Moonbright

Chapter 9

The water dispute starts before dawn.

Hella and Bren's mother are both at my door, voices overlapping. I'm not even dressed yet.

"She moved the stone." Bren's mother has her arms folded.

"I didn't move the stone. The rain moved the stone."

"Rain doesn't move stones."

"It does if the bank erodes."

"The bank didn't erode! You dug it out."

I stand in my doorway. Wait for them to notice I haven't spoken.

They don't.

"Enough."

They stop. Eyes dropping. Shoulders lowering.

"Show me."

I follow them to the stream in unlaced boots and yesterday's trousers.

The marker stone hasn't moved.

The bank has eroded.

Hella's washing station is wider. The runoff hits the filling spot.

Both right. Neither going to admit it.

"Move the washing station two paces upstream," I tell Hella. "Past the bend. Runoff carries south."

"That's farther from my dwelling."

"Yes."

She looks at me. Decides not to argue.

"Fine."

"And you." I turn to Bren's mother. "Fill before dawn. Less foot traffic. Cleaner water."

"I already—"

"Before.dawn."

She nods and they leave.

The stream runs over the rocks. I crouch, splash cold water over my face. Numbness across my skin. Cold in my teeth, behind my eye—

Honey and chamomile.

She was here. This morning, maybe earlier.

My fingers dig into the cold mud.

Don't.

Graw border. Getting hotter. That's what today is about.

Not her.

The clearing sounds different when I get back. Fire going. Two pots. Steam. And that voice.

"—bottom will scorch if you don't stir it. Here. See the color? That's what you want. Darker than that and it's ruined."

She is teaching someone to cook.

I stop at the treeline. Yesterday only a handful ate her food. Today—double that. Rhen on the same stump, bowl in hand. More wolves beside him. Liara at the second pot, stirring without being told.

Liara. Never says more than a few words at a time since her mate died.

Two years. Now she's standing beside a human woman, head tilted, hands moving.

I don't go to the fire. I go to my dwelling, pull on a clean shirt, and wait for Maren.

He's late.

"Eastern patrol came back early." Maren drops the bark markings on the table. "Fresh Graw scent along the ridge."

"How old?"

"Last night. Maybe dawn. Same two tracks as last week." He spreads the markings out. "Here. And here. They're mapping the game trails."

"That's deeper than before."

"By half a mile." He traces the route. "If they push again, they'll hit the southern stream."

"Double the ridge patrols. Day and night."

"The new moon’s tonight. I need everyone back before dark."

"Then double them now and pull at dusk. But we're thin, Keer. I've got—"

The door darkens.

Young wolf. Tall, nervous. Shifting his weight.

"Not now," Maren says.

"It's fine." I lean back. "What."

"The human moved the bandages."

Maren goes quiet. Eyes on me. Waiting.

"Where are they now?"

"On a shelf. She hung it on the wall. Clean separate from dirty."

"Were you looking for a bandage?"

"Yes."

"Did you find one?"

"...She showed me where they were."

"Then what's the problem?"

"It's not just bandages." Hands moving. Talking faster. "I went for tallow and it wasn't there. She moved it because she said the fat goes rancid near herbs. Her voice is so high pitched I couldn't—she just—everything's different."

"Was the tallow going rancid?"

"I mean, it smelled—"

"Yes or no."

"...Yeah."

"Then it's in a better spot." I hold his eye. "She should have asked first. I'll tell her."

He stands there, wanting to say more but can't find the words.

He leaves.

Maren watches him go. "First one today?"

"First one today."

He chuckles, "won't be the last."

"Nope." I pull the bark markings back. "The ridge. Show me the tracks again."

We work through the routes. Graw is creeping toward. Twenty years of holding this territory. Every trail. Every crossing.

Maren's talking about scouts when Bren appears.

The one whose arm she fixed yesterday.

"She told me my wrap was wrong."

"It was wrong."

"She told me in front of the pack." He rubs the back of his neck. "Said whoever wrapped it must've been drunk, blind, or actively trying to kill me, and that I should consider all three a possibility because anything was better than assuming they knew what they were doing."

"Hella wrapped it."

"And now Hella won't talk to me."

"Was the wrap dangerous?"

He stares at the ground. "My fingers were going purple."

"So she was right."

"She was right and loud about it." He shifts. Meets my eye. "I'm not angry at her. She fixed my arm. But Hella's been wrapping wounds here for six years and now she's humiliated. There's a way to tell someone they're wrong that doesn't—"

"I know." I exhale. "I'll talk to Hella."

"And the human?"

"Her name is Melori."

He blinks. Weight shifts. My skin prickles.

Why did I say that?

"Could you maybe tell Melori that being right doesn't mean being right at people?"

My mouth pulls at the corner. I would very much like to see him try.

No.

"I'll handle it."

"Thank you."

He goes. Maren hasn't moved.

"Don't."

"I wasn't going to."

"You were thinking about it."

"I was thinking about anything." He folds his arms. "But since you brought her up—"

"I didn't bring her up."

"—Dara's not complaining about the supply bench."

"No."

"Should be. It's her area."

"Go ask Dara why she's not."

He holds my glare—one of the few who will—then drops it. "I'll finish the route schedule."

"Do that."

The door stays open after him.

Two complaints. One about objects. One about people.

She's not rearranging shelves.

I spread the bark markings out again. The routes blur. I fold them and leave.

Axan finds me at the forge. I'm sharpening a blade I don't need sharpened. Hands need something to do. The forge is the farthest point from the cooking fire.

"Tarek's side is closing clean," he says. "Dara changed the packing this morning. Using something—"

"I know what she's using."

"—Melori showed her." He finishes it anyway, grinning. "Closing faster than anything I've seen."

The blade finds its rhythm again.

"She doesn't look at you the way the others do," he says. "You notice that."

My hand slips.

"Not once. She doesn't look away. Doesn't submit. Doesn't flinch. Just—"

"Stop."

"—looks at you and sees—" Axan pretends to think about it. "—a person, Keer. A whole one."

Blood wells across my thumb.

He's laughing. Quiet, mostly in his shoulders, the way he always laughs when he thinks he's gotten me—and he has gotten me, and he knows it.

"Axan."

"Keer—"

"Leave, Axan."

He's still laughing when he leaves. The cut heals in seconds.

The rest of it doesn't.

The last wolf who looked me in the eye was trying to kill me. Took his throat out.

Melori did it over a pot of porridge.

Nugget.

The bear.

The grief stench hits before he does. Sour rot underneath the anger. Five years since Vara.

"She's taking over."

"Sit down, Tovar."

"I don't want to sit down."

"Then talk."

"It's not just supplies anymore." He's pacing, can't hold still. "She taught Liara how to cook the grain. Told Bren his wrap was wrong in front of everyone. Built a shelf. And now she's got Dara—Dara—" He turns on me. "She's showing the packs healer new techniques. And Dara's listening."

"Is the technique better?"

"That's not—"

"Tovar. Is it better?"

"I don't care if it's better!" His voice cracks. "She's human. She has no standing. No rank. She walks into our territory and starts teaching your pack how to do things and you just let her because—"

I stand, unfolding myself slowly, towering over him.

"Because what?"

He stops pacing. The words are right there. I can smell the intention.

"Choose carefully."

His nostrils flare. Hands fisting, releasing, fisting again.

"Vara would hate this."

His face cracks. One second. Then sealed shut.

"Vara's dead." Harder than I mean. "The pack is alive. Every decision I make is for the living."

"Is that what she is? A decision?"

"Every call I make is a decision."

"Then that's the problem. You're making the wrong ones."

The bond presses. Raw heat. I step into him. Close enough his head tips back.

"If you have a problem with how I'm leading this pack, challenge me. Right now. Throat or belly, your call."

He goes still.

"If not, you walk out of here and you keep your grief off my healer."

His breathing is harsh. Ragged. He doesn't move.

"If she gets us killed," he says. "That's on you."

"Everything's on me."

He leaves.

The wolf's still pushing. Shift hours away, not close enough. I need walls.

Through the common ground. Fast. Someone calls my name, keep walking.

My dwelling. Door shut.

I pour water from the barrel over my head. Cold running down my chest. Pooling at my feet.

Not enough.

Is that what she is? A decision? Tovar's voice. Still in my skull.

She's twenty-two. Kestria's age. I watched her wrap a bear's leg with hands that didn't shake. I watched her meet my eye across a cooking fire and not look away.

My fist hits the wall. Wood cracks. Splinters in my knuckles.

The barrel didn't touch it. I need running water. Cold enough to hurt.

The stream is the farthest point from the cooking fire.

Out. Cold air. Trees. I push the thought of her down with every step and it keeps surfacing—her hands on Tarek's bandages, her voice across the fire, her bright blue eyes meeting mine like I'm just a man.

Fuck, she's here.

Crouched at the bank, sleeves past her elbows, scrubbing a bundle in the current. White hair half-fallen from whatever knot she tied this morning, the pink stain at the ends catching wet. That pink chicken roosting on a rock beside her.

I could turn around. She hasn't heard me. Human ears.

Her heartbeat. Steady. Unhurried. The warm honey scent carried by the water.

I don't leave. I can’t.

She looks up when my shadow crosses the bank. Sets down the bundle. Doesn't flinch. Doesn't look away.

"Did you need something?"

Every prepared sentence dissolves.

Hella.

The wrapping.

I had words.

She holds up her hands. "If this is about the cooking, I asked Axan about the grain."

"Not the cooking."

"The supply bench?"

"No."

"The shelf? The bandages? The tallow?"

"Bren's wrap."

She pushes wet hair off her forehead with the back of her wrist. "Wha—oh right. What about it?" Her head tilts.

"You told him the technique was dangerous. In front of people."

"Well, it was dangerous."

"Hella wrapped that arm. She's been wrapping wounds here for six years."

Her chin comes up. Eyes steady.

Hella. The wrap. Stay there.

Her voice goes sharper, pitch climbing. "Six years of wrapping wrong doesn't make it right. It makes it six years of bad practice."

"She's embarrassed."

"She should be grateful someone caught it before her patient lost a hand."

I step closer. The bank is soft. My boots sink. I kneel—the mud giving under my weight, cold wet soaking through at the knee. She's crouched so we're almost level. Her face close enough to see the water droplets on her jaw.

Didn't mean to get this close. The wolf pushed and my legs just—

"You can be right and still be wrong about how you say it."

Her nose scrunches.

"Fine." Clean. No sulking. "I'll talk to Hella. Show her the technique. One on one."

"Good."

"Was that everything?"

"Dara says you're teaching her wound packing."

"She asked."

"You showed her everything."

"That's how teaching works."

"Healers usually keep their methods."

She looks up and her face is open—unguarded. "If I get hurt, or sick, or you send me away, someone needs to know how to pack a wound. No one should keep that kind of information to themself."

"Stop teaching Dara everything." I lean forward. "Keep something for yourself."

A strand of wet hair clings to her cheek. My hand cups her jaw, thumb swiping the hair back off her skin. Her face is cold from the water. Her pulse is not.

I should move my hand. I don't.

"That's terrible advice," she whispers.

"Probably."

"Definitely." The sharp edge has completely vanished from her voice. Softer underneath. Water running between us. Her hands still dripping. The light on the pale ends of her hair and my hand still at her jaw and—

"No one's sending you away."

Her pulse skips. Stutters.

Said too much.

"That's not what you said before." Not looking away. "You said I'm not part of this."

"I said you don't need to do it."

"Same thing."

"It's not."

Her hands lift. Slow. She puts them flat on my chest, wet fingers curling slightly against the damp tunic. Warm skin underneath. Warm pulse.

Mine.

She tips her head up. I can see the moment she feels my heartbeat through the tunic—her eyes change.

Kneeling in mud. Her hands on my chest. Her face open for the first time all night.

"Stop acting like you're leaving."

She looks up at me and her face is—

"Old habit."

I cover her hands with mine and lift them away. Careful.

My thumb brushes her knuckle and I feel her shiver.

The wolf presses forward—harder than usual. I press back. The mud under my knee. Cold water.

The pack that needs its Alpha sharp. Present. Not kneeling in a streambed thinking about the hollow of her—

"Keep teaching Dara."

"You just said—"

"Changed my mind."

I stand, mud releasing my knee, and turn.

Walk.