Page 3 of Beneath the Mountain Sky

Our brother mutters something from behind us that gets instantly carried away by the breeze rustling the leaves, but even without being able to hear it, I’m confident it wasn’t very complimentary.

So little of what Connor says ever is these days.

Maybe my attitude has been rubbing off on him…

There are certainly enough people around here who seem to think that’s the case, if the comments on Raven’s posts on the McBride Mountain Community News page are any indication.

The way she portrays Connor and me, warning people away from us and our volatile moods, we might as well be wild sasquatches waiting in the forest to attack unsuspecting hikers and tear them limb from limb.

I have been known to rip someone a new one…but they typically deserve it.

Connor finally catches up with us, releasing a huff that has nothing to do with exertion.

We’ve done hikes far worse than this, faster and harder, before and often, scouting for areas to log and hunt, but he, like me, prefers to choose when we go instead of being told we are by our insistent little brother.

I scan the surrounding area before rotating back to Liam. “Where did you say you thought you saw this ‘perfect’ tree?”

Apparently, the only one specific tree in the entirety of the Blue Ridge Mountains he can use to make his next rocking chair happens to be in a copse, nowhere near town or anything resembling civilization.

Go fucking figure.

Liam motions ahead of us vaguely. “It was up near the river. A grove I stumbled upon last year up here.” A glimmer of anticipation flashes across his green gaze, making him practically tremble. “I’ve been eyeing it for a while, waiting for the perfect project.”

His genuine excitement is enough to make some more of my annoyance ebb, and I do my best to push away all those thoughts and memories that plagued me while I was hiking alone.

I step over a fallen log in the direction of the river that flows down the expanse of McBride Mountain. Liam walks beside me where the trees will allow it, with Connor trailing behind.

Liam smacks me on the shoulder. “Thanks for coming with me, by the way.”

“Did I have a choice?”

A slow grin pulls at his lips. “Not really. I would have dragged you two out here, kicking and screaming, if I had to.”

Connor snorts. “I would’ve liked to see you try, little brother.”

Liam tosses him a dirty look, but there isn’t any malice in it or their words. Pushing buttons, testing limits, and throwing verbal barbs have always been our love language—but it hasn’t come to physical blows in years.

Mom would be proud.

At least, of that.

Not of what I’ve done.

Not of what I’ve become.

Acid churns in my stomach, imagining the verbal lashing she would give me if she knew how I destroyed things with Willow as the three of us continue higher up the mountain, weaving through the endless towering trees and dense foliage toward the sounds of the river finally starting to filter to us.

I push away a low-hanging tree branch with my axe so Liam and I can pass around it and almost allow it to sling back and smack Connor, but aggravating him even more isn’t a good idea. “Which side of the river?”

It’s an important question since I don’t particularly feel like wading through the still-chilly water this early in the morning. Especially when I know we’ll be out here for hours, breaking down this tree into manageable-sized logs to get it back to Liam’s workshop on the makeshift sledges we’ll put together with the materials stuffed in the pack Liam carries.

A task that would have been far easier if he had chosen a target that wasn’t in such a hard-to-reach part of the mountain.

This portion of our home is completely wild.

Harsh.

Desolate.