“Thank you,Morakkari,” she said. “I am grateful.”
As we turned into the forest, my guards followed, though, like always, they stayed a respectful distance away. It was my first time stepping foot inside and I found that when my eyes adjusted to the darkness, it wasn’t as frightening as I thought it would be. Curious, as we walked further and further into the darkness, I passed my hand over the black vines and they felt smooth and soft beneath my palm.
“They make a good broth base,” Hukan told me when she noticed me eyeing them. “Very rich. Very nutritious. And inside, they have edible seeds, though you must boil them first.”
“It seems everything can be used for something,” I commented, looking around as Hukan led us deeper inside.
“It is the way of the Dakkari,” she told me, walking next to me. “To be wasteful is an insult to Kakkari. And if we take something, we must replenish it.”
“Is that what those golden seeds were for before we left the old camp?” I questioned. “To replenish?”
“Lysi,” she said. “Seeds that will produce food for the next horde or the next herd of animals that passes through. You get and then you give. Even during yourtassimara, there were seeds planted in every lantern, so wherever they landed, wherever Kakkari’s wind took them, they would flourish and provide.”
My lips parted. “Really?”
I’d never known. I remembered the glowing lanterns lifting into the sky that night, twinkling like stars. I thought that…wonderful.
“Lysi, it is tradition. It is the Dakkari way.”
I’d heard that more times than not…the Dakkari way.
“Even the southlands,” Hukan continued, stepping over a fallen vine, “are evidence of this.”
I saw her look over her shoulder, at my guards, as I asked, “How so?”
She didn’t answer. At least not right away. We walked deeper and deeper so that even when I turned, I could no longer see the warm glow of the camp.
“Thekuverigrow this far inside?” I asked, getting a little nervous with the darkness, though I hid it as best as I could. “There’s hardly any light. It’s a wonder that they grow at all.”
“They thrive best in darkness,” she replied and after a few more minutes of walking, she said, “Here we are.”
There was a small grove ofkuveriberries, growing on grey, bushy, wild plants at the base of the stones the black vines grew on.
“Let us hurry,Morakkari,” Hukan said, already plucking some of the berries off and dropping them into her basket. “The grand meal grows near.”
I nodded and helped her pick the little fruits off the nearest bush.
“Thank you for bringing the sweet bread yesterday,” I commented after a little while had passed, once a quarter of my basket was filled. “It was delicious.”
Hukan inclined her head. After another moment, she said, “I always enjoy when the horde comes through the southlands. It is bountiful here, is it not?”
“It certainly seems so,” I said.
“Perhaps because there are no outsider settlements anywhere near here,” she commented. “They are the opposite of Dakkari. Wasteful, all-consuming. They do not care of the destruction they leave behind. They only take.”
My hand paused in plucking a berry off the bush. My eyes flashed up to her but her expression seemed innocent enough. “Human settlements, you mean?” I questioned slowly.
“Lysi,” she said immediately. She looked up at me, her green-rimmed eyes contracting on me. “Oh but you are not human anymore, are you,Morakkari? I meant no offense.”
Yes, she did,my gut told me. She’d meant to say that, had said it purposefully to hurt me, to draw a clear line between us. Dakkari and human. In her eyes, I wouldneverbe Dakkari, despite her words.
Inhaling a long breath through my nostrils, I didn’t want to give up. I didn’t want to go back to ignoring the other’s existence because it made things awkward around camp, around Arokan.
Brow furrowing, I said carefully, “Hukan…I want there to be peace between us. For Arokan’s sake. He cares for you deeply. I know you have never liked me. I know you think Arokan can do better than me.”
She paused in plucking as well, turning to look at me with an unreadable expression. There was a familiar flickering in her gaze which made dread pool in my belly, which made me think that once again, we were back to where we’d been before. I wondered why it had reversed so quickly.
“But he chose me,” I said, steeling my voice, needing her to understand. Softly, I confessed to her words I had not even told Arokan yet. “I love him. And I believe he loves me too. I am his queen and I am not going anywhere, no matter what you—”
