Page 19 of House Divided
Enoch had no idea when she had become “his” Madeline, but he didn’t care. It was true. She was his, and he would protect her to the very end of his strength. So Enoch ran, a heavy pack on his back, dragging the sled behind him.
As the suns descended in the sky, Enoch faced a decision: to rest, or to keep going through the night. His body shouted at him to rest, but Enoch was afraid that if he stopped, he would not be able to start again. He knew that sucking the venom from Madeline’s puncture wound was having some sort of effect on his system.
Stop, and she dies.Enoch had no idea if that was actually true, but he feared it in his heart. So he strapped a small battery-powered lamp to his forehead and kept running.
It was around twilight that Enoch fell for the first time.
The shock of falling sent a burst of adrenaline through his system, which drove him to get up quickly, drink some electrolyte solution, and check on Madeline. The dark line on her leg had crawled up another inch or so.
“Dammit,” he muttered feverishly and fed Madeline some more water. Then he picked up the poles and resumed his run.
As dawn broke, Enoch could see that the hills were much closer than he had thought. Despite his exhaustion, he had covered a substantial amount of ground in the night. Exactly how he was going to make it up even the gentlest of slopes, he had no idea.
But I’ll do it. My Madeline needs me to.
About an hour after sunrise, Enoch fell for the second time.
This time, it was harder for him to get up. The grass felt incredibly comfortable, and his system was exhausted. All he wanted to do was close his eyes and sleep. The grass was cool to the touch.
The grass. Grass has snakes. A snake bit Madeline.Enoch’s eyes jerked open.She needs you!
With a moan, Enoch got to his feet once more, grabbed the poles of the sled, and staggered onward.
The first hill was close. It swept upward in a graceful curve, smooth and symmetrical. To Enoch’s feverish gaze, it looked almosttoosymmetrical.
Real geography doesn’t work like that. His thoughts were muzzy. What did he know about how geography worked?It’s a hill, you fool. Get to the top of the hill. Survey the landscape. Find the settlement that will have medicine for Madeline.
Grunting at himself, Enoch forced his legs to move faster.Climb the hill. See the land. Find a settlement. Save Madeline.This became his mantra, which Enoch repeated over and over as he drove himself onward.
He drew closer and closer to the great, sweeping hill, which seemed to expand to fill his whole field of vision.
Climb the hill. Save Madeline.
Enoch was no longer sure how those two thoughts connected, but they were all that he had left, until a final, terrible old thought broke through from where he had buried it years ago:
You failed Grace.
“No,” gritted Enoch, unaware that he was even speaking out loud. “Notagain!” Drawing on some hidden reserve that he hadn’t even known existed, he drove his legs harder, faster, pushing himself toward a goal that he was too exhausted to even understand anymore, beyond knowing that he simply had to achieve it.
The rise of the hill was less than a hundred meters away. A door opened in the hillside.
A door?
There were creatures, running out of the door and toward him. It made absolutely no sense, but Enoch didn’t care anymore. Somehow, he had found people. These were people.
Are these people?They seemed quite short in stature and appeared to be covered in thick colorful fur.
Enoch stopped and did his best to stand upright. A semicircle of the diminutive furry humanoids stood and stared up at him.
“You have to save her,” said Enoch, and then, for the first time in many years, he added, “Please.”
Then his vision faded to black, and he could feel himself falling, and he was unconscious before he hit the ground.
