“You?” He pauses in the road. I stop too and wait as he looks me up and down. After a moment, he shakes his head. “I think you have a too-generous heart and that it’s easier to care for others than to put yourself first.”
His kind observation makes me relax, just a bit. It eases something tight in my chest. “I just feel as if I’m jumping from caretaking project to caretaking project,” I say. “I just know what it’s like to be scared of what’s happening to your loved ones and wanting to help out.”
“First of all, I don’t think you helping your brother was a ‘project.’ You loved him.”
The way David is referred to in past tense feels like poking an open wound. “I still do.”
“Anyone would do the same for family. And second…is that what I am to you? A project?”
Oh god, talk about putting my foot into my mouth. “Maybe in the beginning, when we hated each other? But I like to think that we’re friends now.” Or flirting partners. Or star-crossed lovers. Or something.
“It was never hate on my part. Hate takes entirely too much energy.” His tone is casual, almost flat, and my senses prick. I glance over at him, but his face is turned up to the blue sky, and he seems to be enjoying the day. No sign of fugue, which is a good thing.
“You should definitelysave your energy,” I agree.
“I can think of a few things I wouldn’t mind exhausting myself doing.”
I blush for the rest of the walk, imagining just what his exhaustion would entail. Every time I sneak a peek over at him, he’s got a sly smile on his face, as if he’s imagining the very same thing, and it makes me get flustered all over again.
The Dirtlands fall away, and the greenery deepens on both sides of the road. Thornhill finally comes into view, and I see chickens racing across the rutted roads, someone’s old dog lounging in the shadow of a nearby house. The village looks a bit busier than last time, and as we pass through the cluster of houses, I notice people working in front of their homes. There’s a woman with a butter churn, and another is hanging laundry on a rope line. Two old women are on stools, sewing in the sunlight. A man is weeding a vegetable patch behind his house.
Everyone pauses to look at us as we walk in. I’m hoping it’s because we just look a bit touristy. But when the old women grab their sewing and make the sign of salt-throwing over their shoulder before scrambling inside the nearest house, I have my suspicions.
“You think the spinner said something to them?” I mumble to Kalos, deliberately smiling through my words.
He huffs. “Without a doubt.”
Just great. So much for my “anonymously helping the locals” plan. They’re not running away in fear, though. They’re just avoiding eye contact and trying to make themselves unnoticeable. I suppose it could be worse. “Let’s go say hi to our friend, then. We’ll start with her.”
We head to the spinner’s house, and her door is shut. There’s a chicken roosting in the weeds to the side of the house, but there’s no sign of a person. The plague marks thatwere here last time are gone, at least. I lift my hand to knock, but before I do, Kalos grabs my fist and pulls it down.
When I look at him in surprise, he grins at me and tugs me toward him, and my heart flutters in my chest. “Is it time for our kiss?”
He doesn’t answer, just pulls me closer. That enticing smile tugs at his lips, and as he drags me forward, I hold my breath in anticipation. Kalos gazes at my face, watching my mouth before meeting my eyes. He leans in.
I lean in to meet him.
Before our lips can brush, he whispers, “Not yet, I think.”
I growl at him. When he laughs, I give him a shove and flounce away to hide my embarrassment. “Now you’re just being a tease.”
“I’ve only got five kisses. I’ve got to make them count.”
With a roll of my eyes, I knock on the door. Hopefully I don’t look too flustered and out of sorts. Hopefully. The chickens nearby are clucking wildly, and I knock a second time to make sure that I’m heard. I clear my throat and manage to get a relaxed look on my face by the time the door opens.
The spinner opens the door and gives me a frazzled look. “What?” Her gaze falls on me as if she’s just now seeing me, then on Kalos, and she goes white. “We weren’t doing anything!”
“Ominous,” I say cheerfully. “Can we come in?”
She pauses, considering. The chickens cluck louder, and if I didn’t know better, I’d swear the sound seems as if it’s coming from her house. After a moment, she sighs heavily and opens the door wider. “Come inside. It’s not as if I can keep a secret from a god anyhow.”
I’m starting to wonder if we should have picked a different house. I step inside into the dark cottage, and the moment I do, I pause.
There’s a woman seated by the fire, her arm bent and bound over her head. More bandages are scattered around the room, along with feathers. Tied to the woman’sarmpitis a flailing chicken, the source of the clucking, and she holds it in place with her other hand despite the chicken’s frantic pecking.
A chicken. Tied to an armpit.
“What the fuck?” I blurt out.
