And then, when she awoke, she really was alone.

****

This time there was no sword left beside her to assure her he would be back. There was no signs, no message, not a sound apart from the life around her waking up.

Scared awake by the solitude she was on her feet immediately, and started searching for any tracks he might have left.

"If you were him, where would you go?" she asked herself and before she could even finish the sentence her eyes were drawn to the dark, green swampforest only a few steps away.

Searching thoroughly through the grass she found what she was looking for, a damp curve in the ground, and then another. Not really footprints, but the prints of someone who walked with the purpose of not leaving any.

She did not even need time to think, but picked up her things and sat off into the dark green shadows under tall trees. Their trunks was incredibly tall and thick, the great roots keeping them up made little caverns over the swamp and supplied them with all the nutrition there were in the mud and slimy water.

Careful not to come to close to the murky ponds Cassandra made her way over moss and mud while desperately hoping the track she was following really was his. Her entire body cold with fear she shouted his name out between the trees, hearing the frantic tone of her voice and knowing he probably was miles away.

She walked until she could no longer see the light brown patch behind her that was the marsh. Then she was filled with uncertainty when thinking that he might just had gone away to scout or hunt, but looking back she saw her feet had left marks where she had walked.

"He can track me," she almost sobbed.

The sound of her voice was no comfort because it did not drown out the listening silence of the swamp, or fill the void she felt beside her. The further she had come into the forest, the more silent it became. It also became more and more difficult to move around because of the ponds. More than once she had to find a different route around them and was afraid that she would loose the precious tracks.

One time she could not find back to them after working her way around several dirty pools of deepbrown water, and almost cried in desperation. Turning towards the tall trunks ahead she shouted his name twice just in case he would be near. Uncertain and scared she stumbled on. Then her path was blocked once more. The water in front of her was more like a river than anything else, looking up and down as far as she could see, Cassandra could not discover any way to get across.

Suddenly her eyes fell on something that made her heart jump. At the muddy bank there was a single footprint, a vague mark of a troll's foot. But where he had gone was impossible to read, and Cassandra's eyes darted across the water again, in case she had missed something. A little way out into the river there was a root that went under and then up again. If she climbed out on it she might manage to jump to the other side.

Certain that Jah'ren had gone that way she hurried over and started making her way out on the broad root until it disappeared into the water. It was almost two meters out to where it came back up again, but Cassandra did not stop to think and leapt with all her strength. Seconds later she crawled safely up on the wood and sighed with relief. She was soaked from the waist down, but still intact and a little closer to her goal.

As she stood up, shakily because of the way the wood swayed beneath her weight, a ripple went through the water some meters away. Cassandra had no intentions of staying to find out what had caused it, and hurried out to the tip of the root, trying to figure how far towards the bank she would be able to jump, and realizing there would still be some meters of water when she landed.

"Jump!" she told herself, and jumped.

She splashed into the water, went under and found muddy ground beneath her feet. Scared and out of breath she broke the surface and looked into a pair of yellow, reptilian eyes.

The beast had not anticipated its prey to suddenly come up of the water and was taken by surprise. Cassandra had the moment she needed to draw her weapon and stabbed after the thing's one eye, hitting her target.

While the creature twisted in pain, she threw her body towards the bank and barely managed to crawl up on it when something grabbed her leg. Looking down she was surprised to see a strange plantlike tentacle wrap tightly around her ankle. A sudden pull dragged her back into the water so she went under. She hacked desperately at the thing with her dagger until it let go and she could get up again. Gasping for air as she surfaced she could only think one thing:

Where are you when I need you to save me?

The infuriated reptilian was right beside her, but with its eye filled with blood it was just trashing wildly around until it got a glimpse of the human who had wounded it, struggling through the water, now heavy with mud.

Cassandra let out a scream of fright and anger as another tentacle got hold of her and stopped her advance towards the bank. She hit the reptilian over its nose with the dagger, and screamed again, this time in rage and pain, as the tentacle almost dislocated her ankle.

Then she heard him. At first she though it was a trick of her hazy brain. But then, as she was pulled under again, she could see a flash of blue dropping out of one of the trees on the bank.

She swallowed a lot of water and kicked furiously at the thing holding her, before it unexpectedly gave in. Something grabbed her hair and dragged her up, before she was thrown onto solid ground.

Blinking through mud and dirt she saw Jah'ren standing on his knees in the river, murky water dripping from him, his swords drawn. Cassandra opened her mouth to warn about the reptilian when another tentacle shot out of the mud, got him around the neck and pulled the large troll backwards into the river again.

Laying exhausted on the bank, Cassandra flung herself forward to grab him, but he disappeared under before she even had a chance of reaching him. Her eyes desperately scanned the surface, but the only thing she could see was ripples and waves from where he had been pulled under.

Jah'ren's bow lay under the tree he had jumped from, the quiver some feet away. Cassandra struggled to her feet and managed just barely to pull the string back with an arrow on it. Looking for a target she pointed the arrow at the splashing water, but it was rather pointless and she knew it. Her gunpowder was wet and the bow so heavy it would have been almost impossible to fire it even if she had a target.

Through mud and tears she saw the flash of a sword briefly coming out of the water and then plunging down again. A moment later the thrashing in the river stopped and the surface calmed for a second before Jah'ren emerged, gasping for air, his entire body coloured brown and red from the mud and blood.

Cassandra let his bow fall and stumbled down to the bank to help. As she reached him he tossed one sword on the ground and the now free hand shot up and hit her over the face hard enough to make her head ring. She staggered sideways and fought to regain her balance, sobbing, but not because it hurt. When the ringing of blood subsided and she once again could stand straight, she turned to the troll. He had gone down on his knees leaning heavily on the remaining sword which he had jammed, blade first, into the dirt.

One look on his face told Cassandra that this was not the time to complain about being slapped. His eyes were burning angrily with a strange fire she had never seen before, but it advised her to keep her distance if she did not want another blow.

Shaking, he got to his feet and waded out into the water again. Then he grabbed the reptilian by its tail and pulled it up onto the muddy ground. Cassandra watched anxiously while he punctured the creature's throat before filling his hands with the blood. She had to turn her head away as he drank it, feeling the nausea turn her stomach.

After some minutes he was strong enough again to stand and picked up his weapons before grabbing Cassandra by the arm and towing her over to the tree.

"Blood call beast, we go, hurry." His voice was cold and angry, making her whimper in fear.

"I'm sorry," she said, trying for forgiveness.

He did not answer, but started climbing, helping her past the difficult areas without a word. They made their way over to the next tree along a thick branch, and moved through the forest high above the swamp. It dawned on Cassandra that he had not gone across the river the way she had attempted, but had started using the paths that went through the treetops, along branches and around trunks. Even exhausted he moved amazingly quick and nimble. Cassandra dared not say a word, but she noticed that there were bloody marks where he came close to the trees or touched them.

As dusk fell outside the trees it became dark as midnight beneath them. Cassandra was starting to have trouble seeing where she was going, and she could guess from the sound of stumbling feet ahead she was not the only one.

She was just about to suggest that they rested when she almost walked into the troll where he had stopped by the trunk of one especially broad tree. Some branches came together and had grown into each other so that they almost made a nest in the crown of the tree.

She helped Jah'ren to sit down, being very careful to touch him in case he was much injured.

"Now you have saved my life twice," she whispered. "If you're not careful I'll start to depend on you…"

"Jah'ren protect," he said, and she could hear the exhaustion in his voice.

"But you left." She tried not to sound like she was blaming him. "Why did you come back?"

"Kass call for Jah'ren. Jah'ren come."

She did not know what to say, but found his hand in the darkness, holding it between her own.

"You did not have to. I was nasty last night, blaming you for things you had not done. I understand why you left, it was my own fault."

"Jah'ren leave. Make Kass not happy. Troll not good for human. No good."

"But you still came back for me."

The darkness went silent. Cassandra continued holding the big hand between her, feeling a weak trembling.

"For long Jah'ren no tribe. Alone. No tribe, only Kassandra."

There were no words she could say after that. She did not even comment on the fact that he had forgotten to pronounce her name wrong. His words scared her more than she could ever tell him, and it made her feel warm and safe and cling to him. He snuck an arm around her shoulders, holding her close. They both fell asleep quickly, tired, wet and cold, borrowing each others warmth and safety.

****

As they made their way through the wild lands, Cassandra finally accepted the troll's superiority in skills, and instead of being annoyed she started asking questions, listening and learning. In return she gave Jah'ren small lections in language, and although his grammar still was horrible, his vocabulary grew every single day.

Walking on groundlevel he would point out tracks or plants, asking her to follow the tracks, or to recite the uses of growths. Since they had no idea about the names of either animals or the plants, a lot of very strange names were invented to their mutual enjoyment and much laughter.

At night, seeking sanctuary in treetops, Cassandra would find little flaws in his speech, try to explain why it was wrong and usually ending up in an endless discussion about why verbs were important when Jah'ren felt things and names were the only words that he needed to know.

One day Jah'ren finally convinced Cassandra to change her old and rusty gun for a light bow he had made for her while the rain pummelled down outside their little cave under some big roots. The next day she got practice shooting when they met a monster. When her first arrow missed, the creature charged, and Jah'ren, shouting encouragements for her to shoot, killed it off just before it was upon them when her second arrow missed.

"Sorry," Cassandra had mumbled, disappointed about herself.

"More practice!" he had laughed as he pulled his massive arrows out of the beast.

They only travelled in daylight, not even Jah'ren wanting to risk being in the open at night. He silently explained, one particularly scary evening, why the wild lands had such a bad reputation.

They had found shelter in a tall tree, as was often the case, and since he was the only one feeling at home sleeping on a branch twenty meters of the ground she sat in his lap, listening to the frightening noises outside of the leaves. She had gotten used to sleep like that, although the first nights had been hard on her, not knowing what scared her most; the height, the enormous shadows and moaning in the darkness, or the fact that her life depended on the long, muscular arms wrapped tightly around her.

That particular night there had been more shadows than usual, then screams; not humanoid, not animal. Cassandra listened, shivering in the warmness of her blanket, feeling the screams right into the marrow of her bones.

"Cursed land," Jah'ren had sighed.

Then he told her a tale of unknown horrors in the night, things no eye could see, no ear could hear, except from the huge, diffuse shadows and the tortured screams. They only came out at night, but then they killed everything in their path, something that made Cassandra sleep very badly, wondering how safe they really were in the tree.

When they needed a fire to roast the strangetasting meat from whatever creature had an unexpected meeting with Jah'ren's arrows, they had to make camp on the ground. Luckily the small cavities beneath treeroots made excellent campsites, and many a tree found their roots blackened by smoke after the nightly guests left.

One night they had camped under a tree to prepare the evening meal consisting of roasted swampcrocolisk with the remains of Cassandra's herbs as seasoning. As the small fire burned out, the thick darkness again closed around them and made Cassandra think of the things that moved somewhere out there, invisible and screaming.

Around midnight she was woken by a sound outside the tree. Scouting out in the dark she grabbed her bow and an arrow. The sound was unlike the now familiar sounds of the swamp at night, but it put her in mind of a large dog sniffing the ground.

Then it was right before her. In the dark she could see a movement where they had entered the small cave, and without a sound she reached back to wake the troll. When her fingers finally reached him he was already awake, touching her hand to let her know. Cassandra drew the bowstring tight, shaking a little by the adrenaline going through her body.

Suddenly something charged the tree, making it shake. Cassandra let out a frightened squeak as a big head, mouth gaping, rammed into the hole. Her arrow hit the creature in the tongue, resulting in it growing even angrier. She could hear the sound of a sword being drawn behind her, but it was immediately muted by a scream and then the creature was dragged backwards away from the tree. Its deathhowls went on for a few seconds, and then everything was quiet.

Stiff from terror Cassandra tried to back away from the opening, the bow dropping to the ground from numb hands. She almost cried out when she hit something, but remembering what the warm softness was she turned and grasped for whatever she could find to cling to.

Jah'ren pulled her to him without a sound.

None of them slept the rest of that night, and by morning the troll silently declared that it could be an idea to get out of the forest soon, if not for anything else then just for the sake of a good night's sleep.

***

I'm being efficient. Go read chapter 5!