Bittersouls, p.8
Bittersouls, page 8
Talon’s eyes narrowed with suspicion. “How many winters?”
“Nineteen,” she answered quietly. It shouldn’t have been embarrassing, but it did feel a little ridiculous. “I missed the Festival by a year. I was going to be Named next summer. And now… I guess I never will.”
The Bittersoul nodded grimly, his eyes wandering as if at a memory. Dela finished cooking the faerat and handed him the spit. He took it with an appreciative nod, looking it over cautiously. She waited quietly as he ate a few bites, then handed the spit back to her. He gave no commentary on the cooking, seeming to have forgotten it the moment it left his hand.
He set the little poisonous sack he’d cut out of the creature on his knee and fetched a small stone bowl from somewhere within his rough. He used the bowl to hollow out a little space in the middle of the fire, then let it sit there to warm. With a pestle, he crushed the gland in the bowl with quick but careful jabs, then added a little water from his waterskin.
Dela watched with quiet curiosity but didn’t ask questions. She’d cooked the faerat well enough, and on an empty stomach, it tasted better than most meals in her recent memory. If this was to be her last meal, she was determined to enjoy it as best she could. Her mother would want that for her, wouldn’t she? The girl wondered if they’d made it through the pass after all. They’d had the pace to make it, she thought, but who knew what complications might have arisen? Surely the other Bittersouls wouldn’t have attacked the whole group, right?
“Are the others like you?” she wondered aloud.
He shrugged. “Not very much.” Then he looked at her with a lowered brow, as if trying to make sure he’d understood the question.
“Do they travel alone?”
“Hm. Yes.” The water was beginning to simmer in the little bowl, and he pushed around the pestle in the mixture to make sure it all incorporated evenly. When it had boiled for a few minutes, he seemed satisfied. With a gloved hand, he pulled the bowl from the fire and set it on the floor next to him to cool.
“Talon?” She bit her lip, searching for kindness in the face of one of the horrors of the Bitters. “Why didn’t you hurt me?”
Maybe he still would. She was talking too much again, and she knew it.
He pulled his hood back again, letting her see his face and hair more easily. “Company is good.”
She sighed, then nodded. Of course. After so long alone, why would he want to waste an opportunity to have a conversation with someone he knew could do him no harm? It must be a rare thing for him. She was just a tool to stay his loneliness. Though it hurt, she supposed she could understand that.
The contents of the bowl cooled over the next few minutes. He sniffed at the dark green fluid a couple times, as if to tell if it was ready. When he decided it was, he filled three small goat-horn vials with it and stoppered them with little balls of some sort of black wax. He then tucked them away into the network of pockets on his patchwork of garments. He stood suddenly, smothering the fire with his boot in a practiced motion. He stepped back toward the threshold of the cave.
So that was it, then. The last conversation she might ever have. He would leave her here with the meal as his final gift. She couldn’t ask for more, of course. He’d shown her far too much kindness as it was. She bit her lip as she watched him go, trying hard not to make any noise that might make him change his mind about letting her live.
Then he stopped. She held her breath as he turned back toward her at the threshold, raising an eyebrow. “Can you eat and walk?”
She blinked. He was asking her to come with him? “Why?”
“You give good company,” he said, as if it were obvious. “I give protection. I can give you your people.”
“You… you’d help me get back to them?” She struggled to comprehend it. “Why? You don’t owe me anything.”
He frowned for a long moment, considering his next words. “You followed me, but what were you following?”
The girl shrugged. “I thought one of my people had been lost. I was trying to find them. Trying to bring them back.” She sighed. “I was trying to—”
“Use madness to save,” he finished for her.
She looked at him and thought she saw understanding in his eyes. A man who could see what she could see and felt what she felt about it. She nodded.
“Come.” He turned back toward the frigid, white world outside, as if that were enough of an explanation. “Must hurry. Vaults by nightfall.”
Chapter 6
Talon lost no time as he moved through the deep snow. Dela kept up only because he was forced to blaze the trail while she could simply follow in his path. After finishing the rest of the morning’s meal, she tucked the roasting spit into her belt. Being made of wood, it was probably one of the precious few he carried.
His hood had been raised once again over his head, disguising his figure in a coat of white against the placid dunes of snow. Were Dela not so close to him, she was certain the roughcloak would offer him some camouflage. She’d often wondered why the congregation didn’t use white leather for their own clothes, but as one of the Tanners had been kind enough to explain, the process of bleaching a pelt to white was long, arduous, delicate, and required the use of some rather peculiar materials to do well. Growing up, Bittersoul attacks had been essentially unheard of—though always feared—so the extra labor simply hadn’t been worth it.
The same would not be true for a Soul. To hide from the threats out here in the Bitters were probably life and death on a daily basis. The congregation offered many protections due to its size alone. Many wilderness predators would take no interest in a group that large, from Jackals to wolves to Bittersouls. But for people like Talon? His wits, skills, and the protections he carried were all he had.
The two travelers didn’t speak while they walked, choosing instead to conserve their energy to deal with the snow. It was exhausting work, and though it was still cold—it always was in the Bitters—they began to sweat with the bright autumn sun glaring down on them. Following the curvature of the Skytooth range, they moved steadily east, watching the slopes above carefully for any signs of disquiet. The pass was certainly closed. There was no mistaking that, and there were no signs of anyone else wandering the bluffs. If the congregation had gotten through, they were long gone. If they hadn’t, they were buried somewhere up there on the slopes.
Dela shivered.
Talon wasn’t an impatient guide, despite the blistering pace that he set. Every few minutes, he glanced over his shoulder to make sure she was still with him. They stopped for a brief respite at midday and drank much of the water they carried with them. There was no meal to speak of, and Dela suspected there wouldn’t be until they’d crossed the mountains. It was what it was. She’d gone hungry before, and clearly so had he. What mattered now was making the crossing.
As evening descended, they moved back up the slopes to where the caves dotted the bluffs. Talon didn’t seem concerned about the snow concealing the entrance they sought, which likely meant he’d traveled these mountains extensively over the years. She wondered what sort of route a Bittersoul must take throughout the year. Congregations like hers had a fairly set territory to prevent them from robbing their neighbors of necessary resources, but even then they were very careful with what they took and only visited each place at its proper time. The Ministers dressed it up as a function of their worship to the One Flame, but Dela understood it was also a simple matter of practicality. The route they had and the resources it afforded them were all they had in a given year. If they took too greedily one year, they might starve the next.
So where did that leave the Bittersouls? Did they follow in the wake of congregations, leaping at scraps and waiting for lost wanderers to prey upon? Or did they move out ahead of them, taking the first pick of the land before the masses arrived? It didn’t have to be either, she realized. The needs of fifty people were immensely different from the needs of a single man. There were likely routes the Souls took and resources they tapped that the congregations had never seen—and would take no interest in.
The Vaults had to be one of those. From what little Talon had said about it, she understood it to be some sort of passage through the mountains, rather than over them. Apparently, the vast network of caves in the Skytooths was far more elaborate than she’d imagined. She only hoped they were getting close. Her legs were aching, and the few hours of sleep she’d gotten the previous night were sorely lacking.
Talon checked on her a few more times as the Flame Above sank toward the horizon, and a look of doubt grew on his face. Then, as if it had emerged from nowhere, they were suddenly standing before the open mouth of a cave. Somehow, it was nearly a perfect circle, measuring a man and a half in height and width. The Bittersoul looked her over as they stopped, the look of concern still plain on his face.
Dela frowned at him. “What’s wrong?”
“You won’t like this place.”
She shrugged. “I haven’t really liked much that’s happened to me over the past two weeks.”
He stepped close to her, bending slightly to match her eye level. She froze at his sudden nearness, then was taken in by the vast darkness of his eyes. From this close, she could see that his irises weren’t black, but a dark gray. He narrowed his eyes at her, interrogating, as if searching her innermost self. “Dela,” he said. “I don’t like this place.”
She nodded slowly, but still wasn’t sure she understood. Whatever the Vaults contained, they seemed to be a last resort for him. The storm had trapped him in the Basin just as much as it had trapped her.
What could incite that sort of fear in a Bittersoul?
He shook his head, sighing and standing upright once again. “We’ll rest here. Going to need sleep before we enter.”
She nodded, deciding against interrogating him further for now. She was too tired anyway. She took a few steps toward the mouth of the cave, nodding to herself about the lovely curvature of the walls. It probably would make a decent enough place to sleep.
“Dela.”
She turned.
“We’ll rest out here.”
“In the open?” That made no sense. It would be too cold. And so exposed. What if someone was watching? Maybe she was too tired to understand him properly.
“Yes,” he said. He was already carving himself a little hollow in the snow. In minutes, he had a little den cut into the snowbank, deep enough for him to lie down in. It would keep the wind off him, as well as protect him from most prying eyes, especially if he positioned his snowy roughcloak correctly.
“You won’t ask me to share that hollow with you, right?” she joked. She wasn’t sure where it came from. She still didn’t feel all that comfortable with him, but somehow humor made it seem easier to stay sane. It would be warmer to sleep near each other, of course, but he was certainly used to sleeping alone, and she wasn’t about to help him change that.
He grinned, then shook his head. “Too small.” He handed her the ice axe he’d used and advised her sparingly while she tried to mimic the construction for herself. It wasn’t quite as smoothly performed, and probably wasn’t as stable, but it would do. She handed him back the axe.
“Rest well, Dela,” he bade her, wrapping his rough around himself and settling in as the light began to fade. “Once we’re inside, we won’t sleep until we’re through.”
* * *
Dela’s whole body ached as the first hints of light on the horizon prodded her from her slumber. Her stomach, empty since the previous morning, clawed at her from the inside. She swore quietly as she hauled herself out from her den. Talon was already awake, watching something on the cliffs to the east.
“Anything wrong?” she worried aloud.
“Another Bittersoul.” He pursed his lips, then shook his head with a grunt. “Don’t think he’ll follow us.”
She pressed her lips into a thin line, trying to catch sight of the glow of a wisp up on the cliffs. She saw nothing. “It’s that bad?”
“It is not a path I would take twice,” he said carefully.
“But you have taken it before, right?” She chuckled hesitantly. “We won’t get lost in there?”
“Thrice, then.” He shrugged. “And no. Shouldn’t get lost.”
Shouldn’t? But she didn’t say it aloud. This was the path he’d chosen for them, and she was as good as dead without him. If this was the way to go, no matter how terrible it was, it had to be the right choice. Didn’t it?
“You said we won’t be sleeping again until we’re on the other side.”
He nodded, eyes still focused on the bluffs above. He held out a waterskin, apparently freshly filled from a small pot he’d boiled that morning.
She took it gratefully. “How long will it take to get through?”
“Two days.” His voice rasped at the words, his own hesitation coming through in the way he said them. His eyes shifted as something moved up there on the cliffs. Dela caught a glint of light, but nothing she could identify. “We go now. Best not to waste our wakefulness.”
And best not to be ambushed by a Bittersoul, she thought. Two days? As in, two whole days? She’d just endured almost an entire night fighting through the snowstorm of a decade, and now she’d have to make it that long in a never ending cave? In the dark? At least there wouldn’t be snow to wade through, she supposed.
They gathered their things and approached the mouth of the cave. As she’d noticed the night prior, it was unusually round, the width and shape of it appearing to continue as far as the early morning light could show. Talon lit a pair of torches and handed one to Dela. As they stepped onto the smooth stone of the cavern floor, he turned to her one last time.
“Dela?” He paused, searching for the words he wanted.
“Yes?” She waited. How many years had it been since last he’d last spoken to someone? His language was passable, of course, but intermittently halting. She wondered how many years it would be again after they parted ways.
“Don’t trust the walls,” he finally said. As if to avoid her response, he immediately turned and strode into the darkness, torch held out before him.
For a moment, Dela trembled. This place scared him. Him. And the Bittersoul that was following them? He might not enter simply because of his inexperience with the cave system, for fear of losing them or becoming lost himself. But it wasn’t any one thing that seemed wrong about the shadow with which they were now willingly concealing themselves. It was everything. No sleeping? Two days of darkness? Distrust for the walls? What about this place earned it the fear of multiple Bittersouls, including the one who seemed so indecipherably casual and stoic?
What were the Vaults?
She hurried after him, her heart pounding in her ears to accompany the harmony of their footsteps. She suspected she would be listening to that melody for much longer than she’d like. The morning light, which should have waxed moment by moment as the Flame Above ascended its throne in the sky, sank ever deeper into the world outside, soon to be forgotten for the dimness and the torchlight.
The tunnels splintered periodically, each maintaining the shape and size of the entrance through which they’d come. Dela was no fool. She could tell that these tunnels were not formed by nature. These were the work of something powerful. The One, or perhaps Its dark counterpart, Bale. Perhaps in her time here, she would come face to face with that being. From the shiver that always seemed a moment away and the way the hairs on her neck and arms stood on end, she hoped not.
Hours passed. The walls remained the same, though the path sloped upward and downward, turning this way and that. Her stomach continued to gnaw at her, making her wonder more and more about Talon. Did he really know the way through this long-forgotten realm? Would he really get them to the other side before they starved to death? And what was the thing about not sleeping in here? If it really would be two days, what benefit was there to walking straight through? She’d seen nothing down here, not even so much as a bat, faerat, or a pile of scat. If this place was occupied by something, especially something to be feared, there should be signs. Something like…
She frowned. The torch Talon carried seemed unusually bright, casting long shadows that flickered with each of his movements. But was the torch really so much brighter, or was it his wisp that seemed considerably dimmer? There wasn’t anything wrong with his wisp, nor with hers so far as she could tell. Yet both seemed considerably less luminous than any time they had been outside, and far less luminous than they had been during the night they’d walked in the storm. It reminded her of what she’d seen at the Soapsprings. The wisps burned brighter when they saw the need to keep their human alive. But somehow, in these dark passages, they found no such need.
Talon turned, eyes inquisitive as to why she’d stopped.
“It’s warm in here, isn’t it?” she murmured. So far from the sun, she could think of only one explanation. Something down here was alive.
He exhaled slowly and gave a dour nod. “They want to make you weary. Want to make you sleep. I told you: don’t trust the walls.”
She shivered. “They?”
The Bittersoul shook his head. “You don’t want to know.”
“I think you’re right, Talon.” Dela caught up to him before he started walking again. “I don’t like the Vaults.”
He chuckled darkly. “Not there yet.”
“What?” She frowned, minding her step as the tunnel sloped slightly downward.
“These aren’t the Vaults.”
The tunnels continued for what seemed like forever. When the torches they’d started with began to burn out, they lit a second set. Dela prayed silently to the One that she hadn’t made a mistake. They only had six pairs of torches to make it through this labyrinth, and though Talon feigned confidence, she suspected that number might not be enough.
As they came over a rise in the tunnel, the air seemed to change around them. It was still warm, even damp, but the absolute stillness that she’d somehow grown so used to was slipping away. In its place, she could feel a dull, rumbling vibration, nearly too quiet to hear, but that seemed to ripple through her clothes, skin, and bones. Talon gave her a serious look as they continued. He felt it, too. They were getting close.
