A Painted Goddess by Victor Gischler Page B

was already regretting his decision to venture into the darkness.
    Water. You need water and soon .
    He realized he’d been walking on a narrow trail the last few minutes, following the path of least resistance between the trees. Probably a game trail. And if animals made the trail, then it might lead to water, right?
    And a few minutes later, he heard it, the telltale trickle of flowing water. He picked up speed, hope blooming in his chest.
    Alem felt and heard himself splashing in it before he saw it. He went to one knee, shoving aside the ground foliage, and felt along the ground, his hand wet and cold as he found the shallow stream. He scooped water frantically. It was so cold and wet in his mouth there was a moment of pain, but then pleasure as he scooped more. He spit out pebbles and dirt. The slow trickle of water could barely be called a stream.
    He trudged uphill, and soon the stream was ankle deep and then knee deep. He scooped in big mouthfuls of water until his belly stretched full. He dunked his head. Alem hadn’t fully realized how desperate he’d been until relief flooded him. He felt refreshed and alive.
    Immediately a deep fatigue soaked his bones. The long swim and critical thirst had sapped him. He trudged out of the water until he found a dry spot, collapsed, and fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.
    It seemed only a few minutes later that his eyes popped open again, but it must have been hours because it was full daylight. He sat up, groaned, every part of him stiff, but he felt a world better than he had the night before. He crawled a few feet back to the stream and drank deeply.
    He stood, looked back the way he’d come the night before, and could glimpse the sea between the trees. He hadn’t really come as far inland as he’d thought. Everything seemed different at night.
    Alem’s clothes clung to him, salty and damp. He looked around to make sure nobody could see him—which was idiotic since of course nobody was around—and stripped naked. He soaked his clothes in the pool, wrung them out, and hung them on a nearby tree limb to dry.
    He put his boots back on and decided to follow the stream uphill. He wasn’t thrilled to set off exploring completely nude, but sitting around watching his clothes dry didn’t appeal to him either.
    As the hill steepened, the stream became wider and foamy, cascading down rough boulders. He looked ahead and saw that the face of the hill became sheer gray rock for a ways, and the stream flowed from the wide mouth of a cave entrance. Alem climbed to the edge of the cave and peered inside. If he were stranded for long on this island—Dumo forbid—he would need some kind of shelter.
    He entered slowly, rough gravel crunching beneath his boots. Once inside, he saw that the stream was fed from deep underground, but to the side, the cavern widened to a dry area, the ceiling rising enough to make standing straight no problem. It wouldn’t be a bad spot. A place out of the sun or rain. He scanned about for a likely spot to—
    Alem screamed when he saw the man. He stumbled back, tripping over his own feet.
    He fell back into the water and was swept out of the cave, tumbling and splashing back down the slope until he was thrown up against a boulder. He grunted, holding his ribs, and staggered out of the water.
    Thicko. Watch what you’re doing. You’ve come too far to break your own neck like some clumsy oaf .
    He trudged back up the hill and into the cave.
    Alem approached the corpse carefully. He stood off to the side so as not to block the sunlight. Quite a few years ago, this man had obviously had the same idea about using the cave for shelter. How many years ago, Alem could only guess. The corpse’s skin was dried out and shriveled tightly against his skull. Patches of skin coming off on the hands, and bone showing through. He was sitting on an upended bucket, back against the cave wall. His tunic was about to fall into dust but looked to have been fine material