“Do you jest?” Tesni asked. “Ryder, I’ve seen the way you look at her when you think nobody is looking. Most of the other Rangers have seen it. Pretty much everyone except Arya has seen it.”
“And if I am?” Ryder asked. “What of it?”
“Well, if you don’t say something to her, and soon, you may lose her forever,” Tesni said. “Knives just proposed, and she said she’d think about it.”
Ryder shrugged. “That doesn’t mean that she’ll say yes, Tesni.”
“I know that, Ryder, but she looks at you the same way you look at her. Everyone in camp has seen it but you. If she thinks you’re not interested, she will say yes to Knives.”
“What does it matter to you who Arya marries? Do you have a crush on Knives, yourself, child? You should be happy if she says yes to him. You’ve known him for four years, and you love both him and Arya.” Again he shrugged. “Maybe they could adopt you and you would finally have a real family.”
Tesni didn’t understand Ryder’s reaction. In her young mind, she thought he ought to be going after Arya, begging her hand in marriage. “I don’t have a crush on Knives. I just think she ought to be marrying you, Ryder. The only reason she’s even thinking about it is because she thinks you don’t want her.”
Ryder sighed. He had wanted Arya for over a hundred years and had never had the courage to do anything about it. She had always seemed so inaccessible, especially where her heart was concerned. But if what Tesni said was true, his feelings were reciprocated. “And just what do you think I ought to do about it?” he asked.
“I think you should just kiss her,” Tesni said.
“Just kiss her?” Ryder laughed. “Tesni, I think Knives told you too many fairy tales. You don’t just go and kiss a woman.”
“You do if it’s true love,” Tesni muttered, walking off, leaving Ryder to think, very carefully, about what she had said. What if it was true love, and he was just letting it slip through his fingers because of his own stubborn pride? Then again, what if he was wrong? What if Tesni and the others were wrong about what they saw? What would he do, then? Maybe, he decided, it was for the best to just let things be.
Arya didn’t know what to say. By the time she got back to camp, she didn’t even know what to think. She and Knives had gone their separate ways. He had promised to be back in a week’s time for her answer. He had left the ring behind, just in case. But now what?
Tesni came running up and nearly tackled her. “Arya!”
“Oof! What is it, Tesni?”
“You can’t marry Knives, Arya, you just can’t. You’re not right for each other.”
Arya blinked. “Tesni, what makes you think I’m going to marry Alastar?”
Tesni just looked at her. “I saw you both amongst the apple trees. I was there in my favorite spot, and I saw him propose, but you’ve got to say no to him, Arya. If you say yes, you’ll break Ryder’s heart.”
Arya snorted. “Tesni, Ryder and I have known each other for over a hundred years. If he had any interest in me, he would have shown it by now.”
“He hasn’t because he thinks you don’t have any interest in him,” Tesni said.
“Ryder is an open book,” Arya said. “I think I would have noticed if he felt anything more than friendship towards me.”
“He tries to keep it hidden because you’re such an ice queen,” Tesni said.
Arya bristled at the description. “Did he say that?”
“No, but that’s what the others call you. Arya the ice queen. You never let anyone get close to you or see what you’re feeling.”
“I let you get close. Maybe that was a mistake.”
Tesni blinked. She felt her eyes beginning to water. She had been home less than a day, and this was what was happening?
Arya noticed. “Tesni…no… I…I wasn’t thinking…” Too little, too late, Arya quickly realized.
Tesni ran.
Chapter 7
By nightfall, Tesni no longer knew where she was. She had scampered up and down trees, running alternately along branches and along the ground, having learned from Arya that it was a good way to confuse someone who was tracking you. In some points she had doubled back, thrown rocks to break branches and twigs to make a tracker think she had gone a different direction.
Now, there were two things she knew with absolute certainty. The first was that even that wouldn’t throw Arya and Ryder for long if they decided to come after her. The second was that she hadn’t yet learned all that much about surviving on her own in the woods. All she knew was that she needed water, food, and a place to sleep, along with a fire if she could get one going. She was starting to wish she’d had her pack.
With a sigh, she sat down against a tree trunk. She felt the bark give a little beneath her slight frame and wondered at it. Turning around, she tested it with her hands. It continued to bend and flex as she pushed, and she dug her nails into the bark, pulling instead.
The bark gave way to reveal a hollowed out tree trunk. Inside was a pack, and she looked inside it. It contained flint, nuts, dried fruit, and a bedroll, as well as a small pot and canteen. Smiling, she realized that this was one of the many emergency shelters that Arya had told her were scattered throughout the forest. Now all she needed was water, and she could find that in the morning.
Smiling, Tesni rolled out the bedroll. She ate some of the berries and a handful of the nuts. It was still a little warm, so she forewent the fire. She wasn’t ready to make it easy for them to find her just yet. She pulled the bark ‘door’ back into place, climbed into the bedroll, and, using the rest of the pack as a pillow, drifted off to sleep.
As she watched Tesni run into the woods, Arya began to panic. She hadn’t taught Tesni everything she needed to know about survival, how to identify edible plants from poisonous ones, how to create a makeshift shelter, anything beyond the need to find food, shelter, and water.
Quickly, she quelled the panic inside and ran to Ryder’s tent. “Ryder! Ryder!”
“What is it, Arya?” Ryder asked, recognizing the panic in the bow mistress’s voice.
“It’s Tesni. She’s run off again and it’s all my fault.” Quickly, Arya explained the situation to Ryder as if Tesni’s very life depended on the speed with which she told the story. It probably did.
Ryder tensed. “Don’t worry, Arya. We’ll find her. We’re both experienced trackers. Even if she utilizes some of the tricks you showed her to hide a trail, we’ll have no problem at all finding her.”
They did, however. By nightfall, they could find no trace of her, and Arya was beginning to hyperventilate. “I can’t believe I just snapped at her like that.”
Ryder held her. “It’s alright, Arya. We’ll find her. We just need to set up camp for the night.”
“What if something’s happened to her? What if she’s already dead? It would be my fault.”
Arya’s hyperventilating was getting worse, and Ryder thought fast. He knew he needed to shock her back to reality, and so he decided to take Tesni’s suggestion from earlier. He kissed her.
Arya’s eyes flew open. Was Ryder kissing her? Suddenly, her head was spinning. Could Tesni have possibly been right about how he felt? Or was he just shocking her back to a normal breathing pattern?
Quietly, she decided to test the idea. She let her eyes close, and she leaned into the kiss, returning it.
Ryder couldn’t believe what was happening. Was Arya really returning the kiss? Was Tesni right? Was she really only even considering Knives because she thought he didn’t care? He wrapped his arms around her. He brought a hand up to her head, massaging the back of it as he deepened the kiss, wondering how she might respond. He was rewarded by her arms wrapping around his neck.
Finally, Arya pulled away. “Ryder…”
“I know, Arya. We need to focus on finding Tesni.”
“It’s getting too dark to search, though. How will we ever find her?” She was sta
rting to panic again.
Ryder gave her another kiss, this one quick, barely brushing her lips. “We’ll find her. She’ll be alright. Tesni is a smart, and she pays attention. She knows what she has to find, and I’m sure Knives taught her something about what’s edible out in the wild. For now, I think we’re in the vicinity of one of our emergency shelters. Why don’t we find and use it?”
Arya looked around, her pupils dilating to take in what little light was available. Fortunately, as a Wood Elf, she had excellent night vision, and she managed to find the distinct outline of a cave that had been covered by ivy that had been planted at the top and encouraged to grow down. The two crawled inside, snuggled into the bedroll together, and fell asleep.
The next morning, Tesni was able to find water nearby. She drank from the fast-moving stream that she could hear running not more than fifty feet from her little shelter. She also knew that she needed to either move on or find more food. Knives and Arya had both taught her to stay put when she was lost, though, and Arya had emphasized how important it was for her to do so if she was near a source of clean water, so finding more food it was.
Near the banks of the stream, Tesni found a huge bush filled with blackberries. She stripped a couple of the branches and carried the berries and some water back to camp, using the canteen that had been included in the emergency pack. On the path back, she found what she knew to be mint, based on the smell, and picked some of the leaves.
Back at camp, she dug back into the pack. It hadn’t been a very comfortable pillow, and Tesni knew it was because of the small pot that had been packed in it. She started a fire, started some water to boiling, and made a tea with the mint and some of her blackberries. She ate the rest, knowing she could go back for more.
By noon, however, she was starting to get scared. She gathered more water from the stream, ate more blackberries from the bush, and then sat tight, wondering if she would ever be found. She also wondered if she even wanted to be found. Could she find the new hideout for the Thieves Guild? Surely Knives would take her back in.
Could she find her way back to camp? Maybe she could ask for new sleeping arrangements, to stay with one of the other Rangers. Arya had certainly made it clear that she didn’t want Tesni around, though.
Could it be better to try and find her way back into town? She could survive for a while in the orphanage, she guessed. It was only until she was either found an apprenticeship, married off, or turned eighteen. One of the three would certainly happen eventually. Ten years in a crowded house with other kids sounded so horrible, though. She had heard that the kids in the orphanages never got enough of anything, whether it was food, water, attention, or clothes.
What if she couldn’t find her way to any of those places, though? Was she going to die out here in the woods? Why did she run off like that? Why did she snap at Arya? She deserved Arya’s anger for that, and now she was going to die, alone, without getting the chance to apologize. As the sun went down and Tesni made yet another meal out of blackberries, she cried herself to sleep in her little shelter.
Arya and Ryder spent all of the next day tracking her. The sun was setting on the second day of a thus far fruitless search, and Arya was beginning to panic again. “Ryder, it’s been two days. What are we going to do?”
“We’re going to find her,” Ryder said, holding her tightly. “It’s the only thing we can do. Yes, she clearly learned from you a little too well about covering her tracks, but you and I are two of the best trackers in camp, and we will find her. Now, let’s find the nearest emergency shelter. I think there’s another one nearby, if I remember correctly.
Arya scanned the trees until she saw the distinct outline of a bark covering. “Over here,” she said, moving towards it. She moved it away and then smiled. “It’s already in use, Ryder.”
“What do you mean?” he asked, coming up behind her. Then he saw Tesni’s sleeping form. “Ah, she managed to find shelter and food, after all.”
“She looks so peaceful,” Arya said. “I hate to disturb her.”
“Well, we’re going to have to, if there’s going to be room for all three of us in there,” Ryder said. He reached in, shaking the girl gently. “Tesni…Tesni… Wake up, Tesni.”
Tesni stirred a little, grumbled in her sleep, and snuggled deeper beneath the top of the bedroll. Arya and Ryder just looked at each other, and Ryder finally, carefully, picked Tesni up, bedroll and all, and moved her closer to the back of the shelter. Then he and Arya climbed in. It was a tight fit, but with Tesni against the back wall, Arya in the middle, and Ryder near the door, the three of them could at least keep each other warm, and Ryder and Arya drifted off to sleep in each other’s arms, Arya’s head on Ryder’s chest.
When Tesni woke up the next morning, she could see a tiny bit of light streaming through around the edges of the bark door. She could also see that she was no longer alone. Maneuvering herself into a sitting position as best as she could, she looked to see who had joined her in the night, and was pleased to see Arya and Ryder curled up together in each other’s arms.
She remembered Arya’s words, telling her that they would always come for her. How they had managed to track her with such little light, she didn’t know. She could only hope to be that good, someday.
Reaching out, she couldn’t touch the door, though she came within an inch. So, she reached into her days as a thief, some of which was slowly starting to come back to her, and to her training over the past two months. She got into a crouching position, aimed herself, and leapt over Arya and Ryder and through the door, knocking it down as she went.
Now that she was awake, if a little sore, Tesni could again hear the nearby stream she had been drinking from, yesterday. Carefully, she reached in and grabbed the pack. She got a fire started, hung the small pot over it, and went and got some water. She found the mint plant from the day before, picked the leaves, and threw them into the pot.
While her mint tea was brewing, Tesni found the blackberry bush and practically stripped it bare. She arranged three leaf plates with the dried fruit and nuts from the pack, as well as the fresh berries, got the cup out of the pack, tested the tea, and frowned. She threw some of the berries in, stirred, waited, and tasted again. Better.
Then she heard the buzzing. About ten feet up was a beehive, dripping with fresh honey. Tesni grabbed a stick from the fire, climbed up, and thrust the burning stick into the hive to smoke out the bees. Once she was content that they were made docile by the smoke, she grabbed some honey comb and scurried back down, tossing the stick back into the fire. Only then did she reach into the shelter and shake Arya and Ryder awake. “Good morning!”
“Morning, Tesni,” Ryder mumbled.
Arya sniffed. “Do I smell blackberry mint tea?”
“I made it myself, and I know I got it right because it tastes the way you make it,” Tesni said, smiling. “I also got us a bunch of fresh blackberries to eat, and the nuts and dried fruit out of the pack, and some honey to sweeten the tea.”
Ryder chuckled. “Tesni, Arya and I have said it before, and we’ll say it again. You are one very clever little girl.”
“I pay attention,” Tesni said. “I’ve always paid attention. Knives taught me how important it is, and you two just reinforced it.”
“You’re starting to remember what Alastar taught you?” Arya asked, sitting up. Now she was awake. If Tesni’s memories were starting to come back even more, then this was something that she definitely wanted to be aware of.
“Yeah. A lot of stuff from my days as a thief is starting to come back to me, though I do have an unanswered question. Why do you call him Alastar, and why does he call you Arrows?” Tesni asked.
“I call him Alastar because that’s his real name,” Arya said. Then she sighed. “He calls me Arrows because…because that was my nickname when I was with the Thieves Guild.”
Tesni’s eyes went wide. “Y
ou were a member of the Thieves Guild?”
“She came to the Rangers the same way you did,” Ryder said, popping some blackberries into his mouth. “She caught you with your hand in her purse. I caught her with her hand in mine.”
“But now you’re in love with each other, and you wouldn’t have it any other way,” Tesni said, grinning.
Ryder and Arya just looked at each other. Was Tesni right? “Tesni…” Arya started, but Ryder interrupted her.
“Tesni is absolutely right, Arya, at least on my half of the situation. Don’t tell me you didn’t feel something in that kiss, last night,” he said, pulling her close.
“I thought you were just shocking me back to reality when I started hyperventilating,” Arya said.
“Then why did you kiss back?” Ryder asked.
“I was testing if Tesni could possibly be right. Now I know she was, by your own admission. Why did you deepen the kiss?”
“I was also testing to see if Tesni was right, in response to your response.”
Arya didn’t say anything more. She just tackled Ryder, kissing him deeply, passionately. The two of them stayed like that until they heard a cough.
“Are you two forgetting that I’m right here?” Tesni asked.
“Sorry, Tesni,” Arya and Ryder muttered at the same time.
“Does this mean you’re finally through being an ice queen, Arya?” Tesni asked.
“Yes, Tesni, I’m through being an ice queen,” Arya replied, hugging her tightly. “And it was definitely not a mistake to let you get close.”
“And you’re going to tell Alastar no, then, when he comes back in a week?” Ryder teased.
Arya frowned, confused. “How did you know…?” Then she sighed. She knew the answer to that. “Tesni?”
“Yes?” Tesni was smiling.
“Tesni, were you spying on me and Alastar?” Arya asked.
Rangers of Linwood (The Five Kingdoms Book 1) Page 6
