Chapter 12 Penny
Penny
Iwoke to the sun streaming through leafless trees. It painted everything in warm golden light as it burned away the lingering mist of night.
My face was cold, but my body felt warm, covered by a heavy wool cloak and pressed against something—someone—radiating heat. I wriggled as much as I dared, feeling the unmistakable curve of Kit's body along my back. One of his arms was thrown across me, and his legs were entwined with mine.
A smile pulled at my lips. I took hold of his dirt-crusted hand and tugged it over my chest, holding us both in place.
I couldn't see much but the sky over the sides of the cart, and I wondered where we'd stopped, but further inspection would require me to ruin this perfect moment, and I wasn't ready for that yet.
So, I laid still and counted rattling breaths.
It might have been prudent to stay at the mission.
Nora seemed kind, and I would have appreciated some treatment to relax the seized feeling in my lungs, but I couldn’t bear the thought of staying, or of Kit leaving me even for a short while.
I didn't have the words to explain what must have looked like a fit of madness.
And Kit wouldn't ask. He never demanded more than I was willing to give. I owed him gratitude for that, too.
After a while, the growling in my stomach could no longer be ignored, so I slipped free of Kit’s embrace and sat up. We were back at the old cemetery. I groaned at the thought of another day of digging, then cringed imagining what we would find at the bottom of the grave.
The muddy shovels were piled in the wagon on either side of us, along with the array of wooden crates that looked to have been rearranged.
Food was stashed in one of those; the big, square one, as I recalled.
I scooted across the floor of the cart and moved boxes to unbury the one I sought, then pried open the lid.
The contents had been jostled, probably in transport from the mission back to the graveyard, so I had to dig to find what I was looking for.
From amidst the hay, I fished out a ripe red apple, then burrowed deeper in search of the pouch of jerky I knew to be inside.
Toward the bottom of the crate, something foreign caught my eye.
Dirt-stained tan and smooth, I dragged my fingers across its domed, porous surface.
When I tipped it over, a pair of hollow eye sockets turned up toward me.
I jerked back, nearly crashing into the crates I had stacked aside.
A chill washed from my head down to my feet.
My mind raced as I surveyed the dozen similar boxes piled all around me.
Most had been at least partially empty before, but I imagined they were all full now.
Reeling, I looked over and found Kit reposed exactly how I'd left him.
He was even dirtier than the night before, smeared with dried mud up both arms and his clothes similarly stained.
He'd done it alone. He dug the grave and unearthed the body, then dismantled it and packed it away. Without help. Without a word. He'd said he wanted to spare me such things, but I wished he wouldn't.
A cough slipped out, and I cleared my sore throat, wincing at the pain.
The sole apple would do little to stave off my hunger, but I was unwilling to search the box for anything else. Sitting beside Kit, I polished the fruit’s waxy skin on the sleeve of my shirt. Between bites, I looked over at him, studying the slant of his nose and the curl of his long eyelashes.
There was something in his face I wanted to capture. Tossing the apple core into a stand of tall grass, I reached into my boot for my sketchbook.
It wasn't there.
I froze, thinking back to the last time I had it and all that had happened since then.
It could have fallen out at the mission, or off the side of the cart while we rode through the night.
Maybe it slipped out while we were digging.
I bounded out the back of the wagon and tromped through yellowing grass and past the score of headstones.
My heart pounded and my breath clouded in the air.
I coughed into my arm as I scanned the ground, searching for the freshly turned dirt and the grave Kit had emptied.
Standing over the mound, my stomach churned as I envisioned the small, leatherbound book left in the hole from when I passed out, now buried several feet down and lost to me.
“Kit?” I called as I returned to the cart and climbed inside.
He was sleeping still, and that gave me pause. He must have been exhausted.
I lowered myself onto hands and knees and crawled toward him, passing our slouched packs and stopping to dig into mine. I was a little worried I might find bones tucked away in it, but a thorough search revealed nothing but clothing and other essentials.
“Kit?” I tried again, creeping close enough to jostle his leg.
Another siege of coughs overtook me. I rocked back on my heels and hacked until I was robbed of air. The sky spun around me as I gasped at last, bleary eyed and blinking at Kit who was wide awake and on his knees before me.
His face was pale beneath the smears of dirt, and the peaceful expression he’d had in sleep had vanished. He looked as teary as I was, but I imagined for different reasons.
I gave a sheepish wave. “Have you seen my sketchbook?”
He frowned, then patted down the side of his pants and reached into the pocket there. When he pulled out the worn brown book, I sighed in relief.
“I meant to put it in your bag,” he muttered. “Must have forgotten.”
Grinning, I scrambled forward to snatch it and felt it over briefly before tucking it into my boot. With the moment of excitement behind me, I settled back, hugging my knees up to my chest and giving Kit room to sit back as well.
His worry lessened as he stretched his arms and glanced around, seeming to orient himself while I spoke.
“Thank you. For everything. I'm sorry I didn't say so last night.”
Shifting forward, Kit moved across the bed of the cart toward the crate with our food stores—and the skull. He pushed the lid aside and began rifling through the contents.
“You don't need to thank me for anything,” he said.
“You took me to get help,” I said, then felt immediately abashed as I added, “even though I didn't stay.”
Kit glanced over, his eyes warm in the bright light. “Bit of a wasted trip, huh?”
From the crate, he produced another apple and the pouch of jerky. My stomach growled audibly, and Kit chuckled. He offered the jerky for me to take while he bit into the apple.
We ate in silence, sitting across from each other in the crowded wagon.
Once he’d sated at least some of his hunger, Kit returned to our bags. He pulled out a folded shirt and pair of wool trousers, and I was reminded of the sorry state of his current outfit. It would look odd, not to mention suspicious, to travel through towns caked with dirt and mud stains.
With the fresh garments tucked under his arm, he bounded out the rear of the wagon and headed toward a nearby stand of trees.
“Be right back,” he called over his shoulder.
I settled in to wait and give him his privacy, then perked a few minutes later when he came tromping through the tall grass wearing fresh pants with his shirt open, chest bare, face damp likely from the creek I could faintly hear nearby, and the dirty clothes slung over his arm.
It was still a novel sight, and as much as I tried to feign disinterest by pretending to notice a sparrow swooping by, my attention returned to the contours of his torso.
His work in the smithy built muscles that always felt so strong when I pressed against him.
His arms were most defined, but even his abdomen was cut with a grid of lines I longed to smooth my hands across.
On either side of those, his hip bones arched up and down, past the waistband of his pants, like a path I would have eagerly followed.
I would have touched every part of him, explored him with my eyes, fingers, and mouth…
The cart bounced as Kit climbed up into it. He stood a moment longer, dropping his muddy clothes in a heap, then starting on the buttons on his shirt. With my pleasant view suddenly blanked from sight, I could focus on other things, namely Kit’s face as he smiled down at me.
“What were you thinking about?” he asked.
“Hmm?”
He retrieved his cloak and slung it around his shoulders, taking up the bag of jerky as well. He sat cross legged across from me and nibbled at a strip of dried venison. “You had a strange look.”
Warmth singed my cheeks, and I rubbed my hand over my face until the embarrassment subsided. “Nothing,” I said. “Nothing at all.”
Quiet descended again, and I mulled over the happenings at the mission.
I was clear-headed enough now to recall Kit’s conversation with the old Symbiarch and her lack of surprise about the brand on my chest. I wondered about the man she had mentioned, Delmer, and how Kit escaped the Bone Men in the first place.
He didn't talk about himself often, and in my panic, I might have missed a chance to learn more about him. But I may have had a reason to ask.
“You said you would explain about Nora. About how she knew you.”
Kit stopped, poised to take another bite. He swallowed. “I did. I think I should explain a lot of things.”
He gestured to the nearby graveyard. “I found this place when I was twelve. I hated the idea of digging up fresh graves—what few there were to be found—and no one’s been buried here in decades. So, whenever my father sent me to find a body, I’d come here.”
He didn't look sad, rather wistful as he continued.
“On one of my last trips, it had been raining heavily for days. I naively hoped it would make digging easier, but it was miserable work. I slipped and cut my palm with the blade of my shovel.” He set the jerky aside and held out his right hand, indicating the thin scar that ran diagonally from the base of his thumb to the space between his pinky and ring finger.
“There was blood everywhere, and I panicked.
“I’d seen the mission on my way to and from gathering bodies, but I’d never stopped there. I knew they’d have questions about the state of me, covered in mud and out alone, but I decided getting caught and arrested would be preferable to bleeding out where no one would ever find me.”
I scooted in closer, near enough that Kit pulled me to himself. He eased me down until I was lying across his lap with my head resting in the crook of his arm.
“Nora took me in, got me cleaned up, and stitched up my hand. When she asked what happened, I thought about lying, making up some story about foraging and falling down a riverbank, but for once my father wasn’t looming over me, and I wanted to tell the truth.”
His gaze fixed on a faraway nothing. “We talked for hours. About my father and the Bone Men, what they made me do, why I was there, and how I got hurt. She listened to all of it and never once made me feel like the monster I thought I was.
“When I was done, she told me I was welcome to stay at the mission as her ward until she found a place for me to go permanently. I refused, insisting that I couldn’t abandon my father, and that he’d inevitably find me anyway.
She promised that if I ever decided to leave, she would make sure I was looked after.
So, when I did finally run after my first Oath, I came back to her.
She found a place for me to stay far enough from Ashpoint that I didn’t feel like I needed to be constantly looking over my shoulder.
She gave me the chance to have whatever bit of a normal life I could manage. ”
It was a lot of information, and I processed it slowly. I liked hearing him talk, but the story he told was heavy. It seemed to take a lot out of him. He sat more slouched than he had before, and his expression was vacant.
I still had as many questions as he'd given me answers, but I could tell the conversation was over.
With a heaved breath, he leaned and reached as far as he was able without forcing me out of his lap. He dug into his pack and fished out the familiar dropper bottle of poison.
My throat tickled at the sight of it, as though it recognized the cause of my days of misery. I bristled.
Kit held up his empty hand. “Not for you,” he said. “I missed last night's dose.”
“Not for you either.” I wanted to make a grab for it. Smash the glass on the ground and get rid of it for good. “Nora said—”
He sighed. “She said you're sensitive to it. I'm managing. And I know what I'm doing.”
I watched as he squeezed a few drops of the greenish liquid onto his tongue, then grimaced through a swallow. He tucked the bottle into his sack without so much as a glance at me.
“We’ll take the longer way back.” He stood and hopped down onto the ground. “It means an extra day on the road, but less chance of being recognized or raising suspicion.”
I nodded mutely, my gaze lingering on where the hemlock vial had disappeared into Kit's pack.
After untying the horse and climbing onto the driver’s bench, Kit looked over his shoulder at me and patted the seat beside him.
I pretended not to notice.