Chapter Eighteen: The Call

The sand-stone crunched under his boots as Calin trudged after Tyas, no words had been said for over an hour and he was all too aware of the tension in the air.

Every once in a while he glanced back, taking small comfort in his friends hiking behind him. But it was difficult to see the clear uncertainty painted across Evany's face and the forced determination on Jerry's.

Not for the first time he wished he had an inkling of what lied ahead to give them some comfort, but it was not to be had. The future spelled mystery in no uncertain terms.

Thinking of crossing a storm ridden sea to reach a different continent was sending thrills tumbling through his belly and also terror.

It was either stay and run from those hunters the rest of his life, or he could follow an almost wretched cryptic ridden man to some sort of safety and find the answers that were nagging at him.

Without admitting it, he started wondering which one was the best option.

Calin almost shouted at Tyas to stop his mucking about, frustrated beyond belief with the man, the situation and the secrets. The secrets...!

Furthermore, his legs were burning and the rucksack was chafing his neck, which would surely turn into some sort of rash. Not to mention, it was pressing into the still tender scar from the lightning that still baffled him. The fact that it really looked like there was glass melted into his skin was more than just a shuddering thought. Not a thing he wanted to think about.

"For crying out loud, aren't we getting close yet?!" Calin muttered gruffly under his breath. Yet the only thing that the forest was revealing was the next bend in the path.

But Tyas wasn’t in sight anymore.

Immediately his pulse quickened, with it, he forced his legs to move a bit faster.

Panic surged in him when he came around a bend, but there was Tyas, busy getting some food from the side of his rucksack.

A great sigh of relief whooshed out of Calin and he headed for a relatively flat rock to drop his rucksack on. The blasted thing was starting to feel heavier than when he had started out.

With a huff he dropped it, cringing slightly at the still tender small gashes on his hands from the night before. After a moment, he rolled his aching shoulders slipping his hand into a side pocket to retrieve a pack of salted nuts.

He savoured the first taste of food in almost fifteen hours and turned to Tyas, who was helping Evany get her rucksack to the ground.

Calin rolled his shoulders some more and asked, "Tyas, how far do we still have to go?"

Tyas finished with Evany and dusted his hands off before he said, "After we eat something, if we press hard we would be there in little over an hour."

A groan escaped him as he took out his frustration on the nuts that he was grinding between his teeth. Evany was first to query their destination.

"Where are we headed?" She asked.

Calin almost wanted to say ‘Middle of nowhere’ but he held himself in check, wondering if Tyas would finally tell them his little secret.

"To the cliffs, then from there we wait until the right time and find our path." Tyas’s voice betraying a sense of uncertainty made Calin sit up, he couldn't place anything at the moment but something was up.

Staring at the man hard didn’t draw any more information out, so finally he shrugged and continued to delve into some fruit that could probably only last a day or two at sea.

He utterly enjoyed every bite of food he could stuff into his body. Satisfying at least his hunger for food if not for some cold hard truth, it was better than nothing.

Better get going, he walked to Evany and asked, "Ready?" With a quick nod she finished some dried biscuits. It only took a moment to help her with her rucksack.

Calin was keenly aware hers weighed half what his did. He groaned, wanting to glare at it.

But it was quickly forgotten, however, as they headed off again.

***

The longer they hiked, the more heavily Calin’s calves ached. His body wasn't use to hiking with a twenty five kilogram thing on his back. It must have been two hours from the cabin!

Since the small break it had been nonstop, but so far it hasn’t shown any sign of cliffs. The sun peeked through the thick trees, but its morning rays barely gave any warmth.

All that took his attention off of it a bit was the birds chirping somewhere in the dense vegetation. The trees had started to fade only to reveal tall shrubs that aspired to be trees as they created a semi archway alongside the pathway.

He jumped when a bush rustled next to him, but when a squirrel ran up one of the few remaining trees. He smiled and continued on the constant hard path.

If not for everything that had happened, Calin would have labelled hiking as therapeutic, even though his body was complaining the whole time. At the very least it took his mind of his significant problems, his scar, Misses Talsen and the others he had left behind in a bid to keep them safe. It was a difficult conundrum to sort through... Yet more than anything, Jim ran through his head. Calin’s presence for ten minutes at that gas station had widowed a woman... It only enforced his reason for not staying in Lamb’s Crest, nobody deserved to be put in harms way because of him.

Calin kicked a pebble with all his strength and it scattered loudly through the leaves of a shrub. A sigh escaped him, no use to dwell in the past. Evany was right. There was nothing he could have done. And even if those things had gotten to him first at the gas station it wouldn’t have insured the safety of Jim.

As clear as that was, the pain in his heart didn’t ease even one bit. Things had changed so drastically for him. But having his situation so direly affect others? It didn’t sit right with him, not even for a moment.

It was incredibly hard not to wish for simpler times.

Evany would quickly rebuke him for being so hard on himself.

With one last sigh, he picked up his pace and wound his way through the seemingly never ending path. The sun started peeking out only every so often. It’s warmth hidden from the troupe.

After what seemed too long, Tyas let up on his hard pace in front. Calin almost bumped into the man as he stopped dead.

Tyas turned around and he looked like he was in a hurry as he said, “Calin, listen carefully, when we reach the cliffs now, we have a couple of minutes. But when I say now, you have to do what I say. I’m asking you to trust me. When I go you must follow, no hesitations, no matter what happens or what you see. We only have one shot at this. It’s the only way I know how to help you to safety and for us to go find our parents. So trust me, just one shot remember. ”

A deep frown split Calin’s face as he asked, “Why?” But Tyas held up his hands.

“Trust me, please?”

Letting out a held up breath, he said, “Fine, let’s do this. I hope you will fess up when we are on the ship. No more secrets.”

With a nod, Tyas started forward again as Calin turned to the other two coming in behind him.

As they reached him he said, “Tyas said we must follow him and do exactly what he says when we get to the cliffs. He said we only get one shot so let’s grit our teeth and get it over with.”

The fear of the unknown was hanging between them, but after a few seconds, Evany and Jerry both nodded at him before going after Tyas again.

The path seemed to become more overgrown as they moved on, up to the point when Calin had to comb his way through thick swaths of shrubs.

As he was starting to wonder if he had lost the path, he pressed out onto an open rock ledge.

The sound of waves thundering against the sheer rock bathed him as he stepped from the brush. There was a slight breeze drifting over the area, but it wasn’t as cold as the morning air that they had faced. It was refreshing.

The sun was climbing the early morning sky. Its rays were like an old friend that had been missed. It felt like days since he had felt warm.

With a slight shake of his head Calin looked up, and to his surprise he made out the moon in high orbit as well. A minute passed before Jerry joined him on the plateau as the boy stumbled from the brush. A few seconds later the grunts stopped as Jerry said, “Wow, would you look at that. I wonder if there’s going to be an eclipse.”

Evany stepped in between the two, having waded through much more eloquently than either of them.

Standing there in awe, they all stared up at the moon close to the sun, but then Evany said,

“Hey! I don’t see a sh—” but Tyas quickly interrupted her as he drew their attention to their right.

“Come on! Hurry we don’t have much time.”

Without any hesitation, they followed Tyas to the right. Calin pressed back into the overgrown path first, it led along the edge of the cliff after the man. Clambering through the brush he made out Tyas’ desperate calls for them to hurry and he increased his pace, while ignoring the several slight scrapes from the twigs.

The disappearance of the shrubbery was unexpected as he stumbled into a small clearing, but before he could right himself, the weight of the rucksack sent him tripping hard onto his knees.

He grimaced from the sting of falling on his knees, but looked up. The area was relatively small, clear of any brush. Tyas came towards him and helped him to his feet. With a groan, he wiped the dirt from his own pants. His hands ached slightly. There were still a few days of healing necessary to close the gashes on his palms from his fall at the grain field.

Picking up his gaze, he surveyed the area again and his heart began to hammer.

It couldn’t be... With a shaking voice he whispered, “This is... This is...”

Tyas had a look on his face that Calin couldn’t describe. Just then the man said, “This is where you fell from the cliff, Calin.”

He stared numbly at Tyas and stumbled forward. Not caring when Evany came faltering through the brush as well.

The walk to the edge seemed to go by excruciating slow. But as he reached it, there was no doubt of the place. Halfway down the twenty meter drop to the beach there was a tree growing from the cliff face.

As Calin looked back, away from the edge, a very different scene flashed before his eyes.

There stood a woman screaming with her outstretched hand, dark shadows moving in the corner of his eyes.

A boy with amber eyes grabbing in vain at him as he started to fall.

A jolt shook through Calin as he trembled. It was all too much. Placing his hands on his head, he shook it to try and clear it. Not even registering it when Evany came closer, her voice was as unsure as her hand softly settled on his shoulder and she asked, “Calin are you alright? You don’t look so good.”

He dug deep into his courage, trying to form the heavy words in his mouth.

Though, without warning, his shoulder suddenly began to throb sharply. He almost doubled over, but kept his balance, he turned away from Evany in the blink of an eye as a shockwave pulsed from his scar through his body.

As he grunted, he looked up. The air above the cliffs’ edge started to shimmer slightly, there was singing coming from somewhere and he had no clue where.

Something tugged at him, coaxing him to come closer.

Without telling his feet to step forward towards the edge of the cliff, they did. His eyes were out of focus. Like he was looking for something but couldn’t quite see it clearly.

But before he could even remotely fathom what was happening, Evany screamed.

With a jerk, Calin spun to see Tyas wrestling with possibly one of the robed men from the night before.

Startled, Calin sprang at the man without hesitation and punched him, dragging the man off of Tyas.

The next moment he fell on the man, hiking gear and all and started punching, in the haze of the fight, Calin made out a tattoo of a tooth sticking out of sand on the man’s rust coloured head. But with the frantic fight it dissipated into the background. Being dislodged, Calin tried to keep the man down. However, it was too late.

Calin ducked under a swinging elbow, adrenalin pumping through him. On his spin under the arm, Calin grabbed the man’s shoulder with his one hand and brought his other arm’s elbow heavily down the tattooed aggressor’s back bone, sending the man off balance. But a leg kicked back and struck Calin’s hip.

That wasn’t the least of it. The man was incredibly strong. Calin warily watched the robed man approach, with fists twice the size of his own and a significant advantage in height. It was imperative not to get caught in a grip.

A shout vaguely reached him. “IT’S STARTING!”

Evany was screaming again.

The scream distracted Calin only a second. Everything started to get dark around them, but it was long enough for a fist to connect with Calin’s jaw.

Spots momentarily dotted his vision as he scrambled to his feet away from the big man. His vision cleared and what lied in front of him made him gasp.

The moon was eclipsing the sun, and at the edge of the cliff, a silver wall of shimmering liquid was forming. Strange flashes of light sparked across the surface, hinting at something behind it.

The edges looked to him the same as oil thrown into water. The one seeking to mix with the other, but it couldn’t. Calin was wide eyed, but somehow he focussed himself as movement next to him caught his attention.

To his surprise, his assailant had abandoned the fight and was running full speed to the silver wall. The odd action cemented an uneasy gut feeling in Calin. Without hesitation he took off after the robed man. And with a final lunge, he grabbed the hairless man’s robe, yanking him back, to the ground.

In that moment, Calin noticed Tyas shouting and shoving at a reluctant Evany and Jerry.

They stumbled towards the silver wall looking scared as he had ever seen them, but with no say in the matter.

Then they vanished from sight.

Shock lanced through Calin as he tried to fathom what had happened, but a fist swung his way again and he dodged only a second too slow.

The fist struck him hard in the face and he stumbled back, but as he expected another assault, there was a grunt and a loud thud. He used the moment to regain his balance and he looked to find the strange skinned man on the ground, unconscious and Tyas with a rock in his hand.

Tyas mouth was moving as he said something, but there was immense noise as a storm wind buffeted them.

Frustrated, Tyas shouted at him. “CALIN! HURRY, WE NEED TO GO, NOW!”

Calin was about to ask where, when Tyas ran into the silver wall and vanished.

Fear gripped him as he pushed his way through the thundering wind towards the thirty meter wide wall. As he got close, a large hole pierced the mass and he caught a glimpse of the others panting on the ground in a forest clearing.

Glancing up, the moon had already moved in front of the sun in a Total eclipse, it was dark as night for a few moments until the sun peaked from the edge again.

Calin stared at the wall again, his whole body was shaking.

There is no way I’m going in there.

Fear utterly ruled his mind and he was about to step back away from the unknown phenomena when a loud snarl split the air.

His heart missed a beat as a nauseas feeling gripped his gut. He spun around. There, through the thick brush, came the large black creature with the white scar, storming towards him.

There were only moments before the thing would hit him and he stumbled backwards.

As the creature jumped with its powerful legs, Calin knew his time was up. There was nowhere left to run. It would only take three seconds.

His mind whirled through a hundred things in that fraction of a second. The last was a hope that the others would find their way without him.

He looked up to stare at the creature in its crimson eyes. He would embrace his last moment with honour.