Page 14 of Spirit Rites
“Why me?” I call out to no one in particular, but I tighten my grip, even though it’s a losing battle. There’s another loud crack, and I hear Kaldar shout something. But I can’t hear anything over the sound of what I’m pretty sure is the tree splitting in two. The branch I’m on shakes violently, and it’s all I can do to hang on. Suddenly, everything goes still and quiet. There’s a ringing in my ears, but everything is quiet. I lift my head slowly and look down. “It worked.” My words are a whisper, but in the silence, they’re deafening.
“It worked,” Kal repeats. There’s a huge divide right under the middle of the tree. The ground beneath the tree is gone. The divide extends right up the tree, as if someone just cleaved it in half. But then a few feet below Kaldar, the two sides of the tree rest against each other. The two sides of the tree are pushing against each other, keeping it standing. I sit up and wipe my forehead. “Who knows how long it will hold? We need to get down.”
“What if the ground splits again?” I ask, not ready to leave the relative safety of the tree.
“It won’t. That’s one thing I know about the Rites. Once you pass a challenge or whatever it is, that same thing doesn’t come back into play again.”
I take in his words. “So, the ground splitting is done. Good to know.”
I watch as Kaldar stands up and tests the integrity of the branch below him. He climbs down two branches and then realizes I’m not following. “You can’t stay in the tree.”
“I know. I’m just trying to convince my muscles to let go.” He stands there a moment watching me, but I wave him on. “Go ahead. I’m coming.” As soon as his back is turned, I push myself into a sitting position. My cramped muscles scream at me, but I force them to work. I manage to stand on shaky legs and begin the process of climbing down. I forget how much harder it is to climb down than up, especially on shaky legs. I take it a branch at a time.
“I’m down,” I hear him call out to me, but I stay focused on my task. I’m only a few branches from the bottom when I hear a sound I really don’t want to hear right now. I freeze at the loud crack that reverberates through the trees. The tree branch I’m currently standing on suddenly disappears beneath my feet, and I’m falling. I hear his shout as I try to grab at branches, but I can’t get ahold of anything. And then the ground is rushing up atme. I’m not going to be able to stop. The world tumbles upside down and all around, and then a hand grabs mine. I jerk to a stop. It takes me a moment to realize I am hanging in the ravine. Then I’m yanked upwards. I stumble away from the edge and bend over, trying to catch my breath and slow my breathing.
“Are you okay? Did you injure anything in your fall?”
I push myself to an upright position and look at Kaldar. “Thank you. You saved my life.”
“If you’re okay, we need to get away from this tree. It’s not stable.”
I follow him, feeling numb. I can’t even begin to process everything that’s happened in the last few minutes. I have a feeling once my adrenaline fades, I’m going to be in pain. But for right now, I’ll use that adrenaline to keep moving. “So, is this place real? Because how was the ground splitting following us?”
Kaldar uses his sword to cut a path for us. “Everything here is real. The trees are real; animals are real and can hurt us. But this place doesn’t exist outside of the Spirit Rites. It’s the magic of our people that creates these places.”
I suddenly want to know everything I need to know to survive. “So, tell me honestly. How long could we be here?”
“My Spirit Rites was only six days.”
I resist the urge to groan out loud. “That’s a long time to stay alive.”
“The longest Spirit Rites to date was eighty-four days.”
I nearly stumble. “Eighty-four days! Please tell me that’s not going to happen to us.”
He looks over his shoulder at me. “We won’t be in here that long. We will complete the challenges they give us and prove ourselves and then get out of here.”
“Ourselves? I thought this trial was for me to prove myself.”
“We will complete the challenges and then get out of here.Together.”
I’m not sure if he’s trying to convince himself or me, but I don’t say anything. The further we get from the tree and the torn-apart ground, the more my body starts to ache. But I try not to think about it. “How good are you at foraging for food?” He calls out after a while of walking.
“I have no idea what to even look for in here, but I’m good at making a meal out of practically nothing if that helps.” He glances over his shoulder at me again.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah, a byproduct of living in the banished community.”
He stops and wipes his forehead with his hand. It does nothing to stop the sweat dripping down into his face. “It’s going to get really thick; watch out for snakes.”
I groan. “Why is it always snakes?”
“Not a fan, I take it.”
“I hate snakes.”
“Well, can’t say that they’re my favorite either,” he says as he turns back to the thick underbrush. “I have no idea which ones will be poisonous, so just be careful.” He starts forward, and I watch him go and try to get up the nerve to follow him in. When he sees I'm not following, he turns back. “Are you coming?”
