The River

Chapter 15

After spending almost two weeks at Ubara’s house Logan and Laura decided to continue on their journey. They have recovered completely, Logan has found new information about rivers. Now he knew that it was not just a myth, he was in search of something real.

Logan’s dreams have come back too. He had the same dream every night and couldn't sleep relaxed, and it was obvious to him that the dream will not give up until he starts the journey again.

In the last days, Logan had found a book that had some information about machines that could create water out of air. He could not understand any of the things in the book, but he talked to Ubara and took the book with himself.

They also gathered lots of food and water and fat for their lamp. Ubara had lots of candles and gifted them with some of his candles.

They started their journey early in the morning, Ubara accompanied them for a while, he brought a bag with himself, and by noon, he opened his bag with his meal in it. They ate the last lunch together under the shadow of a hill near the river and after that Logan and Laura continued their journey alone.

For some time Laura would look back and see Ubara standing there looking at them go until eventually she lost him on the horizon and figured that he is going back to his empty kingdom now.

For several days nothing special happened, the landscape changed a little bit, now everywhere was full of small and big rocks. It made it easier for them to find a shadow and rest from time to time.

They did not need to use their reserved food, every day they would find a plant or insect colony and eat fresh food. Laura experimented a lot with new plants and gathered a bunch of them for later and bigger experiences.

“These plants will make your backpack heavy,” said Logan while they were sitting beside a big rock and watching the sun set. “But I can’t let them go,” said Laura “I want to gather enough materials so when we go back home, I can make different combinations.” Logan looked at her when she talked about going back.

He has never thought of going back, not that he wanted to stay on the source forever, but it was a one-way adventure in his mind. It was the first time he actually thought about the journey back. And it made him feel stressed.

“How do we want to go through that tunnel again?” asked Logan with a worried voice, “I don’t know,” said Laura “We will figure something out then.” Logan smiled at her. He was not really worried about the tunnel or things like that, he just didn’t feel that there would be a journey back, his journey had no specific end, and it would take forever to finish. but thinking about the journey back, would make it twice as long and twice as hard. He couldn’t bear the thought of it and went to sleep after dark.

The journey continued slowly through the rough and rocky landscape. Laura would find many different plants and take a sample from each of them. Most of the nights, Laura would make a fire and experiment with her new material to create new food.

This place was different from their own village and nights were colder here, sometimes they had to let the fire be lit for a long time before going to sleep.

Without the fire’s light, the sky was full of stars at night, they would lay on their backs every night and look at the moon and stars. The moon was small until eventually, it disappeared on a night, they knew that it would be back some nights from now. But that night without the moon in the sky, the stars were shining brighter.

“Do you see that?” said Laura as she was lying on her back beside Logan and was looking at the sky, “What?” asked Logan, “That blue line,” said Laura pointing at the sky, “Yeah,” said Logan “That’s so beautiful,” “What do you think that is?” asked Laura, “I don’t know,” said Logan “Star dust maybe,” Laura took a deep breath and said “Yeah, maybe, if stars have dust it is probably blue and bright,” they stayed silent for a while.

“What do you think they are?” asked Laura, “What?” asked Logan, “Those starts, what are they?” asked Laura again, “They are stars,” said Logan with a confused voice, “I know,” said Laura, “But what are stars?” “It’s like asking what are rocks, they are rocks,” said Logan pointing at a rock near them and then pointing at the sky and continued “And they are stars.”

“My father used to say the stars are the souls of the good people who are dead,” said Laura not paying attention to Logan’s theory and continued “But Hector was talking about how our body dies every day and how it goes back to earth,” Laura didn’t say anything for a moment and then continued again “But I like my father’s version better, I don’t like to be sand in the earth, I like to be a star in the sky.”

“Maybe both are true,” said Logan, “What do you mean?” asked Laura, “What Hector said was about our bodies, it was not about the idea of us, maybe the body that I had years ago, is dead now, but the memories, the thoughts, and the mind of me is still alive, maybe our minds go to the sky and becomes a star,” “And from there looks at the earth again,” added Laura, “Yeah, maybe,” said Logan, “I like it too,” said Laura.

“But,” said Laura, “What are the moon and sun?” “I remember from my parents that,” said Logan, “People used to worship the moon and the sun as gods, I think they are still doing it in some places,” “So,” said Laura “They are gods?” “I don’t know,” answered Logan, “I sometimes think,” said Laura “Maybe the moon is something like our own earth,” “What do you mean?” asked Logan, “I mean,” continued Laura “It is like earth but in the sky,” Logan thought for a moment and then said, “Maybe, but are people living there too?” “I don’t know,” said Laura “Maybe there are two people on the moon looking at the earth and wondering if anybody lives here.” “Yeah,” said Logan “And the people over there are shining like the moon itself,” “Yeah,” agreed Laura with laughter.

On the next day, at noon, they started a fire so Laura could boil some water and make warm food using her new plants. Suddenly she stood still as she heard a noise, before she could say anything to Logan about it, a black panther jumped out from between the rocks and attacked Logan.

Logan could survive the first attack, Laura jumped fast for her sword and bow. Logan was wrestling with the panther for life and death. He stopped the jaws of the panther that was on top of him with his bare hands.

Lora fired her last arrow and it hit the panther exactly on the neck. There was a loud roar of pain and the panther ran away immediately after. Laura went and helped Logan stand up. “Are you ok?” asked Laura, “Yes,” answered Logan still in shock “Where did it come from?” “I don’t know,” said Laura “He closed on us without making any noise, I just heard him before the attack.”

Laura checked Logan's body, there were no wounds except some small scratches. But his new shirt was torn a little on his back.

“We better go as fast as possible,” said Logan. “He may come back again,” Laura started to pack and Logan helped her. They ate some food in a hurry and started following the river.

They walked for some time with fast paste, but eventually slowed down. They reached a narrow passage between two rocky mountains. And as they were walking inside it, a black panther jumped in front of them.

They both stopped and took out their weapons, “Is it the same?” asked Laura, “Does not seem so,” answered Logan “He has no wound on the neck,” they were getting prepared for the fight with the panther that a roar came from behind. The previous panther was standing behind them.

Laura and Logan stood back to back each facing a panther. The wounded panther started to attack. Laura defended herself with her sword.

“I think it’s better,” shouted Logan, “That we start to attack, that way at least we have better control over whom to fight.” they just shared a look and attacked simultaneously on their obvious first target, the wounded panther.

The other panther attacked them from behind at the same time and they could not complete their attack. They have been trapped between those two black panthers.

There was no other way but to fight till the death, they attacked again this time on the healthy panther, Logan’s dagger hit the panther this time and almost cut his throat, the other panther attacked again and made them distracted from their attack. Now both of the panthers were wounded, it was good news, after all, they seemed to have some chances now. 

Suddenly they heard a whooping sound and a big spear hit the other panther from nowhere and it dropped dead on the spot. Several men ran down from the top of the mountain. They shot another spear to kill the wounded panther, but he was lucky and could run away. Two of the men chased the panther and five more stood in front of Laura and Logan with their long spears.

They shouted something in another language unknown to Logan. There were some words familiar to him in their speech, but not he nor Laura could understand their sentences.

One of the men came fast toward Logan with his spear, Logan defended himself with his dagger and pushed the spear away. Other men attacked right after this and Laura joined the fight to help Logan.

The Long spear of those men gave them an advantage, but Logan’s powerful hits plus Laura’s fast hits of the sword made them a very hard hunt for those men.

They had long grey dresses with some sheets covering their head and parts of their face. Their clothes had made them scarier. They did not have swords and fought only with their long metal spears. Though it was a good weapon to hunt something or someone from far away distances, it was not the best weapon in terms of handling in a face to face combat.

At one point Logan could take one of their spears in his hand and pulled it as hard and fast as he could. The spear dropped out of the man’s hand behind Logan. Now they only had four armed men in front of them.

The danger of the other two men coming back from their hunt was in Laura’s mind. She checked their back from time to time.

They all were tired. There was no winner in this fight. Of course, they all knew that in the long run, eventually Laura and Logan will lose their energy sooner and had to think of a way to win the fight before that happens.

“Wait,” shouted Laura to Logan “I have an Idea,” “What?” said Logan, “Put down your weapon,” said Laura as she was going to put her sword down, “What?” shouted Logan “Don’t be crazy, they will kill us,” “No,” said Laura “They have no reason to do so, they are fighting because they are afraid of us,” “I won’t,” said Loga as he was fighting hard and poking Laura to do the same “They will kill us in an instance,” “They will kill us,” shouted Laura “If we continue to fight, please trust me on this.”