Chapter 18

Chase woke up to the sound of a rooster cawing. His eyes snapped up and he tried to sit up but smacked his scalp against something and felt a splitting pain in his head, the sharp thud seemed to have startled something because heard a bunch of scurrying around him.

Chase gingerly felt around at the large lump on his head encrusted in dried blood. His memory was very foggy and his headache would worsen when he opened his eyes, but he slowly looked around himself trying to figure out where he was.

He was in a small, claustrophobic hut filled with dried grass and feathers, the stench of fresh and old droppings made him feel sick to his stomach.

He rushed out of the small space to breathe fresh air and not feel so trapped. It didn't help much, the moment he got out he started vomiting, not that there was anything for him to throw up. He retched and drooled, surrounded by clucking chickens. Once he was done he felt worse but his head grew clearer, the crisp morning air woke him.

The first thing he saw when he shakily stood up was the chicken coop he had crawled out of. He rest against it and his eyes eventually settled on a house of some sort.

They were in a small clearing surrounded by tall lumbering trees, when he looked up the sky above fit inside his palm and the sunlight flickered as the branches swayed back and forth. In the middle was a collection of logs, beams, mud and stone that loosely resembled a house. It was built layer by layer like the flabs of a pig, the house seemed to spill out of its foundation in every direction. There were all manner of tools and benches strewn around, some he recognised and others that were foreign to him.

Chase was about to tell Elie that he had found a strange house when he noticed she wasn't there. He panicked and looked for her before spotting the bearded man from before, he was clothed this time around.

"Stop that! Your going to scare off the birds!" He said gruffly.

Chase fumbled over, grabbing him by the collar.

"You! Where is she?!" He said with a hoarse voice. His eyes were bloodshot and he had dried vomit encrusted on his lips and under his nose.

He pushed Chase away, "At least wipe that shit off your face before you touch me. I couldn't fit you both in one coop, she's in the other one."

Chase poked his head inside and dragged himself over to her. She bolted awake and held up her knife before seeing Chase and relaxing her posture.

"We're ok, we're ok now." He whispered.

Chase held his daughter briefly to put himself at ease and gather his thoughts before leaving the coop.

"I'm really sorry for everything, we will leave soon."

The man crossed his arms unimpressed, "I doubt you can walk five steps in a straight line, so how are you planning to leave exactly?"

"I... We can figure that out. I'm really sorry we will stop bothering you." Chase said trying to make himself look as small and unthreatening as possible.

Conleth scratched and ruffled his hair with a frown, "Ah, fuck it. I already said to the kid that I'd give you guys a place for a few nights. Just don't scare off the birds and you can stay in the coops."

Chase was hesitant but some part of him felt a sense of relief, "Ah... Sir-"

"None of that sir shit. It's Conleth."

"Yes, thank you... Conleth. For saving us."

At these words, Conleth's eyes seemed to soften and he seemed almost embarrassed.

"No need for that, I tried to kill you so lets just call it even. The coops are yours until you recover, I'll give you some food so don't go bothering any of the local wildlife."

"Thank you so-"

"Yeah, yeah, I get it." He said, waving at him dismissively.

Conleth went back inside, leaving Chase to process their situation. Everything considered, it was far better than he feared.

He crawled back into the coop Elie was staying in. She had already curled up into a ball again.

He managed to unfurl her so that he could inspect her arm. She just watched him with half open eyes, not resisting or reacting to anything he did. She was covered in scratches, grazes and bruises, both new and old. There was hardly anywhere where she wasn't hurt in some way.

Her arm was especially bad, it was a speckled red bruise that ran up to her shoulder, but fortunately the bone didn't seem to be broken. Although he was a bit concerned when she calmly told him when it hurt, but didn't flinch even when he touched it directly.

He heard Conleth's voice "This is for you two."

Chase heard some scuffling outside and peeked out, there was a bag that the chickens had gathered around, pecking at the leather. Conleth was walking back to his house and went in without saying another word or looking at Chase. He grabbed the bag, inside was what looked like a dry loaf of rye bread, some mushrooms, two strips of dried meat and a water skin. He wanted to say "Thank you." But Conleth had already gone inside, so instead Chase murmured it to himself.

He tried feeding Elie but she had already fallen asleep. He managed to prop her up and wake her up enough to give her some rye bread he softened with water and two bites of dried meat. Once she regained her appetite a bit he stopped her, "Don't eat it all at once, you will feel sick. You can have the rest later."

He checked his tongue out of habit and after stopping himself just before his fill, he lay down next to her. They huddled close together in the cramped coop.

Her fever had flared up again. She was warm to the touch, so he made sure that she wasn't uncomfortable before closing his eyes and let the drowsiness take him. He didn't even care if something appeared in his dreams, he felt so heavy that he would put up with anything for a decent rest.

He was rudely woken by something moist touching his face and breathing down his neck in ragged gasps. Chase shouted and flailed around in the dark. Something scurried out of the coop and the chickens panicked and ran off into the night, the pale moonlight casting their silhouettes. He rushed out and looked at what it was that had caused the commotion. He couldn't tell if his eyes were playing tricks on him, but he swore he saw the creature from before slink away into the forest, spooked by his sudden outburst. He shuddered as he watched it disappear.

It was only after a few minutes vigilantly staring at the shadows between the trees, just in case it came back, that he realised how cold it was. He felt the faint crunch of frosted mud underneath him and let out a short puff of fog, drawing fresh cold air into his lungs.

He went back into the coop to warm up, keeping one eye on the outside at all times. He placed a hand on Elie to check on her, she hadn't woken up earlier, she was much cooler than before, almost too cold. He was already uneasy but now he was on edge.

He heard a tiny whispering sound he couldn't quite make out, "Elie? Are you awake?"

He leaned in closer to make out what she was saying.

"Love you dad... Love you."

There was a strange sense of panic that engulfed his clouded mind. He gently shook Elie trying to wake her up, but soon he was doing everything in his power to get her to open her eyes.

"Elie. Elie! Wake up! Come on! No, no, no, no! Wake up!"

He tried pulling up her eyelids but even then her eyes just rolled back. He couldn't tell if she was cold or not due to how numb his entire body felt, all he knew was that his hands were shaking.

He lifted her out of the coop, trying to find something to wake her up. Her skin appeared as pale as her hair in the moonlight, casting her in a deathly grey.

Chase spotted a warm flickering light from within the house. He ran up to it without thinking, knocking on the windows doors, anything to try getting in.

A minute later a disgruntled Conleth cracked opened the door and peeked out, "What the fuck do you want at this hour?"

He held out Elie's limp body to him "I... please let her stay inside, she isn't waking up. She- she won't survive the night. Please I beg you. I will stay out, just make sure she is warm."

Chase saw him rubbing his forehead before closing the door.

"PLEASE! I'LL DO ANYTHING!"

"Alright alright, I'm just undoing the chain. Stop fucking shouting."

He opened the door and Chase held Elie out for him to take.

Conleth sighed, "Just bring her in, I'll setup the fireplace."

Chase didn't ask twice and stepped in, he looked around for a fireplace, he walked into two different bedrooms before Conleth pointed him to the living room.

He sat down bringing Elie as close to it as possible, soon a small flickering fire started to warm the room. He rocked back and forth, with her in his arms and watched closely as some colour started to return to her face.

At some point Conleth had tossed a blanket for them to use, Chase wrapped her up as best he could with fumbling hands.

Conleth stared at them for a moment, he wanted to say something but he didn't know what.

He climbed into bed and stared a the picture on his bedside table. It was a picture of a woman, she had wavy brown hair tied up into a loose bun, and flushed rosy cheeks, a small dimple betrayed the smile she was trying to hide. Conleth turned over in bed so that he wasn't facing her.

He couldn't go to sleep that night.