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I followed her pointer finger and turned happy enough to leap to the highest point of the outcrop. There, growing among patches of moss, were two moth heart flowers. I recognized them by their brown and black mottled petals, patterned and textured like the fuzzy insect wings they resembled. "I’m going up there."
Maagda caught the sleeve of my shirt. "No, wait." She pointed again, this time to a spot underneath the outcropping. "The graves."
"The what?"
"Graves. We can’t tread on the grave soil of the ancients."
I squinted to see what she was talking about. Three large round natural stones occupied the space below the outcropping, shielded from the elements by the ledge. If it weren’t for them lined up in a neat row, I would have assumed they had been placed there by Mother Nature or whatever Racopians liked to refer to as their nature deities.
"On second thought, those must have been put there in recent years," Maagda voiced. "I don’t remember them from when I was little."
"They’re modern graves. I think we might be safe from the wrath of the ancients today."
"It’s still considered bad luck to disturb their rest."
"I’ll do my best not to, but we have to get those flowers."
When I moved forward, she didn’t come with me. "It doesn’t take two of us."
I couldn’t fault her for her superstition. Sometimes, I still held my breath when I passed a cemetery. Today, however, the only thing that would leave me breathless might be getting up on the rock to pick the flowers. I reached the base and started climbing.
The moss may have been dry, but it still managed to be slippery. I lost my footing once and had to cling to the sun-warmed rock to prevent dropping down six feet. If those lizard hatchlings on Treoid 5 could see me now.
I thought of how similar the wind on Racopia sounded like their hissing while I scrambled up the rest of the rock. I grabbed tufts of moss while getting to my feet. The moth heart flowers were in my sight at last.
The wind had battered them pretty hard. Most of their petals had blown off the stem like dandelions. Fortunately, the part I needed to create the extract came from the heart-shaped stamen. I plucked both flowers, wrapped them in a clean cotton cloth, and placed them in a compartment of my utility belt with care.
Maagda made a sharp hissing sound. "Harper."
When I viewed her, I caught sight of a winged figure in the sky. She ducked into the nearby shrub brush. I dropped down below the ledge and took cover among the three gravestones.
The winged figure landed on the ground between me and Maagda. The male Racopian was pale blue-grey in color, almost the color of a winter lake. The air around him turned just as frigid.
He saw Maagda first and leapt towards her with fangs bared. She produced her own and the two of them struggled. He fell back, his forearm bleeding heavily, only to spring towards her again. I whipped out my stun pistol and fired. The beam struck him in the leg. He fell to his knees.
Maagda ran at him. He stretched his wings and lifted away from us, clinging to his injured arm. His right leg remained unmoving as he flew towards the mountains.
"One of Isath’s scouts." Maagda spat his blood in the dirt. "Varus and Dremos need to know about this."
I realized I was breathing heavily from the surprise attack, and my breath came out in visible white puffs. My hands were ice cold wrapped around the handle of my weapon. I had to uncurl one finger at a time after I put the weapon on my hip. "We got what we came for. Let’s go."
She hoisted me up and flew with me back to the caverns. Along the way, we kept looking over our shoulders and above our heads in case another one of Isath’s scouts decided to follow us home.
***
VARUS
The sun was close tosetting as I watched the soldiers practice their drills in the training yard. Isath’s forces wouldn’t ease up on them just because it was dinnertime. I wouldn’t, either.
"I want to see those blocks," I shouted to them. "Again."
A few groaned in protest at having to do yet another drill.
"Don’t get sloppy." Dremos reprimanded them from the other side of the yard. "You at least have a chance here, not on the battlefield."
I gave him a nod of solidarity. It was good having my general back.
I would’ve been in a better mood if other things were going well. I didn’t get a moment to speak with Harper since we were in the supply closet days ago. The memory wouldn’t leave my mind or my libido.
