LITMIR.BIZ

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Kari’s voice was incredulous.

      “Yes. Picked and dried, they are good against skin rash. They can be used against illnesses of the lungs, also.”

      Kari looked at her in wonder. “Why do you tell me this?”

      “You seemed interested.” Tillu stopped, confused.

      “And you do not mind telling me?”

      “Why should I?” In the dying evening, a cuckoo called and was silent.

      “The old midwife Kila was our last healer. She would never say what herbs were in her mixes, or where she got them. She learned from her mother, and said it was her wealth, and not to be shared. So when she left, only the commonest healing was known. I thought all healers would be jealous of their secrets.”

      “Selfish, if you ask me.” Tillu was appalled.

      “Then, if I wanted to learn the herbs of healing, would you teach me?”

      “Of course. When we have time, I will be happy to show you how to gather herbs and how to use them.”

      “Tomorrow?” she pressed.

      “Don’t we move on tomorrow? We’ll both be leading animals tomorrow. We’ll have no time to stop and gather herbs and talk.”

      Kari grinned knowingly, looking girlish and less strange. “Oh, we may. One never knows.” Taking wood from the pile Lasse had brought, she built up her fire, and began preparing food. The savory smell as the meat simmered in the pot made Tillu aware of her hunger. She came out of the shelter, stretched, and suddenly felt every pang of the day’s long hike.

      “Here we are!” Lasse strode into the firelight, pleased at having accomplished his task.

      “You were long in coming,” Kari observed coolly.

      “They had stopped on the riverbank, to fish!” Lasse’s voice was between annoyance that they had been hard to find and wonder that they would do such a thing.

      “See what we caught! Carp said they’d be there, under the bank behind the roots! And they were. See, Tillu.” The char shone silver in Kerlew’s hands, fat and slippery. They flopped from his grasp onto the grass. Kari eyed them with approval.

      “Gut and spit them, Lasse, and we’ll grill them over the coals,” she ordered calmly, never doubting that fish and boy were hers to command. Lasse moved meekly to her directions. Tillu and Heckram both stared after him as he took the fish to one side. When they lifted their eyes, their gazes met, sharing amusement and sympathy for the boy. Then Heckram’s eyes warmed to something else. Tillu turned from him hastily, to watch Kerlew wiping his slimy hands on the grass.

      “Did you behave today?” she asked him automatically.

      “Yes.” He didn’t seem to feel any need to enlarge on his answer. His deep eyes were guileless as they stared up into hers. She wanted to ask how his day had been, if he had missed her, what Carp had taught him. But she could not in front of all these people. She had been stupid not to put up her own shelter. She would have no time alone with her son tonight, or tomorrow. Deep frustration edged with loneliness overtook her. She was severed from Kerlew, blocked by the layers of people around her. And to have Heckram so near strained her resolution. Every time he caught her eyes, her skin tightened. She had not found a way to let him know that she had changed her mind. He was looking at her again, his brows lifted slightly. The fuzzy beginnings of a beard softened his jawline. She stared at it, wondering if he had known she would find it attractive. Then she asked herself why she imagined he would even think about such things. Did she fancy she was the only woman he might consider bedding? Did she imagine he slept alone each night as she did? The thoughts stung her. She turned aside, avoiding him. Kari was directing Lasse as he cleaned the fish. His eyes were bright with her attention, and neither seemed to mind Kerlew crouching nearby and sorting curiously through the entrails. Tillu dropped to one knee, to crawl into the shelter and rest until the food was ready. Perhaps it would ease her aching muscles.

      But Carp was already there, lying on the skins as if he were lord of all. His mouth hung ajar and the light from the fire revealed an occasional tooth behind his slack lips. It reflected off his grayed eyes like a sunset in a scummy pond. He nodded at her, his mouth widening. His hand gestured her in. Tillu drew back, stood again. Until she had met the herdfolk, she had never known how to describe Carp’s smell. But now she knew he smelled just like a wet dog. It did not make him any dearer to her.

      The evening was cooling the land; moisture was settling to the ground. The cooking food gave off a marvelous aroma, making her dizzy with hunger. She put one hand against the rough side of the boulder that backed the shelter, and then, without thinking, began to walk around the boulder, away from the firelight and the murmur of Lasse and Kari. The soft lichen on the stone was warm with the day’s heat, like a man’s rough beard against her skin. She leaned back against it, looking out over the lake and wide valley below her.

      The small fires of the herdfolk blossomed like white wildflowers on the shore. Their tents were an unevenness in the dark. The people and dogs were moving shadows that passed before the fires. Beyond them, the lake was a shining blackness, and in the deepest part the moon and stars shone. Tillu felt dizzy looking at the sky at her feet. She lifted her eyes and looked beyond it, and realized for the first time how far they had come in one day. Kari had said they would travel for ten days. Where would they be then?

      Far behind her were the mountains that were the winter grounds of the herdfolk. Before her was the wide lake that tomorrow the herd would skirt. And beyond it, beyond the last dwarfed trees and bushes, rolled the tundra. It was featureless in the darkness, and it was hard to tell where the lake left off and the tundra began. She had heard of the tundra, in legends of Benu’s tribe, but she had never walked upon its wide flat face. A nameless dread of such a barren place rose in her, followed by a more pragmatic fear. In such a place, where would she gather willow and alder barks, birch cones to burn for a congested head, birch roots to boil down for cough syrup, willow roots for colic medicine, and a thousand other remedies that came from the tall trees of the hills and mountain valleys? A feeling akin to panic rose in her, to be replaced by resolve. Tomorrow she must be free to gather as the herd moved along the forested edge of the lake. She must have her supplies before they left it for the barren vast lands to the north.

      She felt more than heard the step of the man who approached her from the darkness. Had Heckram followed her, mistaking her leaving the fire for an invitation? Dread of the confrontation rose in her, even as her body betrayed her with a tingle of excitement. She turned to him in the darkness, taking a deep breath to speak. She gasped in surprise instead as hard hands gripped her shoulders and shook her.

      “Where have you been?” he demanded gruffly. She pushed away from him, but he seized her wrist in a grip that numbed her hand. Joboam shoved his face close to hers.

      “Capiam tells me to watch over you and see that you are cared for. When I tell you to follow, you wander off, so when he comes to my fire to speak to you, I must say I do not know where you are. I lose his confidence. The healer, the najd, and her idiot boy, all are vanished. Capiam thinks you have changed your mind and left us, that the herd will face another summer without a healer. He asks me if I have offended you. Me! And I must leave my fire and my food and come seeking you, going from tent to tent, fire to fire, like a fool, asking if any have seen you!”

      Fury tightened his relentless grip on her wrist, and when she pulled at his fingers with her free hand, he captured it, holding both her hands in one of his as he spoke. He made the differences in their sizes obvious by drawing her hands up high. She stood on tiptoe trying to ease the pull, feeling she couldn’t breathe, made speechless by fear as much as by pain. Joboam’s eyes glittered in the dark. Her aching muscles screamed with the stress of being stretched up.

      “Kari…invited me…to stay with her…,” she gasped the words. The man was huge. She stifled the fury that rose in her, the desire to kick and scream and fight. As well take on a bear. If this was all he was going to do, she could stand it. She had endured worse from men just like him and survived.

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