Page 168 of Mates for the Raskarrans #1-6

CHAPTER TWELVE

Carrie

A ll night, I dream of Endzoh’s hand touching my face. And other places. I wake up hot and restless, wondering how I’ve gone from feeling intimidated by him to this intense crush in a matter of a couple of days.

Lorna knocks on my door first thing, and if she notices how flustered I am, she only attributes it to yesterday’s encounter with Larzon.

“He’s already out on patrols this morning. Vantos left with him first thing.”

My mind is so on other things, it takes me a moment to work out what she’s talking about.

“Breakfast?” Lorna tips her head in the direction of the fire, a question in her look.

Yesterday, I felt like hiding. Today, not so much.

My whole body fizzes with the anticipation of seeing Endzoh - a far louder feeling than any trepidation I might feel.

My face still feels hot where he touched me, and it takes everything in me not to raise my fingers to the spot, trace the path his took.

How can just a brush over my cheek have me so undone?

He was only getting rid of the chalk dust I’d covered myself with, and he left pretty quickly afterwards.

I worried at the time I’d done something to make him uncomfortable - and maybe I did.

He gets uncomfortable pretty easily. But he gestured for me to have a good night’s sleep, smiling in that small, quiet way of his, so I know he’s not upset about it.

The other girls are pleased to see me, and the members of Gregar’s tribe that are about all greet me with a smile.

Endzoh isn’t one of them, and Khadija isn’t around either.

I wonder if they’ve gone out on a patrol or something.

Things have been all over the place since Darran’s tribe arrived, but normal village life must continue, and that means hunts and patrols until the rains come.

There are very few unfamiliar raskarran faces at the fire, and most of them are elders, so I imagine the rest are out learning their new territory, the patrol routes they’ll be taking, the best hunting grounds in the area.

Which means we have the morning to ourselves before raskarrans start arriving back.

Ellie’s out with Anghar, Rachel’s in the healer’s hut caring for Callif, Sally’s walking round the village in an attempt to make herself less uncomfortable during her increasingly frequent contractions, Liv walking with her.

Hannah and Mattie have their slates and practise writing together, while Lorna keeps the children out of trouble.

I take out my sewing things and make a start on my next project - another adjustment on a pair of trousers for Lorna.

I’m just unpicking the seams when Molly comes to sit next to me.

“Would you show me how to sew?” she blurts out in a rush of breath, then blushes, adding in a much quieter voice. “I want to be able to do something that’s actually useful.”

I nod, setting aside Lorna’s trousers and instead turning to my collection of scraps.

I don’t need words to show Molly some basics - I just demonstrate how to do the stitch, then hand it over to her to practise.

She starts off uncertain, her stitching wobbly and uneven.

But she perseveres with it, and within an hour she’s cracked the basics, so I move her on to her first repair.

It’s one of Anghar’s vests, torn during a hunt.

The tear in the fabric just needs sewing up so it doesn’t get worse - nothing technically tricky about it, except making it look neat, and it won’t matter to Anghar if it doesn’t.

Molly gives me a nervous little smile as I hand it to her, then bends over her task with a look of determined concentration.

Working beside Molly reminds me of working with Mom back home.

Every time I teach Molly a technique, I’m remembering my mother’s instruction to me.

How carefully she taught me each element of our craft.

The pride she took in her work and wanted me to take in mine.

I wait for the guilt, to feel a pinch in my gut that I’m sharing something I only ever shared with Mom with someone else.

That I’m finding some joy in it when Mom’s at home alone and always will be.

It is there, but it’s not as loud as it normally is. Just a quiet sort of discomfort in my belly. I touch my fingers to my locket, but it doesn’t increase in weight about my neck.

To my surprise, I’m feeling content. Relaxed.

I wonder if it’s the tea starting to take effect or if it’s because Hannah and Mattie include me in their conversation, encouraging me to write responses.

They squint at my misspelled words, sounding them out until they know what I’m trying to say, the three of us giggling at the issues my bad spelling and their hesitant reading causes.

I suspect it also has something to do with the way my mind keeps going back to the heat of Endzoh’s fingers against my skin. How my whole body seemed to be drawn towards his, an ache settling in my lower belly that I really want to explore.

I don’t know which is the biggest contributor, but my throat feels relaxed enough that I think I could probably speak a few words if I wanted to.

Funny how I’ve wanted it desperately for so long, and now it’s shifted to a pleasant surprise, but not something I need. Lorna’s done that with her writing lessons, Endzoh’s done that with our gesture conversations.

Losing my voice doesn’t mean losing it completely. Not anymore.

The hunters are first to return, bringing with them some smaller animals they’ve caught in traps and snares.

With the big rains coming, most of the larger prey has moved on to different areas, returning to places they can shelter or get away from the non-stop rain.

Most of the smaller creatures have already bedded down in their nests to sleep through til the sun comes out again.

The remaining animals are scrawny, not fat enough to survive such a long sleep, hence why they’re still out and about - making the most of the last few days of feeding, giving themselves more chance to survive. Instead, they’re going into our pot.

I never gave much thought to the source of our food on bottom tier.

It was so unpalatable, so unrecognisable as anything that might have once grown and lived, it didn’t really occur to me to wonder about its origins.

Everything here is so raw, so immediate.

We see the source of everything we use - from the water canteens made from animal bladders, to the sinews I use to sew my clothes, to the small animals spit roast straight over a fire, their living shape still recognisable.

It takes a little getting used to, but there’s an honesty to it, and the raskarrans have great respect for anything their forest provides.

They don’t take more than they need, and they don’t waste.

Jaskry dumps his catch with Namson and goes straight to Sally, who’s still pacing back and forth with Liv.

I watch as he folds her into his arms, soothing a hand over her back, talking to her in a low voice.

Sally presses her face close to his chest and seems to breathe in a great deal of comfort from his scent, his proximity.

Liv leaves them to it, coming over to join us at the fire.

“That baby’s coming any moment now,” she says.

“Grace will hate to miss it,” Molly says, her voice quiet.

“There will be time to send someone for her. She and Calran didn’t go that far.” Liv smiles at Molly. “Grace won’t be forgotten. Don’t worry.”

We begin the lunch prep, the hunters skinning the animals - most of us girls still being too squeamish to do that - while we prepare the rest of the ingredients.

Every few minutes, another raskarran returns to the village, and every time, I try to discreetly glance round to see who it is.

My stomach is a strange mix of fizzing anticipation, and bubbling nervousness, both sensations only increasing for every raskarran arriving that isn’t Endzoh.

It doesn’t help that Darran’s tribe are obviously still feeling put out about the whole mating situation.

Their sullen looks - sometimes very deliberately aimed at me - only make the nerves bubble harder, while the knowledge that a single smile from Endzoh would make me feel better only ratchets up my anticipation.

I’m not the only one who’s noticed their sour mood. Liv watches them with narrowed eyes, but her blazing anger of yesterday has faded into something more like pity.

“We need to sort this out before it becomes a real problem,” she says, and though it’s out of nowhere, no one asks what she’s talking about.

“Can’t you just tell them all to back off?” Mattie says.

“I can,” Liv says, “but I don’t think that’s fair.”

“Not fair on who?”

“On them,” Liv says, unapologetic, “but also on those of you who want to find a mate one day. Darran’s brothers aren’t the only ones who are joining the tribe. When Walset arrives, you might find there’s someone you wouldn’t mind being pursued by.”

I think of Endzoh. Feel the phantom brush of his fingers over my skin. Does he think about me the same way I think about him? I don’t know, but I don’t want him to be warned off before we can figure out what this thing between us is.

“What if we don’t want anything to do with them in that way, though?” Mattie says, shooting a scathing glance in the direction of Darran’s tribe.

“Well, they probably need some help to know that’s your position on the matter.”

“Saying ‘no’ isn’t enough?” Mattie’s expression goes dark. “That doesn’t make them any better than most human guys.”

A heavy silence follows her words. To Liv’s credit, she doesn’t shift uncomfortably. She just looks at Mattie. Meets what she hasn’t said head on.