My eyes flutter open as I lay in bed, beginning to doubt what I saw the night before. Why would Raina be out in the middle of the woods like that? Late-night hunting? No, that wouldn’t make sense… Maybe she’s looking for something? I don’t get much further in my thoughts before a knock at the door snaps me to attention.
“Hey, hurry up in there. We let you sleep in a little ‘cause of last night, but we’re just about ready to move out.” Joffrey calls through the door.
“Sure, sorry, here I come,” I swing my legs off the edge and put pressure on the ground, a stinging sensation travels up my leg. I let out a gasp, and push myself up off the bed, almost falling forward from the painful feeling in my feet. I walk to the door and grip the handle, and another stinging pain courses up my arm. Fighting the pain, I pull the door open and step out, the sun shining brightly overhead. Joffrey is standing by the door, and I see the rest of the group packing up necessities over by the firepit.
“You alright, kid? You look like hell,” He smirks.
“It’s just… my feet. And my hands. They’re like… burning still,” I examine the scars, noticing they’ve faded ever so slightly. These just happened, how could they be going away already?
“Well, we’ll just give you a light load then. Silven and I can pick up the slack,” he runs his thumb under the strap across his chest, attached to his bag.
“I appreciate it…” I start to walk to the group, but Joffrey stops me with a tap on the shoulder, “Yeah?”
“Hey, look… I just want to say thank you,” He hangs his head, hair halfway covering his face.
“Uhm… Okay, but what for?” I gaze inquisitively.
“For saving my life… last night,” His voice made my heart feel warmer, he really means it, “That beast had winded me and I wouldn’t have been able to move fast enough. If you really did stop it, then I owe you.”
“Oh, yeah… Of course. Why wouldn’t I want to help you guys, you’ve already saved me from the outside here.” I smile wide, ignoring the searing feeling in my hands and feet.
“Yeah, I suppose we did,” he lets out a chuckle, “But I still owe you one.”
I walk off to the others, who are wrapping up packing the last few things, and go directly up to Silven, making sure to acknowledge Raina and Gontu with a little, “Good morning”. He’s already packed me a smaller bag and he hands it to me by the strings.
Joffrey walks up to the group and announces, “Alright guys, are we ready to head out? Got everything we need from here?”
“Yeah,” everyone says unanimously.
“Perfect, let’s get moving, we need to find a spot before sundown.” He starts to walk South, directly away from the Kingdom, with the rest of us in tow. I turn around to see Gontu wandering in a completely different direction and I tap on Joffrey’s arm. He follows my gaze and sees Gontu as well, shouting out to him, “Where are you going, Gontu? We’re going this way!”
A slew of incoherent rambling comes from the old man, who is waving his walking stick around in the air before he finally metaphorically shoves us off and disappears into a different part of the forest. I turn to Joffrey with my face stuck in a “Huh?” position, and he just shrugs.
“Guess we’ll just keep moving, he somehow manages to just kind of… turn up… perfectly fine,” Joffrey states before starting to walk off again. I glance at Raina and see her expression disguising disgust as she turns from where Gontu entered the forest. I wonder what that look was for?
As we traverse through miles of the thick forest, Joffrey occasionally stops to pick a few leaves or berries off of plants, telling us things like how the Vitrablossom leaves are good for bandages because they secrete a gel-like substance that has healing properties and the leaf itself acts as a binding, or these berries are really good for roasting, or avoid these plants because they can kill you with the hundreds of very tiny spines coated with toxins.
The sky begins to skew a golden-yellow color, and we agree to quickly find a place to set up camp for the night. We find a clear water creek and Joffrey quickly produces a few small axes and shovels from nearby resources. We chop down a few trees and take long sections of logs, and stand them on their ends into holes we dug, creating a sort of perimeter with the water-side open, finishing as the night sky begins to take over. Raina sets up a campfire, and Silven takes out some fish he caught while Joffrey, Raina, and I were setting up camp.
"So…" I mutter to Joffrey as he takes the fish and starts roasting it, Raina sits as far from the fire as she can, and Silven starts skipping rocks down the creek, "How far do we have to go?"
"Well, we have a few more days of travel ahead of us. Those beasts can track a very long distance," he grimaces as he bends over to stoke the fire, "They are probably not very far behind us, but this log wall should keep us covered for the night."
I sit on one of the log pieces we set around the pit, and my legs, numb from the long trek, begin to ache, and the searing sensation trickles back in. I suck air through my teeth as I remove my shoe, worn and torn from years of use. Examining the scars, I see they've faded even further, "Joffrey, do you know why these are fading like this?"
He walks over and crouches down, taking a close look at the tendrils, "Hmm…" he sits and ponders for a moment, "I think it could have something to do with the amount of energy you expel." He places his hand on my leg and creates the same purple aura he did before, a cooling sensation creeps into my leg and relieves some of the pain, "When I tested you, that must not have been a release of much energy. But when we faced the beast, from what you described, it sounded like you were producing more energy than your body could handle, and it started to use your body's life energy to amplify your output."
"So these marks aren't burns?"
"They are," he rubs his hand over his face, pulling against the skin as he tries to form an explanation, "But not traditional burns. Your body can replace your life energy slowly, but if too much is used up at once, then you can reach a point of no return."
"Oh, so that's why it's fading? I'm slowly regaining my life energy?" I stretch my leg out and roll my ankle, the burning feeling not nearly as prominent as before. Wow, I still don't really know how it works but his Specialty is incredible.
"It's… a possible explanation. Like I said the other day, we really don't know much at all about Symbiotic Specialties, for all we know you may not even be Symbiotic. But I think it's safe to say you aren't Parasitic because you're clearly able to have some control over it." He stands back up and walks back to the fire, taking the fish from the skewers. Silven hears this and throws one last rock, skipping down the creek maybe twenty feet before sinking, and he comes back to the fire to help Joffrey cut up the fish. "Maybe after a while, we can begin work on tapping into your Specialty again."
"Are you sure? I don't want to hurt myself more." My eye line falls to the dirt, and I flip over a flat stone with my foot, trying to avoid eye contact. Silven pipes into the conversation, reassuring me.
"Well that's what we're here for," He hands me a chunk of the fish and walks off to Raina, who has been sitting silently in the background with her eyes closed. Why does she never involve herself? I guess she's just a really quiet person… Silven mumbles something unintelligible and Raina opens one eye, snatching the fish without a word and tearing into it. He comes back and continues, taking a seat next to me, "We'll do what we can to stop you if you go too far."
Joffrey adds, smirking, "I wouldn't have suggested it if I didn't think we could handle it.”
“I guess that’s fair…” I curl my knees up to my chest and gaze into the fire, cradling the fish in my hands. The others finish their food relatively quickly, but I'm too stuck in thought to eat my own. Why have I been dreaming for so long? I'm ready to be home now…
"You alright buddy?" Silven's voice breaks my thought and I glance in his direction, his face full of worry, "You uhm… you haven't eaten yet, are you okay?"
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"Yeah… yeah I'm okay," my eyes fall back to the fish and I hesitantly bring it to my mouth, and after a moment of debate, I finally take a bite, fighting to chew and swallow it down.
Suddenly we all hear a very distant roar, the same roar as the beast we fought the night before. My body freezes in place, but Joffrey throws down the last bites of his fish and nearly dives toward the fire, Silven following right behind. They knock the burning lumber across the grass and hurriedly stamp out the last flames and embers. Raina climbs to the top of the log wall and looks out over the forest. We're plunged into darkness, and just as I'm about to question why, Silven rushes to me and very quietly shushes me.
"Why are we being so quiet?" I whisper to him.
“Those things can see a hell of a lot farther than you think,” he matches my volume, crouching down, “We should try to get a little rest while we still can.”
Joffrey sneaks over, “They can see the smoke, even this dark at night. We need to stay very quiet, and get some shut-eye before that thing gets too close,” he murmurs.
“Okay,” I reply, wrapping up my fish and putting it in my bag, then laying down on the ground. Silven lies down nearby and Joffrey takes a seat on the log and shuts his eyes. I stare blankly at Joffrey for a moment before asking quietly, "Are you going to sleep too?"
"Raina and I will keep an ear out, you two get some rest," Joffrey reassures me. Just then Raina hops down and lands with barely a ruffle of the leaves.
"We've got three, maybe four hours before they're too close." Raina says, keeping quiet. Wow, that's the first time she's spoken since we've left camp, she's got a really soft-sounding voice, honestly. I can't tell if that's more sweet or scary though…
"Sounds good. Hopefully, we can see the first bouts of the sun by then," Joffrey rolls his back and sits up straight, taking a deep breath in and stretching his arms to the sky. "Now then, get some rest, Salem."
"Yes sir." I yawn and shut my eyes, my thoughts beginning to wander. I hope I finally wake up at home, how long has it been? Has it even been a day yet? I wonder if my parents have gotten anything to eat…
Before I could realize it, I'm being nudged awake. Ugh, five more minutes… I get nudged again and my eyes flutter open and I see it's the earliest hour of the morning, the first rays of sun bleeding into the sky. I turn over and see Joffrey crouched next to me, holding a finger to his lips. Oh crap, the beast. I fling myself off the ground and see he and Raina packed up the necessities while Silven and I had slept, so we were able to quickly get ready and begin treading through the creek. A roar fills the air and I turn back, seeing a massive gush of fire reaching far above the treeline about half a mile away. Oh my god, that's too close.
"Come on, hurry. We need to get out of this area as fast and quietly as possible," Joffrey ushers us into an opening in the dense brush and follows close behind. I'm right behind Silven, slipping between branches and limbs, occasionally getting whipped as Silven passes one that snaps back to position. I look over my shoulder for a moment and Raina is right behind me with Joffrey in tow. Okay, we're all together. We dash through the brush as fast as we can for what felt like an hour, finally hearing the roar farther away than before and stopping for a moment to catch our breaths. Silven hands me a water canteen as we're both gasping for air and I take a giant swig, coughing as some enters my windpipe. I hand it back and he chugs some down as well.
Joffrey and Raina examine the forest ahead and point out a semi-clear path that we can follow. Feeling a bit better, besides a little choking, we continue onward into the woods, slower this time. Finally having a chance to think straight, I look at my arms and hands, the scars have almost completely faded now as well as most of the pain. These marks are so weird… At least now I can probably be okay if I use my power again. That'll be fun! That beast sounds scary though…
We walk for the better part of the day, trying to take as few breaks as possible to gain some distance from the beast. We pass a smaller creek, giving us a chance to refill our near-empty canteens and keep pushing on. After night falls we finally take a break, and get a couple hours of sleep before pushing onward under the dark sky. Another day and night go by without any incident, and with our food supplies starting to dwindle, we begin searching for an area to settle a new proper camp. Eventually, after a few more miles we found the mother load, just a couple of hours into the morning. A beautiful large pond, maybe 200 feet wide, full of aquatic flora and life. Pernberry bushes are growing on the far right side of the water, and Silven and I bounce energetically on the ground. Joffrey walks up to the pond and scoops up some water, carefully checking the contamination level. He brings it to his mouth and slurps it from his palm, turning back to talk to us.
"It's good. There seems to be another small stream of water that runs through this body of water." He points to a water run-off spot where the stream flows down further. We all take the opportunity and jump in, cleansing off nearly a week of sweat and grime that has built up. The dirt flows away as we finally relax for a moment and bask in the sun. I'm floating on my back and the top of my head bumps into something hard. Tilting my head back into the water, I meet eyes with Silven, who is staring back the same way as me. We burst out giggling, and he sinks under the surface, spitting a mouthful of water out like a fountain as he comes back up. We spent the next half hour swimming and cooling off, then it was time to set up a more permanent resting place.
Joffrey, Raina, Silven and I start working toward creating a clearing in the forest, large enough for a couple of cabins. Taking around three or four hours, long enough for the sun to be overhead, we emptied out a good amount of space but needed just a bit more. At this point, my arms are dragging, and I'm ready to stop. Joffrey's ability to make these axes strong is nice, but god is this exhausting… What if I tried using my power? Maybe Joffrey could help me…? I walk over to him sizing up some of the logs and give him a small poke in the arm.
"Yeah, kid?" He acknowledges without turning to me.
"Do you think… maybe I can use… m-my power? To maybe cut some of these trees?" I freeze up as I sputter over my words.
"No, I don't think that's a good idea. You still need to learn control over it." He answers sternly.
"B-but… how can I do that… I-if you aren't going to teach me?" I ask, cowering down as he turns to face me before he responds.
"I will. But not now. Go see if Silven or Raina needs any help at the moment. Then once we get settled in, we can take a crack at it," He lines his ax up to cut the log at an approximate length and raises his arm high, swinging down hard enough to cleanly chop the log in two.
"Okay…" I kick up some dust and wander off over to Raina, who doesn't pay me much mind, so I don't bother trying to talk to her. I meander my way to Silven, who is chopping away at trees, clearing more space for the cabins.
"Hey! What's up, Salem?” his cheerful tone gave me warm feelings inside.
"Just, uh… Trying to help out however I can," I sheepishly reply.
"Great! Wanna help me cut up these trees?" He points to another ax lying on the ground nearby, and I hastily grab it.
"Yeah, definitely!"
An hour or so passes and we've cleared out an area large enough, then we begin working on cutting the logs to the right lengths, stacking them with layers of clay-like mud to fill any holes between. We make three different rooms, one for each of the adults, and one for me and Silven to share. We get the roof done rather quickly, and by the time we've got a full cabin built, it's still early in the afternoon. Silven and I are sat by the edge of the pond chatting, with our legs dipping in, basking in the sun with a cool breeze blowing through,
"What about… me versus twenty angry Squirbunnies?" Silven asks with a chuckle.
"Hmm… Definitely the Squirbunnies," I burst out laughing as he was taken aback, his betrayed look followed by his dramatic response.
"Wow, Salem, you dare think so low of me?" He mimics a stab to the heart, sputtering out, "Oh, you've hurt me so!" He collapses back onto the grass, opening his mouth and drooping his tongue out with an "Eeegh" sound.
We laugh for a moment, then Silven sits up, yanks his tunic off, and begins sloshing into the water, diving in once he reaches knee depth.
Joffrey walks up as I watch Silven swim about, and he gives me a little nudge.
"Hey.. uhm.." he mumbles like he's trying to find the words. "Could we… talk?”
"Yeah, is everything okay?" I pat the ground next to me and he slips off his shoes, sitting down and dipping his feet in the water as well.
"Well… I uh… When things… Uhm…"
"Are you okay, Joffrey?” I give him a teasing nudge with my elbow.
"Yeah, yeah… just… You know." He groans and aggressively ruffles his hair, and clears his throat, "I just wanted to talk about… Well…"
Silven breaks the surface of the water a little way out, hollering, "Guys, I think I made one of the fish mad!" As he says this, Joffrey and I notice a ripple under the water, quickly approaching Silven. As it closes in, the fish flies out of the water and slaps against the back of Silven's head, causing him to smack his face into the water. I can't help but laugh at the sight, looking over and seeing Joffrey chuckling as well.
Silven comes back up and sees us laughing and shouts, "Hey, don't be making fun of me now for that!" Before diving back under in our direction.
As our laughs die off, I turn back to Joffrey, who, for the first time since I've been out here, is smiling wide. He notices me staring and his face flushes red, sputtering over his words even more than before. "Well… Yeah, anyways…" He hurriedly stands up before continuing, "Good talk! Good talk…" he says, mumbling as he begins to shyly stumble away. I watch as he walks away, my sight getting drawn to the sky by a stack of dark clouds rising into the sky in the direction opposite of where we came from.
"Hey, Joffrey?" I holler over my shoulder, to which he turns back around.
"Yeah?"
"Is that smoke?"