Day 4

Viola’s day after leaving the group in Point.

Viola wandered through the jungle in search of her wayward sister Fiona, who had run off.

Viola believed she has gone to find Ranger. A strange man who had helped them. After kidnapping them. Perspective on the way things happened differed between the sisters.

She hoped Fiona was with Ranger and they were safe. It was getting darker and Viola was still looking for her sister. She had spent most of the day in the jungle and she was sure she had never seen this part of it before.

I am lost and alone at night in the jungle. Great! she thought.

She tried to start a fire but the wind off the water kept putting out the fire. It was still drizzling with rain making everything very cold. Shivering she walked along the river bank. Swinging her arms in an attempt to keep warm. She could see a faint light ahead.

A camp fire? A village?

Light meant people. She ran towards the light, but it seemed to be moving further away. The closer she got the further she was.

This makes no sense she thought Maybe it’s a hallucination.

Then something rumbled next to her. She raised her hands defensively. A low grumble came from the other side of her. Then she was grabbed into the air and tossed. Her bag fell and she screamed while flying through the air. Something caught her, and yanked her into a tree, she was tossed again like a doll through the air, and caught once again.

She stopped screaming, catching her breathe.

Two women lifted her by the arms onto a platform high in the trees. She couldn’t see the ground. She wasn’t sure if that was because of the darkness or how high up in the trees they were.

She was taken into the tree and there a woman sitting in the skull of something huge with animal skins over part of it and horns on the top of it.

The woman stood up. She was muscular and her long blond hair was in natural dreadlocks.

It was dreadful.

She looked Viola up and down. Then spoke in the unknown language.

“I am sorry” Viola said “I do not understand.”

Viola had thought she looked bad from her time in Chayim. But these women looked worse. They were branded some had several brands on them.

Who would do that? Viola thought.

The woman spoke again. Viola once again expressed that she didn’t understand. She was then taken to a bridge between trees and a net of sorts put over her and then she was tossed over hanging in the sky from a wooden rope bridge, in a net. She wasn’t cold anymore, but she shivered from shock as she swung in the wind.

Fiona had found her way back to Ranger’s home. She had hoped he would be happy to see her but he wasn’t. Instead of the warm welcome she had hoped for she was greeted with an angry tone.

She then decided that if anyone had the right to be upset it was her. He left without saying goodbye!

“You are a difficult ungrateful man,” she moaned

“I have come all this way through the forest to see you and you’re rude. You didn’t even say goodbye! You left like some thief.”

She said knowing he couldn’t understand her but she didn’t hold back.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

“I like you and if you have any sense, you’d know that when a woman goes out of her way for you, she’s a keeper. Instead, you push me away. Have I made myself to ease for you?” she snarled.

Not sure if she was angry with him or with herself for making it easy.

With a language barrier, actions and tone was all one had.

She wondered if her actions said

I’m a desperate slut?

She went quiet, looking at him wondering if he’s just a nice guy who helped two lost women back to the city. Or if maybe she had been something more meaningful than just a good deed for the day?

She had connected with him. He had been in her mind, spoken to her.

Was she just reading into it because it was new and exciting for her?

She stood in silence for the longest, minute, ever. Before deciding that sacrificing her dignity hadn’t been worth it.

She quickly climbed down the ladder and headed back towards the city Point.

Ranger stood by his ladder watching the silly girl run off into the forest.

She’s so young, why would she be so set on an old man who had nothing to offer her. Maybe women from her world have no standards.

He was a man in hiding. One of the last free men in his tribe and he wanted to stay free. Hiding in the jungle was not a suitable life for a man wanting a mate. But he had become content with his life. Hiding away and hoping for better days.

He decided to follow Fiona from a safe distance. He wanted to make sure she got back to the city safely.

Fiona threw stones into the river as if taking out all the anger in the world on that river through those stones.

Fiona sat on the side of the river. Her feet really hurt! She needed new shoes. She put her feet in the river.

It started raining and she felt cold. Sure, in herself she decided that walking at night would be ok. She could handle herself.

Even though she had never taken a life she had done a lot of training, in hand-to-hand combat.

However, at the time her feet weren’t aching and full of blisters.

Rain run down her face washing away her tears.

Or adding to them, depending on your point of view.

She followed the river, walking along its banks. She was so busy thinking about Ranger and what a fool she had made of herself that she didn’t notice how muddy the river bank was becoming.

In one motion, completely unexpected she slipped into the river. The water sucked her in and pulled her along. She tried to swim to shore, but the current was too strong. She tried using the current to get her closer to the edge but she was pulled through rapids, battered, bruised, and cut.

Fiona became afraid she was going to drown. She gasped for air in between being pulled under by the current.

Then a strong hand grabbed her, pulling her out or the river.

She coughed and spluttered. Looking to thank her rescuer she saw Ranger. She heart sank, as if him rejecting her wasn’t bad enough. He now saved her from drowning. How pathetic she must look to him.

Ranger looked at the half drown water rat. Her big blue eyes were red and her blond hair stuck to her face. Her white and pink dress was so torn it barely covered the necessaries.

She looked like she was going to cry.

Ranger quietly picked her up.

This girl was trouble. Yet it was nice to be seen again, to be needed.

Fiona wasn’t sure what she was going to do if she opened her mouth. She wanted to say

What do you want? but she was afraid that crying would be all she could manage.

At first, she tried to keep it as formal as possible as he carried her through the darkness.

But it was dark and she had nearly drowned. She was also freezing and shivering from cold and in shock.

She rested her head on his shoulder, her teeth chattering in his ear.

Her eyes started to leak, small tears rolling down her face. They grew in size until she was full on crying.

Almost dying in a foreign land… it was awful.

Death didn’t care how strong you are. Or how good or bad you have been. It comes without prejudice, cold and uncaring. Age didn’t sway it either. It could not be reasoned with.

She realized she wanted to live. What she had always thought was important like country and service for the greater good, this meant nothing when dying.

Her convictions melted. Her sure place failed her.

Death seemed pointless and so life seemed fleeting. Her life hadn’t flashed before her eyes. The feeling of panic and the desire to live was all she had while fighting the water.

Ranger entered her mind.

She was sitting on a swing in a park, he asked her

“What are you doing?”

“Swinging” she replied

“Why?” he asked

“It is fun” she replied

Beginning to realize it wasn’t real and he was in her head.

“Why did you bring me here?” she asked looking at the park where she had spent hours playing after school and during holidays.

“You are happy here” he said

She wasn’t sure if it was a question or statement.

“Do you care if I am happy?” she asked

“I want everyone to be happy” he replied.

The park vanished and she was in her school field.

Ranger was standing with her.

“Tell me about it?” he asked.

“What are you doing?” she asked

Finding it hard to identify what she was feeling. But whenever her feelings changed so did the surroundings.

“Let me see you?” she said.

Then she was standing in a small town she had never seen. People were being loaded into cages pulled by horses. They were taken to a castle and made to work. They were branded and beaten and whipped. Forced to serve the queen, a child queen.

There were dead bodies left in the streets and children left without anyone to care for them. This happened everywhere and all towns were affected. Everyone lost someone. A young man returned home to find he no longer had a home.

The queen put out a reward for anyone who turned in a mystic healer. Ranger’s people were taken into the service of the queen. Healing the sick for a price until they died in her service. Their bodies fed to the animals.

The young man hid in the jungle living off the land and waiting for the time when things would change. Ranger was that young man. Time had passed but he had stayed the same. Still waiting!

“I would like to try something” he said

Taking her hand and leading her into an outdoor class room. Children sat quietly on their benches. Writing what was being written on a board. Almost like a chalk board.

He sat down on one of the benches in the back row. She joined him.

He gave her a scroll and something to write with.

“Try” he said.

She began to copy the word from the board into the scroll.

Ranger broke the connection.

His eyes were glowing ruby red. They were back at his home.

He brought her clothes, his clothes, to change into. She realized for the first time that she wasn’t modest. Her dress was destroyed.

He brought warm water and something to clean her scrapes and gashes. He put orange goo on her open wounds.

“Thank you” she said

Not expecting him to understand.

He said something but she didn’t understand. He put bears skins down on the floor and other animal skins. He made up a nice little place for her to sleep.

Fiona took his hand. She looked into his deep brown eyes. She wanted to kiss him but being rejected earlier crushed her courage.

She let his hand go.