As we grew closer to Hengeist, Hengeist grew closer to me.
The mountain pierced deep into the sky, splitting the clouds like a blade, it's white-stained precipice the blood it had drawn. The air had hardened and hollowed, wisps of arctic breath cutting from our mouths in the climate. And that same air pushed us, dragging us down, not like a god, but a jesting brother. And so we could bare it. No need for a break.
Edwards chattering away about a time he once bedded four women at once, Caruthers then reminded him I was only fifteen, followed by me reminding the three of them I'd heard worse growing up. Then they all laughed and my shoulders loosened, the mention of my home no longer drove a stake through my chest.
"This here is the entrance. We've made good time." Caruthers announced. Gesturing to a cave entrance, obscured by layers of snow. We wadded through, kicking away blackened sleet and chuckling as Benjamin cursed at the cold. Then we wandered into the darkness, the cave entrance slowly forming into a spiralling tunnel.
Next I saw light. A single flickering torchlight mounted on the wall. Caruthers pulled it from it's place and we kept moving. Some tunnels formed into branches. Two or three paths. Caruthers chose each like a reflex, picking up his pace.
Since we'd entered the cave, everyone had fell silent. Benjamin and Finlay's bickering stopped, Caruthers ceased any witty remarks. Smiles faded. My distraction had been ripped from me, replaced by quiet worry.
For the first time I considered it. This could've been a trap, a lie. But why? We were all of us worms, hunted by falcons, and worms do not hunt each other.
I didn't even notice that walking was getting easier. The tunnel was levelling out.
"Were you hoping they'd give up halfway?" I whispered. Met with mannered chuckles that stopped a mite too soon. My fears grew stronger.
'Maybe I should turn around, they'll never expect it. But that doesn't mean they can't stop me...'
Just then, my eyes flooded with orange.
"We're here."
A gaping ravine stretched out farther than I could see. Jagged spikes of stone littered across the ceiling like icicles. Chained lanterns of warm light dangling from them like honeycombs. I treaded out of the tunnel, onto a cliff edge that wrapped around the entire ravine, barricaded with crudely-built fences of logs and planks. I looked down below.
Layers of slums and shanties sprawling to the left, to the right, bathed in the same orange light. A winding river parting both sides, with miniature bridges connecting them at points. Gliding along them were tiny specks of green. Gimen. Faint echoes of commotion and conversation.
Hengeist was real, and it was more than I ever could have imagined. More than a hideout, more than a town. A home. A cove of hope, a treasure long lost by our people. Proof we could be more. Proof we had tricks under our sleeves. Perhaps the humans had not yet ruined us. I wanted it to be true.
"This way." Caruthers said. Ben and Finlay broke off without a word, marching in the opposite direction.
"Where are they going?"
"Home. Where else?"
"...Alright. What about us?"
"Just wait."
*****
Caruthers had left me too, without even a word goodbye. Now I wandered through the streets of Hengeist, following a stranger to my new home.
Each home hobbled together out of tattered planks and scraps of metal, all layered like a rainforest. The bottom layer held streets of stone and gravel, the top held streets of wooden bridges. Lanterns dispersed at intervals along the fence posts. Market stalls of over-ripe produce and random trinkets, bartered over like gold. Children playing tag in the street, shoving past my leg as if they couldn't see me. Workers hauling around crates and baskets. Houses in haphazard construction. The smoky scent of game being cooked over fire. Arguing, banter, quiet laughter, yet nothing like the village. Higa Village was warm, loud and yet ordered, how a home should be. This was quiet chaos. Hidden disarray. The idea of a homely place to live hobbled together by people who'd lost theirs long ago. All of it a mirage. The air bore no despair, no depression, only a small prodding, the feeling that this place was not all they wished it to be.
For the first time, I noticed my condition.
Blood, dirt and dust caking my clothes and skin from head to toe. My shirt torn, my boots ravaged. I should have been treated like a wounded animal, with pity, attention, the works. Instead, no one seemed to care and I of course knew why. Because they'd arrived exactly the same, watched other people arrive the same, as they would for years to come. What haunted me was not special, not worthy of notice.
A drop of green in a jade ocean. No. A drop of red in one of blood.
Hengeist held the most Gimen I had ever seen in one place. Surrounded by my own, I was more alone than ever.
The man I was following directed me to the back of the town. Down a creaking staircase toward the space below the top layer of slums. It'd been turned into more rooms, a maze of doors splitting in all directions. It strained my eyes to see so many. These were neater than the slums, yet cramped. A labyrinth of tiny rooms.
He lead me to one, and without a word he swung open the door. Inside lay another Gimen boy, around my age, lying on a bed of stitched rags, beside him a barrel with a lantern placed on top. Still he lay like a corpse, only his chest moving up and down.
The guide clasped his door shut, leading me to another. This room was empty.
"In here." he grumbled.
"This is where I stay?"
"Mhm."
I stopped around the room a final time, the exact same as the other. A bed of dirty cloth and a barrel.
"...Okay, thank you. So, what happens now--"
He turned and slammed the door. I nearly chuckled. These people couldn't even pretend to give a shit about me.
Then again, did I deserve someone to care?
That's right. Why should I expect them to take pity on me? For a split second I'd found new bonds, but they were never real.
I'd escaped the humans, escaped the forest, the mountains, but the past... the past had me, and I was but a prisoner. Doomed to relive it in solitude. And so I did. Slumping onto my ragged bed, curled into a ball, and sobbing like a baby, cursing myself for being so pathetic, then crying harder.
So began the curse of Hengeist. If only I'd known it was a trap after all.