Page 69 of Raven's Dawn
Straight ahead sat a clearing. Unlike the last one, there was no lake, only a cluster of trees. I didn’t even see another bush lined archway.
“Is this the exit?—”
“Shh,” Jeremy repeated.
Leaves rustled. Branches cracked.
Somewhere in that cluster of trees, a blur moved at rapid speed.
“Look what you did,” Jeremy said, then took off after it.
Graham followed him.
“What did I do?” I asked.
“The deer, you idiot,” Graham called.
25
RAIN
I’d only made it a foot into the archway when a scream sounded. Not petrified, just pissed. And in a language I knew but couldn’t speak. Elvan.
Cold soil crunched beneath my feet with each thump. The yelling got louder, and a handful of English curse words made her easy to identify. Laila. That was confirmed when I made it through another archway.
This clearing was identical to the one I had just left. A murky brown, swamp complete with a murderous, white horse. Laila was on its back, struggling to stabilize herself as it tried to buck her off. The only difference in the area was the archways. Rather than my two, she had three. The one I had just come from, the one she must’ve just come from, and her exit.
I wasted no time. Lifting the wind behind me, I willed it to carry me toward the horse. In moments, I was in front of it. With the dagger in hand, I lodged it through its eye. It kept bucking, this time lunging forward, so I stabbed again. And again, and again, and again.
As it neighed and cried, Laila stabbed from behind.
In a splash of crimson, it let out a final screech before tumbling into the pond.
Laila fell with it.
Grumbling and cursing, she used the animal’s head as a stepstool. When she only slid some more, I extended a hand. She squinted at me, then accepted. “But if you’re not Rain, I’ll stab you too.”
“Stab me. I’ll heal.” I held up my arm, revealing a cut I had gotten sometime during my battle. It had been longer, thicker, when I discovered it. Now, I was watching it heal before my eyes, only a few inches in length as opposed to my entire forearm. “You okay?”
Once she sat on the soil, catching her breath, she nodded. “Yeah, just trippy. You?”
“Feeling alive.” Stretching my arms overhead, I rocked my body back and forth to extend the tight muscles around my ribs. “I think I’m coming off my peak, though.”
“Lucky you.” She reached into her jacket and came out with a canteen. After chugging for a moment, she offered it to me. When I accepted, she went on. “Used to love hallucinogens. Now, I just can’t wait to see right again.”
With a laugh, I sat beside her. A long chug of water later, and I sighed deeply. “I don’t know. Makes me feel big and strong.”
“You’re big and strong already.” She studied me for a moment. “They really got in your head, huh?”
“No, not really.” Really, they had. “It’s just annoying. With Graham, at least I know it comes from a place of love. He thinks that it’s his job to protect me. And I appreciate it, but…”
“You’re not a kid anymore?” she asked. “Believe me, I get it. Me and Jeremy have gone round for years about his insistence on protecting me all the time.”
“It’s patronizing, isn’t it?”
“It’s sexist, is what it is. It’s benevolent sexism, but it is, in fact, sexism.” Sighing deeply, she looked around for a moment. “They think that because its rooted in love and not oppression, it’s not misogyny. But it is. You’re a woman, so you can’t fight. You’re a woman, so you can’t defend yourself. You’re a woman, so you need a man to fight your battles. You’re a woman, so you don’t want to get your hands dirty.” She rolled her eyes. “Symbolic of this place.”
Yes, that was my thought exactly. After Graham had moved to Earth, we had debated this very topic. He insisted that it wasn’t sexist to assume there was a woman’s place and a man’s place, so long as no harm was done. But clearly, the way I felt showed that there was harm being done.