Chapter 32 #3
He watched the tells he’d learned to read: the grinding at her jaw, the way she set more weight to the left, the tremor in her spine when the path turned uneven.
At the first switchback he lifted two fingers to the drummer—slow the cadence—and palmed off a heavy basket to Darion without making a show of lightening her load.
A flat stone slick with chaff tipped under her sole. His hand rose. He didn’t grab but offered the air between them. Her fingers brushed his knuckles, found balance, and kept going. Pride cut through his chest so clean it almost hurt.
When the wind kicked, he moved closer and let his shoulder take it. Halfway, he uncorked the waterskin and held it out. She could take it or leave it. She took one swallow, returned it, breath unsteady for a beat before it evened.
The last rise steepened. He kept the pace she set. She didn’t lean on him. She didn’t need to. And he was glad everyone watching could see who had made the climb.
JingYi—Lady Wulfbane.
At the top of the hill, a long feasting table stood.
It was not yet dark, but limyerite torches began to glow.
The ceremonial sack—stuffed to bursting with grains, fruits, and roots—sat atop a thick rope at the centre of the open circle, waiting for the game of tug-of-war to begin.
Cheers rose as the men formed their lines.
Laughter echoed across the golden field.
Watching from the sideline, she spoke softly, not turning to him, “Why do they fight over it? The sack, I mean.”
Alexander’s gaze didn’t leave the gathering lines of villagers.
“It’s called Virekhal Seldane—The Trial of the Split Sheaf.”
She glanced at him. “A trial?”
“Two teams pull on the same offering—harvested by all, divided by none. It doesn’t end until the sack tears and the contents spill. The belief is simple: if the earth sees the people strain for its harvests, it will repay their hunger with bounty.”
“And the sack’s tearing represents the blessing?”
“It does. If the sack doesn’t break, it’s taken as a warning.”
“Does that happen often?”
“Only once that I remember. The year after my mother died. The sack held.”
“And?”
He gave her a wry smile. “The winter nearly starved us.”
JingYi looked at him fully, eyes rounding.
“It’s supposed to be fun and games before a long winter. But my mother—” He stopped. The words dragged. “She believed in the old meaning. In what the gods give only after they watch us labour for it.”
“What do you believe?” she asked.
His jaw flexed. The laughter of the men filled the air. The game hadn’t yet begun, but the two teams already finished forming.
“I believe most rituals are less about the gods,” he said finally, “and more about what we’re willing to suffer to feel worthy of the blessings.”
JingYi didn’t reply, her eyes glued to the sack. The signal was given, and the men on both sides began to pull. The sack jerked, taut and trembling. They pulled again.
Shouts rang out—good-natured, thunderous.
The villagers urged both sides on. The rope creaked.
Alexander chuckled when one man slipped in the grass and got up again, chortling.
The tension built until the centre of the sack stretched to its limit, the woven fabric beginning to strain and fray.
It looked about to rip apart, and then they would all have their cheer, their ceremony, and feast.
That’s when he saw JingYi sway. He steadied her elbow.
“JingYi?”
She didn’t reply. Her shoulders remained square, chin held high, but her fingers curled tightly into her skirt.
The tremor was so slight it might’ve gone unnoticed, except he’d seen it before—in soldiers trying not to faint from blood loss, in his own hands after the letter arrived declaring his father’s execution.
“Are you well?” he asked.
She didn’t answer. Her glazed eyes were fixed on the field, on the men cheering as the tug-of-war reached its crescendo. Both teams strained, sweat dripping down their faces and necks. She didn’t blink as the villagers stomped their feet in a quickening rhythm, roaring their approval.
Her head tilted, just slightly, but her face had gone pale, eyes glassy and unfocused, staring at the bursting sack yet no longer watching the game. Her breath caught once, then again. And right when the fabric tore into shreds, her knees gave out.
He moved, catching her before she hit the ground.
“JingYi—!”
The world surged around him. Cheers broke into gasps. Heat bled through his sleeves. She shivered hard in his arms. Her scent blew open—honey and clean herbs turned hot with fever—a wild, moon-sick sweetness that caught in his throat. Alpha heads snapped up throughout the clearing.
His own spruce-and-iron scent flared, a hard shield he threw over her as he shouted for space and dropped his cloak across her shoulders. Still, it came in waves, unbound and tidal, dragging at his own pulse until he had to set his jaw against the urge to bare his teeth.
“Darion!” he barked, already pulling her closer. “Clear the path!”
His entire focus narrowed to the woman in his arms, crumpled and trembling, her head pressed to his chest, her fingers curled around the fabric of his sleeve.
He carried her down the hill—away from the altar, the table, the torn sack spilling bounty onto the ground.