by Aimee Moore
“Do not lament, Sera. Kraw are strong, I will be whole again soon.”
I let a sorrowful sigh out of my nose, then looked around again. “Where are we?”
“We're about four days south of the Kraw village,” Mindrik said.
My mouth fell open. “Four days?” I squeaked.
Dal gave a single nod, laying on his back in the pine needles with a slight wince.
“I've been asleep four days?”
“I think the bigger problem is that we've had to carry your dead weight for four days. And let me tell you, it was not pleasant,” Mindrik said. “Your smell alone should have been enough to repel those Kraw, there was no need for the fire show.”
The memory came back to me in a flash, and I turned to Mindrik. “What happened?”
Dal gave a short noise in his throat, gathering thought to his words. “You destroyed everything this high off the ground,” Dal raised his hand to about four feet height, “for at least three village lengths. If I had not been on the ground, I would have died with the rest.”
My world tilted, and goosebumps chased their way up my arms. “That cannot be,” I whispered.
“Oh, it was,” Mindrik said. “The brute lifting me over his head like a prized swine saved my life with his primitive display.”
I put a muddy hand to my crusted forehead. “All those Kraw,” I breathed. “All those lives, gone because of me. How many women and children did I snuff out?”
“It is the Kraw way,” Dal said from his spot on the floor. “They knew that death would find them in this world.”
“Children, Dal,” I said. “How can you be so indifferent to innocents, especially after you've had an innocent of your own blood destroyed?”
Dal scowled up at me, then turned away. I'd pressed a nerve and I hadn't meant to.
“Yes yes, very touching, lots of emotion.” Mindrik waved a hand into the air. “We need to keep moving. Patroma was not killed, and much of the camp was asleep when you cast that nova, Seraphine.”
I let off a soft sigh, then nodded. Glancing at Dal, I noticed with some regret that he appeared indifferent to me as always, once again the rock that had ignored my existence for months. Was he angry with me, or was this how we were to be now that we were no longer forced to proximity through our captive state?
Trying to rise, I fell backward with a groan, unable to force my legs to work through the pain.
“That bad, is it,” Mindrik said.
“Why do I hurt so much?”
“If you don't know how to channel your gift right, it takes from you.”
I scowled at the pine needles. “You failed to mention that.”
“Well you failed to mention that you could wipe out a battle field. Up you go, you'll feel better once you get those joints moving.” Mindrik wrapped both hands around my arm and helped me up.
My hip sockets stung and clicked with every step, my back was stiff with pain, and my chest was sore all over as if my lungs were singed. The tips of my fingers, though no longer muddy, were blackened as if burned. The soot rubbed off. I examined the odd state of my person, then looked up at Mindrik, who was watching me with a curious expression.
“What?” I asked.
“You truly did not know.”
“Of course not.”
“Hmm.” He turned away and began walking, and I winced as I kept up. “There is another curiosity this day, aside from your self naïveté. It is odd that your beast is so wounded,” Mindrik whispered between us.
I turned and glanced at Dal, who was stretching, then looked back at Mindrik with a frown. “You saw him get mauled, I don't see why it's odd.”
“Not physical wounds, Seraphine.”
I shook my head. “I know, I said something I shouldn't have.”
“There is food this way,” Dal said, shoving between us and stomping forward.
With a final glance, Mindrik and I followed the hulking Kraw through the woods. After an hour of walking that did my joints good, we came across a large lake. The reflections of smoke and clouds billowed across its glassy surface, breaking up the stunning blue of lake that stood cradled between the brown mountains.
I rubbed my arms for warmth, gazing across the great sight. I had never seen such a thing. “Where is the food, Dal?” I asked, looking up at him.
Dal gestured at the water and made his way to the lake, picking up long sticks to examine as he walked. He discarded three or four on his way to the shore of the lake before finding one that he liked.
“What have you guys been eating while I was asleep?” I asked Mindrik.
“Not much. Your beast—"
“He's not my beast. His name is Dal and he's a person.”
“—Is a skilled hunter, I'll give him that. Problem is there isn't much left to hunt. The Kraw from the village farmed their meat with grain they imported from elsewhere. There is neither grass nor meat here. I have developed a taste for lizard.”
I wrinkled my nose, hugging my arms tighter.
“Scoff if you may, we are alive.”
“Silence,” Dal said from the shore.
We held our tongues, watching as Dal made his way to the bank, skipping across a few stones, and landing on a rock jutting out into the water. There he sat with his stick and began to sharpen it with his sword.
I gave a soft sigh, sitting in the blanket of brown pine needles.
Mindrik sat next to me. “Can you do it again?” He whispered.
“Do what?”
“The fire, dear woman.”
The memory of that blinding flash came back to me. At the time, I didn't know that I was the one who had created it. I only knew that Dal was dying, and it made a part of me want to die, too. I lifted my lashes to the Kraw on the lake, still as a stone, sharp stick poised. My heart flopped into my throat. The implication was hard to fathom.
I looked down at my hands and picked at my burnt nails. “No.”
Mindrik tilted his head at me. “You can, you just don't know it. You did it once before, and you can do it again. Who knows, maybe you can do more.”
I shuddered to think of how much devastation I would wreak upon people. I pulled my knees up to my chest and rested my head on them, looking at Mindrik. He wasn't so bad looking when he wasn't scowling. There was a regal air to him that I hadn't noticed before in the hut. If things were normal, he would never spare me a passing glance, and I would sigh at his rich robes and fine schooling from my quaint cottage.
“Seraphine, you have the countenance of a woman who is doing deep thinking. And that is a very bad thing for a man to be in the presence of,” Mindrik said with a smile.
I found myself smiling in return. “I was just thinking about how if things were normal, you and I wouldn't even talk to each other.”
“Well, I think that everyone except mud trolls would avoid talking to you.”
I laughed. “You know, I'm not always this dirty. It was Dal's idea.”
“The beast did this to you?”
“Mhmm. The other Kraw made attempts on me. So Dal told me that filth would deter them. I think it worked.”
Mindrik furrowed his brow and looked out at the lake. “And yet the beast never once made an attempt on your virtue.”
“No, he completely ignored me for months. I was none more than an insect on his wall. And he became a rock in my cage.”
“How, then, did he learn our language?”
“I would sing to myself. Or recite poetry. Or talk to my family.” I frowned at the ground, breaking pine needles in half.
“Talk to your family? The dead cannot hear us, Seraphine.”
“Well, yes, I know, but in Lambston sometimes we would visit the graves of our loved ones and talk to them. We don't know for sure, maybe they really can hear us, you know.”
Mindrik took a gentle breath. “And so the beast learned our tongue just by listening to you?”
I nodded.
“Peculiar indeed...”
“They're smart, Mindrik. You have
to have noticed that by now.”
“Or perhaps only that one is smart.” Mindrik said with a gesture to Dal.
“If that's the case then we're lucky to have him on our side.”
“Time will tell,” Mindrik said.
Both of us startled and sat back as a stick full of fish was thrust at us. We looked up the stick to see Dal, a little wet, holding the stick out.
My stomach growled with all the ferocity of a bear.
“Make fire,” Dal said, pitching the stick into dirt and stalking off.
I twisted around to watch him. “Where are you going?”
“I shall return.”
I gave Mindrik a puzzled look, and he shrugged and set about clearing a space for the fire. After a brief stint in gathering sticks of pine, we had a crackling flame to cook with. The heat licked its way into my chilled skin, and goosebumps rose on every inch of me as if I had sunk into a warm bath. Mindrik found a branch to set the fish on so that they would roast without tiring our arms, and we sat in quiet contentment around the fire as the smell of food caressed our faces.
Dal returned and sat next to the fire with us. There was easily enough fish to feed us and then two extra Kraw.
“You're an amazing hunter, Dal. How did you know there was food this way?”
Dal took his time answering. “Water has a smell.”
“An hour away?” I asked.
Dal gave a nod. “Your world dies, but there is life in water. In every world I have been to, water holds life.”
“This is a good spot for sleep, yes?” Mindrik said.
I watched the two of them regard each other for a moment, noting that they had become much more civil to one another.
“There is a large stone by the lake that will shield us from onlookers,” Dal said.
“Is the water safe to bathe in?” I asked.
The men turned to me as if I had sprouted another head.
“Well, mud itches, and even I am not immune to the smells a human body can make after such a time. Are there harmful creatures in the water or not?”
“You will not be harmed by the water, Sera,” Dal said.
Mindrik poked at the fish over the fire. “I have no idea if this is done or not.”
“Here, let me. My family used to cook fish from the river,” I said. I sat up and stuck a finger into the thickest part of the fish. It was still squishy. I sighed. “It will be a while.”
“All my schooling, and country bumpkin is the one who won't die of worms,” Mindrik said with a smile.
“Be careful, or country bumpkin will give you an under-cooked fish,” I said, heading toward the water.
“Where are you going?” Mindrik said.
“To the lake. I want to be clean.”
Mindrik frowned. “I offered you a bath, if you will recall.”
“I'd prefer to do it myself, if you don't mind.”
He furrowed his brow up at me as I padded away from the fire and toward the calm waters of the lake. The pine needles poked my feet, brushing and sliding under me. The warm crackle of the fire grew distant, and the calm slap of the lake beckoned. When I got to the shore, I stuck one foot into the icy water and sucked in a breath as violent shivers ran through me. It was not going to be a pleasant bath, but there was a warm fire waiting for me.
I turned and looked at the camp, but neither Dal nor Mindrik were paying attention to me, so I shimmied out of my skirt. My sack shirt went to my thighs, so I was not entirely indecent, but I did not want to wade through the water in a skirt. Clutching the dirty skirt to my chest, I took careful steps into the slime and mud, daggers of ice stabbing at every muscle and bone in my body as the shock of water rose up my body. Gooey lake bed squished up between my toes. My skin became so taught against the freezing cold that I thought I might break as I shivered violently. Tiny fish darted away from me.
Finally chest deep in the water, the shivers were wracking me so hard that my teeth were clattering, and I found it hard to bathe through the tremors. I held my skirt between my knees so that it would not be lost and began trying to work through my hair. What I wouldn't give for a hot bath, warmed by the fire in my family hearth.
I stopped scrubbing at my crusty mud. I had fire. There was no need for me to shiver in the muck like this. With a whisper of a thought, I beckoned the flame to my skin. It answered my call like the warm breath of a lover, and I looked down to see my skin glow a soft orange as the fire simmered within me. The lake water wasn't so cold anymore. On the contrary, I didn't think I ever wanted to leave my warm bath.
With a pleasurable sigh, I tilted my head back in the water, scrubbing at my scalp to remove the mud. Soon, my long hair flowed free within the water, not a tangle or a glop of mud in sight. I scrubbed at my face, marveling at how cold and strange the world felt without my mask of mud.
I made sure I was neck-deep in the water and then worked my way out of the sack shirt, free to scrub the mud and dirt off of my body. Keeping my fire alight was taxing, as the cold would sink into me again as soon as I forgot to channel my energy to my gift. And that energy was depleting. I cleaned quicker, not wanting to be plunged into the ice water again any time soon. I worked my clothing through the water as well, swishing and squeezing until it was clean. Then I gave a languid twirl in the water, delighting in the sensation one last time.
When I stopped, I looked up at the fire in the woods and thought I saw Dal looking at me. My heart thrummed as I squinted to see further, but the fire and its two occupants now appeared wholly unconcerned with the human in the lake. Shaking my head, I pulled my clothes back on, then sloshed my way to the shore. I channeled my fire magic as long as I could in the cold air, but much like kneading dough for too long, the effort to maintain the heat became too great and I let go. The cold sunk into me instantly, and I sloshed through swishing, prickling pine all the way back up the bank to the two men. Two men who stared at me as if I were a stranger. At least the smell of cooked fish was welcoming.
“What?” I asked, looking down myself to make sure I had put my clothes on right. They were on, but I crossed my arms to cover my ice hardened nipples poking through the wet sack shirt. I trembled and took a seat by the fire.
“You're not a mud troll,” Mindrik said.
“Of course not,” I said, inching closer to the fire.
The crackle of the fire filled the space, and I glanced up at Dal and Mindrik, who were watching me. “I've been gone less than twenty minutes,” I said, as if they were losing their minds.
“There's skin under all that mud,” Mindrik said.
I shook my head and stood to poke at the fish. It was hot enough to burn, and it was firm. “The food is ready; I'll find some sticks.”
We ate in silence for a time, Mindrik and I giving the occasional groan at our meals. Dal ate his in big, easy bites, bones and all, and I wondered if Kraw insides were made of rock as well. My stomach, the monster that had been roaring for food for months now, couldn't handle an entire fish. I groused at it as I set my fish aside, waiting until I had room for more. Who knew when the next meal would be.
After a time, I was warm and dry. Heavy sleepiness began to pull at my eyelids and make me droop.
“Oh my,” Mindrik said, staring at me.
“What?”
“Your hair.”
“What about it?” I pulled at it, wondering what malady was befalling me now. Perhaps I didn't get all the mud out.
“It's dried flame red,” Mindrik exclaimed.
I frowned. “It's not flame red, it's just red.” I examined the long lock between my fingers. I didn't see the reason for his outburst, it was simply long red hair. Nothing unusual. I looked back up at Dal and Mindrik to see them both staring at me again.
“Oh for heaven's sake you two, spit it out.”
Mindrik cleared his throat. “I was not expecting red under all that mud, is all. I had thought your hair brown.”
“He is surprised at your beauty,” Dal said, in a neutral tone
.
My face heated and I averted my gaze, not sure what to say. Lonnie thought I was pretty. But he had never mentioned beauty. Those were two different things, weren’t they?
“Yes, well, I suppose there's that. Are you going to eat that little fish, Kraw?” Mindrik pointed to the small one by Dal's knee.
Dal handed the small fish to Mindrik without a word. I had watched the large Kraw consume three fish by himself while I could barely eat half of one, and I began to wonder if he would ever be full. I picked mine up and nibbled at it again, even though my stomach was full enough to burst.
“Don't the bones bother you, Dal?” I asked.
“Bones give strength to my bones.”
“My insides would fester if I ate like you,” Mindrik said to Dal.
Dal grunted half a laugh. “Kraw—"
“Are strong,” Mindrik and I said. We glanced at each other and smiled.
When I looked at Dal again, he was frowning into the flames, ghosts floating through his eyes. “What's wrong, Dal?”
The ghosts evaporated, and his gaze met mine. Dal took a deep breath and straightened. “We have far to travel, still. There will be danger.”
“How much longer?” I asked.
“Maybe a few weeks,” Mindrik said. “But at least we will be warmer as we travel south.”
I smiled to myself, overjoyed at the prospect of some warmth in my life at last. “I'll get to see the ocean,” I whispered.
Mindrik waved a dismissive hand. “It's just more water, surely you've seen plenty of water in your life.”
I furrowed my brow at Mindrik. “My village was surrounded by rolling hills of grass on all sides, as far as the eye could see. For me, dreams sail upon the endless waters of the mysterious ocean. Where do your dreams reside, Mindrik?”
Mindrik tucked his robes around himself with a frown. “In my head where they belong,” he said.
I sighed, forcing down another bite of fish, and glanced at Dal, who was back to brooding. Where did Dal's dreams reside? And when did his arm wound heal over enough for the maggots to be gone? Oddly, most of Dal's wounds appeared to be nearly healed over, even his nose was looking right again, as if food gave his body the strength to finally knit him back together.