"In Haven Below, even victory tasted like ash. The elders called it a hunt, but Eris knew better—every step outside the walls was a gamble with death."
Eris and Kaylah had passed the outer gate of Haven, leaving the last secured area behind them. Looking back from a distance, all that was visible was a crumbling perimeter fence and a few old houses rotting in the dust. It looked like an empty village, home to only a few desperate families trying to cling to the surface. To the rest of the waste, it looked like a hollow shell worth nothing to raiders.
Unless a traveler knew exactly what to look for, the gate to the underground warrens could never be found. The tunnel entrance of Haven was hidden by natural rock formations, concrete debris, and remnants of overturned vehicles piled high against the cliff face. They were the leftovers of a great flash flood, offering a natural camouflage. The rubble had become Haven's greatest disguise.
They climbed the rocky knoll just beyond the perimeter. Before them lay a clear view of the sparse forest—their daily hunting ground. Broken roads ran through the dead earth, and old cars lay half-swallowed by dust and thornbushes. Beyond the brush, the ruins of the old world waited in silence.
They had done this every single morning. Scan for movement. Hope for something better. Today felt exactly the same, but hope was a stubborn thing out here.
"Tracks look dry," Eris muttered, his breath visible in the crisp air. "Maybe today we'll find more than rabbits. Even frogs would be a welcome change in our daily meals."
He looked to the right side of the ridge.
"Red sky in the morning," he muttered, frowning at the dark, reddish sun. He could feel the heavy, humid wind blowing in from the east. "We're getting another downpour."
Beside him, Kaylah wasn't looking at the tracks in the dirt, nor the rising sun across the horizon. Her eyes had already drifted past the rusted wreckage. She was quiet, her mind far away, piecing together the stories the elders told around the campfires.
She pictured a house—not a shelter carved into stone or patched together from scavenged metal, but a real house like the elders described when the fires burned low. A place with walls that kept out the cold and windows that opened onto green fields instead of dead earth.
In her mind, a heavy wooden table stood piled with actual food, and a back room overflowed with tools and strange machines waiting to be taken apart and understood. There would be untouched tech to repair. And books. Not the brittle scraps and half-burned pages hidden away in Haven's archive, but entire shelves of them.
She wanted stories with happy endings. Stories that would make a child's eyes light up. It wasn't that the younger ones complained about the adventures they made up themselves, but another kind of magic would be welcome—something beyond the endless hunt for meat.
And Eris? In this dream, he was no longer mysterious or burdened by the silver light in his veins. He was a grown man, his face relaxed with a constant smile. The four of them would live together. Or maybe not—Leo and Myrah should have their own house by then, everyone finally free of the underground's damp, heavy walls.
"Stupid dream," she muttered with a small smile. "I'd risk everything if it meant seeing a place like that."
A firm nudge against her shoulder broke the spell. She blinked, startled out of the vision. "What?"
"I said it's going to rain today, Dreamer," he repeated softly. He didn't have room for those kinds of pictures. He wanted a better life, certainly. Everyone did. But whenever he tried to picture the future, all he saw was another day survived.
"Again?" Kaylah groaned, finally processing his words and pulling her collar tighter against the damp air.
"Yesterday's rain flooded half the snares," Eris replied, shaking his head. "We already emptied the ones that survived. Nothing will wander back into the flats this soon."
She sighed, her eyes drifting toward the scrapyard spreading out across the flats. Kaylah and the other scavengers had picked the near edges clean years ago, but rumors always persisted of untouched caches deeper within the metal maze. Nobody went past the far tree line, though. Far beyond it stood the ruined city. No one went there anymore. Wolf packs and other beasts had claimed the concrete streets.
The distant skyscrapers stood cold and unmoving against the gray sky. Kaylah kept her gaze locked onto the forbidden horizon as doubt crept back into her mind.
"You think Elder Rhys was telling the truth?" Kaylah asked.
"About what?"
"The hidden pass."
Eris snorted. "The one that leads to cities full of people?"
"Villages."
"Empires, according to him," Eris countered, though his gaze lingered on the forbidden skyline. "I've heard the stories. The Elder is old, Kaylah. He tells scary legends to frighten the children to keep them near the perimeter."
"Well, it's not only the Elder," she said, turning her head back toward him. "There is a rumor that the Ghost Walkers emerged bloodied from that side the first time they arrived in Haven. And Barik is one of them."
Eris said nothing. The name caught his attention. Ruvio had once told him to seek Barik whenever he needed help. If the old stories were true, Barik had crossed that wilderness once and come back alive. And there was Dara, too. The names carried a weight that legends didn't, and the old man's secrets felt heavy.
"They said ghosts followed them out of the trees," Kaylah added, her voice dropping to a whisper. "That's why they were called Ghost Walkers."
Suddenly, a noise cut through the drizzle.
It was a loud, distant crash, followed by the muffled, gasping sound of someone trying to stop a scream. The sound was thick and choked, echoing off the rocky ridge before vanishing into the wind.
Eris instantly notched an arrow, his eyes scanning the grey brush. "Who's there?" he called out.
Nothing but the patter of rain answered.
"Speak out!" Eris demanded, stepping slightly in front of Kaylah.
"Should we check it?" Kaylah breathed, her fingers locked around the bone handle of her knife.
Eris hesitated, his heart pounding. "Speak if you need help!" he called again.
Still, the wasteland remained silent.
"We're leaving…" Eris shouted one last time, watching the shadows.
Still nothing.
A low rumble of thunder rolled across the valley.
The sky had darkened while they stood there. Heavy clouds were gathering beyond the ruined skyline, turning the afternoon light a dark gray.
Eris lowered his bow. Whatever they had heard, it wasn't answering. And they had no food to bring home yet.
They couldn't eat rumors.
They couldn't hunt legends.
When no answer came, Eris lowered his bow a fraction. He turned to Kaylah, trying to lighten the sudden silence. "Maybe a ghost?" he murmured, offering a small, teasing wink.
Kaylah grinned, her eyes still scanning the brush. "If it's a ghost, it's a very heavy one," she said, her voice turning serious as she looked at the movement in the distance. "Probably a wolf. It's a forbidden zone for a reason, and no one is supposed to be out here with them roaming around."
A low rumble of thunder rolled across the valley, a reminder that they were standing in the open while the sky grew dark and heavy. Eris looked away from the distant ruins. They couldn't eat rumors, and they couldn't forage for legends.
Eris let his smile fade. "Then we'll try the northern ridge first. Maybe we can catch some frogs in the brooks near the old greenhouses if the rabbit traps have nothing."
"Myrah will just steal the frogs you find," Kaylah said, wiping the damp sweat from her brow.
"For dinner?"
She laughed, a rare, dry sound. "No. As a pet."
"Didn't she eat some frogs just the other night?" Eris tilted his head, a faint grin returning to his lips.
"She had no idea they were frogs. I skinned and cleaned them down at the stream before we even got back to the gates. Remember?"
Eris groaned as his boots squelched through the thick mud. "Please let us find rabbits today. Real meat. We have to come back early, Kaylah. There's a storm coming."
Kaylah followed his gaze. If the rain came early and they returned with nothing, they would end up joining the long line for the evening ration—hoping there was still enough thin soup left by the time their turn came.
Eris adjusted the bow on his shoulder, his eyes shifting away from the valley floor. "Let's try the ridge first."
"North?" Kaylah frowned, a puzzled look crossing her face. "The ridges are steeper up there. The frogs are down in the ravines."
"You're losing your nerve already, Scrap-Girl," Eris smirked. "You're forgetting Myrah. If she catches you bringing home frogs for dinner, she'll think you brought her a pet. She'll cry for days if she finds out we put them in the pot. We head north. We'll try our luck with rabbits and whatever wild greens we can find."
"What about the brook down there?" Kaylah asked, gesturing toward the muddy western slope. "At least frogs would be something other than water-soup."
"We'll double back down to the brook if we catch nothing on the high ridges," Eris countered.
Kaylah considered it for a moment, then nodded. "Fine by me," she said, adjusting her satchel. "My stock of medicinal herbs is almost gone anyway. The hardy stuff only grows near the northern rocks. I might find some roots up there."
"And while we're up there," Eris added, "keep an eye out for mushrooms. Elder Soren loves them. At least we'll have something to pay her back for watching Leo and Myrah while we're out."
Kaylah nodded, her expression softening. "Right. She gave us food when we had nothing."
As they began their walk, Eris didn't notice the faint, fresh disturbance in the dirt a hundred paces to their left—a single, heavy boot print that didn't belong to a wolf, a broken branch dripping with a smear of blood, and a broken spyglass
Together, they turned away from the croaking ravines of the west and climbed toward the steeper northern route. The terrain here was harsh, rocky, and heavily picked over.
Other hunters had snares permanently set in the area, and sometimes, desperate scavengers would steal right from them. A handful of old snares remained hidden beneath the grass and fallen branches. There was no telling whether they had already been emptied by someone passing through—or whether luck had finally favored them during the night.
It wasn't much of a plan. Then again, most days in Haven weren't.
Hunger sat dull in Eris's belly, but deeper down, a strong resolve filled his chest. It wasn't just about food today. He needed to master the silver river rushing beneath his skin—a quiet vow fueled by every cough and gaunt face waiting back in the dark.
Eris closed his eyes, drawing in a deep breath of freezing, humid air. He tried to remember every lesson Ruvio had ever given them, but the elder loved talking in riddles. Half the time, the old man's advice sounded like nonsense to Eris. Today, he would have to rely on what the waste itself could teach him. He had to experience it firsthand if he ever hoped to understand what the elder was trying to teach.
"Quiet the blood, boy," Elder Ruvio's voice echoed in his memory, dry as a grinding stone. "The waste speaks in a whisper. If your own heart is pounding loudly, you're already deaf."
Eris forced his shoulders to drop, trying to anchor himself against the mud. He reached inward, grasping at the strange tremor vibrating through his veins. It was a power that reached for something older, something not entirely human. Ruvio called it the song of buried waters—a living fragment of the ruin that had somehow settled inside his marrow.
"Eris?" Kaylah's whisper cut through the drizzle, sharp with anxiety. "What are you doing? We need to move."
"Just... give me a second," he muttered, his jaw tightly clenched.
"You listen," the old man had always murmured, his eyes heavy with secrets, "but you must also learn to ask. The river holds more than just currents, Eris. It holds memory. And it holds answers."
Eris had never fully understood what the riddle meant. How exactly did someone ask a river? But right now, with a storm coming, he had to try. He focused entirely on the silver hum in his wrist, pushing the energy outward and letting his senses stretch into the dead brush.
For a second, the silver in his veins finally reacted. His vision blurred with a sudden flash of light, and his heart rate spiked. The power didn't want to bend to his will; it wanted to break him.
"Eris, your hand," Kaylah breathed, reaching out but hesitating to touch him.
He looked down. His fingers were trembling fiercely, his skin pale against the mud, and the veins in his wrist were faintly glowing with a metallic hue. Swallowing hard, he wrestled the chaotic energy back down into his chest until the glow faded. He was sweating despite the freezing air.
"I'm fine," he muttered, though his teeth chattered from the strain.
But the push had worked. His heightened senses caught a sudden break in the valley's silence. It wasn't the faint hiss of air through broken window glass, or the scrape of claws on stone. It was a tiny vibration. A flicker of real movement.
There was a faint splash of water, followed by a quick rustling beneath the rusted frame of a half-buried car up the northern slope. Eris dropped to one knee, his gaze focusing as he traced the newly disturbed soil.
"Did you see it?" Kaylah asked, her hand instantly dropping toward her wire net.
"Small prints," Eris whispered, the lingering hum of the silver guiding his eyes directly to the track. "A hare. Maybe a pair of them."
A rare smile touched the corner of his mouth. Maybe today the wasteland would show them a little mercy.
He slipped an arrow from his quiver and drew the string back in one smooth, practiced motion.
The trembling in his hand eased.
The silver settled into a quiet, steady hum.
For a fleeting moment, the wasteland didn't feel empty.
Eris released his breath, his finger anchoring against the bowstring, completely unaware of the shadow watching them from the rusted cranes above.
***