Trial by Fire (Worldwalker 1)

A young man rode forward, taking command. He jumped off his mount and stood over an old man who had been knocked down and couldn’t get back up to his feet. The young man was well-dressed and had pale skin and white-blond hair. He looked like an overgrown choirboy.

“But I’m not a scientist,” the old man said in a wavering voice. “I’m a history teacher.”

“You’ve been found guilty of teaching the history of scienc

e,” the baby-faced commander said in a whiny, unpleasant voice. Rowan stiffened when he heard it, like he recognized it, and turned slightly to look.

“But it’s not the same thing,” the old man pleaded. He rose up on his forearms, trying to explain himself better. The commander began to hit the old man over the head with a baton. He was smiling, his baby face leering obscenely.

“Don’t look.” Rowan put his hand over Lily’s mouth, his eyes locked with hers as they listened to the old man being beaten to death. It seemed to take hours. Lily found herself counting the blows, her lips silently tracing the words “six, seven, eight, nine” against the palm of Rowan’s hand. When it was finally over, the rest of the elderly people were rounded up, tied together, and led away.

Rowan eased his hand away from Lily’s mouth, his other arm still holding her close to him. Lily looked over Rowan’s shoulder at the old man.

She’d never seen a dead body before. He was so still, and he looked smaller, barely the size of a child. Lily heard herself hiccup and realized that she was crying.

“Shh,” Rowan breathed. He squeezed her shoulders and tilted his face toward hers. “Look at me.”

Lily gulped a few times and tried to control herself. When she met Rowan’s eyes, she was surprised to see that they were soft instead of angry.

“I’m not going to let anything happen to you. Okay?” He ran a hand across her face, brushing her wet cheeks dry.

“That man—” Lily broke off, her voice had come out louder and rougher than she’d intended. “Why did that guy just kill him like that?”

Rowan shook his head and looked away, his lips pursed as if he didn’t want to discuss the matter any further.

“Why?” Lily demanded. “He was just a history teacher. What did he do wrong?”

“That’s just it. He was a teacher. The truth is, he got off easy,” Rowan said bitterly. “The rest of them are going to be tortured and then hanged.”

“By whom?”

“Haven’t you figured out who runs things in this world?” He didn’t have to say it. She knew it was Lillian.

“You recognized him. The killer.”

Rowan nodded and dropped his eyes. “Gideon,” he whispered. Rowan clasped her hand in his and pulled her up. “We have to move. Now.”

“Where’s Tristan?” Lily asked, clutching Rowan’s wrist.

Rowan paused, his gaze turning inward for moment. “He’s okay. He got away.”

“Are we going to him?”

“It’s too dangerous,” he replied, shaking his head and frowning. “There are guards everywhere. We stand a better chance if we split up for a while.”

Lily nodded reluctantly and followed Rowan. He stopped momentarily to pick up a discarded gun. He flicked open the chamber, saw that it was empty, and cast it aside. He didn’t waste any more time trying to scavenge a weapon and led Lily out of the glade. She ran alongside him, trying to move as quietly as she could. She could barely hear Rowan’s footsteps hitting the ground while she seemed to make so much noise that she was convinced at any moment they were going to get caught. But try as she might, she couldn’t figure out how to make her feet quieter.

Rowan led her deep into the woods, neither of them speaking. Years ago, Lily had come to terms with the fact that she wasn’t in control of her own body, that at any moment a fever or seizure could overtake her and potentially kill her, but this was different. Now she was at the mercy of a whole world she didn’t understand.

Rowan brought them to water, tasting it carefully before he slung the pack off his back and took out a water pouch. He filled it and passed it to Lily. Hands shaking, she drank from the pouch while he scooped water into his mouth with his cupped palm. When she’d drained the pouch, he refilled it and they moved on.

Every now and again, Rowan would stop, brush some fallen leaves aside, and pick acorns or mushrooms off the ground. The mushrooms he’d hand to Lily, indicating that she should eat them, and the acorns he stowed in his pack. Lily eyed the mushrooms warily, her stomach still churning from what she had witnessed, but after the first taste of them—woody, earthy, and surprisingly meaty—she didn’t hesitate when he handed more to her the next time they stopped. After she ate, Rowan would reach out to touch Lily’s wrist in that odd gesture again, like he was taking her pulse. She wondered vaguely what he was doing, but was still too shaken to question him.

They never stayed in one spot for more than a few seconds at a time before moving on. Rowan ate nothing at all and drank only a few sips of water. Everything he gathered, he gave to Lily to eat or saved for later, even though she urged him to take some for himself.

“I don’t need it,” he’d said simply when Lily offered him the water pouch. “I drank my fill at the stream.”

He wasn’t acting tough, or trying to be noble. He’d stored those acorns against some kind of emergency. Lily could tell from the detached way he pulled up a handful of wildflower bulbs, scraped them clean with his knife, then gave them to Lily to eat without sparing them even one hungry look, that he was someone who’d learned how to live with very little. He didn’t get thirsty or tire as quickly as someone with Lily’s upbringing. Rowan was a survivor.