“How did you get it to bend?” Morco asked.
“Heat,” Caius answered.
“And the string?” Morco shifted his gaze to me.
“Plant fibers,” I said. “A mixture of several different kinds. I started to work on the arrows, but that’s been more challenging.” I reached for the few that I’d created, wooden sticks with misshapen wooden feathers. “On the surface, these arrows are made with feathers. Helps them fly. As far as I can tell, there are no birds here.”
“There are,” Morco said. “They’re just hard to see in the dark.”
“I haven’t heard them.”
“Because they don’t want to be heard.”
Because we lived in a dark world where hiding was the best survival. “Can you hunt them?”
He shook his head. “They’ve never been our primary prey. We’ve harvested their eggs from nests in Stonework.”
“Stonework?” I asked.
“The fortress my ancestors built. It was home until we were forced to flee.”
I nodded in understanding with a twinge of pain. They hadn’t always lived out in the open in little cabins with no food. They’d had a place to call home…until someone took it away.
“We can’t rely on feathers,” Morco said. “We’ll need a substitute.” He stared at me like he expected me to produce an answer right on the spot.
“I—I don’t know.”
“We’re so close. This is the last component we need.”
“Morco, I said I don’t know?—”
“But I know you’ll figure it out.” He didn’t raise his voice or seem angry, but his tone deepened. “You always have. You always do.”
Caius looked away, like he felt as if he was intruding on a private conversation.
I was irritated that Morco simplified something so complex, but I was also touched that the believed in me so unconditionally. That he didn’t care how difficult the task seemed, he had faith that I would find a way. “Okay.”
“The rest of the meat has gone bad. We’ll need to hunt again.” Morco turned to Caius, like this was his responsibility. “Morale in the camp has increased. Everyone seems stronger. We need to continue that.”
Caius didn’t object. “I won’t pretend I haven’t enjoyed being full for the first time since…I can’t even remember.”
“Gather a team and leave today or tomorrow.”
I was relieved Morco wasn’t leaving. If he did, I would probably go with him.
Morco looked at me again, his stare back to penetrating and intense. “My mother wishes to speak with you.”
My instinct was to swallow. I couldn’t imagine how terrified my expression must have looked. She’d been in the cabin when Morco was ill, but I hadn’t even looked at her, wanting to be out of her space as she comforted her son. “Why?”
His eyes had been born of the night, dark and endless, but full of so much substance. He showed it to me now, looking at me as his equal rather than his subject. “Because you’re leading our people as much as I am.”
Morco escorted me farther down the path than I’d ever been.
The cabins were larger here, and one was bigger than all the others, a building surrounded by several bonfires, a set of double doors that led inside.
“Your mother lives here alone?” I asked, wondering why a single woman had so much space.
“No. She lives with the rest of the Elders.”
