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vines that formed
a vivid green net above him, the nocturnal wildlife was out in
force.
    Other dark, bulky monsters chased him through the dense
rainforest, herding him the west. As these snarling animals, big as
horses, tore their way after him, he ran – a young man frightened –
and though he was fit and healthy he knew the things were gaining
on him.
    Wiry muscles creaked beneath soaking clothes, as stiff as if
someone had coated his sinews with concrete. As he vaulted the
fallen trees and wove between clawing branches, the young man
gradually felt the burning in his throat return. It was as if he
had swallowed sun-roasted sand, and with this fierce burning came
the pop of his leg muscles, resigned once more.
    His pursuers were far enough away to grant him a moment’s
stop. His teeth and eyes were like torches compared to his dark
skin. His forehead poured with sweat, his ears had an insistent
pressure behind them, and even surrounded by all this dripping
green vegetation his tongue was thick and dry against the roof of
his mouth.
    Bats and bats.
A few hours previously, a spiralling fog of insects had drilled its
way through the trees, and Isaac wondered if the sky-rodents were
chasing food.
    The pursuers had been following him a long time. They’d
chased him even over the baked Sinh-ha plains to the east, but then
they had only been a few black shapes against the shifting disc of
the dawn sun. Now he dared not sleep, nor stop too long to rest,
because with the sounds of those fearful animals he could also hear
angry voices from time to time; angry at being forced to chase him
for this long, through the rainforest and then the plains, and back
again.
    He had been confused in the desert. He’d turned around almost
entirely, too tired to follow the sun properly, and limbs exhausted
from the constant abuse he gave them. It had been an entire week
since he had last heard his sweet Sarai’s voice, telling him
to not worry, Isaac, everything will be
fine . He had gotten up by the light of the
fire one night, pulled his satchel over his chest and left – he was
the reason, he’d realised, that they were being chased.
    Isaac spotted a tunnel in the thick foliage, a wet green
hideaway that he crawled through. Tiny insects buzzed around him.
Prickly, tufty caterpillars wandered across his knuckles as he
waited on all fours, listening as the voices of the hired forest
nomads surrounded him, then disappeared. He realised he was free,
for the time being. Pulling back a thorny veil of vines, he stepped
back out into the thick atmosphere of the rainforest.
    He sat for a
while, throat deathly dry. He could feel the cracks as they broke
their laborious way through the once-phlegmy membrane. Restless but
exhausted beyond words, Isaac attempted to settle in the leaves.
Water seeped into his tattered trousers, making him uncomfortable
as he rubbed his ankles.
    He didn’t see the creature drop silently behind him, clawed
feet leaving no impression on the wet plant-life. The talons were
around his neck in a second. He felt his feet part from the ground,
and he choked off a torrent of hot breath as a decidedly feline
countenance barked just an inch from his face. It drew back its
yellow lips to show teeth of iron; Isaac managed a scream as the
sanguilac twisted for his throat but caught his shoulder instead.
After a blissful numb second, he felt sudden ferocious pain down
his arm and up his spine, exploding in his skull.
    His feet
buckled as he was dropped and, landing on his knees, he felt cool
air on his neck once more.
    He heard rapid
footsteps, barely audible, running away from him, and the sound of
branches whipping as the sanguilac disappeared.
    Whilst rubbing his bruised throat, he gingerly touched his
savaged shoulder, mildly curious as to what frightened the
beast.
    Pain in his
neck, and then he knew.
    ~
    Awakening, Isaac stretched out with his hands, running his
palms over the hard surface he was lying on. A tiled floor.