Chapter Sixteen

“Stop!” Leuther shouted. The wolf growled a growl so awful it soured Leuther’s stomach. He felt it in his chest, threatening to stop his heart. He froze instead, just long enough for Sula’s mind to catch up with her. She punched him hard in the jaw. A fair response for his own slap, she thought and he would later agree. Still the punch knocked him back a few paces.

As he rubbed at his jaw, the foolish scholar stared down two threats ready to pounce. The girl let out a bark more terrifying than the wolf’s, so terrifying it roused the young man from his stupor. “W-wait. Please. I can explain. I did not really mean to hit you… Well, actually I did, but it was for a good reason, after all you are my friend and I would not want to hurt you because then you might not… Oh no, please do not come any closer. I really can explain. Poison! Those berries are poisonous!”

Sula paused for a second to wonder but sneered away the idea. “If they are so poisonous,” she began, “why isn’t the wolf acting strange?”

“T-to people!” Leuther added then took a deep breath to calm himself. “Those berries are poisonous to people. The mutt, however, can stomach them quite well.”

The wolf snarled and Sula did too. “I don’t believe you.”

“You should. I have no reason to swat them away otherwise,” Leuther said. “They were red, weren’t they? If they were yellow, they would have been bad for the wolf too. But since they were red, they were okay for him.”

Sula narrowed her eyes. She still did not fully trust this stranger but would humor him.

“Yes, they were red,” she admitted. “What does it matter?”

“Well, about half of red berries are poisonous. Of that size? Probably ninety percent are poisonous.”

“And how do I know you aren’t making things up?” she pressed, even less convinced than before. After all, her papa used to pick her red berries from the woods all the time and he never mentioned poisonous ones she should avoid.

“Well, you do not,” Leuther relented. “And I do not know for certain they are poisonous. There is still that ten percent, but the odds were high. Did they maybe smell sweet, yet somehow acidic like a pikros pepper at the same time?”

“Huh, they did have a smell like that to them,” Sula said. As the implication grew that perhaps Leuther had saved her life and not merely wanted to get a blow in on her, she softened a little. Did he really save me? The idea almost disgusted as much as it impressed. She had always thought she could fend for herself. What did it mean now that she had to rely on this unimpressive young man to help her?

“Well then,” Leuther began his conclusion. “I know for certain. Given their color and the fact that ‘Wolfie’ there seems fine with them, that sweetly acidic smell would indicate they are Mykian berries, named so after a once great civilization that like the berries appeared beautiful on the outside, but ultimately fell to the toxins of revolution from within. Yes, one of those wicked sugar-drops is enough to paralyze a person within the hour. Two will kill them instantly, tightening their muscles until their heart bursts from the pressure. Yes, those have to be Mykians. Though I am surprised the juice is not tingling on your skin.”

Now that he mentioned it, the hand Sula had held the berries in began to cramp. Her fingers twitched then splayed out wide, feeling as though they might pop free of her palm. Sula’s heart began to race as she called for Leuther’s help. The scholar only laughed and assured her that the tightness would be temporary. Reassured, Sula let loose a deep sigh and tried not to think about the growing ache in her knuckles.

Leuther could not help but shake his head at the girl. To go from thinking every word he spoke was a lie one second to trusting him without question the next. Of course, he reminded himself. She is just a helpless child lost in the woods.

“In any case, we should be getting back to camp. Look how tall the shadows have grown. Night will soon be upon us,” Leuther said. “Do not worry about the berries. With the haul that I procured, we will not want for food for days.”

Sula’s ears perked up at the promise of a filling meal. She did not hesitate. She scampered ahead and left Leuther and the wolf to navigate the darkness alone. It had come on thick over the forest. So thick that it was nearly impossible to navigate. If not for the sound of the cub’s pattering feet in the distance and the wolf’s night-adjusted sight, the two would certainly have lost themselves in it.

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After a short stumble through the bramble, the brush overhead cleared and the light of the stars shone down enough for Leuther to orient himself and pick up his pace so that he might catch the two wild things.

When the wolf reached the camp, he found something amiss. Sula, illuminated by the celestial reflections of the stream, stood away from the camp and gaped at the sight. Moments later, Leuther pulled up his jog beside Sula and put his hands on his head to catch his breath.

“I thought for certain you would have started without us,” Leuther wheezed. “What’s the matter? Have you lost your appetite?”

“Lost my appetite? Is that some kind of joke?” Sula narrowed her eyes at him. “Some haul you’ve procured.” The venom she spewed in the last word was palpable. It stung. When Leuther at last rose his head, confusion on his brow, and caught sight of what had troubled the other two, a panic beat at his chest like a drum.

“My truffles!” the young man screamed loosing with it a piece of his very soul.

The camp was in ruins. Branches and fallen pine-needles were scattered everywhere. Where there were no needles, the soil had been churned up as though by a rowdy plowman looking to plant new seed. The ground had been so badly mauled that it was now, perhaps, more brown than green. Even the water was not spared the onslaught. Its current ran brown with mud.

Worse still, based on the burgundy bits sprinkled about the ragged sod, some monstrous beast must have found the supply of truffles and scurried off with them. On closer inspection, Leuther noticed the same small holes by the thousand he had used to locate the truffle. He decided that one of the mire minks or chipmice he had seen earlier must have followed him back to camp and had plundered with his group of vermin bandits.

“What should we do?” Sula whimpered. She had imagined the taste of the truffles all the way back to camp. They had carried her forward. And now their destruction tasted like dirt. Her belly gurgled wildly in its anger.

“Well, it is far too dark now for me to go fetch more,” Leuther said, the disappointment weighing heavy on him. He rubbed his stomach guiltily. “It would not be safe.”

The wolf growled a soft agreement. Sula nodded. Each knew that, no matter how much their bodies protested, a night without food would not be their undoing. It would, of course, leave them exhausted and cranky and would be likely to keep them up through the night, but it would not kill them. The same could not be said if they tried to brave the pitch-black wilderness. Perhaps, the wolf might have managed well enough himself, but that would leave Sula and Leuther without protection from the wild, unnatural threats that seemed to grow the older the night grew. They could not leave camp. They would have to pass the night hungry.

It was this situation that Sula and the wolf were dreading. But Leuther, fumbling with his waistband, was thinking about something else entirely. Leuther drew two large truffles from beneath his shirt. For a moment, while the others were distracted by the camp’s carnage, he thought to shovel them straight into his mouth, one in each cheek, but his guilt getting the better of him, he held out the delicious morsels to his companions.

“Here,” he said. His reluctance shattered with a crack in his voice. “I-I saved these for later. A midnight snack or something of the like.”

The wolf did not wait for an explanation. He snatched the truffle between his back teeth and wolfed it down. Sula was slower to snatch hers. She looked up at the young scholar. Something about the crestfallen way he sagged his head let her know the significance of the sacrifice. She wondered at how long he might have been stuck in those vines. How little had he had to eat or drink? As though he could tell what she was thinking, Leuther dropped the truffle between her eyes, balancing it on the bridge of her nose.

“You should not worry about me, girl,” Leuther said with a smile. “I will be just fine.”

“If you say so,” Sula said, grabbing the truffle from her nose. But she did not eat it. Not yet. There was still much to be done for the night and she needed to finish these preparations before she could worry about food. Her stomach protested, but she silenced it.

Together, the three set about preparing camp. Sula kindled a fire as her papa had taught her. The wolf dug up dirt and grass into makeshift bed-mounds. Leuther examined logs from the stream and finding some suitable vessels, filled them with water and dragged them back to camp.

The last two logs Leuther brought would not do for water containers, but they worked perfectly placed as benches around the now roaring fire. Deep into the night the three sat and talked by the flame. Mostly they shared stories. Sula could not help but ask for the stories of heroes. Though so much had happened in the past few days, she realized how little and how much she had changed.

When the three grew drowsy and prepared to retire, Sula brought out the truffle to roast in the fading embers of the fire. Leuther watched happy with the decision he had made to give it to her. His hunger pangs had long since faded into a prideful satisfaction. In that moment they could have forgotten the terrors around them. Drawing the truffle in both hands from the fire, Sula took in its ashy smell. Something jolted in the cub’s stomach and a red blush crossed her face as if she too had been seared by the fire.

“Sula,” the girl said as if prompted. Leuther might have asked to clarify but all at once he felt a punch against his chest. The cub had slammed a fist into him as she shoved the truffle into her mouth. Leuther’s mouth fell open in shock. He had deserved a lot of beatings in his days, but this one he could think of no reason for. When Sula’s fist opened, Leuther suddenly realized what she meant. Before she let him get a word in, she darted off to bed. In his lap laid half of a roasted truffle, crudely split down the middle.