Now I will do the same for her.
19
Despite my best efforts, shedoesn’t stop bleeding. Blood drips from her mangled arm, leaving behind a dotted trail in the sand. Her breathing is shallow against my ear, her chin propped against my shoulder. Jyn slips in and out of consciousness, groaning in agony even in sleep.
I carry her through the night, and then all through the day. By noon, my skin peels back, burnt and blistered by the sun. No matter how much I pray for rain or the reprieve of a single cloud, my wishes go unanswered. I’m unsure of how much progress I’ve made, for each stretch of sand looks precisely the same as the last. Knowing my poor sense of direction, we may well be going in circles. If so, I’ve doomed us both.
My neck strains and my back cracks, every step a trial. To make matters even worse, I lost sight in my damaged eye nearly an hour ago, the surrounding skin swollen to the point of sealing my eye shut. Any other person would be concerned, but my only thought is getting Jyn to safety.
I would gladly lose my other eye if it meant she would be all right.
Behind me, Jyn groans. It’s a soft, weak sound.
“A little while longer, my lady,” I wheeze. There’s sand in my throat, crunching between my teeth. My mouth is too dry to swallow away the irritation.
“Put me down, Sai,” she rasps.
“Save your strength. I’ll carry you the rest of the way.”
“Hurts…”
“Just bear with me a while longer. Would you like to hear a story?” I ask, trudging ahead. “It’s a good way to pass the time.”
Jyn mumbles against my shoulder, “Fine.”
“How about the tale of the first Fated Ones? My father used to tell me that story all the time.”
Another step forward, another sharp jolt of electricity slicing through my bones and muscles. I keep going because I have to. I will not fail her.
“A long, long time ago,” I begin, huffing a labored breath, “a boy was walking home one night after a day spent fishing by the riverside. The night was clear, and the moon was full and bright, stars speckled across the sky. The young boy crossed paths with an elderly man standing at the center of a bridge.
“?‘Boy,’ the man said, tying a red thread to the little boy’s hand, ‘do you see that lass, just over yonder? She is destined to be your wife.’
“The young boy scoffed at this. Girls were abhorrent to him, you see. Covered from head to toe in maladies and insects. He was sure to catch something, were he not careful. The boy was quick to cross the bridge, pick up a stone, and hurl it at the girl in a fit of childish anger before storming away.
“It was not until many years later, on the night of his wedding, that he was finally able to meet the woman his parents had arranged for him to marry. When the woman removed her red veil,he discovered a scar over her brow. He asked her how it happened, to which she responded, ‘When I was but a young girl, a boy threw a rock at me and left me with this scar.’
“It was in this moment the boy realized that what the old man had said was true. And that is the origin of the red threads of fate.”
The end of my tale is met with silence—not that I was expecting jubilant applause. Jyn is barely hanging on.
“Fret not,” I say, half speaking to myself. “There’s a light up ahead. Do you see?”
I squint to get a better look. The sun is mercifully fading in the distance. Finally. I’ve been walking all day; our canteens of water are now depleted. The light in question appears to be moving, rocking back and forth as it eludes us. Could it be a lantern? Who in their right mind would be all the way out here in the middle of the Wastelands?
“You there!” I shout, my voice carrying over the sands with no echo. My throat is so torn that I could easily be mistaken for a toad. “Please, we need help!”
All of a sudden, the light goes out.
An indignant squawk escapes my throat. “We mean you no harm!” My words soak into the sand, my already weak voice dampened entirely. “Please, my”—Fated One, destined soul, the other half of my being—“friend is hurt!”
The light flicks back into existence, this time to my right at the very top of a rolling dune. I blink in confusion. How did it get there so fast? Brimming with newfound determination, I start toward the lantern, eager for assistance.
“Sai,” Jyn rasps. “Sai, stop—”
“All will be well, my lady. All will be well.”
The moment I climb to the apex of the dune, the light flickers out again. I see no footprints in the sand, no shadowy figureretreating into the distance. Just when I think I’m going mad, the light suddenly reappears on the other side of the dune, as if leading me down a trail. This is getting frustrating.
