16
Isabel squeaked, inhaling sharply with a hand pressed to her mouth in shock.
Her lashes flickered, eyes darting between Francesca and the arrow firmly lodged in the rabbit’s ribcage.
It hung lifeless from Francesca’s fingers, blood beginning to wick through its pale fur.
A queasy unease swarmed my stomach, nausea beginning to rise through my chest as I fought through the urge to throw up.
“A rabbit? I k-killed a rabbit?” Isabel asked through a sob, lashes still blinking as she fought to hold back tears.
“Yes, a rabbit. It’s dead, I’m sorry Isa,” Francesca said, stepping out of the shadows, still firmly holding the rabbit’s legs in her grip.
“Oh no. I didn’t mean to, I didn’t know it was there!”
Isa began spiraling, pacing and gripping the hair at her temples as she whispered beneath her breath.
In that moment, the little girl I knew, whose innocence made my entire world feel lighter, seemed to slip away.
I knew from this moment on, there would be a scar upon her soul, something she carried with regret, tarnishing her childhood memories.
“It’s okay, Isabel,” I soothed, rubbing her back with calming circles. Her breath hitched, shock and sadness rolling from her with each exhaled hiccup.
“It’s just a rabbit, Isa,” Francesca chided, eyebrows scrunched. “People shoot them all the time. They’re a pest.”
Isabel’s hands dropped, her mouth gaping for a moment before she swallowed and began pacing again.
“No, they’re so cute! I didn’t mean to; I’m never using this thing again.”
She kicked the bow, sending it beneath a pile of fallen gum leaves.
“Isabel, calm down,” Francesca said, approaching her, gripping her shoulders with familiar affection. “You just need to keep practicing, okay? Soon, your aim will improve and you’ll find your targets. Just keep trying. Don’t give up so easily.”
She knelt, retrieving the weapon from the leaf litter, dusting it off before offering it back to Isabel with a reassuring smile. Isabel took it with quivering fingers, looping it across her shoulder, swiping away stray tears as she sniffled.
“I’m done for today. I’m going to go home and bathe and have nightmares of that poor rabbit.”
She turned on her heel, head hanging with remorse as she returned to the path, disappearing between the trees. Sadness lingered in the air, the breeze seemingly haunted by what occurred.
“So dramatic, sweet fox,” Francesca whispered, beginning to collect stray arrows from the forest floor.
She had taken to referring to Isabel as little fox in the months prior, since she began shadowing us more than she ever had.
I liked the way she included her in our world, offering a token of sameness. Rabbit, Raven and Fox. Woodland friends. Kin.
“She’s so like you, and unlike you all at once,” Francesca said to me suddenly, her presence closer than I realised. It was comfort; her proximity, as my mind replayed the look on Isabel’s face.
“What does that mean?” I laughed, stepping closer
to her, longing for our skin to touch.
“It’s not bad, Rabbit. I just mean she’s sensitive as you are, but she’s also different. More … hopeful, I suppose. She holds onto that naivety that we lost too long ago.”
She said it as though we were fully grown, adults in our own right.
Yet we we’re only just within the throws of adulthood, freshly eighteen with many years of experience left.
She said it, as if she couldn’t see the darkness that swelled in Isabel’s eyes when she saw the slain rabbit, the regret.
The scar tissue that formed across her heart as it broke.
But I wanted this moment with Francesca – I wanted to agree, to marvel in her words, her wisdom. I wanted her to be pleased with me. To love me.
“I do envy that about her, the hopefulness. It would be nice to not fear the world.”
I agreed, biting my cheek as I eyed the collection of arrows now grasped in Francesca’s hand.
One of them dripping crimson, droplets sliding down the shaft, spreading across her knuckles like she herself was bleeding out.
She smiled at me, brushing her bloody thumb across my cheek, eyes alive beneath the whispering trees.
“There’s nothing to fear, Heather. Just so much to explore.”