Awakening the Mare (Fall of Man Book 1) (6 page)

They had come for me.

My whole being shuddered in fear and there
was no turning back, no giving up to the Sybaris. My only choice
was to flee.

I always kept my satchel with the time
capsule and other items in the barn. I tossed that bag over Casey’s
neck, walked him from his stall, and mounted him.

The doors to the stable were open and I knew
the Sybaris could see me.

They didn’t come in, but their faces were
smug, as they believed they had me encircled with their
vehicles.

Taking a deep breath, focusing forward, I
whispered to Casey that we were going to go as fast as he
could.

With a loud ‘Ha!”, I snapped the reins and
bolted from the barn.

The line of vehicles were ahead of me and I
didn’t have enough distance to generate the momentum for a jump.
But I had to try.

Thinking ‘leap over’ and ‘fly’, I pulled back
on the reins and hoped for the best.

How it happened, I still don’t know.

Casey made the leap and without a problem, we
cleared a vehicle. His hooves hit hard to the sandy ground surface
and we didn’t stop.

We just kept going.

They followed me with their vehicles until
the terrain of the land made it impossible for them to keep up.

I went south, then west, away from the
gatekeepers and finally, I lost them.

Or so I thought.

I crossed over the old road on the edge of
town, and they turned around. I was foolish to think they ceased
following me. I slowed down my pace, feeling secure.

In the few minutes that we trotted with ease,
I decided I would go around the Salton Sea and head toward Angeles
City. There were people there when I was a child, surely there were
still people living there. As well as the fact that the Rebels
against the Sybaris were somewhere, I just had to find them and
hoped that they welcomed me.

The Salton Sea was never a thriving body of
water, in fact it reeked of dead fish. But it was a passageway for
refugees to make it to Akana.

I knew I could take the long way around the
body of water, and once clear of it, I was safe. The Sybaris never
went that far west. That was Savage territory.

As soon as I came upon my route to go around,
I realized how wrong I was in my thinking. I wasn’t safe. Not at
all.

Six vehicles rapidly began to pursue me.
They’d figured out what I was doing. Knowing well they could outrun
my horse.

My only option was the Salton Sea, as foul as
it was. I veered in that direction, planning to get as close as I
could with Casey, then dive into the body of water, knowing they’d
never come for me in there.

I’d get in the water, wait it out. Taking a
refugee float was out of the question, Casey couldn’t do that.

I smelled the salvation of the sea, and
pushed Casey to the limits of his speed.

A little more. Just a little more.

The water was close and there was a planked
bridge. All I had to do was get there, jump off, and dive in. I was
focused until Casey stopped and reared up on his hind legs with a
painful ‘nay’.

He didn’t go forward, in fact, he nearly
threw me from his back. I tried to calm him, then I saw an arrow
dug deep into his side.

“No!”

They had shot my horse.

Another nay, another jolt, and another arrow
into Casey.

I could no longer keep him steady.
Emotionally, I was crushed for my dedicated friend.

His final attempt to get me to the sea ended
with an arrow to his neck. Casey’s legs buckled and he went
down.

The force of his fall threw me to the ground,
and I rolled quickly to a kneel. The Sybaris climbed out of their
vehicles and rushed my way.

Sea to my right, Sybaris to my left. I
noticed my bags had been thrown from Casey and I snatched them up
and ran as fast as I could to the planked pier.

Just as I was about to jump in, I spotted one
of the floaters that Refugees used to cross the sea.

The Sybaris stopped. “Go on!” one of them
shouted. “Jump in there. You were not educated in water. You’ll
sink and die. It will consume you.”

They were right. I had no idea how to be in
water or what it would do. I never thought past the idea of jumping
in. There was a reason there were floating devices. Man, as well as
Sybaris, weren’t meant to be in large bodies of water.

“Make your choice!” he shouted.

I did.

When I lowered my bag to the floating device,
they raised their bows.

Eyes wide, I hurried to the edge and
carefully climbed down into the floater. It was tied with rope to
the pier. I undid it and pushed away. The floater moved slow and on
its own.

Crossing the sea was going to take forever at
that rate.

The Sybaris were relentless.

They kept aim on me and fired. An arrow
sailed my way, and while I tried to move, it hit into my arm. Not
deeply, but enough to penetrate the skin. My reaction was to
quickly remove it. Blood seeped from my wound. With nothing to
cover my injury, I ripped the bottom of my blouse, and held the
cloth tight to the entry site.

The float drifted with the current of the
sea. Slowly, but farther away from the Sybaris.

I couldn’t figure out why they still waited.
What were they waiting for?

For me to drift back to them probably.

When an immediate sense of dizziness hit me,
I realized there must have been something on that arrow. A poison.
Everything went out of focus and my head swarmed in disarray.

I was fading, my eyes were hard to keep open,
and consciousness was slipping away. I could only hope that I made
it far enough away from the Sybaris before I passed out.

Consciousness drifted from me. My eyes were
heavy, my head hurt, and it felt like the one time I drank wine. I
had heard tales that Sybaris poisoned their arrows, and I found the
truth in that when one sailed into me.

Knowing how fast the poison worked, at least
Casey didn’t suffer much.

I fought to keep my eyes open, using my hands
in a manner to push the floater farther from the shore.

My battle to stay awake ended and my eyes
grew too heavy to keep open.

The last I saw were the Sybaris at a distance
from the sea. Standing there, watching me.

Was the poison deadly or did it only disable
me? I guess I would find out. No matter how hard I fought it, it
was stronger than I.

*

I woke to a dark sky speckled with stars,.
still in the floater. My head was shooting with pain, as was my
arm. The blood from my wound had saturated the sleeve of my blouse
and it was sticking to my injury.

Using my uninjured arm, I tried to bring
myself to a sitting position but couldn’t move. My legs and body
felt as if they were weighted down.

I tried to see where I was. Looking left to
right, I discovered I had somehow made it to the middle of the sea.
It was cold and my lips were dry from thirst. There was still
nothing I could do but take comfort in my safety surrounded by
water.

My eyes rolled to the back of my head and I
passed out again.

This time, I dreamt.

It was a weird dream that started out with
the feeling that the floater was spinning, as if it were going down
a funnel. In the dream the floater threw me to the sky, through a
series of bright lights, and I landed at my home.

Just outside the sitting room window, I saw
my mother inside, pacing, lit by a single lantern. It seemed so
real, but it was only a dream. I knew it was a dream, especially
when I absorbed through the walls and stood right by her. Her arms
were clasped tightly to her body, and I couldn’t decipher the look
on her face. Worry? Fear?

Then again, my mother’s fate was unknown.
Surely, with what transpired in the town square between Nito and I,
my mother had been taken.

There was knock on the door, it opened, and
Iry walked inside. He peeked out of the windows and closed the
curtain.

“Anything?” my mother asked him.

“They weren’t able to get her.”

My mother sighed heavily.

“You and Sophie will be fine, but it won’t be
long before they use you as a bargaining tool to get her to come
back.”

“Then what?” she asked. “Will they kill
her?”

“It depends who takes her.”

“Iry, tell me you’ll do it. Tell me.”

“I’ll try. She has to return to be chosen.
Otherwise, if they get her outside the Straits, she is free
game.”

Slowly my mother’s head lowered and her hands
went to her face.

It was an odd dream, very realistic.
Especially when Iry looked directly at me.

It startled me, and then there was a single
knock on the door.

“Wake up, Vala,” Iry said.

Another knock.

“You are safe for now. Find refuge. I’ll come
for you. This way is best.”

Knock.

“Wake up.”

I opened my eyes, immediately shielding them
from the bright sunlight.

The knocking was slow and continuous, and I
noticed the float jolted with each knock. I must have drifted up
against something.

My entire body ached, especially my arm. With
the sun beating on me, I would think I would be warm, but I wasn’t.
My body shivered with chills.

The floater hit again.

“Hey, you alive?”

I jumped at the sound of the male voice.
Quickly I turned my body, my muscles were sore and hurt with every
move. The poison had worn off. Sort of. My head still pounded and
throbbed.

His face was young, possibly around my age.
He was thin, but it was hard to tell how tall because he crouched
at the end of a wooden pier.

His brown hair wasn’t long like the males in
my community, it was shorter, as if he defied the laws and cut
it.

“Man,” he said, “you look like crap. You
okay?”

“Man? I am female, can you not tell?”

He laughed and extended his hand. “Here.”

I sat up. “What?”

“Take it.”

I looked at his empty palm.

“Take it,” he repeated with insistence.

“I don’t know what you are offering or if it
is something I cannot see, but what is it I am suppose to take from
your hand?”

Again, he laughed. “Funny. No, grab my hand.
I’ll help you out. I won’t bite.”

I gasped. “I certainly hope not.” I knew by
his appearance he wasn’t a Sybaris. Why would he mention biting me,
though? Unless humans in the west did bite.

“You gonna let me help you?”

He talked strange.

“Yes.” I looked at his hand. “But I cannot
touch you.”

“Why? You sick?”

“I was hit with an arrow that had
poison.”

“I don’t think it's contagious, but that does
suck.” He reached down and grabbed my arm.

I screamed.

“What? What?” he asked. “What’s wrong?”

“You are male. We are not properly courted.
You touched me.”

“Oh my God, you’re one of them chicks.
Seriously, those laws don’t apply over here. Please let me help you
out of that boat. You look really bad.” Again, he held out his
hand. “Let me help you.”

Reluctantly, and with some fear of
repercussion, I accepted his help from the float. As I made my way
to the pier, my legs were weak and they buckled under me.

He removed a strapped canteen from his
shoulder. “You lips are really dry. Have a drink.”

“What is it?”

“Um… water?”

“You talk funny.”

“No,
you
talk funny. Drink.”

I took a drink. It was cool, but as soon as
my mouth registered it, it tasted funny and it made me cough.

He lifted my arm. “You’re hurt.”

The back of his hand went to my forehead. I
gasped. I was so shocked by his boldness, I could barely move.

“Plus you feel fevered.”

I inched back.

“Why do you do get scared when I touch
you?”

“Because you are male.”

“Yeah, so?”

“It’s just….” I took another drink and forced
myself to swallow. “Never mind. How did you find me?”

“It was our day,” he said. “Every couple of
days a group comes out here to check. Since we had a few people
from Esperanza escape, our leader wants to make sure we check
often. If you crossed the sea, you probably don’t know.”

“Know what?” I asked.

“A lot of things.”

“So there are others. Any from Akana?”

He made this groan sound, as if he was
searching for words, and tilted his head. “Not sure. You’re
actually the first girl I’ve met from the Netherlands. The few that
came before you, they kept them separate until they
normalized.”

“I am very normal.”

“Hmm. I bet. Well, you also seem very ill. At
least look it. How are you feeling?”

“Tired, yet, I slept. Unwell, if that makes
sense.”

“Yeah, it does. They hit you with one of
their tainted arrows. Can I take you to camp? Have you checked out?
We don’t want to waste daylight hours. Then we’ll take you to
AC.”

“AC?” I asked.

“Angeles City. That’s why you crossed right?
You wanted to get there?”

“I was being chased out. I was fleeing for my
life.”

“Seriously?” he asked. “Usually people leave.
Wow, you must have done something.”

“I vomited on Nito.”

“Wow, must have been some vicious upchuck for
them to hunt you down.”

“It burned her.”

“Cool.”

Cool?
He was confused. Burning was
hot. It was going to take me some time to learn the way he spoke
and fully understand.

I asked. “How far is the camp?”

“Just a few miles. You’ll be safe, I promise.
You need someone to check you out, make sure you’re okay, look at
that arm. You lost some blood.”

“It went into me.”

“Obviously. The car’s over here.”

We walked for a few feet and then I noticed
the vehicle. I stopped.