“Just follow the trail,” Lowe said, sounding like he was enjoying himself far too much. “It’s better to let the weakest member of the group set the pace.”
“Weak.” She sniffed. “Excuse me for having been ill for most of the voyage here and now being asked to climb veritable mountains for hours.”
“We’ve barely been out here for one hour, walking around the base of what is, at most, a hill.” She could practically hear Lowe rolling his eyes. “Which you could jump off the very top of and have to work to sprain your ankle.”
“Lies.” Calya smacked a branch out of the way with the staff he’d given her after she’d tripped for the hundredth time. Hours ago. “It’s midday at least.”
“An hour and a half if I count you dawdling at the inn,” he said, nimbly sidestepping when she poked the staff at him. “I did warn you that it was a hike.”
“I’ve gone for plenty of walks outside.” She stopped. “Are you sure we’re going the right way?”
“Let me consult the nearest street sign,” Lowe said dryly. “There should only be one path out here, Calya.”
She looked around but saw only a thicket of frustratingly evergreen shrubs on all sides. A true path had given way to a few breaks in the greenery, narrow and twisty as they disappeared from view. “I’d say the local wildlife decided otherwise.”
Lowe glanced around, chin lifting as a breeze rustled the leaves. He squinted at the roughly sketched map the extern had provided. After turning to face the water, which could be glimpsed through bare patches in the spindly trees around them, he said, “Go left. We should be getting close.”
Calya turned in the instructed direction. A faint line of worn, dead grass suggested a hint of a trail, and the shrubs grew smaller as they led away.
“Good plan. At least we get to go downhill?—”
Too vigorous a step combined with her lack of attention as she turned her head to call back to Lowe, and Calya slipped as a loose rock beneath her foot gave way. Downhill turned out to describe a sharper incline than she’d bargained for as she lost her balance and fell.
She shrieked, the sound cutting off as she bounced off something large, hard, and with much less give than her side. Lowe shouted behind her, but she didn’t register anything beyond her own pained gasp.
Mercifully, the hill was short, and she tumbled into a clearing, narrowly avoiding impaling herself on an old marker stick at the end of an overgrown field.
Groaning weakly, Calya pushed herself up to a sitting position. She wiggled her fingers, then her toes, relief coursing through her when everything moved as it should. Her cloak sported a few new rips, her sleeves and trousers torn in multiple places. Already, the burgundy fabric of her right sleeve darkened as she bled freely. An ache built in her side, the pain growing as her wits came back.
“Calya!”
“Here, I’m fine,” she wheezed, and looked around. “I found the site.”
What was left of it. A dozen marker sticks were placed around the edges of the desolate field, breaking it into quadrants. Although, enough time had passed that, if not for the markers, there wouldn’t be any distinguishing features to indicate separations at all. A barren patch of hard-packed dirt suggested the placement of multiple structures, but only one long shack and the skeleton of another remained.
Lowe leapt clear of the shrubs, landing with enviable grace on the clearing’s level ground and springing over. He knelt in front of her, his hands deftly running over her scalp, her chest, checking front and back as he assessed her damage from stem to stern.
“I’ll live,” she said, wincing as he peeled the stained fabric from her right side.
“By the grace of Carram’s breath,” he muttered, naming the aspect of the wind. “Let’s get you inside and see if they’ve left any med kits around.”
“I can walk,” Calya said, taking his hand and hauling herself upright.
“Sure you can.” He stooped, one arm hooking under her legs, the other steadying her back as he lifted her off the ground. “But we’re not risking you trying and managing to break your leg.”
“Lowe!”
The corner of his mouth lifted with the hint of a smirk. “Don’t fight me, sweetheart.”
She hmphed, though more for her pride than anything else. Lowe was refreshingly solid, and now that she’d been off them for a moment, her feet added themselves to the tally of aches and pains. “So you’d prefer me docile instead?”
She liked the way his chest shook with a laugh. “We both know you don’t have it in you.” Much softer, murmured almost like an afterthought, he added, “But, no.”
The site looked as if it had been abandoned some time ago. The remaining buildings, temporary construction that must’ve been deemed not worth the trouble of salvaging, were beginning to fall apart. The shack’s sod-and-pole roof had developed holes, but it was mostly dry inside. A few rudimentary desks and chairs were left behind, though all the chairs were broken.
Lowe set Calya down on the sturdiest of the remaining tables, then went off to rifle through drawers.
“Guess they haven’t used this place in a while,” she said, giving the building a critical look.
