by V. K. Ludwig
“Said who?”
“What?”
Max finally looked up from his microscope. “Who said you can’t resign and appoint someone else? I asked your sister, and she said no law would prevent you from it.”
“Appoint another chieftain?” I asked, the surrounding walls blurring and closing in on me. What he said screamed crazy, so why did the corners of my mouth twitch as if someone pulled on a thread? As if something inside me actually considered it?
“That’s never been done before. Besides, whom would I appoint? Most men I know would still come back for me in the middle of the night and execute my family, fearing I might challenge my decision at a later point.”
He pressed his eye once more onto the lens and squeezed the other one shut. “I still don’t see why you would consider yourself broken if you couldn’t produce an heir. You’re a good chieftain, Rowan, and I dare say you might even be a good husband.”
I scoffed. “If I was such a good husband, why would my wife have left me?”
“You wanna hear what I think?”
“Nope.”
He looked up at me, cocked his head and drew in a long breath. “I think you don’t give a shit about the clansmen. Or an heir. Or someone challenging you. You and I both know you’re not that easy to kill, and you have some of the best fighters behind you.”
Max flipped the light switch on the microscope, but he could just as well have turned off the sun. Everything inside of me went dark, leaving my soul lost and disoriented.
“I think there’s only one thing you truly fear,” he said, the little bit of pity in his voice scratching across my heart. Ripping it out. Leaving it behind in the darkness. “You worry that she’ll leave you again, don’t you? Worry she might think you’re broken.”
“So it’s true then. I am broken…”
He placed his hand onto my shoulder. “You are perfectly fine the way you are, and I bet Darya would say the same. But, Rowan, there won’t ever be an heir.”
Chapter 22
Darya
“Don’t think I take it for granted that you came here,” Hazel said, crisscrossing her legs on the giant purple and red-striped floor pillow. “I know we’re not friends, but I figured you could share a few more details. You know, between us women.”
No, we weren’t friends. But my embarrassment over believing she had something with Rowan still hung over me like a dark cloud and wouldn’t quit pouring. The least I could do was answer her invitation. For tea and goodies, she said. Yeah, right — interrogation was more like it.
Adair cleared his throat and leaned back against the wall of windows, trays with wheatgrass sprouting behind them. “I might not be a woman, but I’d still like to know what kind of man that guy is. He’s marrying my sister after all.”
“There isn’t much more to tell about chieftain Xavier.” I shrugged for what felt like the tenth time and grabbed another brittle lingonberry muffin from the plate in front of us.
Ruth pulled her knees together and curled her feet up. “Sorry, they’re so dry. Adair showed me how to use the solar oven, but I’m still not getting it right.”
“I like them.” Adair took one and held it up for all of us to see. “You make pretty good muffins. And you put something in there this time. Like… a spice or something.”
A smile lit up her face, making her flushed cheeks even more prominent. “Rosemary. I put rosemary in it. And some of those dried orange peels you gave me. Just a bit.”
She picked up the tray and reached it out to me. “Another one?”
For a moment I could have sworn that, just beneath the tray, her knee inched toward Adair until it bumped against his.
He jumped up, his forehead in wrinkles and his gestures hurried. “I forgot I have to open the radiator lines before the house cools down too much.”
Even in the depth of winter, the sunroom felt too hot, and I thought I saw the broccoli sprouts hanging their heads inside their black growing trays. Adair jumped up and shuffled over the floor pillows and wicker stools.
“Want me to come, too?” Ruth asked.
Adair swung up his palm. “Absolutely not.”
Hazel rested her hand on mine. “Are you sure there’s nothing else you can tell me about chieftain Xavier?”
“I already told you I didn’t exactly spend much time with him,” I said, thankful that it was the truth. “He’s not a bad guy. At least I don’t think he is. Just a bit… complicated. Maybe?”
Her fingers dug into my skin. “You believe he has a bad temper?”
“Bad temper?” I couldn’t help but let out a scoff. “He seems to have the emotional range of a doorknob.”
The sunroom turned quiet for a moment, making the room feel even more like the sweaty, smothering and glorified greenhouse it was.
“You’ll be fine,” Ruth said in a calming voice, brushing Hazel’s ashen hair from her clammy cheeks. “From what Darya said it sounds like he’s a nice-enough guy. And you can always come back if he’s not. I mean, they have laws to protect women from abuse, right? Just like here?”
“If he’s a real jerk, he can make my life a living hell without ever rough-handling me,” Hazel said and scrunched up her nose. “Divorce isn’t really a thing here unless someone fucked up big, big time. No guy who scored a wife would be so stupid to let a woman get away from him.” She flicked her eyes toward me and reached out for an awkward pat against my arm. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to —”
“No, you’re right. I fucked up,” I said. “Instead of running away from it all, I should have sat down with Rowan and talk. I messed up big time, and I’m done making excuses for it. All I can hope for now is his forgiveness at some point, and that we can make it work.”
“Make what work?” Hazel asked, her wide eyes locking with Ruth’s. “Like… the co-parenting thing?”
The night in the tent pushed back into my mind, prickling my eyes and slowing my breath. Who gave a shit about politics? There was hope now. Hope, and a real chance at making this work, no matter what others thought.
“The thing is,” I said, a heavy sob clinging to my vocal cords. “I don’t think Rowan still wants to go through with the divorce. And neither do I.”
Fast and relentless, my head began spinning at my own words. Even now that I had shared them with others, they still sounded fake.
Hazel’s posture stiffened. She turned her head away from me, giving me a good look at her ponytail, which swayed from left to right and back again.
“I’m very happy for you,” Ruth said in a sweet voice, but she eyed Hazel’s reaction in what seemed like a mix of confusion and seeking guidance.
Hazel jumped up from her pillow, which made it skitter against the muffin tray. She walked over to one of the floor-to-ceiling windows, pulling frantically on a pair of white strings.
“You won’t be happy for them anymore once you have to hide inside the house all day,” she said, lowering one of the wooden blinds down along the smudged glass. “Guess it’s a good thing I’m marrying Xavier. Leaving this place never sounded better than right now.”
Ruth grabbed the floor pillow and pressed it against her chest, glancing around for an explanation. Not that she would understand. How could she? She didn’t realize how things were before Rowan. How things might be again if…
“What’s going on in here?” Adair had pushed the sliding door open, leaning half his body into the room. “Five minutes without me and a cat-fight breaks out?”
Hazel pointed her finger at me like a knife. “Rowan won’t divorce her.”
Adair stepped into the room and gave a clicking sound with his tongue, slowly sliding the door shut behind him. “I see.”
“Um, I don’t… I don’t understand,” Ruth stammered, her innocence placing needles underneath my tongue. Reassurances or explanations, it didn’t matter — whatever I said would leave a bloody taste on my lips.
“My sister thinks people will turn against Rowan for staying with a tr… um… with
—”
“With a traitor,” I whispered, the rough taste of iron rubbing against my tongue.
“With his wife,” Adair said. “She thinks there might be a rebellion which Rowan couldn’t fight off.”
“Might?” Hazel sneered, her gaze bouncing from place to place. “The entire village will turn on him, and there’s no telling what kind of man will replace him. All those new laws and… everything will be like it was before. The rapes. The assaults. The… the…”
“Does that mean we won’t be safe here anymore?” Ruth asked, digging her fingers deeper into the pillow, pulling it against her chest. “Nobody would touch me, right? Right?”
“You’re freaking her out, Hazel.” Adair walked over to Ruth, kneeled down in front of her and caught her eyes. “I promised I’ll protect you, and nothing will change that. Nobody will touch you as long as I live.”
Hazel crossed her arms in front of her chest and spun around. “Stop making her promises you can’t keep.”
“Shit, Hazel. What is it with you?” Adair asked and stared at his sister. “It’s not like everyone here is against it. I don’t give a shit about whom Rowan is married to. I got his back, and so does River, Oriel, Uncle Peter —”
“Keep going dear brother,” Hazel said, raising an eyebrow in a I-dare-you kind of way. “Think you’ll be able to count out ten men? Fifteen, maybe? You are stupid if you believe Rowan will win this.”
“It’s not gonna come to that,” Adair’s voice wavered as if unconvinced of his own statement.
My heart sunk deeper and deeper, bottoming out somewhere near my guts. I was motionless as if embedded in thick air and an overbearing feeling of a terrible fate. Barely hanging on to the edge of my reasoning. I can’t break his heart again.
“I only hope he will come to his senses and change his mind,” she said.
Panic pushed inside my ribcage. So far, I hadn’t considered that he might change his mind. No… he wouldn’t. I was sure.
Hazel studied me with her lips pressed together like plywood, concern seeping from the wrinkles around her mouth. No, not concern. Much stronger than that. Panic, almost. “Did it ever cross your mind that things might have been better if you didn’t come back?”
Is this fair, her eyes added as an unspoken question, dragging your own Clan back into chaos?
I had no answer.
“Did you leave Rose with Autumn?” Adair asked. “I better walk you back now, but we can swing by at the cabin and pick her up on the way.”
I shook my head, more at myself than his question. “No. I’d like to go to the village first and see Rowan. He went to see Max earlier, but should be back at the longhouse now.”
He gave me a quick nod and disappeared inside once more, leaving us women behind with a mix of fears and doubts. Hazel had once more turned away, her face almost as pale as the snow she overlooked through the windows. Ruth remained hunched over the pillow.
“Ready when you are,” Adair said, stepping back into the sunroom and handing me my coat.
I left without saying another word, telling the concerned voices in my head to shut the fuck up. Rowan would have told me if he wasn’t certain. And even if people would rebel against him, he’d take care of it. Some of our best men supported him. Adair said so himself.
So why the hell did my stomach feel as if I’d jumped off a cliff?
We left the home and headed south-east toward the village, trampling footprints two feet deep into the snow. The white blanket of winter reminded me a whole lot of my mind, wiped blank, leaving me disoriented and wary.
“I didn’t need you to walk me down here,” I said as we approached the village where salted fish hung strung on a line to dry with the freeze.
“Yeah, it’s pretty safe for everyone now…” he said, the way his thoughts stole the momentum of his voice, making it clear there was more. Safe for everyone. Except me.
Rowan’s eyes, somehow a darker gray than just a day ago, found mine the moment I stepped into the longhouse. I gave him a reassuring smile. A we-can-do-this smile.
His gaze flinched away from me, flitting about the room without returning.
“What are you doing here?” he mumbled, fidgeting through a stack of old maps on the table in front of him.
“Wanted to stop by and say hi before I pick up Rose and go back home.” And talk. Reassure each other.
“It’s awfully nice of Adair to bring you here, but it isn’t his job to play your guard. His skills are better applied somewhere else.” His eyes remained locked on the paper in front of him, waving me over with his hand. “I need your input here.”
I took a step toward him, his rumbling voice suspending my foot inches above the ground. “Not you. Adair.”
“Oh…” I said, glancing over my shoulder at Adair who hurried to his chieftain’s side.
“We received a recorded message from the council,” Rowan said, his voice raspy. “Said they prosecuted pastor William, Max’s dad, as a conspirator and public enemy. They gave us some coordinates, around twenty-three miles west of their northern gate.”
“To do what?” Adair asked.
Rowan sucked in his cheek and squinted his eyes at one map, his finger tapping mindlessly against the brittle paper. “That’s what I’m trying to figure out here. Maybe they want us to come to get him.”
“Yeah… I don’t think so. Maybe it’s a trap,” Adair said, “and they’re trying to get us.”
“Damn right.”
Adair took a few steps away from the table and rubbed the back of his neck. “Did they say anything else? Or give a time and date?”
“Nothing.”
“Something doesn’t feel right about this.” Adair returned to the table and leaned over the maps, his palms firmly pressed against the wood. “You don’t just give fucking coordinates and don’t specify a time or date. By the time we get there, someone from the Ash Zones might have been quicker. Or a bear. Or a cougar. I say we send three men first thing tomorrow morning.”
A shadow squirmed over Rowan’s already gloomy face. “Not a chance. I can’t spare a single man. Not as things are right now.”
His eyes came looking for mine from a lowered head. They locked for a fraction of a second.
I gave him a reassuring nod.
No nod came back.
He wasn’t asking for reassurance, turning my heartbeat into a stutter inside my ears at the realization of it. No, those sorrow-filled craters across his forehead told me just how terrible things were.
“We will send two of the younger scouts,” he said, tracing his finger across pale-green ink. “Give them two of our rangefinder binoculars and have one approach from the north, the other from the north-west. If this forest here is still standing, it should give them enough cover to go undetected. We need to know what’s waiting for us before we go in.”
Adair carefully folded the map back into a neat rectangle and pinched it underneath his arm. “Consider it done. I’ll brief them right now.”
He gave me a nod and rushed out the longhouse, leaving me behind feeling like extra luggage nobody cared to claim. But I wouldn’t let this deter me. I ran once when things got tough. Never again.
“Did you tell Max?”
“Not yet,” Rowan said, his head dropping further. “No need to upset him when we don’t even know yet what we’re dealing with. I want some details on this area first.”
I walked up to Rowan and let my hand glide over his strong shoulder and down his arm, ignoring how his muscles tensed underneath his sweater. “I’m sure everything’s gonna be okay.”
“Sure you do.” He pulled his arm away, letting the cold of the room penetrate the skin of my palm. “You think everything’s gonna be perfect. Well, guess what? It will not be okay, and it sure as hell won’t be fucking perfect.”
A quake rumbled through my knees.
I grabbed for the edge of the table and sturdied myself against the wood. Something’s happened. Did he change his mind?
“Support?” he asked, his voice a little too bright, a little too… sarcastic. “The last time I needed your help and support you took off and disappeared for a year without saying a word.”
What he said hit me in the face like a concrete block, turning me dizzy and disoriented. He is just tense. He is overworked. He is in a tight spot.
He is… he is… he is…
My inner voice turned into a dying echo, disappearing somewhere behind a wall of sense. He must have changed his mind. Why else would he push me away like that?
I pressed my behind against the table and inched closer to him, letting the beard on his cheek bunch up inside my hand. He let out a deep sigh, his throat almost too narrow for all to fit through. For a moment, he closed his eyes as if hiding something from me behind his lids. What it was I couldn’t tell. Did he take on more than he could handle by bringing me back? By staying with me?
Whatever it was added another concrete block, stacking itself between us like a solid wall.
I searched for my inner voice. Not the one that talked sense. The one that went against all the odds, because I loved this man with every pump of my heart. I found it whispering a gentle I love you, fading quicker than the closeness between me and my husband, who began to turn his face away from me.
I took a deep breath. “Why are you like this? Why are you pushing me away—”
“Everything’s either broken or fucking falling apart.” His face hardened, and my heart turned to stone. “I think you’re better off without me, Darya. There’s no god damn fixing for us.”
Chapter 23
Rowan
“I think you’re better off without me, Darya. There’s no god damn fixing for us,” I said.
Because I am not worth it. I am not worth it.
The words replayed inside my head, making me flinch away from the warm hand of the woman I loved so damn much.