After the Fire (After the Fire: Book the First) (4 page)

The
wolf growled and Eleni followed his eyes. Something white flashed in
front of her, making her flinch. A white bird landed just above her
and looked at her. A white raven. It turned its head this way and
that, taking note of her. Eleni looked down at the wolf. She was no
longer growling. She was staring at the bird and then she lowered her
head in an odd way. Almost as though bowing to it. Eleni looked at
the raven. It looked back. She frowned. Ravens were not supposed to
be white. It wasn't albino, like the rabbit her mother had showed her
once as a child. That rabbit had red eyes and snow white fur. Eleni
had even been able to touch it as her mother held it. But the raven
didn't have red or even pale eyes. It had normal beady raven eyes.

The
raven let out a shriek and flew to a higher branch. Eleni marked it,
but moved on. There was no sign of the strange man from the night
before. The creatures were quiet. As if even they, the
beasts and monsters of the wood, feared Eleni as well.

She
walked with the wolf until her feet were tired and the hem of her
dress was wet with dew. There were no monsters this night. And the
raven followed her incessantly, squawking occasionally. Shooing it
away did no good. It just hopped out of Eleni's reach and
watched her in an eerie way, as if it knew her.

Finally,
just before dawn, Eleni spotted a deer. A great deer with horns that
spread out from its skull like the bony hands of a giant. Eleni crept
up on one side, the wolf on the other. She held out her hand and the
buck was dead before it even registered the scent of wolf and fire.
She went to the carcass. The head was still partially attached, the
wound burned black by her fire. There was no life in his eyes. Eleni
let the wolf feed on the meat from the throat. Then she used her hand
to cook the remains of the tender meat and picked at it with her
fingers, careful not to soil her only garment. When she had her fill,
she hefted the deer up, her powerful muscles working to keep her
upright with the great weight on her shoulder.

She
had once seen Cosmin try to lift a carcass like this when she was a
child. She had giggled as he staggered underneath it, finally letting
it drop to the ground when it was obvious he couldn't carry it. But
strength had always come to her easily. The pig from the night before
had been difficult only because she was weak from the blue creature
that attacked her. Now she walked lithely with the deer on her
shoulder, the horns poking into her thigh with every step. The wolf
ran off, as she always did at dawn. When Eleni reached the village
gates she dropped the animal unceremoniously into the dirt.

She
looked up to see Rastin looking down at her with an arrow aimed at
her head. She smiled at him and let a flame burst from her hand. He
pulled back his bow further and she walked away. When she took her
mother from the village, Rastin would not live to see her walk away.
She would make sure of that.

Eleni
slept soundly that night for the first time in many months. She was
usually plagued by strange, fevered dreams of faces she didn't know
and places she'd never been. But to her relief, she slept dreamlessly
with the door to her iron box wide open and the scent of the traveler
wrapped around her.

She
woke at sunset, feeling refreshed. She walked away from the village,
ten men pointing arrows at her back. The wolf joined her as she
walked toward the river. When she got there, she carefully hung the
jacket on a tree, followed by her dress. She stepped into the water
and washed herself. She could tell the water was probably frigid, but
it didn't affect her. She could sense the cold, but she couldn't feel
it. When she had scrubbed the grime off of her body and hands and
feet, she submerged her head and let the current of the river wash
her hair.

It
had been her hair that had first worried the village folk. Her mother
told her. It was an omen after the fire to have a child with hair the
color of flame, even though her mother's had been nearly as bright.
At the time Cosmin's father, Farin, had been in charge. He had been a
level-headed man. The day after Farin died, Eleni had seen the
blacksmith working on a great iron box. Her box. In a month's time,
she had been sent to live there. She had seen her mother every day
after that until five winters ago. Eleni hadn't seen her since.

Eleni
wrung out her hair as she emerged from the water. She wished she had
a comb. Her mother used to come and comb her hair. By the time she
reached her clothes, the water had evaporated from her body, becoming
steam and trailing away into the cold wind. She dressed and walked
along the snaking tree roots, smooth and cool under her feet, to find
the wolf. The animal joined her, licking blood from her muzzle.

Eleni
looked past her to see a freshly-killed polecat. The wolf licked her
snout again. There was a flash of white and something landed on what
was left of the carcass. The white raven from the night before looked
at her and thrust its beak into the polecat's face. It tore at the
fur to get at the meat within.

`“Strange-looking
creature, is it not?” said a deep voice behind her. Eleni
jumped, moving quickly away from the noise. The traveler was standing
there, smiling at her.

“Where
did you come from?” said Eleni, moving further away from him.

“I
came to see you,” he said. The wolf was looking steadily at the
man and Eleni expected the creature to run at him and sink teeth into
soft flesh. Instead, the wolf walked over to the man, sniffed him,
and kept walking. Eleni looked at the man, Fin, in shock.

“No
one ever sneaks up on me,” said Eleni.

“I'm
sorry,” he said. “I just wanted to speak with you.”

“Why
does the wolf not tear you apart?”

The
man shrugged. “I have a way with animals.”

“You
are wearing clothes now,” he said. His eyes twinkled as he
looked at the jacket. His jacket.

“They
are afraid of me,” she said.

“Weren't
they always?” said Fin.

“They
are afraid in a different way,” she said. “They know they
cannot control me. It scares them.”

“They
stopped locking you up,” he said.

“You
were watching me?” she said, narrowing her eyes. “How
long have you been here?”

“Don't
worry,” he said smiling. “Nothing I haven't seen before.
Remember?”

Eleni
looked away from him, listening to the forest. It had been so quiet
for the last few days. No monsters. She didn't know what it meant.
She looked back at Fin. “Where is your horse?”

“Epona?
I left her with my friends,” he said.

“Another
town?” said Eleni. “Where?”

“Not
a town,” he said. “More of a camp. Would you like to sit
down somewhere? So we can talk?”

“We
are talking now,” she said.

“You
don't make things easy, do you? Are you going to tell me your name at
least?”

She
eyed him suspiciously. “Eleni,” she said quietly. “Who
are you?”

Fin
smiled again. It was a kind smile. “Someone that might
understand who you are. Someone that's just like you.” He
turned and started to walk into the wood. Eleni watched him go. He
looked back at her. “Are you coming?” he said. He
disappeared in the trees.

Eleni
looked around for the wolf. It had gone when she was busy talking to
Fin. She shook her head at her own negligence. She needed to be more
alert. She was growing lax. Slowly she put one foot in front of the
other, almost surprised to find that she was following the way Fin
had gone. As if her body had made a decision before she could do
anything about it.

Fin
was sitting on a rock smoothing his beard. He had his legs stretched
out in front of him and held something that looked like a boar tusk
in one hand. He saw her and gestured to a similar rock next to him.
Eleni froze, looking around. The white raven let out a scream in her
ear as it flew past her head and alighted on Fin's shoulder.

“I
saw that raven yesterday,” she said.

“It
belongs to a friend of mine,” said Fin. “Please. Sit.”
Eleni felt nervous and twitchy. She couldn't remember the last time
she had been invited to sit with another person. Not since she'd been
separated from her mother. Fin watched her with patient eyes. He
lifted the tusk and Eleni heard the sound of a cork being pulled. Fin
lifted it to his lips and drank, making a face as he re-corked the
container.

“You
drink from the tusk of a pig?” she said, suddenly curious
again. She took a step toward him, but stopped again. She was afraid
to be close to him, but at the same time she did not want to leave
him. She looked behind her, into the thick of the woods. Two golden
eyes grew larger as the wolf emerged from the brush. She looked at
Eleni almost chidingly, then walked over and lay down next to the
large stone Fin had invited her to sit on. Haltingly, Eleni followed,
stopping every few steps and looking around, as if she would find a
reason not to stay. The man, the raven and the wolf all watched her
progress in silence. All three seemed to know the difficulty of what
Fin had asked her to do.

Fin
looked down as she sat. He lifted up the object he had raised to
drink. “This is a horn, not a tusk,” he said without
looking at her. His voice was friendly, without a trace of the
contempt she felt from most of the villagers. All but Alin. Though
she had felt fear from the old man quite often. Fin did not seem to
fear her. He did not seem to loathe her either. Eleni did not know
what to think about him. She felt a great curiosity towards him, but
she was afraid he, too, would
leave when he grew tired of her. Either that or
he would come to loathe her.

“A
horn,” Eleni repeated. Fin handed her the object. It was nearly
as long as her forearm and heavier than it looked. It had a strap on
it so it could be worn.

“From
the head of a steer,” he said. “Great wooly beasts. As
tall as you and ten times as heavy. At least.”

Eleni
stared at him, transfixed at the way he spoke, the languorous way he
leaned back watching her. She could listen to him all day. She looked
down at the horn in her hands. It was polished to a sheen, and was
cool and smooth in her hands.

“You
don't see many these days, of course. But every once in a while I
come across one.”

“Where?”
she said suddenly, surprising even herself.

Fin
smiled. “I come from the West,” he said. “From the
Islands.”

Eleni's
eyes widened and her heart beat in her throat. “The West,”
she repeated.

“Have
you never been away from here?” he asked.

Eleni
averted her eyes. It made her nervous to meet his eyes. “I was
born after the fire,” she said. She was quiet for a long time,
staring at the horn, turning it this way and that to make the ivory
catch the light of the moon. “They tell us that nothing
survived,” she said. “Only our village and the monsters
and the Reivers.”

“Who
tells you that?” he said.

She
didn't meet his eyes and spoke as if he hadn't. As if she had to
continue or she wouldn't be able to say it. “They tell us that
all this is because of me. I am a bad omen. We are being punished. We
survived the fire so we could see what happens. So we could see what
has come because they were kind to take me in.” She fiddled
with the cork in the horn. Fin was silent. “They tell us
nothing survived,” she said again. “But you are here. So
either they are wrong, or you are not real.”

“I'm
real,” Fin said softly.

“I
could not find your horse's tracks,” she said, glancing up at
him. “I looked for them last night. You left no trace.”

Fin
looked up at the sky. The moon was rising and was almost directly
overhead. It was almost full. “You and me,” he said
softly, “we're not the same as the rest of them. There's some
that will fear us. There's some, nothing can stop them from hating
us.” He looked at Eleni, his face finally serious, unsmiling.
“There's some that would do anything to worship us.”

Eleni
didn't breathe for a moment. She forgot to look away from Fin. He
stared right into her. “That cannot be,” said Eleni, her
voice a whisper. “What you are saying, I don't understand...”

Fin
smiled with his eyes. “Let me show you something,” he
said. He leaned forward. “Put your hand here, on this patch of
grass.”

“What?”

“Please,”
he said. “I want to show you.” Eleni did as he asked,
crouching down and placing her hand on the ground. The wolf raised
his head from his paws, watching them. “Now burn it,” he
said.

“Burn
it?” she said, not comprehending. “What is the use of
that?”

“Just
burn it,” he said.

The
raven hopped down to Fin's knee and then down to the ground, seeming
to be taking in Eleni's every movement.

Eleni
let the fire flow gently through the palm of her hand. Smoke rose
from between her fingers, lingering in her nostrils. She removed her
hand to show him the hand-shaped burn in the earth. He nodded and
Eleni sat back down on her stone, watching Fin. He smiled at her
confused expression. He knelt next to the scorch mark and placed a
large, scarred hand over the smaller, blackened hand-mark.
He exhaled oddly and Eleni saw something in his
eyes. A flash, like the lightning in the mountains, only bright
green. It was gone in an instant. Eleni sensed something happening in
the ground under Fin's hand. Like a cool sort of heat. She felt a
gentle rumble in the ground, like thunder with no sound.

There
was a pressure in the air, and then a movement under Fin's fingers.
Eleni leaned forward. Something was coming out of the earth under the
man's hand. At first Eleni thought it was a living creature, then she
realized they were plants. Green grass and vines snaked out of the
ground, wrapping around Fin's arm as the vines sprouted leaves and
the buds that came before the blossom. Fin took his hand away,
untangling himself from the vines and laughing at the look on Eleni's
face. The scorch mark was gone. The damage her hand had made had
disappeared and been replaced by new growth. Eleni shook her head,
frowning. She knelt down by Fin and examined the ground. The plants
had roots when she tugged at them. It was real, not a trick. She
looked up at him.