Page 20 of A Soul to Touch

Damnit. I don’t have time for this.

She walked over to Mr Axe and dropped into a crouch in front of him.

“Oi, you.” She tapped him against the cheek a few times until he stirred.

His eyes flung open, albeit barely as one was bruised and nearly swollen shut. Mr Axe sat up, bewildered and likely concussed.

“You!” He looked around hastily while backing up on his arse. “Where are–”

“Go home,” she told him. “Go back to your family, or whatever. There’s something in the forest, and it spooked the piss out of your friend.”

“A Demon?” he squeaked.

“Not sure. Maybe it was just a bear, but you need to go back to the city before the sun finishes dropping.”

She rolled back onto her heels and stood as he got to his feet. His knees appeared wobbly, but he managed to get to a slouching position while holding his gut.

“Why would you wake me? We tried to rob you.”

Mayumi walked over to her belongings and began criss-crossing her satchels over her torso.

“Because it’s inhumane to leave you unconscious in the snow for either the frost to clutch you or for a Demon to eat you.”

Mayumi saw his axe on the ground close to where her bags had been. She picked it up and then offered the handle out to him, holding the blade.

He looked so unsure as he slowly reached to grab it. Mayumi was sure it was one of the few belongings he owned, and he probably used it to work for the little coin he could gain.

“Thank you?” he awkwardly asked when he took hold of it.

Mayumi nodded and stepped back. “Now, if I turn around and you try to attack me again, I’ll slice your throat open and use you as Demon bait tonight. I don’t give second chances easily.”

She couldn’t tell if his partially blackened, blood-stained face paled, but he stepped back from her.

They parted ways.

The entire way back to her home, Mayumi tried with all her might to listen for the Duskwalker that might be following her.

A decision had been made on her walk home, and Mayumi planned to enact it now. Her food had been put away, she’d gotten the fireplace going, and she’d washed the sweat from the day off her body – as well as the dried blood from her knuckles.

Night had fallen before she managed to get back to her cottage, and she exited her cottage now into darkness.

There was no hesitation as she crossed the porch, her boots loudly thumped against the steps as she walked into the clearing. In the middle of it, she knelt and sat back on her feet. She had to shuffle her body so her sword sat comfortably. Her bow could be unwieldy over her body as well because of its length.

Then she yanked her dagger out of her weapons belt and sliced at the back of her arm. It was a place she could still handle fighting with a wound.

It was mostly superficial and stopped bleeding relatively quickly, but considering the Duskwalker didn’t go rabid and feral when she’d beat Mr Axe to a pulp, splattering crimson liquid over her now tender, pink, and swollen knuckles, she didn’t think she had anything to worry about.

With her own blood dripping on the snow, Mayumi waited.

“You have two options,” she yelled into the cold night air. The wind had a terrible bite to it, and she stifled a shiver when it coursed down her spine. “You can come out, or you can wait until a Demon picks up my scent and comes for me instead.”

Her ears twitched when she thought she may have heard a snarling growl echo back, but it was so low that it was hard to truly distinguish.

Nothing emerged.

Fine.Mayumi gripped the handle of her dagger again and pressed the tip to her forearm.

She flinched when somethinglandeddirectly in front of her – she’d been expecting something to sprint at her from within the brush. The wrist holding the dagger was swallowed by an impossibly large hand thatyankedher until her knees unbent and barely touched the ground.

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