Incarnate

by Jodi Meadows

Page 3

  Author: Jodi Meadows

  I couldn’t tell this boy what I was.

  “You didn’t have to chase me outside. I’d have been fine. ”

  He scowled, shadowed lines between his eyes. “Like you were fine in the lake?”

  “That was different. Maybe I wanted to be out there. ” Stupid mouth. He was going to know if I couldn’t control my stupid mouth.

  “If you say so. ” He wiped the inside of the water heater dry and stuffed it back in its bag. “I doubt you wanted to die. I was filling my canteens when I saw you jump. You screamed, and I saw thrashing as if you were trying to swim. When you reached the lake a little while ago, you startled like a mouse realizing there was a cat in the room. What were you doing in the woods? How did you run into sylph?”

  “Doesn’t matter. ” I scooted closer to the heater.

  “So you aren’t going to tell me your name. ” A statement, not a question. He’d start guessing soon. He could rule out all the people who I definitely didn’t behave like, all the people reborn in the wrong time to be eighteen right now, and all the people my age he’d seen in the last few years. “I can’t remember offending anyone so much they wouldn’t trust me with their name. At least not recently. ”

  “You don’t know me. ”

  “That’s what I said. Did you get water in your brain?” It only half sounded like a joke.

  I didn’t know of a Sam, but considering the meager collection of books in the cottage library, that wasn’t a surprise. I didn’t know about a lot of people.

  I gulped the rest of my tea and lowered the empty mug, mumbling, “I’m Ana. ” My insides were warm now, and I wasn’t drowning. When he kicked me out, I’d be no worse off than before, as long as I could find my backpack.

  “Ana. ”

  Shivers crawled up my spine when he said my name. And what a name. When I’d gotten the nerve to ask Li why they chose that, she said it was part of an old word that meant “alone” or “empty. ” It was also part of Ciana’s name, symbolizing what I’d taken from her. It meant I was a nosoul. A girl who fell in lakes and got rescued by Sam.

  I kept my face down and watched him through my eyelashes. His skin was flushed in the warm tent, with steam from the tea. He still had the full cheeks of his apparent age—close to mine—but the way he spoke held authority, knowledge. It was deceptive, the way he looked like someone I could have grown up with, but he’d actually lived thousands of years. Hair fell like shadows across his eyes, hiding whatever he thought while he studied me in return.

  “You’re not—” He cocked his head and frowned. I must have been as easy to read as a sky full of rain clouds. “Oh, you’re that Ana. ”

  My stomach twisted as I pushed off the blanket, torn between anger and humiliation. That Ana. Like a disease. “I’ll get out of your way now. Thank you for the tea. And for saving me. ” I moved for the door, but he held his arm across the zipper.

  “That’s not necessary. ” He jerked his head toward the blanket again, no room for argument in his tone. “Rest. ”

  I bit my lip and tried to decide if, as soon as I fell asleep, he would contact Li, tell her he’d found me in a lake, and I wasn’t capable of caring for myself yet.

  I couldn’t go back to her. Couldn’t.

  His tone gentled, like I was a spooked horse. “It’s all right, Ana. Please stay. ”

  “Okay. ” Gaze never straying from his, I lowered myself again, back under the blanket. That Ana. Nosoul. Ana who shouldn’t have been born. “Thank you. I’ll repay your generosity. ”

  “How?” He was motionless, hands on his lap and eyes locked on mine. “Do you have any skills?”

  Nerves caught in my throat. This was one of the few things Li had explained, and she’d explained often. There were a million souls in Range. There’d always been a million souls, and every one of them pulled their weight in order to ensure society continued to improve. Everyone had necessary talents or skills, be it a head for numbers or words, imagination for inventions, the ability to lead, or simply the desire to farm and raise food so no one would starve. For thousands of years, they’d earned the right to have a good life.

  I hadn’t earned anything. I was the nosoul who’d taken eighteen of Li’s years, her food and skills, pestered her with questions and all my needs. Most people left their current parents when they were thirteen years old. Fourteen at most. By then they were usually big and strong enough to make it wherever they wanted to go. I’d stayed five extra years.

  I had nothing unique to offer Sam. I lowered my eyes. “Only what Li taught me. ”

  “And that was?” When I didn’t speak, he said, “Not how to swim, obviously. ”

  What did that mean? I’d figured out how to tread water when I was younger, but everything was different in the winter. In the dark. I frowned; maybe it had been a joke. I decided to ignore it. “Housecleaning, gardening, cooking. That sort of thing. ”

  He nodded, as if encouraging me to go on.

  I shrugged.

  “She must have helped you learn to speak. ” Again, I shrugged, and he chuckled. “Or not. ”

  Laughing at me. Just like Li.

  I met his eyes and made my voice like stone. “Maybe she taught me when not to speak. ”

  Sam jerked straight. “And how to be defensive when no offense was intended. ” He cut me off before I could apologize, though my mouth had dropped open to do so; I didn’t really want to leave the warm tent, especially now that the herbs and overall exhaustion were taking effect. I grew drowsy. “Do you know anything about the world? How you fit in?”

  “I know I’m different. ” My throat closed, and my voice squeaked. “And I was hoping to find out how I fit in. ”

  “By running through Range in your socked feet?” One corner of his mouth tugged upward when I glared. “A joke. ”

  “Sylph chased me and I lost my backpack. I planned on walking to Heart to search the library for any hint of why I was born. ” There had to be a reason I’d replaced Ciana. Surely I wasn’t a mistake, a big oops that cost someone her immortality and buried everyone else under the pain of her loss. Knowing wouldn’t help the guilt, but it might reveal what I was supposed to do with my stolen life.

  “From what you’ve said, I’m surprised Li bothered teaching you to read. ”

  “I figured it out. ”

  His eyebrows lifted. “You taught yourself to read. ”

  The tent was too hot, his surprised stare too probing. I licked my lips and eyed the door again, just to remind myself it was still there. My coat, too. I could escape if I needed to. “It’s not like I created the written word or composed the first sonata. I just made sense of what someone else had already done. ”

  “Considering how other people’s logic and decisions are rarely comprehensible to anyone else, I’d say that’s impressive. ”

  “Or a testament to their skills, if even I can figure out how to read. ”

  He gathered the empty mugs and put them away. “And the sonata? You figured that out as well?”

  “Especially that. ” I covered my mouth to yawn. “I wanted something to fall asleep to, even if it’s only in my head. ”

  “Hmm. ” He dimmed the lamp and shifted bags around the tent. “I’ll think about repayment, Ana. Get some rest for now. If you want to find your bag and go to Heart, you’ll need all your strength. ”

  I glanced at the blankets and sleeping bag, wary in spite of exhaustion. “Like before?”

  “Janan, no! I’m sorry. I thought we knew each other. I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. ”

  “It’s okay. ” He was probably wondering how he’d managed to find the only nosoul in the world when chances were so much higher of him rescuing someone he already knew. He was showing me more kindness than anyone ever had, though; I should try to reciprocate. “There isn’t much space. I’ll face the wall if you’ll face the other way. That way neit
her of us is cold. ”

  “Don’t be silly. I’ll face the wall. ” He motioned me closer to the heater. “We’ll discuss other issues in the morning, and that’s”—he checked a small device—“in three hours. Get some rest. It sounds like you’ve had a difficult day. ”

  If only he knew.

  Chapter 3

  Sylph

  MOVEMENT AROUND THE tent dragged me to the edges of consciousness.

  Water murmured, a switch clicked, and something unfamiliar swished, like powder falling into ceramic. A heavy, bitter scent flooded the tent as Sam stirred water into a mug.

  “Wake up. Time to go. ” He touched my shoulder.

  I gasped, fighting the way my mind conjured a similar image of him leaning over me, only a few hours old. The dark hair had been dripping, and the broad hands urging my heart to beat again.

  Like an idiot, I stared at him until I saw only the present. Last night became a memory again. “Oh. ” I’d been staring too long. “It’s just you. ”

  “Yes. ” His tone was chalk-dry. “Just me. ” Before I could apologize for insulting him somehow, he sat back. “Drink your coffee. We’re leaving in twenty minutes. That gives us enough time to pack and load Shaggy. We’ll eat breakfast while we walk. ”

  “Shaggy?” I sat, blankets knotting around my legs, and reached for the nearest mug of dark liquid. Then I answered my own question with a smirk. “The horse? Creative name. ”

  “His full name is Not as Shaggy as His Father, but that’s a mouthful. ” Sam’s grin turned into a grimace when he tried his coffee. “Drink up. It’s not worth lingering over, trust me. ”

  I inhaled steam as I took a careful sip to test the temperature. Hot and bitter, with a strange sweetness to it, like honey. I gulped down the entire mugful. “I like it. ” My skin felt warm enough to glow. “Li never let me drink coffee. She said it would make me short. ” And it was too expensive to waste on a nosoul, but I didn’t need any more of his pity.

  “Li was tall last time I saw her. What happened to you?” He suffered another taste and held the mug toward me.

  “Apparently Menehem was short and I’m unlucky. ” I eyed the coffee, judging whether he’d yank it back at the last second. If he did, he’d spill it on me. Better to ask. “You don’t want that?”

  “A companion on a caffeine high will wake me up just as well, without the aftertaste. ” He set the mug between us. I snatched it up and drank before he could change his mind. “Wait until you try real coffee, grown in special greenhouses in Heart. You’ll never want to drink this chemical imitation again. ”

  I couldn’t help but be intrigued. Something better than this? I looked forward to finding the greenhouses he described.

  “Now pay attention to where everything goes. I’ll pack this morning, but if I’m going to help you get to Heart, you’re going to do your share. ”

  I stared. Why would he help me? Weren’t we supposed to talk about how I’d pay him back for saving me last night? Now that he’d offered, however, I couldn’t bear if he took it back. He seemed— Well, he seemed like he didn’t hate me, and he’d rescued me. Not that the latter meant anything, since he’d assumed I was someone he already knew. Not Ana the nosoul.

  “That’s fair. ” I cleaned the mugs and water heater. Everything went into the pouches I’d watched him store things in last night. “What else?”

  He went outside to feed Shaggy, leaving me to roll blankets and check the tent floor for anything that had escaped its bag.

  Only one thing. A brass egg the size of two of my fists together. A thin silver band circled the middle, covering a seam where you turned it. And to keep your grip on the slick metal, the top half of the egg had shallow grooves.