Timbrelle opened her eyes. In her unconsciousness she’d once again been placed beside the fire. This time she looked around before sitting up.

A ring of rocks circled a modest fire. Leaned against the retaining circle were a pair of skewered and roasted sickly looking fish. At the edge of the pond, mere feet away crouched a young woman. Bright white hair stood out against the dark water but it didn’t seem to be an indication of her age.

“You’re awake then?” The woman asked.

Timbrelle flinched. “How can you know that? Is that an ability?” The croak of her voice startled herself.

She stood and turned around flashing Timbrelle a disarming smile. “Not at all. You just snore really loud. It cuts off suddenly when you wake up.”

She offered a blackened fish to the now thoroughly flushed woman who took it with a sheepish expression.

“If I’m being honest, I haven’t slept that deeply since I entered the Dorark. First time eating meat too. Were these really living in the pond? I think that would be first animal I’ve encountered that were indigenous to the forest.”

Tiny fish bones, nothing more than needles, poked at the inside of her mouth as she chewed. The meat was flavorless and the consumption process painful, but that nasty little mud fish was like a gift from the Gods after spending so much time on mushrooms.

“It’s a big forest, so I’m sure there are other animals somewhere.” The new woman said.

Yeah, and she ate bugs because they’re just that good; if there were rabbits she’d have eaten rabbits. Timbrelle offered only a neutral hum through her fish in response.

“My name is Diadna— or Adna, I guess. But past that…” She trailed off and offered a shrug in conclusion. “Woke up in the water at dawn with this big lump on my head and no memory of what led up to that point. I think we got caught in a landslide.”

The spot she pointed to on her head was covered in luminous white hair, but an ugly black bruise was creeping its way out of her hairline and across her temple.

“You don’t know how long you’ve been stuck in here?” Timbrelle asked.

“Stuck? In the pond?”

“In the forest.”

Adna blinked at her. “Are you lost?”

It was Timbrelle’s turn to stare blankly at the woman. Such an innocent question felt all at once infuriating, surprising and hilarious. She squelenched out half a laugh before it turned to wracking coughs. Pain cut through her chest bringing back the memory of the previous night.

“When you woke up, did you… feel any different?” Timbrelle asked through shallow breaths.

“I don’t think so. You mean, like new abilities?”

“Not exactly. Different like… in a bad way.”

There was a long silence between them as the woman considered the question.

“I have thought about that question as many different ways as I can possibly consider and I have reached the conclusion that I don’t know what it means.” She knitted her brows together in concentration, seeming to give the question one last pass. “‘Different in a bad way’, huh? Other than the bonk head… I guess my back hurts.”

Timbrelle offered an apologetic smile. “Yeah, I guess that was a weird question.”

***

Timbrelle lead them away from the pond. She could sense that the creature was waiting nearby, clearly aware of her position, but she didn’t know why it waited. That uncertainty was enough to send her at a vicious pace through the Dorark.

Adna was surprisingly talkative. For a woman with no memories, she was full of interesting tid-bits about the world they lived in. She could recite the entirety of the Founding manuscript, but couldn’t produce a surname. Where are you from? What do you do? Do you have a family? When Timbrelle’s attempts to delve further into her past, were met with a sincere, if useless “I don’t know”. In fact, even her knowledge of religion, history and math seemed to have no source or foundation in her memories. As though the information simply existed within her.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

After flipping liberally through conversation topics, Adna settled into the founding history of Yost. As it turned out, the royalty of Yost were renowned for their scandals and she was starving for trashy tv.

“He killed her? Why?”

“That’s the thing! No one knows why he did it!”

“No one knows, or you don’t know?” Timbrelle challenged.

“No one knows! That includes me! Good Lord, what a stupid question! If we’ve established anything today, it’s that ‘Adna doesn’t know.’” She barked.

“It’s just a little weird to me that you don’t know, but you do know that no one knows. Just seems like a tricky way of saying that you don’t know the answer!”

“Boo. Semantics.” Adna said dismissively. “It doesn’t matter why he killed her. What’s important is the next part—the foreign occupation of Yost didn’t end.”

“But that’s not what the oracle said was supposed—“

“Exactly!” Adna interjected, “that’s when everyone realized that Duke Tuchard had been corrupted. It was clear he was fabricating the revelations to manipulate trade in his favor. After that incident the infrastructure crumbled pretty quickly. That’s why Yost was such a rigidly religious state; the churches were a constant when the Duke lost all credibility.”

“Are you religious?”

Adna stared blankly for a few seconds before giving the latest of many shrugs.

She’d been helping Timbrelle through the forest. Long conversations and the occasional boost made the day fly by. She didn’t complain about the distance and pace that Timbrelle insisted on, instead filling the ever silent forest with trivia and exaggerated hand gestures. There was little light left by the time they stopped at a clearing. At midday they’d sidelined their search for a way out to focus on finding a place to stay the night. Feeling very fortunate to find a clearing by nightfall, Timbrelle led them in.

The cozy spot was lined with brush that reached up to their waist. At first, the trailing golden berries dangling from a Hookthorn tree, visible at a substantial distance, seemed like an offering from the forest. That and the relative cover of the undergrowth made an ideal camping spot. It wasn’t until emerging into the lush blue grass carpeting the clearing that they truly took in the grisly scene.

Five piles of miscellaneous rags, gold, shoes and personal items dotted the area. A normally verbose Adna stilled and fell into a defensive posture, scanning the darkening forest for whatever had left the items. Timbrelle, however, sighed and plodded in. She knelt at the first pile and began sorting useful, if blood encrusted, items.

“They do this sometimes.” She said, almost to herself. “They me leave gifts.”

Thirteen gold pieces, one sock and a belt were there only salvageable things from the first pile. The rags, once clothes, crunched audibly and rained rust colored blood dust into the grass. She made in through the second pile before Adna spoke again.

“Timbrelle?” She said in a quiet voice. “How long have you been here?”

She put aside a a set of shoes, gold and a rucksack that had managed to maintain most of its structural integrity.

“A lot longer than I’d like, Adna.” She slumped, “but I don’t know how many days it’s been. Somewhere between a month and two, I think.”

“And I’m the first person you’ve seen?”

“I find…” Timbrelle fingered the Golden ring tied into her hair, “remnants of people.”

Adna did not respond. They were both still, unwilling to be the first one to speak in the newly created atmosphere.

Timbrelle was the first to return to the task at hand, shuffling through the piles, mute.

It was a silent job.

“Two pairs of shoes, a ton of rope, forty-four gold coins, four swords, a belt, sock, bottle, pocket watch, glass eye and a pouch of seven rubies.” Timbrelle listed off their haul at a fire Adna organized. While there had been no real conversation, some of the tension had lessened.

“I’m excited about that bottle.” Timbrelle said through a mouth of Hookthorn fruit.

“You’ve been in here too long. You should be excited about the gold and jewels.” Adna scolded.

“For all the forest vendors?” She gestured in every direction.

“We’ll get out of here. Stop being such a downer.”

“I don’t even think those are real rubies. They smell amazing, probably some hard candy.” Timbrelle said.

Adna snatched the pouch away and sniffed it repeatedly, scoffed and threw the bag back at Timbrelle.

“They smell like nothing. No, actually, the pouch itself smells like butts.”

Timbrelle sniffed the pouch and recoiled. “It smells like butts and— you know what it is? It smells like that strawberry candy everyone’s grandma has. You know, the one that’s chewy on the inside.”

Adna looked unconvinced and a little confused.

“I’ll prove it to you.” Timbrelle grabbed the smallest one, a clear rectangular cut ruby in a deep scarlet, and placed it in her mouth. She immediately started hacking and coughing hard enough for Adna to awkwardly hover in an attempt to help. “Oh god! I swallowed it!”

The two women stared at the pouch of rubies between them.

Timbrelle reached for the stones before her companion swept them up and hid them behind her back. “Don’t eat another! I don’t know anything about myself, but after becoming rich I’ve decided that I really like money.”

Feeling violated, Timbrelle massaged her stomach. “I just meant to taste it, but when I had it in my hand I couldn’t stop the impulse to eat it.”

“I’m told babies also have that problem.” Adna said. “Who knew you had so much in common?”

“How rude. If you’re mean to me, I’ll eat all your savings.” Timbrelle countered.

“Pretty sure babies do that too.”

“Damn. Somebody’s on fire today.”

“We’ve only been together one day.” Adna said dryly.

“You’re right. This is setting my expectations pretty high, kid. Hope you can keep it up tomorrow. I expect hilarity.” Timbrelle yawned and wormed down into the grass to let Adna take the first watch. “Take some time in your watch to think up some real gut busters.”