by P. C. Cast
“Nik? It is you.” The ghost of a smile lifted the corners of her lips, but only for a moment.
“Yep, it’s me. Okay, stay close.” He started forward, but Jenna pulled on his hand, holding him back.
“Where are you taking me?”
He smiled at her. “Home. Jenna, I’m taking you home.”
42
The sun was partially up in the morning sky and it was already unusually warm when Nik finally decided they were far enough from Tribe territory to take a break. He sat on a moss-covered log, wiped the sweat from his face with the back of his sleeve, and handed Jenna the drinking skin before digging into the basket for the hard flatbread sandwiches his father had packed.
“Thank you, Father,” Nik said gratefully, taking a huge bite of the first sandwich. “Here, there’s plenty,” he said around a full mouth, offering Jenna the basket.
Delicately, she took a sandwich and began to nibble on it. Nik watched her, trying to decide what to say. Their trip had been one of silence, relieved only when Nik said something. If it was a question, Jenna answered it monosyllabically. On her part, she’d not initiated conversation or asked questions.
Nik swallowed and cleared his throat.
“How have you been, Jenna?”
Her eyes met his. “How do you think?”
He looked at her—really looked at her. Jenna’s dark hair was a matted mess. She was so thin she looked years older than when he’d seen her last. How long ago had that been? One month? Two? She was so pale that the dark circles under her eyes looked like dirty smudges.
“I think it’s been hard for you,” Nik said.
“Yes.” She went back to nibbling on the biscuit. As if speaking to the sandwich and not to him, she continued. “Thank you for setting me free. Is this where you’re leaving me?”
“No,” Nik assured her hastily. “No, I want to leave you with Mari.”
Like a trapped bird, her gaze darted to his and then flitted away, only to return again. “I—I don’t know a Mari.”
“Yes, you do. Mari told me you’re friends.”
She stared at him speechlessly.
Nik kept talking. “Mari saved my life. I was hurt and almost died. She found me and healed me, and now I need to find her again because I need her help to heal my cousin, O’Bryan. You remember O’Bryan? He was there the night you were taken.”
Jenna shook her head, but Nik couldn’t tell if it was from disbelief, or if she just didn’t remember O’Bryan. He hurried on. “I was at Mari’s burrow with Sora for almost a week. Of course they blindfolded me and didn’t let me see where they lived. I was hoping that you could get me near enough to the burrow for one of them to find me again.” Nik carefully didn’t mention Rigel. It had been obvious that Mari led an unusual, hidden life, and he knew, of course, that Rigel was a recent addition to that life, and he wasn’t sure how many Earth Walkers were aware that the pup even existed. “Then I’m going to ask Mari to trade your life for my cousin’s.”
Jenna shook her head again. “Did you say Mari and Sora?”
“Yeah, I don’t like Sora much, though,” Nik said.
“This—this doesn’t make sense,” Jenna said. “What about—” Then the girl pressed her lips into a white line and stopped speaking.
“Were you going to say what about Mari’s mother, Leda?”
Jenna’s pale face flushed pink with shock. “H-how do you know her name?”
“I told you—Mari healed me and I was at her burrow.” He paused, and then in the kindest voice he could manage, added, “Leda is dead.”
Tears filled the young girl’s eyes and made slashes of a white trail down her dirty face. “No,” she whispered brokenly. “Leda can’t be dead.”
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
Jenna bowed her head and sobbed. Helplessly, Nik watched until, tentatively, he reached out and patted her back gently. When her sobs faded to small hiccups and she wiped her face on the edge of her shirt, Nik offered her the water skin again. She took it, and even though her hands trembled, drank deeply.
“Jenna, will you help me?” he asked.
She looked at him through puffy, red eyes. “No one can know where Mari lives.”
“I won’t tell anyone. I give you my word.”
Jenna shook her head. “No. You don’t understand. I don’t even know exactly where she lives.”
Nik ran his hand through his hair. “Can you get me close to her burrow?”
Jenna moved her shoulders restlessly. “Maybe.”
“I promise you that I’m not trying to trick you or Mari. How about this—you get me as close to her burrow as you feel comfortable. Then we’ll wait and see if she finds me. If she does, she can choose.”
“Choose?”
“Yes. She can choose whether or not to help me,” Nik said.
“But you said you would trade my life for your cousin’s. If Mari says no—”
“If Mari says no you stay free,” Nik interrupted. “You’re not going back to Farm Island no matter what.”
“Why? Why would you do this? You wouldn’t free me that night. Why do you free me now?”
“Everything is different now.” Then, with a small smile, he added, “Plus, I know Mari, and I believe she’ll do the right thing.”
Jenna stared at him for a long time, until Nik didn’t think she’d answer him. But just as he was trying to figure out what else he might say to convince this girl to help him, she actually smiled and said, “You do know Mari! I’ll help you.”
* * *
“Hey, I can go get the snares. I know how much you hate doing that. And, plus, I’ve had a nap and—” Mari’s words were smothered by a huge yawn.
Sora snorted. Mari’s eyes were bruised with exhaustion. She was pretty sure the girl hadn’t slept a full night for a week. “I see how rested you are. Do I hate checking the snares for rabbits? Yes. But you were up most of the night with Danita.” Sora glanced at the pallet. “She’s finally sleeping, and it’s time for you to sleep, too. I’ll get the snares today. It’ll be your turn tomorrow.”
“Really? You don’t mind?”
“Well, I mind, but I’ll do it anyway. Plus, you’ll be fresh and rested so you can get up with her again tonight if she has more of those dreams.” Sora shuddered and lowered her voice. “I thought she was going to cry herself sick.”
“Yeah, it was bad, but I did find Mama’s recipe for peaceful sleep. While you’re out could you gather some more lavender? Mama’s journal said to pack it around someone who is having troubled sleep. It soothes night terrors.”
“She’s definitely having night terrors,” Sora said. “I’ll get plenty. Anything else?”
“Yes, I need some fresh aloe for her wounds. If you cross the stream by where we set the snares and climb over the bank to that rocky area, you’ll find a bunch of it there.”
“Okay, no problem. Go back to sleep. I might be a little while. I want to harvest some wapato root for dinner, and I’m sure I saw some growing by the watercress.”
Mari yawned again and said, “Whenever you talk about what you’re going to cook for dinner you make me hungry.”
“Good.” Sora smiled, enjoying the feeling of being appreciated by Mari. Her smile widened as she teased. “And if you’re going to be hungry, you might as well have something specific to think about. Tonight I’m going to mash the wapato root with garlic and mushrooms and some of that precious salt that you like to hoard. That and strips of rabbit rolled in ground flax and fried, and I’ll take care of that hunger.”
“You know, sometimes I don’t mind having you live here.” Mari smiled at her, and Sora thought that she had begun to look genuinely happy sometimes. Mari was still smiling when she lay back down beside Rigel—the lazy creature had hardly moved during their conversation—and closed her eyes.
“Yep, I know! I totally know,” Sora said, taking her walking stick from beside the door. She kissed the tips of her fingers and touched them to the Eart
h Mother carved into the arched doorframe.
Her mood light, even though she dreaded the thought of checking the snares, Sora made her way with increasing confidence through the bramble maze. Then she turned to the north and headed for the little stream that was a breeding ground for rabbits.
It was early, but the day was already hot, and Sora found herself wishing for rain. It was nice, really, in the spring when the rain made everything seem washed clean and vibrantly green. Mari was easier and easier to be around—she certainly appreciated good cooking. Soon the big peppers should be ripening. Sora mentally crossed her fingers that the crazy males were too crazy to think of destroying the Clan gardens. They hadn’t bothered the herb garden at the birthing burrow, so maybe that wouldn’t be a worry.
Almost skipping, she scampered up the little ridge beyond which was the clearing beside the rabbit stream. With happy thoughts of planning dinners for Mari and now Danita, too, Sora picked up her pace and in what seemed like no time she was slipping and sliding downhill, and looking forward to taking off her shoes and wading into the stream.
“Check the snares first. Get it over with,” Sora told herself. She went to the live snares, exclaiming in delight when both traps held bright-eyed rabbits. “I’ll have to crowd you both into one cage to carry you home, but Mari is going to be so pleased!” Then she approached what she thought of as the killer snares. Since she was alone, Sora held her hands up in front of her eyes and peeked through her fingers. Two were empty, but the third had trapped a fat turkey, which had Sora grinning, kicking off her shoes, and doing a little happy dance as she waded into the lazy stream. She bent and splashed water on her sweaty face, considering stripping down and taking a proper bath in the cool water before she started searching the marshy bank for the tasty wapato roots.
Sora was so preoccupied with thinking about how she was going to prepare the lovely turkey that she didn’t know the males were there until they were almost upon her.
“Pretty Sora. Pretty, pretty Sora.”
She spun around to see Jaxom standing just a few feet from her, staring at her with such intensity his gaze almost burned. Emerging from the tree line behind him were two more males. She recognized them as Bradon and Joshua—two men who were older than Jaxom by several winters—though recognizing them was sad. The men had changed drastically over the weeks since Leda’s death. They walked with bestial, hunched movements that reminded Sora of the stories the Clan told of Skin Stealers who would come for bad children, particularly those who wouldn’t sleep when they were told to go to bed. What was left of their clothes was little more than tattered rags, through which Sora could see strange, broken wounds and missing skin that left raw, oozing flesh.
Sora wanted to run—she might have even been able to outrun them, but her body wouldn’t obey her mind. It was as if the males had forged iron nails from the ruined city and driven them into her feet, rooting her in place.
“What do you want?” She tried to sound confident and just the right amount of annoyed, but her hands were trembling so badly that she had to ball them into fists to keep them steady.
“Wash us!” Bradon demanded, his voice rough and scratchy, as if he’d become unused to speaking.
“I’m not a Moon Woman. You know that. I didn’t even have time to apprentice before Leda died.”
“Wash us!” Joshua shouted as he and Bradon entered the clearing.
“I told you, I can’t!” Sora said. “And it’s the middle of the day. There is no moon in the sky. Even Leda couldn’t Wash you right now. Go away. I can’t help you.”
“Pretty Sora must Wash us!” Jaxom said, taking another step toward her. Sora could see that he was less hunched and feral than the other two males, but his gaze kept lingering on her tunic and her breasts that were too visible beneath the damp material.
“No! Stay back!” Sora bent and grabbed a fist-sized rock from the stream bed and held it up threatening. “Jaxom, I wish I could, but I can’t help you. If you go away now I’ll promise to practice drawing down the moon, and meet you back here, in this clearing, on the night of the next full moon. By then I should be able to Wash you.”
“You will Wash us!” Bradon said.
“Wash us!” Joshua repeated as they began to close the distance between them and her.
Sora looked frantically around, trying to find anything else she could use as a weapon. Why hadn’t she asked Mari to teach her how to use that slingshot? Mind whirring, she remembered the digging knife she’d put in her satchel—the satchel that was lying on the bank by Jaxom’s feet.
Bradon and Joshua reached Jaxom, and then everything happened very fast.
“If you can’t Wash us, then you will do other things for us!” Joshua said, and with a predatory snarl he lunged for Sora, grabbing her wrist and wrenching it so that she cried out and dropped the stone.
He began to pull her from the stream. Sora fought him, kicking, hitting and punching—though it felt as if she was struggling against a tree for all the effect she had on him. She fell, and Bradon took her other wrist, pinning her to the ground.
“Jaxom! Help me! Remember that we used to be friends? You used to like me!”
“Pretty Sora should stay with us. Pretty Sora can make us feel good.” Jaxom’s eyes were bright with lust as he captured her kicking feet by both ankles, and spread her legs.
It was then that Sora began to scream.
43
Nik suspected the girl was leading him around in circles. He understood why—she was showing her loyalty to Mari and whatever rules of secrecy her Clan followed, but he was out of time, patience, and energy.
“Jenna, how close do you think we are?”
“Not far now, and a little way from here there’s a pretty stream and a clearing. I thought we could wait there. It might be cooler by the water,” Jenna said, sending him a shy, sideways smile.
“Thank you, Jenna. That does sound nice. This part of the forest is pretty, even though there aren’t any of our pines.” Nik smiled at Jenna. “I suppose that’s the point—that Earth Walkers don’t build their burrows near Tribal groves.” Jenna was opening her mouth to respond, when Nik hesitated, coming to a halt. He held up his hand, stilling Jenna. “Did you hear that? Someone’s voice?”
Jenna cocked her head, listening along with Nik.
The scream, filled with terror and pain, pierced the serenity of the forest.
“Stay behind me. If I say run—then you run and try to find Mari. Tell her I need her. Tell her she knows who can find me.”
Jenna’s dark eyes were huge with fear, but she nodded. Nik notched his crossbow and held three more arrows to ready between his fingers. Gritting his teeth against the pain in his leg, he began to run, following the sounds of fear.
He topped the rise with Jenna close behind him, and looked down at a clearing with a little stream bubbling through the middle of it. Sora lay beside the stream, arms and legs spread by three Scratcher males. The one between her legs was ripping her clothes from her as the two holding her arms bared their teeth and leaned down, licking and biting her arms and breasts. Sora was shrieking and struggling.
Horrified, Nik sighted and shouted. “Leave her alone you fucking animals!”
The males reacted exactly as Nik had hoped they would. They lifted their heads, searching for him.
Thawk! Thawk!
The two males that had been holding Sora’s arms were easy targets and arrows buried to the feathers in each of their foreheads.
The one between Sora’s legs began sprinting across the clearing, staying low, but running with superhuman speed. Nik sighted and shot, and then cursed loudly as the arrow went through the back of the creature’s shoulder. It knocked the Scratcher to his knees, but he recovered with amazing quickness, and before Nik could sight again, he’d crawled on all fours and disappeared into the forest.
“Stay close to me!” Nik told Jenna, and then he surged over the ridge, slipping and sliding down to the clearing. He ran thr
ough the stream to Sora.
“No! No! No!” she shrieked when he reached her, scrambling back, over the body of one of the men. Her eyes were wide and unseeing with panic.
Jenna moved quickly around Nik. “Sora! Sora! It’s Jenna. It’s me.”
“Oh, Goddess! Oh, Goddess! Jenna? Run! They’ll hurt you! Run!”
“I’ll check the forest for more of them,” Nik told Jenna. “Talk to her. Try to calm her.”
Nik hurried to the tree line. He found the bloody trail left by the wounded Scratcher, but saw no sign of more of them. He sniffed then, wondering what the hell that rancid smell was, and his eyes returned to the blood path. He bent, touched a scarlet drop to his finger and lifted it to his nose. He grimaced in disgust at the smell—it was the blood! Its scent reminded him of a long-dead carcass. He wiped his hand clean on a thick pad of moss, then, keeping a wary eye on the seemingly empty forest, he backed to Sora and Jenna.
Jenna was smoothing Sora’s torn clothing and trying to get it to cover her body. Sora looked up as he got close, eyes filled with fear.
“It’s just me—Nik,” he said. “You know I won’t hurt you.”
“Nik, you saved me!” Sora said, and then her face crumpled and she began to cry—great wracking sobs that shook her entire body.
Jenna pulled her into her arms. “You’re safe now. You’re safe now,” she murmured.
Nik crouched beside the two girls, eyes still scanning the forest around them. “Were there more than three of them?”
“I—I don’t think so,” Sora said through sobs.
“Okay, then let’s get you out of here—now.” Nik started to help Sora stand, but the girl cringed away from him. He met Jenna’s gaze, and the girl nodded her head, understanding.
“Come on, Sora. I’ll help you stand up,” said the girl.
Nik retrieved the satchel that wasn’t far from them. “Which way?” he asked Sora.
“I can’t tell you,” Sora said.
Her sobs had quieted, but tears still tracked down her cheeks, mixing with blood from a split in her bottom lip.
