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Chapter 3: The Girl
Part 1
Sparkcamps were simple, nothing like the main camp at all. The shelter was stored in a tree: rope and canvas sheets ready to be fashioned into a quick lean-to should the skies decide to water. There was a skin that held some extra weapons and stones, and flat rocks buried at intervals around the firepit should they need surfaces. The pit itself was also modest—a small pile of spiritwisp coals, so named for the thin, clear smoke they made. All evidence of a sparkcamp could be eliminated in less than 30 seconds.
Frix cooked a gresselbird on a spit, replaying the bridge encounter over and over in his head. All morning, they had watched bits of debris float down the river. Swinn sat nearby, back against a tree. He twirled a shortsharp, playing it slow across his fingers, now and then giving it a little flip and catching it. The others were off hunting.
It was late morning, quiet and lazy, as if the woods were sleeping in. Frix began to find the silence agitating, so he was happy when Swinn said, “So, you saw one up close.”
“Two, really,” said Frix, pulling back from the fire.
Swinn caught his sharp, and kept it still. “And?”
“It was dark, I…”
“Mossa said the girl took you down?” An amused smile.
“Defending her friend,” Frix admitted. “Caught me as I was corkscrewing in.” He mimed the motion, using the smoking gresselbird as a prop.
“You get hit with witchlight?”
“Yeah.”
“What was that like?” Swinn hunched forward. His shaggy brown hair fluffed out in a curtain around his head.
“Like… pushing. And numbness. It didn’t hurt so much as just… I dunno. But the eyes, Swinn.”
“Just like the stories, huh?”
“Just like the stories.”
There was a crunch behind them, followed by Mossa’s teasing voice. “Were they pretty?”
“The witches?” said Frix, confused.
“Her eyes,” said Mossa, pretending to swoon.
“Oh come on.”
“You did let her go.” This from Dreff, who appeared from the underbrush, holding a few gutted hopjacks.
“We were told to break a bridge, not to murder witches,” Frix said.
“Their fault they were on it,” Dreff said, unslinging his catch. The carcasses flopped to the ground.
“They weren’t looking for any trouble, okay? They were young. Kids I think.”
“Yeah, some kid just knocks you over? And how’d you let them get so close anyhow? I thought you were our sentry?” Dreff had taken several steps closer. Frix heard Swinn stand up.
“You ever fight a witch, one on one, Dreff?” Frix gripped his spit a little tighter.
The older man’s lip curled, and he sighed out his nose. He walked past, shoulder coming a hair’s breath from smacking into Frix’s. He stood by the river bank. There were no more hunks of wood to be seen. Mossa rolled her eyes.
“It’ll be harder now, you understand,” said Dreff after a while, still looking out at the water.
“Yes. They know my face, Mossa’s voice, probably,” conceded Frix.
“Maybe Dreff and I should go alone,” suggested Swinn.
“No,” said Mossa. “I need us all.”
“Eat up then. Long hike,” Dreff said, and moved off somewhere down the riverbank.
The Seedwind set off at high sun.
Dreff was the senior nose-runner, so he went first. Mossalea and Swinn ran flanks—they set off more or less together. Frix was tail-runner, so he had to wait several minutes before he could escape into the rush of the sprint, in order to keep the proper distance behind. He checked his armaments. He had a standard issue shortsharp. On his back, a not-so-standard slinger and pouch of round, sanded stones. Last, but not least, was his cloudwood cudgel. Passed on through many Bit family generations, it measured two-foot, was white as a bone, and carried most of its deadly weight in the smooth, sanded knot on its business end.
He gave the handle a squeeze. It was time. He fled down the path after his team.
His heartbeat quickened as he ramped up his speed, but a portion of it had to do with excitement. There was nothing quite like officially beginning a raid, although this was technically ‘part two.’
They followed a classic tactic, with a twist. Generations of coexisting with witches had taught the triads how best to avoid being cursed by the bloodlight. If you tried to attack outright, there was a fantastic chance of capture, from which no one returned. But, if they caused some sort of diversion first and forced witchy attention towards fixing or finding something, it was much easier to sneak into the towns or outposts and do what needed to be done. The trick was to stagger the raids and randomize the frequency of the second attack so that the witches couldn’t get a hold of a pattern.
In the past few generations, as the raids became more common, the witches started building large wooden structures around or atop their temples. Bloodlight pyres—some small and mean, some massive and towering, their pointy tips cutting above the natural leafy shape of the treetops. If the creatures felt threatened, legend had it they would set these huge pyramids ablaze. If that happened, you had to get far away, as the fire would get in the witches and energize them all.
Which made this raid particularly risky—they were to ensure that the thing was set to flame today. A four-person Seedwind group was not enough to intimidate an entire town, no matter how much rockpunch they had, so the plan was to start the fire themselves. This was unheard of, and Frix had pressed Mossa to explain, even though her briefings with the bole-marshal were strictly confidential. She insisted that she was not told, and he believed her, which meant this was coming straight down from the Heads themselves. Frix thought it was maybe a three-stage raid: a small distraction to allow for a huge distraction to allow for… what?
They always told him he asked too many questions. This was not a trait that was tolerated well in Seedwind training, so he’d learned to keep most questions to himself. He pushed thoughts about the strange raid away, letting the heat of the run coax his brain into routine. He could imagine Mossa’s reprimand now: sentries had to be aware of everything around them, not spending time in their heads!
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