man shouts from across the clearing. “Kora!”
More worried voices call out, and I hear people running toward us. I hold the little girl’s hand loosely, ready to drop it in case I’m grabbed or dragged off. A woman speaks, very near to us. Her words are foreign to me, but I hear her fear.
Kora stays close by my side. “Mama, this is my friend Fennel. She speaks the second language. She’s not runa, but she’s hurt. She needs Nerang.”
“Where did you come from? How did you get here?” A man asks me angrily.
“Please, I need help.” I touch my forehead, assuming it must look as bad as it feels. Pain grips my ribs when I move, and I grimace. I want to ask the people to help Peree, but first I need to figure out if they'll help us or kill us.
“Your head looks like the sky before a storm,” a second man says with concern. “What happened to you?”
“I came from the caves, through the river. I hit a few rocks before I landed in your water hole,” I say.
Several people mutter. The first woman, who I assume is Kora’s mother, asks, “You came from the Dark Place? By yourself?” Her voice is soft.
I make an effort to smile. “I’m pretty much always in a dark place.”
“We should take her to Wirrim,” the angry man says. “He should know about this.”
Kora speaks up again, her small voice determined. “Nerang first.”
“The child is right,” a new man says. His voice is gentle with what I can only describe as an undertone of suppressed laughter. “The girl is injured, she needs our help. Have we lost our ability to be hospitable?”
“Wirrim should know that a lorinya is here, claiming she came from the Dark Place,” the angry man says.
“Then go tell him. In the meantime, I will offer our visitor what aid I can. Come with me, young one.” The laughing man puts my hand on his arm and guides me away from the others. His skin is smooth; it feels younger than his voice sounds.
“Thank you, Kora,” I say over my shoulder.
“Don’t forget you promised to skip with me, when you feel better.”
“I won’t forget.”
I hear groups of people talking about me in hushed voices as we walk. It’s clear I’ve drawn a crowd. The man leading me seems oblivious.
“I am Nerang,” he says.
“I’m Fennel.”
“You have no sight,” he remarks casually. “You must be brave, to have journeyed through the Dark Place all alone.”
I hesitate, wondering if I can trust him. I already want to. His voice is calming and familiar, as if I’ve known it all my life. Or maybe it’s that he smells of rosemary, like Aloe.
“I wasn’t alone.”
Nerang pauses. His voice is sharper than before, but still kind. “There are others?”
“Just one.” I think of the heat of the wound in Peree’s leg, and his last words, pleading with me to go. My words come out in a rush. “And he’s hurt far worse than me. He’s no danger to anyone, truly, he can’t even walk. Please, please help my friend. He’s at the water hole.”
Friend—the word doesn’t seem sufficient somehow. My heart will break if Peree dies, as surely as it would if Eland or Aloe died. It’s already splintering. After a moment Nerang calls to someone nearby, in the other language. A man answers. Their short exchange sounds like birds bickering over a meal.
“Our men will go to the water hole,” Nerang says.
“Thank you,” I say breathlessly.
“You and I will go up, into the trees,” he tells me.
“Climb?” I ask doubtfully. My ribs are throbbing, and I’m weak as a hatchling.
He chuckles, and gently presses me forward. I step onto what sounds like wooden boards. Reaching out, I feel more wood—a stripped, horizontal tree branch—at about the level of my stomach. Nerang joins me, then says something in the strange tongue again. The boards under my feet lurch, and we rise into the air. I grip the branch, bracing myself.
“Don’t worry, young one, you won’t fall,” he says.
“Where are we going?”
“To my home. My herbs and treatments are there.”
“You all live in the trees?”
“In the trees, or on the ground, as each family pleases.”
I can’t decide if I’m more shocked that the people get to choose, or that some would choose to live on the ground in constant danger from the Scourge. The platform stops. I don’t move, afraid to make a misstep.
Nerang takes my arm again. “This way.”
I feel like we’re very high, higher