by Ruby Dixon
“Give me another root,” Hemalo says, his gaze on the female.
I get another out of my bag and hand it to him. He offers it to the creature, but she only chirps and looks expectantly at me. Even her hunger cannot sway her from her kit. I have an idea, and I crouch on the ground, holding Shasak out. “Here,” I whisper. “Come see him.”
She creeps toward me, chirping hesitantly. As she moves, I can see her ribs through her thick, matted fur, and my heart aches. Why are they so hungry? Did the earth-shake send them far from their home, too? “It is all right,” I say in a low, soothing voice. “We are here to help.”
The female reaches for Shasak, even as Hemalo gets to his feet and moves to the fire. He gets a length of leather and dips it into the water I have warming in the pouch, and then approaches the female, squatting next to her. She cringes back, hissing.
I hold Shasak out again.
She reaches for the kit, and Hemalo reaches for her arm again. The female hisses once more, but does not run away. She growls low in her throat and hisses, but her long hands creep toward Shasak, and she touches him, making sure he is all right.
“Do not let go of the kit,” Hemalo murmurs to me as he begins to dab at the terrible wound on her arm. “If you hold him, I think she will stay long enough to let me help her.”
I nod, and my gaze meets the mother metlak’s. Does she understand that I am trying to help her? That I want nothing more than to love and care for her kit? Perhaps she does, because she does not snatch him from my grip. She strokes his fur and chirps at him, while Hemalo cleans the wound. Sometimes he hits a sore patch and she turns to hiss at him, but she does not move away.
“Is it broken?” I ask him as he continues to wash it.
“I do not know. I do not think they have a healer.” He looks concerned.
A terrible thing. I have never thought about how precious Maylak is to our tribe—I have always harbored a little resentment for her because she did not save my Hashala. But how much worse would we be without a healer? She worked tirelessly to heal Pashov in the cave-in. She has watched carefully over the births of so many kits and fixed many wounds, all without complaint. To have no healer at all must be that much more dangerous. I wonder if the female and her mate have a tribe or if they are alone. Perhaps that is why they are starving. Perhaps her tribe died in the earth-shake.
“Her arm will need to be sewn,” Hemalo murmurs to me. “The flesh is badly torn. Do you think she will sit still for that?”
I stare at him, aghast. “Who will do that? You?”
He shrugs. “I am good with an awl. Unless you wish to do it?”
I do not. Just the thought makes my stomach churn. “Will she sit still?”
“We will use intisar to numb it and hope she does not notice.”
“And if she does?”
“You and I wear a few new scratches.” He gives me a faint smile. “If we do not, though, her arm will not stay clean.”
I nod slowly. “There is intisar in the baskets.” It is one of the few plants that the metlak did not eat.
For the rest of the morning, we tend to the wounded female. It takes time to chew up the intisar roots and longer still to slather the wounded arm so it can be numbed. As Hemalo works, I make soothing sounds and stroke Shasak’s furry head, and then stroke the female’s head as if to suggest that we are friends, that I am taking care of her. I offer the root again, and she takes it, chewing frantically even as she touches the kit in my arms over and over again. She seems to feel that if she can touch her kit, that all is well. She hisses at Hemalo as he sews her arm, but otherwise ignores him. Occasionally I see a shadow pass in front of the cave entrance, and that tells me that the male is outside, waiting, but not brave enough to come inside. Hemalo is careful with the female metlak, taking care of her wounds as if she were his own, and stitching the flesh as tight as possible. He rubs more intisar paste on the wound when he is done and wraps the arm in a length of leather, tying it off at the wrist. The female hisses at him and immediately tries to chew on the ties. Hemalo adds more paste to the outside of the leather, giving me a rueful look. “If we make it taste bad, perhaps she will not be in such a hurry to eat it.”
It seems to work; the female chews again and then makes a face, her tongue flicking over and over again as she tries to get rid of the numbing, foul intisar paste.
“What now?” I ask.
“Now,” he says, and his voice is incredibly gentle, “we should give her her kit back.”
My heart aches. I have to swallow the knot forming in my throat. “I do not want to. I want to keep him.”
“I know. But would you want someone to keep your kit from you?”
I would not. I slowly hand him over, every bone in my body protesting. The female immediately snatches him from my grip with a surprising ferocity, hauling him against her chest. She scuttles backward, hissing at us one last time before racing out into the snow. I hear a couple of angry hoots and calls from her mate, and then they are both gone, leaving only their stink behind.
My heart feels as if it is breaking all over again. The cave is silent. The blanket I cradled Shasak in is empty in my arms. It should not hurt as much as it does, and yet I feel hollow and so alone all over again. I cannot stop the tears from falling down my cheeks.
“Asha, my mate,” Hemalo murmurs, such tenderness in his voice. He comes to my side and puts his arm around my shoulders, pulling me close against him. “It is all right to be sad.”
I sob against his shoulder, burying my face against his neck. I ignore the excited hum of my khui, because my heart hurts too much to think of such things right now. I think of Shasak, so small and trusting in my arms…and the way his mother snatched him back and raced away from the cave. All we tried to do was help her. Will she have enough milk to feed him? Will she discard him again to go hunting, and this time it will not be someplace safe because we are in their cave? My heart is full of worry and sadness, and I cannot stop weeping.
“Shh,” Hemalo whispers against my mane. He strokes my back, over and over again. “I have you.”
For some reason, that just makes me cry harder. He does not have me. He has left me. I only found him because I came after him. I cannot stop weeping. “Everything I love leaves me.”
“I am here.” His big hand rests on my lower back, and then he squeezes my side. “Feel me against you.”
I shake my head, so sad that I feel it deep in my soul. “You left me, too. Always, you leave me.”
“Is that what you think?” His big hand cups my jaw, and he forces me to look up into his eyes. There is such sadness there, sadness and love, and it makes me ache all over again. “You think I choose to leave you?”
I feel his tail trying to twine with mine, and I flick it away. I push at his shoulder. “What should I think? When I need you the most, you turn your back to me. Twice you have done it now! You left me after Hashala died, and you have left me again now that we resonate? Tell me what I am supposed to think of that.” My voice grows in strength with anger and hurt.
He stares at me for a long, long time, saying nothing.
“What?” I say, feeling defensive.
Hemalo sighs. “I am a fool. I should have explained myself.”
“That would be nice,” I say tartly, though I do feel better to hear him call himself a fool. It is what I have called him in private, after all.
He brushes his knuckles over my cheek, and I want to start crying again at how good it feels to have that small, loving touch. “I left you because I care for you.”
“That makes no sense,” I tell him, pushing his hand away. “Only a fool would say such a thing.”
“Perhaps so, but it was how I chose to help.” The look in his eyes is so sad. “I left our mating because my presence made you angry. Every time you looked at me, you were full of fury. You attacked me with words, and you sought the furs of others. It made me feel like my presence at your side was making things worse. I thought maybe
if you had time to yourself, time to heal, then you would come back to me.” He gazes at me with such love that it feels as if he is touching my cheek all over again, even though his hand is not moving. “And even if you did not come back to me, if you were happy, I could live with that. It is your sadness that tears me apart.”
I swallow hard. What he says is true. I was not a good mate. After Hashala died, I was numb. And then, I got angry. I lashed out at everyone, but most especially at him. If Hemalo said anything to me, I attacked. If he looked at me wrong, I spat ferocious words at him. I kicked him from my furs. I destroyed his leathers and his work when I was upset, which was often. “I was a terrible mate. But I felt you were not even trying to understand me.”
“I was not,” he agrees softly. “I was lost in my own grief. I wanted you to turn to me for comfort, and instead, you turned away and made me your enemy. I felt as if I lost both my kit and my mate in the same day.”
That hurts. It hurts the most because he’s not wrong. I did not think about his pain, only my own. The apology I want to say sticks in my mouth, though. It is hard for me to unbend, to accept that I have been the terrible one in this mating. That he was quietly trying to be there for me and I pushed him away. It does not make me feel good. So I tell him the only thing that comes to mind. “I never went to another’s furs.”
“If another male would make you happy, I would give you to him,” Hemalo says gently. “I know you have never wanted to be with me.”
I open my mouth to protest, but have I not said the very same words to him in anger? Before we mated, I enjoyed flitting from the furs of one male to another. I liked being coveted by every hunter in the tribe and choosing to bestow my favor. I never looked at Hemalo, because he was always quiet, never loud or demanding. He was content to stand in the background. When we resonated, the entire tribe was shocked, but no one more so than I. It was like I had seen him for the first time when my khui sang to his. At first, I was upset. Why did I not get one of the strong, brash hunters that flirted with me? Why did I get the quiet tanner who was content to stand in the background?
But resonance chooses. And I think it chose wisely for me. Over time, I grew to appreciate that Hemalo was steady and quiet. I learned to like his soft smiles and gentle voice. I liked that he was content to let me shine while he stood behind me. We never competed for attention, he and I. Hemalo is happy to let me take the lead. I did not realize how pleasant it was and how right for me he was until I lost him. Everyone else in the tribe eventually irritates me with their words or their demands. Not Hemalo.
Perhaps I pushed so hard against him after Hashala died because he did not fight. Because he did not rage like me. He was quiet in his sorrow, because he is always quiet. Why am I just now seeing this? Why did it take me so long to recognize that because he is different than me in personality, he will grieve differently than me, too?
I feel ashamed. “I might not have picked you at first, but you are the only one I can see myself with. You are the one that is right for me…except that you keep leaving,” I add, unable to resist jabbing at him. “Twice now you have abandoned me.”
He gives me a small, rueful smile that makes my belly flutter. “It is because the throbbing here,” he begins and presses my hand over his heart, “means that it makes the throbbing here,” he says as he leads my hand to his cock, “unbearable.”
“Do you think it’s more bearable for me if you leave?” I retort, and stroke his cock through his leathers just to be spiteful. And maybe because I enjoy teasing him. Maybe. I feel a shiver move through my body as he hardens under my grip, and his khui begins to sing even louder. I cannot resist touching him, just like I cannot stop the wetness that creeps between my thighs.
“I thought of Jo-see, actually,” Hemalo says.
That stops me cold. I lift my hand, frowning. “Jo-see?” That small, chattery human?
He nods. “Jo-see left and she was able to bear not mating to Haeden for almost a full turn of the moon. I thought perhaps if I left, it would give you time to adjust to the idea of being my mate again. That I could return when you were ready.”
It is the sweetest—and most ridiculous—thing I have ever heard. “That is foolish.”
He sighs and rubs his brow. “I seem to think many foolish things around you.”
“This is true. Why did you not talk to me?”
“You think I do not wish to talk? I talk. It is you that does not wish to listen.”
I scowl at him. “You never talk to me. You never tell me what you are thinking. You force me to guess, and I guess wrong. I would never tell you to leave our cave, and I would never tell you to walk away when we resonate! It solves nothing!”
“You never talk to me, either. You think it is easy for me to see you hurting and when I try to find out what is bothering you, you turn me away? You snarl at me and push me aside? You never tell me how you feel. I am your mate. Your happiness is everything to me. You think it does not wound my heart when you want nothing to do with me?”
I glare at him, but the tears come again, because I know he is right. I am not good at expressing myself when I get angry. I shut down and hide away. “I will try harder,” I grit out, and it sounds very sullen, even to my own ears.
“All I want is for you to talk to me when you are troubled or when you are hurting.”
“I am hurting right now,” I say hoarsely, thinking of Shasak out in the cold with his dirty, hungry mother. More tears start to flow from my eyes, and I cannot help myself. My lower lip quivers, and then I bury my face against his neck again, because it is too much for me to handle.
“I know you are.” He strokes my mane, his hands and voice soothing. “You are full of love and want a kit of your own. You want to be a mother.”
“I am a mother. My kit is dead.” I sob. “I still miss her.”
“I miss her every day, too. That will not go away, Asha. But we can keep our memories of her and still move on with our lives. She would want you to live. She would want you to be happy.” He strokes my cheek. “And you have not been happy.”
I have not. Not since she breathed her last. I have been miserable and tried to make Hemalo miserable, too. “Sometimes I worry I do not know how to be happy.”
“I think you do.” His caresses feel wonderful against my skin, and he smells so good. I love huddling against him. For the first time in a long time, I feel warm and protected and strangely calm. I am crying and upset, but…I still feel it will all be all right. Is this what I have been missing? Hemalo’s soothing love?
Perhaps I am a bigger fool than he is.
I sniff, snuggled against him. “I am still going to miss Hashala.”
“I know.”
“And now Shasak, too. He was mine, even if I only had him for a day.” I barely had Hashala for longer.
“You can miss them both,” he agrees. “But you cannot allow it to destroy your life.”
He is right. Still, I think of Shasak and how small and helpless he was in my arms. His mother was starving and injured, and the one-eyed mate to her not much better. “What if they cannot survive the brutal season?” I whisper. “What if I have sent Shasak back with his mother just to starve to death?”
Hemalo pats my back, reassuring me like he would a kit. Once I would have found it irritating, but today I find it soothing. “If you wish, we can spend a few days gathering roots and bringing them back to the cave so they will have food to eat. We can see if they will follow us, since they know we have food. If they do, perhaps we can lead them somewhere where the food is more plentiful.”
I suck in a breath. What he is suggesting, no other hunter would consider. Take time during the brutal season to feed metlaks? But Hemalo does not think like a hunter. He never has. “You would do such a thing?”
“Of course. You are my mate, and it is important to you.” He rests his chin against the top of my head, next to my horns. “And for a day, he was my son, too.”
Tears blur my eyes ag
ain. “You are a good mate. I am sorry I have been so awful to you.”
“Not awful.” He touches my cheek again. “Just unhappy. And I did not work harder to make you happy. I retreated into my own hurt, thinking I was doing what was best for you. I will talk to you from now on, I promise.”
“And you will not leave?”
“Never,” he whispers. His fingers graze my chin once more, and then he tilts my face up. We gaze at each other for a long moment, and then he leans in and presses his mouth to mine.
I draw back, surprised. “What are you doing?”
“A mouth-mating, like the humans do.” He looks puzzled. “Did I do it wrong?”
“I…do not know.” I press my fingers to my lips, curious. My khui is singing loudly, but I do not know if it is because we are snuggled close or because the mouth-mating is exciting.
His smile is gentle. “Then we will have to practice it.”
15
HEMALO
Six Days Later
“Are they still following us?” Asha murmurs as she moves to my side, wading through the deep snow. “Or did we lose them?”
I glance backward, squinting at the distant ridgeline. My eyes are better than hers, and I can pick out the yellowish coats of the metlak in the distance, even against the endless white hills. “They are still there.”
“Good,” she says, her expression brightening. “I think this is a good valley. Lots of plants. They will have plenty to eat here.”
I grunt agreement, turning forward again and wading through the snow. The weather has been foul off and on, dumping snow every time the clouds appear. Between storms, Asha and I have been collecting roots to feed the metlak couple. We leave them outside of the cave every evening, and by morning they are snatched away again. It does not matter how much food we put out, either. It is all gone by the morning. Asha frets that they do not know how to pace themselves, to save food when their bellies are full. She worries what will happen if we leave.