023 – Lost and Frost – Part 3 –

The aching pain from his stomach and throat awoke Uriel multiple times through the night, each time it only got worse, and Zeresha's cries made it all the worse on his heart.

She was a large horse and needed a large amount of food and water for her daily upkeep, and now two days had gone by in which she had hardly anything.

Uriel looked like a hollowed-out corpse with the biting cold acting on his dehydrated skin, as he tried to move about all that he could think of was the pain coming from his throat, just moving his tongue felt like he was trying to slide something fat in a little gap between two rocks.

Every second was an excruciatingly painful one, as Uriel lifted his gaze to the world around him he noticed something in the grass and shrubbery.

He wondered if his eyes were playing tricks on him, but as he thought about it the same thing happened the night before, there was a layer of frost coating the grass.

And frost was water…

Uriel jumped up and dived into the land with energy he had previously lacked and spread his dry mouth as wide as he could before grabbing and shoving as many pieces of grass as he could into his mouth.

The effect was like wetting a dry rug, the frost melted instantly on his tongue and gave him some much-needed relief.

As the minutes passed by the sound of him ruffling through the grass awoke Zeresha as he pulled out handful after handful of grass and threw it into his mouth letting the frost melt into a gentle trickle of water before spitting out the grass.

"Girl look… there's water," Uriel cried with a raspy voice and motioned for her to start eating the grass.

The mare looked at the youth with peculiarity, she had never seen him eat grass before, 'Did the youth perhaps realize how tasty grass was?' she wondered and followed his instruction.

After a while, Uriel stopped with his mouth feeling much better, never in his life did he think that water could be so sweet and wonderful, and never had he been more grateful for the frost.

He looked at the sky trying to gauge the time, from the looks of things it would still be some hours before the sun arose, looking at the surrounding shrubbery he realized that he had a lot of work to do.

With renewed vigor, he grabbed the long strands of grass and rubbed them against the opening of the water skin squeezing out whatever water he could get.

The little flakes of ice broke off rapidly turning into little droplets of water, the progress was slow, but like that, a good hour passed by before the water skin was filled.

Uriel could only look at the fat pouch with shimmering wonder, never in his life did he realize that he could get so much water from plants, and he couldn't help but think of the gods.

But after a second he rejected the idea of thanking them, he had offered prayers to several of them before, but help didn't come to his people when they needed it.

Instead, he offered a word of thanks and gratitude to a god whose name he did not know, because why would he offer thanks to the gods whose names he knew, they did nothing to help him.

When the water skin was full he took a big sip of fresh water which seemed to completely reinvigorate his body, he could feel the water creeping down every fibre of his throat before settling in his stomach.

And once more he got to work refilling the water skin, after a while he pulled the pot from his pack and started to fill it with as much water as he could, by the time he filled half the pot the sun started to rise bringing with it a new day.

As the morning arrived Uriel gave the pot to Zeresha after noticing that she was hungrily eyeing the water skin, it seemed that the frost on the grass wasn't enough for her, and Uriel couldn't blame her there was a reason that he squeezed the water into the water skin instead of sucking the grass dry with his tongue.

As Zeresha bent down and started to gulp down the water Uriel pulled out a portion of bread and cheese which he rapidly wolfed down, when he finished it he couldn't help but look at the rest greedily.

His stomach was still yearning for more, but he knew that he had to be careful he was lost, and with limited supplies, he was fortunate to have a solution to his water problem, but as for food that was an entirely different story.

In the past two days, he hadn't seen much of any game or any bushes with berries not even mushrooms which could easily be poisonous, not to mention that he didn't have a bow to use for hunting even if he came across an animal.

Currently, his only option was to keep heading in an eastward direction hoping to come across a village or perhaps a farm.

The new day began, and the cycle repeated, two days then three days, and before long a week had passed as Uriel wondered with Zeresha.

For the most part, the mare was doing fine, grass was her food, and the water that Uriel was able to gather from the frost was just barely enough to get them by from one day to the next.

But once they hit the one-week mark Uriel couldn't help but to start panicking his supplies were starting to go low and he cursed himself for giving into temptation one day and eating three portions all at once.

Now all that he had left was a little dried meat and a quarter of a block of cheese, and he was probably more lost than ever, he was certain that by this point he should have at least stumbled upon the road.

Every day felt like a great challenge, he awoke to chilling frost, he had to work in the ice cold to get water for himself and Zeresha, then he had to go without breakfast and drink water sparsely, until the evening when if he was lucky he could find tinder for a bit of warmth, where he had to eat a small portion of his meager potions of food for dinner.

He could say with due honesty that nothing in his past had been more difficult or scary, because at least in the past he had people around to talk to and who could help.

Sure he had Zeresha and he loved the mare for all she had done, but it was completely different from speaking to his mom and dad, or Cassandra.

Many hours of his days were spent with him simply urging himself to get up and walk, just one foot in front of the other, he had to look at the positives.

'At least I still have Zeresha,' he would constantly remind himself her company gave him something to focus on other than his thoughts, and her warmth every night saved him from the worst of the cold.

"I still have some food, I still have a source of water," he would mutter to himself in an endless loop throughout the day and when his mouth became tired he would just think it.

One day in the middle of the afternoon Uriel looked up in the sky and for the first time in a week he saw movement.

He stilled and rubbed his eyes to make sure that he was seeing clearly and after gawking for an eternity he became certain, in the distance he could see a bird, there was a bird flying in the sky.

"Zeresha!!!" Uriel cried and gave her neck a stroke, "Look!!!" he shouted and pointed up to the sky, "Let's go, let's go!!!" he chanted and started to run in the direction of the bird.

Uriel excitedly chased after it as he recalled a child's tale, one that had a valuable life lesson that every child would be taught from a young age.

The lesson came from a fable about a boy who got lost on the road and became separated from his family.

One day the boy saw a beautiful bird and couldn't stop himself from trying to catch it, each time he drew closer to the bird the bird flew further away until the boy became lost.

Though the boy didn't notice he was lost, not until much later, but when his parents noticed that he was missing they were filled with despair and took a long rest at the nearest village.

A day later a fisherman returned to the village with the boy in tow, and when everyone asked the boy what had happened he explained.

He told them that he followed the bird for a long time until he came across a stream and at the stream he realized that he was lost.

While crying he fell into the stream and got pulled with the currents until the fisherman caught him and brought him back to the village.

The moral of the story was simple if you are ever lost follow the first bird that you see, and where the bird goes you'll find water and a way back to people.

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