Our walking on the rocky soil was getting harder and harder. Every time we were about to starve Emunah found something to eat, from worms to roots , small plants and even fruits. These occasional moments were sometimes very poor, so we were forced to stop from time to time and rest a little bit. We always found a nice spot far from the heat of the sun. During these precious moments I had time to think about the others I left in the camp and my old world that seemed so far away now in time and space. I wondered If Ashley was okay and I was hoping that John could take care of her. Other thoughts went to my aunt Martha and my old life I was used to. I was learning to survive without a thing and this made me smile a few times because I could have never guessed this was happening to me. If my friends could find out what I was experiencing, they would make fun of me.

"Ehi Romeo wake up, we need to go or we will never make it to the top" said Emunah suddenly. Her voice brought the reality back, I stood up from the fresh rock I was sit on and waved goodbye to the nice spot where we stopped. I couldn't understand where she was getting all her energies without sleeping in a soft bed and eating just occasionally. That girl was my age more or less but she was in some way older than me. The way she walked, she spoke and she looked was of a wise woman.

Even if she didn't want to open up, I was too curios and when we stopped again, I asked to tell me her story.

"I never wanted to talk about it" she replied "The only ones that know about it are Mara and Tov"

"I don't want to harm you but if I can, I want to help you" I said.

"How do you think to do that?" she said.

"By listening with an open heart and no judgment at all" I said with a smile.

"You see you can understand people a little bit after a while when you know their stories. I know we haven't spent much time together, but all I tried to show you in these days was that I am open to whatever you have to teach and all your ways"

"That's right" she replied. "I will tell you my story" She surrendered.

When the sun was already setting, we stopped on a rock with grass all around that reminded me the sea and my childhood with Martha who always took me on the beach.

"Let's begin" said Emunah suddenly "I was not born in this place, but people who suffered a lot showed me this way of living. My parents had some troubles and my mum, after she divorced, wanted to find another man so she sent me away from home. I grew up with plenty of people who were abandoned and at times less lucky than me. I started drugs and bad habits, I was weak, alone, scared and I had no directions. Once everything seemed lost and when the hope was gone, I met a man who definitely saved me. I was angry with the world that didn't give me a fair possibility and the life I wanted. That man showed me that I could turn all these feelings into something greater even than my life. He would have showed me a way to do that. He taught me everything he knew and he said that one day I would have done the same with someone else, because when you have the light of a sun and his fire inside you, you need to give it away and to share it with the world or you will get burned" Tears were coming out of her eyes and she stopped speaking.

"I know your friend was important but Koach sacrificed himself to save him and he's here no more" she added.

That moment I fell like a bolt of electricity coming through me and I connected what happened: she lost someone very important too and I didn't even realized. I understood that moment her wrath against me! It was not about me, it was about the ignorance of the world I came from. In that moment I simply went closer and hugged her tight. A few seconds after she hugged me back. "He told me that the only way to make the world a better place was by our own example" said Emunah through the tears.

"In his opinion the only way was to take all the people ready to change and the ones that are outsiders to the society as we know, to make them warriors. Disciplined and brave like soldiers to protect what is most sacred. The fire they have inside is stronger than anyone's and their motivation is the pain that they fell so they would be the most compassionate ones. Before dying he smiled and he told me that I would be better than him one day and I would finish what he started. Now I miss him and I don't know who I am no more. How could he possibly think I will make the difference?"

"Hush now" I replied gently "Of course you are making the difference. You took me, someone who should have never been here in the first place and taught me everything you knew. If we survived it's thanks to you. Training me was not like training someone who wished for knowledge. It is the opposite! I didn't want to be here and I want to go home. I don't belong here! In this time anyway thanks to you I discovered more and more and this experience may change my life. You have done a lot, for me at least" It was a moment charged of complicity and friendship, still lost in my thoughts something got my attention.

Ear to ear with my head on her shoulder, I could see behind her and there was something moving under the tree not so far from us. She felt I noticed something, so she took me for the shoulders and looked me in the eyes. I had no time to say what I saw because she screamed. She watched her leg and I could see two tiny red dots on her heel and some kind of animal running away through the grass. His body had two yellow zig zag lines on his back, that in the animal language means warning, I may be deadly.