It doesn`t matter, Sosa reminded herself as she felt her teeth beginning to clench together, her shoulders cramping. She had to force her muscles to relax.

　　It really didn`t matter.

　　They were moving too slowly through the forest, she kept thinking; but too slowly for what? It had begun raining soon after they left. The huge trees funnelled the water towards their own trunks so by the time it came to ground level it was streaming down the bark. Sosa insisted they refilled their flasks every time they drank because the rain would not last forever, but even then, they might be able to find a stream. They had a small amount of food but Sosa knew there were trees that bore fruit. Much like Eleris had done, with her, she would leave them for short periods while going off to gather supplied. It have her time to be alone. A thought, a word, a memory would pop into her head and she would collapse into helpless sobs. It was better not to be around the others when that happened.

　　The light she had pooled and connected between the two bits of armour, one Grammawe boldly wore at the front of the group and the other was passed around as different villagers brought up the rear, was holding well. In fact her subterfuge of an experiment had worked. Sosa could indeed leave the group for short periods, but knew if she left them too long, the bodaki would find a way to lure them apart.

　　The rain currently was cooling, and cleaning off the blood from their slaughter. The noise was refreshing. It also covered the sound of the bodaki who now trailed their retreat and surrounded them.

　　So there really was no rush.

　　Sosa and Talon had followed Eleris and they had run hard to make it here in one day, but with the elderly and the injured, it would take far longer to return. They would be here at night, probably two, before they reached Rala.

　　But it was okay. Sosa could keep them safe.

　　So, could she have brought the wounded along? Could she have brought those who could not walk? Could they have dragged them into the trees?

　　It was too late now.

　　If Sosa had doomed herself with this act, then she had doomed the rest too. No one had asked her, or challenged her. Not one of the surviving villagers could say they did not know where the blood came from or what she had done. She had made them complicit in this. She had damned them. If the ki abandoned them, they would all die.

　　We might be here forever, she thought. We might already be dead. Perhaps we are ki already, and we will spend the rest of forever walking through the endless trees.

　　The anxiety returned in waves like it always did, drowning out any reason. We`re moving too slowly! Sosa varied her speed, allowing the group to trail past her and then speeding up to walk past them all. At least they had stopped smiling at her, or bowing their heads grimly. She had wondered if they would do that forever. She hadn`t saved them. What was wrong with these people? She`d literally just come back covered in the blood of their loved ones.

　　These people were leaving many things, including Ale-ki. They would never see it again and had already chosen the next thing to deify.

　　Her.

　　These people were just as selfish as she. They were grateful to Sosa for saving them even though she had let the others die. She had killed their mortally wounded so these people could leave, could survive. She was a monster, no better than the bodaki. And these people let her do it. They chose her as their new leader.

　　It disgusted her.

　　Sosa knew she wasn`t worthy of this strange adoration, she wasn`t worthy even to survive. She should be dead back there with her parents. What did that mean of them? Where they worthy?

　　She reached the front of the trudging group. Her grammawe was at the fore and smiled, the one smile Sosa could accept.

　　Grammawe, how are you doing?`

　　The armour suits you.` The old lady kept moving, stiffly, through the trunks, the path ahead a little clearer given its recent use. She was right too, the armour fitted very well, just like it seemed to fit whoever donned it.

　　You knew this used to belong to Gris, didn`t you?`

　　Who?`

　　Never mind.` Sosa walked a while in silence along side her grammawe. For a moment she felt like a child again and though that life was long gone, it was pleasant to feel, if only for a moment. Are you okay, after what happened?` She had to remember that her losing a father meant Grammawe had lost a son.

　　You mean Halo?`

　　That hit Sosa like a falling branch from a high darktree. Halo`s death was so long ago it was a different life. But it wasn`t, was it? It was only a moment ago. She had lost her brother and had gone after Gris. They all thought him responsible, but that wasn`t true was it? It was the things in the trees, the damn bodaki. Halo had strayed too close to the trees and they had come for him. Gris had saved the boy, maybe brought him back. That`s what they had seen.

　　And now her brother was gone and&

　　Her grammawe just nodded, looking grim. I lost my husband too, you know, not long ago.`

　　I know, Grammawe.`

　　He had a spear a bit like yours.`

　　You can tell me about him if you like.`

　　So she did. They shuffled through the undergrowth side by side, being cooled by the rain and Sosa listened to stories, though somewhat jumbled, about her grammawe`s life. She cried, but it felt okay, no one else could see. It was raw, awful, so very painful, yes, but somehow okay. Hours crept by and eventually Sosa worked her way back down the line and instead of despising them each for their willingness to survive in the face of all this loss, she spoke to them.This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

　　One by one they became people again and they were people Sosa was glad to have saved. People who deserved to have survived, even when so many others had not. Maybe they were worth having bloodied her hands to save. Sosa would never say so. There was no measure in the world that would allow such comparisons to be weighed.

　　She felt the guilt and the anger leak away. Her anger towards Eleris went with it. It was childish, once again, Sosa had shown her age. Of course she would not attack the woman who would save them. There was no way the guardian of Rala had deliberately left their village defenceless. Eleris cannot have known what she had done.

　　Night fell and they stopped to rest.

　　Sosa took several pieces of armour and placed them in a square around the villagers, attaching more of her light to them, using it to bind them together. It was strangely exhausting. How much effort did it take to cover a whole village? Little over a day ago, she had been unable to do this at all. Maybe if she practised she`d be able to do the same. It was possible Gris had continued to do this for the village for generations without their knowledge.

　　Sosa left the group to collect fruit and water. It didn`t take much to feed her whole village.

　　As night settled, they set a camp and started several fires. Sosa expanded her protective square of light but between the sounds of the bodaki and the fear that the protection might fail as she slept, Sosa spent yet another night sleepless.

　　Morning light filtered through the canopy. The darkness eased but in the trees it was never gone. They ambled on and Sosa began to hear quiet grumbling. Villagers were getting tired. The guilt she felt over leaving behind the immovable never abated, but she did at least feel some vindication. A day`s travel had not taken them to the little shelter she judged was half-way. How slow would they have been if they had carried their wounded, only to have them all die anyway?

　　It was an awful thing to weigh up, but she had done the right thing. Then she hated herself for weighing it at all and walked in sullen silence.

　　By mid-morning they found the hut and stopped to rest. Someone, Eleris presumably, had emptied the place out leaving only the building`s shell. Hopefully this meant they would make Rala the following day. The rain eased off and the sun returned. Sosa worried the heat would slow them, if it was possible to move slower than this.

　　She missed Talon, and there was much time to dwell on it. Her chats with Grammawe were strangely nice, but there was so much about Talon`s death that left empty voids inside her. She wanted his help to keep them moving, keep them safe, keep them reassured. They fought the forest together and now she fought alone. Sosa gave the order to move once more and stood tall, looking strong, looking like someone the villagers could have faith in, someone they could follow. Inside she felt like a river bank of sand, crumbling under a merciless torrent. While she awaited her charges painfully slow return to action she studied the shelter.

　　Clearly, it had been built half way along the path that joined their two villages and the smoke from its fire had been visible from hers. They had found Eleris here, but why? And why set up a fire deliberately meant to make that much smoke?

　　The line of refugees began to file past.

　　Did she come to get away from her village? Sosa could understand the need, but then why the signal fire? Strange to come so far, when a short distance into the trees would bring her solitude. It was so deliberately half way.

　　Pushing the thoughts aside, she arranged her shared armour, Grammawe taking point again, and several other bronze adorned villagers spread themselves around the group`s perimeter. Sosa was getting better at hanging her light from the various pieces.

　　She watched them all pass, resisting the urge to scream at them to move faster. As the last ones passed she lingered, wondering, and then made to turn away but something caught her attention.

　　Every day, she grew more sensitive to the light, more able to control it, though it was tiring on this scale. She also grew more sensitive to the dark. She could easily tell where the bodaki were inside it. More than this, she could feel the movement of it as it drifted and swirled. The dark was rippling, like something out of sight sending waves as it waded through the river. Something large disturbed the darkness, making it hum like the armour and the spear made the light hum.

　　Everything fell silent in the forest.

　　Sosa hurried after the party and the dark moved to fill the void where her light had been, but it didn`t fill with bodaki as normally it would. They were staying still. The birdsong, the insects, all were silent. Even the wind rustling the high boughs stilled.

　　Within moments she caught up and could contain her impatience no more. There was an unease to the air, more than that induced by the pacing bodaki.

　　More than a day, she thought. More than a day.

　　Come on,` she said as she passed the line of refugees, this thin line of survivors, We need to move, we need to move faster, let`s go, come on.`

　　Still the dark behind them hummed, ripples of black washing against the wall of light as something distant disturbed it. Something large. With the pendant and the sensitivity it provided, she could feel the currents of darkness reacting as it moved.

　　Looks were cast her way. Villagers could not feel what she felt, as Talon and Sosa had not understood what Eleris had known. If they asked she would tell them, but she wasn`t volunteering her worries. If they could not sense it, they were better off.

　　Maybe the dark always hummed like this? She had expected a rush of power when she first donned the pendant, but it had been a slow trickle of sensitivity and strength to her abilities. At one point she hadn`t been able to see the light, or sense the position of the bodaki in the dark, or even feel the movement of the darkness itself, but now she could do all of those things.

　　It appeared to work, they were moving noticeably faster, but she also became aware that the more elderly and the injured were falling to the back of the group. She had left those too injured to move, no not left but sacrificed. If she had to, would she abandon these slow moving people as well? If it was the only way to save the rest?

　　How many were worth sacrificing to save how few?

　　She made it to the front where Grammawe led.

　　We still going the right way?`

　　Keep them moving, Grammawe, you`re going the right way, just keep them moving.` She tried to sound upbeat, she tried to smile, but her glances back along the line of people who trailed after and beyond them to the source of the ripples in the dark didn`t go unnoticed. Grammawe nodded, gave a grim smile, and pushed on. Sosa stood while the line filtered past and she kept encouraging them. Her cheeks ached from the forced smile.

　　The humming grew. Villagers glanced over their shoulders. Were they starting to feel it too, as she had once done, that nagging fear that built into immobilising despair? Had they simply noticed the silence that was following them? Or were they just following the worried glances of their new guardian?

　　The last traveller passed, wearing one of her arm guards and the protective blanket of light that hung from it. Sosa looked back into the trees for some time, not sure what to expect. Did she want the thing to catch up? Did she want to see it? Kill it?

　　Eleris had run from it and not for their benefit. Sosa could not hope to kill it. She turned to follow the villagers, trying to ignore the growing feeling of dread that came from the ripping of the dark. The skin on the back of her neck prickled and she felt herself beginning to shake.

　　Sosa?`

　　The voice came from behind. Sosa froze, staring at the thickening wall of black. Sosa didn`t blink, didn`t move. For a moment she didn`t dare breath. The dark no longer hummed, it rumbled, pulsating at her from all sides.

　　Sosa?`

　　It was closer now, she could hear footsteps approaching; the sounds of a child`s zori clad feet pressing into the undergrowth. Still she didn`t turn, afraid of what she might see.

　　A small hand slipped into hers. It was warm, the skin soft against her rough palm. Little fingers closed around hers in a way that made her gasp. Tears fill her eyes which stared away into the distance, not daring to look down at the hand or the child it belonged to. But she had to.

　　Slowly she turned her head towards the eyes of the small boy who held her hand.

　　There`s monsters,` said Halo, his voice quiet and soft. He sounded frightened, his voice so quiet, so vulnerable. But it`s okay,` he looked up at her, renewed hope in his voice. After all he had found his big sister. And she was a guardian now. There`s somewhere we can go that`s safe,` he said, There`s a village out there in the trees. Come on, we can find it together.`