Chapter Twelve
When I wake from mynap, I can hear them talking about me. Night has fallen and they are sitting around the fire, grilling meat. The smell wakes me from my sleep, but before I get up and go to them, I listen. Someone is not happy with me.
“She’s getting worse, not better,” Pharaoh grumps.
“What do you mean?”
“Less obedient with time, more headstrong.”
“Maybe that’s a good thing,” Silver says. I silently nod my head in agreement. “If she’s to be a mother, she will need to have her mind about her. She can’t remain a malleable little girl forever.”
“When was she malleable?” Alexios laughs.
“That idea of hers is dangerous,” Pharaoh says. “It’s foolish. Death awaits in Dallas.”
“Maybe,” Alexios agrees. “Likely not her death. They would take her. Our deaths, almost certainly.”
His words make me think. He’s right. I can’t ask them to go back to the city where their friends died. But that doesn’t mean I can’t go. Doesn’t mean I can’t do something to make a difference.
I make a big show of yawning and stretching and waking up so they have a chance to fall silent and pretend they weren’t just talking about me.
“Hey, sweetheart, how are you feeling?” Silver breaks the silence, beckoning me over to him.
I slip over and let him draw me down into his lap. Sometimes I feel a little lonely with my mercenaries. They have one another to talk to, but who can I talk about them to? Nobody but myself. All my thoughts stay private in my mind and heart, as they always have.
“Sore,” I say. “You were rough with me.”
“No rougher than you needed,” Pharaoh says. I restrain the urge to pick up Silver’s drink and throw it at him. I know Pharaoh means well, but he is the most maddening man in the world.
We eat the meal they have prepared, and I think about what must be done. If it is true, if Tore’s seed has taken root inside me, then I am not content to live out here in this wilderness. I know how that story goes. It is my story, and I do not want to see it repeated. It would be well if I were to have a son. He would have three men to show him the way. But what if I have a daughter? What if I, like my mother, am to pass in the bearing of my child? What then? Another girl to end up inevitably alone as the passing of time takes her fathers and makes them weak? No. I will leave my offspring a greater legacy than a remote shack surrounded by stringy predators.
I know the mercenaries will not come with me. They are thinking of our survival. I am thinking of more than that. I am thinking of what it means to give life, and what life is given in the birthing.
We are owed compensation for what we have lost. I was sold, and yet we have nothing to show for it but this dusty old shack.
* * *
Over the next few days, I think about it more and more. I think about what we could do if we just had the power to live like citizens, and not as outcasts.
They notice my mood. Pharaoh mostly ignores it. Silver tries to cheer me into a better one, but it is Alexios who succeeds when he pulls me aside one afternoon as the others go out to hunt.
“I have something for you,” he tells me.
“Oh?”
I can’t imagine what he could possibly have for me. None of us have anything out here.
“I know you know how to use these,” Alexios winks as he hands me first a knife, and then a gun. “And you know better than to tell anyone you have it.”
“I won’t,” I promise, slipping the items into my clothes. I will have to hide them somewhere Pharaoh won’t find them. No easy task, but I think I’m up to it.
“I’m not encouraging you to do what you know you shouldn’t,” he adds. “I just don’t want you to be vulnerable out here. I’m giving you these so if need be, I know you can protect yourself.”
“I can. Thank you.” I smile at him, appreciating what he has done, and what it says about how he sees me. I am not less than. I am not weaker in his eyes. He protects me, but he knows I am a force in my own right. I feel respected.
“I...”
He pushes a finger to my lips. “I am not aiding you in disobedience,” he says. “I will punish you just as the others will if you leave this camp. I mean that, Trissa.”
“I know.”
He smiles at me. “I love you. I hope you know that. We all do.”
It is the first time any one of them has said that word. I dive into his arms and press my head against his chest, blinking back tears. “I love you too,” I say. “Remember that, always.”
“Back at you,” he smiles. “Especially remember that the next time you get punished.”
“There’s going to be a next time?”
“With you? Definitely.”