The Feral Sentence- Complete Box Set

by Shade Owens

  It looked so small from this distance, like a shriveled ant under a scorching sun.

  “Yo… how… what the…” she ranted, waving her arms.

  “What?” I asked.

  Was I supposed to feel guilty? Remorseful? I didn’t. She didn’t deserve to live—not after everything she’d done.

  “You killed her,” Coin said.

  I cocked an eyebrow. “Was I supposed to shake her hand?”

  She punched me playfully on the shoulder then clapped her hands together, a grin stretching her face. “Yo, Brone, you’s some badass shit.”

  She raised a flat hand in the air at face level and stared at me, waiting.

  I grimaced. “Are you seriously trying to high-five me right now?”

  Her smile quickly evaporated and she dropped her hand. “Nah, man. I’m just proud of you.”

  I threw my bow over my shoulder and loaded my quiver with my new set of arrows. I didn’t know how to respond to her, so I didn’t. This wasn’t some game. I didn’t earn points every time I killed someone. I wasn’t ashamed of what I’d done, but I wasn’t proud of it, either.

  I did what had to be done.

  “Brone,” Coin said.

  I’d nearly ignored her again, but she nudged me in the ribs. Her thick lips were parted, and she was staring down below, but not at the dead Norther—at something farther ahead. She squinted her eyes and raised a hand over her brows to block out the sun.

  Her vision wasn’t great, I knew. But mine was, and I could see it.

  I could see her.

  “Is that who I think it is?” she asked.

  I was speechless. Was I hallucinating?

  Down below, on the right side of the bay, was the tall, frizzy-haired outline of a woman I’d have recognized anywhere: Trim.

  CHAPTER 4

  I stepped off the last rock at the bottom of the waterfall, careful not to trip. Trim was kneeling in the tall grass, hovering over something out of view.

  “Trim!” I shouted.

  She got up and swung around, her eyes wild and thirsty for blood, but the moment she saw me, something in her softened. For the first time since I’d met her, she looked happy to see me, even though she wasn’t smiling.

  But the smile on my face vanished when a spear came whistling through the air, missing my face by less than an inch. I stopped midrun and turned toward my attacker—a four-foot girl with red markings across both cheeks and hair wilder than Trim’s. Her mouth was open wide, letting out a bloodcurdling scream, and she ran at me with a blade above her head.

  Elektra?

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa!” I shouted, two hands by my face. “Elektra, it’s me!”

  As Elektra sped closer, I realized she wasn’t coming at me, but at Coin, whose eyes looked like golf balls. She didn’t know anything about Elektra. In fact, I’d never told her the story; I’d never explained to her that we’d found an eleven-year-old girl on the island during one of our hunts.

  I stepped out in front of Coin, shoulders drawn back, and raised a stiff hand. “Elektra!”

  She stopped, her feet sliding through the grass, and stood there looking dazed.

  “I know you,” she said.

  “Yeah, you do. And this is Coin. She’s a friend.” I patted Coin on the shoulder to show Elektra she was on our side. Coin flicked her index finger in the air as a way of waving hello.

  Trim stepped over the tall grass and grabbed me by the forearm, pulling me in for a one-armed hug.

  “I can’t believe it’s you,” she breathed.

  I’d never imagined the leader of the Hunters would one day be hugging me. I hugged her back, feeling at home.

  “I can’t believe it’s you, either,” I said. “Where is everyone?”

  She pulled away and averted her gaze. Where were the rest of the Hunters? What wasn’t she telling me? Was someone hurt? Was someone missing? Was she not with them at all?

  “You look taller,” Elektra said, her orange wire hair bouncing up and down as she moved closer to me. She threw her arms around my waist and hugged me. She still looked like a sweet kid with her tiny nose and eyes spread wide apart, but the red markings all over her face and her torn clothes made her look like someone who’d been raised in the jungle.

  I’d once found her to be extremely annoying, viewing her only as a liability (or a disability), as someone who would only slow us down, or worse, get us killed. But by the looks of her, she’d taken her role of superhero Elektra rather seriously.

  “You look shorter,” I teased.

  “Brone!”

  My eyes shot up, but just in time, because through the abundance of soft grass came Rocket bursting out into the open. She lunged at me and the air in my lungs came blasting out. I fell flat on my back with her arms wrapped around my waist.

  “Oh my God, it’s you! It’s really you! Sorry. I didn’t mean to—”

  She climbed off me when I tried to say “Rocket,” and I sounded more like a house cat being accidentally stepped on. She gave me her hand and helped me back up. “I never thought I’d see you again,” she said.

  It was hard to believe she was here, right in front of me. She still looked the same—bright emerald eyes, small build, and dreadlocks tied back into a knot at the base of her skull. She smiled from ear to ear, her eyes darting from my eyes to my lips, to my hands, and to my toes, as if seeing an illusion.

  The image of the Hunters’ heads on pikes flashed into my mind, but I shook this horrific nightmare away. It hadn’t happened. I had to stop dwelling on it.

  “And who’s this?” she asked, looking at Coin.

  “Coin,” I said. “She’s a friend. Listen, guys, Fish—”

  “Ain’t nobody told me we was havin’ a party!”

  From the thick of the jungle came Biggie, waddling her way across the field. She looked like a giant beside Flander, who was limping and holding on to her for support. I was so thrilled—so indescribably happy to be seeing the Hunters’ faces, but for some reason, the only thing I could think about was the next step. As much as I wanted to sit down with my friends to talk about everything that had happened, there was no time to waste.

  Fisher needed us, and to help Fisher, we needed Navi.

  I parted my lips to try again, but Biggie’s arms came swinging around me. She lifted me into the air, and I thought my lungs might explode.

  “Je-Jesus!” I let out.

  “Yo, Brone! Am I hallucinating?” She gave me a big kiss on the cheek, then dropped me back to the ground.

  “Are you guys okay?” Rocket asked, her eyes narrowing and her smile disappearing. “Where have you been? Where did you go? Did you see anyone else? Who else survived?”

  “Hold your horses, Speedy Gonzales!” Flander said, the loose skin of her arms jiggling as she waved a hand. Her silver hair had grown out a bit, and it hung to the sides of her face. Her skin was darker, if that was even possible. She’d always been so suntanned to the point of looking like a giant piece of leather. She clasped me by the shoulders, a gentle smile on her lightly wrinkled face. “Good to see you, Brone.”

  I smiled back. I’d missed them all so much.

  “Yo! Give the girl some space,” Biggie said, using her body as a human shield. She then reached for Coin’s hand and shook it hard. “I remember you. You were one of dem Battlewomen, right?”

  Coin nodded. It was evident she felt out of her element. Maybe she was intimidated, too. The Hunters had always been so highly thought of. And now, she was standing in front of them as if this was some high school reunion.

  “Where’s Eagle?” I asked, peering over Biggie’s shoulder and toward the jungle.

  Everyone went quiet. I didn’t need verbal confirmation to know that she was gone.

  “Eagle saved me!” Elektra let out, and Rocket quickly turned away, digging her face into Biggie’s chest.

  They held onto each other, a heavy silence weighing down on us.

  “I-I’m sorry,” I said.

  Trim
stepped forward and raised her chin, but she didn’t make eye contact. “Don’t be,” she said. “At least she’s in a better place than we are.”

  I knew she was hurting, but she’d never show it.

  Flander cleared her throat and patted me on the arm. She pulled a bow from around her chest and handed it to me. It was carved of cherry wood, and the bowstring was green—something pulled off, or out of, a plant. There was an engraving on the handle that read, “E.” She grabbed my arm and placed the bow in my hand. “Make ’er proud, girl.”

  I rubbed my thumb against the engraved initial. E, for Eagle, I knew. This was her bow. This was the bow she’d used to defend the Village when the Northers had first attacked us—when she’d been maimed.

  Eagle had always been regarded as the best Archer in all of Kormace. To carry her bow was the biggest honor anyone could ask for.

  “I will,” I said. I pulled my old bow off my back and gave it to Flander.

  “We should head back,” Rocket said. “The women are unprotected right now.”

  “The women?” I asked.

  Biggie let out a loud scoff. “We ain’t the only ones who survived, Brone.”

  “How many more of you are there?” I asked.

  “Twenty-eight,” Biggie said. “Two are hurt pretty bad, but we managed to get the others out in time.”

  “We’re camped out in a cove,” Rocket said. “Shore’s not too far from here. Come on, we’ll take you there.”

  She reached for my wrist, but I pulled back. She looked like a kid who’d been given a gift, only to have it taken away.

  “We can’t,” I said.

  “What’s going on, Brone?” Trim asked, her dark eyes narrowing on me. She knew something was wrong.

  “It’s Fisher,” I said, and her eyes lit up like a Christmas tree.

  “You saw her? Where is she? Is she okay?” she rambled, and I was taken aback. I’d never seen Trim express so much emotion before. But then again, Fisher wasn’t only her right hand; she was her best friend.

  “No, she’s not.” I bit down hard, and my jaw popped.

  “She was attacked,” Coin said, finally getting involved in the conversation.

  “Attacked!”

  “By who? When?”

  “Who the fu—”

  Everyone circled around me, their eyes popping out of their sockets like something out of an old Tim Burton movie.

  “It was a crocodile,” I said. “Bit her pretty bad.”

  “Where is she now?” Trim asked.

  “She’s in Redw—” but I cut myself short. They wouldn’t know what Redwood was. “She’s in a camp we set up. A few of us. Ellie’s with us, too. We have a brainiac who’s been trying to heal her with plants, who’s great, don’t get me wrong, but I don’t know if Fisher will pull through. We came out here looking for Navi.”

  Trim pulled back, her posture straightening. “Navi,” she repeated.

  “You didn’t tell her?” Rocket hissed.

  I glared at them. “Tell me what?”

  Rocket shook her head, a solemn look in her eyes. But she didn’t say anything. Instead, she turned around and walked toward where Trim had been kneeling earlier. She pushed aside a handful of grass and looked back at me with slanted eyebrows and an upside-down smile.

  Navi’s pale body was lying in a bed of broken plants, her bare arms crossed over her bloody chest and a peaceful blue smile on her face.

  CHAPTER 5

  “Brone, calm down.”

  I paced back and forth, slipping my fingers through my hair and pulling hard and cursing under my breath.

  Someone touched my shoulder, but I slapped it away. What the hell were we supposed to do without our Medic? How were injured women supposed to recover? A few medicinal plants weren’t enough. We needed someone who knew what they were doing. We needed Navi, and now, she was dead.

  This time, a pair of solid hands grabbed me by the wrists. Without thinking, I pushed back as hard as I could, only realizing my mistake when Trim fell back against Biggie.

  No one said anything, and for a moment, I thought Trim might kill me. I’d pushed our leader. She stepped close to me, her breath making its way into my mouth.

  “Fisher’s my best friend,” she said. “So, trust me when I say we’re going to make this right.”

  I let out a sigh. She was right. There was no use panicking over what we couldn’t change, and if there was one person who’d risk everything to save Fisher, it was Trim.

  “You good?” she asked, resting a hand on my shoulder.

  I nodded.

  “Now,” she said, repossessing her role as the leader, “we split up. You guys head back to the Cove, and Brone and Coin will lead me to Fisher. We’ll gather up the women over there, including Fisher, and bring them to the Cove.”

  “I’m not letting you guys go alone,” Rocket said.

  “Rocket—” Trim tried, but Rocket pulled a blade out of the holster on her belt and came by my side.

  “No one’s gonna go looking in that Cove,” she said. “It’s safer there than it is back in the jungle, and you guys need all the help you can get.”

  Trim nodded. “All right. Flander, Biggie, you guys head back to the Cove and let the women know what’s going on.”

  Biggie wrapped an arm around Flander, nearly knocking her over. “You got it, boss.”

  Trim glanced at me briefly. “Lead the way, Archer.”

  I led them out of the open field and back toward the waterfall, along the steep, rocky slant we’d come down. A mass of thoughts rushed through my mind. Was Fisher still alive? Would she even make it all the way to the Cove? Would I remember how to get back? Coin had left markings on the trees—hopefully that would suffice.

  “Is that your doing?” Rocket asked, tilting her head toward the dead Norther’s body.

  Coin slapped both hands together. “Damn, you shoulda—” but she stopped talking when I shot her a leave it alone sort of look. This wasn’t the time to celebrate.

  “Yeah, it was,” I said plainly.

  “Were there any others?” Trim asked. Her body was hunched forward as it always was in a constant predatory state. Her eyes never rested, and she was always inspecting every inch of space around us. I was happy to have her by my side.

  “Didn’t see any,” I said. “But we came across an Ogre who said—”

  “An Ogre?” Trim cut me off. “It spoke?”

  I nodded.

  It was hard to tell if she was intrigued or disgusted at the idea we’d had any kind of communication with an Ogre.

  “What’d she say?” Rocket asked.

  Coin scoffed. “Not much.”

  Neither one of them bothered to look at Coin. Gaining the respect of the Hunters wouldn’t happen overnight.

  “We had to force it out of her,” I said. “She was injured. Looks like three Northers did it. And if that one”—I pointed in the direction of the body at the base of the waterfall—“was part of that group, there are only two left.”

  Rocket regripped her blade—a loose twirl in her hand. “Let’s keep our eyes open.” She hopped over two rocks at once like she had springs for knees. “You should be proud, Brone. I think you avenged Navi.”

  I looked back at her. “What’re you talking about?”

  “Navi came from this way,” Rocket said. “We found her in the field with an arrow in her back. Whoever shot her did it from over here.”

  Had Navi been with Marie, Coin’s friend? The one we’d found lying dead with her intestines pulled out? It made sense. Footprints trailed alongside the river. Navi must have tried to escape, only to be shot by the Norther at the top of the waterfall—the one I’d kicked down. Then, maybe the Ogre came across Marie’s body and started pulling out organs, only to be attacked by another group of Northers.

  It was all speculation, but it added up.

  Maybe if I’d run faster… I thought. Maybe if I’d kicked the Norther off before she fired at Navi…

&nbs
p; Rocket must’ve sensed my guilt. She pressed her hand against my lower back. “Navi was dead way before you came down.”

  I nodded. I wasn’t so sure this was true, but the thought eased my guilt, so I did my best to convince myself that Rocket was right. Once we made our way back up to the top of the waterfall, I followed the footsteps we’d been tracking earlier, but in the opposite direction toward Redwood.

  I stepped inside the crowded jungle, moving past the trees and gliding through shrubs. It was better to move through the wilderness than to travel alongside the river where we were basically walking targets.

  Trim clicked her fingers. It had to be Trim; she was the only one who ever did that. It was a quick and easy way of telling everyone to stop moving and be quiet.

  I glanced back. Her eyes looked like little black slits and she was scanning the area like a hound dog, her nose in the air and her head moving from side to side.

  “What?” I mouthed.

  She pointed at her ear, and I listened. Through the jungle’s static, never-ending orchestra, I heard it—the sound of hundreds of flies buzzing in unison. And then the smell hit me, and I threw a hand over my mouth.

  Trim pointed a few meters away from us toward hanging vines and a rotten tree stump, but Coin quickly grabbed her shirt.

  Trim swung around, an alien rage in her eyes. It was evident that being the leader of the Hunters, she wasn’t accustomed to being pushed around by anyone, especially not by a complete stranger.

  “Ain’t worth it,” Coin whispered.

  I understood where she was coming from. Why inspect a dead body? Why set yourself up for heartbreak? For all we knew, it could have been an Ogre or a Norther or even an animal. I exchanged a look with Rocket, and although neither one of us wanted to inspect a dead body, it was better to be subjected to a traumatic scene than to forever wonder whether it was one of ours and whether we knew her.

  “What if it’s Murk?” Rocket whispered.

  Trim lowered her eyes and bit down hard. “We need to check.”

  She pushed aside a curtain of banana leaves and disappeared into the greenery. I listened to the sound of her footsteps—the sound of vegetation crackling and popping—and followed close behind. The smell was vile—a mixture of sour, rot, and a sickening sweetness. It was enough to make me slap a hand over my mouth.