No Shelter Trilogy (Omnibus, Books 1-3)

by T. S. Welti

  I turn my head to stretch the sore muscles in my neck when the snow starts to fall. Isaac pulls his hood over his head.

  “We have to go inside,” he insists. “We can talk in there.”

  When I don’t respond, he throws his arm around my shoulder and guides me into the cave. Everyone is staring at us, except Elysia. She’s already tucked into Eve’s sleeping bag. The burden of innocence puts her right to sleep.

  Mary raises her eyebrows at me and I look away. Daedric and Isaac take in the tense atmosphere with quizzical expressions.

  “What’s going on?” Isaac says, as I take a seat on the sleeping bag and push my hood back. “You guys look like you’re planning a surprise party or something.”

  “Oh, I don’t think it’s that big of a surprise,” Mary says. “In fact, I think it’s pretty microscopic. Wouldn’t you agree, Nada?”

  “Nada, what’s going on?” Isaac asks as he stares at me.

  I feel like a child who’s been caught stealing.

  “I’ll tell you later,” I say.

  “By later she means when I’m not around,” Daedric says, as he slips inside his sleeping bag.

  I peel off my coat and my boots before I slide into our sleeping bag. Isaac gets in after me and I flinch as he slips his hand under my shirt.

  “Your hand’s cold,” I whisper.

  He pulls his hand out and lays it on top of my shirt. “You want to tell me the big secret now?” he whispers in my ear. “Or are you going to make me tickle it out of you?”

  “No!” I whisper. “No, just give me a sec.”

  I turn around to face him and our noses are almost touching. My mind flashes to the night Isaac and I had sex. It felt so right… so perfect. But so much has changed in the three weeks since.

  I lean forward and our lips touch. “I love you,” I whisper.

  “I love you, too,” he whispers. “Is that what you had to tell me?”

  I shake my head and stare at his lips because I don’t want to see the change in his eyes when I say the words.

  “I… I might be… pregnant.”

  I don’t know if he’s stunned or angry or disappointed. I refuse to look up. After a long silence, a chuckle spurts from his lips. I look up and he’s smiling.

  “You’re kidding, right?” he says.

  My heart sinks. This was not the reaction I expected.

  “You’re not kidding?” he whispers.

  I shake my head as he whispers a few curse words.

  “Exactly. What are we going to do?” I whisper. “How am I supposed to hike to Umbra?”

  The fear in Isaac’s face is unmistakable. “I’ll figure it out,” he says. “Don’t… just don’t worry about it. I’ll figure it out.”

  He kisses my forehead and pulls me tightly to him. Suddenly, the story of Isaac’s brother Jack pops into my mind. What does Isaac mean when he says he’ll figure it out?

  CHAPTER 5

  When I wake, Isaac has already started a fire and made a cup of oatmeal. He hands me the cup.

  “Eat up, beautiful,” he says, as he squats next to the fire with a weary smile on his face. “We’re leaving today.”

  Something is different about him.

  “You cut your hair?” I ask then I take a sip of the warm oatmeal.

  His usual shaggy brown hair is hacked down to a short crop of hair that sticks out in all directions yet manages to look purposely gorgeous. It looks so good I’m not even offended that I’m the one who usually cuts his hair.

  He yanks a knit cap out of his coat pocket and pulls it over his head. “Yeah, I really hacked it up.”

  “It looks good,” I say.

  Everyone else is still asleep, but Daedric stirs in his sleeping bag.

  “How long have you been awake?” I ask. “Did you sleep?”

  “I couldn’t sleep, so I got up and did a few things around here. I packed all our stuff and I checked the traps. They were all empty, so I made some oatmeal. How does it taste?” he babbles anxiously.

  “It’s fine,” I say, as I place the cup on the ground and pull on my jacket and boots. “Have you been drinking that coffee you brought from the cabin?”

  “Yeah, I had a little bit. Where are you going?” he asks, as he attempts to help me tie my boots.

  “Nowhere. I’m just cold,” I say, batting his hand away.

  Daedric sits up and pulls his jacket on. He struggles to pull his boot on over his injured foot, but he manages without help from Isaac or me.

  “Do we have any fox jerky?” Daedric asks.

  “We’re all out,” Isaac replies. “And the traps were empty.”

  “I’m going hunting,” I say, as I reach for my backpack, but my hunting gloves aren’t inside the usual pocket. “Where are my gloves?”

  “I packed them up,” Isaac replies. “You can’t hunt. We’re leaving soon.”

  “What are you talking about? I need to hunt.”

  I scour the contents of my pack, but they’re gone.

  “Give me the gloves, Isaac,” I demand.

  He keeps poking the fire and refusing to look at me. “Only if you let me come with you.”

  I storm out of the cave without the gloves, but Isaac is right behind me.

  “Keep the damn gloves!” I shout.

  He cuts in front of me to block my path and I stumble in the fresh snow. He helps me up and hands me my hunting gloves.

  “Here, take the gloves,” he says. “I’m sorry. I just don’t want you to get hurt.”

  “Please don’t do that, Isaac. Don’t start treating me like I’m going to fall apart at any moment.”

  “But you need to be more careful now. You have to think of—”

  “Stop!” I shout. “Please… just stop.”

  The snow gets deeper the further away from the cave I get. I wade through the knee-high snow trying not to breathe too loudly so I don’t scare away potential prey. Every few steps I look over my shoulder to make sure Isaac isn’t following me. When I arrive at a large pine tree, I tear off two large, feathery branches and use them as handheld snowshoes. The mouth of the cave disappears from my view and I plop down on the snow to rest and the tears emerge instantly.

  I weep for my lost freedom. I weep for my increased mortality. I weep because I am now forever bound to Isaac. I weep for a child who did not ask to be born into a forgotten land.

  I return to the cave and plunk two rabbits down next to the fire. Isaac has rolled up our sleeping bag in preparation of our departure. I squat next to the fire to warm my hands and face and close my eyes to block out the stares.

  “Make it all into jerky so we can get out of here,” I say.

  Isaac squats next to me and grabs the dead rabbits by their hind legs. He tosses them to Mary and she gets to work gutting and skinning them.

  “You okay?” he whispers.

  I nod but I don’t speak. Just hearing his words triggers a painful swelling in my throat and I feel like an idiot for not being able to control my emotions. Is this the kind of emotional instability I’m doomed to endure for the next eight months?

  My legs get tired from squatting so I sit back against the cave wall and unfold my legs in front of me. Isaac sits next to me and rests his hand on my knee. We sit in silence for a moment before Elysia bursts into laughter.

  “You guys are so serious,” she says with a giggle and even Mary laughs as she pulls the rabbit’s organs out of its body.

  “We’re just thinking,” Daedric says, ruffling Elysia’s long brown hair.

  She pushes him away with her feet. “You think too much.”

  Daedric topples over and winces as his foot bumps the floor. I fight the urge to tell Elysia to be careful.

  “Hey, watch where you’re landing those kicks, ninja,” Daedric says. “Or I’ll sick Nada on you.”

  Elysia stares at me, trying to determine whether Daedric and I share some sort of secret disciplinary agreement.

  I shake my head. “Don’t listen to him, ho
ney. He’s trying to scare you.”

  Elysia narrows her eyes at Daedric and kicks him again. “See! She’s not mean and ugly like you.”

  “She’s just pretending,” Daedric says. “Go kick her. She’s the one who thinks too much.”

  “No,” Elysia replies.

  “Why not?”

  “Because she’s pretty and you’re not.”

  Daedric shakes his head at me. “Skating by on your good looks again. You should be ashamed of yourself.”

  Isaac appears annoyed, but, for the first time in two days, I can’t contain my smile.

  We head south and make it past the cabin before Daedric needs to rest his foot. Eve and Elysia use the break to brush each other’s hair. Eve does a beautiful braid that curls around Elysia’s head like a seashell.

  “Want me to do yours?” Eve asks me.

  My first instinct is to refuse. It looks like too much work and I have a lot more hair than Elysia, but I give in. I need to get used to viewing the kindness of others as kindness instead of pity.

  By nightfall, we’ve traveled at least twenty miles—much more than we expected to travel considering the collective state of our health. We set up camp on a rocky cliff after clearing away most of the snow. We gather around the fire to eat rabbit jerky and reconstituted vegetable soup. The conversation is light and punctuated by long silences as we try to avoid all topics that could lead to Vic or the Guardians.

  When everyone gets tucked into their sleeping bags, Isaac hands me two pieces of jerky.

  “Eat this,” he whispers, as he tries to push the dried meat into my hand. “You need it more than anyone else. No one’s going to miss it.”

  I shake my head. “Put it back.”

  “Come on, Nada. You just hiked twenty miles. You haven’t eaten enough.”

  “I’ll have more tomorrow,” I whisper. “You can go hunting with me.”

  Isaac looks skeptical, but this suggestion seems to placate him. He wraps the jerky in a handkerchief and stuffs it into my backpack.

  “We’d better take down a bear,” he whispers, as we climb into the sleeping bag. “We have to fatten you up.”

  He slips his arm around me and kisses my neck. I grab his hand and hold it close to my chest as he kisses my ear.

  “I’m going to take care of you,” he whispers. “Like I promised your mom.”

  I’m overcome with a sudden urge to make love to Isaac, but I know I can’t with so many people around. My primal brain begins to conjure up ways for Isaac and I to be alone and I immediately think of tomorrow’s hunt. No, we can’t make love in the snow.

  I turn to face him and he smiles as if he knows what I’m thinking. He kisses me softly on the lips and my breathing quickens. His hand moves over my breast and I shudder.

  “Whoa…” he whispers. “They grew.”

  I move his hand down to my waist and kiss him firmly. His hand slips beneath the waist of my pants and lingers on my abdomen. I grab his hand and shove it farther down.

  His fingers move with gentle purpose. Within minutes I’m clutching the back of his neck to keep from convulsing. I can feel his lips curl into a smile as we kiss.

  “What was that about?” he whispers.

  “I don’t know,” I whisper, as I collapse in his arms. “Please don’t judge me.”

  He chuckles as he kisses my forehead. “How could I judge you?”

  CHAPTER 6

  I’m the first to wake in the morning so I grab a book out of my backpack and nestle in next to Isaac to read Undine’s Daughter. It’s the only possession I still have from before the storm. This was Lara’s favorite book. My mother bought it for Lara before she was murdered and she read all three hundred pages of it seven times in three months.

  When my mother and I were forced to abandon all our possessions to flee the inevitable floods that consumed Los Angeles, Undine’s Daughter was the only thing I grabbed on my way out. In the three years since we fled, I’ve read the book at least twenty times. And I still cry every time I read the part where Undine’s daughter, princess of the water spirits, defeats the sea witch, regains control of her underwater kingdom, and the prince calls her by her name.

  “You’re reading that again,” Isaac whispers in my ear. “Aren’t your hands freezing?”

  He takes the book from me and folds the corner of the page to mark my place before he stuffs it back in my backpack. He takes my hands in his and only then do I realize how cold my fingers are. It’s impossible to turn the pages of a book with gloves on and very easy to get sucked into the pages and forget reality.

  My reality is cold.

  He rubs my hands between his and huffs hot puffs of breath over my fingers. This is Isaac. This is his way of honoring a promise he made to my mother.

  “You love me,” I whisper.

  It’s a realization spoken aloud, but it comes across like an accusation.

  He looks somewhat embarrassed. “Yeah, let’s get the fire started.”

  He releases my hands and slinks out of the sleeping bag without bothering to zip up the bag behind him. A sharp draft of cold air washes over me drowning out the certainty of my words.

  I slip into my jacket and boots and help Isaac with the fire. I make a cup of oatmeal for everyone, but Isaac passes his cup back to me claiming he’s not hungry. I don’t bother arguing with him because he’s busy talking to Daedric and Eve about rabbit jerky rations. When they’re done with their conversation, I speak up.

  “I thought we were going hunting,” I whisper to him.

  He shakes his head but he doesn’t look at me. “There’s no time for that. We have to make it into Nevada by nightfall. Vic can be here in less than a week and we have to stay at least three days ahead of him.”

  Suddenly, I begin to feel like Undine’s daughter. I’m working for a purpose, but I’m not myself anymore. I don’t have a name. I’m just a carrier. Whether I’m carrying a message, like Undine’s daughter, or a child, I’m still just a carrier.

  This is why Isaac freaked out when I said he loved me. I’m mistaking his attempts to care for the child inside me for love.

  Maybe this is just my elevated hormones creating unnecessary insecurities in my mind. Maybe I’m right. There’s only one way to get a truthful answer out of Isaac.

  We hike for two days straight, only stopping to sleep and occasional twenty-minute rests. Though my right boot suddenly feels too small, I ignore the blister forming on my big toe. I’ll have a chance to rest once we’re near Las Vegas in another four or five days.

  I’m surprised Daedric’s foot isn’t bothering him after two days and eighteen hours of hiking through mountainous terrain. Once in a while, I catch him looking at my right foot as if he can see my blister through the leather.

  We finally reach the old Lida Junction Airstrip in Goldfield, Nevada at almost ten in the evening. Though I haven’t been carrying my backpack, I feel dead. We enter an old courthouse across the street—a two-story building that looks like a fort than a government building with mock turrets lining the top of the building.

  Inside the lobby I collapse onto the stripped concrete floor. Isaac lays out our sleeping bag and I watch him in silence. He reaches for my feet to help remove my boots, but I stand.

  “Where are you going?” he asks.

  “Come with me,” I say and I head for the stair shaft next to the broken down elevator.

  “You two keep it down up there,” Mary calls out as we enter the stair shaft.

  Isaac doesn’t ask where I’m taking him. I bat away cobwebs and kick aside pieces of broken drywall as I climb the stairs. We reach the second floor and find a gutted out office area where half-burned piles of old court files have been strewn about by the wind. I turn around and Isaac doesn’t look amused.

  I grab the front of his jacket and kiss him. He kisses me back, but there’s no power in it. I kiss his neck and he moans softly. I slip my hand into his waistband and he takes a step back.

  “What are you do
ing?” he says.

  First, I’m stunned by the rejection. Then I realize I’ve gotten the answer I wanted.

  I try not to let the hurt show in my face. “Nothing. Let’s just go down.”

  He grabs my hand to stop me. “Don’t do that, Nada.”

  “Trust me, I won’t do that again.”

  “That’s not what I meant,” he says. “Don’t pretend nothing’s wrong. I know what you’re doing and that’s not the way to do it.”

  I’m not sure if he’s talking about trying to test him or trying to seduce with him. Either way, I feel even worse now.

  “There are other ways to show love,” he continues, as he pulls me into his arms and kisses my temple. “Not that there’s anything wrong with your way. But not here… not in this dump.”

  “Geez, leave it to you to make me feel like a floozy,” I say with a smile.

  “You’re my favorite floozy,” he says.

  We return to the first floor to sleep. When I remove my boots, the blood crusted around my big toe has stuck my sock to my blistered skin. Isaac helps me remove the sock and clean the wound.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” he says, as he searches for a pair of clean socks in my backpack.

  Daedric and Eve watch Isaac work looking just as disappointed in my refusal to report the injury.

  “Can you two go set up the traps?” Isaac asks Daedric and Eve. “We’re going to rest here a couple of days.”

  “Stop babying me,” I whisper to Isaac as he tucks me into the sleeping bag.

  “Then stop acting like a baby and start thinking like a m—”

  “Hey!” I shout and everyone turns to look at me. “No one wants to hear that.”

  Mary definitely doesn’t want to hear that word spoken aloud. Daedric doesn’t even know yet, and I’d like to keep it that way. I don’t want to hear the word because it’s just too weird.

  “Good night,” I whisper and everyone goes back to doing what they were doing.

  Daedric and Eve are untangling the ropes on a large trap. Isaac slips into the sleeping bag behind me and puts his mouth right next to my ear.

  “Why haven’t you told him?” he whispers.