by Sarah Chorn
“Oh, thank Fate,” he whispered and pulled me into his arms.
That is how I spent much of the next few days, in his arms while he tended me day and night. No chore was too small for him, or too inconsequential. He wrapped me in his wolf skins and whispered stories about Star Woman and her lover, the Moon. He held my hair while I purged my stomach, and fed me broth spoonful by careful spoonful. While he nursed me back to health, Annie and Jasper watched from the shadows and Harriet and Jack from the loft.
I learned, much later, that retrieving me from the school had been quite an ordeal. I was lost to the world, and no one knew how to heal me without the aid of shine, nor could they let a healer near me, lest my secret nature be exposed. Somehow, Miss Mary had a non-shine medical textbook secreted away and she brought it with her to the cabin. Together, Miss Mary, Jasper, and Annie stitched up my wound and watched over me until I woke. I had been sleeping for nearly a week. When my father showed up, no one thought I would wake again. People died from far less than a blow to the head.
School was out for the next few weeks due to Longest Night and the terrible weather. Even the shine mines and fields ceased operation during this time of year. The world went quiet, and all attention focused on hearth and home as we gave thanks to Fate for one more year lived, and prayed for the next to be kind to us.
I suppose this is why my father came. He knew that this would be one of the only times of year no one would stop by for an unexpected visit. He would be safe as he could be until after Longest Night and it was time to leave again, to hide away from the world. During this one precious week, though, he was mine, and I cherished him.
I seemed to heal more rapidly once I woke up and was strong enough to eat food and keep it down. The storm raged around us for days on end, and soon my father seemed to chafe at being confined, pacing and often taking time outside, alone. He didn’t seem to know what to do with himself. He was a man suited to the wilderness, to open spaces and unencumbered skies. Being stuck in a cabin, which was full of people, must have been hard for him, but he handled it well.
I remembered what Annie had told me the day she gave me my boots. A mountain lion may be beautiful, Cassandra, but do not forget its nature. There is a reason we do not allow such creatures in our house. My da reminded me of a mountain lion, pacing the days away.
One afternoon, Da sat beside my pallet, fingering some beads he’d pulled out from his pack. Annie was fixing dinner with Harriet and Jasper and Jack were working on sums at the table. “Da,” I said. “Are you a bad man?”
The cabin went quiet. Annie let out a moan that seemed to stick inside her like a pain she couldn’t shake.
“Cass, you shouldn’t—“ she began.
“It’s fine,” Chris said, holding up his hand. He fixed his eyes on me. We’d been apart for a few months now, and I had already forgotten how my father’s stare seemed to go right through me. “Has someone told you that I am a bad man, Cass?” His voice was soft, but his words were hard, and I wasn’t sure how to respond, so I buried myself under the blankets with only my eyes peering out above them.
“They said you were a criminal,” I finally admitted. “Said you were a murderer.”
“Is that why you were struck?” He ran a hand through my hair, moving it so he might study the stitches near my temple. They were still sore to the touch, and I winced.
I thought of Jack, and his anger when we’d fought. I thought of the kids at school and how they had reacted to me. I remembered the cruel taunts the boy shouted before he pelted me with rocks and tears spilled down my cheeks. “You aren’t a bad man,” I sobbed. “You’re my da.”
Chris looked over his shoulder at Annie and then cursed under his breath. “It’s not as simple as that, little flower. Sometimes men do bad things for good reasons. Sometimes men do good things for bad reasons. The world isn’t all black and white. A person can be more than one thing.”
Annie let Harriet take over the dinner preparations and pulled up a chair beside Chris. “Honey,” she said, cupping my cheek. “Your pa has done some things that put him on the wrong side of the law, and a lot of people are mad at him. A lot of people praise him, too. Only you can decide how you feel about him. No one else can decide for you.”
“They hate him,” I said.
“Who hates me?” Chris asked.
“The people in town. And they hate me for being yours.”
Chris seemed to chew on this a bit. “Likely what they say about me is true, Cassandra. Likely, I’ve done exactly what they claim. I’ve got blood on my hands. Does that mean you don’t love me anymore?”
I gave that question a lot of thought, felt Annie and Chris watch me while I did so. I have blood on my hands. Even at five years old, I knew what that meant. I knew that frightened me. I did not know my father as well as I thought I did. I also knew that he had never hurt me, and he never would. But… “Did you leave me here because you don’t love me?” I whispered.
And that was when my tears truly fell. My sorrow assaulted me, all those months of worry and waiting, of wondering if he left me because I wasn’t good enough to be his daughter. I never gave those thoughts voice, but they were there, in the back of my mind, gnawing at me day in and day out. I dreamed of him leaving over and over again, and in each dream, there was another inadequacy that made him feel like I was deserving of being left.
It is the tragedy of youth that things are felt so keenly, and likewise a tragedy that adults believe that children are too young to understand.
That question unlocked something in my father, though, and in a flash, he was on the pallet with me in his arms. Annie wiped away a tear and turned to give us what privacy she could in a cabin as small as ours. “Is that what you think?” My da whispered in my ear. His arms around me felt like heaven, and for the first time in months, I felt like I belonged somewhere.
Home. It has ever been my father’s arms.
“Cass, answer me. Do you truly think I left you here because I do not love you?”
I clung to him and nodded. “Why else would you do such a thing?” I asked.
“Oh, little flower,” he pressed his lips against my crown. “I’m a broken man, Cass. The truth is, something in me died years ago, and then the rest of me shattered when your ma passed. There’s nothing inside of me but winter. You are the only thing in this Fate’s forsaken world that keeps my heart beating. I left you here not because I don’t love you, but because I love you so much I wanted you to have opportunities I cannot give you. I wanted a better life for you. That’s what love is. It’s not holding on, it’s letting go. I love you enough to give you more. Do you understand?”
I wasn’t sure I did, but I clung to him. I soaked him up, let the smell of the wilderness saturate me.
“I want so much for you, Cassandra. I want you to wear fine dresses and read books. I want you to know how to do sums, and live a life of plenty. I want you to know enough to be able to blaze your own trail. Your mama was a smart woman. She went to the finest schools. She made me promise that I’d do right by you. It was her dying wish, you understand? And maybe I lost sight of that for a time, but she’s always been my guiding star. I knew that leaving you here, with a good family I trusted, and all the stability I can’t offer was the way I could fulfill her wish. She wouldn’t have wanted you to live a life on the run.”
“I don’t remember her,” I whispered.
He seemed to hold me tighter for a spell. “She was the best thing that ever happened to me, Cassandra, and she gave me you, the most precious gift I have ever received. She loved you so much it hurt. She used to watch you and say, ‘It is a strange thing, to know my heart is beating outside of my body.’” He paused. “We were happy, the three of us. So blessedly happy. Just us, locked away in our own private world.”
The quiet that settled between us was heavy yet comfortable. No one in the cabin spoke. Annie sniffled near the stove. The smell of cooking food was heavy in the air.
“I st
ill love you,” I finally said.
“What?” Chris asked, startled. Likely, he had forgotten about his earlier question. Does that mean you don’t love me anymore?
“I still love you,” I repeated. I twisted about in his arms so I could meet his eyes. I rested my hand against his cheek and wiped away a tear with my thumb. “Whatever you have done, whatever sins you carry within you, I forgive them. I forgive you and I love you.”
It was really that simple for me. Perhaps my father had done horrible things. Maybe he had killed someone. Maybe he had blood on his hands, but underneath all of that, he was still my father and this night, he let me see a bit of the man he was, and the broken, frozen, emptiness he held under his skin. The yearning, yawning pain that seemed to go on and on. He’d let his guard down enough for me to see the chips and cracks in his armor.
He was my father, and I loved him. I gave him that gift that Longest Night. I gave him the gift of my heart, and I hoped, in some way, it would act as the sun to melt some of the ice that dwelled within him.
“Little flower,” he breathed, brushing his lips across my forehead. “I do not deserve you.”
Days passed, and I grew stronger. I savored that time, the warmth of it, the sense of family that the holiday brought with it, but all things come to an end, and I knew my father was readying to leave before anyone else did. I was used to his patterns, and I was so attuned to him, it would have been impossible to hide any of his preparations from me. When he started fingering his pack, checking his supplies repeatedly, and bartering with Jasper for bits of rope and a new knife, I knew he was getting ready to leave again.
“Take me with you?” I whispered the night before he departed.
It was the small hours, the time when even the softest whisper sounded too loud. He probably thought I was asleep, though he was a fool if he did.
“I can’t,” he said, sinking into the chair beside my cot. “You’re healing now, and it’s time. Longest Night is over, and it’s not safe for me here anymore. Plus, you’ve got your studies, and friends now. You’re making a life here, little flower, just like I wanted for you.” He stopped, swallowed a few times. “Your ma would have wanted this for you.”
His big hand cupped my cheek. He looked into my eyes, and for the first time in my life, I think he saw me not as a child, but as someone he could reason with. I was still so young, but at that moment, something shifted between us.
“I want you to say here, Cass. Stay and learn. Can you do that for me? I promise, I will come back every Longest Night, and more if I can.”
I did not agree to his terms right away. I studied him, and he studied me, and I knew that I had an opportunity to demand something of him.
“What if I get hurt again?” I asked, tears welling. “What if I get hurt and you aren’t there?”
“Little flower, it’s not safe for you—"
“You can’t leave me without a way to reach you.” I was sobbing now, my whole body shaking with the force of my sorrow. I couldn’t stand the thought of him walking away again, leaving me behind with no way to reach out to him should I need him. I was alone all over again.
“Cass, it’s best to let go. Holding on to me will only hurt you.” He paused. “I shouldn’t have come back here. I shouldn’t put you through this again.”
“There was a tree,” I pressed. “Remember the twisted willow tree with the big boulder about two hours away? I will leave a scrap of red cloth there if I need you.”
He didn’t seem willing, his eyes went hard, and he looked at a point above my head before a sigh escaped him. He chucked me gently under the chin with a knuckle. “I will leave you a trinket once a month, at the full moon so you might know that I am alive and well,” he finally said. “That is all I can promise you, Cassandra, and it is more than I should do.”
It was enough, a small tether that would bind us. Once a month, I would go to that stone and receive some gift from my father, and I would leave one in return. Such a meager thing to hold onto, but to me, those treasures were priceless.
“Jasper,” My father said the next day. It was time. We all knew he was leaving. His pack was full and propped by the door. He had furs wrapped around him and a thick hat shoved on his head. “Do you still have guns?”
I saw Annie go stiff and still. Jack and Harriet’s eyes went wide, and even I was startled. This was something I did not know about. Jasper had guns? They were expensive beyond measure, and the shooting shine with which to use them was beyond price. How did Jasper have such tools, and where did he keep them?
“Chris,” Jasper said in warning.
“Sorry,” My father replied. “I thought the kids knew.”
“Well, now they do.” Jasper motioned to the room he shared with Annie. I listened as something heavy was moved. There was some whispering and a bit of shuffling about, and a few moments later, my father appeared with a gun on his hip, and a belt with three vials of shooting shine strapped around his waist. It wasn’t much, but it was far more than I ever imagined anyone would have on them, especially if they weren’t a company man or a lawman.
“You must not speak of this,” Jasper said to the house in general. “I used to run guns and shine back in the day, with Chris.”
“I thought you got rid of them,” Annie admonished.
I could sense an argument brewing, but Jasper didn’t reply and Annie let it rest, though I bet there would be an argument later, behind their closed bedroom door.
“I need to go,” my pa said. “Cass, are you well enough to see me outside?” My head was throbbing and I was a bit dizzy but I wrapped myself in warm clothes and followed my da outside.
The night was cold. The moon looked down on a world blanketed in fresh snow. Trees laden with white, reached up with naked branches to caress the sky. My breath hung in the air. My father knelt before me, clasping my shoulders with his hands. “Cassandra,” he said, meeting my eyes. “I love you. Do not ever doubt that.”
“I won’t,” I whispered. He wiped away my tears with his thumbs. I had not even realized I was crying.
“Do not forget about the stone,” he said.
“I won’t,” I said again.
“I will come back every Longest Night, more if I can.” He studied me, as though memorizing me. Then, he stood and walked away.
I would always watch him go. I would never see him come. It was the way of things between us. And while I gave him the gift of my love that winter, he likewise gave me a gift. I now had some answers, and with them, I found a place for myself in this new world of mine.
The next night, they found themselves at the edge of a swamp, boots wet and sinking into the mud. They waited while Chris made some peculiar bird calls, before pausing a few moments to do it all over again. “Wait,” the man said, resting a hand on Arlen’s shoulder. “Sometimes it takes a minute.”
He made the calls again, and Arlen listened while the whistles and chirps slid across the darkness to whatever lay beyond. The wet was doing nothing for his already aching feet. He could feel all that damp kissing his freshly popped blisters, and his muscles were on fire.
He was exhausted. They’d pushed hard, tearing through the forest before they sloped down a hill and hit a large meadow that ended abruptly on the edge of a swamp. To the edge of no man’s land, waiting for… something.
“Fucking Rose,” Chris muttered under his breath.
“Can’t we just…” Arlen waved his hand in the air before him.
“Not unless you want to get shot.” The outlaw paused and studied Arlen. “Well, probably wouldn’t hurt you at all, but me? I like my guts where they are.”
Finally, after an eternity, a shine light flashed three times before vanishing. Chris grunted. “Follow me. It’s slick out here, and the mud can suck you down before you know it. Step where I step.”
The going was slow, wading through knee-deep cold water. They walked a circuitous route that made no real sense to him. He could hear Christopher counting low unde
r his breath; footsteps, Arlen realized. Twelve steps, and then a left turn. Eight more, before a right. They made their ponderous way around some tall swamp grass, bullfrogs going silent as they passed. Nothing but the sound of Chris’s whispered counting and the kiss of water at their calves.
Finally, after what felt like hours, they found a wooden platform perched just above the surface of the swamp, stretching into the distance until it disappeared. Around them, bullfrogs once again filled the night with their song, and crickets acted as the accompaniment. The stars glowed overhead, brilliant and undiminished. He’d never seen a night sky so bright, so undiluted by city lights, so completely unbroken, save for the edges cut off by the jagged mountains that surrounded him.
It was summer, and the night was warm, and if he wasn’t so bone-weary and strength-drained, he was positive he would have enjoyed standing under the glory of the heavens, impressing its majesty upon his soul.
By the time they reached the platform, Arlen was so exhausted, Chris had to help him up. “Mind yourself,” the outlaw muttered as the wooden platform, built with boards nearly rotted through with age, groaned under his weight. Soon, footsteps shook the planks. Arlen squinted at the dark, and could barely make out the shape of a house up ahead. “She’s got company.”
“You fool!” A woman shrieked, her voice rolling over the swampland around them, momentarily silencing the night’s wild music. “You should have come around the other way. You know better! You’ll catch your death walking through the water like that.” She turned her attention to Arlen. “Poor man is tuckered out.” She thwapped Christopher upside the head, setting him to laughing.
And wasn’t that a sight to behold. Chris was a quiet man. He seemed more comfortable in his own head than speaking. He was a mystery, an enigma, strong and silent, and all but a stranger to Arlen. But now the outlaw laughed, and it transformed him. He seemed younger, suddenly, more… human. More approachable.
Gone was the brooding, dark figure that he’d been following. This was a man the world could love. Now he caught a glimpse of who Christopher Hobson used to be before his life decided to give him a wound that refused to heal. Before the world broke his back.
