Page 92 of Mates for the Raskarrans #1-6

CHAPTER TWELVE

Vantos

W e were lucky to reach the cave before the storm started in earnest. Bad enough to be caught in the downpour, but at least we are in shelter now the thunder and lightning have begun.

Not that it seems to make any difference to Rachel.

She shakes and trembles in my arms as the thunder rolls outside, her little face burrowing into my neck.

I feel every tremor of fear that passes through her, each whimper escaping her mouth spoken against my skin.

“Does the sky not storm on your world?” I ask, stroking her hair in an attempt to soothe her.

It is still damp from the rain, not as soft and silky as normal.

I follow the path of her back down, ending with my hand resting against her hip.

My top is bunched up, her soft, smooth legs revealed beneath it.

My mouth goes dry as she hooks her legs over mine, burrowing even closer to me, another flinch rocking her as lightning illuminates the cave once more, her little hands jamming over her ears in anticipation of the thunder.

I place my own hand over hers, shielding her ear from the noise, the other is pressed against my heartspace, which thunders in its own way at her closeness. I hope it drowns out the worst of the thunderclap for her, that she is less frightened for it.

When the rumble finishes, I remove my hand, speaking to her in soothing tones.

“It is okay. The storm is some distance from us. We do not need to fear it. It is just loud and bright. It will pass before long. I knew it was coming - it is the temperature. When it drops suddenly, you know the heavy rains are about to start. You can smell the approaching rain on the air, also. When I climbed the tree, I could see the storm clouds gathering. That is why I ran with you through the trees, to bring you to these caves so you would feel safer. You think it is loud now, here, but you should try enduring such a storm in a tent.”

I chuckle to myself, remembering many a night endured on watch, wet through to my very bones as I watched the lightning arcing across the sky.

“Sometimes, the rain falls so heavily, that the fabric of the tent can no longer keep it out. I have slept many cold, uncomfortable nights, wishing for my hut as rain water dripped on my head.”

I know she does not understand my words, but I hope she can read the lack of fear in my tone, in my calmness.

I stroke her back, my other hand resting against her thigh, my thumb brushing the soft flesh there.

My tail has looped around her leg without my command, my body instinctively seeking to comfort her.

Another flash, another ripple of thunder.

Rachel still flinches and trembles. I keep talking to her of nothing.

I tell her stories of the time when I was a youngling, my sisters still babes in our mother’s arms. Two younglings at once.

It is a rare blessing among raskarrans. My parents were much blessed by Lina.

I tell Rachel of their mischievous ways, how you would be just done getting one out of trouble, and the other would be in it.

Always tipping over storage baskets, finding our father’s hunting blades, eating things from the ground.

It is strange. Normally, even thinking of them hurts my heartspace, but telling the stories to Rachel only makes me smile.

The ache is still there, it always will be, but it is dull. Not a sharp pain as it usually is.

The storm continues to rage outside. I break from comforting Rachel to arrange the pelts for sleeping.

It is early yet, but there is no point waiting up.

By the time the storm has ended, it will be too dark for safe travel.

We may as well sleep early and rise with the sun.

Make up for the time we have lost this evening that way.

I go to set up Rachel’s bedding on the other side of the cave, but she shakes her head, dragging it back to where I am. Rachel settles herself right next to me, moving my arm so it is wrapped around her. I can feel the rapid beat of her heartspace against it, her fear still strong.

I curse that I have not the words to reassure her.

That I cannot explain that it is just nature, that many storms will rage between now and when the big rains come.

That she has nothing to fear from it as long as the storms are not directly overhead.

And even then, the rains usually prevent the lightning from starting fires.

“If the storms get particularly bad or close back at the village, we sometimes go to caves like this one,” I tell her.

“That way, should a tree be felled by the wind, we are protected by the rocks. That is Lina’s way.

She provides us everything we need to be safe and prosperous.

But this is not a bad storm. If we were home in the village, you would be spending this night safe in your hut with the sick one.

The female with the bad arm.” Her name evades me for a moment. “Lorna.”

Rachel rolls over, looking up at me. “Lorna?”

“This is the female you share a hut with, yes?” I gesture to my arm, miming it hurting. “Lorna?”

“ Whadabowt Lorna?”

I sit up, reaching for a branch from the fire. I use the ash coating the burnt end of it to draw a crude picture of a hut on the cave floor, and two stick shaped figures inside it.

“Rachel,” I say, gesturing to one, then, pointing at the other, “Lorna.”

“Oh,” Rachel says. “ Myroommate.”

“Myroommate,” I repeat, trying to wrap my tongue around her strange words.

Rachel giggles, and I smile, delighted to have succeeded in distracting her.

“ My ,” she says, patting her chest. “ Umm, my.”

The sound of a raskarran word on her lips makes my heartspace jolt. But it makes sense that this would be one she would learn. Gregar and Anghar both refer to their females as ‘my Liv’, ‘my Ellie’.

“ Room-mate,” she says, enunciating the words clearly as she gestures to the hut and the two figures inside it.

“This is a word that means living together?” I gesture to the figures. “Ellie, Anghar, roommate.”

Rachel giggles again, and when a flash of lightning illuminates the cave, her flinch is less. I scoop her into my arms, holding her as the thunder claps. Already it is growing more distant, the storm passing us by. Rachel shudders, but she seems less afraid, and it makes my heartspace glad.

“ Ithinktheremoarthan roommates,” she says when the final rumbles fade.

She turns back to the drawing, scuffing out the lines of the hut with her fingers.

“Ellie, Anghar,” she says, pointing to each little figure in turn. “ Whassthewordfomates?”

She frowns, shaking her head. “ Issthesamestoopidword. ” She taps the image again. “Ellie, Anghar, lovers. Gregar, Liv, lovers .”

“Mates?”

“Mates,” she repeats, saying the word slowly as she wraps her little tongue around the shape of it.

Then she draws a little shape above the two figures, like two hills with a point beneath them.

“Mates,” she says as she taps the shape.

It is a symbol, then. I nod to show I understand.

Another flash of lightning and rumble of thunder passes as Rachel draws another two sets of figures, and she is so absorbed in her task that she barely seems to notice.

The first two figures have their arms intertwined, big smiles drawn on their faces.

The second pair have angry faces, their arms folded.

“Sam, Maldek,” she says, pointing to the smiling pair. “Hannah, Mattie. Liv, Khadija.”

Ah, so the smiling represents friendship.

“Friends,” I say.

“Friends.”

She’s beaming now, and my heartspace leaps, delight going through me. I point to the two angry faced figures.

“Enemies.” I take the twig from her hand and draw a cliff by one of the figures and a tree by the other. “Like the Cliff Top tribes and the Deep Forest tribe.”

Rachel considers my additions to the picture, then takes the twig, adding a spear to the Deep Forest figure, and a bow and arrow to the Cliff Top figure.

“Vantos,” she says, pointing to the Deep Forest figure, then indicating the other figure. “ Badguys.”

She turns to me, placing her little hand over the wound on my shoulder. I nod.

“Enemies,” I repeat.

She says the word a few times, then repeats the words for each different relationship in turn. Mates, friends, enemies. They are perhaps not the most useful raskarran words to know, but I will follow the path of her interest, wherever it takes us.

“ Ayhatethatthoseguyshurtyu, ” she says, tapping the Cliff Top tribesman, placing her hand over my shoulder wound and pulling a pouting face.

“ Bad,” she adds, then uses the twig to scribble over the Cliff Top tribesman with a hearty dose of anger.

“ Bad ,” I agree.

“ Good, ” she says, pointing to the figure that represents me. “Friend.”

Even as my heartspace trips over itself in the knowledge that she considers me a friend, my headspace registers that she used the singular form of the word correctly. Clever little female. I decide I will teach her as many words as she wishes to learn.

I start by pointing to the fire and naming it. She copies me, repeating the word until her lips form the right sounds easily. Then she points to other things around the cave - the pelts, the bag, the pile of baskets. She points to the rain outside.

“Fire good, rain bad ,” she says, mixing words from my language and hers. I laugh, understanding her meaning.

“Good,” I teach her, smiling and pointing at the fire. “Bad.”

I put on a grumpy face and indicate the rain, making her burst into peals of delighted laughter.