Eden by Keary Taylor

Author:Keary Taylor
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Keary Taylor
Published: 2011-09-21T17:01:02+00:00

TWENTY-ONE

The beast hit the ground with a loud cry. A circle of red started forming on his neck before he was even fully down. He twitched for a few moments before the fight seeped out of him.

I slung my bow back across my shoulders and leapt down the small cliff I had been hiding on. I crouched beside the animal, checking to make sure it was fully dead. I saw my own reflection in the buck’s eye as he took his last strangled breath.

I pulled my arrow out of his neck and wiped it clean on the grass at my feet. I placed two fingers under my tongue and gave a loud whistle. Two minutes later Bill and Graye joined me. Together we started the mile journey back to Eden with the animal.

We had been hunting nonstop for the last three days. While scouting duty was as important as ever, it was now just as important to find food. We had brought back three doe’s, a few foxes and rabbits, and now this buck. The kitchen had been busy cooking, bottling, and drying the meat, others tanning the hides.

Not only would our food supplies have to last us the few weeks till the first group left, and then another month after the second group left, it would also have to last the week, maybe two, journey into the unknown. And who knew what immediate food sources would be like once we reached where we were going.

It had been brilliant on Avian’s part to put everyone to work on making preparations to leave. With everyone so busy, there was no time for anyone to sit and worry too much about the fact that we were moving, that we would be traveling so far. Everyone had a role to play. Hands were needed to forage the woods nearby, searching for berries and edible mushrooms. Others were needed to collect water in any containers we could spare.

As I walked through Eden, after I had dropped off the buck, I caught a glimpse of Gabriel. He sat at the entrance of his tent, staring out over the rest of us. He watched as the rest of us worked. He wasn’t supervising, checking to make sure everything was done right. He was just gone. He’d checked out. I hated him for his behavior.

Checking to make sure no one was watching me, I poked my head inside Avian’s tent.

Sarah had not come out of the tent since before the meeting. When I pressed Avian about it he simply told me that she was not feeling well. I did not think he was intentionally lying to me. He was lying to himself.

“Sarah?” I said quietly through the dim light. “Sarah?”

Only silence greeted me. I stepped inside, closing the flap behind me. It felt muggy inside and it was suffocatingly hot as the sun beat down above. “Sarah?” I said again as I knelt next to her cot.

A thin sheet was gathered up around her neck, damp and clinging to her skin where it touched her.

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