If I were willing to trance, I could probably have located her in the building quickly, but that would make me more vulnerable than I was comfortable with now that Hel had peeled off to cover the back. Instead, I walked to the front of the building, stepping cautiously over the threshold.
It was dark inside the building, and I paused to give my eyes a moment to adjust. There was a little light from the rising moon filtering in through the dirty windows. Piles of what might have been decomposing books lay tossed around the room, covered in dirt and dead leaves. I knew V would have ached to see the ruin of knowledge that surrounded us, and I was glad he wasn’t here.
The building was a large one, the main area easily two stories tall. Vines grew through the windows and up the walls. It was a large open room with what might have once been shelves piled throughout.
In the very back of the room I could see the shifting shadows cast by a small fire. I worked my way towards it, moving carefully. I spied a few unpowered trip wires as I worked my way across. They were cleverly built from twine and some deadly looking spikes but were nothing that I couldn’t easily see and avoid.
The lack of powered traps reinforced my opinion that Skyla was struggling more than we originally thought. If she was fully powered, I would have expected her to have her own version of my Air alarms set up.
I made my way through the shelving until I came around the corner where I found her. She was seated in front of a small brazier that looked like it had been salvaged from a camping supply store. She had a fire burning under a small metal pot. I saw pages sticking out from the fire and realized she was using the books as fuel. She poured water into the pot. Nearby were the bones of some small rodents. There were times Erix and I had resorted to eating rats as kids, but the thought still turned my stomach. It looked like she was trying to make some kind of meal with just the water and a few handfuls of plants she had collected.
She saw me a moment after I saw her, and in half a heartbeat a fireball flew from her fingers toward me.
I jumped back and it slammed against the far wall, thankfully missing me completely.
“Skyla,” I called, pitching my voice low, hoping to reassure her. “I’m not here to hurt you!”
The fireballs stopped, but it was a moment or two before I heard her call out.
“Who’s there?” she demanded, her voice quavering slightly.
“It’s Kat, Skyla,” I called. “Air Mageia.”
“Kataramenos? Is that you?” her high voice called.
“Yeah, it’s me,” I walked around the corner and slowly moving toward her, my hands held up in front of me in a gesture of peace.
Up close she looked even worse than I’d originally thought. Some of the stains on her clothes were old blood. Whether it was hers or not, I couldn’t tell. She held a knife in her left hand and a tendril of Fire circled her right. The hand that held the knife was shaking ever so slightly, the crackling cookfire making its shadow waver across the wall behind her.
I paused as I moved out from the shelving, revising my early thankfulness that V wasn’t here. He was so much better at talking to people than I was.
“Hey,” I said softly.
“Hey,” she responded warily.
I saw her eyes rake me from head to foot, and I could imagine what she was seeing. I was clean, healthy, and certainly wasn’t starving. Then I saw her gaze catch on my bare neck.
“You don’t have a collar!” her right hand dropped to her side in her surprise.
I nodded.
“Are you— are you a ghost?” she asked, her voice trembling.
I couldn’t keep myself from a bark of laughter.
“Fuck, no. I’m very real.”
“How did you get it off?” she demanded, tugging at her own medallion.
“That’s a long story,” I began. “And you look really hungry.”
She stiffened, then lowered her other hand as well.
“I guess there’s no point in killing you if you don’t have a medallion,” she said finally. “It wouldn’t help me graduate.”
“No, no medallion,” I answered. “But I’ve got plenty of food and I’m willing to share it with you.”
She eyed me suspiciously.
