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“My wits are fine,” I assure him, giving him my best smile.
“Then perhaps try to look at me like you’re not half crazed.”
I must make a sorry sight, it is true. I can feel the blood seeping from my temple. Head wounds always bleed copiously, and I do not know how much time I have been lost to semi-consciousness. Long enough for a significant amount to coat me, I imagine, matting my hair and staining my clothes. And now I am beaming at him like nothing could make me happier.
“I am fine,” I say. “A little dizzy, and my head is aching, but it is nothing some djenti berry tonic will not fix. I know what I saw, and I saw a female - loose from her pod.”
Razhan’s eyes grow wide, disbelieving.
“This is not some dreaming delusion, I swear it,” I say, firming my voice, even as I push past him, heading down into the lower level of the Mercenia hut to thepodroom so that I might prove this to myself. “I did not do this to myself by some accident.”
“I know that much, Maldek, but…”
His voice cuts out as his eyes must land on the same thing I am seeing.
Thepodat the very centre of the room, where my linasha once rested, is cracked open, only emptiness remaining inside it.
It is strange how the sight fills me with joy and terror both. I am not succumbed to some madness. I saw what I saw. My linasha is awake.
And in fear or perhaps confusion, disorientation, she has struck down one who would help her, determined to escape what she must have perceived as a dangerous situation. Only to head out of the Mercenia hut and into another one.
My heartspace constricts at the thought of her out there alone. Images of Sam being taken flash in my headspace. Those same images replay with my linasha’s face.
You could not protect Sam. You will not be able to protect her, either.
No. I will not fail again. My linasha will not be taken from me, if I have to raze the entire forest to ensure it. For once, the strength of my thoughts and feelings quiets that needling voice.
“This is my fault,” Razhan says, his tone aghast.
I turn to him. He stares at the emptypod, eyes wide, jaw slack.
“I touched it earlier,” he continues. “That awful sound it made. And now there’s a female loose in our forests with no one to protect her.”
His shoulders sag, and there is anguish in his eyes as he looks up at me.
I glance round the room, seeing what I did not register before. No otherpodsare changed - their occupants still rest inside them, sleeping endlessly. It is only my linasha’spod, the one that Razhan touched, that has come open.
“You could not have known.” I am quick to reassure him. “Even our sisters do not know the workings of thesepods. It is no more your fault that one has opened than it is theirs that none of them have before now.”
“We must go now to find her. Before she is hurt.”
I nod, resisting the urge to press my hand to my temple against the lancing pain the movement sends through my skull. I only hope my eyes look sharp, focused. That he will not try to stand between me and the search for my linasha.
“Razhan! Maldek!” Delfom’s voice calls from above, and we both run up to meet him. As we reach the middle level of the hut, my head swims from the exertion, and I am forced to brace myself against the wall.
“Get this inside you,” Delfom says, shoving his waterskin against my chest. I take it, swigging down the cold water, laced with the bitter taste of djenti berries. It will be a little while before the tonic heals me fully, but just the refreshing coolness of it sharpens my headspace some.
“No sign of other tribes,” Delfom continues. “The moons are bright, still. If there were many raskarrans come this way, I would’ve seen tracks. Karvin has seen nothing, either. He’s looping round one last time now, checking there’s nothing I missed, but I suspect this was a scout. They have checked to see if this place is defended and found that it is. They will be back in force, or not at all. Hard to say, but we should send to the village. Have our brothers come. I can go now.”
“Wait,” Razhan says, pulling him back before he can go anywhere. “This was not some raskarran intruder.”
Delfom’s eyes grow wide as Razhan relays our findings.
“How?” he says.
Razhan opens his mouth to tell of his faults, but I cut across him.
“It matters little,” I say, urgency to start the search for my linasha building inside me. “It is dark, cold, and we do not know how much she knows of our forests. Finding her is our only concern. We should leave now. Find Karvin and divide the forest between us.”
