Guardian: The River

Hazy sensations washed over my body, weighed with an underlying ache and drowned in icy cold. Cutting pressure dragged at my throat and sunlight drew red and orange patterns on my eyelids. Opening my eyes required too much effort, so I focused elsewhere. My legs thrashed rhythmically, pushing against something that didn't truly resist. The same substance supported my back and caressed my face. One arm swung in a similar, if slower, pattern to my legs. The other…

Trepidation oozed through my gut, but I tried moving the arm. Mind-splintering pain shot from my wrist, and my muscles seized. Water closed over my head as I sank, dragged deeper by the cloak around my neck.

'You're in the river, idiot.' Flailing, I struck out for the surface, bursting clear with a gasp and gawking around. Broken tree branches and sandbars studded the frigid watercourse. 'How did you avoid all that?'

My limbs refused to fall into the easy pattern they'd found before; they instead paddled awkwardly like I'd always done in the swimming hole at the Training Post. Twisting, driven by a distant need to get out, I grabbed a sturdy branch and clung while the world swam in and out of focus. My teeth chattered and I glanced at my injured wrist — a bit of chipped crystal poked out from between the blue-tinged sausage fingers.

'How did the story crystal get there?' Explanations eluded me, so I turned to retrace the past day's events.

'You were guarding the bridge. The soldiers came — they burned the Post. You had to get everyone to safety.'

I frowned. 'No. That's not right.' The crystal's edges bit into my hand. 'That's only the story. What really happened?'

For a moment, my mind was filled with smoke and flames. Then an errant wave splashed my face, and a murky roar filled my mind.

'That's right — you woke at the waterfall.' Once named, the memory was sluggish but clear.

'Jerky for breakfast.' My stomach growled, demanding more.

'The Infected squirrel.' My heart leapt, two quick beats in rapid succession, before falling back into its leaden pace.

'The badger and Grig.

'Tyr, and slogging along with the litter.

'Then…'

My brow furrowed, and I tried to piece together the fragmentary images. They didn't make sense; somehow, some way, the Infected followed us to the camp. I craned my neck, peering upriver while my teeth clattered together like the castanets Kit had demonstrated at the EMBG.

A small boat with four indistinct figures navigated the river's obstacles; two rowing and two studying the banks and snags. The blue-robed figure in the front pointed toward an open channel I could just make out past the snarl of wood I clutched.

"Hey!" Kicking, I wedged my injured arm over the branch. It moved under my weight, but I waved once before crashing down. "Help!"

My head ducked back underwater. The gnarled wood dragged at my limbs and kept me beneath the surface. I thrashed, trying to get clear, and my wrist smacked against something solid. Bubbles streamed across my face when I screamed.

Realizing my error too late, I clamped my lips shut and thrust my uninjured hand forward, attempting to disengage from the snag. My lungs burned; I fought the impulse — the need — to inhale. The thud of my heart echoed in my ears and the murky, storm-bloated water obscured my gaze. Pressure built around my chest. My arm grew leaden, pushing with less and less force against the branches.

Just as my mouth slipped open and a stream of water entered, a violent yank on my throat pulled me away from the logjam and upward. My head popped above the water, dragged by the cloak. Incomprehensible sounds battled with the roaring in my ears and my back scrapped across the wooden side of the rowboat. The chokehold on my neck eased abruptly, and I fell, slamming into the boat's side and dropping back into the water before I could do more than gasp.

When the frigid water swallowed my head again, I forced my limbs to paddle. Choking and sputtering, I burst clear. Scorching hands grabbed my upper arm, dragging me once more across the wood and into the boat. Sprawled on the rough planks with the wooden ribs digging into my body, I coughed until my throat burned. Blue cloth draped over me and chafed my skin, and once I controlled my breathing, I peered through tear-clouded eyes at the people in the boat.

Two men — one bulky and one thinner — handled the oars, maneuvering the boat against the current. Both had long, blood-streaked scratches on their straining arms. A man in a loose shirt and pants crouched over me, toweling me off with — if I had to guess — his own robe, and a woman clutched a wadded ball of bloodstained denim.

"Grig!" I jerked up, supported by one hand while I cradled the other to my chest, and searched as if I might have missed his presence in the boat. "Tyr?"

The man hovering over me exchanged a glance with the woman, and one rower bit back a sob.

"N-no." I shook my head, teeth chattering still in the chill that the sunlight didn't touch. "He's fine. They're both fine." I shoved the robe off and pushed to my knees, making the boat rock. "That's why we brought him here. So he'd be—"

"Settle down or you'll have us all in the river." The man's voice was as firm as the hand that pushed me back to the boards.

I went, but my teeth sank into my lip to still my protests. 'They're fine. They have to be.' I nearly shouted when a hand fell on my forehead.

"By the Way," the man muttered. He squinted at me when I met his gaze with wide eyes.

"Isamu," he said over his shoulder. "He's burning up."

"Move." The woman pushed the man aside, jostling the boat as she knelt. Her hand — just as hot as the man's — rested on my forehead briefly before slipping down to grasp the forearm that I'd pressed to my chest. Her face creased, a furrow forming between her brows. "Row faster. I need my kit."

"We're… trying…" The burly rower leaned into his strokes. "Unless you'd… like to give… us a push?"

"If we had a sailboat…" The disrobed man frowned. "Maybe if I—"

"If we had… a sailboat… you wouldn't need… us, eh?" The burly rower grinned tightly. "Better plan… ahead next time."

"Less chatter," the thin rower said. "More rowing."

"W-who a-are y-you?" I clamped my teeth together to still their chatter, but the shivers that racked my body didn't stop. While I looked for the cloak I'd carried from the Out Post, the woman — 'Isamu?' — tugged the blue robe over me like a blanket.

"Marc," the woman nodded toward the burly rower, then the thinner one. "Thom." She jerked her chin at the man who still frowned at the river bank as if they held the key to unraveling a mystery. "Nuada. I'm Isamu. We're Gitano."

Twisting into my crystal, I bound the names to memory, though the effort left my head spinning.

"And you, Guardian?" she asked while her fingers played gently with my gauntlet. "What brings you here?"

"C-cairn. Y-you k-know I'm a F-flit?" At the confused looks this garnered, I continued, "B-bones. I m-mean a B-butterfly."

This elicited an understanding nod from Isamu, and my story poured out, in stuttered starts and stops, while she made encouraging noises.