Free Shadowline Drift: A Metaphysical Thriller by Alexes Razevich Page A

paused in the doorway.
    “I need to warn you, the Lalunta women here don’t regard you as entirely human. It’d be a good idea to stay out of their way.” She pressed her lips together a moment. “Especially Naheyo. She treated your wounds, but she grumbled about it. She doesn’t like you and won’t tell me why.”
    Jake wasn ’t surprised. Most cultures considered outsiders inferior. Usually he didn’t let it bother him. This time, something in Pilar’s voice and the memory of the cold-eyed girl with the machete made him shiver.

 
    Seven
     
    Outside, someone walked past the window of the room—a glimpse of form, dark hair. Moments later, Jake sat up on the green cot, his back straight, listening to the sound of harsh footsteps padding in the space beyond, coming toward him. He finger-combed his hair and smoothed his sprouting beard, hoping Pilar had returned, a spare battery found perhaps, a working phone in her hand.
    The heavy blanket that served as a door was pulled aside. The machete girl stood between the jambs—long black hair streaming past her shoulders, a blue-and-yellow-striped T-shirt over her skinny chest, a plaid skirt that skimmed her knees. Her bare feet were tucked into an old pair of silver tennis shoes with the tongues pulled out. Only her eyes moved as she looked him over, her gaze as cold and bland as a cat’s.
    “ Hello,” Jake said, thinking she probably didn’t speak English, but might know the greeting or guess the meaning from the tone. He tried to remember her name. Pilar had told him, but it hadn’t stuck.
    She stared at him a moment, then bolted forward as though hurled by an angry hand. Her arms were behind her back, a branch as thick as the grip on a child ’s baseball bat showing above her head. Jake flung up his own arms to protect himself. She stopped just shy of him, bent down, and put her face up next to his, their noses nearly touching. Her breath smelled of chicory and felt hot on his skin. His eyes fastened on the branch. His heart beat hard against his ribs.
    Slowly, keeping the same bent-over position, she backed halfway across the room. Her attention never wavered from his face, or his from hers. He dropped his arms down by degrees, ready to fling them up again. The girl’s lips parted and she hissed—as clear a warning as any animal might give. She straightened her back slowly, still regarding him as though he were some unknown creature she’d chanced upon in the forest.
    “ Naheyo,” she said.
    “ Naheyo,” he repeated, remembering now that it was the shaman’s name, and feeling pleased that his voice stayed steady. He touched his chest. “Jake.”
    “ Jake,” she said, and followed it with a string of angry-sounding words in her own language.
    “ Naheyo,” he said softly, trying to make peace. His gaze darted between her face and the club she still held behind her back. He held one hand out to her.
    Her eyes narrowed and s he sprang forward again. He squeezed against the wall, his injured ankle binding him to the cot like a goat fettered for slaughter. She skimmed his face with the fingers of her left hand, then jerked her hand away as though afraid of what contact with his skin might do to her.
    “ Lish gorum .” She threw the words at him as if they were stones, then turned and stalked toward the hanging blanket, trailing the stick in the dirt floor.
    Jake stared after her. Sweat poured down his sides.
    At the doorway she twisted and bolted toward him again, shrieking, furious, the club held in both hands over her head. Jake thought suddenly of a film he’d seen of Amazonian tribes on the hunt, killing a monkey with a single blow. He tensed, ready to grab the stick if he could, to protect his head if he couldn’t.
    She stopped, the club held poised in midair.
    “ Lish gorum ,” she said again. And lay the stick at his feet. They stared at each other for a long, breathless moment. She turned and strode from the room, her retreating steps as