Chapter 7 Morco #2
“Maybe our luck is finally about to change.”
I hadn’t felt any kind of life in my heart for a long time, but now I felt something.
Hope.
We returned to the Gathering and dropped our packs on the table, the root vegetables rolling out everywhere. The muscles in my back and shoulders finally relaxed once the weight had been removed. My forearms ached too.
“What’s this?” Caius grabbed the new vegetable Hanne had found.
“A beet,” Hanne said. “Remove the skin and boil it, and it’ll turn soft. It’s not as filling as a potato but has its own hardiness.”
“How long do they last?” Liam asked.
“The beets, for a month,” she said. “The potatoes, a couple weeks. The carrots probably for a month.”
Caius couldn’t hide his surprise. “So, we can store them until we’re ready to use them?”
“Yes,” she answered.
He looked at me, a grin on his face. “Can you believe this? We don’t have to rely on the next hunt. Or split a fish twenty-five ways. Eat a stew with chunks of fish, water, and rosemary. We actually have food.”
“And we can grow it too,” Hanne said. “That way, no one has to leave.”
“And you said there’s more?” Liam asked her.
“I imagine there are mushrooms here,” she said. “But I haven’t come across them yet. Honestly, they aren’t as filling as these, so we can do without.”
The ache in my muscles faded, but the burn in my forearms remained, like I’d somehow pulled a muscle I hadn’t even used. But I kept my focus on the conversation and tried to appreciate their excitement. No one had been excited in a very long time.
“The timing couldn’t be better,” Caius said.
“The babies will be here any day. The mothers need the sustenance.” He glanced at Hanne, looking at her like someone who had been in the tribe forever, had moved with us every time the apricum had changed, had survived the bleakness of the dark. “You saved us.”
Her eyes immediately shifted away like she wasn’t prepared to accept such gratitude. It seemed like she wanted no recognition at all. When her eyes lifted again, they flicked to me for just a second before they looked at Caius again. “You saved me first.”
I watched the pot over the fire begin to boil, the air bubbles dancing on the bottom before they exploded to the surface.
When steam skated over the surface and a froth developed, I wrapped my hand in a cloth and grabbed the pot by the handle.
I extended my forearm, the bandage gone, exposing the bite that had reddened and moistened with pus.
I sucked in a breath and held it before I tipped the pot, pouring the boiling water directly into the cut.
I released a groan I couldn’t contain then set the pot aside before I applied pressure with a clean cloth, hoping the scalding water would be enough. I continued to grip my arm as I waited for the burn to fade, remaining calm as the pain slowly began to drift away.
My concentration was shattered by the knock on my door.
I sighed in annoyance, company unwelcome right now. I tossed the linen aside and pulled down my sleeve before I opened the door.
My annoyance deepened because it was the company I wanted the least—Allegra. “What?” I barked. It was the worst person at the worst time. Our final conversation had been pretty conclusive, so her only purpose now was to dig into old scars.
Her anger rose to meet mine. “You act like I never meant anything to you.”
“You don’t mean anything to me now.”
Her anger should have intensified, but it actually subsided. “I did nothing to deserve this ire.”
“I know you talked to Hanne.”
She flinched outside the door, the bonfire far in the distance on the other side of the cabins.
“I don’t know what you said because she refused to rat you out.” Hanne had lied straight to my face when I’d asked her what Allegra had spoken to her about. I was annoyed with the deceit, but I also respected her for refusing to be a snitch. “Be grateful for that.”
Her face hardened in an attempt to hide her emotions, to act like that meant nothing to her, when it definitely affected her in some way.
Allegra was usually superficial in her emotions, always wearing them right on her sleeve, but now she shuttered her expression.
“The second someone new shows up, you turn your head? That’s all it takes? ”
This conversation would happen whether I liked it or not, and I’d rather it not take place for everyone to hear. I stepped away from the door and moved deeper into the cabin so she would follow me.
She came in and shut the door behind her before she faced me, that same hardness masking the emotion underneath.
My patience had shattered a while ago, but I forced an attempt at calm. Not just in consideration of her feelings, but because I was the chief and was held to a higher standard. “What did I promise you, Allegra? Because I don’t recall making any.”
“We were together—”
“We were fucking. The sex was good, so the fucking continued. That’s it.”
Her eyes started to water. “If we had more time…”
“My feelings wouldn’t have changed, Allegra. If Hanne had never joined us, this would still be over. My feelings for you have never been deeper than the flesh.”
She quickly turned her head like that would hide the wound I’d just left.
“Don’t blame her for something she didn’t do.”
She took a breath. Then another. Her lips pressed tightly together in a thin line to lock her emotion away. “I see the way you look at her.” She refused to look at me, focusing on the stones of the fireplace.
“We’ll never be hungry again because of her, Allegra.”
“That has nothing to do with it, and you know it.” Her anger seemed to give her the confidence to look at me again. “You’re going to stand there and pretend it isn’t true? A woman always knows when her man is thinking of someone else.”
I held her stare and searched for the right response. “What do you want from me, Allegra?”
“I want to know why.”
“I don’t love you.”
“No. I want to know why her.”
“We aren’t together.”
“But I know you want her.”
“Fuck, Allegra.” The last piece of rope slipped from my hand, and now I was untethered. “What difference does it make? If I tell you I desire her body and her mind, would that make you feel better? Would that make this personal intrusion stop?”
Her breathing had quickened, and her eyes began to water.
She’d put the dagger in my hand and forced it into her own heart, but I still felt responsible for the wound.
She was too proud to cry in front of me, so she blinked a couple times to combat the swell of tears. “If you have to fight a woman for a man, he’s not worth fighting for.” Her eyes were elsewhere as she spoke, as if recalling the phrase from the past.
“There’s truth in those words.”
She looked at me again, this time with pained defeat. It seemed like she might say something more, but instead, she turned around and left my cabin—hopefully for the last time.
I walked past the Gathering to the tilled earth that would be used for the garden.
Hanne was on her knees in the dirt, while Caius and Liam continued to dig the trenches in the soil with their wooden shovels.
They seemed to work in comfortable silence, ready to plant the additional seeds that Hanne was able to harvest from a portion of the root vegetables we’d excavated from the forest.
She dug a small hole in the dirt with her shovel, dropped a couple seeds inside, and then compacted the dirt with the back of the shovel. Her hands were caked in earth, and she had some on her cheek, as if she’d wiped the sweat from her forehead with her forearm and smudged the dirt along the way.
I stood there and watched, waiting for her to finish before I interrupted her.
When she needed to stretch her legs, she stood, placed her hands on her hips, and watched the guys work. It took a moment for her to notice me, and when she did, she had this recognition in her eyes, excitement and fear mixed together.
Whenever I looked at her eyes, my stare was locked in place, more absorbed in their color with every glance.
Time seemed to stand still whenever I was in her presence.
I considered her one of us, but I also continued to view her as a star that fell from the sky.
I’d turned my back on her and fled, and if I’d succeeded, I would have doomed my people.
Good thing she was too smart to get left behind.
Her eyes lacked confidence, but they were packed with grit.
She didn’t look away, didn’t wane in her stare by her sheer force of will.
It was a different kind of strength. Ever since she’d slept on my shoulder, she’d been distant, almost ashamed, when she had no reason to be. “We were just planting the seeds.”
An explanation I didn’t need. “Come on.” I nodded toward one of the tables so she would follow me.
Caius and Liam both took a break from their work to look at us, but they turned back to the dirt when we walked away.
I sat on one side of the table, a thin slice of tree bark in the center between us, along with a dagger.
She sat across from me and looked at the items, as if she couldn’t make sense of them. She lifted her eyes to mine in search of an explanation.
“The bow and arrow. Can you draw them for me?”
“You don’t have a quill and ink?”
I didn’t know what a quill was. “We used to use ink and parchment, but we’ve lost those luxuries through our many journeys.”
“Oh.” She reached for the dagger and held it by the hilt before she started to carve the soft wood, first making a curve and then another straight line.
“This is the wood, something stiff but also flexible. And this is the string, something that stretches and snaps back. We used to use horsehair woven with other fibers. I’m not sure what you have down here, but I’m sure there’s something. ”
I examined her drawing and tried to understand it. “Then what?”