Chasing Shadows (Saving Galerance, Book 1) (7 page)

“Deal with it?” she repeated, her face falling slightly in
disappointment. “I had rather hoped they would like each other.”

“Oh, they do,” he answered confidently.

“You’re just saying that,” she said, narrowing her eyes up
at him.

Slowly lowering his head, he rested his forehead against
hers. “I’m not just saying that,” he whispered.

Norabel closed her eyes in happiness, but opened them a
moment later, asking abruptly, “Do you think they have strange names? You know,
like Reginald or Yari?”

Mason chuckled and lifted his head from hers. “Yari? Where’d
you come up with that name?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know; it just popped into my head.”

“And what else just pops into your head?”

She thought about it for a moment before nodding and saying,
“Mason.”

“Mason?” he repeated, raising his eyebrows. “What? Are you
saying I have a strange name?”

She laughed and shook her head.

“No, that’s what you’re saying,” he insisted.

“I only meant it popped into my head.”

He gave her a goofy smile, commenting, “As it should!” His
smile subsided, and a forced expression of contemplation crossed his face.
“Speaking of names that pop into people’s heads…there is this one name that
keeps pestering my mind. Kind of like an incessant, oh, I don’t know, bell that
won’t stop ringing in my head.”

“Maybe you should stop pulling on the rope,” she suggested.

“Maybe I don’t want to,” he said, surprising even himself by
the tender way it had come out.

Norabel looked down to her boots at that, and Mason cleared
his throat and took a step back. “Come on,” he said, trying to sound
light-hearted again. “Let’s go see if we can find those marmots that live up on
the hill…

Valor Wood was much more pleasing in the light than it was
in the dark. Though it wasn’t as beautiful as her childhood home in the
mountains, it still contained the charms and pleasures that any green forest
had to offer.

Mason had been waiting for her at their usual tree when she
arrived, and with a short, brief greeting, they started forward into the forest.
As she was walking, she didn’t let Mason’s stoic, somber mood get her down. It
was the way he always seemed to be, and whether or not he found her perpetual
happiness childish and annoying, she wasn’t going to let him stop her from
enjoying the forest.

Finding a fallen tree on the ground, she hurried over to it
and hopped on top. Then, taking each step cautiously, she began to walk across
the log, marveling at how different the forest looked from just a few feet
higher off the ground. It reminded her of when she and Mason would balance on
logs and rocks in their meadow, trying to see who could stay the longest on one
foot. Of course, he would never do something like that now.

Hopping off the fallen tree, she rejoined Mason on the road.
Looking up to the sky, she smiled, seeing the rays of sun coming through the
trees. She held her hand up and watched the beams of light dance with her
fingers and cast a pattern over her face.

Her grandfather once told her that the Albatross came from
somewhere beyond the skies, far away from this world. He said that every time
you looked up to the sky or the clouds or the sun, you were really glimpsing at
their home. Yet, even though it was so far away, they would still be able to
see even the smallest person should they look up and wave hello.

“Why are you always doing that?” Mason asked from her side.

“Doing what?” she inquired, drawing her thoughts back down
to earth.

“Smiling.” He shrugged, putting his hands in his pockets.
“What is there to smile about?”

“I was smiling at the sun,” she informed him, choosing to
tell the truth while avoiding any mention of the Albatross.

“Why? It’s always been there. It’s not like it’s going
anywhere.”

Norabel stopped and looked up at it again. “Maybe that’s why
I’m smiling,” she said in deep deliberation. “No matter how long this world is
going to go on, each person that comes to pass will look up at the same sun,
will live and be alive because of its same warmth, just like us. Don’t you
think, if there’s anything worth smiling at, it’s that?”

“I never thought of it that way before,” he admitted, taking
a peek up to the sun and squinting his eyes. Then, having had enough, he
motioned ahead of them, and they continued forward. Soon they found the spot in
the road where they had torched the basket last night. A few charred strands of
the basket lay on the dirt, and several Pax boot prints circles around the
scene.

“The shot came from over there,” Norabel said, pointing up
to the trees on the right side of the road. “Maybe we should see if we can find
anything.”

Mason gave a relenting shrug of his shoulders, and she took
it as permission. Hurrying across the road, she happily entered into the thick
grass of the forest. She bent her arm down low as she walked, feeling the
blades of grass with her fingertips as she passed.

Finding a small red bug on the tip of one, she stopped and
bent down to watch as it crawled across the long green stalk. Her grandfather
told her that her Guardian Albatross was always trying to show her things. Some
of it, he said, might seem very unimportant, when in fact it was the opposite.
A bug on a leaf, for example, or a half-eaten apple. The downcast expression on
a friend’s face, or a stranger across the street. Every day her guardian was
trying to show her what she needed to see, and she wanted to make extra certain
that she always received his message.

Norabel studied the bug intently as it paused at the very
tip of the blade of grass. Then, coming to a decision, it flew off and landed
on a nearby flower.

“I thought we were here to look for clues,” Mason commented
from behind her. “Not to stare at bugs.”

“If you don’t stop to look at bugs, then you won’t find any clues,”
she reasoned.

She glanced over at him from where she was crouched on the
ground and expected to see him rolling his eyes at her. However, when she
turned her head, she only had a moment to prepare herself as Mason’s body
slammed into hers.

She gasped in shock as his heavy weight fell over her, and
she couldn’t remember having ever felt so incredibly small and fragile than in that
moment. Her lungs tightened with pressure, and a wave of fear washed over her
as she thought a Jotham’s attack might be coming over her. She had had several
of them when she was just a little girl, and they had been frightening and
horrifyingly painful experiences. What was worse was not so much the feeling of
suffocation, but the expressions she had seen on her parents as they were
helpless to do anything about it.

Then, before the tension in her lungs could block out her
air-supply completely, the pressure on her chest lifted, and she opened her
eyes to see Mason staring down at her. His hands were on either side of her now,
supporting most of his weight, but he did not move to get off her. She tried to
keep her face from heating up as he stared down at her. She wondered why it was
he had so suddenly jumped her in the first place.

“What is…” she started to ask him, when he silenced her by
placing a finger to her lips.

He raised the finger to his own lips, telling her to be
quiet, before carefully rolling off her. Norabel took in a quiet gasp for air
as he did so, and watched as Mason crouched low in the grass, reaching out for
something that had fallen there. When he pulled his hand away, she saw that he was
holding a simple twig from a tree with a couple of green leaves still attached
at the end. She didn’t know why he had chosen to pick up this object, though
judging by the expression on his face, he looked just as surprised as she did.

Before any more questions could build up in her head, she
saw something fly in the air above her head, and Mason swiftly caught it with a
jerk of his hand. Bringing it up to his face, he saw that it was the same type
of twig with leaves. Only, someone appeared to be shooting them off as arrows.

Placing her hands in the soft grass on either side of her,
Norabel strained to sit up, and looked out to the trees where the shot had come
from. The branches of a tree a few yards away rustled, and a moment later
something dropped down from it. But “dropped” was not quite the right word. More
like flipped. A young woman had gracefully flipped out of the tree and landed
nimbly on her feet as though she had been exiting trees like this her whole
life.

As she stood there, staring at the two of them, Norabel
could not help but be impressed by the commanding and graceful presence she
seemed to radiate. The young lady’s hair was a reddish-brown color that seemed
to shine more like fire in the light of the sun, reminding Norabel of how the ash
tree looked in the fall when its leaves turned a beautiful deep auburn. Her
expression was static and unyielding, her brown eyes seemed to carry a
captivating mystery, and everything about the way she held herself said that
this was a woman of confidence.

“Don’t be scared,” the girl said, raising her hands in the
air to show they were empty. “I’m a friend.”

There was a bow strapped around her back, and a few arrows
stored with it. Unlike most girls in the kingdom, she was wearing pants instead
of a skirt, and Norabel looked to the long brown boots laced up her legs, figuring
she probably had a weapon stored inside.

The girl took careful, slow steps towards them, approaching
them as someone would an injured animal. Behind her, Norabel could hear the rustle
of grass as Mason rose to his feet. Norabel did the same, and when she was
standing upright, she felt Mason’s hand tug at her arm, pulling her back behind
him.

“I’m Ashlin,” the girl announced, holding her hand out in
front of Mason. “You must be the Point-Man.”

Mason looked down to the offered hand, and then back to the
young lady’s face, his eyes betraying no sign of fear.

Seeing that he wasn’t going to shake her hand, Ashlin
shifted her gaze to Norabel, commenting, “And you’re the Shadow.” Noticing
Norabel’s wide eyes, she smiled, adding, “It’s alright. I’m not here to turn
you in.”

“Why did you help us last night?” Norabel asked, not being
able to hold back her curiosity.

“Norabel!” Mason scolded.

“She already knows who we are,” she pointed out. Then,
looking back to Ashlin with the wide, silver-blue eyes of innocence that always
seemed to reside on her face, she asked again, “So, why did you?”

“You were in danger of losing your load,” Ashlin replied.
“And I couldn’t let the Pax have it.”

“Where are you from?” Mason asked suddenly. He raised a
hand, pointing to the arrows on her back, and said, “Those arrows weren’t made
inside of Breccan. The tails are different.”

“I’m from Noor Summit,” she answered.

“You got a transfer?” he questioned skeptically.

Ashlin shifted her weight and glanced back to the road.
“Something like that.”

“Doing what?”

She gave a small sigh. “Something boring and Pax-enforced
like everybody else. Look…” She spread her arms out in front of her. “It
doesn’t really matter what I do. What matters is that you could do with a fifth
person on your team, and I can give that to you.”

Mason looked down to her boots and then back up to her face,
asking, “What makes you think we need another person? Or that I’d trust you
enough to just let you on?”

“I didn’t turn you in,” she stated calmly, shrugging a
single shoulder.

“You have to do more than that to earn my trust.”

Ashlin took a step forward. “Then how about your respect.
Gather your team together and meet me here tomorrow afternoon.” It was her time
to eye Mason before saying, “Then I can show you just what I can do.”

Without waiting for a response, she turned and swiftly
headed for the nearest tree. With one extension of her arm, she caught a branch
and swung herself up like a bird taking flight. A second later she disappeared
completely from sight, and though Norabel couldn’t see the other trees moving,
she had the strong suspicion that, if she were to run over and check the tree
she had grabbed ahold of, she would no longer be there.

Glancing back to Mason, she saw that he almost carried an
expression of anger on his face. She had known him long enough to know that he
didn’t like surprises. Regardless of what he thought about Ashlin, she was
certainly a surprise.

“Come on,” he ordered Norabel gruffly with a sweep of his
arm. “We’re going back.”

Silently obeying, she followed him out of the forest grass
and onto the main road. They travelled in silence for a few minutes, before she
chanced to ask him a question.

“What are you thinking?”

“I’m not sure,” he answered tersely, staring at the road
ahead of them.

Norabel waited for him to add anything to his answer, hoping
for the smallest insight into his head, but found, once again, that he was
shutting her out.

That next day, Mason found Norabel at lunch once more,
informing her that he had decided to go back to Valor Wood in the afternoon,
and that he was going to tell Logan and Archer what had happened. She silently
nodded and said nothing as Mason promptly left her. She wasn’t about to argue
with him when he had already made up his mind. She wondered how he could be so
sure about something so quickly, when she was completely at a loss as to how to
feel about the whole thing.

When work ended for the day, she was supposed to hurry home
and then make for the path up the mountain that eventually led into the woods,
but she found herself dawdling in thought.

“Something on your mind?” Hunter asked her when she appeared
at his checkpoint.

She had not even realized where she was, and looked up to
him in mild surprise. “Hmm?” she asked.

“You seem troubled by something,” he said, his worried green
eyes contradicting the smile that was forever on his face.

“Oh, it’s nothing, just…” she was about to leave it at that,
but somehow she felt it would be rude not to tell him her thoughts when he had
shown so much concern for her. Taking a peek behind her, she saw that a woman
named Kaylee was waiting to pass through the checkpoint, and Norabel stepped to
the side, saying good-naturedly, “Why don’t you go in front of me.”

Kaylee blinked in confusion for a moment, before graciously
moving forward and into the checkpoint. Hunter quickly found her name and put a
check next to it before waving her through. When she had gone, Norabel stepped
back up to his station box.

“I was just wondering,” she said, looking down at the large
ledger open in between them. “What happens if someone is transferred to another
village?”

“Transferred?” he repeated.

She looked up from the book and saw even more worry on his
face.

“Do you think you’re being transferred?” he asked.

“No,” she answered quickly, before adding, “I mean, a few
years ago I was actually offered the chance to move somewhere else. Though it
wasn’t exactly a transfer, so much as an invitation.”

“Wow,” he commented with a shake of his head. “That must say
a lot about you.”

“What do you mean?”

“Uh…” he stuttered slightly before he explained, “What I
mean is, it’s really rare to even get a transfer. We haven’t had one here for
the past couple of years. But the fact that they actually asked you about where
you wanted to go…”

“Sorry, what?” she interrupted, her small voice barely
breaking past the sound of the summer bugs chirping in a nearby bush. “No one’s
been transferred here for the past few…” she trailed off, scrunching her brow
in confusion.

“No,” he replied, eyeing her carefully. “Not since two
winters ago. I’d know. It would be in my ledger.” He cleared his throat before
asking, “You’re not regretting your decision to stay here, are you?”

“What?” she asked, looking up to him and trying to clear her
head of the hundreds of questions and worries that were going through it. “Oh,
no,” she finally answered, giving him a sweet smile. “There’s a lot that I love
about Breccan.”

Hunter’s gaze shifted behind her for a moment, eyeing a man
that had just stepped in line. Realizing that he had to go back to work, he
looked down to his ledger and put a checkmark next to her name, quickly
labeling the time. As he did so, a small smile formed at his lips, and he
commented quietly, “Well, Breccan is lucky to have you.”

His words sent a strange sensation through her body, and for
the first time in her life, she felt her age. This was what it felt like to be
a twenty-one year old woman. These were the confusing and exiting feelings that
went with it.

Before she could stand there any longer and make a mute fool
out of herself, she gave Hunter a brief, “Bye,” before passing through his
gates and hurrying for home.

*

Mason, Logan, and Archer had all gathered by the meeting
tree in Valor Wood soon after they got off work, and were each leaning against
the trunk of a tree, waiting for Norabel.

“Drat it! How much longer do ya think she’ll be?” Archer
asked, snapping a thin branch off the tree behind him and putting the broken
end up to his nose.

“Maybe someone at work held her back?” Logan reasoned.

“Or maybe girls are always going to be slower than guys,”
Archer commented, dabbing the broken twig up to his neck in hopes of capturing
the scent of the tree’s sap. “Maybe we should think twice about letting another
one on our team.”

“I’d say we’ve already got two,” Logan joked, snatching the
stick from Archer. “And why don’t you try real perfume? It works better.”

“Girls aren’t inherently slower than guys,” Mason said,
crossing his arms over his chest and looking disapprovingly at the road. “Norabel’s
probably just stopped somewhere, looking at an ant pile.”

Archer chuckled in agreement. “Yeah, or standing with her
ear to a tree, trying to hear it talk.”

“Or maybe she’s coming down the road right now,” Logan said,
pointing Archer’s stick in that direction. “And you two better shut up before
she hears you.”

Seeing that Norabel was making her way down the path towards
them, Mason kicked off from his tree and started towards her.

“You’re late,” he mumbled, throwing her a glance as he
walked up the road.

Norabel stopped and watched his retreating back in
confusion. She had tried to get there as fast as she could. Of course, she
couldn’t move too fast, but she thought she had been rather prompt.

“Don’t mind him,” Logan said, joining her on the road. “He’s
just on edge because of this whole Ashlin thing.”

“He told you?” she asked, starting to walk with him at an
easy pace.

Archer ran up from behind them, his heavy footfalls pounding
up from the ground and striking against the soles of her boots. He bypassed
them and chose to walk with Mason.

“Yeah,” Logan answered. “I was a little angry with him for
lying to me.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you,” she apologized quickly.

He smiled and bumped her arm with his, putting her at ease.
“I’m not mad at you, Norabel. In fact, there’s not one time in my life where I
can say that I have been.”

“Thanks Logan,” she said, linking her fingers together in
front of her and staring down at them. “That means a lot.”

Up ahead, they could see Mason stop in the road and bend
down to pick something up.

“I hope my brother didn’t hurt you yesterday,” Logan said,
bending to whisper into her ear.

“Sorry?” she asked.

“He told me he had to dive on top of you to save you from
what he thought was a flying arrow.”

“Oh. That,” she said, giving out a soft laugh. Logan
chuckled as well.

“Are you two coming or not?” Mason asked in impatience,
waving a small stick with a few leaves left on top.

“How’d ya know that isn’t just a broken stick on the road?”
Archer questioned, pointing to it in suspicion.

“Because it’s the same one I shot at him yesterday.”

Archer nearly jumped in shock as Ashlin appeared to drop
down from nowhere and stand in front of them on the road. Her auburn hair had
been let down to her shoulders, blowing in the whisper of a summer breeze, and
the elegant green bow she carried was carefully poised in her hand.

“Please tell me this is the girl,” Archer said, staring at
her with wide, hopeful eyes. “Because, if it’s not, I’m voting we put her on
the team anyway.”

“What happened to ‘girls are slower than guys’?” Logan
reminded him, playfully hitting his arm. “We should think twice before letting
another one on?”

“That was before I saw her,” he whispered, loud enough for
everyone to hear.

“Guys,” Mason cut in. “If you’re finished ogling, we should
get off the road now.”

“There’s a clearing not too far from here,” Ashlin
suggested. “It’s hidden from any traffic that might pass this way.”

“Hey, you lead and I’ll be right behind you,” Archer
responded, grinning.

Ashlin gave him a brief look-over before swiftly spinning
her bow and pointing it to a spot in the trees. “Come on,” she said. “It’s this
way.”

Travelling into the forest about a half-mile north, she led
them to a grassy clearing that had a circle of large, thick trees encompassing
it. Walking to the center, they saw that a target sign had been pinned up to
the bark of several of the trees.

“What is this place?” Logan asked, turning in a circle to
catch a glimpse of each of the targets.

“It’s where I’ve been training for the past few days,” she
answered. “Though, to be quite honest, I’ve been training for a lot longer than
that. I used to be part of the Noor Summit Harbingers before I was transferred.”
She flipped her bow deftly in her hand in a few, mesmerizing turns, saying, “I
asked you out here today so I could prove myself to you. To put it bluntly, I’d
like to be on your team.”

“Well, that’s good enough for me,” Archer said, putting out
his hand for her to shake. “My name’s Archer.”

Ashlin gave him a smart look before digging her bow into the
ground and taking his hand.

“I’m Ashlin.”

“I know,” he responded, not letting go of her hand.

“His real name’s Gillian,” Logan offered helpfully. “He
catches fish for a living.”

“That would explain the smell,” Ashlin commented, drawing
her hand away.

“I don’t smell!” Archer defended. He shoved Logan in the
arm, adding, “And nobody calls me that.”

Seeing that there was no getting around the introductions
now, Mason came up to her and offered his hand. “I’m Mason,” he said, his voice
embodying the ever confident leader he longed to be. He then motioned with a
flick of his head, saying, “That’s my brother Logan, and that’s Norabel.”

“Norabel,” Ashlin said, turning to address her. “What a
sweet name.”

She had given her a smile when she said it, but Norabel
wasn’t sure if she was making fun or her or not.

“Well, now that we’ve got that over with,” she said, grabbing
her bow once more. “What’s say I show you what I can do.”

Without waiting for a reply, she grabbed an arrow from
behind her back, placed it in her bow, and let it fly. She had done it so fast
that Norabel didn’t even think that she had looked at her mark. But, sure
enough, a moment later, the arrow came thudding right into the center hole of one
of the targets.

“You might want to duck,” she warned them, before she took
out another arrow and let it fly to her right, and another and another, all in
quick succession, so that she had made a complete circle and had hit every
single mark smack dab in the center.

Archer gave a low whistle in admiration from where he had
quickly dashed to the floor. Mason, however, did not give out his praise so
easily.

He rose to his feet, saying, “That’s great and all, but how
is firing arrows going to help us steal cargo?”

“Alright,” Ashlin said, walking over to the trees.

Moving like she had before, she swung up into a tree and
disappeared behind its leaves. A moment later an arrow shot out, landing nearly
on top of another arrow that had previously been struck in the center of a
target. Then, in the span of a few seconds, arrows shot out from different
angles from the tops of the trees, landing squarely on their marks. If Norabel
hadn’t known any better, she would have thought that five or six men were
hiding up in the trees instead of just one girl running through them as easily
as if she was walking on solid ground.

This show earned an encouraging clap from Archer, and she
dropped down from the trees right behind him.

“You’re still firing arrows,” Mason pointed out.

“And you’re not getting the point,” she defended. “I can
hide where no one can see me. I can move so quietly that even the mice don’t
hear me coming.”

“Well next time we take on a band of mice, I’ll be sure to
enlist your help,” he said sarcastically.

Ashlin clamped her jaw tightly in determination, and then
turned to where Archer stood, telling him, “If you’d care to blindfold me, I
can do it that way too.”

“Alright,” he said, thoroughly amused by the whole
situation. He searched his pockets, taking out several pieces of dried fruit,
the remnants of a squished pinecone, and the crust of an old slice of bread, but
could find nothing that would work as a blindfold. He was about to take out a
knife and cut off a piece of his shirt, when Norabel stopped him.

“Here,” she said, taking off the sash of her dress that tied
around her waist. Holding it out, she offered it to Ashlin.

Ashlin gave her a smile as thanks, and then took the sash to
Mason, saying, “Will you do the honors?”

Mason eyed both the cloth and the girl in deliberation. No
doubt he was impressed, but he seemed to be working extra hard to appear
unfazed by the whole thing. Then, relenting to her request, he took the cloth
in his hands and stepped behind her to wrap it over her eyes and tie behind her
head.

“Would you all mind standing perfectly still for me,
please,” she ordered.

Norabel held her breath in suspense as she saw Ashlin reach
behind her for an arrow. She positioned it in her bow and moved slower this
time as she pulled back on the string, searching for her target. Then, taking
in a deep breath, Ashlin let the arrow fly, and spun to claim the next target. However,
her first display of taking her time with the shot appeared to be nothing more
than an unnecessary show, for she let the rest of her arrows fly with barely a
moment’s hesitation between each one.

Taking off her blindfold, she smiled as she saw her success.
“Do you see now?” she asked. “I can hit targets without even looking at them.
You do all of your operations in the night. You need someone that can work just
as well in the dark as they do in the light.”