Chapter 25: Mist

Tarek had no body. The pain was gone, and so was he. The relief was so immense that he wanted to faint… but he had nothing to faint with. His usual senses were totally gone. He could not see, yet somehow, he sensed the frantic strides of the torturer searching for his vanished victim. He could not hear, but in some way, he knew the children were shrieking and calling out questions. He had no feeling of his own flesh, but there was a curious settling, spreading sensation that was both inevitable and frightening. The torturer strode through the space where Tarek had been hanging and he felt a scattering and swirling of his self that defied description.

The only part of the body he’d had a moment ago that he could still feel was his heart. It beat strongly, wildly – and yet it was distant somehow and muted even as it increased in tempo. The beat was a warning. It called to him.

Everyone was yelling and dashing about, but the scattered fragments of Tarek settled to the ground, clinging to its chaotic ridges and valleys as if he belonged there. The dirt was wet, cool, and peaceful. Tarek thought he might hover against it forever if only that heartbeat would stop bothering him.

The ground sloped ever so gently down from the wooden frame toward the house directly behind, and Tarek flowed along the wet earth, reveling in the effortlessness of it all. He went where the land willed, and nothing could touch him. He pooled in the black shadows underneath the short-stilted hut, finding a depression in the earth a few degrees cooler than everywhere else. The vibrations and commotion of the bloodthirsty Iktaka felt as if it were occurring on the other end of the Land.

Still the heartbeat nagged at him. It was faltering now, skipping and stuttering, and a vague sense of alarm drew his thoughts together. What’s happening to me? He felt as if he were losing himself, dissipating into nothing.

Part of him longed for that final scattering, but his sense of self-preservation had awakened and was clawing for control. For survival. I will not die here.

With an effort of mind that he couldn’t quite put words to, he flexed, drawing in on the spreading bits of himself that were evaporating like wisps of mist. He felt clearer, more real – but not yet himself. Again he pulled inward with the strength of his mind, again, again. Sensation was returning. His heartbeat grew stronger.

And then he was there, lying in the blackness underneath the house, a real human again, stark naked with his back on the ground, staring up at the hut’s floorboards only a handwidth above his face. Every shred of pain came flooding back, and he bit into the back of his own hand to keep from crying out.

What just happened? How?

He didn’t have time to figure it out. From the sound of things, no more than two dozen heartbeats had passed, and the furor of the missing spy was still building only a few body-lengths from where he lay. Forcing himself to move, he shimmied out from under the back side of the house and lumbered away from the firelight and the voices as quickly as his wobbling legs would allow.

It seemed most of the adult Iktaka hadn’t yet roused from their beds, but there were still a few people standing about their doorways and looking dispiritedly out at the rain. Tarek slipped from shadow to shadow, chafing at every delay and wondering what he’d do when he got to the guarded exit from the village. He knew he needed to move fast. He could still hear the voices of alarm at his back, and the sky was lightening with every passing heartbeat. News of his escape was bound to spread quickly. Already he saw a few of the villagers looking in the direction of the torturer’s hut as they began to recognize that the noises they heard were not the screams of pain they were accustomed to.

A burly man came running down the lane Tarek was on with a spear in one hand and a sputtering torch in the other. Tarek scampered underneath the nearest house as quietly as he could, intending to hide behind the ramp up to the entrance as the man went past. He cursed under his breath as he realized that this hut had a short ladder instead of a ramp, and it offered no hiding spot. With no time to spare, he spread himself flat in the dirt and put his face to the ground, hoping he’d look like nothing more than lumpy ground in the shadows under the house. He had to keep his right arm clenched to his side; the stab wound little Kashee had given him burned fiercely.

The man pelted past in the direction of the torturer’s pavilion without slowing, and Tarek breathed a sigh of relief, trying to find the will to fight past the pain in his armpit, back, and finger so he could get up and run again. Had he thought he’d face anything other than more torture if he were found, he might have been tempted to stay where he was.

“Tarek!” someone hissed.

Tarek jerked his face out of the dirt in shock. Tavi was running right at him from the dark lane behind the house, and Pahtl was right on his heels. He launched himself out from underneath the house and met his brother halfway, wrapping his good arm around him in a rough embrace, heedless of the pain.

Patl twined himself around his feet. “Hurt, hurt,” he murmured mournfully.

“It’s all right,” he whispered. “Or it will be. How did you get in?”

“Gap in the stakes,” Tavi said. “Tell you later. We have to go. Pahtl!”

“We go,” the otter said. “Follow me.”

They ran after the canny creature as he darted between houses and zagged from one dark space to the next, skirting pools of light and Iktaka mustering to the sounds of alarm. A flash of color at the edge of Tarek’s vision made his heart stutter, thinking someone was coming at them, but it was merely a bunch of bright clothing someone had left draped out their window to dry. Mindful that he’d lost his loincloth somehow – how did that happen? – Tarek dashed to the side and snatched a large shirt and pair of pants, tucking them under his arm for later use. I paid for these clothes with my own skin and blood.

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Then a horn sounded in the distance, and Tarek knew their time was up.

“We’re almost there!” Tavi whispered. The fence of stakes was visible in the gaps between huts only a stone’s throw away. More faces peeked out of huts as the alarm roused the Iktaka, and one woman caught sight of Pahtl and the brothers as they dashed past. She yelped in alarm and withdrew to the darkness of her hut, but only a few heartbeats later Tarek heard her yell, “Raiders!”

The word was echoed by others as the Iktaka came tumbling down their ramps and ladders half-dressed, juggling spears and looking all around in the dimness of a clouded dawn. One man saw them running and reached to intercept them, but Tavi bulled into him, knocking him down and leaving him behind. They were lucky he was unarmed.

Then they were at the fence, and Pahtl said, “Here,” worming his way between a pair of stakes that had been set a tad further apart than the others. He wiggled sideways and found another gap in the second set of sharpened spears and he was outside. Tavi turned sideways, sucked in deeply to narrow himself, and slipped through, wincing as the bark scraped at his back and chest simultaneously.

Tarek tucked his arm in close, turned sideways, and hoped that the stake wouldn’t touch the still-burning patch of raw flesh on his back. He jammed himself into the gap, but his frame was wider and more muscular than his little brother’s. He wedged in tightly, losing a little more skin, an aggravating pinprick added to his screaming wounds.

“I don’t fit,” he gasped, withdrawing.

“What?” said Tavi from the far side. “You have to!”

Tarek looked to both sides, but the stakes rose up like a miniature forest, barring his way. “I’ll have to run past the guards. Get to the trees and hide.”

“Tarek, no!”

He didn’t bother to argue. No fewer than five Iktakan villagers were running for him, spears in hand. One had a bow. He ran parallel to the fence, pulling on his last reserves of strength. He wondered if he’d chosen the direction that led to an exit or the one that led to a blind corner. With a breathless chuckle he realized there was no going back. The stakes flashed past him in the dimness, and he was grateful for the rain that might hinder anyone with a bow.

People were chasing him now, yelling at the top of their lungs to attract others. He could see firelight ahead and breathed a sigh of relief as he saw a gap in the fence ahead. He’d chosen correctly. Unfortunately, there were two men with spears standing in the entryway, looking out past the gate in alarm as they heard the shouting and tried to prepare for an attack from without.

It came from within instead. Tarek charged at the one nearest him and knocked the man down from behind. The guard’s spear went spinning into the mud, and Tarek gathered his balance, ready to face the other one. That was where his luck ran out. He was still three arm’s lengths away, and the man already had his spear leveled. Tarek skidded to a halt to keep himself from being skewered. The crowd was closing in from behind.

With a caterwauling roar, Pahtl sprang at the man from outside the fence. The hardened guard shrieked in alarm and dropped his spear as the giant otter bit at his knees and calves. Defenseless, the man fled into the village, and the otter laughed.

Tarek dashed in and to scoop up the discarded weapon with his good hand, dropping the clothes under his arm into the dirt. A sandaled foot pinned it to the ground, and the haft slipped through Tarek’s fingers and back into the mud. He lost his footing and went down to one knee. Looking up, he saw the horn-crowned chieftain, back now from his search into the surrounding jungle, a massive war maul in his hand. His teeth were bared in a rictus grin.

“You’ll tell our enemies nothing!” the gaunt man cried, lifting his club high overhead. Tarek was overbalanced and exhausted. All he could do was watch his death blow coming.

Instead, he heard a solid, wooden clonk and suddenly Bachi was there, dancing in anxiety and holding his heavy stick awkwardly as the chief pitched forward on his face.

“I’m sorry,” the boy cried, wringing his hands. “I couldn’t do it before! I tried!”

Then Tavi was there, thrusting the discarded clothes into Tarek’s hands and pulling him to his feet. “Later! Run!”

None of them needed to hear it twice. With angry, armed villagers at their heels, the three boys and the otter dashed into the jungle darkness.

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