Mira woke the next day to stiff limbs and a chill that sat deep in her bones.
The last she could recall of when night fell, she’d been laying on the ground closest to the fire with Magic shuffling through their remaining duffle bag, since hers was lost to the depths of the Maidenwoods. All she had was the warmth of the flames and her pitiful extra sweatshirt to keep her comfortable.
In the Elnoiran alleyways, their stack of crates was a reliable way of blocking out wind to keep them warmer.
Now, Mira woke with a shiver, her fingers dirtied with mud she’d tracked in her tossing and turning overnight, dewdrops bubbling in tiny beads along her skin. A mourning dove was competing with an owl, their coos and melodies a low, stead call. Dying embers flickered where the fire once was, and the trailing wisps of smoke were the only evidence of its existence.
The only thing she had to combat for warmth and comfort was the heavy quilt, which had been tossed over her at some point during the night, and Magic’s duffle that had somehow migrated beneath her head to act as a pillow.
Close by, Mira heard the shuffling of leaves and dirt; Magic was already awake and, from where she lay on the ground, she could see him sitting with a stack of fabrics at his side. It took her a minute to register that Magic was folding and organizing their wet clothing that had dried overnight, the sight of it equally baffling as it . Which he wasn’t obligated to do. Nor had she asked him to do so.
Mira drummed her fingers on the ground, running over words in her head, unsure if she even wanted to start a conversation yet. She kept it in the back of her mind as she propped herself up on her elbow to get a better glance at her brother, but the mere idea of doing so seemed worse the more she took in the scene.
Magic was not only folding and stacking the clothes in neatly separated piles, he was dragging his hand over one of the garments repeatedly, methodically. Like there was something about this particular outfit that he had gotten wrong the first time. His strokes were borderline aggressive; Mira watched him pause and sprinkle something along the ground before picking up the clothes—which she recognized as his coat—and smelling it.
His revulsion was clear; Magic’s entire body recoiled and he dropped it, coughing into his elbow, glasses fogging from his breaths. Mira sat up straighter, rubbing sleep from her eyes, blanket crumpling to a heap in her lap. It wasn’t until Magic returned to his work, dragging his hand over the outside of the coat over and over ahead that Mira spotted the wrinkled and shredded remains of herbs: cida flowers and mint.
Her stomach fluttered and she felt slightly ill. Mint and cida flowers were highly perfumed herbs and common in Chrome, popular for their food favoring an use in aromatherapy, respectively. But their potent scents made them excellent at hiding the scent of death.
Mira had gotten intimately familiar with their scents growing up. The smell of mint and cida overwhelmed the chapels where phoenix wakes were held to cover up the gasoline poured over empty caskets before they were burned in honor of deceased coal miners killed by tunnel collapses.
They were gorgeous plants with vile uses and she had no doubt that, somewhere in his brain, Magic was replicating the process to remove the smell of smoke from their clothing. And, judging by the sheer number of ground down plants at his side, he'd clearly been at this for a while.
“Mags?” she called, wrapping the blanket over her shoulders for additional warmth.
Magic flinched, whirling to face her, long black hair fanning out and falling to brush his shoulders. His eyes were wide in a way that reminded her of a startled deer. “You’re awake.”
“Yeah. Been awake for a bit.” She paused, waiting for Magic to say something, but when he said nothing and she lacked a means of continuing it, Mira motioned towards the clothes for another opening. “What are you doing with those?”
“Organizing.”
It was the way in which he spoke, nervous and fearful, that worried her. He was her only source of navigation—Mira certainly didn’t trust her own skills to get them out of the Maidenwoods unscathed and in one piece. She barely knew the difference between something being left or right when she was walking through the roads back at home and every other town they’d been through so far. And while she still didn’t know how to forgive him—the thought of doing so just to appease the awkwardness irritated her—they needed to work together. Otherwise, how else were they going to get out of here? “Take a break from the clothes, Mags,” she said. “Focus on how we’re getting to Subsidia.”
Magic pursed his lips, swallowing hard. Without a word, he nodded, got up with the fabrics in hand and walked towards her. He still kept his distance, approaching only close enough to hand her the clothing before walking in a stagnant circle to observe his surroundings. Then he tossed his coat on, looking visibly distressed by the action, and waved for her to follow in total silence through the morning muck of the Maidenwoods.
* * *
After two days of travel and most of their mornings spent walking, Mira realized that they’d severely underestimated the drop in temperature.
When they were closest to the forest’s center, the weather was reminiscent of what most western fall nights were like: cold, but generally bearable if you had an additional source of warmth. And if it weren’t for the wind, the fires would have lasted far longer during the night. Mira couldn’t count on all ten fingers how many times she’d woken up in the pitch black of night to rekindle fires swept away by a gale force that jolted even Magic out of slumber.
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On the third night, they sought shelter in the form of a tree with a gaping hole at its base that reminded Mira of an open mouth. It felt strange, huddling into the tiny space. It was claustrophobic, heavy with unsaid words and discomfort. Mira could’ve cut it in half using one of her father’s pearing knives. Her gaze cut towards Magic, who huddled into himself, his hair concealing much of his face.
Settled awkwardly on opposite corners inside the tree’s trunk and sharing the quilt between them, the cold seeped its way in; Mira watched plumes erupt from clouds from her mouth, the only sound aside from the wind being the chattering of Magic’s teeth, the crackling of his breaths with each whistled inhale.
* * *
Supplies ran low by the fifth night.
It was all Mira could do to grin and bear the lack of food from their pre packed berries and herbs. They might have had more if she’d been able to tear her bag free of the Beast’s grip and contribute something. Maybe it wouldn’t have gotten them that far, but it might have saved them some bit of trouble.
Skipping meals was the only solution to preserving their fruits. Immediately, Magic put all of the berries into one container, disregarding the careful separation Mira had gone through just to sort them into what each of them preferred. In the grand scheme of things, Mira knew it was a weird thing to be upset about. But Magic hated sour foods the same way she despised sweet ones. So when she questioned his logic, he took a breath and nervously rubbed his hands along his jacket, sitting on an old log, eyes flitting in the direction of where they’d need to continue walking.
“It’s more to eat,” he said.
“No, it isn’t,” Mira replied, sitting a few feet away. “It’s still the same amount of food for the two of us and putting them together doesn’t make it—”
“Who said it was for the two of us?”
Mira blinked. She didn’t quite understand what he was getting at, not until he took a breath, dug out the large, mangleroot basket he’d weaved several days prior and tossed the combined berries in her direction that she pieced it together. By the time her frozen brain even concocted a response, her brother had left to go and gather water from the river.
Despite his complete lack of meals aside from the occasional bird’s peck at the sweeter berries he loved so much, Magic plowed through the path they’d settled on to get to the north with impressive speed (though Mira figured it was more out of a need to keep himself occupied and distracted about their destination than anything else). The only evidence of his hunger and fatigue were the occasional brain fog that screwed with his directional sense and put them on a wrong turn, forcing them through some kind of scenic route.
Mira, though, struggled to keep up. It was an agonizing and unwelcome addition to the trip. The pain in her sides and stomach made walking and focusing hard. She’d stumbled over pebbles and her own two feet and nearly picked up a thin snake she mistook for a vine—the hissing was enough to throw her back into the present. Magic, though, marched on, unfazed and unnerved by the lack of food. Considering how none of this seemed to bother him, Mira almost wished she’d trained herself to resist hunger like her brother.
Almost.
The idea of hunger was new to her—Mira never had to wonder where her next meals came from. Her father had made plenty of money off their bread and pastry sales and much of what they could afford always lent themselves to leftovers the next day. There was never a shortage of food and if there was, it was because of a drastic shift in the worth of zirca coins. But that itself was rare and Mira never found herself concerned with it.
Mira also never considered herself as being terribly spoiled or pampered. Although in comparison to her brother who braved hunger like a damn champ, she was. And the unconscious complaints that left her mouth made that all the more apparent.
Despite it all they’d made decent progress.
When the two of them holed up for sleep in a burrow somewhere in the Maidenwoods, Mira spent that night kept awake by stomach cramps and her brother’s fretful sleep.
* * *
By the morning of the seventh day, Mira was exhausted.
Rest no longer came for her as often as it once did, the mixture of fatigue and anxiety worming its way throughout the creases of her brain. It wasn’t herself Mira worried for; her own sense of time and orientation had long since shattered, but Magic’s directional sense was starting to spiral. Mira wasn’t sure why and she didn’t want to ask. The longer they walked and the more progress north they made, his sensitivity to sound and touch worsened, making it difficult to be anywhere near him. Mira was lucky to be within a few feet of her brother without startling him.
He no longer spoke his thoughts aloud or muttered to himself about which way was the best to avoid tangles of brambles or shrubs that would slow down their pace. Instead of directions, Magic was muttering what she thought were poems under his breath and Mira wasn’t sure if it was superstition or lack of food that was messing with his head—during the day and at night.
But that evening, came the torchlight.
Mira could see the little flames twinkling like stars on the ground through some of the more spread out trees and with the hooting of nearby owls, it almost felt like something grand out of a fable. Even Magic, for all his moods, seemed to briefly forget whatever it was that had been plaguing him.
Energy and adrenaline washed away whatever heavy set fatigue that remained in her body. Mira snagged her brother by the jacket sleeve—which he surprisingly threw no fit about—and ran with him in the direction of the shimmering light beyond the forest.
There was no telling how long they ran for or how much time it took them, but Mira did know that when she’d spotted the fire, there was not a lick of light in the sky. Now it held the makings of dawn, the sunrise steadily climbing up the horizon to sprinkle the earth in pale, gold light that was surprisingly bright for this early in the morning. With it, though, she could make out large wagons and tents, civilization on the cliffside of Jaggian Peaks.
Finally.
She’d been at most a mile or two away from the lowest layer of the settlement when her feet gave out and her ears rang so loudly she could barely make out the voice of the person beside her. Someone snagged her by the shoulders and hoisted her to her feet. It was short-lived; the grip went away and Mira felt her feet slide on drier earth.
Dust clouds made her eyes water as her legs could no longer carry her. From her spot on the ground, she felt the vibration of a stampede and, vaguely, Mira recognized the bleating of a goat before the dark seized her.