Into the woods

[Deleted]

She couldn't even remember why she ever volunteered to do a supply run through the woods. She felt weak for thinking it, but she'd much rather stay inside the camp and occupy herself with a less riskful task, but she'd somhow felt the urge to prove to everyone that she wasn't just scared little Fox who needed protection. It seemed like her attempt had totally backfired though and would just show the others that she would always need to be saved.

Everything had happened so quickly, one minute she'd been raiding some bushes full of berries with Monty and the next a third Delinquent that had been out with them was hit by an arrow. She'd let out a shriek and just started running off into the next best direction. She only stopped once her sides started to ache, feeling as if hundreds of daggers dug into her flesh. Fox leaned forward and rested her hands on her knees, trying to catch her breath and then strained her ears for any signs that the Grounders were still hunting her, but she couldn't hear anything.

The girl took a minute to take in her surroundings, finding that she was hopelessly lost and another wave of panic hit her. She had just fled blindly when that boy had been shot and she hadn't stopped for what had felt like hours which meant that there was probably no hope of finding her way back to the Dropship on her own. She felt positive that she wouldn't survive for long out here by herself. With tears in her eyes and hugging her torso tightly, she started taking slow steps forward, she couldn't just stay here in the same spot after all.
After a while of walking and pitying herself, a small hut emerged from the trees. Fox thought she might be hallucinating at first, but it was definitely there, even after she blinked a few times. She hesitated for a moment, the cabin's inhabitants would be more Grounders after all. But her thirst triumphed over her fear and so she took a deep breath and slowly opened the hut's door.

Tag: amber4

[amber4]

TRY NOT TO RUN FROM THIS FREEDOM ALWAYS HAS A PRICE TO PAY tagged: fox

Trikru would never give up a hunt... Especially when the sky girl had made it so easy; running off like a frightened animal, away from their camp, away from her now dead partners. She was fast, but that didn’t mean that she wasn’t easy to track. Her strange footprints tore through the earth with the speed of her run and the trackers were still following her trail at a slower, steady pace. It would always outlast the frightened fleeing of prey... Of course, had she not found the trading post she would have been dead within the hour, one way or another, but as this small and frightened girl opened the trading post door the trail would run cold. Her labored breathing was loud enough that Niylah heard it in the back of the hut. The soft chiming of the doors opening normally meant a customer had arrived, but the sound of her breathing made the hairs on Niylah’s arms stand.

Her father was not here. He was in TonDC with Indra, planning an attack on the Sky People. Had her mother still been alive, he wouldn’t have volunteered to fight them. She was more tolerant and peaceful than the man she married... Niylah inherited at least some of her traits. Instead of fighting, she would look after the post. It was cluttered and lit with candles and lanterns that illuminated the walls of pelts, weapons and dried foods. She even had a plastic duck behind the counter with a bunch of miscellaneous items—most from before she was born. She pulled out a short dagger and kept it close to her wrist as she made her way out from her room to look at the intruder... she wasn’t Trikru. She wasn’t Azgeda, Ponda, Ingranrona, Boudalan or any of the surrounding people... she was Skaikru.

“Yu na gon we!” she said urgently as she slipped the knife back up her sleeve and approached her with wide eyes, hoping she wasn’t injured... she was clearly fleeing. Niylah didn’t know what to do... she could speak their language. The warriors had said they spoke the mountain men’s tongue, but exposing that was risky. If she was running, then Niylah was already damned if she didn’t kill the girl. If she left they would know Niylah let her go—but if she didn’t, that was worse. She hissed lightly as she walked past her and gestured for her to move out of the way as she examined the dirt outside the post. The prints were clear as day after a recent rain... Niylah was quick to work and grabbed a broom from beside the door. Quickly, she marred the prints violently to erase them. She couldn’t have been a moment later. As she reached the edge of the woods where the prints hit grass, she could hear the warriors approaching. Quickly, she walked back to the hut with her eyes on the girl. “Hide. Now,” she said firmly; gesturing towards the counter for her to hide behind as she shut the door.

OWL

[Deleted]

Maybe she hadn't made the right choice after all and she should have just tried to find a good hiding spot outside, Fox thought as she looked around the dark cabin, filled with strange objects. She stared at the figure in front of her, her chest heaving up and down with labored breaths. The woman used words which the girl couldn't understand and she just felt confused and frightened. The Delinquent had heard about the Grounders' female warriors, but somehow she'd still always thought of dirty bearded men when she'd heard someone speaking about them since she'd hardly ever seen one herself, certainly not from this close.

Fox let out a little shriek and pressed her back against the cabin's wall when the woman approached her. The girl's brow creased in confusion when the Grounder walked past her and outside the door. She tentatively stuck her head out of the door, wondering what she could be doing outside and saw the stranger wipe away her footprints in the mud. She would never have thought of something like that herself and felt a little pathetic, being reminded again that she probably would be dead by now if it wasn't for everyone else protecting her all the time. She just couldn't think of a reason why this Grounder woman would ever help her, everyone in the camp who'd ever met one of them and lived to talk about it always talked about how savage they were.
Of course she could still have other ideas for her, another reason why she didn't want those other Grounders to find her. Maybe there was some sort of bounty on her and her people's heads and the woman just wanted to collect the price money for the Skaikru girl. Whatever her motivations were, Fox had no other choice but to accept the Grounder's help. She was at the mercy of this woman if she didn't want those warriors outside to put an arrow into her chest.

The teenager stood there for another second when the cabin's inhabitant told her to hide, her eyes darting to the door and back to her as she was still panting. She didn't have much time to think though as she heard yells from outside the door and she quickly ran up to the woman, staring into her eyes for a moment, before she sunk to her knees and crawled under the counter. Hugging her knees close to her chest, she could only see the Grounder from her waist down, her strange garments blocking Fox' view of everything else. All she could do now, was pray that this stranger had a kind heart despite being part of the people that had only seemed cruel to her and her friends so far.

Tag: amber4