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“This way will save you a job later,” she said with a smile.
Something had changed between us. She seemed happier, chirpier.
I wanted to take her hand. After all, I had taken a lot more during the night…
But I didn’t.
She had a fiancé and would marry him when she returned home. As much as I might not like it, I made a promise to myself that I would help her return home.
To her friends, to her family…
To her fiancé.
Just the word “fiancé” threatened to make the bread repeat on me.
We trudged through the forest. I kept an eye on the open sections of sky visible through the empty patches of canopy.
“Those are some beautiful flowers,” Hazel said.
She pointed to a clutch of light blue petaled flowers with a dark patch around the edges that resembled an ink stain. They were nestled in the roots of a tree.
“Those are Healer’s Touch,” I said.
“They are?” she said.
I bent down and plucked the flower heads off. There were three plants at this location and another four on the other side of the tree.
“You don’t want to take the entire flower?” Hazel said.
“If we just take the heads, we get the medicine and the flowers can bloom again.”
I pulled down a large leaf and wrapped the petals inside it. Then I tied it together with dried vines that hung limply from the tree’s bark.
I curled the vine into a hoop so I could carry it in one hand.
Wiiiiiiing!
I would recognize that sound anywhere.
“Get down!” I said.
I grabbed Hazel by the hand and pulled her toward the tree trunk. I scanned the sky and, finding we were exposed beneath a section where the boughs did not reach, I swung us around to the other side of the trunk.
“Is it them?” Hazel said.
“Yes,” I said. “With any luck, they won’t see us.”
The ship was far away but we both whispered.
“Are they looking for us?” she said.
“Maybe,” I said. “But more likely, they’re looking for the Fallen Temple. They’ll keep searching until they find us.”
“What happens if they find it? Is there another place we can retreat to?”
“No. But that would be a good idea.”
We never saw the ship. We only heard its engines whine and turn in another direction. Probably to murder some poor innocents they’d locked onto.
