They kept trudging, as the darkness slowly began to ease, and the eastern sky lightened. They’d walked through the night – and would have to walk further – they had a long way to go.
Som called a break and the other five sat where they were, the forest floor was no more or less comfortable two steps further on. Sera wove towards the edge of the trees, cut off sharply where the land fell away in a steep tumble of stones to the plain below.
Som called after her. “Don’t go being seen now.”
Sera nodded, she’d stay back in the shadow of the woods, she just wanted to see the dawn.
Sunlight washed her face with soft gold as she stopped before the last line of trees. A clear sky, grey-fading-to-blue arched over fine lines of cloud, painted in shades of peach and apricot. Hard to believe it could be so beautiful, so completely unaffected by the upheaval on the lands beneath.
A light glinted out on the plain, Sera squinted. No, too far. But there weren’t any settlements out this way, no farms, at least not yet. Another glint, something moving, she hugged the shadows of the tree she stood beside.
Yells erupted behind her, and a clash of metal on metal said the greetings weren’t friendly. Sera looked around her, then went up.
The DNA of Stories 