Elmira Ashwood's Arc

Chapter 3 of 5

Dawn pushed Elmira into the woods with empty hands. The cannon faded behind her, and she ran low until the trees thickened. Her plan was simple. Find a weapon before anyone found her. She smelled the clearing before she saw it. A painted stone stood at its center, crossed sticks laid neat at its base. The careful sticks told her everything. Someone had already swept this ground clean and marked it as taken. She crouched and breathed slow. Moving meant being seen. She needed cover. A huge hollow tree leaned at the clearing's edge, its black opening wide enough to swallow her. She slipped inside and pressed her back to the rotted wood. Through a split in the trunk she watched the painted stone. Nothing moved. She turned her eyes down to the dirt at her feet, then to the rib bones tangled in the roots — small animal, picked clean, sharp at the broken end. She worked fast. A straight branch from the floor of the hollow. Green vine stripped and wound tight around the longest rib. Her fingers ached by the time the binding held. She tested the point against the bark. It bit. Elmira crawled out of the tree with a spear in her fist. She was still alone, still hunted, still behind. But now her hands could kill.