Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 77764 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 389(@200wpm)___ 311(@250wpm)___ 259(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77764 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 389(@200wpm)___ 311(@250wpm)___ 259(@300wpm)
“Didn’t you hear the part about the storm?” Veronica chides me. “Don’t make me send my mate after you, too.”
“It’s just more snow,” I joke. “And I’m not going far. Just up the hill and looking for some of the sweetweed. I’ll come right back to camp. I won’t be gone more than an hour, maybe two. And I’ll bring a cloak.”
“I’ll go with you, Tita Flor,” Katamneas says brightly.
Veronica frowns down at her young son. “No you will not, sir. You’re going to stay in camp.”
“I shall go with her.”
I cringe at the sound of R’jaal’s voice. Damn it. Do we have to do this song and dance today? I turn towards where R’jaal stands at the entrance to Veronica’s hut. I’m not entirely sure if he followed me here or if there was some other motive, but I’m a little annoyed at his presence. Doing my best to hide it, I smile brightly. “I’m sure you’re busy, and I’ve got to go get a cloak…”
He holds up a spare poncho with a hood on it. My poncho. The one I left in his hut a million years ago and never went back to get.
Well…shit.
Smiling tightly, I take it from him and slip it over my head. “Your timing is amazing. Really.”
“Thank you,” he says, not catching my sarcasm. “Shall I carry your bag?”
If it was anyone else, I’d be all over that offer. But because it’s R’jaal, I practically snatch it away before he can touch it. Everything with R’jaal comes loaded with a ton of guilt. “I’ve got it.”
Veronica gives me a sympathetic look. “Maybe you shouldn’t go out after all.”
I’m tempted. Spending the afternoon listening to R’jaal’s self-recriminations is not high on my list of things I want to do. He’s clearly torn with what he wants from me, and I’m just done with it all. But at the same time, I want to work on the dyes. If I don’t go out and get the leaves today and a storm comes in, I’m going to be sitting in my hut twiddling my thumbs. That decides me.
“It’ll be fine. Come on, R’jaal. I’m heading for sweetweed plants.” I grab my walking stick, salute Veronica, and head for the distant cliff paths that will take me up into the snowy foothills.
R’jaal keeps to my side, even when I slow down as the path grows steeper and a thick snow starts to fall. To his credit, he doesn’t try to push me into returning to camp. In fact, he doesn’t say anything at all.
It’s unusual, but it suits me just fine. I head along one of the paths, scanning the cliffs for the sweetweed. There’s a fair amount of plant life that thrives under the snow (I guess they don’t require much sunlight) that the dvisti eat, but for our part, we tend to stick to the stuff that clings to the cliffs and the bushes that dot the landscape. Sweetweed is one of the cliff vines, so I keep to the rockier parts of the trails and wander along, keeping an eye out for tiny curling leaves and a bluish-green sort of plant.
“I fear we are not friends any longer,” R’jaal says suddenly as I climb over one large rock.
Oh. Errr. How do I answer that without being unfair? “Things just get weird between people when they break up. Not that we were together, but you know what I mean. It’s not just you. It’s how I feel about the situation, too. All of it is just kind of awkward.”
“I do not know what you mean,” he says gravely. “What is broken between us?”
He has to ask that? Is he being deliberately obtuse or is he truly that clueless? I frown in his direction, and then I’m saved by the sight of a sweetweed plant halfway up one of the cliffs. “Aha,” I say, pointing at the object of my desires. “Found one.”
R’jaal practically races forward. “I will retrieve it for you.”
He’s clambering up the cliff wall before I can protest. That’s a little irksome, but it beats having a tough conversation. This is probably difficult for him, too, and I feel a twinge of sympathy. “Great, you get that one and I’ll head farther down the path. Where there’s one, there’s got to be more.”
We collect in silence for a bit, the retrieval of the plants occupying our time. The moment R’jaal points one out, he heads for it, and so I deliberately go find another, and I think about the awkward situation that got us here.
It was all during that first year, when everyone was resonating right and left around us. When it seemed like it was just a matter of time before our khuis went off like rockets and solved the problem of who we’d mate to. I’d been flirty with R’jaal for a while. He’s handsome, and thoughtful, and sweet. Very gallant, something that makes me appreciate his selflessness, and he seems more mature than a lot of the others. As the oldest single woman amongst the humans, I can appreciate a bit of maturity.