Chapter 17
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
FOX
S ofia didn’t even bother chasing after the man as he ran in the forest. At least Fox thought he had run away. One moment, Fox was looking at him and the next the man had crouched, folding into the shadow and then…
Fox shook his head, trying to clear his thoughts. He was exhausted beyond reason and his head was ringing with pain. He could only watch as Sofia turned on her heels, lunging at the other man who was struggling to stand after Fox had managed to bash his head with a rock three times. She drew the blade across his throat and he fell, unmoving. Perhaps he should have been relieved to see the man dead, but the coldness of the act made him shudder.
“Should we go after—” he started when she finally turned to look at him. Unable to finish the sentence, he gave a vague wave in the direction the man had run.
She raised an eyebrow. “He’ll be miles away by now, unless you can run at the speed of a wolfshifter.”
The sentence didn’t make sense and he stared at her blankly. “He was injured, he won’t make it that far. No man could.”
“Shifters can do a lot of things humans can’t,” she said, matter-of-factly.
He clenched his jaw. “You keep saying that word like it means something.”
“Shifters?” she said, not bothering to hide the sneer at his confusion. “Do you want me to explain it to you like you’re a child? Those—” she pointed a finger into the dark “—were not just men. We’re lucky to be alive. I don’t know a human who’s seen a wolfshifter and lived to tell about it.”
“Shifters are mythical beings from Dragonborn stories.”
“Well, you should tell them that,” she said, kicking the man at her feet. “Or better yet, chase down the wolf that just shifted directly in front of you and tell him.”
“I didn’t see anyone shift ,” he said and he meant it. It had been dark—all he’d seen was the man crouch over and disappear.
“You’re an idiot,” she said bluntly.
His face burned.
“And this idiot just saved your life.”
“I’m pretty sure, I saved yours first.”
“I wouldn’t have needed saving had you not kidnapped me.”
“It was running away that got you into trouble!”
He threw his hands up in frustration. “Sorry, oh captor of mine. Next time, I’ll stay tied up and quietly wait for you to chop me into small pieces.”
“I was hardly going to chop you up,” she said and he thought he could almost sense amusement in her voice. “It would have been a finger or two at most.”
He didn’t see the joke.
“Feral bitch,” he muttered, plenty loud for her to hear.
She only rolled her eyes and turned away from him to pick up her bag.
“That’s mine!” He moved to grab the dagger she was sliding into her belt, but she sidestepped before he could.
“I don’t think so.” She turned, pointing it at him, more in annoyance than as a threat. “A, this is Emilio’s blade, not yours. B, I definitely don’t trust you with a weapon. And C, you’re still my captive.”
Fox laughed, full-throated. He waved his arms around them, as if she might not have taken in their situation until now. “What do you plan on doing? Tying me up and dragging me the however many miles back?”
“I won’t tie you up if you promise not to run or attack me,” she said.
He couldn’t hide the smirk that curled his lips. “You’ll tie me up if I don’t behave?”
She narrowed her eyes and he stepped forward again, attempting to swipe the blade from her waist. Before his fingers even brushed the hilt, she sidestepped and brought her smaller dagger across his forearm in a shallow, but decisive warning. He hissed at the flash of pain and pulled back.
She smiled. “Behave.”
“I’m not going to follow you like an obedient animal to my own slaughter.”
“Stay out here, then. The wolfshifters seem all too happy to make friends.”
He looked around the forest and took in their surroundings. The trees had already been unfamiliar and towering when he’d first exited the tunnel, but now they were enormous, the roots twisting up from the ground nearly the size of him around. At some point over the past few minutes, the sun had crested the horizon and the shadows of the forest were starting to recede. The night blooms had closed and the morning birds were waking from their sleep, the trills beginning to replace the hum of the night insects. But none of that told Fox anything.
They were farther from Suvi than he’d ever been before—farther he’d guess than Sofia had ever been. With the pace the men had taken, he wasn’t even sure how far they were from the tunnel he’d originally come through. They’d been running all night. He looked back at Sofia, unsure if it was more relieving or frightening to see his own uncertainty reflected back. For all her talk, she had no more control over their situation than he did—except perhaps a few more daggers. She couldn’t drag him back to the resistance base without his cooperation, and there was no way he was going to be the one to follow her.
“I’m going to head south now,” he said. “You can follow me if you want.” He didn’t wait for her to answer, and started moving. He was weaponless, hungry, and had no idea where he was going, but he knew she’d have to head in the same direction as he did. At some point over the next day or two, she’d slip up and he’d have a weapon. He’d decide then what his next steps were—running back to Suvi without her or bringing her back as a prisoner.
Sure enough, he heard the soft sound of her steps a few moments later. He glanced over his shoulder and saw her walking a few yards away, bag in hand and the bow and quiver tucked back in their place on her back. He wondered what supplies she had in there and if he could convince her to share. She was watching him with the same careful stare he was giving her, neither quite willing to turn their back on the other. Now that she was moving, Fox didn’t want to have her behind him, and he fell back so they were walking relatively even, albeit still keeping a few yards apart.
They continued like this for hours, each watching the other more than the ground before them. Fox tripped three times walking like this, which only made him more bitter because Sofia had managed to jump over every root in her way without taking her eyes off of him. But she couldn’t hide the exhaustion and hunger that was plaguing her just the same as him. They had been able to find enough morning dew on the lower leaves to slake their thirst, but Fox hadn’t gone this long without food in cycles and he was beginning to feel the exhaustion of the last few days, the adrenaline having been left behind with the dead bodies.
It was midday before Fox stopped, eyes zoning in on the stack of mushrooms painted across the trunk of a large tree. He recognized the blue-capped fungi with their small yellow freckles. They were the same mushrooms his mother had cooked on special occasions and his mouth watered with the memory of their buttery taste. He moved automatically, steps suddenly lighter as he leaned over the trunk and plucked the mushrooms from the wood. He didn’t care that they were raw and flecked with dirt, placing the first cap on his tongue?—
“Stop!” Sofia was there suddenly, slapping him across the face and forcing him to spit out the blue cap.
“What the—?” he said, turning on her with fiery eyes.
“Are you trying to kill yourself?”
“I’m trying not to starve.”
“Those are dragon scale mushrooms, not nobles, you idiot. One bite of those is enough to kill a jaguar.”
He looked back at the mushrooms where they’d fallen, trying to understand what she was saying. “They…I know what nobles look like.”
She leaned over plucking one of the mushrooms off the ground and turning it. “Orange gills, not yellow. And nobles grow on the ground, not on trees.”
He was looking at it now, noticing the slight difference in the color and the size of the yellow freckles. His stomach turned.
“If your people spent as much time getting to know this land as they did tearing it down to build things, maybe you’d know that.”
He rolled his eyes at the insult, wanting to point out that he wasn’t to blame for the decisions of his forefathers. Instead, he turned to her smirking. “You saved me.”
She scowled at this, giving him the satisfaction of showing her annoyance. “You’re still my prisoner and I’m not going to let you die after all the trouble you put me through.”
“I’m your prisoner?” he asked, looking around them. “So if I run off, you’re going to stop me?”
“I don’t need to. You’d die out there without me and you know it. Once we get back to our side of the rainforest, we’re marching right back to the base.”
“Once we get back to familiar territory, I’m arresting you for treason and kidnapping.”
She stepped forward, drawing the small dagger she’d used to slit the throats of the men just that morning. It was cleaned of blood, but he could still see the shadow of where it had been. She pointed it at his chest, poking him just hard enough for him to feel the sharp tip through his tunic and cloak.
“I’d love to see you try.”
He stepped closer to her, forcing the dagger a bit deeper into his skin. It stung, but he ignored it, wrapping his hand around her throat, just hard enough he could feel her swallow beneath his grip. He was taller than her and loved the way she had to crane her neck to look up at him when they were this close. The uncertainty that flickered through her eyes told him he had made his point. The only reason she’d caught him the first time was that he’d been unaware and she’d had a handful of allies. But out here, even if she had the weapons in the end, he was plenty taller and stronger than her. He still had the advantage.
He stepped back and dropped his hand, satisfied that he’d shut her up.
“We should find food,” he said as he continued to walk back in the direction they had been going.
“You mean I should find us food,” she said, coming up beside him, knife still in her hand as if she might stab him just for fun.
“Well, you apparently don’t appreciate my contribution.”
“If I want to die, I’ll let you know. Keep an eye out for blue and yellow mushrooms on the ground. They’ll be under the dead leaves. I’ll keep an eye on the trees for some fruit or nuts. I know you probably think those only come in sacks at the market, but they actually grow naturally out here.”
“I know where food comes from,” he said, ignoring the fact that he’d never even gotten food from the market on his own. Food came on plates from the kitchens or the barracks’ cafeteria, and he realized how ridiculous that was in this moment. So he bit his tongue when she let out a derisive laugh and did what she said, reluctant but too hungry to ignore her instructions.
The next mushroom he found, she let him eat. It gave him a stomachache, but he was still breathing at least. And that’s all he needed for now—to stay alive long enough to get back to familiar territory, overpower Sofia, and take her to Chief Commander Harlow. He knew where their base was, knew what at least a few of their faces looked like. He knew more about her resistance than any soldier had in cycles and he was going to hand-deliver all that information to the chief commander. His father would no longer be able to deny his usefulness as a king’s man, and the chief commander would have all the energy and support he’d put into Fox’s training proven right.
He smiled even as his stomach cramped, imagining the woman beside him in chains.