And sitting on the trunk’s lid were neatly folded items.
Her things.
Not the ones he had been giving her, but her ones from before. The ones that Sladec had told her had to be taken, likely destroyed. She had surrendered them as he’d instructed her to do, but to see them sitting there, waiting for her...
Her blanket, her ratty clothing, even her tattered boots, so carefully arranged so she could readily identify them. And on top of all of those, the cord that had so long graced her wrist, the gift from her father.
She drifted toward them, not quite convinced they were truly there, but as her hands reached out, as she felt the remnants of her past, real and whole and there...
Behind the elation mingled with sadness for all she had lost in coming here, she felt even more a humiliating amount of guilt.
For she had just snapped at the man who had saved them for her.
8. Endow
Renna ran her unsteady hands over her blanket, her old clothes, so much coarser than her new things despite their years of wear, still not quite believing that they were there. Her knees had given way as she knelt before his trunk and she picked up her blanket, so thin and flimsy but hers. She noticed how different it smelled as she brought it to her face, of herbs and soap she did not recognise. He had washed them, folded them, and kept them. Why had he not brought them to her?
“You...” she murmured, her voice wavering. She closed her eyes, her words halting as she remembered he would not understand them, but not finding her feet able to move just yet. She wanted to tuck everything in her arms, to hold it all close, a piece of a home that wasn’t hers anymore but still took up such a large part of her heart.
She heard a thwump behind her and she peeked over and saw that her bundle of bedding had been dropped onto the floor, Machrus staring at it only briefly before he followed her, his hand parting her hair and settling on her neck. Not gripping, not restraining, merely touching. Enough that she might speak to him freely.
There was much she wanted to ask. She wanted to cry, wanted to mumble apologies for her harshness. Wanted to fume that he had not given them to her before if he had been able. But instead she settled on what was most pressing.
“Will you get into trouble for this? For letting me have these, I mean.” She couldn’t bear to let them go. Not again. Her name might never be restored to her, but these were enough.
Machrus grunted. “Perhaps. I suggest you allow few to see them.”
She would have to keep them hidden then. She might not feel any particular fondness for Machrus, but she would not have him punished for being kind to her. Especially not when she hoped he would be more so in the future.
Renna turned, acutely aware of how tall he was when she had to crane her neck up so far to look at him. But she wanted him to hear the words, to know how true they were, to see her gratitude. “Thank you. You have no idea how much this means to me.”
He looked down, not at her, but at his hand upon her neck. His fingers were long. He could have hurt her badly if he wanted, but he didn’t. He was just a presence, a weight resting there, but still he made her feel small. “They are yours,” he reminded her simply. “They will remain so.”
She smiled before looking back at her things. She swallowed before tying the cord back around her wrist. It felt right to have it there, just as it had been for so long. The rest of her things would have to remain in here, safely tucked away, but her sleeves would keep the cord hidden well enough. Her tunics were lovely things, embroidered at the neck and hem, the only oddity that both sleeves had slits cut into them, presumably so that the cuff on her arm could always be seen. Except that she found it cold to not have the benefit of a full sleeve so she wore her shawl most of the time. Machrus never said he minded that the cuff was out of view, though his was always visible.
Her knees were beginning to trouble her, kneeling as she was, so it was with some regret that she got to her feet, Machrus’s hand falling away as she rose. She stood awkwardly for a moment, him standing so close, her thoughts filled with past and present, uncertain of how to proceed. She bit at her lip, considering, but touched his hand before she could think better of it. “I shouldn’t have spoken to you like that. It was rude and I’m sorry.”
She waited, hoping he would make a reply, would ease her conscience a little by a show of acceptance, but he only stared down at the floor, his mouth the hard line she so often saw him wear. Clearly she could do nothing right.
“I do not...” he began to say after she sighed and took a step toward the door, her hand returning to his so he might finish. He glared harder at the ground, and she hoped it would not take offence when it was clearly she who had upset him. “It is not my intention to make things more difficult for you,” he said at last. Not to her, of course. Not when he could address the floor instead. “It is not my desire that you be unhappy.”
But he did not care enough to do what was necessary to make her happy—to talk to her, to help her learn about this new world, to teach her properly. Her tongue burned to make the retort, and shame welled up in her. He didn’t deserve that. Not from her. Not when he had just shown he was capable of consideration, more than even his brother had allowed.
“Sladec... he mentioned something about pairing,” her cheeks flushed and she couldn’t bring herself to look at him.
“We do not need to speak of that.”
She released a breath she had not realised she held. “And that’s fine,” she quickly assured him. She needed to talk about a lot of things, but she would gladly remain firmly silent on that subject. “I just wanted to... I want you to know that I’m grateful. For you not pushing me to... to... be married properly.” He finally looked at her, a frown upon his face. Not unusual for him, so she patted his hand and moved back to the kitchen. Her heart ached a little when she put down her blanket, wanting nothing more than to tuck it into her leggings as she had back at camp, to keep it close and safe. But if it slipped and someone noticed—someone not Machrus of course—it would be far more difficult to explain than a bit of cord peeping out from a sleeve.
He followed her and she felt him watching as she began fixing a meal for them. He had not taught her, had merely grunted when she asked him to, but she had eyes that worked well enough, so she felt sufficiently knowledgeable for the endeavour. He did not intervene, did not try to stop her, the first time he had not since she’d come here.
The meal was a simple one, boiled grain simmered in a white liquid she did not feel ready to ask about. But it didn’t pain her stomach and she hadn’t perished from it yet, which felt like a victory.
When she set the pot over the fire, a feeling of satisfaction coming over her as she did so, Machrus laid two fingers on the exposed skin of her arm. “We are married.”
She looked at him over her shoulder, her brow furrowing. “Yes,” she acknowledged somewhat hesitantly. And here she thought he didn’t like her to state the obvious.
“You know this?” She was confused at the surprise in his voice.
“Why shouldn’t I know it? I was there when you tried to drown me.” His eyes flashed and she begrudgingly amended. “When we...” she hadn’t the word for what had passed between them in those waters, so she gave a shrug instead. “I understood that was a marriage ceremony.” A terrible one, but apparently what his people practiced.
“Then why,” he began, each word chosen carefully, “would you presume we are not properly married?”
Her cheeks warmed again, and it had little to do with her proximity to the fire. Evidently they were going to have to speak of this after all. “Well, we haven’t...” she closed her eyes, struggling to find a word she found acceptable. She remembered his vow, the words he had spoken when he had first brought her here, and decided he could not mistake her meaning to repeat at least some of them. “There hasn’t been any bed sharing, now has there? Where I’m from, that part is important.”
For some inexplicable reason, Machrus relaxed. “
Ah. No.”
She studied him, trying to understand the man she found so often incomprehensible, her earlier frustration beginning to outweigh her gratitude. He might have given her a gift, but that did not change that things between them were strained, and Sladec had made it abundantly clear that he expected changes between them. She shook her head and sighed deeply, trying to settle on a kind way to approach this. “So... what are we going to do differently?” She did not truly mean we. She hadn’t the least idea what else she could be doing, not unless he first was willing to speak openly with her. But it seemed nicer to include herself in the prospect of change.
Machrus grunted, peering into the pot, though he seemed to try to hide the fact that he was doing so. “I think I did it right,” she commented quietly. “I’d be more certain if you’d shown me how to do it.” She was proud that she was able to keep the twinges of resentment from her voice. She wanted him amiable, not to feel like a cornered beast, harassed until he yielded.
“You... you do not know what you are asking of me,” he said just as lowly when she had grown certain he would not be answering her at all. “And I do not wish to explain it.”
She bit her lip again to keep from snapping. She had not been so prone to crossness back in the colony. But then, she supposed she was more resigned there, her life was simply laid before her, however depressing and woebegotten it might have been.
“So you’re happy then? With how things are?” She felt a niggling despair that he might be.
He glared into the fire. “That is not what I said.”
Renna wished she could move away from him, but that meant they could not speak at all, and there was so much that still needed to be addressed. But his fingers were still against her arm, not pressing, barely a touch at all, yet she felt them acutely, warm and unwelcome when he was proving so unhelpful.
“I don’t understand,” she breathed, shaking her head and willing down her foolish tears. “You don’t want to help me learn anything, but I cannot learn from anybody else. So I’m just to... to live here? All alone and without any work to at least make me even the tiniest bit useful?”
His mouth compressed into an even firmer line. “I told them to choose someone else.” She flinched before realising he meant himself rather than her. He had not had any idea who she might be when he’d come to marry her, so she couldn’t take it personally. Very, anyway.
“But they didn’t,” she reminded him, her voice a bit colder than she’d intended. “And you’re all I’ve got, so if you could just...”
He pulled away from her, and that despairing feeling magnified tenfold. He took a cloth and removed the pot from the fire, taking it away and putting their meal into two bowls, just as he always had done. Silently. Taking care of her in his way, every movement precise and habitual, but lacking any warmth.
She had agreed to this, she remembered with a grimace, realising now that she’d had no idea what she was choosing. Not now that she was faced with it.
She followed him back to the table, her appetite gone. She pushed around the meal with her spoon glumly, cursing her lack of courage. It was what had prompted her to agree to this in the first place and what stilled her tongue now.
He wasn’t looking at her, was simply eating his meal—that she had at least helped to make, whether or not he had allowed her to finish—and though she did not know where her daring came from, she found herself putting down her spoon. She did not reach for his hand, but instead took his foot in between hers, though it took a bit of rustling to find a patch of skin not covered by a sock.
He startled, finally glancing at her, his own spoon half raised to his mouth.
“Did your brother’s instructions mean nothing to you?” She refused to be cowed by his glower, pushing on before he could interrupt her. “I’m not asking for you to... to have any sort of feelings for me,” her cheeks burned just to think of it. This was mortifying, even though she forced herself to keep talking, afraid she might run off if she allowed herself to stop. “I don’t need you to be my husband for real.” She didn’t know if she could bear for him to be that. “But when I agreed to this, I was glad you didn’t want me. And I still am,” she hastened to add, though there was a prickle of something that suggested she wasn’t being entirely truthful, not anymore. She pushed it away firmly. “But what I did expect was that I would have a place here. Doing something. Being something. Can’t you understand that? I’ve always had a job, a purpose...”
And even at her worst, she’d had that to cling to. Something known in the midst of pain and disaster. Yet here she floundered, and he was doing nothing to help her.
“You do not understand,” he said at last, putting down his spoon and tracing his finger along the tabletop. She was getting rather tired of hearing that.
“Then explain. Please. You’re the only one that can.” She wasn’t bitter. Not in that. Only pleading.
“You wish to... mingle with the others. To speak with them, yes? To find occupation?”
Renna nodded firmly. “I want to be useful. I don’t do any good here. You certainly don’t need me.” She couldn’t be sure that she was needed anywhere, not when she had seen just how many individuals made up the Marzon people, but she could try. Needed to try. “But I’m not able to communicate with any of them, not without you. And you have your own work.” That, and she was fairly certain he was wholly unwilling to follow her about at all times, providing a much needed link of language. “But maybe... when you’re not too busy, you could teach it to me? That could be a start.”
He closed his eyes, and she caught a moment’s pain in his expression. She had done that. Hurt him in some way, yet she could not bring herself to rescind her entreaty.
“Our language is not taught,” he said at last. “It is... conveyed.”
That was terribly unclear. “Through... through touch? Is that what you mean?” She had worked that part out already, but it was nice to have it confirmed. Yet no one else was allowed to touch her, or for her to touch them. Which meant she truly would be forever reliant upon him and his goodwill. It was a depressing thought.
He gave a hesitant nod. “And... another means.”
She felt a moment’s brightness before she remembered to what he likely referred. Renna cleared her throat, unable to look at him. “By... pairing, you mean.” She hadn’t the least idea how that particular act could pass along an entire language, but it seemed strange enough that holding his hand could allow them to speak in the first place. And it did not get much more intimate than allowing him to...
He was looking at her oddly, and she willed her cheeks to quiet, but her embarrassment was too far set.
“What do you believe that to mean?” Machrus asked, still giving her that peculiar look.
She gave a little cough, adjusting her shawl. “I... I didn’t realise it could have different meanings.”
“Many things do,” he observed dryly. “And I should like to know what you believe my brother was demanding of us. Of me.”
She wanted to go busy herself in some way, and she cursed yet again that she had to be touching him for them to speak, and she felt trapped and hopeless all at once as she struggled to find words, to communicate what should have been so obvious. “He wants us to have sex,” she finally blurted, not able to come up with a more subtle insinuation that would also not lead to his continued confusion. “To really be married.”
There. She’d said it.
Machrus was staring at her, not glaring, but not giving any sign of what he was thinking of her pronouncement. He was silent for a long while, probably waiting for her to speak more but she was resolutely quiet. She had done as he’d asked and now it was his turn for talking.
“That is not his to command,” he said at last.
She chuffed out a disbelieving laugh. “But that’s rather the point of us getting married, isn’t it? To solidify the treaty. Hard to break something like that when there’s a whole new generation of mixed blood children runn
ing about.”
Machrus sat back a little in his chair, something in him hardening. “You think poorly of the young?”
“What? No!” Perhaps the concept of having a child for the sake of a trade agreement, perhaps even the lingering suspicion that Sladec had in fact been urging Machrus to... to be with her, regardless of her feelings on the subject.
She felt mildly ill just to think of it.
He did not seem convinced, shaking his head briefly before seeming to force himself to calm. “I will not deny that the eventual... conjugation and conception of children in these unions is celebrated. It keeps us whole.” He looked at her rather expectantly, and she stared back rather blankly before belatedly realising he meant to ask if it was the same in the colony.
She grimaced, her voice growing lower, memories ready too quick to assault her. “Sometimes,” she explained, each word carefully considered, “it’s hard to appreciate the prospect of a child when you’re not sure how you’ll manage to feed them. When you don’t have a safe home to keep them.” She pressed her lips together to keep from saying more. It was obvious that things were different for the Marzon, and it was her responsibility to keep her people safe with tales of the good they had to offer, not the fear and dangers they left behind.
Machrus stared at her a while longer before inclining his head ever so slightly. “Regardless,” he redirected, much to her relief, “our brides choose when we are to join. They are not forced.” He imbued the last with such distaste that she could not help but believe him.
“All right,” she affirmed, something in her relaxing to have that at least explained, especially now that her bedding had joined his in the other room. “So what’s a pairing, then?”
Machrus sighed, his glare returning and he picked up his spoon again, pushing her own bowl back toward her. She didn’t want it, but she’d made it and she wasn’t going to waste his food. She took a bite with little enthusiasm, but he seemed pleased at her effort. She couldn’t imagine why.
Trade (Deridia Book 2) Page 11