Of Auras and Shadows by Karter Jennifer

Author:Karter, Jennifer [Karter, Jennifer]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bold Strokes Books
Published: 2024-01-16T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Ten

Scars and Origins

It was odd to find a place in the Dark Lands that didn’t produce its own uniform light, which made the twin caves all the more ominous. Eryn raised her lantern and stared into the slanted teardrop-shaped cave entrances. Stalactites and stalagmites covered nearly every surface, oozing yellowish-green goo. A light breeze, the only one they’d encountered in the Dark Lands, brushed Eryn’s face, emanating from deep inside the two caves.

The walls shimmered with hidden ichor. Unlike the spring that had been ready to pop like a pustule, this ichor looked like a thin layer of golden webbing just below the rock face.

Eryn retrieved a stick and brushed it against one of the stalactites. The goo ran down the stick, far less viscous than Eryn had anticipated. She dropped the stick and watched as it melted onto the cave floor. “Well, I don’t think we’re going in there.”

“Is there much there?” Rina asked. She was staring at the goo a little too closely for Eryn’s comfort.

“Not really, no.” Unless the strands of web connected to some deeper source, Eryn doubted there would be enough to make it worth drinking and running back. She’d been so excited to find ichor only two months after their first find, that it was hard to turn away. They were five days out, and it was time to head home empty-handed.

As they turned toward home, Eryn lamented how short missions felt. Of course, now that they were spending some nights together in the Community, it wouldn’t really be three weeks before she was able to be with Rina again. But here, they were free.

Since their first night together within the Community, almost two months prior, Eryn had invited Rina on weekly outings that she couldn’t help but think of as pseudo-dates. They hadn’t been very romantic. The sewage trench had been the worst, but the laborers needed all the help they could get, and it had been an opportunity to work beside Rina and a great excuse to bathe together afterward. Even if it had taken multiple rounds of water before bathing was fun and not just necessary.

In the trench, no one had questioned Rina’s presence. They were just happy to have her strong arms. But everywhere else, just as Rina’s purple tunic had stuck out like a sore thumb, the reactions around her bordered on unwelcoming. While transcribing old texts from yellowing, degrading linen to new cloth, every priest, even those who couldn’t see, had stared at Rina. No one had ever questioned Eryn’s presence in any part of the chapel or the crypt, but Rina was met with disdain everywhere she went.

She’s here to help you! Eryn wanted to scream. Instead, she repeated the same thing over and over. “Everyone serves the Community. My guardian is joining me in doing that.” It was the same phrase she told the pastorals when she and Rina showed up at dawn to milk cows, the tinkerers whose machines they had oiled, and the mountain folk they’d help split wood.

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