Chapter 12 Shiloh
SHILOH
Once I’d finished eating (another excellent meal prepared by Rivven), helping with the dishes, and getting ready for the day, I met him outside. While I’d been getting dressed and putting my hair in a braided bun, he was getting started on a few of his early chores.
“You’re not wearing a jacket?” I asked, taken aback by his shirtlessness. It was overcast today, and definitely cold. I slipped my comms tablet out to check the temp reading. It was currently negative twelve degrees Celsius.
“No. I do not even think I have one,” Rivven. “Will yours suffice?”
“It should be fine,” I said, glancing down at myself and my old winter coat. “It got pretty cold on Terratribe I as well. Though we never got snow like this in New Toronto.”
I was a bit more worried about how my boots would hold up than my jacket.
Tasha had also brought me a spare pair of gloves, as well as a fluffy pair of earmuffs that I was currently wearing now.
She’d said that we could order in new winter boots for me, or that they could be made on-world by one of the guys. But that obviously hadn’t happened yet.
Fortunately, paths had been shovelled all over the place, so there would be no trudging through hip-deep snow for me.
I had no doubt that Rivven would be able to forge a path through dense snow this high, with his height and the walloping muscles of his legs.
But I’d probably get stranded and freeze one step in.
As we left the main building from the side door that led to the outhouse, Rivven offered me his right arm. Just like he’d done that first morning on the stairs.
“In case it’s slippery,” he said.
I didn’t hesitate this time. And this time, I didn’t just place my hand on top.
I slipped my arm completely through his, so that we were linked.
“Thanks,” I said.
Now that I was closer, I could see why he didn’t seem to need a shirt. Heat positively poured off of the man, radiating towards me, penetrating my glove and sleeve. It took a lot of will power not to snuggle closer.
Apparently, I hadn’t possessed that will power last night. I certainly hadn’t meant to sleep beside him.
But then again, I didn’t seem to have tried very hard to avoid it, either.
As we walked along the narrow, shovelled path, the remaining snow made delightful, clumpy-crunch sounds beneath our booths.
Somehow, even the grey sky today felt bright and open compared to the one I’d left behind in New Toronto.
And I was grateful for some cloud cover.
I didn’t have sunglasses, and I wasn’t sure how I’d handle bright sun glancing off snow all morning right after getting over that migraine.
“I wonder if it will snow more,” I said, my eyes scanning the heavy clouds.
Rivven looked up, appearing to do the same.
“Perhaps,” he said cheerfully, as if looking forward to this prospect. Which made very little sense to me. Wouldn’t that mean a lot more work and shovelling for him to do?
Maybe he just appreciated the beauty of it.
The aesthetic appeal was something I could not deny.
The snow rolled and stretched into the distance like someone had unrolled a carpet of sugar-dusted marshmallow across the landscape.
We were behind the building now, and I could see the remnants of an old wooden shed of some sort, snow drifting up around its sides.
“That is where Warden Tenn sustained his injury,” Rivven said, gesturing at it with the long, blue line of his tail. “I have taken down most of the rest of the roof. But for safety’s sake, I would ask you do not enter the remains of the structure.”
“I promise,” I said. I wouldn’t even be able to get over to it right now, anyway. Unlike other structures on the property, this one had no path shovelled to it.
Tasha’s words returned to me then.
I’ll never forget the sight of Rivven, down on one knee in the mud, doing everything he could to get that beam off of the person I loved. Not ’til the day I die.
Being out here, actually seeing it with Rivven at my side, made me feel a little teary.
The shed looked entirely benign now, nothing but old wood half-propped up by the snow.
It made more words come back to me then.
Rivven’s. About how there was goodness and badness in everything, and it all hinged on the proportion between them.
The shed’s roof had collapsed. It had nearly killed someone.
But that someone had survived. And maybe the remaining walls of the shed could still do other things. Better things. Like give shelter to a small animal or insects.
The first intact building we visited wasn’t too far from the saloon. It was a little log cabin-looking thing. Like a tiny house unto itself.
“These are my eggbirds,” he told me, swinging open the door to what I could now see was a coop for domesticated birds.
Inside, six big, fluffy-looking creatures, puffed up with downy feathers in shades of white and blue, were perched or nestled down in various places.
“I’ve already collected the eggs, fed them, and replaced their water,” Rivven explained.
“Replaced their water? I’m surprised it wasn’t an ice puck!” This shelter was insulated from the wind, but didn’t seem to be heated at all.
Rivven pointed at a metal bowl of water in the corner. It was placed on top of a tiny box.
“That there has got a small heat coil,” he said. “It runs on a solar battery attached to the roof of the coop. I have something similar in the barn where I’ve got my shuldu and bracku. Keeps the water from freezing, and shuldu seem to drink more in the winter when the water’s warmer.”
“Hold on. Bracku?”
“Two females,” he clarified. “A mother and her calf. For milk.”
“Gotcha.”
“I can show you them next. If you want…?”
There was a kind of rise at the end of his sentence, turning it into a question. He looked down at me. White danced through his eyes before he blinked and looked away.
White means strong emotion.
Affection or arousal.
I swallowed, suddenly extremely aware of his proximity in the tiny coop. Of the hot bulk of his arm in mine.
“I’d like that.”
We exited the coop, and Rivven firmly closed the door behind us before taking me down another shovelled path to a larger building nearer to a stretch of trees. Many of the trees back here seemed to be coniferous, retaining their spiky sense of green even this deep in winter.
This building was the barn. It felt warmer than the coop had, and I had to imagine it was at least partly from the body heat of the gigantic animals inside.
There were three of them. Two were shorter and wider, with big, bovine faces.
The larger of the two had big, pink udders.
These were obviously the bracku. The smaller one, which had a coat the colour of good butter, gave a trilling sort of low at our entrance, which yanked a startled but genuine laugh from my throat.
It was pretty dang cute.
The other big creature in the barn had to be the shuldu. It had the general shape of an Old-Earth horse, but with curving horns and a stubby little tail that pointed straight up, like an arrow at the sky.
Rivven confirmed my thoughts.
“That is my shuldu. Her name is Foxitt,” he said.
Foxitt’s coat was a lovely, light reddish brown, as were her horns. The only part of her that was not this colour was her pointy tuft of a tail, which was a creamy white.
“And you ride her, then?” I asked. She was so big. It was a little intimidating. But at the same time, the prospect seemed an undeniably intriguing one. Fun, even.
“Yes. Of course. It’s the only way to get around.”
“Other than the slicer things.”
“Yes. But only the wardens have access to those. Would you…” He paused, turning his attention to Foxitt, patting her neck gently. “Would you like to ride her?”
“Alone?” I balked. I was definitely interested in the idea. But not that interested! I’d never even been around an animal this big, let alone been in charge of one.
“No! Not alone,” Rivven said, turning back to me at once. His eyes were bright white. He cleared his throat. “With me.”
“Oh. Right.”
Was there any real reason to refuse? I couldn’t think of one. I did want to try riding Foxitt. If I was going to be living permanently on this world, I should get used to the way of life here, including being on a shuldu.
“Alright, then. Let’s do it,” I said on a rush before I could change my mind.
His eyes seemed to get brighter, though that might have just been my imagination. Immediately, Rivven set about preparing Foxitt to venture outside. When the mount was ready, Rivven led her by the reins out of the barn doors.
“How should I, um…” I eyed Foxitt. She looked even taller outside somehow.
I didn’t have a clue how I’d get up there. Maybe I could climb up a snowbank and kind of…vault off of it.
But I should have known Rivven would have me covered. His left hand gripped my waist. His right forearm pushed against the backs of my thighs, buckling my knees as he hoisted me upwards.
“Oh!” I yelped as I was deposited onto Foxitt’s back with what seemed like barely any effort at all on Rivven’s part.
I grasped at the reins, panicking that I’d fall off, but Rivven was already hauling himself up behind me.
He reached around me with his hand on the left side and his tail on the other, gently taking the reins from me.
“Thanks,” I said, my heart hammering away in my chest. “For a second there, I thought I’d take a tumble!”
Rivven made a sound of displeasure, or maybe disbelief, low in his throat.
“You never need to worry about that,” he said quietly. “Not while I’m around.”
My pulse, which had just started to slow back to normalcy, spiked once more.
It had been years since someone had told me I could rely on them. Years since I’d had someone to support me, to keep me from falling.
And hadn’t Rivven already proven the truth of his words? Even the simple act of walking down the stairs that first morning had been made so much better with his solid arm beneath my hand.