When the World Came Crumbling Down

Chapter 3

I sighed, turning over contentedly in my sleep, forgetting I was on a limb, though not for long. I struggled to regain my balance, and then froze – several large men were standing at the river bank, drinking and discussing something. My heart beat in my chest so franticly, I was afraid they might hear it and chase me down. There were six, all men, wrapped in furs. Two men had on bulky backpacks, and another held a bow in his hands. I figured he wasn’t really any good with it – he held it wrong. Seeing him hold a bow made me realize I didn’t have mine – I glanced down to where I had left mine, and my throat constricted with tears. It wasn’t there – I looked back at them, suddenly and irrationally angry. Nobody touched my bow and arrows – NOBODY. No one in camp had even seen them.  It didn’t look like they had them on them, and that was the only thing that kept me from jumping on top of them and going wild with my six-inch blade. I wondered what they had done with them – had they thrown them in the river. It didn’t matter – whatever they had done with them, I didn’t need to get killed over, and they looked like they were used to killing. The two with the backpacks looked like brothers, both with reddish brown hair and big, barrel-like bodies. Another one had blonde hair, tied back from his sharp, girlish face. The biggest one, and the eldest from the look of him, seemed to be the leader. He had ‘killer’ written all over him, with dark brown hair cropped short and scars all over his face and arms. He turned in my direction and I saw a shadow of a beard. The other two were hardly noticeable, and looked like they were just along for the ride, though I wouldn’t call them puny by any means. They were muscular, but young, only about seventeen or eighteen. They were dirty and their light blonde hair was greasy, beginning to clump into dread locks. I wondered why they didn’t bathe in the river, but I was secretly glad they didn’t. ‘Raiders,’ I realized with a shudder. Suddenly my original fear came back to me as I realized that if I could see them, they could see me. I started carefully up the tree, trying to be quiet and move slowly enough that I wouldn’t be noticed. Carefully, carefully…I nearly fainted when I felt a meaty hand latch onto my ankle, pulling me down. I screamed and kicked out, my foot connecting with someone’s face. They let go long enough for me to jump out of the tree and start running, but I didn’t get far. Another man grabbed my arms and pinned me to the trunk of a hickory tree before I could draw my knife, pressing his body up against mine laughing at the seventh man’s cursing, the one who caught me in the tree, the one I had kicked in the face. “Where you think you’re goin’ honey?” The one who had me pinned asked. In response I screamed and struggled, then spit in his laughing face when I realized it was futile. His fingers dug into my arms, and he crushed his lips to mine, his beard shadow scratching my chin. Big mistake, for him. I latched my teeth onto his lip, biting down as hard as I could, desperate to escape. I tasted blood almost immediately and he screamed and let me go. While they were distracted, I started running, faster than I had ever gone, crashing through the brush, hearing their heavy footsteps and angry voices behind me. I didn’t know where I was going, I was just going, hoping that if they caught me Sarah and Zagna wouldn’t find my body.

Shane was on the ground, preparing a place to sleep when he heard the first scream; coming from the direction he had found the bow and arrows. Who had screamed? Why? Had the owner come for the bow and arrows and met the raiders that had been trying to catch him? He heard another scream, sounding more terrified and a little angry. Thinking quickly, he tied Shadow to a nearby tree, grabbed the new bow and a few arrows, and ran in the direction of the screams. He couldn’t leave whoever it was in the hands of merciless killers.  He hadn’t killed the pesky raiders before, but that was when they were only bothering him, not some innocent by stander. Soon he had to stop, listening for a scream to tell him which direction to go. Instead he heard running footsteps, but was unable to tell which direction because the sound bounced from tree to tree. Turning around and around, trying desperately to locate the source, he heard crashing brush and snapping twigs. He turned toward the sound, and froze. Running toward him through the undergrowth was the most beautiful girl he had ever seen, neither tall nor short, somewhat skinny but not unhealthy, she had long blond hair, so light it was almost white. By her ear a lock of her hair was braided and wrapped in a strip if red cloth and she had streaks of color, probably berry juice, in her hair. She was wearing a tight dress, ragged around the bottom that ended mid-thigh. Wrapped around her waist was another, wider strip of red cloth, and she was wearing skin-tight green forest boots that came up to just above her knee, so close in color to her dress he figured they were made from the same material. So stunned by her beauty was he that he didn’t move out of her way, and she was too preoccupied by whatever it was that was following her to notice him before it was too late. She slammed into his chest with such force it sent them both to the ground, Shane landing on his back and her landing on top of him. She cried out and looked at him, a comical expression of fear and shock on her face. Their eyes met and locked - his emerald green eyes and her dull gray eyes. He forgot why he held a bow. Heck, he forgot everything, except that there was an extremely beautiful girl staring into his eyes…suddenly her head jerked back and she barred her teeth, letting out a cry of pain. He was startled and more than a little confused, that is, until he saw the big leader of the band of raiders dragging her away by her hair. The red haired brothers pulled him up right and held him firmly, taking the bow and arrows and discarding them in the brush. Smiling, the bigger brother punched him in the gut, knocking the air out of him and making him completely useless, then punched him again and again, busting his lip and, it felt like, cracking his ribs. Through the haze of pain, Shane saw the girl jerk free and punch the leader in his nose, taking him by surprise. Cursing and wiping blood off his face, he grabbed at her and she kicked him in the gut, right in the area his diaphragm was, doubling him over and bringing him to his knees. Instead of running, she kicked him again, this time in the face, laying him flat before the two big men with dreadlocks could grab her. She pulled a bowie knife and slashed in their direction, keeping them back. “Oh come on, sweetheart, don’t be like that! We just want to be friends, is all!” One of them said, laughing and circling for an opening. “Touch me again and you’re dead, you cowardly bastards!” she screamed angrily, still not running. “Ouch! She’s a feisty one, ain’t she Fred?” one said to the other “Oh she sure is! This oughta be fun!” the other replied, laughing. By this time the leader of the group had recovered, and he was angry. He quietly crept up behind the girl and just as he was about to pounce, Shane called out to the girl “Behind you!”

Spinning around to see what the problem was, though I had a pretty good idea, I barely had enough time to blink before the big man was on me, but thankfully he hadn’t realized I had a knife. I only hesitated for a moment before plunging the six-inch blade into his stomach, and then drawing it out and doing it again and again before the two men who had previously been trying to get at me pulled me off and tackled me to the ground. Though the blade was slippery with blood I still had it, and used it to get them off of me, slicing one’s arm and the other’s cheek. There were six men left – two were beating on the stranger that I had run into, two standing over their dead leader’s body, and then the two still calculating a way to get at me. There was no way to kill them all, not without my bow. Not alone – they were all too big…hmmm. “HEY! I have a business proposition to make, if you’ll stop beating on my friend!” Startled, they stopped, looking around warily, as if they were waiting for an order. Just as I thought – without their leader they were nothing, like a puppet with no strings. I quickly started talking, before someone stepped up to fill the position. “I will fight your best man, hand to hand, if you win, you get to kill me. But if I win…” I paused, and started slowly walking towards the stranger, forcing myself to walk loosely, as if I was comfortable, in control. And for good effects I started fiddling with my bloody knife, running my finger up and down its blade, acting like I knew how to use it. “Let me guess, you kill us?” The smallest man sneered, seeming to be uncertain of my skills. I smiled slowly, mockingly, and spoke slowly, with an underlying hint of humor. “No. WHY would I do that? No.” I laughed quietly, almost a snicker. “I want you to let us go,” I said, gesturing with my knife at the man the red haired twins were holding up. “No. You have to stay and fight to the death. You killed Shawn, so you must die. He can go though,” said the biggest brother. “IF you can beat me.” He said this while laughing, as if the mere possibility was absurd. “Fine. I said, resigned. At least I would die saving someone, an honorable enough death. “You have a deal. But the man needs to be free, so I don’t have to worry about killing your friend because he doesn’t want to let him go. WHEN I beat you.” I said this last part with more confidence than I felt, but not too much to make him back out of the deal. “Let him go. This won’t take long,” the biggest brother said to the other. I took the last few steps towards the man I called friend and took him from the two brutes, keeping my knife handy in case they tried anything. “This won’t take long. When I start to fight, turn and run. Just keep running, no matter what you hear – they probably won’t notice you’re gone. There’s a refugee camp near here – take a deer to them for me. Say Rin sent it,” I whispered into his ear, so quietly the men couldn’t hear, ignoring the suspicious scowls directed my way. I felt his arms wrap around me and I kissed him, knowing this was the last time I would. I’m not completely sure, but I thought I heard him murmur ‘no’ in my ear. I don’t know. I let go of him and went to stand in front of the man that would kill me, staring at his bare chest. I threw the knife in the ground and prepared to die.