We didn’t stop running until Flickermark forced us to. A dead end. The path we were following narrowed gradually until it became an earth and stone wall blocking our way. Dead ends weren’t uncommon in Flickermark, but with the tribe we generally were able to avoid them unless they came in the form of rock falls. During the past few days, Fellen and I had encountered a handful of them, but then we had an idea of which path to go back to and try based on where we had been.

This path had dove downward, so that our momentum nearly sent us crashing into the wall, and there was only a thin strip of stars overhead. From what I had learned of the constellations Fellen knew, the strip wasn’t enough to guide us, and the woolen thread dangled from my fingertips, unknotted during our mad dash from the shamble man. My memory of the corners we took was vague at best with more attention paid to if I could hear the shamble man’s uneven footsteps, rather the direction we went or the paths we bypassed to get here. I wrinkled my nose in irritation as I realized the only certainty I had was that we had turned right onto this path and it had taken five or so minutes to reach the dead end.

Fellen sank down onto the ground as we both tried to catch our breath. The fear that the shamble man might round one of the shallow bends the path took kept me from doing the same, but I still had to lean forward and support my weight by resting my hands on my knees. We stared at each other wide-eyed before flicking our gaze up to check the path.

“Do you think it followed us?” Fellen asked.

“I…” I checked the path again. “Even if it did, they’re slow. We shouldn’t stay here though, just in case.”

She nodded and stood back up. “That was my first time seeing one. Up close.”

“Same.”

We had both seen them as gray blobs in the distance when the tribe rounded the Statue Garden, but it was a vastly different experience to have one of those resolve itself into a corpse lurching its way toward you. We didn’t hold hands again as we crept our way back up the path, but we did keep closer together than we ever had previously. I did my best to keep in the front without Fellen noticing. I doubted my blessing would offer me much more protection than her when it came to a shamble man, but it was something, and if I was in front I had a better view to figure out where we should go.

Nothing appeared to block our way before we reached the beginning of the dead end path. I cut the long string of knots from my ball of woolen thread—now much diminished—so that I could start a new strand without getting them confused. We had the two basic choices of going left or right. Back the way we came or further into the unknown. Considering that the first choice left us with a better chance of running into the shamble man again, and it was nearly as unknown as if we continued on, it wasn’t difficult to make our choice. I knotted the string as we turned right.

This path also narrowed quickly, so that we couldn’t walk side by side, but it didn’t turn into a dead end. I hated how it narrowed my field of vision though, especially when it sometimes narrowed to the point that we had to shuffle sideways for a few long minutes before it opened up again. If anything came after us we would be little better than fish funneled into a trap. A couple times, I led us onto new paths simply because they had more breathing room.

When we came upon a small rock fall, I stopped. Not because it was blocking our way—it wasn’t, not completely. It looked like a majority of the stones had gotten stuck between the walls of the ravine, and I could see an opening under the first rock that we could crawl through. But it was cramped and, just looking at it caused the claustrophobic feeling I had been holding at bay to clamp down. My whole body weight felt suddenly doubled as my attention focused on the dark opening and my mind conjured an image of all the stones collapsing down onto me. Fellen’s gaze crawled across my back, and then I was back in the store, Mother’s second look of disappointment searing my back, with no way out except to turn and bolt past her through the tent opening. And that wasn’t an option. It was never an option, no matter how hard I tried to please her, or how badly I wanted to just be outside the tent. I wouldn’t even complain if she had me count seeds again, if I got to do it outside.

But all I got to see was the tent walls, pressing in on all sides, round on the outside wall where the skins stretched around the supporting sticks, and flat in the middle where the divider hung to split Mother’s store from the family side of the tent. I knew every inch of them. Knew how they shifted and strained during a storm, the way they muffled the twins’ giggling laughter, the exact number of patients we could fit inside—sitting, standing, and laying down. I couldn’t escape them, just like I couldn’t escape Mother’s critical gaze and her lectures and her disappointment, day after day. I couldn’t even look forward to meal times, because then I had to contend with the crowd of tribe members and the oppressive weight of their judgmental looks. Plus, meal times never lasted long enough for me to truly enjoy being outside the tent before I had to go back inside.

Mother clicked her tongue, and I froze. A lecture about the importance of discipline and how I had made her waste valuable time, was imminent. I had taken too long to answer a question, and by the way she was gripping my arm, it had been a simple one. A lecture and a spanking then. I needed to focus, needed to get the timing of my apology right and remember the answer to the question, so I would know it when she inevitably asked again. So she wouldn’t decide to not teach me for a few days out of spite like she had before. Learning was the best escape I had.

As Mother began to berate me, I noticed her voice sounded wrong and then her voice morphed until I finally recognized Fellen’s voice whispering my name and asking what was wrong. I used her voice to ground myself, and slowly, painfully, pull myself out of the memory of the tent and her disapproval. When my vision cleared, and all I was left with was the discomfort of the ravine walls around me, I closed my eyes so I couldn’t see the stupid tunnel and held myself rigidly way from the walls even though the exhaustion pulling at my limbs urged me to slump against one. I couldn’t risk inciting another flashback. I also became aware that the hand on my arm was Fellen’s.

Voice thin, I hissed at her. “Let me go.”

She did, startled. “What happened?”

I didn’t answer her. It took enough effort to keep reminding myself that walls around me were ravine walls, not tent walls, and that there were stars above me that I could see if I chose. She was nowhere near, she wasn’t my mother anymore, I had a new name and she had no hold over me. I could go and explore and learn what I wanted.

I felt Fellen’s hand inching near to touch me again. “Don’t touch me.”

She snatched her hand back and asked again, urgent, “What happened? What’s wrong?”

I had a choice to answer her or not. My choice. This time I did dredge up the energy to respond, if only to make my recovery easier. “I remembered something…unpleasant. I need a bit of time to recover and then we should go back the way we came.”

“Oh.” I could almost feel her remembering my last interaction with the healer and trying to puzzle out how a memory could have such a strong effect and what triggered it. “Okay.”

At least she didn’t press me on my sudden change of plans. I trained my gaze up onto the sky above and rubbed my hands together, breathing in the cool night air slowly, in and out, to ground myself further in the moment. I’m not sure how long it took before I turned my head toward Fellen and flicked my chin forward to get her moving. “Let’s go. I want out of these narrow passages as soon as possible.”

She went, but I saw the barely suppressed questions clamped behind her teeth before she turned her head. Even if I managed to put her off for the rest of the night, I doubted she would be able to put off waiting for answers before the next. I distracted myself by developing answers that might satisfy her curiosity without endangering myself as we twisted our way back down the path and through several more. A short while later, we finally reached a ravine that opened up wide enough that we could stand shoulder to shoulder four times over and not touch both walls.

It wasn’t perfect, but it was enough for me to breath a sigh of relief.

--

We continued on throughout the rest of night without anything exciting happening. I managed to scrounge up some edible moss that was hiding underneath various rocks and ledges. It was gritty and tasted like dirt, but it was better than nothing. We weren’t able to find a good nook to tuck into during the day, so instead we settled in the straightest bit of path that we could find, so that we had more warning if anything came near.

As dawn began to light up the sky we heeded Grandmother’s last bit of advice and prayed. We had put off praying before in case we brought the goddess’s attention to us, however slim of a chance that was. We didn’t need the bad luck that often came with Her attention—only huntresses and Grandmothers wanted Her gaze on them as She had reason to look on them favorably and grant them good luck. If She paid attention to anyone else is likely because they had earned Her ire.

But we couldn’t thank Her for Her averted gaze after being confronted with a shamble man. That was one of Her creatures, through and through, and a sure sign that She had at least the tiniest portion of Her gaze on us. So this time we prayed for the next best thing: to appease Her and hope She forgot us. Flickermark was difficult enough without having to worry about accidentally offending the goddess. Now we needed our prayer to reach Her, so She wouldn’t think we were ignoring Her when the goddess deigned to watch us. Of course, there was also the worry that our prayer of appeasement would get lost in the jumble without Grandmother to guide it to the goddess’s ears, but we had to do what we could.

Fellen and I faced each other, kneeling, as we each pricked our respective marks and let the blood fall down onto Flickermark’s floor. Then we did our best to emulate Grandmother.

Fellen started the prayer. “We gift this blood to the Goddess so that She does not have to take in the coming days. May it grant Her strength.”

“We only aim to pass through this holy place while honoring the memory of the Beloved’s trial here. May your bond last eternal.”

We pricked our marks again and said the last part in unison. “These lowly girls give our blood in offering. Do you accept?”

The drops of blood soaked into the ground as we anxiously watched them. I could feel my heart in my throat when they didn’t flake away after counting to thirty and then sixty. Our offering hadn’t been accepted, if it had reached the goddess at all.

Fellen met my gaze, fear plain on her face and in her posture. “What do we do now?”

I did my best not to show my own worry. “We try again.”

We repeated the prayer, but the new drops of blood didn’t disappear anymore than the first drops had. We were about to try the prayer one last time when I felt the ground shift behind me, something rustled, and a shadow passed over us.

Fellen stared past me, slack jawed and pale as bone. I twisted around to see that a six foot pine tree had risen up from the ground behind me—and there hadn’t even been a sapling there before. One of the goddess’s favored trees. My expression was quick to mirror Fellen’s as horror and awe both fought for dominance in my chest.

Then two hands appeared from the shadow the tree cast as a whisper woman pulled herself up to sit on its edge like it was the lip of a pool and she was resting her feet in its depths. She had short, straight ash brown hair that went barely past her chin and warm beige skin, something I had only seen in a couple tribes before. Her mark was a combination of swirls that covered the left side of her neck and the lower part of her cheek and she was young. Like she had only graduated from the Seedling Palace in the last year or two. The whisper woman wore a dark blue jacket trimmed with dark fur that fell just past her hips over a long dress, and the jacket was held closed by a white belt about four fingers wide that had a pattern of gray pine tress. The dress’s design looked like a whirling gray and black mist that blended well with the tree’s shadow.

She eyed how close our prayer needles were to our marks. “I wouldn’t do that again if I was you. The goddess doesn’t take kindly to those who try to get Her attention through quantity over quality.” Two prayer needles clattered to the ground. She watched us, nonchalant, as if trees grew from nothing and whisper women appeared from their shadows everyday. “Well, a bit of blood wasn’t going to sate Her anyway. You piqued Her interest. Two girls trying to follow in the Beloved’s footsteps through Flickermark all on their own? Doesn’t happen often.” She held up a hand. “But the only way you can truly honor the Beloved’s trial here is to complete it as she did.” She outstretched her hand. “You’re to give me everything but the dresses you’re wearing.”

I swallowed, wanting to protest, knowing we needed what meager supplies we had, but was unable to find the words in what was an obvious display of the goddess’s power. When I met Fellen’s gaze, as we began to hand over our packs and supplies, she also looked conflicted between awe and fear. The whisper woman slung our packs over her shoulders before gesturing to our belts and feet.

“I’ll need your cloaks, eating knifes, slings, and stones as well. And your shoes. The Beloved might have had to make her journey alone, but given that you both are so young, the goddess will allow you to stay together.”

The prospect of losing our tools for hunting and protection got both Fellen and I to speak up at the same time. I said, “But what about the animals? They weren’t here before,” while Fellen asked, “Why?”

The whisper woman shrugged. “You prayed to the goddess; this is Her answer. Besides, the goddess is already giving you one small mercy—I wouldn’t be so quick to beg for another unless you want to attempt the trial on your own. If you want your belongings back make it to the Grove. But also know that if you take the exit, you’ll have failed in your goal to honor the Beloved.”

She held her hand out again insistingly. We gave her everything but the dresses on our backs. There wasn’t much choice unless we wanted to risk angering the goddess.

Fellen pressed her lips together before hesitantly speaking up while the whisper woman got our stuff situated. “What if we can’t make it to the Grove?”

The whisper woman looked up from shoving my cloak in Fellen’s bag. “Then I guess you failed or died and you weren’t worth a fraction of the effort it took Her to grow this tree and bring me here.” She got the cloak in the bag and seemed to listen to the air for a moment before grinning at us. “Don’t just follow the obvious paths.”

And then she pushed herself off, into the tree’s shadow, and she was gone. Fellen and I stared after her for several long minutes before Fellen said what we were both feeling.

“I hate this.” She started to cry. “I hate this!”

I didn’t know what to do. I could feel the cold numbness slipping in again—like I was watching the situation happen to someone else. It was all a little too much. Getting separated and needing to survive on our own in Flickermark; the shamble man quickly followed by my flashback; and now having all our supplies taken from us by decree of the goddess. I wanted Rawley or even Grandmother. They would know what to do. They wouldn’t break from the strain. All I could do was shift closer to Fellen and awkwardly pat her on the back. In a distant way, I was surprised I wasn’t crying too, but ever since I pictured freezing my tears and shattering the frozen sack I put them in, it felt like I had forgotten how to cry.

After a long while Fellen looked up at me, eyes red and swollen. “What are we going to do?”

I looked down the path we were on. “Keep going.”

“And if we get attacked?”

“We run.”

Fellen brought her knees up to her chin. “Do you think they made it out by now? The tribe?”

I blinked and opened my mouth to answer before closing it again. I hadn’t thought to wonder about how the tribe was doing since we got separated from them.

Fellen answered her own question. “I think they are. Or if they’re not, they will be soon. They’ll finish the last few days of the run without any picker bands sneaking in and stealing their stuff. They’ll arrive at Grislander’s Maw, everyone safe and sound, and they’ll get the spot next to the waterfall. Ma’ll finish weaving the blanket she was making for me, and when we get there too she’ll give me a hug before wrapping me in it. Nole will praise us for surviving on our own and advance my apprenticeship. Then we’ll get to enjoy the cold season’s celebrations and I’ll beat you in so many contests that you’ll never be able to make a comeback.”

Her words sounded both like a dream and a promise. I didn’t say anything. If that was what was going to keep her from crumbling, then it was better for her to keep believing in it. A gust of wind cut through the ravine and we both shivered. Reluctantly, but knowing it was the smart thing to do, I held my arm open without looking at her. I felt Fellen eye me warily for a few moments before shifting closer and I wrapped my arm around her. She feel asleep against my side as I took first watch.