Ellen's Arc

Chapter 1 of 45

Ellen wanted to build a haven for cast-out women, but she would freeze before she found the ground for it. The raiders had taken her clothes, her pack, her water. They left her a torn slip and a laugh. Now she crossed the ashplain alone. Grit blew against her bare legs. The sun burned her shoulders raw. Wind stripped the sweat off her skin before it could cool her. She had a day, maybe less, before the heat dropped her. Ahead stood an old hotel, tall and out of place on the flat gray plain. Its stone front rose six floors. Half its windows were dark holes. Ash had drifted against the grand doors like snow. Travelers had sheltered here before her. Ellen had seen their bootprints in the dust for miles. If they had passed through, they had left things behind. She climbed the cracked steps and shoved a door open. Cool air met her. It smelled of dust and old wood. The lobby stretched wide, its ceiling still whole. She moved room to room, pulling drawers, checking corners. Empty. Empty. Her hope thinned with each dark doorway. A cold coming from a stairwell stopped her. She followed the draft down to a cellar. There, in the dark, sat a stack of packs. Someone had cached them and never come back. Ellen tore one open. A canvas coat. Boots. A water skin, still heavy. A knife. A bundle of flint. She dressed fast, her hands shaking with relief. The coat swallowed her. The boots pinched, but they held. She slung a full pack on her back and drank. The water was flat and warm. She had never tasted better. For the first time since the raiders, she could think past the next hour. The plain would not kill her today. She could search for haven ground. A sound came from above. A long, low growl, then the crack of claws on stone. Ellen froze. Orange light flickered down the stairwell wall. She climbed to the top and looked. Across the lobby stood a wolf the size of a horse. Fire ran along its back in bright veins. Its breath came in waves of heat she felt from thirty feet. Smoke curled off its fur. It had smelled her, or the water, and it stood between her and the doors. Ellen backed against the cellar wall. She had gear now. She had a knife and a coat. None of it would stop that thing. The one door out was behind the wolf. She gripped the knife and searched the walls for another way. There was none she could see. The cache had saved her from the plain and trapped her with a beast made of fire.