SOFT WINDS TUG AT ME, PULL ME FORWARD INTO the dark embrace of the forest. The leaves of the trees are bright, a heartbreaking green that only comes with the Thaw. I stop and take a deep swallow of air. It's like soft, sweet water filling my mouth and chest. It's like breathing in freedom. Life.
This is how I imagined it.
A hot breath blows against my neck.
Well, near to.
I turn and find myself face-to-face with Isi's horse, its soft nostrils speckled with moisture. Above the white blaze on the horse's forehead, Isi frowns down at me. I raise my eyebrows. In response, he looks pointedly behind at the others: Sister Violet and her little boys, Daniel and Nico. Frère Andre with his battered hat and wiry beard. Kane.
They're all walking in the forest with looks of wonderment on their faces. They're all walking…
"Too slow," Isi hisses.
"They're just not used to being out here yet," I say, although we've been walking hours at this pace and I'm not used to it yet, neither. Nishwa is scouting way ahead on his beast, doubling back, scouting ahead. Matisa brings up the rear, scouting behind from time to time, on her own horse.
"We do not have time for getting used to things," Isi says, watching them with a frown.
"And how do you suppose we speed them along?"
"I wish I knew. They do not even know how to ride."
"You wish they hadn't come."
"Don't you?" Isi turns his eyes on me.
"Course I'm glad they came," I say.
Isi studies me in that hard way of his, like he's asking me to be sure of my words, be sure of my own mind. I hate that look. It reminds me of how often I used to fail my Honesty virtue. Shouldn't bother me. Ever since I proved Discovery, I've seen the virtues in a new light. They're not so cut-and-dried. Still, I'm relieved when he clicks his tongue and urges his horse back to Sister Violet and the boys. I sigh deep.
Mayhap "glad" wasn't the right word to use. Sister Violet is more determined to keep her family together than I figured. And I know why Isi's irate. When it was only the six of us setting out-Matisa and the boys, Tom, Kane, and me-it was going to take a week, doubling on horseback. Now with so many of us walking, it'll take closer to two. But with Kane showing up like that, all hopeful…
A wave of guilt washes me as I remember Matisa's face. She was torn; bringing them wasn't the plan, but she could see Kane didn't know how to refuse his ma.
Isi was unhappy, but she convinced him it would be all right.
And Frère Andre. Well, once Sister Violet was coming with the boys, what was one more?
"Je suis agé," he said. "Je n'aurai pas d'autre chance de voir le monde."
It was true: he was old. If he wanted to see the world, coming with us was his chance. I feel a pang, thinking about him saying goodbye to his bird-boned daughter and her life mate and youngsters. She clung to him a moment with her tiny arms, but when she pulled back, she offered him a smile.
"Allez-y voir le monde, papa," she said. Go see the world.
I watch him stomp along, pack on his back with two rifles strapped across it. We had one rifle in our effects already, and Kane has dead-sure aim, but he hasn't practiced much with a gun, preferring his knives. It's good Andre came.
But it should've been Tom.
I watch Nico drop behind his ma and take Kane's hand. Kane smiles at him and my pang disappears. At least Kane didn't have to say goodbye like I said goodbye to Tom. The relief on Kane's face, though, once Matisa convinced Isi-it made me happy and uneasy at once. And keeping the truth about the Bleed from him is weighing on my mind.
Thing is, telling Kane about the Bleed now, and how we're staying safe from it, means asking him to keep it from his ma. Can't do that. And if he tells her, it's not just one person Matisa has broken her vow for, it's three. No. Matisa will keep us safe until we reach her people.
I shove down a niggle of unease.
Isi leans and scoops up a delighted Daniel, setting the little boy before him on the horse's dappled-gray back. He wheels the horse in an about-face.
"Look, Em!" Daniel calls in glee as they trot past. He's beside himself with the excitement of being out here. His older brother Nico is another story, more wary, but right now his eyes, too, are wide with wonder.
I follow after them, les trembles-the tall poplar trees-yawning and rustling above us. I press into the brush, stepping on springy new moss, tiny green shoots of horsetail. As I clamber over a log crusted with moss, my good foot lands on something hard-like stone. I hear a clink as my foot grinds down. The new ferns I push aside to get a look at the source are feathery soft. But my fingers touch something cold and solid.
Bones.
I recoil. Looks like a deer, picked clean long ago, washed white with the wind and snow. I step around it careful, wondering how it died. Predator or old age? Or mayhap the winter was that harsh.
I have a sudden thought for the Jameson family, who passed this way months back, with no weapons but a bow and their few belongings in packs on their backs, right after the first snow-bitten winds coursed through the coulees and around the fortification.
No way they survived.
I swallow. It was the settlement's decision to cast them out like that. Brother Jameson killed Pa. He would've killed me, and Kane, and anyone else who stood in his way if Kane hadn't brought him down with his knife. None of the settlement wanted to trust his kin after that. And I didn't think too much on it when they left, neither.
But I know what it's like to feel cast out; I've endured plenty-enough wary stares in my day. Imagine that feeling being the one you take with you to your grave?
"What is it?" Matisa has appeared at my elbow, silent as frost.
I start and look around, confused that she's here beside me, off her beast.
She throws her head to indicate behind her. "I gave my horse to Sister Violet for a little while. Nishwa can scout behind."
I look back. Frère Andre is now leading Dottie, with Sister Violet and Nico perched atop. Kane walks beside them.
Guilt floods over me again. "I'm sorry," I say. She frowns in confusion. "About this morning," I say. "Had no idea they'd want to come. I'm sorry for putting this on you."
She waves me off. "Refusing them did not feel right."
"But it'll take us near twice as long to get to your home, now."
"We have time."
She sounds like she means it. I raise my eyebrows.
"If we start to lose too much time," she says. "I can send Nishwa and Isi on ahead."
I study her. Only half a day from the settlement and she already looks happier-like a weight has been lifted. "Are you sure you're all right?" I ask. "This morning…"
Her cheeks color a mite. "This morning I was a bit frenzied," she admits. "The mapmaker's news unsettled me. And Kane's request was one more surprise. But we are on our way now. And we will reach my people in time."
I step over the bones and we continue walking. "Isi doesn't seem to think so."
"Is that what's bothering you?" she asks, keeping pace with me. "He has always been impatient to get home."
"It's the fact we're here at all. You teaching me to ride didn't sit too well, remember." Matisa spent several days getting Kane and me comfortable on her horse while we waited on Soeur Manon. Isi had watched us circle the sheep paddock, his face a thundercloud.
She sighs. "I know." She gets a sly smile on her face. "But maybe it was because you took so long to learn."
"I did not!" I protest. Except she's right; I don't ride very well.
"Your boy, though, he's another story," Matisa says, appreciative-like. It's true: Kane took to riding horses like it was a memory he'd stored in his bones long ago and finally remembered.
I crane my neck to look at him. Dark eyes, new-shaved head, shirt open at the throat. He looks easy out here, natural. Like he was meant to be outside the fortification all his life. He catches me looking and holds my gaze. He puts his hand to his heart, pretending to adjust the leather pack on his back. It's a secret gesture: You are here, it's saying.
My steps falter. I feel his ma's stare and snap my head forward.
"Ah," Matisa says, like I've explained everything.
"'Ah' nothing," I say, keeping my face blank. I pick up my pace.
"'Ah' everything," she says. "You two will be field mice under an eagle's watch."
"Well, then," I say, not meeting her eyes. "Need to find a burrow."
"Would you two mice know what to do with yourselves in a burrow?" She nudges me with her elbow.
"I have ideas," I mutter.
Matisa's laugh rings out clear through the woods.
Flames crackle bright and orange, casting long shadows on the trees at our backs. Kane's little brothers sit with their ma. Daniel's head lolls against Sister Violet's shoulder, and Nico rubs his eyes, fighting sleep.
Across the fire, Kane sits next to Andre, who I think is busy describing the strange new birdcalls he heard today. Kane's only half listening; his eyes keep rising to linger on my face. I can't stop the smile that tugs at my lips.
His ma peers at me, so I busy myself with feeding the fire another stick, though it's already roaring good.
Our bellies are full of venison stew and the tea Matisa prepared-the remedy-and we're all wrapped tight against the quick-cooling night. Our tents and bedrolls are tucked away in the trees, waiting for our tired bodies.
Beside me, Nishwa tilts his head, checking the tops of the trees, the sky.
"What are you looking for?" I ask him.
"The clouds will clear soon," he says.
I frown. I'm about to ask how he could possibly know that when a sound rises up from beyond the trees. Shrill. Keening. Like a lost and terrified child. The hair on the back of my neck stands.
The chatter around the fire stops abrupt.
"Sacrament," swears Frère Andre.
Kane is on his feet in a heartbeat, hand flying to his knife.
Matisa raises a hand. "Please, sit," she says, calm.
I throw a look to Isi and Nishwa, who haven't moved a muscle, despite the ghost-cry.
"Mescacakan," Matisa says. Our faces must be comical-blank, because she grins. "Like a wolf, but smaller."
An animal-one that doesn't make its home near the settlement.
"Is it dangerous?" Sister Violet asks.
"They are not." Matisa smiles. "But their song is strange to the new ear."
We listen, and more voices join. Sharp and shrill, coming, it seems, from every direction, all around us. And, true to Matisa's words, as the cries blend and weave they become a kind of song. Sorrowful, beautiful. I can feel my face matching the others' as we stare around at each other, wide-eyed. Daniel is rapt. Nico's brow is furrowed, but a small smile pulls at his mouth.
We sit still as ice, listening.
"The stars," Nishwa says, nodding his head heavenward.
I look up, and my breath stops.
Out here, away from the glare of the burn baskets in the fortification courtyard, more stars than I ever thought possible stream across the dark sky above us. So many stars. Dancing apart and crowding together. Large streaks of white; smears of frost upon a dark wood. Glowing, glimmering. Like they're alive.
Soeur Manon used to describe the night sky as though the Almighty himself had sprinkled bits of silver upon a black cloth. Sitting here, I remember her knobby hands, remember them soothing my brow, and I feel like she's reaching toward me from her resting place.
And I feel the goodness of these woods sinking into my skin. My skin, bathed with the starlight that shines and pulses and echoes the mescacakan song.
