by Barb Hendee
Then I came back to myself and pushed on his shoulders.
He jumped up as if I was on fire and moved away. “Kara, I’m so sorry. I don’t know why I…I would never do anything to…”
But I was shaken and still felt the soft, welcome pressure of his mouth on mine. This brought shame. I did not love Raven as a man. I didn’t desire him. He was my husband’s brother.
“Please go,” I begged.
After breathing hard for a moment to gather himself, he left.
* * * *
That afternoon was among the worst in my life. I was tortured over keeping Tristan’s secret and now I had one of my own—which I intended to take to my grave. By this point, I’d reasoned well enough that Raven and I had both been distraught about Tristan. What happened had been some kind of reaction. That didn’t explain the feelings when he touched me, but it explained the action.
That evening at dinner in the common house, I could see Raven was troubled. He and I could barely look at each other.
I would need to fix this.
Not long after dinner, he and Jade began fighting about arrangements for the wagons. She wanted him to move into hers and give his to Tannen and Badger. I didn’t follow all of this, but it ended with him storming out the back door.
Seeing my chance, I slipped away from the family table and followed him out back, spotting him walking along the tree line.
“Raven.”
At the sound of my voice, he turned and winced. I was probably the last person he wanted to see.
“I’m sorry about this morning,” I said instantly. “We were both upset about Tristan. That’s all. I needed comfort, and we were both distraught.”
Somehow, I’d said the exact right thing. Relaxing visibly, he nodded. “Of course you’re right. It didn’t mean anything. I love Jade.”
“I love Caine. You are his brother, and we must always be good friends.”
With a sigh, he smiled. “You may not say much, but you’re fair-minded when you do.”
“Will you come back inside?”
“Yes.”
He fell into step beside me. Before this was over, I needed to know something.
“We’ll never speak of this again,” I said, “but could I ask you one thing about this morning?”
“What’s that?”
“When most men and women…touch like we did, does it normally feel like that?”
At first, he didn’t speak, and then he said, “No. I’ve never felt anything like that in my life.”
Somehow, this was the answer I had expected.
* * * *
A few days later, my secret about Raven seemed to lose any importance as I became certain about something else. My courses had not come in two months, and I could not keep down my breakfast.
Tristan was home that morning, in his workroom, and I went in to see him. For some reason, though I wasn’t ready to tell Caine yet, I wanted to tell Tristan.
“Little Bird,” he said. “Do you need me?”
“No, I wanted to talk to you about something.”
“If it’s about my health, you can save your breath.”
“It’s something else. Something I think will please you.” I touched my stomach. “You will have another great-grandchild.”
He stood up and came to me. “Oh, Kara. You have made me so glad.”
* * * *
Not long before Raven’s group was scheduled to leave, Caine brought down a large buck deer with his bow. The men built a fire outside and set up a spit, and they roasted the venison. The flour supply Raven had brought was beginning to run low, so Brida had ordered a rationing of bread, but there was plenty of roasted meat.
Everyone gathered in the common room that night.
Caine and I sat at our family table with Tristan, Logan, Brida, their two sons, Raven, and Jade.
Tristan took a bite of meat and raised his cup to Caine. “Fine venison,” he said. “Rich and tender.”
But he didn’t take another bite. Instead, one side of his face twitched, and then his entire body jerked as he fell off his chair. Raven was on his feet first.
“Grandfather!”
Everyone was up, but Tristan lay on the floor with the side of his face still twitching. I wanted to run to him, but he was surrounded.
“Raven, help me,” Caine said. “We have to get him home.”
* * * *
That night, the family held vigil around Tristan’s bed.
Near the mid of night, he awoke and looked around.
“Grandfather,” Raven said, kneeling to grasp his hand.
“Where am I?” Tristan asked, but speaking was difficult for him.
“In your room. You collapsed.”
Neither Raven or I gave away that we had seen this before. I got Tristan a cup of water, but Brida took it from me and moved to the other side of the bed to help him to sip. “You are ill,” she said to him. “I know it seems unfeeling to speak of such things, but what if you do not recover? You must name a successor.”
Aghast, Raven stood up and stepped away from the bed. “Brida!”
Neither Caine nor Logan reacted. Instead, they both looked to Tristan.
Raising his hand, Tristan pointed to Caine.
“Caine.”
This was the only word he managed to say. Then his body jerked again, the side of his face twitching more fiercely. He went stiff from the force of it, and then he went still. My heart was breaking.
“No!” Raven cried, rushing back to his side.
But Tristan’s eyes were closed, and he did not breathe. He was dead.
The room was silent but for the sounds of Raven’s sorrow. I was too numb to weep, and Raven wept for me.
* * * *
We prepared the body, and the people of the settlement came to say their goodbyes. Once this was done, the men built a pyre, and Tristan’s body was burned. Caine’s form of mourning was more internal than most people’s. He took the ashes and let them drift in the air from the top of the cliffs as a symbol of the safe place that Tristan had found for us all.
A number of us stood beside Caine, and when the last of the ashes were gone, I asked him quietly, “Now that it’s happened, do you wish to be leader?”
He looked down at me. “Yes. I was never certain before you came. But I want it. I want to do what’s best for our people.”
That night, he called a meeting in the common room. When everyone had gathered, he stood near the hearth. Logan and Brida stood near him. Raven was having trouble accepting Tristan’s death. He sat in a chair with Jade on one side and me on the other.
Caine addressed the room, and his voice carried.
“Tristan has passed over to the other side, and we all mourn him. He was tórnya for as long as most of us remember. Before he died, he named me to succeed him, but at first, I hope to simply carry on with his wishes. It was his wish that there be no more autumn raids. We don’t need the luxuries those raids provide, and it will be safer to us to live within the laws of those on the outside.”
No one appeared surprised by this announcement. Even in their sorrow at the loss of Tristan, many nodded their agreement.
“This will place an extra burden on Raven’s group in purchasing supplies,” Caine continued. “But I’ve spoken with him. We still have silver from the raids I can give to him and Jade. They will do their best to help us through the winters.” Stepping away from the hearth, he said, “For now, that is all.”
“It is not all,” Logan said. He walked up to the hearth and addressed the room. “In addition to ending the raids, I propose there be no more of us traveling through any part of the year. Everyone should remain in the settlement. We’ll dismantle the homes on the wagons and use the wagons for other needs.”
“No,” Raven said, rising from his c
hair.
Caine turned around to face Logan. “As a member of our people, you are always welcome to voice a proposal. I hear your proposal now and reject it. You have no other authority here.”
Logan had been nearly silent since Tristan’s death, probably filled with pent up disappointment. His face twisted into rage. “Then you are no leader! You care nothing for the safety of our people, and I call upon the sixth law!”
Brida started in alarm.
But Caine strode toward Logan, closing the distance rapidly. “Is that what you want? Trial by combat?”
People all around were becoming frightened, and I wanted to stop this. “Caine, please…” I said, stepping forward.
But Raven caught me around the waist, holding me tightly. With his other arm, he caught Jade, pulling us both away from the conflict. “Keep back,” he said.
“I invoke the sixth law!” Logan shouted.
Caine answered, “And how do you interpret the sixth law when you can’t even read it?”
Logan aimed a punch, hitting Caine in the jaw and sending him stumbling backward. Then he grabbed a fire poker from the hearth. As Caine gained his balance, Logan swung the poker at his head. But Caine leaned back swiftly, and as the poker flew past, he swung with his fist, smashing it into Logan’s nose and dazing him.
Then Caine swept Logan’s leg, using a move I’d seen before, and Logan’s large body hit the floor. Caine kicked him in the head hard enough to make a thudding sound that resounded around the common room, rendering Logan unconscious.
It all happened in a blink, but the result was critical.
Whirling on Brida, Caine said, “Logan cannot invoke the sixth law twice!” He paused. “I am tórnya.”
Tightly, she nodded.
Caine looked around. “Am I recognized?”
People all across the room nodded, and Doris said aloud. “Yes.”
Pulling at Raven’s arm, I said, “Let me go. Please.”
He released me, and I went to Caine. His mouth was bleeding and the side of his face was already turning black.
But he was the settlement’s new leader.
* * * *
A few days later Raven and Jade and their group of travelers packed the wagons to leave for the rest of spring and the summer. Jade’s larger wagon was now in the lead. She, Raven, and Sean would live there, and Raven had given his smaller wagon to Tannen and Badger.
Though I’d still not told Caine I was pregnant, I planned to tell him tonight.
For now, we had farewells to make, and I was sorry to see Jade and Raven go.
“We’ll miss you,” I told her.
She embraced me. “We’ll be back in the autumn. I’ll try to find you some blue wool material for a new dress.”
But she was happy to be rolling off with Raven. I could see this. Jade must have the blood of a traveler.
Caine hugged Raven. Everyone who would remain in the settlement said their good-byes. After climbing up onto the bench of the lead wagon, Raven settled in beside Sean and Jade and picked up the reins. Clucking to his horses, he started the caravan, and one by one, the wagons disappeared down the chute.
Turning back toward the settlement, Caine offered me his arm. I took it.
“Do you ever think back to that first day here,” he asked, “when Raven gave you the choice to go with him? Do you ever wish you’d gone?”
I laughed. “Traveling on the road from place to place with no home? I think not.”
“So you’re glad you stayed with me?”
“Very glad.”
Perhaps Caine was overly serious, and perhaps he did spend much of his time focused on the good of the settlement, but I didn’t mind.
He was the finest and best of men.
The Choice
Chapter Twenty
The settlement around me vanished, and I found myself inside the shack, kneeling by the hearth, staring into the three-tiered mirror. The memories of all three experiences I’d just lived swirled around in my head at the same time.
Now, there were three reflections of the dark-haired woman as she gazed out at me from all three panels.
“Which path?” the woman asked. “You must choose.”
Images and emotions surged through me until I couldn’t think clearly.
“Which of the paths will you follow?” she asked. “The road…or flight…or the settlement?” she paused. “Raven…or Royce…or Caine?”
Her statement of the choices let me focus, and my mind flowed backward to the life I’d lived with Raven. I ached for him. I could still feel his mouth on mine and the natural act of touching him. I saw myself on the stage telling stories, in open-air markets shopping for bread, and scenes of cooking by a fire with Jemma. I felt a sense of freedom. I felt my connection to the rest of the troupe.
I felt the warmth of joining my body with Raven’s under a blanket in our wagon.
But then I saw Jade’s face on the night he and I were married.
I saw the pain in Caine’s eyes.
I saw the frightened faces of the people in the settlement when Logan was named leader and he cut them off from outside contact.
I saw myself leaving all this behind, leaving Jade behind, and rolling out into the world with Raven.
Raven.
The images rolled forward to my life as Royce’s mistress, to the night he’d forced himself on me to the following morning when I’d begged his forgiveness for resisting him. I saw myself living in fear.
But I also saw the gentle comforts of living in the Capello manor, the library and the chessboard. I saw the faces of Adina and Trey, and I could still feel my love for them. I could feel Lily wriggling in my arms.
I saw Royce dead on the floor with blood running from his nose. I heard Francis telling me I’d inherited a third of Loraine’s fortune. I heard Trey’s kind voice as he asked me to stay and be a family with him and Adina.
Images rolled forward to the third life, to Caine. I saw my fear and loneliness in the early days. I heard Tristan’s kind voice. I saw myself taking my place among the women. I saw myself at the front of the school.
I saw Caine through my eyes as my feelings for him began to change and deepen. How I admired him, how I wanted him to become leader, how content I had been in my life with him.
My mind raced. Did I now know the future? There were acts I regretted. If I chose Raven, could I find a way to convince Jade to bring Sean and come with us? In the third life, if I broke my word to Tristan and told Caine of his growing illness, might someone in the settlement know of a way to help Tristan?
The dark-haired woman in the mirror watched me.
“Once I choose,” I asked, “will I still remember what I’ve seen? Can I alter events via what I’ve seen here?”
She shook her head. “These are the possible paths, and you have been given the gift to see and to choose. But once you have chosen, all the memories you have seen will be gone.”
I closed my eyes. I’d remember nothing.
“Choose for yourself,” she said. “This is a gift, and there is nothing more I can tell you. Which of the paths will you follow? The road…flight…the settlement? Raven…Royce…Caine?”
But I could not choose.
I understood now that although I did love Caine, my feelings for him were starkly different from my feelings for Raven. If I chose Caine, I would never experience sweeping, encompassing, passionate love. But what would become of Caine should I opt for the first choice, for a life on the road? Would he never marry and live his life alone? With Logan as leader, would Caine’s voice of reason be silenced? What would become of the people in the settlement?
What of the child I’d carried?
And yet, what would become of Adina and Trey should I not choose Royce? Would they be fated to live their entire lives under Loraine’s opp
ression?
In the end, it was Jade’s voice I heard from when she’d spoken to Raven on the night he married me.
You and your talk of choices. You cling to your preaching of choices like a religion, but in truth, it’s just an excuse for you to do what you please instead of doing what is right.
I would do what was right.
“I choose Caine,” I whispered and opened my eyes.
The dark-haired woman nodded, standing now only in the left panel. “The third choice.”
The air before me wavered, and the mirror vanished
* * * *
I stood in the darkness just outside the door of the shack, feeling dizzy and disoriented, as if I’d forgotten something and needed to remember. What was I doing out here? Then I remembered that Raven had just left me—with the door unlocked—and I had to a decision to make.
He’d given me the option of leaving with his troupe in the morning or staying here and taking my chances—or I could escape the settlement and try to get back to my lady. Looking to the left, I saw the long tree line stretching along the backs of several dwellings. I could make my way along these trees far enough to slip down into the chute.
But instead, I just stood there, knowing I couldn’t force myself to take such an act.
Ashamed, I went back inside and crouched down by the fire. I stayed like that all night, even after the logs had burned to ashes.
Outside, once the sky had begun turning gray, I heard footsteps approaching, and I watched the door. Caine entered first, with Raven behind him.
Caine wasted no time. “Raven’s just asked that you be given a choice to go on the road with his troupe. I’m asking you to stay.”
Before he’d finished speaking, I’d made up my mind. I didn’t know either one of them, but I couldn’t risk leaving this place with a group of strangers and traveling further from my lady and my home.
Caine stood there looking down at me with his dark eyes locked into mine, and I suddenly wished that I were not crouched on the floor. Standing, I tried to straighten my wrinkled and mud-spattered gown.