When Given a Lemon

Part 10

Picking up the pace as fast as we could without jeopardizing our safety, we scrambled through the snow and frozen undergrowth, praying that it wouldn't be much further and that we wouldn't encounter any unwanted surprises of our own like that soldier had.

We ran for a while, forcing our way through the snowpack, Merryl taking the lead since he was the one who could best see the remnants of the trail left behind, with me in the rear because I was the least fit of the three of us.

I huff and puff trying to keep up with them, quickly soaking my uniform in sweat that I know is going to get very cold very quickly if I ever get a chance to slow down. The other two with me are more experienced in traversing the unbroken terrain in this weather. Being from a very temporal region, I suffer in both hot and cold, my body unsure how to deal with the extremes.

I've given up trying to follow this trail Merryl is tracking, focusing instead on his back to ensure I don't lose sight of it as a mist descends upon us blurring the edges of our vision and hiding the details of the landscape.  The air becomes more clouded the further we go just as the frozen landscape becomes even colder. As the temperature descends, I watch with fascination as the mist crystalizes, creating tiny shimmers that settle on the tops of the mounds of snow we are wading through.

My breath steams out in front of me which I find annoying, in fact it is probably the thing that bothers me the most about being out here. I imagine scenarios where an unknown enemy is able to hunt me down because they could see my wispy breath even from the most creative of hiding places I might find. My ruthless mind fills the time with these pointless thoughts as we press on.

The path curves about the sterile landscape that in this part of the forest looks like a neverending stretch of barren trunks surrounded by snow and shadow. I prefer the conifers we passed under earlier; not only did they break up the monochrome of the light ground and dark trunks, its full green-blue branches also provided some protection from the deeper drifts of snow below.

A distant call catches our attention.

The sound of a shouted command, not one spoken in urgency or fear, but in annoyance or impatience. Merryl picked up the pace even more and I worried for my ankles, knowing how much they loved to trip me up every chance they got. This time they spared me though and a distant troop soon came into view ahead. Merryl called out, waving his arm to catch their attention and show we were fellow soldiers.

Crunching through the packed snow until it opened up to shoveled ground, we were met by the soldiers. When an officer was called over we explained what had waylaid us. Merryl was exemplary at remembering each step of our journey whereas I would have stumbled over telling the story in all the wrong order had it been left up to me. He was even able to give the absolute coordinates for the body we had come across, though I suspected they already knew at least that much. Unless the fleeing soldiers had been more like me and were running for their lives, blindly hoping they were headed in the right direction. I chuckled at the thought. I’m exaggerating my disparity of course; I did make it back after being thrown in the frozen pond after all, though I think that was more blind luck than anything.

We must have looked pitiful shivering and dirty, me seemingly laughing at nothing, because someone grabbed warm blankets from the medic tent to wrap around us and it wasn't until then that it finally dawned on me that we had made it back to our encampment.

Finally! I breathed out shakily. I wouldn't become frozen forest fodder or food for any monsters! At least not today.

We had reached the safety of the camp where my tent and clean, dry bedroll and change of clothes are! I felt suddenly choked up, unable to conceal how relieved I felt to finally be back here, in this horrid camp!

The carcasses of a few larger animals, deer by the looks of it, were roasting on large spits over sizzling fires and a heaping pile of still buzzballs was stacked a short distance away from it. The first makes me salivate, the second makes me cringe. Why did they need to bring those back? Then an ungainly thing a little further away, splayed out on a tarp caught my eye. The sight of this made me lose my appetite all together. It was bug-like but totally different than the buzzballs. The body was much bigger and quite ungainly, reminding me a little of an engorged tick with a barbed tail, long wings, and with the mouth and teeth of a lion. It was a horror to behold. If that was the cause of the mangled body and the footsteps retreating in terror, I would have been right there with them!

Since my voice has stopped working, I silently point. A nearby soldier confirms my suspicions, their telling of what happened catching Merryl and Lemon's attention too.

“They chased us for leagues! I bet they would have come all the way here even if Boz hadn't tripped…” they trailed off, their lip quivering.

“That thing” they pointed at the carcass, “isn't one of the ones that went after us and Boz though,” another continued for them.

“Yeah, that one,” they also pointed, having calmed a little, “it came from somewhere else.”

“Yeah, we had gotten separated from the Cap, an that one was being hunted by his group.”

“Lieutenant Wilo shot it down.” Wilo was the lieutenant that had accompanied us along with the captain; the one Merryl had just explained everything to. I hadn't known their name before. I looked up to find Wilo hadn't gone far. They ignore us of course, and the beast, mouth busy watering over the sizzling venison. Unwilling, my eyes return to the grotesque corpse where I now easily recognize the arrow protruding from its eye socket.

“Gross. Glad it's dead–wait, wait, wait!” I waved my hands at this terrible revelation, startling several people in the process, “you said they, so…they as in there's more?!” I reflect upon our night spent helpless and exposed where more of them had been out there! Possibly watching us, stalking us! What if the only thing that kept us alive was our fire?! If I had decided to step out of the boundaries of the ruined foundation… The thought sickens me and I quickly cover my mouth.

The others barely acknowledge my reactions. I suppose that's fair. They had already lived through their own terrible ordeal, being chased down and losing one of their companions. If I were them I wouldn't sleep well for weeks afterward. I still might not after only seeing the corpses. Both the attacker and the victim provided plenty of material for many sleepless nights to come.