by Jenn Vakey
I nodded, handing it back to him.
Motioning me back behind him, he lined himself up with the target, held the crossbow out in front of him, and pulled the trigger. The wisp that came from the crossbow as he fired was followed by the thud as the arrow sank into the target. Not perfectly centered in the small black circle in the middle, but it was impressively close.
Then it was my turn.
“You’re not going to laugh at me if I suck at this, are you?” I asked nervously, loading the crossbow and taking my position. My hand shook slightly, despite my efforts to prevent it.
“I didn’t laugh the first time you threw a punch.”
That didn’t make me feel any better. I was so used to being good at things that it made me feel uncomfortable when I encountered something I wasn’t. Even more so when someone had to be around to see it. But I knew it was pointless to try to send him away until I got the hang of it. That one he probably would end up laughing at.
Trying my best to clear my mind, I took aim at the target and fired, missing wildly. To his credit, Rhydian actually didn’t laugh. He just handed me another arrow and told me to try again. So I did. Again, and again, and again.
By the sixth arrow, I actually managed to hit the target. It was toward the edge, nowhere near where I was aiming, but it was an improvement. The more I shot, the more difficult it became to keep the events of yesterday out of my mind. What happened with me mixed together in my thoughts with the story Rhydian had told me. Then I started to picture that man in ways that it hadn’t actually happened. When I was armed like Rhydian had been. It caused a wave of guilt to move through me again, my body not caring that my mind tried to rationalize that I had done what I had to do. I had saved Jordi from being taken. Still, my hands started to shake, my mind making me see that man ahead of me instead of the target.
“Good,” Rhydian said, reaching down to take the crossbow from me. I didn’t look at him. I didn’t want to know if he had noticed what was happening. He had already seen me at my lowest. It wasn’t something I relished happening again.
Without commenting on it, he stepped forward to take my place and fired a few shots himself. He was good, and I doubted he really needed the practice in that moment. But it gave me the time I needed to try to pull myself back together. I knew I had to. What happened was done. It couldn’t be changed. I needed to figure out a way to move past it, otherwise it was going to threaten everything I was trying to achieve.
So instead, I focused on Rhydian. The way his body tightened just slightly right before he squeezed the trigger. The way his hair pulled out from where he had it tucked behind his ears when the breeze moved through the trees toward us. Why couldn’t Adler have been after someone else? Why did it have to be him?
Rhydian turned around, his mouth opened slightly like he was about to say something. The words didn’t come, though. As his eyes moved toward me, I watched as his expression hardened to the level that it had been that first day when he found me in the woods. And it scared me.
“Don’t move,” he said, his voice low and commanding. Then, before I could even react, the crossbow in his hand lifted up toward me.
Terror pushed through my veins like a wave of ice water. What had just happened? How had we gone from being comfortable to this? Did he know? Did something happen that made him figure it out?
My heart was in my throat, tears threatening to fill my eyes. I wanted so badly to run, but my legs felt like lead as they rooted me in place. All I seemed to be able to do was stare back at him, my eyes on his as I tried to understand what was going on with him. Was he going to kill me? What would happen to Lillith if he did?
But his eyes weren’t on me at all. He was looking to my right, just past me. A little voice inside of me told me that there was a threat there, but my fear was too palpable to listen.
Then he fired.
I flinched, barely able to prevent myself from patting my body down to check for injuries. But that little voice was there again, practically screaming for me to listen. Telling me that I could hear the arrow whizzing through the air as it moved past me. Behind me. The thud as it hit something. Something that wasn’t me.
“Can I move now?” I asked, my throat dry and scratchy.
Rhydian let out a breath, some of the tension leaving him as he nodded and started walking toward me. As he passed, he reached out and grabbed my hand, giving it a quick squeeze before letting go and moving further back. He was trying to reassure me, but the act alone was enough to completely clear my mind. It was the way it felt, that jolt of energy that spread up from my fingers, filling my entire body in less than a second. Replacing that fear with something closer to excitement, then sadness when it ended so quickly.
What the hell was wrong with me? Why was I letting myself have any of these feelings? I should be left feeling revolted when he touched me, but this was anything but. I… liked it.
I couldn’t think about that now. So I turned, focusing my attention on what was actually going on. Rhydian was about ten feet from me, crouched down over a mound of something on the ground. I watched as he gripped the arrow, pulling it out of whatever he had hit. It came out red. Blood.
“What is it?” I asked, looking over his shoulder as he wiped the arrow off on the creature’s thick, coarse coat. It didn’t look like the animal fur I had seen pictures of in the books. It was denser, closer to the quills of a porcupine. I had done a report on them in year four, though, and this was no porcupine. Its body was lean with long legs that would have left it about two feet tall had it been standing. And its coat was a mix of red and orange. Its tail was narrow like a whip, with a thicker bunch of the fur at the end.
“It's an ikati,” he said. “They don't usually come past the wards. This is only the second one I've seen since I've been here.”
“And if it had gotten me?” I asked, watching as he stood and looked further out into the woods.
“Let's just say they make the snox feel like a tickle. Their saliva is acidic.”
He didn't need to say more. I had dealt with a few acid related injuries in my time as a Healer. Even thinking about it made me shiver.
“Thank you,” I said, now very glad he had turned around when he had.
Rhydian gave me a typical Rhydian shrug and started walking back toward the bag he had left on the ground. “It was purely for selfish reasons. I didn't want to have to carry you all the way back to camp.”
His words were harsh, but his tone said they were anything but. There was also the fact that I could tell he was lying. It wasn't one I was going to call him out on, though. I was just glad he seemed to care enough that he didn't want me to get bitten by one of those things.
“At least I would have gotten to keep my clothes on this time,” I said without thinking. As the words left my lips, I couldn’t believe I had actually said them. I could already feel my cheeks starting to heat as I watched him shift back around to face me. Not wanting him to see it, I turned and started scanning the woods around us, as if searching for any other sign of danger. It was something we hadn’t talked about since my first day in Alkwin. Something I had never intended to bring up. There had been times where we had touched, mainly during training, but that had been so different. He had taken my clothes off of me. Seen me in a state that I had always been raised to believe that no man should see a woman in before they were married. It was something I hardly wanted to think about myself, let alone have a conversation with him about.
“It’s faster to take the saliva soaked clothes off, but I guess I could have stopped and let you writhe in pain for a few minutes while I cut just the leg of the pants away,” he stated.
I forced myself to turn and face him, giving him what I hoped came off as an approving nod. “Good, because a girl can only be carried half naked into camp so many times before losing people’s respect. I can’t use up all of my allotted times in the first couple weeks here.”
Rhydian groaned, giving me an exasperated look, then
held out the bag of arrows for me to take. “You really pissed a lot of people off in Eden, didn’t you?”
There was no need to ask him to clarify. I had gotten in trouble quite a few times over the years for not being careful with my words. Eden valued respect, and much of what I would say didn’t convey that.
“Councilman Meltzer did forbid Pax from hanging out with us once,” I said as way of an answer. “He said I was going to corrupt his son. Thankfully his wife talked him out of the decision. Not that Pax would have really listened.”
He smirked, handing me the bow. I walked past him and loaded it again, then took aim at my target. It was much easier now that my mind had moved past the events of yesterday. Maybe it was seeing Rhydian actually use the crossbow on a threat instead of just a target. Or maybe I was still distracted by the conversation about him seeing me without clothes on. Either way, when I fired, I managed to make it within the rings on the target.
I squealed with excitement, allowing myself to give a quick jump before loading it again. Rhydian actually chuckled behind me, but I didn’t care. It was progress, and nothing was going to keep me from being happy about that. In fact, I quite liked that he was loosening up enough to joke and laugh. He had a nice laugh.
The image I had in my mind of him during the walk from Eden to Alkwin was nothing like the man I had been getting to know. To me, a murderer was evil. That was the way I had been raised. They were cold, ruthless. But that wasn’t the Rhydian I had seen. Had Adler not told me what he had done, I don’t know if I would have even been able to picture him doing such things. In a way, I hated Adler more for telling me. For bursting that bubble that would have left me actually liking this Rhydian. Enjoying spending time with him. I despised him for making me have to betray the trust I had been fighting so hard to earn, and proving Rhydian’s first opinions of me right. He had turned me into the bad guy here. Sure, Rhydian had done something awful. He was fighting for the people he was protecting, though. Not just the people in Alkwin, but for every Tainted still stuck behind the wall in Eden. How many of them would die because of my actions? One’s he left me with no choice but to do.
I hated him for that.
When I looked at the target this time, it was Adler I saw on it. That smug, evil little smile of his. The ease at which he used human lives to get what he wanted. I didn’t want to be used as a weapon against the Tainted. I didn’t want to be used against Rhydian. I wanted another way.
Maybe I could just tell Rhydian the truth. Tell him what had really happened that night, what Adler was planning. Not only would that keep him safe, but it was possible they could mount a rescue mission to go back into Eden and find my sister.
But I couldn’t take that chance. Telling him now would destroy any trust I had earned. There was a chance that he would simply cast me out of Alkwin, not listening to anything else I had to say. I couldn’t risk Lillith’s life like that.
When I fired again, my aim was true and the tip of the arrow struck right between where I had been picturing Adler’s eyes. There was no guilt with it, though.
The walk back to camp was just as quiet as the one there had been. It wasn’t my nerves keeping me from talking, though. Now it was the entire state of my life. I didn’t want to do what Adler wanted. Not just because I had started to have some respect for Rhydian, despite his actions. It wasn’t even because I knew it would be harming the chances for the Tainted.
It was Adler. I didn’t want him to get his way. I wanted to find another way to do this. I just didn’t know what that could possibly be.
“What’s that?” I asked as we neared the tree line. My eyes had been moving around so as not to make Rhydian think I wanted to have a conversation. When they landed on something up high in one of the trees, I found myself stopping to study it.
“It’s a tree house,” he answered casually, as if that explained everything. I met him with a look of confusion. Why did trees need houses? He smirked, his green eyes sparkling with amusement. “It’s for the kids to play in. Rumor has it that people used to have them in their yards before the war.”
That made a lot more sense than what I had originally believed, and I was glad I hadn’t expressed my thoughts out loud. Looking up at it, I could see what he meant. It was like a little house that was braced within the tree’s branches, with a ladder moving up along the trunk of the tree.
“That’s...awesome,” I said, my eyes widening with excitement. Could they put actual houses in trees? Ones large enough for adults? If so, I doubted there was anywhere I would enjoy living more. I would even gladly settle for a smaller house just to accomplish it. “I’d build a place like that for my kids,” I said, starting again toward the city. He didn’t need to hear my thoughts about adult sized ones.
Rhydian just looked over, one of those rare real smiles on his face that I had found myself enjoying.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Another sleepless night left me leaving my room again long after everyone else had gone to sleep. Without even putting thought into where I was going, I walked out into the cool night air and made my way to the table. I had just rested my head down on it when I heard the soft click of the dorm door shutting. There was a tiny jumping feeling in my chest, and I smiled. Even more so when something flew through the air and landed down on my chest.
“They didn’t teach you how to dress for the weather in Eden?” Rhydian asked, walking over and taking his spot on the side of the table.
I shrugged, unfolding the thin blanket he had tossed at me, trying not to smile at the very thought that he had actually brought it. Or that he had made it out here so quickly, dressed and with a blanket in hand. Had he been waiting for me to leave? Listening for the sounds of me sneaking out of the dorm to come to the spot that was quickly becoming a normal place for us to talk? I wasn’t even going to try to tamp down the way that made me feel. The fact that I would have actually liked if he had. I didn’t even try to pretend that it was because it was another step forward in Adler’s plan. Not tonight. I didn’t want to think about that tonight.
“How many different kinds of animals are out in the woods?” I asked, angling my head so I could see him as I pulled the blanket over myself.
He let out a slow breath, his face twisting slightly as he thought it over. “You’ve seen the snox and ikati. There are some that were from before the war. Like deer and hogs. Zaydan swore he saw a bear once, but no one else has. As for the new creatures, there are a few. Glodalo is like a squirrel, but they’re much larger. Almost the size of a snox. They also have hands similar to ours.” He held his hand up and waggled his fingers. “Which they use to move around in the trees.”
After picturing a giant squirrel with human hands, I shook my head to clear the image and asked, “Dangerous?”
He shook his head. “Not really. I mean, they will attack if you mess with them, but their bites won’t do anything unless they get really lucky and get your throat. Although, I guess they could take off a finger if they had the chance. We mainly hunt them.”
I scrunched up my nose, not really wanting to think about whether or not some of the mystery meat I had been eating had come from them. Rhydian noticed and rolled his eyes.
“Noted. No more telling you which animals we eat,” he said, amusement not hidden at all. “Within the wards, you aren’t likely to see anything more than Glodalo, deer, and hogs. Well, there are some snakes in the woods, but most aren’t venomous. As long as you stay on the path outside of the wards, you probably won’t run into many more. Snox are one of the only ones that don’t fear people.”
A shiver moved through me, which wasn’t caused by the cold. “Those things really are horrible. I thought I was going crazy out there. The trees were melting, there were voices in the woods trying to call me off of the path. I even saw people fighting. It looked like a Tainted fighting a few guys that weren’t, but not like us. More like images from the history lessons from the war, but they were standing right there in front of me.”<
br />
“I was bit a couple years ago while out hunting,” he said. As he did, I noticed that the normal tightness in his voice was gone, making him seem almost like a completely different person. Thinking about it, it hadn’t been there at all since he came out to join me. Instead, it was like we were having a normal, relaxed conversation. It was nice. “I saw my mother sitting by a campfire out in the middle of the woods, which I should have known was just in my head because she’d been dead for several years by that point. Instead, I just sat down with her and had probably the craziest conversation of my life as I watched her using a sewing machine to make clothes for the animals in the woods.”
“Really?” I asked, trying hard not to laugh. It was impossible to keep from smiling, though. Luckily, he was actually smirking himself when he looked down to meet my gaze.
“It was winter,” he explained, his eyes moving between mine. “It took several hours for anyone to realize I was missing, then a couple more for them to find me. I ended up having to spend a couple days in the clinic after that. Apparently imaginary fire won’t actually keep you warm in the winter.”
Was that a joke? I smiled at the lightness in the way he spoke. The guarded way he always carried himself even with his own people was gone. Looking at him now, the way he was looking down at me, I knew I was in trouble. That something was happening that I didn’t really understand, but I seemed to be helpless against.
* * *
Rhydian had apparently told the others about the ikati, because it was one of the main topics of discussion at breakfast the next morning. Thankfully no one decided that it was the best place to talk about what one of those bites could do to the human body.
“You seem to attract animals, Leeya,” Evanly said.
Zaydan laughed. “I would say trouble in general. I saw a bear out in the woods once. Probably would have gone after me if one of my abilities wasn’t to talk to animals.”