Chapter 1: Whiskey and Waypoints
The air in the cantina’s backroom was a solid thing, a stew of sweat, cheap rum, and the coppery tang of blood that hadn’t been properly mopped from the floorboards. Jace’s knuckles were white around his glass of whiskey, his only anchor in this den of shifting shadows and quieter sins. The lantern overhead flickered, making the posters of forgotten, scantily clad women seem to writhe on the stained walls.
He was a rock in a dirty river, the noise and the press of bodies flowing around him. He was used to the clean silence of the jungle, the honest weight of a pack on his shoulders. This place, with its sticky floor and desperate laughter, made the skin on his neck prickle.
Then the river parted for her.
She slid into the booth beside him without a sound, the worn leather sighing under her weight. Her thigh pressed deliberately against his, a line of heat through his worn trousers. He didn’t look at her, just took another slow burn of whiskey.
“You look lost, hunter.”
Her voice was a low hum, something that vibrated in the marrow of his bones. He finally turned his head. Dark eyes, like pooled ink, held his. She had a face of sharp, elegant planes, skin the color of old honey, and a stillness that was utterly alien to the frantic energy of the room.
“Not lost,” Jace said, his voice rough from disuse. “Just drinking.”
A smile touched her lips, a fleeting, dangerous thing. She traced the rim of her own empty glass with a fingertip. “There’s drinking to forget, and there’s drinking to remember. Which is it for you?”
He didn’t answer. He watched her hand, mesmerized. She dipped that same finger into his whiskey, ignoring his slight frown. The amber liquid clung to her skin as she drew it back. Then, with an artist’s concentration, she painted a wet, crude line across the sun-browned skin of his forearm.
He flinched at the contact, cold and intimate.
“This is the river you crossed,” she murmured, her breath warm against his ear. Her finger moved again, drawing a jagged circle. “The mountains you think are keeping you safe.” Another line, cutting through the others. “But this… this is where you need to be.”
He looked from the map evaporating on his skin back to her face. “And why would I need to be there?”
“Because what you’re looking for isn’t out here.” Her gaze swept dismissively around the squalid room. “It’s in there. Past the old ruins, where the river forks into a waterfall that sounds like whispering. You’re hungry for something real. I can see it. It’s in the way you hold that glass, like it might be the last solid thing in the world.”
Jace felt a jolt, as if she’d laid a hand on a live wire inside him. She saw too much. This was why he preferred the company of trees. They didn’t look at you and strip you bare.
“Who are you?” he asked, the question sounding more defensive than he intended.
“Selene.” She leaned back, the spell momentarily broken. “And you’re Jace. The man who walked out of the deep green two weeks ago with a panther skin and a story in his eyes that no one here is smart enough to read.”
“A story about needing a drink.”
“A story about being empty,” she corrected softly. “The jungle filled you up for a while. Its challenges, its simplicity. But it’s not enough anymore, is it? You’ve started listening for voices in the wind.”
He wanted to deny it. To tell her she was crazy. But the truth was, he had heard things lately. Not words, but… a pull. A longing for a different kind of depth. He’d mistaken it for restlessness.
“This place you’ve drawn,” he said, nodding at his arm where the map was now just a shiny patch. “What’s there?”
“A different kind of test. One not of your body, but of your spirit. Of your… desires.” Her eyes glinted in the lamplight. “The city took your family, hunter. It made you hard. The wilderness honed that hardness into a blade. But a blade is a lonely thing. It needs a hand to wield it.”
“I wield myself just fine.”
“Do you?” She gestured to the half-drunk whiskey, the solitary booth. “This is fine?”
A large man stumbled against their table, sloshing liquor onto the wood. “Hey, sweetheart, you wasting your time with this quiet type? Come have a real drink.”
Jace’s eyes flicked up, a cold, flat stare that had made bigger men back down. The man paled slightly, muttering an apology before shuffling away.
Selene watched the exchange, her expression unreadable. “See? The blade. Always ready. But for what?”
She stood up in one fluid, silent motion. She placed a small, carved stone on the table between them. It was smooth and dark, with a single spiral etched into its surface.
“The river fork. The waterfall that whispers. Come at dawn if you want to remember what it feels like to be full. Don’t bring your knife. Don’t bring your past. Just bring the emptiness.” She looked down at him, and for a second, he saw not a seductress, but a guide staring into a deep chasm. “It’s the only thing you’ll need to trade.”
And then she was gone, melting back into the crowd, leaving behind the scent of night-blooming flowers and the impossible weight of her words.
Jace stared at the carved stone. He picked it up. It was warm from her hand. The noise of the cantina seemed to fade into a dull roar, a world away. He looked at his glass, then at the door.
He tossed a coin onto the table, the sound swallowed by the din. His chair scraped against the sticky floor as he stood. The blade was sheathed, for now. And for the first time in a long time, he had a direction other than away. He pocketed the stone and walked out, the map on his arm now dry, but seared into his memory.