Zara was in pain. The hole she slept in was not kind to her exhausted body. A root dug beneath her ribs, her head swung off her shoulder and all the running yesterday made her hurt even more. She slowly took in the day. It was cloudy she noted, just enough cloud cover to reveal the sun in the most annoying times. At least she slept deep enough and therefore felt like her head wasn’t going to collapse, she felt her neck was going to give up the ghost, or stab her in the brain.

She straitened against the trunk she slept next to. Craning her neck as much to work out the kinks in her spine as see what the boy did to the camp, a rush of fear ran up her spine, or to her.

She looked herself over, and found nothing amiss. She was wrapped and tangled in her blanket and she could see no signs of the boy coming near her.

Fear dislodged the last remnants of sleep from Zara, and she could actually look at her surroundings. The camp was still here, and not much had changed. The boar was skinned and his leather cleaned and set to tan on a makeshift tanning rack. The meat was nowhere to be found and the hole above which it was hung was filled in.

The boy himself was crouched next to the fire pit, now lit, and was roasting what she assumed to be the boar he killed. When the scent of sizzling meat reached her nose, her stomach growled like thunder. She closed her eyes at the sound, then slowly opened them back up and looked at her camp mate for the look of disapproval or a sneer of derision. Characteristically, it seemed the boy cared little if at all for her or her hunger or the traitorous calls of her stomach.

Finally, Zara swallowed her pride and stood up to join the boy that found her in the woods. It took a while to untangle her sleeping blanket, and even more time to return feeling into her legs that, like her, fell asleep. Lastly a few moments were spared to wonder whether returning feeling to sore muscles was a good idea.

She awkwardly shuffled to the fire pit, nether her soreness nor did the new swords she had strapped to her waist help her reach the fire pit with her dignity intact. She stood across the boy in silence for a while waiting for him to shoo her off or invite her to eat. She fiddled with the handles of her swords for a while before finally deciding to break the silence.

“Can I join you?” she asked.

The boy finally looked up at her. “Didn’t you prepare food for your travels?” he asked back.

Zara felt herself flush. “I did!” she defended herself “But I ate it all already.” She finished, her last words fading into a whisper.

“But I was planning to hunt something before we met!” she added again.

“Sure.” he said. “Grab a slice and eat with me.” he returned his attention to the strip of meat he was roasting above the fire.

“I didn’t see a bow or arrows. Were you planning to make some? How were you planning to hunt?” he asked as Zara settled next to the fire with a hefty strip of boar on a makeshift spit.

“Uuuuh…” Zara started. “I have a sling for that. It’s smaller and easier to find ammunition.” She explained.

“Oh. All right then.” The boy responded.

The silence stretched. Zara found herself looking for reasons to talk to the boy, even though he was not to be trusted, his stoicism and apparent comfort in silence made her want to fill the void with something. She decided that it was worth asking for his name again. She took some time to construct a question he couldn’t deflect.

“What should I call you?” she voiced the question, as the fire crackled in the late morning wind rebuffing the chill that would make the morning too cold for comfort.

“You decide.” He answered.

Well fuck you, too Zara thought, but begrudgingly admitted to herself that she didn’t ask the question precisely enough. The boy was acting like the mysterious masters from the chivalric novels she read in the castle. They always kept being mysterious instead of answering questions the hero needed answered to progress the story.

Zara re-constructed the question “What do others call you usually?” she voiced the question with badly hidden exasperation.

She was already trying to prepare another version of the question when the boy answered.

“They call me ‘You’” he pointed with his finger miming how someone would point at him “or ‘Hey’, or ‘Chogach’.” he finished.

“You said you don’t have a name. What is the last word then?” Zara asked, feeling smugness fill her chest as she thought she caught him in a lie, remembering their conversations from yesterday.

“Well it is not a name, at least, it is not a name for a person. It’s a word for what I am, or what I am trying to become.” He took a moment to think for a moment, ignoring or not catching on Zara’s disappointment in not unravelling a lie. “It would translate as ‘Free traveller’ or ‘Free walker’ in your language. So that is what they call me.”

Zara hid her disappointment when he finished.

“Then I’ll call you Walker. It sounds like a name from where I come from. I am Zara Sarff.” Her own name exited her own mouth before the thought of the boy, Walker, selling her out to Him clamped on her tongue.

Walker nodded “Fair enough Zara Sarff.” He stood with his spit and started to walk off. When he was passing her he added, “When you are done come find me. I’ll be at the tree I showed you yesterday if you want to start training in the sword.” and walked off.

Zara barely understood him as thoughts of being returned to her captors almost made her burn her boar meat. She scarfed down the game when it was roasted enough to be edible, then stood and followed after Walker. Training was better than thinking about what He would do to me if He found me. Zara thought as she reached the knotted old tree from last night.