As soon as Kamila's eyes met theirs, stark fear raced through her veins. She knew that she had made a mistake. She wasn't capable of saving the young woman. Instead, she had put herself in danger too along with her.
"Who are you?" One of the men asked in a gruff voice, taking a step closer.
"Where did she come from?" His companion asked looking around the forest.
Their appearance was shabby, to say the least. Although Kamila was not well versed in the fashions of the town, she was well aware of what poverty looked like in contrast to privilege.
The young woman had started whimpering like an injured animal, lying helplessly on the ground. Kamila looked at the dangerous men and imagined calling out to her father. She was sure she could get his attention.
But the question was did she want to? Was she ready to put her father's life in danger to save herself and a young woman that she had never met before?
Her eyes met that of the young woman in question and the fear there made her blanch in guilt. She knew she wouldn't call her father.
"Who are you and what are you doing here? If you know what's best for you, you would leave this instant," Kamila said, in a bid to make her voice firm.
"This is all very strange. I thought this was a secluded area," the taller, gruff one said.
"Please... Please, let us go. I promise I won't tell anyone. Just let us live," the young woman pleaded, now including Kamila in her party.
"Be quiet!" one of the men shouted taking a step towards her.
"Hey!" Kamila shouted. "Stay away from her. Let her go!"
Her voice had left that wobbling quality and she was shocked at the audacity of her tone. Her first time interacting with outsiders and she had talked this way.
The shorter man took a blade out of a sheath and Kamila's forehead started sweating. But instead of attacking Kamila, he turned around and plunged the knife into the young woman's heart. A spray of blood engulfed his whole face as he wiped it off and Kamila stood there, staring at the lifeless face of the young woman.
It was the first time that she felt wetness in her eyes along with a mixture of rage and debilitating fear. The men were stepping towards her now. She had failed the young woman. She had just stood there and let her die. The shorter one had just reached her. She would die too if she didn't move.
That was her cue to stumble on her feet and run away. Kamila knew that the direction she was running towards was far away from their cave. She was killing her every chance for survival. But she had no other choice.
She was a fast runner. She had to be. After all, living in the wild was no easy thing. Any wild animal with dangerous claws could kill you if you were not careful. But the creatures chasing her were something far worse. They had intelligence far beyond that of a wild beast. That was what made them the scariest. Kamila had no hope of fooling them. Kamila didn't have the thinking capacity at the moment.
Just before she could plunge herself into the lake, the beautiful lake of her home. The same lake in which she bathed every day. The one which was forever contaminated with this memory, something grabbed her hair.
She halted to a stop, almost ripping half her hair.
Her worst nightmares were realized. She turned around. The shorter man had hold of her. She struggled, kicking him in the groin but the man deflected, slapping her face, hard. She stumbled. But a wave of fierce anger swelled through her. Her memory took her to the scene of everyone being killed.
She slapped the man back.
There was a shocked silence. The man looked at her with wide eyes, his hand coming to rest on his cheek as if he couldn't believe what she had just done. Kamila couldn't believe it either. But she was going to die anyway. She was glad that she had done that before going down.
The expression on the men's faces changed to that of something sinister. Before this slap, Kamila had been nothing to them but an inconvenience. Their chase had been indifferent. But looking at their faces now, Kamila knew that she had called forth their wrath.
"You bitch!" The short man grabbed at her neck again and without much thought, threw her to the ground.
Kamila winced as her whole body vibrated at the contact with the ground. She looked at the men and knew that it was over. It was time to go. This was a shocking realization and at that moment her mind cleared. It started working again. On contact with the ground, she had felt something sharp digging into her hip bone. Her hands moved on their own to clutch at the wooden mass.
The makeshift weapon her father had made for hunting.
They had killed numerous animals, small and large for food with this weapon. It was good enough to use on human beings too.
But instead of trying to kill her, Kamila saw her tormenter's hand go to his pants and she looked away. There was a sound of a zipper. An intense repulsion moved through Kamila and an urge to vomit rose again.
It happened so fast. She thrust the weapon up as soon as the man fell on top of her. For a moment the man stared at her in shock before realization came. His eyes went to the wooden mass stuck in his chest. Blood sprayed out of his mouth and he tried to utter something. Kamila realized she couldn't breathe. She tried to struggle but now her hands were trapped between their bodies. The man had become a heavyweight. He didn't die immediately.
The gruesome sight made Kamila want to curl up like a baby. Why was it not ending? The blood continued to spray on Kamila's clothes.
Just before she fainted, her eyes went to the back of the other man who was immersed in looting the dead, not having realized what had just happened. It is all over, she thought as her eyes closed against her will.
Just a moment later, there was the sound of hooves. Kamila felt that she was in a dream state. Horses again in their little forest? Impossible! Maybe she had died and gone to heaven.
When the heavy weight lifted from her body, Kamila got the shock of her life. She opened her hazy eyes, ready to see the taller man and meet her death.
But her gaze came to rest with someone whom she had never seen before. She would have remembered him.
He looks like an angel, she thought, squinting at the handsome face of a stranger. His forehead was large, his eyes dark, cheekbones high. His tightly pulled black hair had escaped their prison so a strand rested on his forehead.
Her haze broke when the angel opened his voice and spoke.