Trapped, Siik-knows how far beneath the seething skin of the earth, with the tunnel we were in undulating like a lizard’s detached tail, and all anyone could do was stare. No one present had the knowledge to understand what had just happened. But one insidious suspicion wormed from my veins into my consciousness: I’d just let something very, very large know my location…
Wil had his, as well. “I needed that blood – an’ look what’s happenin’ cause o’ you. Why’d you smack the blood?”
I blinked, mouth working as I tried to find an answer to that same question. Above the turbid waters of my soul, motivations frothed incomprehensibly. As the seconds passed without greater comprehension, I muttered, “Who drinks random pools of liquid?” then grabbed the man and shoved him ahead of me.
Stirred by the sudden movement, Tully shivered into action. Her scars shuddered under the quaking bloodtech light in her hands. “Thi- This is one of the early quakes. We have time.”
We scrambled up the tunnel on our hands and knees as strange mucus began to ooze from the walls. The worn Grower in front of me slowed, and I shoved him onward. Moisture alongside heat built in the air, until it became so thick that every part of me sweated.
“We have time,” Tully insisted as we frantically clawed our way upwards.
A stinging built in the parts of my skin pressed against the spongy walls, but before it could ascend to greater heights we shot out from the hole we’d entered and emerged back into the cavern with the others.
Wil staggered forward, then slumped onto the floor. Beneath a sheen of mucus, the surface of his arms resembled raw, uncooked meat, and looking down I found my hands were similarly burned – having several layers of skin stripped away. Yet unlike him, the wounds only extended to my hands and small flecks on my face – my beaten jacket and sliced clothing had taken the brunt of the strange liquid’s burn. I wiped the affected areas on a nearby pile of leaves frantically, then did the same to Wil.
Behind me, Tully did the same. Beads of moisture – either sweat or condensation – rolled down her brow. The ten of us with sense to do so looked to her. Someone with as many years under their belt as her should have been through several Achings before. With her Spiderblood and experience, she had to know a way out. Moments before she finished wiping her hands, a large rumble sent her stumbling sideways. Rita’s short form caught her before she fell.
“We have…” Tully paused, tongue licking sweat from her scarred lips. “We have a few dozen minutes. Give or take. The early quakes aren’t accompanied by regrowth. We…” She clenched her eyes shut, breath coming in and out in short, harsh pants.
“Ox’s balls, Graves,” said Rita, using her leader’s moniker, “you alright? You hurt?”
The Spiderblood waved her off. “I’m fine.” When Rita didn’t let go, she repeated it again, with greater ferocity. “I’m fine. We need to go back the way Vin and I came.”
“What?” I grated. “What about the soldiers above? What about- “
“If I can find a vantage point, I can guide you out.” She untucked a carved whistle on a string from beneath her stolen breastplate. “Rita knows my signals. Then you can do the same for me, when you are above all of this.” Her last word exited in a panicked hiss.
“What about Ronnie?” I snapped. “They’re too big! What about Wil? He’s assimilating Godsblood- “
There were mutters from the others, at that. Becoming Blooded was never a simple thing. Depending on the type and concentration of the divinity, integrating it into the body could take anywhere for hours or weeks – or outright kill the would-be Blooded, if they couldn’t handle it. Though the burns on his arms may have been the wound that initially fell him, it was the Godsblood that would keep him down. But beyond the Houses, all most people knew of divinity and Blooded were stories. I doubted Wil had intended to put himself in a coma. Though his intentions meant little in the circumstances.
“-he’ll be in a fever for hours at least. We won’t be able to pull him through the cracks!”
“We are in the jaws of something beyond us, Vin. Even lizards will sever their tails- “
“We’re not godsdamned lizards, Tully, and a person is not a tail,” I spat. After a moment, I let the anger hiss from my mouth, and quietened. “I’ll stay; get them out.”
She clenched a chattering jaw. “We need you- “
“And I need you to understand that you’ll lose me anyway, if you make me come up with you. I’ll save…“
And that word’s righteousness shivered through every portion of my limbs, beating from something deep within me, even as a distant part of me understood that staying might kill me. But Ronnie would stay for me. In the grimy void of existence, all anyone really had was family; wherever they found it. I’d died to give substance to that belief. I’d do it again.
But how fair was that death, huh? Ma shouldn’t have had to do it; Ma wouldn’t have had to do it if it wasn’t for me sticking my nose where it didn’t belong. And wasn’t this whole thing just the same stupid mistake as before? And of course I knew why Ma’d done it – my blood wouldn’t let me forget – but that kindness was a weight around my neck, and I’d have to live with it until the day I died.
I winced at a sudden pounding in my skull. My patchwork soul was buried beneath the cogs of my consciousness. Though its thin stitches never swum into focus, sometimes the gears would jam. It reminded me what I was.
“Them,” I finished, wiping the flinch from my face. My thoughts had taken less than a fraction of a second, like lightning striking from a blackened sky, leaving only a painful afterimage.
She eyed me, then clenched her teeth and nodded. After tossing me her small handheld light, they started to leave. Wil’s kid tried to stay, as did Taja, but I convinced the latter he needed to take care of everyone else for me. Ronnie's dog seemed determined to stay with them, but a few firm hand gestures to both Davian and Yowler had the hound reluctantly ambling away -- albeit with several glances over its shoulder. Four tunnels waited to be explored; one of them had to hold an exit. It needed to. I’d eat through a layer of stone, if that’s what it took. Of course, I doubted the Aching would spare me the time to whip out some cutlery and get chewing.
Ronnie and I didn’t have time to watch the others go. With increasing frequency, the pink and red walls around us trembled in anticipation for the oncoming growth. Whatever material formed the surfaces was flexible enough to withstand these initial quakes, but soon enough the Heartlands would begin the process of renewing itself: growing and shifting plants, land, and rivers according to processes beyond humanity’s ken. Many people above ground would die during this process.
We were not above ground, and I didn’t need the Spider’s wit to figure out what would happen to those trapped in a cave.
With Taja and Rita having scrambled through another tunnel in my absence, three tunnels remained to be searched. After rolling Wil onto his side – lest the red-streaked bile dribbling from his throat drown him – Ronnie and I each set off down a tunnel, hands wrapped in pieces of torn tapestry. Out of necessity, the giant Strain took the largest one and Tully’s bloodtech light, leaving me to swallow against the lump in my throat and set out into my own personal hole.
Light rapidly disappeared, but though my sight was blocked by darkness and my nose by the acrid stench permeating every fold of the walls, my remaining senses were acute enough for me to grope along speedily. Though it was far wider than the hole I’d scrambled through moments before, fear remained, waxing and waning as the tunnel’s innards seethed like the guts of a snake, writhing against my feet and outstretched hands with barely restrained mania.
As I clawed my way through, the spongy walls around me tightened. Whether it was the result of the Aching or its original form I did not know, but when it grew narrow enough that progress meant continuing on hands and knees, I knew neither Ronnie nor Wil would be able to make it through in time. I turned back, and soon clawed my way back into the abandoned camp.
The cavern trembled, and a chord of mind-bending panic pierced me as I realised I had no idea how much time we had left.
“Ronnie!” I called into their tunnel. “Does yours look promising?” Then I barked a strangled laugh as I realised the Strain couldn’t respond.
But then Ronnie did, using the sound of metal striking against metal.
“One strike means yes,” I yelled, “two no!”
Another clash. I waited, stomach churning, for the second. After a few distended moments, none came.
“Okay,” I muttered. “Okay.” In a louder voice, I told the dark hole: “I’m gonna look through the last one!”
Another clash, and a grin flashed across my face. I began to step into the final tunnel, only to shudder to a halt. A jagged scream rose from the passageway the others had left through, rising into a staggering crescendo before falling into something too quiet to hear. Unlike earlier, the strange, pink walls absorbed any echo that could’ve arisen, leaving the cavern cruelly silent in its wake.
“Belay that for a second,” I said to Ronnie – gods knows how far away – and sprinted up the way we’d entered from.
Slimy ground threatened to steal footing from beneath my pounding steps, and even my stolen Foxblood couldn’t prevent me from careening into the stony speartrees studding the way back. But there was no time – there was never enough time – and even as my knees and forearms collided with the trunks and threw me against the shaking walls I was taking another step, pushing myself further upwards.
I heard Rita far before I saw her. The woman’s breaths were desperate enough to penetrate past the rumbling all around us. Moments later, I’d sprinted far enough upwards for her to enter eyeshot. Lit by the toppled form of her lantern, the guard’s upper body protruded from the crack I’d squeezed through to enter. Her lower body could not be seen, but I read its fate in the unnatural shape of her back, studded with the splintered remnants of the crossbow slung on her back. The crack had closed on her, ever so slightly. It had broken her spine. Rita’s legs were beyond her.
“Vin?” the middle-aged woman whispered, struggling to tilt her head away from the floor. “C’mon, big man. Say something.”
I forced words from my dry throat. “I’m here.”
“Pull me.”
“Rita, I- “
“Pull me.”
I knelt down, grabbed her arms, and pulled. Something creaked within her body, and the scream she’d been holding tore from her mouth. I let go.
“Pull me,” she hissed.
“I’ll tear you in half, Rita.”
“Blood.” The cuss slipped breathlessly from her mouth, forgotten as soon as it departed. She wasn’t addressing me. “Oh, gods. I’m stuck.”
I searched for something to say; some avenue to make the truth palatable. I found none.
“What if you… No.” The woman twisted her head against the floor, looking up at me. “You’ve gotta kill me.”
“What? No.”
“I’m not bloody well staying here an’ starving t’death, in this wretched place. Can’t imagine a worse way t’go.” She looked away. “Gods, what was the bloody point of it all?”
My mouth worked soundlessly.
She looked back up. “You’ll look after the Head, if you’ve any humanity left in those veins o’ yours. If you’ve still a soul beneath it all.”
I swallowed. “I will.”
“You kill me – and you leave my soul well enough alone, or I’ll… bloody…” Her mouth groped for a threat. “I’ll haunt you. Give you indigestion.” At that, she barked a humourless laugh.
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A streak of panic ran up my body. “What’re you talking about?”
“Bloody Ravenblood.” She spat. “You cultists killed me Da and me sisters, and then your god ate my brother and Siik only-knows how many others. An’ now I’m left to beg one to end me.”
My hands shivered. Sickness brewed in my gut. I struggled to rein my breathing in. For a single, grotesque moment, I felt relieved she was dying in this place. “How’d you know?”
“I’m not tellin’ you.”
Mind racing, I soon arrived at a likely answer. If she hadn’t figured it out herself, then her source would be Tully. As soon as my mind made that conclusion, it felt like someone had filled my body with fire. I needed to: find Tully; curl up in a ball; cover my face; vomit. Desperately, I hoped I was wrong. Asking her aloud would give an opportunity to find some manner of confirmation – in her breath; in her expression; in the flickers of her eyes – but even though I was ravenous for some kind of abrupt denial, I couldn’t let Rita’s final moments be about me.
“Alright,” I said instead.
Rita shook her head as well as she could. The sneer on her face softened. “Me dying by Avri’s sort. Could’ve figured that’s how it would go a decade ago.” She closed her eyes. “Funny, that.”
I straightened, and drew the sword on my back. A few test swings revealed a decent balance, and the Owlforged steel would cut what it needed to.
“Forgive me, Vin,” she asked, “if I say I wanna stay outta your skin.”
I ran my tongue over my teeth, nodding slowly. “Yeah. I understand.” I lowered the edge of the blade to her neck. “Goodbye, Rita.”
Rita smiled loosely. “Luck to you, big man.” Her tone was soft. “Luck as far as it’ll take you.”
I clenched my eyes closed and turned my head away. Then I brought my blade up, then slammed it down. The motion was easier than it should’ve been.
A dull thump sounded from my feet. I kept my eyes on the ceiling, but couldn’t avoid seeing her lifeforce flicker. The nauseating urge to dip my fingers in blood and save something filled me, but I held it at bay until Rita’s flame vanished. Forever lost, at her own wishes. That was fair; that was excruciatingly cruel.
My breaths were drawn and expelled through tightened teeth. I scooped the fallen lantern from the ground and ran back.
----------------------------------------
Ronnie had found a way out. At the back of the twisting tunnel, the fleshy material had transitioned into more mundane stone. A gap in its wall streamed faint light. Cold air whistled through, almost managing to push away the heat emanating from further below. It was just small enough that none of us could fit through.
The giant Strain had wedged their axe in the crack in an attempt to chip away at its edges, only for their exertions to snap the oversized hatchet’s haft. Given time I could carve a new one, however if time was plentiful we wouldn’t be so desperate.
Ronnie was beating at its edges with the steel head of the axe when I arrived. With Wil cradled in my arms, a dim enough light might’ve painted him as some sleeping, precious noble, carried by his Blooded bodyguard. But the azure light of the lantern I’d given to Ronnie revealed a different story: one with dirt-smeared fingernails, a sun-beaten face, and frequent seizing. His painfully twisting features were a human mirror of the caves around us.
I wasn’t a bodyguard, so I dumped him unceremoniously on the stone and slid to a halt beside Ronnie’s crouched form. The Strain jerked eyes more white than blue from me towards the crack, then continued frantically chipping at it. Every blow was accompanied by a wince as the healing innards of their arm frayed further.
Moments were spent with me staring at nothing as the walls of the tunnel fractured behind us, stomach churning as I realised what I needed to do. In the end, I spared a glance towards Ronnie.
“Don’t tell anyone about this,” I said, and flexed the divine muscle that grew bone from my arm.
In a way, the sensation was similar to the sixth sense my Ravenblood granted me. It was unlike anything else in my world; no touch, taste, or sight spoke its language. I could attempt to draw parallels between it and the other senses I experienced in much the same way I could sheath a spear in a sword’s sheath: with a lot of mindless, brute will that utterly failed to comprehend either. It was something else, and the divine muscle was similar in its dissimilarity.
That was where their similitude ended. Ravenblood was passive – I couldn’t turn it off even if I wanted to. This thing was active – only ever responding when I called for it. The feeling of ivory sprouting from some corner of my flesh or bone and extending outwards was like dragging nails down sandstone; in contrast, the Raven’s power pulsed so quietly I could ignore it, with some effort.
But the difficulty of understanding each was analogous. Comprehending the information my Ravenblood delivered had taken years; understanding what was a plant, bug, human, person, or inert stone meant deciphering an alphabet where letters constantly blurred into one another. The process was so difficult I’d actively ignored it most of my life. Even now, with some mastery, my sense grew a little wider and a little deeper every day, and every day I was forced to learn just a bit more.
I grew the bone as if I’d been doing it for years instead of barely a week. I knew the growth needed speed before it exited skin, and sloth when most of its ivory form had emerged. I knew the best method to ignore the pain was biting the end of my tongue and looking elsewhere. I knew how to best create the chisel I needed with the limited power afforded to me, and a dozen other shapes if the need arose. Small parts of the process were missing from my mind, but I could fill in the gaps with what I knew.
It was an understanding borne of decades of careful practice. I shouldn’t have known any of it.
It took five seconds to grow a chisel from the bottom of my hand. Ronnie watched the entire process, eyes so massive in her head I might’ve mistaken them for Gast’s. They looked at me, and all I had for a response was a tremulous smile.
“Sorry.” I didn’t know what, specifically, I was apologising for. I waited a blow that would inevitably fall.
All Ronnie did was look at me. There was still blood on my legs.
I began working away at the sides of the gap, using my other hand to pound the top of my fist in a poor imitation of a hammer. But the tool I’d created was sturdier than bone had any right to be, and small chips fell away as I repeatedly jarred my entire hand.
A crash emanated from behind us, accompanied by a flood of air. Ronnie started working again. Despite the cold streaming from the crack in the wall, sweat trickled down my spine. The unmistakeable sound of something sharp spearing through flesh crawled from behind us, amplified so greatly my ears ached just to hear it. The rumbling of the walls became so violent every blow I delivered to the gap landed astray. Images flashed through my head: Ronnie’s body and mine trapped in an echo of Rita’s, immobile beneath the vast weight of the earth with our skin quietly growing sallower as the days passed, until finally – unnoticed by anything else – we ceased breathing.
Then an immense swathe of life travelled from down the tunnel towards us. Behind us, a mass of crimson earth tore through the stone as if it were rotten wood, accompanied by a cacophony like a rolling ball of lightning detonating with every inch it stole. I hastily shielded my face as shrapnel sliced my skin, when the stone wall – the only obstacle between us and freedom – was obliterated in an eruption of speartrees growing hastily from beneath. My mouth hung open. Ronnie grabbed Wil and tackled me outside.
Icy stone slammed against my cheek. After several moments, I shoved myself out from underneath the other two and carefully stood on the shaking floor of the crater. Behind us, white trunks thrust from the ground, travelling upwards as they grew and completely concealing the crack we’d leapt from. Shadows danced wildly in the little light that slipped through the surrounding mountains; a phantom mirror of the trembling of speartrees. Human life still flickered through the crater, but whatever cries they made was indecipherable underneath the rumbling of the inevitable Aching. The sound was no longer as all-encompassing as in the tunnels, yet the way the crashing of the earth clawed for the sky above remained unnerving in its own right. Above us, the cold blue sky snubbed what lay underneath it.
As I tried to orient myself, a crack emanated from behind me. Before I could fully process what that meant, a long shadow fell upon myself and the two others. I barely managed to arrest the fall of a speartree’s trunk before it turned Ronnie and Wil into bloody chunks. My knees felt they were being crushed, and my arms as if a swarm of hornets were eating into their flesh.
“Get out,” I grunted.
Ronnie had already dragged Wil out.
I released the immense weight. A glance revealed the speartree’s base had been gouged to pieces by the menacing tip of a newer, rapidly-growing speartree. Its stump oozed painful strings of sap. As I watched, another distant thump indicated a different speartree had fallen.
Arms hanging stiffly, I turned to the giant Strain. “Get up on the mountains,” I told them. “Kit’s waiting up there. Find us a path.
Ronnie paused, gaze falling on me with a weight greater than any speartree. Their blonde hair swayed as they shook their head.
I swallowed. “No,” I growled, gesturing to Wil, “you can’t fight; not with him. I’ll get the others – we’ll move better without the dead weight.”
They sliced their hand sideways. ‘Negative’.
“Ronnie,” I pleaded. “Find us a way out. Help us if we need it. Please, just trust me. Trust me.”
They looked at me with their pale blue eyes. After a moment, Ronnie nodded.
A sudden upheaval of emotion filled my chest. I clenched my eyes shut, sealing the tears that sprung behind them. “Thank you,” I breathed.
I slowly rotated, trying to sight a landmark. With a precision that surprised me, my mind fixed upon a bead of radiant energy atop a mountain. All lifeforce was different, but it was rare that I managed to comprehend a single flame’s idiosyncrasies without other, contextual clues. But somehow, with my sixth sense alone, I knew it was Kit.
I pointed in that direction, and Ronnie – careful to avoid slipping on the ice – hauled Wil onto their shoulder and began lumbering past me. A hand slapped me on the shoulder as they left.
‘Luck’, they signed.
Ronnie disappeared. I placed my hand over my mouth and allowed myself a single, muffled sob.
Then I turned and began running towards the centre of the crater.
Despite sprinting as fast as my legs allowed, four dozen strides later I was intercepted.
Three cloaked figures emerged from the speartrees, deftly avoiding the few that fell. All bore bruises and torn clothing. I recognised two: one bore a broken nose from the stone I’d pelted into it earlier, while the other’s tall, muscular form had pursued Tully and I. The bone stiletto sprouting from his wrist had lengthened into something closer to a shortspear, long enough to almost scrape the ground when his arms were lowered. The third was built similarly – albeit slightly broader and taller – but her bone weapon was matched with a coating of tough ivory over her other hand.
We both halted. “That’s an Albright,” the tall man whispered to his female counterpart.
Vaguely, I knew what the abilities of seven gods and their Blooded were. That knowledge was so common it’d been embedded in children’s rhymes. Dure for toughness; Enn for power; Kani for senses; Siik for mind; Wump for emotion; Yoot for magic. Growing bone wasn’t on that list.
I knew it wasn’t Avri’s. I would’ve remembered cultists sprouting extra bones if it were.
That left just one god.
By process of elimination, I understood I was facing a pair of Shrikebloods. I just didn’t understand why.
I kept my hand near the hilt of my stolen sword, but didn’t touch it yet. “I’m not an Albright. My friends were stuck in the mound, and I just want to get them out.”
The unblooded, broken-nosed man – though upon closer inspection he bore the round features of someone yet to leave boyhood – opened his mouth to retort, then halted and eyed the two others.
“Story checks out,” noted the man. “Findlay was blocked by some third party, and seemed not to like him, from what we gathered. Though he’s no civilian.”
“Don’t matter,” the woman said, waving a hand. She spoke in a thick Heartlander accent. “We’re th’ rats under th’ Albright’s floors. If they know we’re here, all they gotta do is stomp.”
I edged to the side. “I won’t say a thing.”
“We could take his tongue?” offered the man.
The Shrikeblooded woman shook her head. “Hundred other ways to tell a story.” She released a heavy sigh. “I’m sorry, pal. This ain’t fair to you.”
She began walking towards me. I could’ve sprinted away, but the frozen stone shook violently beneath – I wasn’t sure if I could build enough momentum to avoid a bone in the back. Instead, I stomped the thin layer of ice beneath my feet into pieces and hastily kicked its shards away. With more solid footing, I drew my blade and waited.
The Shrikeblood walked with ease. Belatedly, I realised she wore woven sandals – a poor choice of footwear, were it not for the bone piercing through their soles to bite into the ice with every step. She drew closer, and then she was in range.
I struck like a viper, and my sword snapped upon her ivory spear like I was holding a branch instead of Owlforged steel. Her bone-clad fist blurred towards me, and I hastily batted it aside with my free hand. Simultaneously, I brought the remnants of my sword down up through her forearm, ramming the steel through one side and out the other.
The Shrikeblood released a strangled grunt, and I turned my palm upwards to slam beneath her chin only for a leg to hook behind my own. Getting taken to the ground alongside my opponent might’ve made me nostalgic were it not for a spike of immense pain as her fist hammered my kidney. Groaning, I grabbed her hand with my own and attempted a headbutt, only for her to tilt her head to the side. An instant later the woman struck down with her bone spear – a foot shorter than it had been moments ago – and I barely managed to seize that as well.
We stared at one another, grunting and grimacing. She leveraged her entire weight onto the weapon and I struggled to keep it from impaling me. My strength was greater than hers, but with my other arm needed to trap hers she didn’t need Oxblood to kill me. I watched as her spear began extending, inch-by-inch, and gradually drew closer to my face. I opened my mouth and bit down on its pointed tip, allowing her full weight to fall upon my teeth, then punched her in the face.
Something gave way under my blow, but that ceased being relevant. The other two cloaked warriors were slowly surrounding us – weapons poised to fall at the first clear shot. I blanched and used the momentum of my fist to begin rolling us across the ice. My fists and her spear flew at one another in a flurry of blows, deflections, and hasty dodges. While it was immediately obvious I was stronger, quicker, and tougher, the Shrikeblood was far more skilled at this kind of scuffle. Her legs wrapped around my arm, and when the warrior realised I was too strong to trap that way she dodged one of my fists and swung around onto my back, locking her ivory spear around my throat. Her other hand stabbed towards my neck.
The blow skittered off the bone I’d grown there.
She mumbled something, but I’d managed to stagger upright and begin sprinting across the ice. My gait felt like a baby deer’s, yet every stumble sent me sliding faster and the Shrikeblood chose to do nothing but cling on. Once I’d built enough speed, I twisted mid-stride and slammed my back into a speartree. The impact drew a cough from my throat, however the woman had it far worse – some part of her crumpled around its thick trunk like a torn branch. I bounced off, turned, stumbled back, and seized her head in both hands.
I stomped on her legs to gain traction and slammed her skull against the trembling ivory of the speartree. Something crunched, yet the woman still blinked wildly so I reared back and smashed it again. Her pupils were massive, but they still moved sluggishly so I roared, driving her head against the trunk like a hammer crushing an apple atop an anvil. Its dirt-stained white was overwritten by steaming chunks of gore.
I released her corpse, panting. It slumped; one side of its head staring gormlessly at nothing while the other side leered from its missing pieces. I gagged.
“You’re not a Seed.” I whirled, finding the man and boy staring at me. Or more specifically, the side of my neck covered in bone.
The man kept himself perfectly still, but for his lips. “You’re one of the Albright’s Blooded?”
I worked my jaw. The land rumbled.
“No, you’re not even a Shrikeblood, are you?” The warrior’s mouth hung open. His eyes were wide. “You’re too strong.”
I flinched away from the light in his eyes.
“You’re the Ravenblood.”
I turned and bolted, like a dog terrified of his master. I tried to wipe the brains from my hands, but did not succeed, and so I wrapped the arms smeared with lifeless, inert blood around my head and drove nails into the side of my face. My mouth trembled; my eyes flickered; I felt as if the sky would fall and crush me like a gnat.
I ran. Neither of them followed.