Page 63 of Graevale
Swatting at a bug that landed on her neck, Alex carefully assessed their situation. Looking about her, and especially above, she could see no sign of the treetop city of the Jarnocks. What shecouldsee were strange, monkey-like creatures jumping through the trees, and birds of all shapes and sizes yabbering to each other. The cacophony of jungle sounds assailed her ears, but it wasn’t the noise that was most uncomfortable, even with her heightened hearing. It was the heat.
Within seconds of arriving, Alex was covered in sweat from the intense humidity. She’d never felt anything like it before, and she quickly began to strip her heavy winter gear off right along with Bear. Given the vast changes in temperatures all over Medora, they’d both thought to wear layers that day—much to their mutual relief.
Down to jeans and a stretchy camisole, Alex was still stifling enough that she summoned A’enara and carefully cut into the denim, tearing it until her pants were transformed into tattered shorts.
“Much better,” she murmured, turning to Bear. He’d undressed enough to be wearing a tank with his jeans, but when she motioned silently towards A’enara, he shook his head firmly.
“These are my lucky jeans.”
Alex wasn’t sure whether to laugh or not. But his jeans had already frayed in some areas—ridiculous that he’d be wearing them in winter—so she knew they at least would be cooler and not as uncomfortable as hers had been.
“The offer’s on the table if you need it,” Alex said, banishing her weapon. Glancing around again, she pointed out the obvious. “There’s a distinct lack of Jarnocks here. I’m guessing that means we’ll have to search for their city.”
“The teachers said it’s to the north of the island.” Bear squinted up through the thick canopy and stepped over a downed log to reach one of the nearby trees. Running his hands along the moss on the bark, he returned to Alex’s side and pointed to her left. “We need to go that way.”
Alex was surprised—and impressed—by his Boy Scout antics. “Are you sure?”
Wiping his mossy fingers on his ‘lucky’ jeans, he said, “I was obsessed with survival VRs when I was a kid. Virtual reality programs,” he added when he saw her puzzlement. “Like in the Rec Room.”
An image of an abandoned castle, a pouncing wolf and a glob of bloodied drool on her arm sprung to Alex’s mind from her first experience with the Rec Room’s virtual reality projector. She shuddered at the memory.
“I used to visit those survival challenges all the time,” Bear continued, “so I learned a lot about this kind of thing.” He indicated to the jungle around them, completely at ease in the suffocating atmosphere, unlike Alex.
“At least one of us knows what they’re doing,” she said. “I know the Library wouldn’t have dropped us off in this specific place without reason, but without you, I’d have no idea which direction to head in.”
“I’m sure you’d have figured it out,” Bear said. At her uncertain look, he added, “Eventually.”
“Well, speaking of eventually,” Alex said, “we’re going to have to find our way back here for this doorway, so we need to remember this place.”
Bear looked around. “How hard could it be? It’s between the tree that looks like all the others, the rock that looks like all the others and the stream that—wait for it—looks like all the others.”
“Very funny,” Alex deadpanned.
Chuckling, Bear said, “Our clothes are here, so they’ll be a marker for us. As long as we only head in one direction and remember where we enter from when we reach the city, we’ll be able to find our way back. Stick with me, Alex, and we’ll be fine.”
Bear was one of Alex’s best male friends, but she’d always considered herself slightly closer to Jordan. That was largely because she and Jordan had more shared experiences together—with SAS and, of course, everything that had happened with her saving him from Aven. But there was a steadfastness about Bear that Jordan lacked. Perhaps it was something that came from him having a loving, loyal family, which Jordan had been denied until the Ronnigans had embraced him. But whatever the reason, Alex was glad it was Bear who was with her today.Especiallygiven his unexpected environmental wisdom.
“Then by all means, lead the way, good sir,” Alex said with a flourishing gesture.
Shaking his head in amusement, Bear did as she asked and walked forward in the direction he’d claimed to be north.
He made it all of three steps before Alex heard a whistling sound. It was so quiet amongst the overwhelming jungle noises that she didn’t figure out what it might be until it was too late. But an inner instinct made her turn her body at the last microsecond, enough that whatever was aimed at her sailed straight by.
Unfortunately, that meant it shot square into Bear’s shoulder, and a surprised sound was all he managed to utter before he slumped bonelessly to the ground.
All this Alex watched with stunned eyes, and when the second dart whistled, she was so shocked by the sight of her friend crumpled at her feet that she didn’t move fast enough before it buried itself in the side of her neck.
She only had time to hiss with pain and yank the barb from her skin before her vision blurred and she collapsed next to Bear, unconscious before she hit the jungle floor.
When Alex came to, the ground was moving. Big, heaving quakes underneath her body, which was slung stomach-down over something that felt coarse and hairy against her flesh.
With a muted groan, she forced her eyes open and found that she was draped across the withers of some large beast, her hands and feet tightly bound. Clumps of muddied, matted hair chaffed against her body, indicating that her transport clearly hadn’t bathed anytime recently—or, perhaps, ever, judging by the odour emanating from its shaggy coat.
Suppressing her gag reflex, Alex kept her breathing shallow and raised her head as much as she could. It was then that she saw Bear dangling face down across a similar beast trudging through the jungle beside her. Squinting at the creature, she thought it looked like a mixture of a wild boar crossed with an elephant.
Seated atop the beast and behind the unconscious Bear were two Jarnocks guiding the steed by vines tied to its formidable tusks. Turning her head slightly, Alex saw legs belonging to two Jarnocks seated behind her as well.
Other than their four captors and the two beasts, there didn’t appear to be anyone else in their entourage. If she weren’t bound so securely and hanging so awkwardly over the creature, she might have had a chance at escaping, but her position was precarious at best. She was better off waiting for the Jarnocks to presumably deliver her and Bear to their city, and see what happened from there.
