Ink was faster than Darian. Despite the knowledge of the Putresco following them, Amos felt certain that there was no pursuit, as such. It was more of a protracted chase now, extended across their journey.
It was too dark for Amos to read the map. The parchment was useless right now, except for its reassuring presence. They would know where to go, once they had slept.
The cold slipped into Amos' torn clothes, its fingers caressing his wounds. It met the dried blood and forced his muscles to tense up.
The open wounds hurt, but not as much as the loss Amos had sustained. Even being jostled in Ink's arms as he ran was not enough to take his mind off thoughts of Kien, Leila, and Yakob.
His mind kept returning to Darian's dagger twisting into Kien's side. It began to rain. Slowly, gently. Dripping like blood from the sky. Water to wash away the guilt, a new beginning.
They're safer without us. We can draw the Trenmir away from them by running.
I know. I wish we could have said a proper goodbye, without all that...
They don't understand, Amos. The Empire taught them - and me - that the Drai are evil at worst and insane at best.
I'm just so tired. The power was supposed to protect them.
The Keeper said there were levels to a Drai's power. Ink said Darian is the weakest Trenmir and you couldn't beat him on your own. We just need to get stronger.
But Xaemarra said the stronger a Drai, the higher likelihood they go crazy.
So we risk insanity to kill Darian. I'd make that deal. Damn good deal.
Amos went quiet.
Say something, Batman.
He didn't.
Ink found a copse of trees atop a hill. The sparse canopy provided a meagre shelter from the rain, and the trunks were ample cover from roaming Trenmir. A campfire would draw too much attention, however, and so Ink and Amos slept in the cold.
Amos' chest rattled with each icy breath. Ink snored loudly. He rolled over and unconsciously threw an arm across Amos, eliciting a painful cough. Ink was warmth against the harsh night, so Amos shuffled closer. He grimaced as he twisted unnaturally.
Amos slept fitfully. Every few minutes he would start awake and scan the horizon for Trenmir banners, then settle back into Ink's warmth slowly. The moon hung heavy in the sky, watching whenever he opened his bleary eyes.
Ink, for his part, slept like the dead.
...
Amos rose with the signature disorientation of a poor night's sleep. He wasn't sure where he was. It was cold. He reached for his phone to check the time and his palm slapped against cold stone. Ink was nowhere to be seen.
Amos stood. He was surrounded by the obsidian spires of the Eclipse once more. Twisted and jagged, all coming to a point in the twilit sky. He rubbed his eyes groggily.
Aquila? What happened?
No response.
Aquila?
Are you there?
"Aquila!" Amos shouted. The words reverberated off the spires, bouncing back into him like daggers.
The world melted away, dropping like curtains in the backdrop of a stage to reveal the throne room where the Keeper had auctioned off his soul.
Why am I back here?
Amos was surrounded by twelve empty thrones. The space was unnervingly still. It felt wrong, like he was trespassing without even trying to.
He looked down and found the map from his parent's room in his hands. It was written in the language of this world - indecipherable. It would be hard for Amos to strike it alone in the world without being able to read.
If Yakob can't help me, I'll have to ask Ink.
He just doesn't seem like the best teacher...
Amos confirmed he was alone then looked down at the map. It was hot in his hands, like a warm mug.
Strange...
There was the icon in the corner - what Amos now knew as the symbol for the Trenmir. It seemed that each Trenmir Order placed their unique signifier within the centre of the potion: A skull, in the case of Darian's Order.
The yellowing paper showed only a small portion of the Maurish Empire, ending at a jagged coastline to the north.
The warmth emanating from the map grew in intensity as he ran his hands across its surface. Amos traced the smudge leading northeast that his parents had made to track Yakob's journey to Botre Village. It followed along a river and ended at Tarton. Where he would have met with Darian and the Trenmir.
He shouldn't have let me go. What was he thinking?
A shaft of silver light swept across the map. Amos looked up and around in a panic, but no one was there. It originated from a small window above Cancer's crescent shaped throne. The light stopped on a single point on the map - a large dot on the northern coast.
There was a gentle, feminine whisper that swelled inside of Amos' skull: <
Amos touched the point indicating what he thought might be a port with his index finger. The heat was greatest here. An angry, grating voice joined the whispers of the first inside Amos' head: <
The map burst into flames. Amos' hands were seared with the sudden combustion before being encased by a thin sheen of golden light.
The world fell away again and Amos awoke with his hands held in front of him, palms filled with ash. A solitary tendril of smoke drifted up and away, curling into the crisp morning air.
The sun had risen while Amos and Ink slept. Its rays shone through distant clouds, filtered first through them to soften the harsh brightness, then once more through the canopy above the two boys. The dappled shadows swayed in the gentle breeze, playing joyfully on the blades of grass around them.
The crickets chirped to each other far off. Amos watched ants marching along the ground in a line. They carried some morsel of food as a team, bringing home the bacon, as it were. He absentmindedly rubbed the ash of what used to be his map between his fingers. Without a map, they were lost.
Amos only knew his destination. It was etched - seared - into the annals of his mind.
The northern port.
Amos was shaken from his reverie by a monstrous gurgling. It sounded like an oozing beast from the depths of hell had risen and come to consume him. He turned with fear in his eyes to find Ink rubbing his belly.
"I want to eat something," he said plainly. His eyes were half-lidded to protect against the onset of the sun's shine.
Amos smiled. "Me too."
They set off into the forest, searching for food. In their haste to leave the farm, neither of the boys had grabbed any supplies. They were both empty-handed.
In the forest, there were many colonies of mushrooms in shapes that Amos had never seen before. Aquila still wasn't responding in his head and resultingly was unable to confirm the edibility of the strange mushrooms. The same was true for a bush laden with midnight berries and thorns, towering fern-like plants, and leafy scrubs. Choosing the wrong thing to eat could poison either one of the boys (though Ink would probably live through any poison). The best option was to hunt.
Amos felt strange. He was pleased to be faced with such simple problems - eat or die. There was no politics, no pretending to be someone he wasn't, nothing to learn about world, no Empire, and most importantly; no Trenmir. It was freeing, in a sense.
That freedom lived in his chest. The knowledge that he and Ink could leave it all behind, go anywhere, be anyone. The far horizons were theirs. Best not to dwell on the past - on his adopted family and Yakob's plan. Being far away was the best way to protect them.
So Amos led Ink in a meandering way heading vaguely north whilst looking for animals to kill with their bare hands. A simple problem.
That day, the sun set on fruitless efforts. Amos and Ink slept sitting back to back under the stars with empty bellies.
"Amos," Ink said.
"Yeah?"
"I'm so hungry."
"I know."
"And thirsty."
"Me too, Ink."
"We need food and water."
"I'm trying my best. I thought you would be able to run after a deer or something."
"You keep scaring them away! I can't chase something that isn't there!"
"Well, you're not the quietest either."
"Still, when Shanty brought me down here there were animals everywhere. She got this huge deer and cooked it with some wild herbs. Oh, the smell..."
Ink's eyes grew distant. Amos began to salivate at the idea of a venison steak - never his favourite in his old life, but beggars can't be choosers.
"We'll get a deer tomorrow. Water first, though, Ink," Amos remembered a piece of trivia from his old life: "You can survive for weeks without food, but only days without water."
Ink licked his lips. "Water..."
The boys fell asleep. They both dreamed of a simple meal - the greatest thing they could imagine at that point.
The following day, the boys realised they were close enough to the river from the middle of the map to hear flowing water. The river was too wide and deep to cross safely, so they drank greedily from cupped hands, then returned to the woods.
The trees were many. Amos stepped lightly on the dry leaves, twigs, branches, and other detritus on the forest floor. Ink followed suit. They were as quiet as each other, which was to say not very.
The din of their footfalls scared off all potential prey and Amos was just about to resort to a vibrantly coloured mushroom when Ink shook his shoulder and pointed at the tree which held the rest of the colony.
Amos looked up and saw the tiniest of strings - microscopic, really - catching the light of the sun. It glinted like glass.
"Is that a spider web?" Ink asked. "I'm scared of spiders."
"No it's a string, look," Amos said and pulled on it. It snapped and the ground just in front of the tree exploded with metal jaws. They jumped up and shut with a CLANG. Amos screamed and leaped back. His heart was thumping. It was a bear trap, or something similar.
"So much for quiet," Ink said, hands on hips.
"I nearly died!"
"Not the first time..."
Amos shot him a dirty look, followed by a cheeky grin. Ink offered a hand to help him up and he took it, heaving upwards with a grunt. "It's a trap," he said.
Ink stroked his chin and nodded. "I wonder if there are any more of these around. We could use them to catch food!"
"Probably," Amos said (also stroking his chin). "That also means there's someone here setting the traps."
"Oh good, they can help us set some up too, then!"
"No, Ink. It's probably a territorial trapper or hunter that does this for a living. They won't like us being here."
"Oh..."
"If they're anywhere nearby, they probably heard my scream. We need to go."
Ink nodded resolutely and set off in a seemingly random direction, crashing through the forest floor. Amos sighed and followed him.