Quoted By:
“Hey! Who the fuck are you!?”
The stranger half turned and tapped his hat with a white gloved finger.
“Why, my apologies my dear lady. One does forget these things. My proper name would alas, cause irreparable damage to your mind, but many call me the Storyteller. You may do so as well.”
Mel’s stomach sank like a slab of ice in a lake. The Storyteller. A capricious god fond of plunging the lives of mortals into chaos for his own entertainment. Personally watching her. Avoid the gaze of the storyteller and stay away from those cursed with his attention, so went conventional wisdom. Pray for his ignorance. There wasn’t much to be done about it, but still, it was like a mouse finding out they had the interest of a cat.
She refocused her gaze and the god was gone. Good. Maybe he would find some other mortal to focus his attention on. She turned her attention to her bloody body, the aching pain in her chest. That was going to be a problem without bandages, ointments or even a decent supply of clean water to work with, she barely had enough water to drink. That damn centipede…Still if she was going to remove it from the situation she’d need to patch herself up first. She fished out the healing potion she had found in Joe’s cave. At least she was pretty sure it was a healing potion, it was the same color as the one Babs had given her.
Maybe it was the blood loss, maybe it was the exhaustion, but she didn’t worry about the unknown and simply popped the cork and drank. Bitter, but refreshing. A shiver ran through her, then a sharp shock of energy, like a coiled spring suddenly releasing. She giggled at the sudden odd sensation of the dozens of scratches, cuts and gouges in her skin sealing up, one after another, feeling for all the world like a stranger running their finger gently along each one. Muscles tightened, then relaxed in her chest and the aching pain there faded away. A wave of exhaustion crashed through her, followed by her stomach snarling at the night. She glanced at the charred corpse of one of the birds that had spent the night assaulting her and resisted the urge to rip it open with her teeth and gnaw the meat from its bones. Food, definitely needed food.
Somehow making the return to her hilltop campsite in the dark Mel threw the remainder of the eggs into the kettle, building up the fire, gnawing on her foraged fruits and nuts. She was greedily consuming the last of the cooked eggs when a glowing light came into view, slowly ascending the hill. She tensed, whispering a dagger of ice into her hand.
