CHAPTER ONE
Morgan
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Flamin’ thatch and cinders fell from the ceilin’. Smoke burned my eyes, seared my throat, and made me cough. I flailed my arms at the rainin’ fire and screamed, reeled to get out from under the heavy quilts and furs pressin’ on me. I rolled onto the rough-hewed planks of the floor strikin’ an elbow hard. My head bounced good as well.
Still tangled in my beddin’, it took me several seconds to realize the air was breathable. I stopped my strugglin’ and looked into the blackness overhead. No fire. The only break in the night was the glow of embers from my hearth twenty feet away.
I sat up and listened, pryin’ the dark. There was no natural thin’ awry, but I don’t believe in simple dreams, not since I was an ogreling and dreamed the dream. If I’d heeded that nighttime vision I’d still have a brother, live within the clan, not in exile. Because they call me a warlock.
I pushed against my furs to free myself, rose and sat on the edge of my cot. Throwin’ a blanket around my shoulders, I made my way to the cabin door, findin’ one of my two rickety chairs with a knee in the process.
Outside, the cold nipped at my snout. I stepped off the porch onto soft pine needles, concentrated on the cluster of trees my home nestles within. The forest disappeared in the shiftin’ fog, aglow from the moonlight makin’ it through the thick canopy overhead.
Nothin’ out of place. Calm. For the moment. But my skin crawled. The ethereal intuition that curses me turned me west. Tragedy loomed. The only homestead west within miles belonged to a peculiar human who cared little for my skinny ogre butt.
Doesn’t matter she distrusts us ogres. I’d learned the hard way not to ignore my sight.
I strode inside to dress. My knee found another chair before I managed it. Summer jacket on, I grabbed my staff at the side of the door and plunged into the night. The moon hung high in the sky and nearly full. I ran when the trees were thin enough to allow light to make it to Earth and the terrain permitted it. After two miles of the steep rollin’ banks of the watershed leadin’ to Black Lake, sweat saturated my shirt. I peeled out of my coat.
My legs weighed heavy. A half hour into my rush I paused, heavin’ for breath, and looked down into a glen. I worried I veered north or south and passed unknowin’ly by the human woman’s shanty. It would’ve been easy to err. Racin’ through the brush in the dark made judgin’ both direction and distance difficult if my wits were calm. The far mountains I woulda used to place my whereabouts hid in the dark. One shadowed rise appeared identical to the last.
Holdin’ my staff forward as a focus point, I concentrated.
The spark has already kindled the first straw.
Off again at a sprint, I dove through branches that tore at my cheeks, snagged my clothes and wrenched at my heavy staff. I stumbled often as the ground fell sharply for the dell below. I smelled the smoke clearly now. The orange glare of flames knifed through the dark.
Reachin’ the clearin’ I froze, shocked at the speed the inferno engulfed the shack. The flames leaped ten feet above the thatch roof. Through the shutters of the one window I made out flames within. If the woman remained inside, she was done for. I stared at the door waitin’ for it to fling open. The flames worked down the walls.
I must try.
I dropped my staff, held my jacket over my head and ran to the door. The top of the frame only reached my shoulders, the flames mere inches away from my head. The heat pierced my exposed flesh. I kicked the heavy plank door, but the whole wall rocked, shakin’ burnin’ thatch upon me. I whipped the jacket about to get the fire off.
A barred door—an occupied home.
I needed another way inside. I ran to the window, leaned back, and kicked at its shutters. The two halves crashed inward. My leg caught on the sill, momentarily throwin’ me in a panic. I fell backward, leg painfully draggin’ across the splintered openin’.
The air inside broiled thick with smoke, the searin’ heat near-unbearable. I considered the wisdom of backin’ away. I could die, tryin’ to save a human surely past savin’. Nevertheless, I climbed in, holdin’ my jacket over my head for whatever protection it would offer me. My eyes watered. I squinted against the smoke.
The human stood before me in the center of the room, flingin’ a quilt about as though fightin’ hornets. Flames climbed the hem of her nightgown. The stink of burnin’ hair broke through my ragin’ senses.
I flung my coat around the woman’s legs to smother those flames, and pulled her onto my shoulder. I couldn’t stand erect in the human cabin. Struggled in a crouch toward the door, the smoke so thick I couldn’t breathe, much less see. Amazin’ the woman still survived. I dragged my hand across the rough wood searchin’ for what barricaded the door. My wrist slammed into the heavy plank. I heaved it to the side.
I groped for the latch, lungs achin’ for oxygen. The form across my shoulder wrenched back and forth. I was ready to collapse when my hand found what I sought, yanked the door open as a crashin’ noise provided the last energy I could manage to stagger forward.
The cold night air immediately refreshed, but the fire followed us. Flames flicked from our garments. As soon as I had us safely away from the ragin’ bonfire I whipped the human off my back, hard onto the ground. Even my leather jacket snapped with flames. I threw it aside and used my own body to smother the fire incineratin’ what little remained of the human’s nightgown. She screamed in agony as I flopped across her. The heat spiked through my shirt, burnin’ my stomach.
Those flames out, I struggled at those flickin’ at my own trousers. Knifin’ pain plunged into my back and I rolled to put out fire I knew dug into my flesh there. Flames sprung back up from my legs, and I raked pine needles together to quench those.
The collapse of the human’s hut interrupted her screamin’ and coughin’. Sparks and smoke deluged us anew. I rolled upon my side against her to protect her from the onslaught. Pain pricked every inch of my flesh.
What if the forest catches?
I stood, struck with a coughin’ fit. My head spun. I staggered, only settlin’ the vertigo by leanin’ over, one hand on the ground. I studied the clearin’. The flames from the less-than-humble shack didn’t reach high enough to threaten the limbs of the century-old pines around it. The forest floor was damp enough from the frequent summer showers to resist an expandin’ fire. I decided there was no, new, immediate danger.
The woman had stopped cryin’. I stumbled a long step to her. Her eyes glared straight up, unseein’. Her mouth hung oddly agape. She shook. From the cold, or agony? Maybe both.
“Are ya all right?”
Ignernt question. Of course she isn’t all right.
She didn’t answer, didn’t look up at me. There was little left of her gown below the waist. It could have been the orange glow from the fire, but her skin looked aflame, already blisterin’ from her stockin’ feet to her thighs. There were gaps in her long mane which flowed over the pine needles.
I struggled to focus on the immediate danger.
How do I stop the blisterin’?
“I’ll be back.”
I rose and picked up my smoldering jacket, realizin’ the extent of the burns on my hands. I took the coat to her nearby creek and soaked it. The icy water immediately eased my own pain, but touchin’ anythin’ felt like plungin’ needles into my flesh. I couldn’t stop though. I carried the jacket back to the human and dribbled the cold water over her burns. She groaned, but otherwise didn’t respond.
I repeated the cold treatment five times. I felt the skin of my hands sloughin’ off as I squeezed the coat the last time. I couldn’t go on. In the dim light of the embers fifty feet away I made out my blood mixin’ with the trickle of water flowin’ over her legs. Still she stared straight up.
“Oh, why didn’t ya flee,” I asked, “instead of tryin’ to fight the flames? Couldn’t ya see there was no beatin’ them back?”
Her eyes closed.
Why did a solitary human, a female, live so far from civilization, anyway? How in the world did she survive our highland winters? An outcast, like me? What I’d always assumed.
I thought back, perhaps ten years earlier, when I tried to greet her the first time I encountered her in the forest. She had been diggin’ about the shadows of the trees and stumps for mushrooms and grubs, a good diet for a troll, less appreciated by any human I ever met. On seein’ me, she pelted me with stones usin’ a stinkin’ sling I had no idea she carried. Those stones hurt.
Despite the insult, her unneighborly manner, from time-to-time I left her a deer or swine quarter hangin’ near her cabin where she was sure to find them. Especially once the snows came.
A shudder shook me. Time to focus on the present. Wakin’ up, she wouldn’t want nothin’ to do with me. But I certainly couldn’t leave her here. She’s half-way on the trek to dyin’ already. In the shape I’m in I couldn’t carry her the twenty miles to the Hamlet on the shore of the Lake. Would they even take her in if I did?
I groaned and folded the tiny woman together. My hands were so numb from the icy water I couldn’t be sure my fingers followed my wishes. I pulled her into my arms, findin’ more burns on my forearms. I grimaced from the pain and stood. Looked over at my staff, reluctant to leave it behind. But had no choice. Not like I could grow a third limb to carry it with—not a warlock skill I’ve acquired—that I know of. I stumbled forward, into the black of the fadin’ moon.
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