Draxin Alistair (16)'s Arc

Chapter 4 of 22

The bull staggered sideways. Its horns swept past Draxin's face and dug sand. It shook its striped head once, snorted, and bolted back through the trees. Branches cracked. Then the forest was quiet again. Draxin pushed onto his elbow. His ribs burned. Zag crawled out from under his collar, cap first, and patted his cheek with a stubby hand. The masked girl stood over him with her boot planted in the sand. She had not moved since the kick. "How did you do that," Draxin said. He sat up and coughed. "That thing was bigger than a wagon. You kicked its head like it was a melon." She looked at him. The cat mask showed nothing. One eye behind the eyehole caught the light for a second, yellow. "Was that a trick? Some village thing?" He wiped blood off his lip. "I hit it with everything I had." She turned and walked back into the trees. Her boots made almost no sound on the roots. Draxin watched her disappear between two red-leaved trunks. He waited. She did not come back. "Hey," he called. Nothing answered. Zag climbed onto his shoulder. "She's gone." "I noticed." "You're bleeding." "I noticed that too." Draxin stood up slow. He pressed a hand against his ribs and felt them shift under his fingers. Not broken. Just angry. He looked once more at the gap in the trees where the girl had gone. Then he turned the other way and started walking. "We should go back to the desert," Zag said. "We should keep looking. The tracks are cold out there. In here there's shade and water and weird girls who can kick." "That's not a good reason." "It's the reason I have." He stepped over a root the size of his leg. The forest smelled wet. Orange and green leaves hung low. Somewhere a bird made a sound like a bell. They walked. Draxin scanned the ground for prints, for anything. Zag hummed on his shoulder. After a while they came to a giant rock leaning against two trees, its face patched with moss. Something floated beside it. Draxin stopped. A small orange orb hung in the air at chest height. It was the size of a plum. Light moved inside it like slow fire. It did not drift. It did not spin. It only hung there. "Don't," Zag whispered. Draxin reached out. His fingertip brushed the surface. The orb quivered. Then it shot forward and struck his open mouth. He gagged. It went down his throat like a swallowed coal. He grabbed at his neck. He tried to cough it up. His eyes watered. He dropped to his knees, hacking, one fist on the rock. Zag stared down from his shoulder with both stubby hands over his mouth. "Draxin?" Draxin could not answer.