Chapter Three
I turned Shame’s reedpipes over and over in my hands, softly caressing their naturally smooth surface. Five dark red reeds, each carefully hollowed out and cut to various lengths. Small, rounded holes were carved into the sides, each one flawless and the exact same size as the next. I hadn’t tried playing them yet, but I could imagine their deep, enigmatic sound.
There was nothing remarkable about the reedpipes, other than the fact that they were Shame’s, as they are quite a common instrument. But, as widespread as they are, I have no idea how to play them. I doubted I could strike up a simple tune, let alone the Stone Kingdom’s anthem.
Mam handed me a streaming mug of mint tea. I accepted it and deeply inhaled the pleasant aroma that sent ice shooting through my veins. I took a sip, immediately scalding my tongue, and dragged my stool closer to the fire, where Mam and Shame sat.
“… shocked; he was a quiet man,” Shame was saying, hands closed around his own warm cup of tea. “A good man, but quiet. Didn’t have many friends, but it was still a mournful event for everyone.”
“I’d be worried if it wasn’t,” Mam snorted and shook her head sadly, staring into the dancing flames that cast long, quivering shadows. “I could almost pity a person who gets Forsaken, if they weren’t criminals.”
My stomach gave an involuntary jolt at the word Forsaken. Forsakenment is a ritual that’s only performed for the most severe crimes. In the ceremony, a person is stripped of their totem, gets a tattoo of exile on their chest if they’re a man, on their forehead if they’re a woman, and is sent away from the village and shunned by all. It is said that if a person is not in possession of their original totem, they will be corrupted with Soul Sickness, live a life full of agonizing pain, and die an excruciating death, which is why no one, sane or otherwise, wants to be anywhere near somebody Forsaken. The only people who don’t get Soul Sickness are children under the age of sixteen, since their souls are still young and developing, resulting in the inability to attach themselves to a totem.
“Who was Forsaken?” I inquired, shuddering deeply.
Shame turned to face me, his expression dark, although whether it was because he still suspected I wasn’t telling him something or because of the repulsive topic we were discussing. “A man from the Fire Kingdom, whose true name hasn’t been disclosed. They’re calling him Flamewolf now. Actually, they’ve been calling him that for a while. It’s his criminal name.”
“But I thought you just said he was a good man,” Mam pointed out.
“He is,” Shame said. “All the crimes he committed in the past were to help others. You see, Queen Apathy, the ruler of the land of fire, is quite prejudiced against the Warlocks of Eternal Flame.”
I cocked my head sideways, recalling that name deep from the recesses of my mind. “But why? Don’t they derive from the same ancestors?”
Shame pushed my head playfully. “You need a history lesson, Joy. Yes, both the Bloodline Mystics of the Fire Kingdom and the Warlocks of Eternal Flame come from the same family, which explains why the Warlocks have some control over their element even though their power is weak compared to that of the royal family’s. But the Warlocks are just a distant branch in the family, so distant, in fact, that they are considered to be a different family altogether and are not permitted to become king or queen. Thousands of years ago, the Warlocks were considered part of the Royal Mystic family, although they could not serve as heirs. During the time of King Honor, one Warlock by the name of Pride Pellet claimed that he had walked through the Fire World, an ability that Warlocks weren’t supposed to have.
“Now, the fire people are a very proud and greedy race, so when King Honor heard of what Pride was telling everyone, he became fearful that the Warlocks’ powers would eventually become strong enough to say that they had rights to the throne as well. This didn’t sit well with Honor, so he called Pride Pellet into his court and had him executed in front of the entire family of Warlocks. Honor then banished the Warlocks to the kingdom’s remote southeastern border, where they have lived until King Fable’s reign.”
Shame took a long sip of mint tea before continuing. “King Fable allowed the Warlocks into the towns again, despite the discouraging of his sages and the complaints of the people. He welcomed the Warlocks warmly, giving them equal rights under the Eternal Flame Act, although that didn’t stop citizens from abusing the Warlocks. Ten years after the act was put into effect, King Fable died mysteriously with no cause given for explanation. As Fable’s only son passed away as an infant, his eldest daughter, Apathy, inherited the throne.
“Apathy despised the Warlocks, treating them the same way her great grandfathers had many years ago; with great disdain and utter revulsion.”
“Then why didn’t she just get rid of the Eternal Flame Act and exile the Warlocks again?” I asked.
“You are so naïve, Joy,” Fury called from the corner of the room where he lounged at the dinner table, feet propped up, counting his totems. He must have been listening in to our conversation, much to my surprise. “Why would you send someone you hate away to live peacefully when you can keep them close and torment them? It’s called slavery.”
I scowled at Fury’s know-it-all tone. “She still could’ve gotten rid of the Eternal Flame Act.”
Shame sighed. “And so she did, but unfortunately, your brother is right on the part about slaves. Apathy works the Warlocks like they have no breaking point. She keeps them in her castle to serve her so she can live her life with maximum comfort, and if one of them does so much as to even touch her, she’ll have them tortured for days. She has them working long hours in the fields for farming, every day doing back-breaking work in the heat of the sun. She gives them no rights. If she sees a Warlock collapsed on the road in sheer pain, she would spit on him, laugh, and continue on her way like nothing happened. If evil had a women’s face, Apathy is it.”
“So where does that villain come in, the one that got Forsaken?” I prompted.
“Who, Flamewolf? Well, first, he was supposed to be Forsaken, but he escaped before the sages even managed to change into their ceremonial robes. He’s the first person to ever have avoided a Forsakenment after he’s been sentenced to one. Second, Flamewolf is a Warlock of Eternal Flame. He obviously has no love for his queen; people say that he ran away from her palace when he was only seven years old. He works as a criminal under the name Flamewolf to help his fellow Warlocks. He steals food and water for them, and clothing too, since most of them are only provided with one pair. Anything he can steal and give them to help their lives as slaves, he does. Apathy’s soldiers have caught him several times, but he’s like a ghost; he managed to escape every time with his cell still locked.
“Very recently, however, Flamewolf was captured again. He was scheduled for a Forsakenment not only for his past crimes, but also because he killed on of Apathy’s officials for whipping a Warlock close to death.”
“But he got away again,” I finished in awe.
“He got away again,” Shame affirmed, nodding, with a hint of admiration in his voice. “He’s frustrated Apathy so much, she’s made him public enemy number one, and has a twenty thousand gold coin reward for his death.”
Mam glanced out the window and stood up. “It’s late,” she said, gathering our empty cups, “and Shame leaves early tomorrow morning. It’s time for bed.”
Just as Mam finished speaking, I became aware of how tired I was. I stifled a yawn, and after a quick goodnight to Shame and Mam, I headed up the ladder to the loft. I walked past Fury’s old bed that h slept in during visits, kicked off my boots, and snuggled deep into the warm covers. The last thing I heard before drifting off was Mam ordering Fury to bed.
*****
I dreamed that I was standing at the edge of a pond, completely stranded with snowy, flat plains in every direction. I was alone, save the angel who stood next to me.
She looked harmless enough; dark green eyes and vibrant red hair with maroon feathered wings sprouting from her shoulder blades and a simple gray dress that fluttered in the gentle breeze. She smiled kindly and pointed to the three rocks at my feet. “Throw those stones into the water. If one of them floats, then you’ll know that I’m a real angel.”
It sounded simple enough. I picked up a rock, which weighed nothing in my dream, and tossed it into the pond. It sunk like any other one would’ve. I chose another once and pitched it in. That one sunk as well.
I looked down. One more left. This one would float; it had to.
I threw it. The rock arced gracefully, slicing through the air with flawless ease. I watched anxiously as it plunged into the water, paused just beneath the surface, and floated back up. It dove back down suddenly, then jumped back up, like two invisible forces were playing tug-of-war. The process repeated numerous times, before finally, the rock never reappeared on top of the water.
A random urging to get the stones back took hold of me, but before I could move, the angel’s menacing laugh filled my ears, robbing me of all thought. I swiveled my head slowly to find the angel was not an angel anymore at all. Her wings had disappeared, and her once kind eyes were now filled with a demonic chaos. She was laughing again, cruelly, at my startled unease.
Two clones of the angel-now-demon materialized at her sides, mimicking her movements as she bent over giggling. I stared, horrified yet unable to move, and realized that the eyes of her twins… they were so familiar…
And then she was grabbing my shoulder and shaking me like a maniac, her replicas closing in, and I opened my mouth to shriek, and suddenly I was awake, and it was only Mam shaking me, her face deathly pale in the moonlight that streamed like liquid silver through the window.
“Don’t speak,” Mam hissed, pulling me to my feet. “Do exactly as I say. Get dressed and go down to your godfather Shame. Do it now!”
“But—“
“Shh!” Mam snapped. “Now! Quickly!’
I obeyed and slid down the ladder. Fury was already there, a bag slung over his shoulder, glaring at every dark shadow.
“What’s going on?” I asked Shame, but he put his finger to his lips and shook his head. I shut my mouth and the house became ominously quiet. It was through that quiet that I heard the screams.
They cut through the night like a knife. There were three distinctive kinds. The first one was a high-pitched howl of absolute terror; unpleasant but bearable. The next spoke of agony, of pain that made the mind blind and set the body on unquenchable fire. The last was the worse. It was human, definitely human, but with a possessed, animal-like quality to it that made my whole being quail at the thought of what kind of horror could possibly cause someone to make such a sound. Mingled with these mind-scarring screams were cries for mercy and a constant, deep moaning that sounded like death.
I was shaking. I knew I was, and I tried to stop, but I couldn’t. What was happening?
And then, I saw it. Through the crack in the curtains, the windows revealed our village torn up in flames that licked the sky with forked tongues. Figures were fleeing for their lives, but they seemed completely disoriented and ran amuck, in circles, or in the direction opposite of the road that led out of town. Among all the panic-stricken villagers were strange, hunch people who walked quickly, but with a gait that suggested they were battling pain with each step. These people were more numerous than the citizens. It wasn’t until one of them walked into the firelight that I realized what they were.
I gasped in shocked horror. The fire revealed a bony, rotting hand. Bits of bloody flesh dangled grotesquely from disgustingly long fingernails. The being stepped forward and his face came into view. His head was topped with an unkempt week of long, limp black hair. He bore sunken cheeks that were tinged gray. And his eyes… they were soul-less, hollow things that were set above a nonexistent nose and a tongue-less, toothless mouth.
I collapsed onto my knees, shuddering waves of revulsion sweeping through me. I retched, light-headed and dizzy.
Shame pulled me to my feet by my elbow, his grip too firm and strong to resist. “Come now, Joy, we must be strong.”
Mam appeared at my side, a bag of coins in her hand. “Here’s what we’re going to do,” she said in a low voice. “Joy and Fury, you two follow me to the Heavenhope Mountains; the undead can’t climb very efficiently, so we should be safe there. Shame will try to alleviate the situation a bit before he joins us. Am I clear?”
I grabbed Shame’s wrist. “No!” I wheezed, still more than a little sickened by the undead man I’d seen through the window. “You can’t go up against the undead! They’re undead. You need the other two sages, or at least a couple dozen mystics.”
Shame pried my fingers off, his face set. “I’m the only one who has a chance, Joy. I can’t leave the undead to pillage the town without at least trying to stop them.”
“The Shaman,” I begged, knowing already that my argument would fail. “He can deal with them.”
“The Shaman is weak,” Shame sighed, “much weaker than I am. He must be kept safe.” Shame gathered me into a tight hug, and then pushed me gently away. He kissed Mam on the forehead, patted Fury on the shoulder, and then he was gone through the door and into the din.
I bit back my sobs, but tears trickled down my cheeks in silence. I hardly heard Fury when he said, “What are the undead doing here? This is much too far north for them.”
Mam shrugged helplessly. “It makes no sense to me either. How they managed to get here is a mystery.” She glanced out the window and grabbed our hands. “Coast is clear. Hang tight onto me now, understand?” Mam took a deep breath and made the obvious effort to put on a brave face. “Let’s go.”
We stepped outside and I fought the need to vomit again. The stench of the undead and their rotting bodies blended with the sour smell of smoke and burning flesh of those who couldn’t escape the flames. My free hand that Mam wasn’t clutching with a bone-shattering grip groped to cover my mouth and nose. Heat blazed across my face as the smell of smoke stung my eyes and set me off on a coughing fit. Mam pulled urgently at my hand and I followed blindly, fighting the wild panic that was blooming in my chest.
I couldn’t tell where Fury and Mam were ahead of me; fire seemed to be omnipresent and malicious, like the jeering face of an enemy, and besides, the coughs racked my body so violently I couldn’t look ahead of me even if the town wasn’t ablaze. For all I knew, I could be holding desperately onto the frail hand of an undead, leading me away so they could throttle me and feast on my healthy, pink flesh…
I chased the nightmare-ish thought away and focused wholly upon following Mam’s tugging. Nothing disastrous was going to happen, we were going to reach the mountains, safe from the army of the dead, and then, when everything had simmered down, Shame would join us, maybe with a minor scratch or two and a non-lethal burn, but strong all the same. Everything was going to be fine…
Close by—unsettlingly close, in face—a shriek of agonized horror sounded, as if discouraging my campaign of grimly optimistic thoughts. I jumped, the hairs on the back of my neck prickling unpleasantly. The scream rang out again, but was quickly reduced to a defeated sob full of pain, which was accompanied by a deep, groaning sound. Mam hurriedly yanked me away, but as I rant past a house that had not yet caught fire, I glimpsed through the gaping doorway a sight that made my knees wobble unsteadily. Prudence, a sweet twelve year old girl in the village, was withering in silent pain that hurt to watch. An undead man was crouching over her body, his gray teeth clamped around her hand that was jerking as spasms rocked her back and forth. It was from this man that the moaning sound came from, although I couldn’t tell if they were sounds of pleasure or emptiness.
The fact that a once-dead man was biting a twelve year old girl wasn’t the horror, however. The horror was the result of the bite. As I watched, nauseated but unable to tear my gaze away, Prudence’s hand began to shrivel and turn a pale gray color. The skin tightened before shrinking away to nothingness, leaving the bones of her hand exposed for all to see. The skin that didn’t disappear began to take on the appearance that it had been rotting for decades.
Prudence’s hand was no longer human. It was that of an undead.
Body numb with appalled shock, I let Mam lead me away. Although I was sure that I looked to be in a daze, my mind was whirring. How was that possible? How could Prudence have turned into an undead from getting bitten? In order for someone to become undead, they had to die first and then rise from the grave… How was it possible that Prudence became one of them? If they could take from both the deceased and the living, then their numbers would shoot up dramatically.
I hardly had any time to be worried about this new revelation, however, when there were more pressing matters at hand. The path leading to the mountains was blocked by an enormous, blazing tree trunk that had fallen to create an impassable barrier. Mam wheeled around to take a detour, only to fly right into the arms of a skeletal body.
My hands clung desperately to Mam, but the undead man was stronger than his haggard appearance suggested. My grip was torn away with the sound of Mam’s half surprised, half alarmed intake of breath. With a ferocity I didn’t know was in her, Mam slammed her shoulder hard against the man’s chest. He let out a grunt and staggered backward a step but quickly regained balance and advanced toward Mam, arms outstretched as if delivering a great bear hug.
“Joy!” Mam yelled, fending off the dead man’s reaching hands. “Where is your brother?”
I whipped my head around, searching wildly through the flames for any sign of Fury. I spotted his retreated figure just in time before he rounded a corner and disappeared. Maybe such an action shouldn’t have caught me by surprise, considering it’s Fury, but I gawked nonetheless.
“That heartless, stupid—!” My eyes fell on Mam and my anger was replaced with fearful alarm. The man’s yellow, crooked teeth had just sunken into the flesh on Mam’s arm. With a grunt, Mam shoved the attack’s head away, groaning with pain as some of her skin tore away along with him. Horror kept me paralyzed as the area around the wound began to turn a sickly, stomach-churning gray. Mam swayed a little, teeth clenched tightly shut, beads of sweat slipping down her forehead; she looked like she was resisting the urge to be sick.
“Mam!” I shrieked and rushed forward to tackle the undead being who was creeping up behind my mother, but before I could fling myself at him, Mam spun around, catching me by my collar, and twisted to the side, the man’s fingers missing us by centimeters.
“Joy,” Mam panted, bent over and looking utterly exhausted, “Joy, listen to me, you’ve got to—“
She stopped talking abruptly and pushed me to the side. With her non-bitten arm, on which the gray color was spreading quickly, she pushed a second undead man who had three decapitated fingers had in the chest. The man looked completely unaffected, however, and promptly grabbed Mam’s wrist, turned it upward to face him, and bit savagely into it. Mam took a deep, shuddering breath of pain as blood dripped to the ground.
I raced forward, ears filled with the sound of my own scream, but before I’d taken two steps, Mam twisted her whole body, wrenching her wrist away, and delivered a stunningly high kick to the fingerless man’s temple, sending him sprawled in the dirt. The first undead man helped the second to his feet, and together, they faced Mam, who was leaning on her knees, chest heaving.
A house nearby suddenly collapsed inward, sending red hot sparks flying in all directions. I yelled and pulled Mam out of the burning shower and took a quick assessment of the environment around us. Fire was everywhere, creating an almost complete circle around me, Mam, and the two undeads, the only escape route being an alley between two houses to our left. If we delayed any longer, we’d surely be fenced in with two people back from the grave for company.
I slipped my arm through Mam’s and considered escaping using our totems, but dismissed the thought almost immediately. Such a plan might’ve worked, if Mam was something small, like a lizard or a mouse, so I could hold her in my talons and take to the sky, but Mam is a deer, much too large and heavy for me to carry. And no way was I going to try to fight the two undeads myself, not when Mam looked in such desperate need of medical help.
As casually as I could, so as not to give my intention away, I shifted my feet to point to the narrow opening in the flames while simultaneously tightening my hold on Mam. I tensed my legs to make a break fro it, but just a fraction of a second before I could break away with Mam, one of the undeads, the first one, pelted toward us with sped like that of a fit young man, something totally unexpected. He jumped and launched himself onto Mam’s back, locking his arms and legs around her neck and waist, like he was getting a piggy-back ride. A movement out of the corner of my eye drew my attention to the fingerless man. I leapt aside, narrowly avoided him as he hurled himself at where I’d stood just a moment before.
I looked up to see Mam stagger a few steps. My eyes darted to the undead man on her back and time froze as a bubble of appalled, uncomprehending shock engulfed my brain.
There was a hold in Mam’s neck, a hole like that if someone had just taken a huge bite of her. Mam’s head hung limply like a rag dolls’ as she swayed on the spot, resembling a drunkard. The open wound was tinged a shade of green that evoked images of deathly illness. Moving slowly like the effort took all the strength she had, Mam raised her head to look at me and mouthed one word: Go.
I stood, rooted to the spot, staring, disbelieving, as Mam’s eyes turned blank, although it was not the peaceful blank look the deceased wear. Hers was like that of emptiness, like there was no sign that a soul had ever inhabited her body. As if in slow motion, Mam’s knees took forever to crumple, and her fall seemed to last a lifetime.
Something brushed against me quite suddenly, and immediately I was filled with a darkness that infiltrated my entire being, a dark that made me feel as cold as if I’d been hit with one of Fury’s stares. Breath was stolen from my lungs, and although it felt like I was suffocating at first, the feeling was not altogether unpleasant. The scene of the burning village transformed into a fairly small field of dead grass. The sky overhead was pitch black, like it was in the dead of night except that there was no sign of stars or a moon.
I looked around, utterly confused. What happened? Where were the two undeads? Where was Mam? What happened to the village? Where was I?
I seemed to be the only person in sight, which wasn’t surprising, seeing how the meadow gave off an aura of desolation and hopelessness. I took a few tentative steps and glanced over my shoulder. Nothing behind me but a wall of foreboding trees that were ominously tall.
This was bad, bad, very bad. How did I get here? What kind of insane trick is this? What kind of cursed magic teleported me to this abandoned field? I surely didn’t do it, unless I had some unknown power hidden deep in the corners of my being…
And then it hit me. Was I dead? Had I been bitten by one of those monstrous undead men? That must be it; what else could it be? I was obviously not in the spirit world, for this place was much too wretched, so that must mean that my soul had split or something when I was bitten… It made sense; undead people are one of the most impure beings in existence.
I whipped by head back and forth. I couldn’t be the only person here. Surely there were others who had died under similar circumstances… and yet, no one came forth and there was no sign that there had been any previous inhabitants. But what about Mam? She died the same way I did; shouldn’t she be here with me?
The thought of staying here of all places with no one for company other than the sorrow-ridden trees was unbearable. Not having Mam was unthinkable. Being dead—dead!—was… actually, if I’m being completely honest, no that bad. The concept of it felt odd to turn over in my head, like wearing a tunic that was too small, but the actual sensation and feeling of it was uncomfortably cold and yet somehow pleasant at the same time. I felt lightweight, like if I let myself go at any moment, I would float upward to the deep, black sky and keep going, never coming back down. This strange feeling of contented disquiet almost eclipsed the feeling of being hopelessly lonely. Almost, but not quite.
Something white suddenly appeared to my right, materializing without any preamble, as if whatever it was had popped right out of thin air. I swung around to face it, hope rising in my chest; the thing was not just white, it was ghostly white. “Mam?” my lips asked, but my throat produced no sound. I opened my mouth to try again, but the impulse to do so died away when I took another look at the ghost figure. It was not, in fact, Mam, but an unfamiliar man, normal-looking with a stubby beard and a strong build. He stared straight at me and I stared straight back, unsure if I should do something. After a long moment of just standing and staring, the man raised his hand, in greeting or in warning I couldn’t tell.
And then, not a second after he lifted his hand up, I was falling, as if my feet and legs couldn’t hold the weight of my body anymore. I gasped, a signal that something was changing, because when I first arrived at the field, I couldn’t breathe at all. My body hit the ground with a dull thud, but it wasn’t soft grass beneath me. As I made contact with the floor, the sky flashed back to the smoky scene, and the smell of burning wood invaded my nostrils. A groan that could only come from the undead sounded close by. With a start, I yanked myself to my feet, back in my dying town.
An undead man, the one with three missing fingers, was standing right next to me, and, as he turned to look at me with those vacant eyes, I could’ve sworn I saw confusion on his face, but that was impossible; the undead can feel not emotion.
I jumped away, out of the man’s reach, more puzzled than ever. Had I fainted for a few seconds? Was that it? I barely had any time to contemplate this, however, because the opening in the ring of flames around us was shrinking fast. Swallowing hard and resisting the urge to look back at Mam, because if I did, I might never get out of this alive, I sprinted across the circle to the opening. With a great cry, I jumped and hurtled over the fire barrier, feeling the heat tickle my belly and, landing clumsily, quickly regained balance and pelted away into the blazing night.
Mam was gone. Gone. Killed by the undead trying to protect me. There’s nothing you could’ve done, I told myself, but that didn’t extinguish the excruciating shadow of guilt that had taken hold of me. I felt numb with disbelief, my mind unable to fully comprehend the fact that Mam was never going to hug me or fuss over me again. All I wanted to do was to sit down on a rock and wait until someone told me I could see Mam, that she was okay, that she was waiting for me…
But that wasn’t what Mam wanted me to do. She hadn’t given up her life for me for nothing.
So, still in a state of dazed shock, I scurried north, dodging roaring fires and too many limp bodies that bore too many familiar faces. Whenever I rounded a corner and came face to face with one from the undead army, I’d wheel around and race away as fast as my feet could carry me, but there were so many crawling everywhere, like red ants guarding their beloved ant hill. Screams had stopped piercing the night, but somehow, that only made it worse; it felt like I was the only one on the entire planet left alive, the last victim to those undead beings.
I did my best to fight off the panic that was growing within me, but before long I felt like a blind madman stumbling around in the town that I no longer knew. Buildings were aflame and had collapsed into themselves, the remnants of windows gaping like silent, shrieking mouths. Fire had turned the village into a maze that I didn’t know the way out of. I staggered to a forked road, randomly chose the left route, and found myself in a whirlwind of sparks and flames that were taunting, jeering faces. I spun around; the way I’d come must be right behind me and then I could escape from this dead end, but I suddenly didn’t know left from right, backward from forward, and then the smoke was choking me, filling me with death with each breath I took, I could feel consciousness slipping away…
Out of nowhere, someone grabbed my wrist and yanked me into the fire.
I didn’t have time to brace myself, didn’t even have time to realize what was happening before it had already happened. I’d been pulled into the fire, surely I was finished, but instead I fell into the snow at someone’s feet, coughing and shuddering.
“About time!” someone barked from overhead. I gave one last hacking cough before lifting my head up weakly to look up into the towering face of my brother.
I lay in the snow for a long moment, gulping at the clean air and relishing the coldness of the snow on my sweaty skin. At last, with a groan, I managed to pull myself up into sitting position.
We were near the base of the Heavenhope Mountains, not too far from the fire that engulfed the village, just a few yards away, close enough to feel the heat pound against our faces. We were in a small ditch with a gentle, sloping side leading to our village. Smoke and fire obstructed all view of the homes that were destroyed. It was silent, save the crackling of the fire as sparks floated upward toward the twinkling stars.
I stared at Fury. Other than the fact that his furs and the tips of his shoulder-length, dirty blonde hair were singed, he looked perfectly fine. Fury didn’t spare me a glance, choosing instead to stare into the depths of the flames.
“Thanks,” I croaked, voice hoarse and throat unbearably dry.
“For what?” Fury snapped, still not looking at me.
“For pulling me out of the fire!” I snapped back.
Fury cast me a weird look. “What are you talking about?”
“You know what I’m talking about!” I snorted. Why was he acting like this? He should be gloating that he’s the most important person in the universe for saving me. “Just now, when you pulled me by my wrist and brought me here.”
“I did no such thing!” Fury growled. “You just burst out on your own, tripped over your own feet, and rolled down here.” He eyed me suspiciously. “How did you get out? You came right from the middle of the fire without a single serious burn!”
I looked down at myself. Fury was right; other than badly singed hair and a minor burn on my cheek, I looked about as fine as he did. Horribly shaken, maybe, but fine all the same.
“Well?” Fury demanded. “How did you do it?”
I glowered at him. “What about you, leaving me and Mam to fend for ourselves?” I yelled. “We ran into two undeads and you just left and now… and now Mam’s…”
Fury arched an eyebrow unconcernedly. “Dead?”
My blood boiled with rage. How could he act so nonchalant about it? How could he? She loved us, took care of us, and he acts like her being gone is no big deal?
“You heartless, self-centered bastard!” I screamed, ignoring the pain I was inflicting on my on throat. “You stupid, ungrateful jerk! She’s your mother! Don’t you feel any sadness at all? She cared about you more than anyone else! She loved you even after you left and never wrote to her like you said you would, even when you started treating her like she was a nobody! You just about broke her heart and she still loved you! How can you not care after all—“
“WILL YOU JUST SHUT UP?!” Fury bellowed and struck me hard against the side of my head. Flashes of white danced across my eyeballs as I slumped against the ground, breathing hard and gingerly feeling my face for any sign of injury.
Fury stared at me, chest heaving and eyes blazing like a maniac. He clenched his fists hard at his sides and seethed through clenched teeth, “You don’t know anything.” Then he turned around and strode away.
I considered letting him leave without me; it would probably be better for both of us. But Mam’s face swam before me until I blinked hard. I could never leave Fury. I hated him with all my heart, but I knew almost instinctively that I had to stick with him for Mam. I had to follow him.
I let him get a few feet’s head start, then, very reluctantly, picked myself up and walked after him.
