Twelve minutes. Arn figured it took him about that to walk from the gathering area back toward his new home. It felt like it took an hour. Though most of the village’s people were still there, finishing off their evening meals or playing games of cunning or reflex with one another, Arn found more than enough eyes on him, watching and analyzing him, to drag his twelve-minute walk into what felt like a short eternity. Let them look, he thought. Continue reading Arn 33
Arn licked his lips and then delicately puckered the salt off of each finger. He drifted closer to Razaad, though he’d taken a break from the paddling. His stomach moaned happily as it started to digest the slab of cooked and seasoned meat he’d just enjoyed. He’d devised a mix of spice and sea salt on Scoa, to keep his hunting supplies longer. It didn’t taste incredible, but it worked. His body would be burning meat into strength for a few hours he hoped. Continue reading Arn 32
A drooping, bloated moon hung close to the horizon as the tide began to drift off the long, sandy beach, casting a web of finger-like shadows across the gritty brown surface of Arn’s raft. The hunter stopped, leaning against the waist high boat to catch his breath. Sweat ran down arms and on either side of his eyes. He tilted his head up so it wouldn’t sting the corners of his sight, and peered up at the twisting branches of the last few trees.
With a groan, Arn arched his back to get a grip of the raft’s underside again. His face was brought low, close to the heavily laden sack that lay on the raft boards. He’d brought a lot more supplies this time. When Arn had lost control of his raft on the coast of Razaad, he’d not been planning to survive from his pack, but had been lost at sea until stopped by Scoa’s stony embrace. This evening, Arn had a bigger plan than to test a raft. He was going to return to Razaad. Continue reading Arn 31
A quiet breeze followed Arn through the still waters in the lowest point of the island. Over his right shoulder he carried a wide wooden trunk. His progress was slow, but at least he was able to do it. His left shoulder still pained him, every other step, but it was a mild pain compared to how it felt to eat. His shoulder was healing quickly, impressively so. If he bit back the pain, he could still move it to most angles. Continue reading Arn 30
Pressed against the shoddily assembled wall boards of Arn’s shack, the hunter’s better cheek picked up an earthy paste of eroded wood. Without a nose, Arn could press his face flat against the slit in the wall. His squinted eyes saw the source of the noise that had disturbed his work. He held his breath at it happened again.
A man dressed in loincloth stood between Arn’s narrow vantage point and the beach, banging a spear against a tree-trunk. The thud echoed four times. Instead of trailing his drum with silence, the man called out. His voice clearly rang, “Wanderer! Wanderer, come out and face me!” Continue reading Arn 29
After a day or two of pouring rain, Scoa Isle was swamped by an ether of white fog. The silence, interrupted only occasionally by the island’s ear-piercing screeches, seemed overbearing. Wordlessly, Arn brushed through wide foliage leaves and quietly dragged his spear-butt through the moss. It was drenched with water, like his hair, like the blossoms in the trees, like the entire island seemed to be.
Another branch of foliage shook with movement, as a leaf-eater glided between the trees with barely a whisper. It was gone before Arn could give chase. He cursed—his food stores were constantly dwindling as he slaved over the raft. He had never seen anything that could move as silently as the herbivores of Scoa. Even their pelts, patterned grey and tan colours, made their movement across the island nearly impossible for Arn’s eyes to spot. Continue reading Arn 28
Arn was not superstitious enough to leave the ruins altogether, but he never descended into that horrid abyss a second time. His skin was covered in bumps and standing hairs whenever he touched the cold, shiny handle of the blade he’d brought up from down there, but he kept it nonetheless. If he survived Scoa, no one need know the potential evil that anchored the mysterious weapon. Continue reading Arn 27
As far as Arn could determine, he was alone on Scoa. Perhaps the tribal tools he’d found in the ruins were his deceased uncle’s, but he had not found any remains either. This puzzle would have to wait. He had not yet thoroughly explored the ruins themselves, which amounted for a town similar in size to his home. He had found a few points that led deeper underground, as though this city had sunken, or Scoa Isle had landed upon it.
It was time to explore those. Arn had a second spear, shorter in length, strapped to his back, along with a few chunks of meat he’d roasted that morning, for lunch and dinner respectively. He laced up his sandals and stood up. Even if it was more screechers that lurked in these ruins, he’d be ready. Continue reading Arn 26
There was no sign of a Scoa tribe in the swamps surrounding the ruins. Only screechers prowled there, and the occasional meek forest creature, like the gently creeping mammal that had spied him building the trap. If the timid leaf eater had known how to dig, Arn was certain they would help him fight the island’s hostile populace. Instead, he searched the coast of the island while living like prey. When the isle whispered, Arn held his breath in tall reeds or half-submerged in salty mud-water. When an ear-splitting hiss split the air, Arn lowered his spear and scoured the limits of his eyesight. Continue reading Arn 25
Through the scattered groves of swamp trees and across the scattered streams and tidal ponds of the salty marshes, Arn glimpsed something he’d never seen before. He could not be certain, from the rocky slopes where he had survived his first few weeks on Scoa, if they were cliffs or some form of tree made of rock. In the distance, near the opposite coast of Scoa, were tall, angular shapes, made of dark rock.
Yesterday, Arn had set out from his familiar crest of the isle to investigate. Today, he would reach them. He’d left the small highlands before during the evening, but as the sun rose this day, he realized that from the lowlands, the distant shapes took better shape. They were not trees nor stone ridges, but something else. They were structures. Continue reading Arn 24