Chapter 4

 She grips her gun closer to her side. The winter has begun to fall and the meat’s growing scanty. She strides across the valley towards the white forest, hoping to catch a few boers and haul them back to the caves for dinner. She’s also taking a moment to think.

            Today the river’s calm. She stomps across the hills, trying to shake out the pent-up frustration vibrating through her arms and her legs. She doesn’t want to be near the cemetery, near her brother’s naked, unburied body.

            She wonders if the camp even has graves. Seems unfair that the camp �" so wiped of emotion, so induratized �" wouldn’t have to bear through the death of loved ones while her people suffered so often. No amount of projecting could take away the sting of death. They would know that, wouldn’t they? Hadn’t they had the same powers long ago, before the divide?

            She doesn’t know the whole story there. All she knows are rumors and hearsay, but she believes what she hears. The others had pushed away the ancient ones because they were afraid of them. And in retribution for that disrespect, that lack of faith, their mental power had been taken from them.

            But maybe that’s just a myth.

            Her hand tightens around her gun. She’s wandering entirely too far into the forest and will soon come out the other side close to the enemy, but she pushes on stubbornly.

            Her brother used to read to her from the old storybook her father had given to her, passed down through her family from the time her ancestors first landed here on this planet. It was full of tall tales and pixie myths and she still has the book, old and battered and pasted together and rewritten with careful hand in the places where the words had torn or gotten lost. Her brother used to read them to her before she could read and then, when they were older, he’d wink and smile and recite some lyric in the most inopportune time just to see her smile. She only remembered one off the top of her head. Oh roaming girlie, where were you going? Towards the sunrise always strolling. Where will you be at broke of day? Where will you be bright and early? When she’d broken off the first marriage her father had arranged for her, her brother had opened the book that night and read that very verse, on purpose, she’s sure. What he had meant by it, she didn’t know. She had never gotten up enough courage to ask, too afraid of what he really thought about her.

            It’s best not to think of things. She’s pragmatic enough to know this. It’s logical. But logic and emotion are two vicious adversaries and the fight is tiresome.

            So she walks on, coming out of the trees by the river, watching the black water stream by, watching the reflection of the apple trees undulating on the surface. She’s picked a snowy scene for the landscape. The sun spills its light onto the soft mounds of snow, reflecting up with an almost blinding glare. She looks up at the trees, at the red fruit pulling the branches down, and feels a pang of sadness that it isn‘t real. That she can’t reach out and pick one. That she doesn’t even know what an apple tastes like. 

            She’s just come from a meeting with the councilor himself. What did they discuss? The same thing they always did. Her marriage. Or lack of. Lee’s a soldier, and as such she’s exempt from marriage duties, from childbearing. Most of her people look at her as an anomaly. Her reputation affords her some privacy, some distance, but it won’t protect her from the expectations of her people forever.

            The thought of marriage frightens her. Childbirth frightens her. She doesn’t like feeling frightened. She doesn’t like feeling so much like the cowering, weak-kneed women around her. But she doesn’t want to die giving birth.

            No. That isn’t it.

            She doesn’t want to have a child die. She knows she can’t handle it. For all her strength, all her solidity, she couldn’t bear to lose a child.

            And every woman who has given birth has lost at least one child. 

            She wanders down the river and tries not to think about it too much. She passes by the territory markers and still continues on, eyes open for the old stone footbridge that was once used to go over to the other side before the war started.

            She ventured to voice her concerns to Basile once, hoping he’d understand. After all, he had lost 3 children in just as many years. Not to mention the recent death of his wife after a mere cut on her foot had led to massive infection. But the Councilor had been surprisingly sedate about all his loss. The words he muttered - Their fault. Their secrets. They could save us - seemed hollow and rote. She asked him why they continued on for years and years and years doing the same thing they always did if he didn‘t really believe in it. Fight. Die. Give birth. He told her, eyes shining and voice subdued, that the war gave them purpose, kept them busy. She knew what he was really trying to say. That without the war, they’d realize their lives meant nothing. She didn’t argue with him, didn’t say that the war is their only way to find a cure. To find some way of making themselves less fragile. Less susceptible. That the war is necessary to their survival. That it’s right. Just. That the enemy has something they need. Something vital. Life-or-death.

            And they won’t share.

            But she can’t say these things to Basile. Arguing with him will hurt him even more.

            Maybe she does love him, after all.     

            She stops at the edge of the river and runs her fingers through the dark water. It has become a bit of a legend that those of the Camp have lined the riverbed with the bodies of drowned children, with unwanted offspring that they have no room for. She thinks of the babies she sees buried every week and feels a surge of fury at the thought of the others walking calmly to the river and holding their children’s heads under the water like they’re discarded animals.

            She stands up and continues on, trudging through the soft piles of snow. There’ll be no boer meat for dinner, she thinks. They’ve all traveled back to the Marked Mountains to their warm caves by the Hoarfrost River. She won’t go there all by herself.

            She walks just a little further on, curious to see the footbridge. It comes into view, dark and crusted with mold. Not very wide or very long, set at a narrow part of the river.   

            She sees her as soon as she clears the hill. On the other side of the calm Sora River, on the line of the Ebon Forest, sitting crosslegged on the ground is a young girl, merely 7 or 8 in her years. She has her shirtsleeve pulled up, exposing an angry red rash dotting the underside of her forearm. It looks like an allergy or something to the leaves of the lyrle tree. It’s odd though, to see it on one of the Camp.

            The little girl looks up and shoves her sleeve back down. Climbing quickly to her feet, she stares wide-eyed at Lee like she’s some foreign object.

            She could lift her gun and kill her. But she’s merely a child and Lee can’t bring herself to do it.

            So, instead, she decides to say, cautiously, “Hello.”

            The girl nods. “Hello.”

            “Why are you out here all by yourself?”

            The girl looks behind her. “I am not by myself. Who are you?”

            Lee tenses. Ignoring the girl’s question, she asks, “Who are you with then?”

            A confused looked passes across the girl’s face. It isn’t a confusing question, Lee thinks. Quite simple actually. She could be one of the Men. But they didn’t travel far out of their mountains anymore. No, she has to be of the camp.

            She tries something else, ears already pricked for any sound. “What happened to your arm?”

            The girl fiddles with her sleeve. “I don’t know. It hurts.”

            They aren’t supposed to be able to get sick. This is important. Somehow. Are their powers failing them?

            She’s thinking of something else to ask, something to take back to her people to be used against the enemy, when the trees rustle and Lee takes a step back instinctively.

            He comes out with his head down. He doesn’t even notice her at first, coming in front of the girl and reaching for her wrist.   

            Lee has plenty of time to run. But she stands there, staring at the long spread of his broad shoulders. At the way his black clothes contrast with the cottony white all around him. How his jacket stretches around his ribs, pulls over the small of his back. How the girl’s brown hair shines with copper streaks beneath the pale winter sun. How her skin looks soft and unblemished. How she stares so steadily at Lee while her father pulls on her hand.

            How it takes him a second longer to realize someone else is there with them.  

            Lee’s body had gone tense as soon as she saw him, but when he whips his head around, finally sensing her presence, his blue eyes catching hers, her fist clenches painfully inside the pocket of her jacket. Her mouth goes dry. The cold press of a palm around her neck comes to her suddenly.

            Absurdly, she lets the projection fall away as if he can see it too. As if she has to hide it from him. The river bank is dry and gray. The sky an ashy red. She swallows against the shock of reality.

            He turns fully, straightening and unfurling to his not inconsiderable height, keeping his eyes on her the entire time, his body rigid, tight as a whipcord. He stares warily at her. He doesn’t reach for a weapon, which lets her know that he apparently doesn’t have one. She keeps her gaze level on his cold eyes, trying not to linger over the myriad of decorations sewn onto his jacket. Trying not to pick out the insignias of her friends, of people she might have known. She will never have the upper hand with one like this.

            His own hands slowly curl into tight fists at his side.  Suddenly, the caves seem so far away. He doesn’t come charging forward in an attack, though. Startlingly, he smirks at her, but beyond that he merely holds her stare.

            When it becomes obvious that neither is going to give in and retreat, he breaks the silence first. His voice is slow and accented with that peculiar intonation of his people. Lee tries not to show how much it startles her. She’s never been close enough to hear a whole sentence from one of them.

            “You’re a bit far from your home, are you not?” A simple question. Mechanically said. No emphasis on any of the words. Odd, measured pauses where there should be none. A dark undertone like the waves of the sea breaking against the shore. That strange way of speaking. But what he means is clear. He’s talking to her like she’s some wayward child who has wandered off too far from her parents. Patronizingly. As if she’s no threat at all. To her own inward irritation, she feels her face turn hot.

            His smirk grows.

            She risks herself almost unforgivably by glancing over her shoulder towards her home. Yes, she can run and get away from him, especially separated as they are by the river, but to show such weakness seems impossible. She can just shoot him. Shoot him and be done with it.

            She turns back to him and meets his question with one of her own.

            “Your little girl is sick, isn’t she?” Not why didn’t you kill me before? When you had that large hand of yours twisted around my neck?

            That smirk stays firmly in place, but somewhere in the absence of a reaction she sees she hit on something. She inhales and takes a step forward bravely.

            He tenses but doesn’t retreat. He shifts a bit until he’s in front of the girl. Lee stops short of the bank, surprised by that. It’s a tiny motion - his shift - but it carries with it an implication Lee didn’t think possible: he’s guarding the girl.

            Without the projection to distract her, Lee sees there’s a small water bucket perched on the bank of the river. She realizes how ridiculously foolish she’d been to never think that there could have been more of them out there somewhere in the trees. She’s lucky they were just getting water and that she hadn’t stumbled onto a military reconnaissance or something. Very lucky.

            Despite the reassurance of the water bucket, she allows her eyes to scan the treeline quickly. Clutches at her gun a little harder. No movement. Not a whisper of anyone else lurking behind the black leaves. When her gaze lands back on his face, he has one eyebrow impressively arched. She gets the uncomfortable impression that he knows exactly what she’d been thinking. She feels stupid. She’s the one with the gun, so how is it that he manages to look so in control?

            She searches for something suitably derogatory to say. Some parry. Some barb. But it takes too long and now he’s outright sneering at her.

            Unexpectedly, it’s the girl who speaks again. She lifts up her sleeve, taking a step towards Lee to show her. Her mouth has barely opened - all she gets out was the words, “Can you-” before he reaches over and puts a restraining hand on her chest.

            “Ada,” he barks, voice suddenly shrill. If Lee were to guess, she could have sworn the girl’s movement panicked him. He pushes her back behind him. When he looks up again, he’s cool and calm once more, though Lee sees how his eyes glance down at her gun.

            She can shoot him. She almost lifts her firearm and does just that, but the girl’s standing too close.

            She’ll get blood all over her.

            He shifts, his feet disturbing the few twigs lying on the ground.

            “Your daughter has a rash.” She isn’t sure why says it. To rub it in? To urge him to ask for her help?

            His response comes quickly. “Indeed.” For the life of her, she can’t read any emotion behind the word. Lee wonders what a rash means for them. They don’t get sick. Don’t have negative reactions to the environment. So what happens when one of them does? Had it ever happened before? Do they kill the sick? Do the sick die or recover? There are so many questions piling up inside Lee. So many things she wants to know about them.

            She allows herself one question, “Is that normal?”

            His jaw clenches. “That is none of your business.”

            So no, then. It isn’t normal.

            She puts her gun into the holster by her knee. He tenses, visibly this time. She makes herself slow down, raising her hands a bit conciliatorily.

            His eyes narrow dangerously.

            Now’s the time to leave. She backs up a few paces. Halts. It would be ridiculous to walk backwards all the way over the hill and out of sight, but she can’t risk giving him her back.

             He just stands there as well. Probably thinking the same thing. She realizes this could go on forever, as long as neither is willing to walk away first.

            His glance sweeps along the hill behind her, as if looking for something. The next thing out of his mouth doesn’t make any sense.

            “Where are the rest of your people?”

            “My people?”

            He looks behind her again. “They should be showing up about now, should they not?”

            “Showing up for what?”

            “For whatever you did to the others.”

            Others?

            She has no idea what he’s talking about.

            “What are you talking about?”

            He frowns - just a little bit, just a faint wrinkle between his eyes. His mouth draws into a tight line. For a long stretch of time, neither says anything.

            Then a crackle, a hiss. A flash of heat against her face. For a second, she’s looking at them through a wall of thin flames, bright orange and white. She takes a step back, startled.

            He doesn’t move.

            She curses herself. She knew she wasn’t standing directly on a fireline. It had been a good foot away from her.  She’s letting the other mix her up. Long after the fire dies away, sucked back into the ground, she stands fighting off a flush of embarrassment.

            He stares at her. Just stares. No smirk. No coldness. Just staring as if she’s no more than a stray leaf fluttering in the breeze, something his eyes are trained on while his mind is elsewhere. She only knows he’s actually paying attention to her because his gaze follows her as she moves.

            Even with the gun, she suspects that if he wanted her dead, she’d be dead now. She debates once again shooting him. If only the girl would move away, just a few feet to the left…

            Another fireline shoots up, high enough to block them from view, nearly licking the sky. Lee had known this one was coming.

            By the time it dies down, she’s gone.

Author's Note

These two characters go on to have a very strange, complicated, and hopefully powerful relationship with each other. Do you feel that this first encounter is interesting enough?