After the Fall

by Janean Worth

  Chapter Ten

  Kara’s lank hair flopped into her eyes as she leaned back against the fallen tree to rest. Her feet ached, but over the last few days, she’d almost learned to ignore that pain. In time, she knew the blisters that had formed would heal and create calluses, and her feet would pain her no more. She was not worried about the pain in her feet. She had other things to worry about.

  For many days now, she’d walked the forest, hiding from the frightening beasts that she encountered and staying near the river, circling the area in ever widening arcs, looking for suitable shelter. She had found none.

  She could have easily sheltered in the fallen tree that she leaned against, for it was enormous and the insects of the forest had long since eaten the tender heart of the wood, leaving a long, hollowed out space behind. However, the log rested on soft loamy soil, which meant that the Fidgets would easily find her hiding place if she rested there during the night, since the vicious little creatures lived in the earth and slept or hid there during the daylight hours.

  The need for a shelter had become her all-consuming thought during the day, and also during the sleepless hours she spent high in the branches of a different tree each night. So far, she’d managed to find small supplies of berries and nuts that she used to supplement the meager food still remaining in her bag. The fox kit seemed happy enough with whatever food she provided, but she knew that gathering food must become her primary focus soon, and so she must find a shelter to use as a central location to hunt and forage from.

  She sighed and fingered the strap of her bag, wishing heartily for her mother’s guidance, and also for the woman herself. Her mother would have known what to do. Quickly, she pushed the thoughts of her mother aside, for they were like a sharp gouging pain in her heart when she let herself dwell upon them. The loss was just too great to contemplate, so she would not let herself think about it at all. One small solace was that she trusted Maude’s word in the matter. She knew that her mother was truly gone from the world. It hadn’t been so when her father had died. He’d disappeared in the wilderness first, sent out on an errand for the Sovereign, and he had never returned. The Enforcers had informed Kara’s mother of his death, but Kara had always wondered about it. At the time, she hadn’t been able to believe that her hearty and healthy father would never return to for them, and had held out hope that he would for a long, long time. At least she had no such confusion about her mother’s death.

  Forcing her thoughts back to the moment at hand, she opened her bag and removed the drowsy fox kit. The small kit blinked sleepy eyes and yawned, and Kara smiled at the sight of its tiny milk teeth and the sound of the soft mewled sigh that the animal made.

  The fox was very well behaved for an animal. It did not urinate or defecate in her bag or chew her things while hidden away as they travelled during the day, and when Kara let the animal out for exercise and to relieve its bodily functions, the kit always stayed near to her side, never wandering far. At night, the animal was silent, lying against her stomach inside her bag as they both waited for the daylight hours to come again so that she could resume her search for a temporary home for them both. The kit was the perfect animal companion, and Kara had quickly come to love the little creature.

  Kara placed the kit upon the ground and waited for it to relieve itself before resuming her walk through the forest.

  “You need a name,” she said to the little animal as it toddled along at her side. The sound of her voice startled the fox a bit and it looked up at her with wide, unblinking eyes. She realized then that it had been several days since she’d said any words aloud.

  “I think I’ll call you Jax,” she told the animal, mentally vowing to speak to the kit more so that it would know the sound of her voice. “Let’s go, shall we? Perhaps today we will have more luck.”

  The day passed quickly, and the sunlight was beginning to wane when Kara stumbled upon the rocky outcropping. At first, she thought nothing of it, since she’d seen many rocky areas while she’d been wandering the forest, but then she noticed the dark, round hole that faced out upon a shelf-like structure of solid rock.

  Intrigued, yet cautious, she ventured closer. The hole turned out to be the entrance to a small cave. Kara could not see the back of the cave, and stood at the entrance in indecision. One of the many frightening creatures of the forest could already be using the cave as a home. The creature could be inside at that very moment, waiting to pounce upon her if she ventured near.

  However, the cave was as close to a good shelter as she’d seen so far in her searchings. She hated to abandon the chance to claim it as her own. The mouth of the cave opened onto solid rock, and if the interior of the cave was made of the same, then the place would be safe from the unexpected intrusion of burrowing Fidgets.

  She needed to go inside to find that out if it was occupied. Bolstering her courage, she searched about for a long branch that she could use to make a modified torch. She needed to be able to see if there was something inside the cave, and perhaps a burning stick would keep anything inside away from her long enough so that she could escape if needed.

  She had no spare cloth or fuel to make a proper torch, so she had to resort to building a small fire using her flint, and then lighting the branch she’d found afire. Hoping that the flame would last for as long as she needed, she tucked her bag, where Jax lay sheltered, close to her side, and entered the cave quickly, before she could change her mind.

  The cave entrance was small, so she was forced to stoop over as she entered. Thrusting the flaming branch ahead of her, she glanced about quickly, looking for lurking animals. To her relief and surprise, none were present.

  The cave was small, so it took only moments for Kara to crawl inside to view the whole of it, but what she saw delighted her. The entire cave was solid rock, with a smooth, mostly flat floor and, to her amazement, a tiny hole in the top near the back that would act as a vent for smoke, allowing her to build a fire. The hole seemed to be an unnatural feature, and Kara wondered momentarily if it had perhaps been someone’s home many years ago.

  The cave was just what she’d been looking for.

  Bits of forest debris had blown inside the cave, drifting at the sloped sides where the rocky floor flowed easily into the domed walls of the cave. Kara cautiously poked at the drifts with her toe, letting out a quickly stifled cry when several large snakes slithered from the debris.

  Snakes had been a problem in GateWide as well, and, in this instance, Kara knew just what to do. She’d done it many times for Mrs. Malmont. Waving the flaming torch near the closest snake, Kara watched as the reptile’s eyes focused on the closest threat. Then, while it was distracted, Kara quickly reached out with her free hand and caught hold of the snake’s tail. With a quick flip of her wrist, she snapped the snake’s body like a whip, stunning the creature. Then, as fast as she could, she flung it to the ground and stomped upon the head. There was a nasty crunch as she killed the snake, but Kara was too frightened to pay much attention. Several more snakes had slithered free, and they held her full attention now.

  If not for the flaming branch, she knew that she’d have been bitten. The snakes were afraid of the fire, and did not get within striking distance of her. She quickly killed the remaining three snakes, tossing them out of the entrance to the cave onto the flat rock shelf, and then lit the remaining debris on fire.

  She backed out of the cave swiftly as the dry tinder caught, flames growing quickly, and took several long gulps of air to calm her frayed nerves.

  The fire would burn any insects or remaining snakes, cleansing the cave of any other vermin.

  She tossed the burnt branch into the small fire that she’d left burning on the rocky shelf in front of the entrance to the cave, and then she skinned and gutted the snakes with her mother’s metal knife. After the task was done, she skewered the snake meat on a green branch before propping them up over the fire, usin
g a good-sized heavy rock as a bolster to keep them out of the flames. Eyeing her work with satisfaction, she wiped her grimy hands on her pants and then she set out to find the nastiest, sharpest brambles that she could get.

  If she was going to sleep inside the cave that night, and she did, she knew that having a thick covering of brambles over the mouth of the cave and a nice, hot fire near the entrance would discourage any visitors that may come during the night.

  With a smile on her face for the first time in days, Kara set off with a purpose, out into the quickly fading light of an approaching dusk, with something like hope filling her heart and the promise of a substantial supper to fill her stomach later.