Cursed: Expulsion

Chapter 4

Layla was looking out of the cave when she heard Zak yawn loudly. It was morning; eight o’clock by Layla’s guess. She turned towards Zak and Nibz.

“Good morning sleepy heads,” she said with a warm smile.

Zak sat up straight. “It’s morning already?” His eyes were still half closed and his hair was as messy as it could be at its short length. He looked at Nibz, who was still fast asleep. “Wow. He actually looks better. I guess you were right; they do heal quickly.”

“You don’t look so bad yourself,” she said eyeing his shoulder and arm; he didn’t even look like he was in pain.

“I know, right?” Zak jumped to his feet. “Good as new,” he said rotating his shoulder like he was warming up for a workout.

Layla’s eyes widened. Good as new? This shouldn’t be possible. First he manages to kill a Reeba monkey and literally disarm their chief, and now he has super healing powers? No, actually it started before the Reeba incident. When he was clutching Nibz’ egg I couldn’t get him off, and he was able to yank his arm free from me when they took Nibz, Layla thought as she bit her thumbnail. It’s fair to say that he gets the super strength when he gets emotional; he wanted the egg badly for the first, and he was being angrily protective of Nibz for the other times. What about the healing? Even I don’t have that ability. It’s so unnatural. Who is this guy?

A growling sound from Zak’s tummy interrupted Layla’s thoughts. “When do we get to eat? Do you have any of that jerky left?”

If only his powers extended to his stomach…. “I’m afraid not. I must have dropped it when the monkeys showed up.”

Zak groaned.

Nibz was now awake. He stretched out his limbs, got up and shook his fur before lazily walking towards Layla.

Zak and Layla stared at him. He started rubbing himself on Layla’s leg. After circling her once, he looked up at her and opened his mouth.

Layla looked annoyed. “I know you’re both hungry! I’m hungry myself! The city is under a two hour walk from here. Can’t you just wait that much longer?”

Zak was scratching his head. He still had his shirt off.

“And you! Put your damn t-shirt on, will ya?”

He scowled and picked up his now dusty t-shirt. “I wish I hadn’t left my bag in the woods. I had a change of clothes in there.” He put his t-shirt on over his head and patted some of the dust off.

“We should get going,” Layla said, stepping out of the cave. “I’m already late. I need to get back before they start looking for me.”

“And we need to eat,” Zak said, following her out. Nibz growled in agreement.

As Zak stepped out into the morning light, he saw that the woods looked wildly different under the sun. There were still, of course, so many trees. Rays of sunlight shot through the branches illuminating a carpet of brown and orange leaves all over the ground. I guess its October in this world as well. The odd part was that when he looked up at the trees, they were still leafy and green.

“What’s with the trees?” Zak asked his face turned upward.

“What do you mean?” Layla asked.

“How are they still green with all these leaves on the floor?”

“They are partially evergreen trees. Don’t you have those?”

Zak looked at her puzzlingly. “Partially evergreen? Of course we don’t! This world keeps getting weirder and weirder.”

“Well, if you’re done marveling at the trees, we should get going now,” she said coldly. “Aren’t you hungry?” She picked up what looked like a handmade bag made of leaves and strung it over her shoulder before power walking up the hill.