Empire Island, Exile the First

Chapter 19

"Try to keep up, god dammit," Calla said under her breath as we ran. I barely kept pace, my legs were so weak and my head filled with confusion. I had known she was on the island, Day had told me herself, but she'd never been this powerful when I knew her.

"How did you find me?" I asked as we ran. We reached the copse of trees where she'd hidden while shooting her arc of lightning towards us and she skidded to a halt.

"Stop asking me questions, we have to run," Calla said, shaking me by the shoulders. "Look, I know you've been through a lot, but stop looking at me that way. I don't have time to explain it to you, but shit's falling apart and we have to fucking go!"

I caught a zap of her urgency and it gave me new fire in my belly. I ran with her away from the trees and into the forest, dodging and ducking under tree branches and through thick bushes. She was always a step ahead of me, staying off the pathways and rushing through the wild parts of the forest like she'd been here before a thousand times.

And she had, most likely. Living on Empire her entire life meant she was still connected to the island, even if the well source was gone dry. Even with that source of power missing from the puzzle of magic across this place, she still drew it from somewhere that I'd never known. My entire focus the whole time I'd been learning had been on the well source. I don't know if my mom would have taught me this had she lived, or perhaps I would've learned from some of the others had I stayed.

But I hadn't, and I just now recognized the flaw. It had weakened me, being solely dependent on one source of power. It had left me vulnerable for exploitation and entrapped by my own arrogance.

Watching Calla as fleet-footed as a deer moving like lightning through the forest compared to me, stumbling and struggling to keep up drove this home the hard way. Through multiple lashes of branches on my face and arms, and through the number of times I tripped over a log and fell to my knees.

"You used to be able to keep up," Calla said as she turned around to help me to my feet. "I don't know what happened to you in the city, but you're practically useless now. I can't save your ass and keep Empire from falling to those fucking fools if you don't at least try."

I bristled at her aggression, brushed the leaves and forest litter off the front of the cloak I wore, and said, "I'm doing my best."

"Your best isn't good enough!" she yelled as she darted off again like a sprite through the woods.

We ran almost the length of Empire north, right into the center of the woods at the heart of the island. We reached a clearing and she stopped running, breaking into a confident stroll.

The full moon hung above us in the sky here, brightening the grassy meadow and the little hut in the middle of it all. It was the size of a double garage from what I could tell, but built out of stone and twisted branches and driftwood. The roof was thatched and a metal chimney rose from the side of it.

Calla opened the rounded wooden door and motioned for me to follow her inside.

The moment I stepped through, I recognized the place. It had once belonged to Magda, the healer. She'd been older than old when I was a kid and I couldn't remember the last time I'd seen her. I hadn't been to her place that often, but from what I remembered, Calla hadn't changed it much.

It was modernized with electric lighting which Calla switched on, and it had a bathroom in the corner that was walled in from the main room. The rest was open with a little wood stove near the kitchen counter. There was a bed in the corner with a patchwork quilt thrown across. A small ginger cat was sleeping there, and when I took a seat on the leather sofa she pointed out, the cat looked up and yawned. He stood up, stretched and jumped to me.