The thought of shifting scared . I’d be exposed to whatever or whoever had placed the waterskin by the fang and spear. What kind of devious power play was that in the first place? Was there a sociopath in the forest, soone who’d get a kick out of playing with ?
The more I thought about it, the worse the ideas that popped into my head beca.
Unsure of what awaited , my mind blanked. But there was no way back. If soone was already tailing , they would have seen a human shift into a Blue Sli the night before. Whoever that was, they knew about my Power.
But where did that waterskin co from? How did I fail to notice anyone climbing the tree?
How? What? When? Where?
Those questions tornted my mind more than anything. Yet my inability to answer them didn’t change a thing. I had to do sothing.
I triggered the Shift, and the Blue Sli expanded once more. A branch slapped into my human face. It stung a little, but that was all the pain I felt. With a quick glance down my body, I noticed that the scratches from the night before had healed. That was in tune with my first Shift experience. Although there were so differences.
The Blue Sli form healed my wounds sohow. The details eluded , but a bit of testing would reveal everything in due ti. Once I was out of danger.
I looked around, my hair standing on end, but there was nothing to see. A sll lingered in the air, familiar yet strange–a musk that hadn’t been in the treetop before, potent and all around .
Basking in the faint sunlight of the early morning, I retrieved the waterskin and took a big gulp. My instincts scread at to be careful, but if soone had wanted to kill , they would have done so already. Poisoning the waterskin to get rid of sounded like a waste of precious poison.
The water was refreshing. I took a second gulp, then a third. As much as I wanted to drink everything in one go, the waterskin had to last a little longer. Relying on a stranger was not on my list. I’d much rather survive this nether of a forest on my own. Trusting myself sounded easy enough.
Other than myself, though, I could only trust my family.
Father’s disappointed face flashed before my eyes. He had a look in his eyes I had never seen before. Maybe... maybe I couldn’t even trust my family. Not all of them. But even if I wanted to trust them, it wasn’t like they could protect from the earl’s people.
Thinking about them, I couldn’t help but wonder what they were doing.
"Do they even care?" I shook my head, a hollow laugh escaping my lips. "They’ll visit a few more towns and make up for their losses. That’s about it."
Nothing would change for them. They’d likely earn a small fortune for their effort as well.
The Choosing made angry. There were so many things I wanted to change. So much I would have done differently... if I’d had the ans to. Alas, there was nothing that could have been done differently. Everyone had to undergo the Choosing at so point to learn about their path, to understand where they belonged.
To awaken a Power was everyone’s destiny. Getting kidnapped–not so much.
It wasn’t my fault. Neither were all the deaths on the flying ship. I hadn’t killed anyone, even if I sotis thought I might have wanted to.
But did I really? Would I kill the soldiers if I had the chance? What about the Wizard, then? The earl? Was I ready to kill them all to take revenge?
No. Probably not.
They had to be punished, but revenge did not necessarily entail death.
Except... if they tried to kill again, I would defend myself. And in doing so, a choice would have to be made. One that might change everything.
Sighing deeply, I sealed the waterskin and attached it to my pants. I retrieved the cooked serpent at next and had a cold, chewy breakfast, until the sa cackling from the night before echoed in my ears.
I fell flat against the treetop and pressed myself firmly into the branches, my eyes searching the periter.
The cackling drew nearer, quickly followed by rustling bushes far to the left. It took only a little while until a pained squeaking resounded and a monster ca into view, in swift pursuit of a small group of... what even were those?
They had the heads of weird-looking dogs, with sharp teeth, torn ears, and long tongues hanging from their flat snouts. They were bipedal, humanoid monsters. Worse still, they wielded weapons. Not steel, but carved from sothing I couldn’t quite wrap my head around. Even so, their weaponry was still better than mine. That much was painfully obvious as they caught up to their prey.
I watched them strike a...honestly, I had no idea what that creature was either. So kind of quadruped, with long front legs and dark fur that hung low enough to brush the ground. It tried to flee, barging through the densely grown thorn bushes that had torn my skin apart like it was nothing. The humanoid monsters were slower, but that hardly mattered.
One of them hurled its javelin, piercing the creature’s leg and slowing it just enough for the rest to catch up. And that they did. Sabers and axes drank deeply of the monster’s blood.
The fight ended quickly, rcilessly, the brutality and efficiency on display scaring shitless.
But there was sothing else, too.
My heartbeat accelerated, not only from fear, but from anticipation as well.
I was afraid to die, yet I wanted to fight these creatures. I wanted to defeat them, grow stronger, and maybe even shift into them.
But how was I supposed to do that? Attacking them without a plan was not an option.
Several plans ford within seconds, but one stood out. It certainly wasn’t the best, but it rang true to –and that was all that mattered.
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