“Hags,” I muttered.
“He is attractive,” Jade spoke, almost as if comforting me for the pink in my cheeks. “There’s no shame in finding him so, Robbie.”
“It’s the brother with the braid for me,” Ilsit chimed in. “Heard him refer to the one-eyed man as his brother. All that hair and that swagger? I’d ride him into the night and through to early morning.”
“That’s enough,” I erupted, eyes widening particularly in her and Tessa’s direction as my sister-in-law cackled at Ilsit and smacked her on the arm. “Fox is but seventeen.”
“She’s nearly eighteen,” Tessa said. “And her adopted mother is a known tramp.”
Ilsit chinked her cup with Tessa’s.
Fox rose from where she was sitting and came to stand near me, signing,I will be careful as you say.
“Thank you,” I said with emphasis, flicking a look at Tessaand Ilsit.
Jade was staring into her lap, dreamy eyed.
Ilsit noticed this and asked, “And what about you, Jade, dear? Which Vyggian man would you like to take a tumble with? The lean, tattooed one? He is missing an eye and thinner than I like them, but he is still fine. Or his brother? Even Tessa would have to hesitate.”
“Not bloody likely,” Tessa muttered, though her tone was humorous.
Jade’s face was reddening. “I—I don’t know.”
“Hmm, the one with two eyes does it for you, doesn't he?”
“Leave her alone, Ilsit,” I said.
Ilsit did not look at me, only waved towards me with her cup. “It’s all in good fun. This is a miserable undertaking. If we can’t joke, I can’t live with it. Jade, which is it? The handsome brother or the more handsome brother?”
The rest of us were silent, watching Jade.
She folded her hands in her lap over the bedroll and then smiled. “The one with the braid. I cannot breathe when he is near our wagon.”
“See?” Ilsit said, pushing one of her knees into Jade’s knee. “You’re just like me. Everyone wants a turn on the darker-haired scout. Except Robbie. She wants to have a hearty rut in the woods with the one-eyed man. And then walk around afterward acting like ‘Oh, no he couldn’t possibly want me.’”
When Jade started to giggle, the rest of them joined her.
“What am I supposed to do with you lot?” I said. I stalked off to the latrines, biting the insides of my cheeks. “You all laugh at danger far too readily,” I called over my shoulder.
28
NOW: TREE
When I finally found a god tree, I found myself wishing for Fox or Jade to be by my side so I could cry out in delight with someone. Even for Daisy to be at my feet would have been enough. But I felt lonesome, that ghostly sensation of being so alone the vacancy of another person was like a presence alongside me, an empty space where a companion should be. I had always been well with my lonesomeness, finding a solace in it even in childhood.
Losing Avery had altered that.
“I suppose,” I said aloud in the dark, “Magda would say that I talk to that lonesomeness. Make it a person. Or a god. Very well, which god will I speak to? I know Sister Sea the least, Brother Air is a mystery, and though I may be a child of fire, the Father does not seem like a good conversationalist.”
I laughed at my own joke. I had always been this way, speaking to Mother Earth when I was alone. “Mother Earth, thank you for this god tree. And I know I am silly as I complained of a crowded house in the past, and now I complain of the brief time of being alone while I hunt. My Avery would say I am a woman of many moods.”
God trees had empty trunks with doorways only someone with magic could see. Inside, the walls were hollow, and that was the only place the luminous mother’s moss grew. I wedged myself into the opening in the trunk, and when I found myself inside the glowing circle, I had enough room to sit and almost stretch my legs out. I sighed and leaned back to place my head against the inside bark.
“I’ll just pray to all of you then,” I went on. “I am terrified. Terrified for Adelaide. Terrified for all of us and this caravan on a path of certain damnation. I worry Ilsit will say something to get herself killed. I worry Starling will sniff around Jade and realize who she is. I worry my Fox will be seen as defective and mistreated. Imissmy man and I miss his being our guardian. I do not understand my feelings for Thane. I do not know what the rest of this life looks like, and that makes me quake with fear.”
Eventually I stood up and found a natural break in the inner bark that my hand could fit through. I slid my foraging knife into the opening and scraped up a handful’s worth of the moss. I deposited it into the bag and went back inside for more, circling my wrist so that the moss all around the little opening was collected. Forgetting every time Magda had slapped my wrist for it, I went back into the opening, reaching a bit farther out with my knife.
And I got stuck.
