Honor and Blood

by James Galloway

  "Well, you know what I mean."

  "I know what you mean, but stop thinking like that, or some human is going to prove you wrong," she said sharply.

  "Yes, mother," Jesmind said obediently.

  "I don't feel quite so abused anymore," Jula laughed.

  "We're all abused equally, Jula," Tarrin told her mildly. "Mother is an equal opportunity abuser."

  "You're just the one with the bad luck to be stuck with mother," Jesmind laughed.

  Triana gave her daughter an ugly look, but Jesmind only winked at her playfully. "I'll contact them and order them to come give you a hand."

  "Make sure they get here fast, mother. We're moving in two days."

  "I'll do that," she assured him. "You can do something for me, too."

  "Anything, mother."

  "I want you to release Jula's bond," she told him steadily. "I want to take it from you, but I can't take it from you because you're not here. I need you to release it, so I can take it from her here."

  Her request surprised him. "I thought you said that Jula was going to be alright," he said.

  "She is, but I need her bond for another reason," she said calmly. "Me and Jula have a kind of idea, and I need her bond to make it work."

  "What kind of idea?"

  "Something you don't need to know, cub," Triana said sharply.

  "Alright, alright," he said quickly. "I'll do anything you ask, you know that, mother."

  "I know. So release her bond, and I'll have to release yours."

  "Why?"

  "Because we can only hold one bond at a time," Jesmind answered before her mother.

  "Oh, alright. You never told me that."

  "It didn't seem very important at the time, cub. We had other things to talk about then."

  "True enough. How do I do it?"

  "It's simple, actually. You just let it go. The bond will release as soon as it realizes that it's free, just like a caged animal."

  "Sounds simple enough," he said, closing his eyes. He focused on that part inside him that was Jula, that was Jula's bond, felt where it had taken up residence inside of him. He willed it to be free, to be able to leave him, then kind of mentally shooed it away from him. It seemed to immediately react to that change of will, and fled out of him almost before he could urge it to leave. The sense of Jula that had been there faded away quickly, leaving behind a curiously empty hole. It had been there so long, he had become accustomed to it, almost like it was supposed to be there.

  "I, I think he did it," Jula said uncertainly. "I felt something, something weird just now."

  "He did it," Triana affirmed. "Alright then."

  Tarrin felt a strange buzzing between his ears, almost as if something he never knew was lost suddenly found its way back to him. When it was over, he felt no different than before, making him uncertain as to what just happened.

  He put a finger to his head. "I'll agree, that was weird," he said to Jula.

  Triana chuckled quietly. "It never ceases to feel weird, cub," she told him. "I've passed, given, traded, and released bonds for a very long time now, and it never stops feeling like that."

  "Well, I don't feel any different."

  "You won't," Jesmind told him. "It's normal."

  Triana nodded in agreement. "That's the main thing I wanted to talk to you about, cub." She glanced at Jesmind. "You two getting along?"

  "We had an air-clearing this morning, mother," Jesmind said calmly. "We're alright."

  "Good. If you two are going to fight, make it short and sweet. Jasana doesn't have the maturity to watch you two clawing at one another for very long."

  "It was short, that was for sure," Jesmind laughed. "But it did what we needed it to do."

  "Her doing that irritated me," Tarrin admitted. "I didn't know what she was doing until it was over."

  "You gotta watch her, Tarrin," Triana said with a sudden smile. "Jesmind may not look it, but she's probably twice as underhanded as Jasana. Of all my cubs, she was the hardest to manage."

  "I noticed," he said, giving Jesmind a look.

  "Mother, stop warning him!" Jesmind objected.

  "Warning me about what?" Tarrin asked bluntly.

  "If you have to ask that, cub, you're not getting an answer," Triana said with a slightly amused look. "I'll call the others. They should be there in plenty of time."

  "Alright," he said, giving Triana a suspicious look. What was she talking about? "I'll contact you after we take Torrian."

  "We'll be waiting," Triana said.

  "Bye, Tarrin. It was good to see you. Nice meeting you, Jesmind," Jula said politely.

  "Take care of yourself, cub," Tarrin told her sincerely.

  "Nice meeting you," Jesmind told her. "Jasana's going to be upset you didn't talk to her, mother."

  "She'll get over it. I have to go now. Take care you two, and remember to settle things immediately. Jasana doesn't need to see you two tearing at each other all the time."

  "We'll do that, mother," Jesmind said.

  "Tarrin?"

  "Alright," he told her, a bit petulantly. "Bye, mother. I love you."

  "I love both of you," she said with uncharacteristic warmth, smiling at them gently just before the image of her faded into nothingness.

  "Well, we have a garden to plant," Jesmind said crisply, smacking her paws together. "You're going to wear that?"

  "It's all I have."

  "I'll have to make you some new clothes," she said speculatively.

  "I'll handle that."

  "I know you can, but I'm going to make them for you anyway," she said. "I think you're getting soft for relying on magic like that. Mother doesn't do it, and you shouldn't either. If you stop doing for yourself, you're going to forget how. Besides, every time you do magic, it gets Jasana curious, and we don't want her getting curious."

  She did have a point. He had to admit that. "Alright, no more cheating while I'm here," he said with a soft chuckle. "I'll do everything the old fashioned way."

  "Good. Now let's go get the garden done before it rains."

  It had been a long time since he had done that kind of manual labor.

  Tarrin, Jesmind, and Jasana had spent the day planting her garden, and it turned out to be an all day affair. They had to plow the patch and prepare it, find the seeds that had gotten lost in her barn over the winter, Tarrin had had to fix a couple of tools--the honest way, since he'd promised that he wouldn't cheat--and then they planted seeds after a brief delay as a shower passed over them, a delay they utilized by having lunch. All of them got very dirty once they started planting, since the plowed dirt quickly melted into a thick, cohesive mud that clung to them as they carefully planted seeds and set up a low fence around the garden to protect the soon-to-be seedlings from the ravages of farm pests and grazing rabbits.

  It felt...normal. Tarrin hadn't felt that way in a very long time, doing something simple, something that didn't have the fate of the entire world depending on his success. Simple things, things done long ago, back when he was human, a familiar pattern of labor that rekindled those old memories and feelings inside him. As the time passed, Jesmind and Jasana's newness seemed to fade away, yield to the sense of them, until by the end of the day, it felt like they had always been there, he had always been there, and this was nothing more than what they had done many times before. It was simply yet another day on the farm.

  And Tarrin had been shocked at how good that felt to him. Despite everything that had happened, everything he'd seen and done and experience, maybe there still was the simple village farmboy inside him, a fellow that had been absolutely overjoyed to return to familiar surroundings and familiar chores. And return to a place which he identified as a place of happiness, surrounded by family.

  Family. Maybe Jesmind and Jasana were family, the same way that his parents and sisters were. Jasana was for sure, but spending the day like that with Jesmind, talking with her about absolutely nothing of importance, working together with her on the ga
rden, it caused even more of his animosity towards her to fade. The feeling of betrayal he had felt, a feeling that had provoked the feral nature in him to distrust her, was losing ground inside him. Jesmind was proving herself to him, and she was doing it by showing a side to herself that he had never seen before. She had always been a rather dichotomous figure in his mind, a being that both inspired fear and desire in him, someone he both loved and hated, liked and disliked, trusted and distrusted, wanted to both embrace and strangle at the same time. Those conflicting feelings had held within him for a very long time, but they were starting to die out now, as the positive feelings he held for her were slowly overwhelming the negative feelings.

  He had seen Jesmind the bond-mother, Jesmind the enemy, and Jesmind the lover, but now he was seeing Jesmind the mother, Jesmind the homedweller, seeing her in familiar surroundings to her, seeing her in a place she considered her own, seeing her completely at ease. She was alot different than he remembered. She was more playful, for one, much freer with herself, and she wasn't quite so intimidating. Jesmind had always been very mysterious to Tarrin before, but now that sense of mystery about her was melting away, revealing the true woman beneath it. She smiled a great deal, and the shift in her stance and posture when she dealt with Jasana showed him how deeply she loved, was devoted to, their little girl. That shouldn't have been surprising, but he had never seen her behave like that before, even towards him, so it was something new, something refreshing.

  It had been a day of eye-opening observations, and he was almost sad that it came to an end. But it did, and just in time, as it had started to rain again just after they managed to get the last of the fencing put up. Jasana squealed as the rain started coming down, racing for the safety of the porch, getting a blistering warning not to track any mud into the house from her mother. Tarrin and Jesmind hastily collected up the tools before they got too wet and stored them in the barn, which had been the old shearing shed. Jesmind had moved everything she used into it, using the pen as a storeplace for a bunch of old chests she had probably taken out of the house.

  "You're a mess," Jesmind laughed as they set the rake and hoe in the barn.

  "So are you. Your fur is gray now."

  "Nothing a bath won't cure," she said with a dismissive shrug. "One of the few times I don't mind getting wet. We do have a bit of a problem, though."

  "What?"

  "You're not coming into my house caked over in mud," she said sternly. "The clothes stay outside."

  "They're the only clothes I have," he protested.

  "Then you'll be wearing one of those old robes I found in a trunk until I can figure out what to do," she said.

  "I'll just clean them--"

  "No cheating!" she reminded him sharply.

  "Oh, right. Forgot about that," he apologized.

  "Don't forget it again," she said sharply. "I have a bucket of water set up on the porch to clean our feet. Those old trunks are over there," she said, pointing to the far side of the barn. "I kept everything I don't use in the house. I knew you'd be a little annoyed if I threw it away."

  "You're right."

  "I think the trunk with those old robes in it is that one with the gold banding," she told him. "Right there."

  "Alright."

  "Remember, clean paws and feet," she warned. "If you track mud on my floor, we're going to have words."

  "You sound like my mother."

  "I hope so," she said imperiously, then she sauntered out of the barn.

  Cleaning his paws on a pile of straw, Tarrin filed through the trunks. They held old clothes, very old clothes that his family hadn't worn in a while since before he left. Mother was a pack rat, and rarely threw anything away. He found one of his father's old robes, still fairly servicable but with an old bloodstain on the sleeve from where he had accidentally cut himself while wearing it. It was way too small, but it would do in a pinch. Tarrin shrugged out of his clothes and put it on. His father had liked baggy, loose robes, so that gave Tarrin's shoulders enough room--if only just-- to fit into it. The hem of the robe ended at his knees, when it dragged the floor when his father wore it, and the sleeves ended almost above his elbows. He had to keep his tail down to keep it from riding up the back of the robe, but other than that it was good enough. He snapped most of the mud off his clothes in the open area of the barn, then bundled them up and trudged over to the house. Jesmind and Jasana's clothes were laid out on the porch rail neatly, and Tarrin realized that they had taken them off right there. Actually, out here, who was around to look at them? Then again, Jesmind wouldn't really care if someone was there to look. She was a Were-cat, she had very little concept of modesty. She was teaching that same indifference concerning clothing to their daughter, whom he had seen wandering around the house without clothes on once already. Tarrin's habits of modesty were ingrained rather than deliberate. He didn't often undress in public because he had learned other habits back when he was human, but it didn't change the fact that taking off his clothes in company bothered him just as little as it did Jesmind. He used what water was left to scrub the mud off his feet, paws, and his forearms and shins, then went inside.

  He was greeted to childish giggling when he came through the door. Jasana took one look at him and laughed, and Jesmind had to suppress a grin. He knew he looked silly, but there was no help for it. "Alright, I know I look silly," he announced. "But it's the best I could find."

  "Why don't you just magic up some new clothes, papa?"

  "Because it's not good to magic things all the time, cub," he told her. "I only do that when I don't have any other way to do something." He held his arms out. "This may look silly, but since I found something that will do, using magic isn't needed."

  "Oh," she mused.

  "You do look silly," Jesmind said with a wry grin. "If you flick your tail, that robe's not going to be necessary."

  "It's nothing you haven't seen before, Jesmind," he said mildly, using the same words she used before.

  ` "True enough," she agreed. "You could at least cut a hole for your tail. You're not going to be able to keep it down like that all night."

  "I guess you're right," he agreed, reaching behind him with a claw extended.

  "Let me do it," she offered, coming over. "I have a better angle."

  "Alright, he said, holding still while she grabbed the robe with one paw and probed it with her fingers, finding the base of his tail. Then she sliced the fabric of the robe with her claw, as neatly as if she'd used shears. "There you go," she said, grabbing the fabric and holding it out. "Go ahead and thread your tail."

  He did so, curving the tip his tail up and under the robe, sliding it along the fabric until he felt the new hole. Then he poked the tip through. Jesmind grabbed the end of his tail and pulled gently, surprising him a bit, helping him snake his tail down to where the robe was snugged against its base. Then she smoothed out the fur on his tail absently, ruffled up during the procedure.

  "There," she said, patting him fondly on the back.

  "Thanks."

  "Any time. What do you want for dinner?"

  "What do we have?"

  "Not much," she admitted. "I have enough for some stew, since we didn't hunt today. Is that good for you?"

  "That's fine," he assured her.

  "Let me go get it out of the pantry," she called. "You know, that room you have down in the basement is unbelievably handy. Where did your family get that piece of metal?"

  Tarrin had honestly forgotten about that. His father had brought that back from his days in the army, a very rare object of magical enchantment. It radiated intense cold all the time, so cold that it couldn't be touched with bare skin, and it served as a very convenient manner of storing food. The chilled food--frozen, if it was kept close to that piece of metal--kept a very long time, allowing the Kaels to stockpile an impressive amount of food. Elke Kael had worked out exactly where something needed to be placed in relation to that metal to determine if it would simply chill, get very c
old, or would freeze. She had even put marks on the floor to show her children those zones of varying cold, so they'd know where to put what.

  "Father brought it back with him from his time in the army. He said he found it in the ruins of an old tower out in the forest. Ruins like that are dotted all over Sulasia, from before the time of the Breaking."

  "I know," she agreed. "He's damned lucky to have found something like that. Even more, to have kept it."

  "He sorta didn't tell anyone what he had," Tarrin chuckled. "Though it was hard to explain why there was frost on his pack in the middle of summer, he used to say."

  Jesmind laughed. "No doubt there. That would stick out a little bit. You know that some of that food down there is from when you were here?" she told him. "It's still good."

  "I'm not surprised," he said calmly. "As long as it stays frozen, it'll keep."

  "I had to throw out all the meat," she told him. "It all got tough and tasteless. It doesn't keep for a long time, even if it's frozen."

  "I know."

  "But I have a kill in there from last ride, enough for a stew." She gave him a smile. "I found an old room buried near that old brewhouse, a room that had casks of ale and wine in it."

  "You found father's aging chamber?" Tarrin said with a laugh. "He had to hide it because some of the villagers would try to sneak over here and steal father's brews."

  "Why did he tolerate it?"

  "It was soemthing of a good-natured competition with them, Jesmind," he chuckled. "They'd try to find it, and he'd try to hide it from them. They didn't outright steal it when they found it, though. Father would go down into the aging room and find an empy spot in the rack, with a pouch of coins to pay for it hanging in its place. I got pretty annoyed with it. Every time they found it, Father would make me help him dig a new opening, and fill in the old entrance." He laughed. "The last time, we dug a twenty span tunnel that opened under the barn. It's been nearly two years--four, really, and I guess they never did find it."

  "That's where I found it," Jesmind smiled. "Those casks down there have aged very well. Especially that apple wine. I think I'll go get some of it."