“I can manage.” Her chin lifted with that same stubborn pride he’d seen earlier. “You don’t have to slow down for me.”
“I know.” He started walking again, but he kept the pace slower than before and she fell into step beside him.
“So. Tarek. Is that a Vultor name?”
He grunted, hoping she would take the hint.
She didn’t.
“It’s a nice name. Strong. Does it mean something? Human names often have meanings, though most people don’t know what theirs are anymore. My name, Jessa, is supposed to mean ‘gift,’ though my mother always said I was more of a surprise than a gift. Not an unwelcome one,” she added quickly, “just unexpected. She wasn’t planning to have children, and then suddenly she had two of us. Me first, then my sister Dani ten years later.”
He didn’t respond. The words washed over him like water, meaningless noise that he should be able to ignore but found himself listening to all the same.
“You’re not very talkative, are you?” Her lips curved up in a small smile. “But then I guess I’m not giving you much of a chance to respond.”
The smile transformed her face. He’d already noticed she was pretty—not in the sharp-edged way of a Vultor female, but something softer and warmer—but the smile made her radiant.
Stop staring at her,his beast growled, and for once, they were in agreement.
“Begin talkative is not considered a virtue for a Vultor,” he said, the words emerging before he could stop them.
She laughed again. “No, I suppose not.” Her gaze dropped to her hands for a moment. “I talk when I’m nervous.”
“You are nervous?”
“Wouldn’t you be? I’m a human woman wandering through the mountains with a strange Vultor warrior? I’d have to be an idiot not to be nervous.”
“And yet you continue to wander.”
“What choice do I have?” The smile faded, replaced by the same fierce determination he’d seen earlier. “For Dani, there’s no choice.”
“Your sister.”
“Yes. She’s… she’s everything to me.” Her voice dropped to a near whisper. “Our parents died of the fever three years ago. It’s just been the two of us since then. She’s only ten. And she’s sick.”
The last two words were heavy with an emotion so raw it made his chest ache. He remembered that feeling—the helplessness of watching someone you loved fade and the desperation that would drive you to do anything, bargain with anyone, if it meant you could save them.
“There’s a stream ahead,” he said, deliberately changing the subject. “We will stop there to drink.”
“Oh, thank the stars.” She pressed a hand to her side, grimacing. “I’m not used to walking this much. Or climbing. Or any of this, really. The farthest I usually go is to the market or the edge of the woods to gather materials to use for dye.”
He didn’t respond, but she didn’t seem to expect him to. She kept talking as they walked, filling the silence with a steadystream of words about her cottage, her loom, her sister’s illness, and the unfairness of the village council. Much of it washed over him, details about a life he would never be part of, but some of it stuck.
She’d raised her sister alone after their mother died. She worked twelve-hour days at her loom to make ends meet. The bolt of cloth that had caused all this trouble—the one that had started the chain of events leading her to his territory—had been an accident, a happy mistake born of curiosity and a willingness to experiment.
He recognized that, too. The drive to experiment, to create, to make something better than what existed before. It was the same drive that had led him to study medicine, to become a healer instead of a warrior like his father.
The same drive that had led to his exile.
The stream appeared ahead, a ribbon of clear water cutting through the rocky terrain. He knelt at its edge, cupping water in his hands and drinking deeply. The cold shocked his system, washing away some of the unwanted warmth that had been building in his chest.
When he looked up, she was rummaging in her satchel.
“Here.” She held out a small metal cup, slightly dented but clean. “It’s easier than using your hands.”
He stared at the cup, then at her. She was offering to share something with him. A small thing, insignificant, and yet…
When was the last time anyone had offered him anything?
