“So we agree it’s one of those devils from the village?” Tethina asked, still clearly searching for her balance.
“Someone sent it to find me,” Dasen answered. “Who else could that be?”
“But you’ve never heard of anything like it?”
“Nothing even close. I mean its appearance is strange enough – too strange to be human, too intelligent to be animal – but what about the poison, my injuries, and . . . and the language?” Dasen remembered the creature saying that its bite was poisonous, which explained the extraordinary pain, the way it had coursed through him like his body was on fire. Even now, it didn’t seem real, as if his mind had intentionally faded the memory. But could that same poison have also healed him? The only thing he knew for sure was that not only were the bite and cuts healed but so were his swollen knee, burns, headache, sore muscles, and every other cut, scratch, and bruise he had received.
Tethina looked at him dubiously. “I already said, it probably sounded like a different language because of its deformed mouth. There’s no way you could understand a language you don’t know. That doesn’t even make sense.” Dasen knew what he had heard and opened his mouth to protest, but she held up a hand to stop him. “Either way it doesn’t matter. What is really strange is the healing. . . . So you think it’s the effect of some poison in its bite?”
Dasen nodded. “That’s the only thing I can think of.”
“But why would an animal have poison that heals its victim? It goes against every principle of nature.”
Dasen could only shrug. “How else do you explain this?” He held out his arm to show the rows of round scars peeking out from the flaking brown blood.
Tethina drew a long breath. “There’s only one way to know.” She ran to the creature still lying in the bushes and bent toward it.”
“Tethina, what are you . . . ?”
A muffled cry cut off Dasen’s question. Tethina fell to her knees then her back. She clutched her right wrist as if that was the only thing keeping her hand attached. Dasen ran to her side, but there was nothing he could do but watch her writhe, teeth clenched in pain. Her face was frozen, eyes squeezed tight, with only a line of tears coursing down her cheeks. Dasen tried to comfort her, brushing back her hair, but could think of nothing more to do.
Finally, after what seemed an eternity, her face softened, her jaw released and she drew in a shaking breath. After a few more, she sat up and wiped the tears from her cheeks with the hem of her dress. “By the great and holy Order,” she gasped. “How can one little prick possibly hurt that much?”
She held up her hand. On the end of her middle finger was a smear of blood from where the creature’s tooth had punctured her skin, but the cut that had released the blood was gone. Awestruck, Tethina stood and looked at her arms in time to see the red of her burns fade to tan. She pulled the hem of her skirt up over her knees, and they both watched as her tapestry of scratches and bruises faded and disappeared.
“By the Order!” Tethina swore. Dasen could only nod his agreement.
“We need to get out of here,” Dasen whispered when he had overcome his shock. His eyes scanned the trees, expecting attackers to come flooding out at any moment. “They’re searching for us. It’s not safe here.”
“It’s not safe anywhere,” Tethina dowsed his growing panic. “If I were the bandits, I’d want us moving. They can’t know where we are or even which side of the river we’re on. Their horses are worthless in this wilderness, and they can’t possibly have enough men to search it properly. If I were them, I’d try to flush us out, get us moving and hope we come to them. This thing is like a rock you throw into a bush to flush a quail. If it kills the bird, great, but your real hope is that it flies.”
She paused and watched the trees. Dasen could barely comprehend what she was saying, but she put a hand on his bare chest. “There can’t be more than one of this thing. Neither of us has ever heard of it. We didn’t see any in the village. It must be their scout. They sent it over here to flush us out. If it were part of an organized party, they’d have taken us by now. No, it was alone, and running now is exactly what they want us to do.”
“So are we just going to stay here forever?” Dasen could not believe what he was hearing. They needed to get out of here, to find someplace safe, someplace with proper food, beds, and water, not to mention a horde of well-armed men.
Tethina looked up at him from painfully close. Her warm tan hand rested on the center of his bare white chest, just below the sparkling pendant, between two pathetic clumps of hair. She watched him for a moment, lips slightly pursed. Dasen wanted desperately to kiss her again but could not find the courage, could not expose himself to that rejection again.
“No,” Tethina eventually broke the moment. She removed her hand and backed away. “But we won’t travel in the middle of the day, and we won’t take any of the easy trails. We’ll leave this evening and go as far as we can in the twilight. We’ll camp under pines, no fires, no wandering about. That means we should have a last good meal before we go. We should also get some of the blood scrubbed off. If your friends have dogs, they’ll smell this blood from miles away, so will any bears or wolves out here with us. We should move that thing’s body too.” She thought for a moment. “We’ll throw it in the stream, then if the bandits are looking for it, they’ll find it far away from us.”
Dasen could not think. That moment with Tethina had clouded his mind, replaced his fear with a far more confusing muddle of emotions. “Okay,” he finally conceded. “But let’s stick together. I don’t think either of us should be out here alone.”
Tethina smiled mischievously. “Nice try. But there’s no way I’m letting you watch me bathe. I could keep an eye on you if you want, but I think I’ve already seen enough.” She looked at his bare chest suspiciously, making him feel exposed and self-conscious.
He looked at himself, ghost white with stick arms, flat chest, and flabby middle. He was certainly no model of manhood. How could someone like Tethina ever be attracted to this? he thought. She deserves better. He suddenly felt the intense desire to cover himself and fought to keep his arms from folding across his chest. “I. . . I didn’t mean,” he tried.
Tethina just laughed and strode toward the shelter. She disappeared inside a moment later. Dasen looked at the blood-soaked rag that was his shirt, wondering if he could possibly wear it again. He was just picking it up to see what he could salvage when Tethina emerged. She was wearing hide pants, a loosely laced men’s shirt with a heavy leather vest over it, a wide-brimmed leather hat, and a new pair of doe-skin shoes. She carried her short bow and had a quiver of arrows slung over her shoulder. If he did not know better, Dasen would have thought that a boy had emerged instead of his wife.
The sentiment must have been obvious because she cut him off before he could comment. “Don’t say a word. This is what I have. It is also much more practical for the forest, and it’s what I normally wore around the village as well, so get used to it.”
Dasen clamped his mouth shut and swallowed his words. He had certainly known that she didn’t always wear dresses, but actually seeing her in pants and a shirt made it all real. Rynn had been correct. If she showed up in the city looking like that, he would never live it down. She would be an outcast and he’d be a laughing stock. He made a mental note to find her a new dress before they got anywhere civilized.
Tethina threw a shirt at him. “Here, this will probably be too small, but it’s the only other one I have. Oh, and give me your pendant.” Dasen looked at her incredulous then realized that she had removed her pendant as well. Once couples were joined, they seldom if ever removed their pendants. It was the symbol that marked them as joined in the Order. Without them, no would know or believe that they were man and wife. It was like she was asking to end their joining.
“Don’t make a big deal of it.” Tell rolled her eyes.
“It’s just a pendant, and you didn’t even make it. I might as well be joined to some jeweler. Besides, we may need to hide our identities, might not want the bandits or someone else to know that you are worth a flaming fortune. You have no idea what some people would do for that kind of money.” Teth seemed only then to realize what she had said. She blanched slightly and brought her hand to her mouth. “I guess we both know what they’ll do,” she whispered. “But that just proves my point, so let me have it. I’ll hide them in the shelter. We can come back for them or have someone come and get them when this is all over, but we can’t risk the wrong people finding them on us.” Faced with that logic, Dasen reluctantly unclasped the gold chain and handed the pendant to Teth. He was stinging from her comment about the jeweler but had only himself to blame for that. She ran to the shelter. A second later, he heard her moving the stone that protected her secret storage area.
While she was away, Dasen unfolded the rough homespun wool shirt and examined it. He hated wearing wool next to his skin. It itched like crazy, and this was not even quality wool. It was rough as tree bark. The weave was loose and uneven, the fabric undyed. The collar was laced with a leather thong in a truly barbaric style. He sighed, looked down at his chest, felt the rising sun beating through the trees on his exposed back, and pulled the shirt over his head. The shoulders were tight, the arms ended well before his wrists, the body barely reached the top of his pants, and it itched and scratched everywhere it touched him. He sighed again, scratched at his neck, and looked toward Tethina, who was returning from the shelter and walking to the body of the creature.
“Better than I thought,” she said with a smile. “Now bring over your old shirt and that blanket. Grab the water too.”
Dasen did as he was told but diverted his eyes from the creature when he reached its body. Tethina seemed no more comfortable around the thing, but she maintained her command. “Lay out the blanket here. We’ll use it to carry this thing to the stream.” Dasen spread the blanket in a clear area near the body. Tethina moved to the thing’s head and motioned him toward the feet. At her prompting, he grabbed the ankles, felt the oil from its fur coating his hands. He studied the thick claws on its four-toed feet. This thing was not human, had never been. But what was it then? And who were these raiders that they could have something like this with them?
“Okay roll it onto the blanket” interrupted Dasen’s contemplation. Together, he and Tethina rolled the creature so it lay face-down on the blanket. Tethina placed her dress, Dasen’s shirt, and the water bag on the thing then grabbed the two blanket corners near its head. With another sigh, Dasen lifted the corners at its feet. The creature was heavy, but with much grunting and several stops, they managed to haul it to the stream. Tethina tied the corners of the blanket around its body then pushed it into the water. The current quickly grabbed it and pulled it from sight. A moment later, she added their blood-soaked clothes to the water.
Tethina shuddered. “Well that’s taken care of.” She watched the forest around them then reached into the pocket of her pants and pulled out a thick bar of soap. “You can go first,” she said. “I’m going to find our dinner.” Dasen opened his mouth to protest, but she cut him off, “Don’t worry, I’ll be close. If anything happens, just yell. If you see people, try to hide. Barring that, yell out their number and where they are coming from, but don’t give away that I’m out here. Got it? Oh, and fill the water skin too, okay?”
Dasen nodded. He watched the trees, feeling horribly exposed.
Tethina turned to go but seemed to remember something and turned back. “I almost forgot. From now on, until we are in a village, I am a boy, your male cousin, got it? That includes the forest masters, understood?”
Dasen examined her again. She had obviously wrapped a cloth around her, already small, breasts. Her hair was shorter than most boys and her build was exactly that of a lanky fourteen-year-old. “That shouldn’t be a problem,” he replied before he could stop himself.
The comment earned him a shot in the arm. But Tethina did not otherwise respond. She turned and bounded into the trees. In a few heartbeats, Dasen could not see or hear any sign of her.
With a deep breath, he pulled the cork from the bag and bent to fill it. It was a much easier task now that the stiffness had left him, knee no longer ached, head wasn’t pounding. The thought brought him back to the creature. Could it be some unknown thing from the swamps of Sylia? Or maybe the far north? Maybe the bandits were Morgs. They were a secretive people – outsiders were seldom allowed into the Fells. It was possible that rouge bands shaved and rode horses, possible that creatures like the one they’d encountered lived there unknown to those outside. It was the most obvious answer. It didn’t feel right, but Dasen took comfort from it anyway. Tethina was probably right, he decided. The bandits couldn’t search for them en masse on this side of the river. The real danger would come when the crossed.
Reassured, he admired his surroundings and decided that this was without doubt one of the most beautiful places he had ever seen: the crystal clear water, towering pines, jagged snowcapped mountains. His every sense was infused by it, the scent of wildflowers and pine, the sounds of rushing water, birds, and squirrels, the sensation of the cold water rushing over his hands. The air even tasted better here. The tranquility of it effused him, and his fears seemed to ebb away until he had almost forgotten the shadows that had been stalking his imagination a moment before.
He secured the cork in the bag and placed it on the bank of the stream, found the bar of soap, and pulled off his shirt. After one more inspection of the trees to be certain that Tethina, or something else, was not watching, he shed his pants and took a tentative step into the water.
It was refreshing on the hot day, but the water felt like it had come off of a glacier, and he was soon shivering from the cold. He waded in nearly to the middle, until the water reached mid-thigh, then dunked himself a few times. He came up shivering and made use of the soap. By the time he had scrubbed away the blood and grime, he was trembling, his teeth chattering. He was just taking a last dunk to get the soap from his hair when a rustle from the trees froze him in place. Kneeling so that the water reached his chest, he watched the spot carefully, and to his horror, Tethina emerged.
“Look what I got.” She held up a pair of grouse with arrows still protruding from their chests. “I hit them on the fly. Pretty good shots too.”
Dasen dropped his hands to cover himself and stammered. Tethina spoke over his outrage. “Don’t worry. I can’t see anything below the water, and I’ve already seen what’s above it.” She raised her eyebrow appraisingly, nonetheless, and stood on her toes. Dasen spun awkwardly around, nearly toppling as he fought the current from his knees without the use of his hands.
“I expect you are just about done?” Tethina seemed to enjoy his embarrassment. “Can I have the soap? I’m going upstream to a still pool. When you’re done, take these birds and my bow back and make a fire. And don’t get any ideas about watching me.” Her voice turned hard. “I can hear you coming from a mile away, and I’ll cut your eyes out if you are any closer than that.”
“How am I supposed to bring you the soap while you’re standing there?” Dasen asked when it became apparent that Tethina did not have any intention to leave.
“Well, if I leave, that will make it much harder for you to bring me the soap, won’t it?” She laughed.
“You know what I mean.”
“Do I? A couple of days ago you were planning to show me everything you have in the back of your coach. So now you don’t feel so confident . . . ?”
Dasen looked back at her, incredulous. How could she bring that up again? He was preparing to defend himself, when she started laughing. “You are too easy. Just throw me the soap, and I’ll spare your innocence.”
Dasen could not help but smile. He had to stop underestimating hi
s wife. She was right, he was too easy. He tossed the soap over his shoulder, but it slipped out of his hand and landed in the trees well away from its intended target.
Tethina snuffed but went into the trees to retrieve the errant bar. “Okay. You’re safe now,” she called. “Though you really never know. I could be hiding anywhere out here. Maybe I’ll wait and see what you have to offer.” Dasen rolled his eyes but refused to rise to the bait. When the comment did not earn the desired reaction, Tethina laughed. “Must not be much then. I guess I’ll just have to wait until you find another coach.”
With that, she disappeared into the trees. As she said, there was no chance that Dasen could find her if she didn’t want him to, so he retreated slowly from the water, trying to keep his back facing upstream. Finally, he emerged from the water and realized how ridiculous he was being. They were joined after all. If she wanted to see him naked, let her.
He wiped away as much of the water as he could, allowing the sun to warm his shivering body, then pulled on his clothes. While he dressed, he felt his resolve build. He would show her, he decided, so he picked up the grouse, water bag, bow, and quiver. It took a moment to find a way to carry all those things, but when he finally had everything settled, he jogged back to the shelter determined to show Tethina what he could do.