Chapter 13
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The afternoon dragged on for Lara. She was accustomed to toiling from dawn to dusk on most days; this idleness was torture.
She took another hot shower, scrubbing her hair, body, and teeth.
Then, despite Ronin having told her not to be wasteful, she stood under the falling water for at least fifteen minutes, letting it melt away her aches.
How would she ever be able to return to quick washes with frigid water from the pump again?
After stepping out of the tub and drying off, she dressed in her own clothes. Their smell reminded her of her old life, which was familiar even if it hadn’t been good. And that familiarity grounded her. She didn’t know if she’d ever feel like she belonged in Ronin’s world.
Returning to her room, she placed Ronin’s shirt in the dresser’s top drawer, wondering if he’d been joking about people filling these things with clothing. Why would someone need so many clothes?
Lara explored the other upstairs rooms. They were similar to hers, with beds and dressers but no decorations.
The room closest to hers had pale blue walls instead of the white in rest of the house.
It was the little differences, like the way her bedding was crumpled and the trinkets atop the dresser, that made her bedroom feel inviting.
Everything else felt too bare, too untouched, too… cold.
She stopped in the doorway of Ronin’s room and stared inside, oddly hesitant to enter.
If he didn’t want you to go in, he would’ve closed the door.
Besides, he was a bot, so it wasn’t like he cared about privacy, right?
Lara crossed the threshold and swept her gaze around the room. His bed was perfectly made, with squared corners and not so much as a wrinkle in sight.
That made sense. Ronin didn’t sleep.
But did he ever sit or lie down on the bed? He’d been sitting in a chair while he’d repaired her boot this morning. Surely, he didn’t just stand stiff as a board every moment he spent in this room.
What did he do to keep himself occupied? Did he just stare blankly at the walls, or did he think about…
No. Not going there right now.
After the space he’d given her last night, after his apology, it felt wrong to come in here without his permission…
But what could he possibly have that he wouldn’t want her to see, anyway?
It wasn’t like bots kept things for sentimental value.
Hell, many humans didn’t even do that. Most people only cared about things relating to survival—food and drink, tools, warmth and shelter.
Though their specific needs were different, bots operated the same way.
Her attention settled on a large chest sitting at the foot of the bed, with several tools, brushes, and narrow rods laid atop it. Amongst those items was the gun he’d been holding when he burst into the toilet room last night after hearing her scream.
Lara stared at the dull black gun. Her heart thumped. If she’d had one that night…
I could have…
She stepped forward and reached for it, halting before her fingers would’ve touched the metal. A single cut could be the end for a human, but Ronin hadn’t been stopped by three bullets to his abdomen. They hadn’t even scratched his metal. This little gun wouldn’t be a threat to him.
Why had he left it behind?
A test, perhaps, and one that posed minimal risk to him. Because if she fired it at him and somehow managed to hit her target, it wouldn’t do enough damage to save her from retaliation.
She swallowed her temptation and dropped her hand to her side, moving on to the double doors on the opposite wall. They slid open on hidden rails, revealing a little room, even smaller than her shack, with clothing hanging on rods to either side. Ronin’s clothing.
Leaning in, Lara drew in a deep breath. The potent mix of dust, sunshine, gunpowder, and steel filled her nose with a strange, warming familiarity, and she jerked back after realizing what she’d done.
But now that she had, she couldn’t help but feel as though Ronin’s scent was ingrained into her. He smelled like the Dust…and war.
Wanderer, dustwalker. How much time had he spent out there? How often did he fight? How many times had he been shot?
“Why am I thinking about him so much?”
Annoyed, she returned to her room, closing the door behind her. Without meaning to, she compared the space to Ronin’s. What would he think if he saw her bedroom now, with the blankets rumpled and the pillows squished in?
She kept the image of Ronin’s bed in mind as she made her own.
But no matter how hard she tried, no matter how careful she was, the blanket always hung off one side more than the other, and every time she smoothed out an unsightly wrinkle or flattened a bump a new one appeared somewhere else.
And she couldn’t figure out how he’d made the corners so perfectly squared.
It’s going to get messed up again when I sleep. Why am I bothering?
With a huff, she sat on the edge of the bed, drumming her fingers atop the soft blanket. Her gaze wandered, eventually stopping on the window. Afternoon light filtered through the plastic coverings, filling the room with warmth, and the shadows of the trees danced on the bottom panes.
When she’d stared up at Ronin’s home yesterday, she’d seen three rows of windows, but this was only the second floor. There had to be another level directly above her room.
So, where was the staircase leading up? That seemed like too big a thing to have missed while she’d explored the other rooms.
She went to the sliding door on one of her walls. It opened to a recess barely large enough for a child to lie in, a smaller version of the room where Ronin kept his clothing. But this one didn’t possess his metal and gunpowder scent.
“Enough already,” she muttered.
Her search of the bedroom was quick but thorough, ending when she wrestled the heavy dresser forward to reveal the solid wall behind it.
Lara entered the hallway and paced its length, brow furrowed, as she considered the mystery.
Maybe the upper window is just for show?
“No. There’s definitely another floor.”
Frustrated and disappointed, she tilted her head back and sighed.
Her eyes caught on a short, frayed string dangling from the ceiling.
There was a rectangle cut in the material around it, as though it were an oddly placed door.
It was bordered by the same sort of wood strips that edged the floor, doors, and windows.
Lara’s eyes widened.
Could that be…?
Standing on the balls of her feet, she reached for the string. It was too high. She jumped, brushing the end and making it to sway wildly. On her second attempt, she caught a solid hold of the string, and she used her weight to yank it down.
Dust showered her, and pain exploded in her head as a ladder slid down from the door and struck her temple.
Lara stumbled back, eyes squeezed shut as she pressed a hand over the throbbing point of impact.
“Fuck!” she gritted through clenched teeth. Tears well behind her eyelids, and she placed her other hand on the ladder to steady herself as she breathed through the pain and a wave of dizziness.
“Someone should have posted a warning or something. Like a picture, making the danger clear—possible beheading when opened.”
Lara opened her eyes and looked up at the hole in the ceiling. Motes of dust floated lazily through the air all around it. And, to her annoyance, she noticed a little sign on the side of the ladder. Black writing and images of little stick people getting hit by the ladder.
She glared at the sign. “Yeah, that’s the perfect place for it. Thanks for the fucking warning.”
The ache in her head continued as she climbed the wooden ladder. Its old springs squeaked in protest.
When her head emerged in the new space, she stopped.
The air here was heavier and warmer than that in the hallway below.
A thick layer of dust coated everything, illuminated by the afternoon sunlight streaming through the rectangular window ahead.
To either side, the ceiling ran up from the floor at sharp angles, meeting in a high peak at the center.
Lara climbed into the room, turning on her hands and knees to look through the opening.
The floor below was covered in clumps of dust. Without her weight on it, the ladder had lifted slightly.
She pressed down on it to keep it extended, but whatever mechanism had locked it open creaked, and the whole thing swung back up, folding the ladder into place and closing the hatch.
She stared at the sealed entry briefly before she stood and dusted her hands off. She’d deal with that problem soon enough.
Turning, she studied the room. The slanted walls, from which jutted the tips of countless nails, were lined with wooden beams running from one end to another.
The floor was also wood, constructed with close-fitting boards that lacked the impossible polish of those downstairs.
Cobwebs dangled from overhead and clung to the walls.
The room looked…old. Unlike the rest of the house, there was no gleam of cleanliness up here, no fresh coat of paint to hide the age. A musty smell filled the air. This room had been neglected for a long, long time.
Stacks of gray bins stood halfway between the hatch and the window. Nearby was a small, square table with books piled atop it. The chair in front of the table matched the one in the main room downstairs.
Lara walked to the table and picked up one of the books, brushing the thick layer of dust off its cover.
Between the discoloration and the cracks in the material, she couldn’t tell what the art upon it was meant to depict.
The pages inside were crinkly, brittle, and stained yellow, but they were intact.
She gently ran a finger along the top line of words on the first page.
Paper was a rare thing amongst humans, and complete books were almost unheard of.