CHAPTER SEVENTEEN #3
I’d given up repeating the lie of my origins long ago. Instead, I considered his question, albeit more defensively than was becoming. Upon contemplation, it was easy to see that I had referenced Milo’s age or size numerous times. The fact that he had a point was annoying.
“It’s not that you’re young—” I started, but the disbelieving incline of his brows as he shot me a look cut off my words.
“Fine, maybe I’m slightly perturbed that my courageous crossing was nearly thwarted by a transforming river lake thing, and that after narrowly surviving, I had to be saved by a child.
I mean, I thought my training would at the very least—”
“What training?”
I bit my tongue with a sharp inhale through flared nostrils.
Deception was not my strong suit, yet even I shouldn’t have let that slip.
I was exhausted in more ways than one, and unease was pressing against the denial I’d constructed in my mind, but that was no excuse; I had to conceal my identity if there was any chance of surviving in Grenythwood.
And that meant it was time to shift the conversation.
“To answer your earlier question,” I began rather pointedly, “of course appearances hold weight.” My entire existence in Lunamor would have been wildly dissimilar had I not been half Soran.
My hair and eyes were a brand I could not shake, and they had married me to a fate I never asked for.
“It’s not easy being so noticeably different. Sometimes I wish…”
It wasn’t until Milo paused, popping the lid from one of his larger pouches, that I realized we’d found ourselves in a clearing.
I joined him, retrieving my own leather flask and taking a quick pull. I looked around us, surveying the peculiar circular area we stood and its lack of trees in the immediate vicinity. Something tugged at the edges of my memory, but I couldn’t place it.
“Sometimes I wish it wasn’t so obvious,” I said finally, wiping the corners of my mouth.
Milo rested there for a moment, squinting at the cloud-covered sky. “I think you’ll enjoy the village.”
“Oh?”
“No one will care about your origins there.”
“Why? Is there an abundance of people who look like me?” I joked, securing my leather flask on my belt.
“No. I’ve only ever met one, and he’s a Scholar who lives just outside the village.
But if the strangest thing about you is that you’ve got blood of Sor in your veins, that might make you the most normal of us all!
” Milo’s grin overtook about half his face, and I couldn’t help the small laugh that eased the weight on my chest.
“I can’t imagine,” I admitted.
“Well, as luck would have it,” Milo said, his dimples deepening, “we’re just about there!” He pointed to the ground and my gaze followed, landing on a red-splotched dirt path we’d somehow stumbled upon without my noticing.
The jovial expression transforming his boyish features settled the nerves attempting to multiply in my stomach—he was giddy to show me his home, so it couldn’t be the uninhabitable bog I’d imagined for my entire life, could it?
In conjunction with one another, Milo and the forest we’d traveled through had been surprisingly pleasant, so I did my best to ignore the steady undercurrent of apprehension flowing through me.
“Herbalist Milo,” an approaching man called from behind, his hand wrapped around the leads of a white donkey with bags strapped to its back. The man’s light hair and tanned skin shimmered with sweat, dampening his dirty brown tunic.
“At your service,” Milo said, bowing low before popping his head up with that toothy grin.
The man offered a tired smile. “Returning from your scavenge, then?” He stopped beside us, gently running his hand down the donkey’s neck.
The donkey, in turn, began sniffing at my shoulder. I slowly leaned away, hesitant to make any sudden movements.
“Yes, indeed. And look here! Would you believe it? I’ve found myself a crosser.” Milo jerked his thumb in my direction.
I steeled myself with a sharp inhale, straightening my spine and raising my chin. I locked eyes with the man, his brown hues no doubt assessing my luminescent blues. His attention flicked up and down my form before he looked back at Milo with a disapproving brow.
“Why’s she dressed like a Hollow?”
“That’s what I’ve been saying!”
“Oh, would you both shut up?” I spat, decorum sorely lacking after the morning’s events. “If you’re so smart, the lot of you—wait, what exactly do you call yourselves?”
Milo rolled his eyes dramatically, angling towards the traveler and whispering in the most conspicuous manner: “This is what I’ve been dealing with all morning.”
The man’s attention skirted to the bits of my outfit he could see peeking through my cloak. Fortunately, he seemed more humored by Milo than insulted by me. “We’ve no single origin, if that’s what you’re getting at.”
As he turned towards Milo to discuss the highlights of the morning’s scavenge, I considered his words.
Lunamor, Sor, and Hollowmire all had distinct bloodlines and subsequent features that could identify the average citizen at a glance.
The fact that Grenythwood might be wholly disparate was…
fascinating. Perhaps Milo was right, and I wouldn’t be viewed as an outsider on sight—once I changed my outfit, apparently, as that seemed to be a sticking point.
“You better head in,” the traveler said suddenly. “I’m sure Master Catrin will be expecting you by now.”
Milo groaned. “If I have to spend the day pruning hollow henbane, I might not survive it. Let’s go, Lyssa.”
I tugged on my leather flask to ensure it was secure before nodding.
As I once again traced his footsteps, I was surprised that the excitement lighting up my body was far stronger than the nerves prickling my hands and feet.
I could still feel the lifelong warnings of Grenythwood pressing in on my consciousness with the thickness of a budding headache—or perhaps that was the ocean moss wearing off.
Either way, it wasn’t strong enough to deter my confident stride.
As we exited the clearing and followed the trail southeast, ‘cross if necessary’ was the loudest sentiment echoing in my mind.
I imagined Vicar as he scrawled the words out for his family.
Had he taken the same path I had to reach Grenythwood?
Had he found himself a guide, or did Bjorn endow him with enough knowledge to make the journey himself?
I might never have the answers to those questions, but somehow, I felt connected to him.
His guidance, along with Bjorn’s inconceivable misdirection to enable my escape, continued to quell the worries that threatened to disrupt my surety.
“We’re here,” Milo said suddenly, pulling me from my trance. He had stopped midstep to eye me expectantly, a mischievous grin twisting his lips and quirking his eyebrows.
I narrowed my gaze as I assessed the surrounding wood. It was only then that I noticed the traveler had disappeared entirely. I opened my mouth to say something, but thought better of it. The traveler’s whereabouts were of no concern to me.
“We’re where, exactly?” I said with an air of disbelief.
“Grenythwood village, of course!” Milo crossed his arms triumphantly.
My eyebrows could not have indented more if I wanted them to.
I turned this way and that, incredulity prompting impatient sighs.
I saw nothing but the same forest we’d trekked through all morning.
It wasn’t until I looked down that I noticed the trail Milo and I had been following ended rather abruptly just a few paces ahead.
Suddenly, it felt as though a cloak of unease had been draped over my body.
The gifts that accompany fear began opening themselves: a sudden shortness of breath, the taste of copper coating my tongue, the loud thrumming of my now-audible heartbeat, and the unmistakable uproar of vitality flooding my veins.
But something else followed. A faint prickling at the edge of my senses.
A barely-there haze, the whisper of a hum.
A massive, familiar sensation was on the verge of being discovered, like a word hovering on the tip of my tongue, and yet I couldn’t quite place it.
I locked eyes with Milo, his silvery hazels wide and awe-struck.
“I’ve never seen someone unveil before,” he said, practically bouncing on the balls of his feet.
“That makes two of us,” I managed, unable to disguise the nervousness in my voice. “What exactly is unveiling?”
“The village has to make sure you’re not here to harm us,” Milo claimed, as if that made any sense at all. “Don’t worry. It’ll be over soon.”
Milo was clearly trying to comfort me, but the discomfort of this seemingly in-between state only grew.
I began shaking, a fruitless attempt to contain the energy expanding from my mind.
The whole of my existence felt tenuous, as though I might come apart any moment, and only the strength of my will kept me put together.
A strength that was devolving in front of me. “W-What’s… happening?”
“Don’t be scared!”
If only that were possible.
I squealed as I dropped to the ground, shadows undulating on the edges of my vision.
“I don’t like this,” I said on all fours, clawing at the fallen leaves beneath my hands to feel something real.
“Make it stop,” I cried. “Make it stop!” I grabbed the sides of my head, screwing my face up in response to the indescribable psychic pain battering my skull.
“Help! Help us!” Milo’s throat-ripping scream was the last thing I heard before the sensation overtook me entirely—and then I was gone.