After the Fire (After the Fire: Book the First) Read Online Free PDF Page A

had a bead on it. But it had been too long. She walked into the
forest anyway, though she was surprised not to see the marks of his
horse's hooves anywhere. Who was this man? This outsider that came
from the world that she had been told no longer existed. What else
was out there?
    The
wolf growled and Eleni followed his eyes. Something white flashed in
front of her, making her flinch. A white bird landed just above her
and looked at her. A white raven. It turned its head this way and
that, taking note of her. Eleni looked down at the wolf. She was no
longer growling. She was staring at the bird and then she lowered her
head in an odd way. Almost as though bowing to it. Eleni looked at
the raven. It looked back. She frowned. Ravens were not supposed to
be white. It wasn't albino, like the rabbit her mother had showed her
once as a child. That rabbit had red eyes and snow white fur. Eleni
had even been able to touch it as her mother held it. But the raven
didn't have red or even pale eyes. It had normal beady raven eyes.
    The
raven let out a shriek and flew to a higher branch. Eleni marked it,
but moved on. There was no sign of the strange man from the night
before. The creatures were quiet. As if even they, the
beasts and monsters of the wood, feared Eleni as well.
    She
walked with the wolf until her feet were tired and the hem of her
dress was wet with dew. There were no monsters this night. And the
raven followed her incessantly, squawking occasionally. Shooing it
away did no good. It just hopped out of Eleni's reach and
watched her in an eerie way, as if it knew her.
    Finally,
just before dawn, Eleni spotted a deer. A great deer with horns that
spread out from its skull like the bony hands of a giant. Eleni crept
up on one side, the wolf on the other. She held out her hand and the
buck was dead before it even registered the scent of wolf and fire.
She went to the carcass. The head was still partially attached, the
wound burned black by her fire. There was no life in his eyes. Eleni
let the wolf feed on the meat from the throat. Then she used her hand
to cook the remains of the tender meat and picked at it with her
fingers, careful not to soil her only garment. When she had her fill,
she hefted the deer up, her powerful muscles working to keep her
upright with the great weight on her shoulder.
    She
had once seen Cosmin try to lift a carcass like this when she was a
child. She had giggled as he staggered underneath it, finally letting
it drop to the ground when it was obvious he couldn't carry it. But
strength had always come to her easily. The pig from the night before
had been difficult only because she was weak from the blue creature
that attacked her. Now she walked lithely with the deer on her
shoulder, the horns poking into her thigh with every step. The wolf
ran off, as she always did at dawn. When Eleni reached the village
gates she dropped the animal unceremoniously into the dirt.
    She
looked up to see Rastin looking down at her with an arrow aimed at
her head. She smiled at him and let a flame burst from her hand. He
pulled back his bow further and she walked away. When she took her
mother from the village, Rastin would not live to see her walk away.
She would make sure of that.
    Eleni
slept soundly that night for the first time in many months. She was
usually plagued by strange, fevered dreams of faces she didn't know
and places she'd never been. But to her relief, she slept dreamlessly
with the door to her iron box wide open and the scent of the traveler
wrapped around her.
    She
woke at sunset, feeling refreshed. She walked away from the village,
ten men pointing arrows at her back. The wolf joined her as she
walked toward the river. When she got there, she carefully hung the
jacket on a tree, followed by her dress. She stepped into the water
and washed herself. She could tell the water was probably frigid, but
it didn't affect her. She could sense the cold, but she couldn't feel
it. When she had scrubbed the grime