Chapter 5

At first, Ciroz wasn’t sure what happened. He didn’t see any monsters, there were none standing near him, nothing. He was certain that nothing was going to jump out of the shadows and attack him now that he was alone with his thoughts again. After a while, he became aware of a faint sound and he instinctively lifted his head, noticing a small pile of rocks forming in front of him. It wasn’t moving, the whole pile of rock didn’t move and yet Ciroz was convinced that something was coming from it. With furrowed eyebrows, he slowly stepped closer towards the pile until finally, one of the rocks moved. Slowly it raised its head, revealing itself as it rose up and revealed four eyes filled with curiosity and confusion. It looked at Ciroz with pure fascination and Ciroz stared at the monster with wide eyes, unable to believe what he just witnessed. He didn’t dare to move a muscle though, afraid that this creature in front of him was just a figment of his imagination. When it noticed that he wasn’t making a single movement, its expression slowly fell. It turned back to look at the ground and placed its head in the stone once again. Ciroz watched, mesmerized, as the rocks began to roll down again. Then, when he saw the rocks disappear, Ciroz finally allowed himself to breathe. This… thing was real. It was alive. And it definitely had human features!

His mind instantly went back to the incident which had taken place hours earlier. He had run through the woods, completely forgetting about the monster that was following him until suddenly, it appeared right next to him. Ciroz had screamed in surprise and quickly hid behind a large tree and had waited for the monster to disappear, but the skeleton had simply kept walking and disappearing between the trees without ever appearing at least twenty metres further down the path. Ciroz didn’t want to think about it anymore, but it made perfect sense.

And although his mind told him that it wasn’t true, his heart refused to accept it.

In his panic, he had ran straight away, leaving the monster behind him. He wasn’t expecting the thing to stop chasing him. He was almost positive that it was going to kill him if it caught him, but he didn’t care. His goal had been to save his siblings; he couldn’t leave them there. Not after what the monster had done to them. And not after what had happened to everyone before that. If it had killed Ciroz, that would mean that it killed them all. And there was a possibility that they still lived and Ciroz didn’t know what he would do if that was true. If they could be saved, then he wanted to do everything possible to rescue them, to keep them safe, especially the ones he cared about the most.

When the dust had begun to settle, when his heart had calmed down, the fear had returned to his brain; a fear that he had never experienced since arriving in that dreadful hell hole. It terrified him. How would he explain this to his friends? How would they react if they found out how useless he was compared to the others? What would they say? Would they abandon him? Would they be disgusted by him?

He didn’t know how long it had been since he had collapsed to the ground, not caring whether it was night or morning. All he could remember was being lost in his thoughts until he had heard the soft noise of footsteps approaching him. Looking over his shoulders, he had spotted Milla, who had walked over and crouched next to him. He could clearly see that she was tired, having probably travelled as much as he had, but she didn’t seem bothered by it.

“What are you doing out here, Ciroz?” she asked quietly.

The crow on Ciroz’s shoulders perked up.

‘She knows my name!’ it exclaimed excitedly. ‘How?! And what does she know?!’ 

“I can hear him talking with Milla,” he whispered in return. “I can barely understand him, I think that he’s hurt and that she’s trying to help. That doesn’t sound good though; I need to find out what’s happening.”

The crow on his shoulder shook its head. 

‘No,’ it insisted. ‘If we go back, we will be caught! And we don’t know if he’ll recognize me! No, we shouldn’t risk it. We should stay here where it is safe!’ 

Ciroz shook his head. He was tired and injured, but he couldn’t sit around while those boys were in danger. And the only way to do that was to get back home as soon as possible. But if he did that, he’d put an end to his existence…

He froze in place as he considered that possibility, feeling tears threatening to fall from his eyes, but he forced his breathing to remain steady before he dared lift his head to look at Milla.