wasn’t sure if it did anything to them, but the hands quickly sunk beneath the surface.

  “So Singer’s Trail is weakening?” Leona asked.

  “Nix aren’t darkling, just monsters,” Daniken said. Before she could say more a tiny arrow sunk deep into Rorick’s shoulder.

  He cursed in pain and pulled the arrow out.

  “What in the Waking Eye is this?” he asked.

  “We need to move,” Daniken said.

  “What is it?” Abagail asked, pushing to her feet. She was cold and shaking, but the need to move was great inside her.

  “The elle folk have found us,” Daniken said.

  “Are they poisonous?” Abagail asked once they were in the shelter of the wooded path with more distance between them.

  “The arrows?” Daniken asked. “No.”

  “No, not the arrows, the nix?” Abagail asked, clutching at her side. The bite wasn’t deep, but it still hurt. Likewise, the one on her leg was debilitating, but it still stung to walk.

  “Oh, those, yes,” Daniken said. “But mainly because of their rotten teeth.”

  “Why, were you bitten?” Rorick asked, coming to her side and trying to peer at the wound under her clutched hands.

  “Yea, in two spots,” she said.

  “We will clean it when we stop. As long as we clean the wounds thoroughly, you shouldn’t be in any real trouble.” Daniken kept walking, urging them all forward.

  Leona seemed lost in a haze, the encounter with the nix had been almost too much. If she hadn’t been aware that they were very far from home before, the run in with the dead beings in the lake was enough to remind her. She didn’t speak, just kept her eyes rooted to the path before them.

  “How deep are the wounds?” Rorick asked her as Daniken pulled ahead of the group. Between them and the elf floated Daphne. The pixie seemed to be more alert of what was going on around them than they were.

  “I will survive. Thankfully it was only two bites.” It could have been so much worse. Abagail reflected on the multitudes of nix that had been around her at the time.

  “Where are the elle folk?” Abagail asked.

  Daniken must have heard her, even though she was far ahead of them and Abagail wasn’t speaking loud enough for a human to hear her at that distance.

  “They are still in the woods,” the elf called back to Abagail.

  The dismal day was giving way to a bright afternoon. Here and there, where snow had broken through the canopy, Abagail could see sunlight dancing along the forest floor off the trail. She just wished it wasn’t so cold. Already her clothes were starting to harden and stick to her. Rorick had shed his cloak for her, and at least she was wrapped now in his dry, navy cloak.

  She tried not to think of how good the cold clothing on the fevered skin around the bite felt.

  Rorick slipped his arm around her and pulled her closer to him. He smelled of the open air and the woods. She took a deep breath of his scent and smiled. For the moment it was easy for her to forget all of the arguing they’d done lately, and how he’d hurt her feelings by choosing to believe Daniken and even tossing aside Abagail.

  She rested her head on his shoulder, trying to ignore the hammering of her heart brought on by their proximity.

  How can I really blame him for the way he’s acting? Abagail wondered. He’s lost everything to the darklings. I think I would probably act the same way he is if that had happened to me.

  And hadn’t she acted similarly? When they were back on O, hadn’t she refused to speak of wyrd and prophecy? Hadn’t she been upset when her family so easily talked about things that would have brought an arm of the Light Guard down on them and burned them all in Hafaress’ Hearth?

  She shook her head.

  “What?” Rorick said quietly, spoken just for her.

  “Nothing. These bites hurt,” she complained, rubbing her side.

  “We will stop soon and clean it,” he promised. Abagail wasn’t sure how he could promise such a thing. After her near death experience she wanted nothing more than to continue on and not stop for anything. Behind them were the elle folk, and she’d rather brave infection from her bites than deal with those diminutive beasts.

  Rorick cast a glance behind them, as if his thoughts ran parallel to her own.

  She caught a glance of Leona again, lost in
her own world with no one, not even the doll, to help ease her mind.

  Abagail couldn’t help but feel for her sister. Leona had lost more than what Abagail had. She’d lost the last little bit of her childhood that she still had before her. While Abagail had to grow up fast, Leona was doing it at a much faster pace.

  Skuld, Abagail thought. What happened to that spirit? She couldn’t believe that it had only been tied to the doll. She’d seen the being, and it hadn’t been attached to the doll at all.

  Abagail looked away from Leona, hoping that her sister would come out of the shock brought on by the nix. Her gaze drifted past Daphne and toward Daniken, who was now much further ahead of them, the glow of her moon scepter nearly lost in the brightness of the trail.

  “I don’t trust her,” Abagail said.

  Rorick stiffened slightly. Their old argument was back.

  “It’s more than the darkling wyrd inside me,” Abagail told him.

  He didn’t relax.

  “There’s just this feeling, Rorick. She’s so much like those Light Guard at home who jumped at their own shadow, blaming a stiff wind on darklings.”

  Finally Rorick’s shoulder relaxed, the tension in the muscles slackening against her head.

  “I know,” he said. “But she has a good plan.”

  “But we don’t even know what that plan is, completely. Don’t you think if it was such a good plan, the elves would have done it by now?” Abagail argued.

  Rorick shrugged against her ear. “I guess we will just have to wait and see what comes of it. We will talk to Celeste.”

  “How much longer do you think we will be in this place?” Abagail asked. She wrapped her arms tighter around herself to fight off a shiver.

  “I don’t know. According to Celeste we should have already been far from here.”

  “I don’t know if she’s taking us the right way,” Leona said. It was the first she’d spoken since their run in with the nix. Her voice still sounded hollow, but at least it was something.

  “How do you know that?” Rorick asked.

  Skuld? Abagail wondered. At one time she wouldn’t have been happy to think the being was with her sister. Now at least it meant some things in their ever-changing life wouldn’t change.