“But he might need it.”
“But the captain will not give up so much storage for?—”
“Should we just leave and go our own way?Find somewhere?—”
“Mira, I would not abandon Arik?—”
I think we both wanted to shout or kick and Halvar’s cries continued for hours as we negotiated our belongings down to a single bag with my lyre tied on top, growing endlessly irritated with each other.
“So then, after Halvar pisses or throws up or gets skat on the two furs we have for him.There will be nothing else to put him in while they dry.We are to be washing his furs nine times each day?They will never be able to dry?—”
“It is summer.They will have to?—”
I had only the dress I was wearing.Fell suggested trousers which everyone, including high-voiced wombed beings, wore on ships.
“I don’t want to dress like a—” In my anger, I’d forgotten the long string of words I needed to sayboyin Norsern, so I said it in Islish.
“Ba-oy?What is ba-oy?”Fell’s tone was not adoring when he said that.I think he assumed it was some kind of insult, and since he wore trousers, perhaps it was an insult that encompassed him.“Do not make owl face at me, I am only?—”
I set Halvar down onto the bed, and his cries multiplied.I covered my face with my hands, pressing against my eyes because they were strained and sore.
“Mira,” Fell said softly, coming to stand behind me, setting his hands on my shoulders, kissing the top of my head.“I admit we are not having a good day.But no wrong has been done.We simply want to ensure we have everything we need.This is not?—”
“We do not want to be doing this at all,” I said, still stern, but a little soothed by how gently Fell was running his hands along my shoulders and upper arms.I leaned back into him, feeling his chest against my back.
Halvar stilled for the first time in hours, his little legs kicking gently.
The calm shattered when Fell shouted, “Ah!”
It happened so quickly, I could only understand what I’d seen moments after.
A bee landed on the bed, just near Halvar’s shoulder.Halvar flailed, his chubby little arm knocking the creature.Halvar’s scream took a moment to come, but it came in full force.A scream I’d never heard from him.
Fell was quick as lightning, his hand shooting out to grab the bee and rip it away from our son.Fell squeezed the creature within his closed fist, killing if it wasn’t dead already, by pressing his own fingers so hard against his palm, dropping the dead creature and pulling a knife from his belt?—
In all the actions Fell had taken, I’d only managed to have my mind boiled by the sound of Halvar’s pain-cry.I hadn’t heard him cry in true, overwhelming pain like that before.I couldn’t handle it.My child should not be suffering so.But because he was, my whole world was wrong and inside out.My bones felt like ice in my body.
“Halvar, baby.”
Fell scraped the stinger out of Halvar’s arm in two quick tugs, by the time I’d run my shaking hands along Halvar’s cheeks, trying to soothe him.
“I will be right back!”Fell ran out the door, leaving me to pick up Halvar, who was still crying like I’d never heard a baby cry.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I said in Islish.My lungs were spasming.My ears couldn’t listen to Halvar’s pain.It felt impossible that my child—my beautiful, perfect son—should be making the noises he was making.Feeling what those noises meant he was feeling.I almost vomited.Tears coated my eyes in a sheen that blurred the world.
“Baby, baby, baby.”My voice was coated in tears, cracking in three or four different ways at once.Holding him was doing nothing to help him.Was it helping me?Not truly.
It felt like ages, but I know it was only a few moments before Fell returned with plantain leaves in his hands.He chewed one quickly, but thoroughly, and when that was done, he spit the green mush onto his fingers, rubbing it on Halvar’s arm where the stinger had come out.He chewed three more leaves and something else—some kind of bark—and applied them in the same way before Halvar’s cries softened.
“You are so strong,” he said to Halvar.
Calm.His voice was steady.Impressed even.
Halvar settled even more, and my heart finally stopped racing.
Fell spit a final leaf onto his fingers and rubbed that onto Halvar’s arm.
In the quiet, knowing things were sorted, I sank to the floor, holding Halvar tight to my chest.Fell sat as well, across from me, his legs on either side of me, Halvar between our chests.
