Dárja wrapped her arms around her mid-section. She nodded but said nothing, worried her voice might crack.
Marnej disappeared behind the rock. She listened as his footfalls faded away through the undergrowth. Her heart still hammered thinking about what might have happened if the soldiers had come upon her. I would’ve been helpless, she thought and began to shake.
A warm breath at her ear made Dárja start. Her hand instinctively went to her knife, but the leather loop was empty. Her panic gave way to annoyance when she noticed it was only the horse.
“Go back to your forage,” she said, her tone brusque and sullen. But the animal didn’t listen. The horse hung its head close to hers, even after she repeatedly pushed it away.
“Go back to your forage,” Dárja said again, this time softer and chiding.
“What did you say?” Marnej asked, leaning around the rock. His outstretched hand held a golden mushroom nestled among fat, dark berries.
“We can roast some fiddleheads,” he added, crouching down beside her. “When we come to a stream, I can try to catch us some fish.”
The sound of the horse snuffling made Dárja aware of the quiet that had grown around them. Conscious of Marnej resting beside her, she said, “Or we can go to a farm.” Then she corrected herself. “I mean, you can go to a farm. Maybe you can get us enough food to make it to the north.”
Marnej’s expression brightened, and she realized that, for the first time, she was witnessing his smile. It was a lopsided grin that made him look more like a fox than a human.
“Yes,” he said eagerly. “We’ve been so careful. But we need food. I can go to a farm and steal what we need.” He popped a berry into his mouth, then held out his trove to her.
Dárja’s unease returned as she scooped up a handful of berries. “Couldn’t you just ask for some food? Are your kind not generous to each other?”
Marnej shook his head. “Asking leads to questions.”
Sunlight cut through the trees, forcing Dárja to squint, but she could still make out Marnej’s sly grin as he carved the mushroom. He held out half to her on the tip of his knife. Dárja took it gratefully but couldn’t help thinking it would have tasted better cooked with butter and onions.
“What if you get caught?” she asked. The spongy mushroom squeaked as she chewed it.
“I won’t,” Marnej said.
The smugness in his voice turned the fresh mushroom sour in her mouth.
“But what if you do?”
Try as she might, Dárja couldn’t keep the doubt from her voice.
Marnej waggled his eyebrows at her. “I’ll sneak in undetected. I’ll use the Song.”
Without intending to, Dárja let out a bark of a laugh that caught both her and Marnej off-guard. His gaping stare reminded her of a giant perch. She broke down into a fit of coughing laughter at the idea of Marnej as an enormous, wide-mouthed fish.
“Well, that was odd,” he said.
Catching her breath, Dárja glared at him.
“There!” he exclaimed. “There’s the scowl I know.”
Dárja leaned over and took more berries, leaving a few for Marnej. She dropped a couple in her mouth, crushing the juice out of them with her tongue before swallowing them. She shook her head.
“What?” he asked. His eyes narrowed. “Don’t tell me I’m not skilled enough to carry food with me into the Song.”
“No. That’s not what I was thinking,” she began to protest.
Marnej crossed his arms in front of him. “Then what?”
“Well.” Dárja faltered, her attention momentarily fixed on dark blue stains that peaked out between his splayed fingers.
She looked up. His smile was gone. His features hardened.
“I don’t know what you can do?” she said, frustrated that the easy moment they’d shared was now gone. “I’ve lived my whole life in the Song, but I can’t tell you exactly how it works. Or, how it might work for you.”
“But you knew we couldn’t bring the horse in,” Marnej pointed out, his chin leading and defiant.
She wanted to knock it back into place.
“I knew that we couldn’t bring the horse into the Song because I’d asked Irjan about it,” she said.
Marnej leaned forward. “And what did he say?”
What came to her mind was a vision of Irjan from her recent dream. She shuddered. The taste of berries and dirt welled up as her stomach began to churn. Dárja covered her mouth and turned aside.
“Can’t even tell me that, can you?” Marnej snorted, scrambling to his feet. “I’m not asking you to reveal your darkest secrets. I’m just trying to figure out how to survive long enough to get us to Northlands.”
“I know,” Dárja said, aware that both her anger and the contents of her stomach were about to erupt. She swallowed, breathing in and out through her nose. Finally, she said, “I’m just trying to remember.”
Marnej waited for her to continue, his arms still crossed and his arrogance palpable.
“I remember Irjan saying that there were limits to what he could do,” she said, then paused, unsure if she could continue. The image of Irjan’s dark, pleading eyes hung over her. “I was small, a mánná. I was always asking him questions. I must have asked him about what he could and couldn’t do. I remember him saying that he couldn’t bring some animals into the Song—like a horse. I remember because I didn’t know what a horse was. All I had ever seen were binna. I’d never seen a horse until we’d encountered you and your men. But now I know that they have their own limitation.”
“Limitation?”
“Their spirit is broken,” Dárja said, keeping her tone matter-of-fact as she recalled the horse’s song with sadness. “They can act wild, but they have no free will.”
Marnej cocked his head, disbelief written across his wrinkled brow.
“What joy is there in bending another’s will to your own?” she asked, her disgust bubbling to the surface even as she endeavored to keep it contained. “Working together. Moving together. Being joined in purpose. That’s joy. That is . . .” Dárja struggled to find the right words. “That’s how we are supposed to act.”
Marnej’s frown changed into a smirk. “Do I need to ask permission of the food I intend to steal?”
Dárja labored to get to her feet, her face flushing with the effort and her aggravation.
“You say you want to know, to understand. And I try to explain, but you choose to mock. I don’t know why I bother. You’ve got a wooden stump for a head, just like every other Olmmoš.”
“I’m sorry,” Marnej said, with surprising sincerity.
Dárja leaned heavily against the rock, letting it take her weight as her anger cooled.
“I don’t know what you’ll encounter,” she said, tired of arguing. “Maybe it’ll be easy for you to take what you need. Maybe it’ll be like the horse. But if you’re not prepared . . .” Her thoughts trailed off.
“It’ll be fine,” Marnej said.
His confidence was at once impressive and infuriating.
“I won’t let you do this alone,” Dárja said, hoping she sounded as sure of herself as Marnej seemed to be about himself.
Marnej laughed. He held out his hand to her. “I’d expect nothing less.”
Dárja took Marnej’s hand, eyeing him to see if the gesture held any scorn. She saw only a genuine smile that, this time, looked more human than fox. As he helped her shuffle over to the horse, she wondered if all Olmmoš were as changeable as Marnej. He was like a frog, leaping from the shore to the lily pad and back again, trying to catch flies. The only problem was that she seemed to be the one exhausted by his antics.
Marnej took hold of the reins and pulled himself up onto the horse. He smoothed the saddle blanket he’d managed to twist, then held out his hand to her once again. The horse shifted as he drew her up in front of him, but Dárja held on tighter to his hand, managing to settle herself in a series of awkward adjustments. With a gentle flick of the re
ins, Marnej guided the horse west toward the arcing sun.
As the day progressed, the smooth, almost gliding motion of the horse’s trot might have lulled Dárja to sleep were it not for the fact that she felt unsettled. She told herself it was because she disliked relying on Marnej. But it was more than that. If she was honest, she would have to admit that she was conflicted.
On the one hand, she couldn’t put aside her resentment toward Marnej. His presence acted as a constant reminder of the sacrifice she’d had to make in order for him to be alive. He’d received the life force meant for her when Irjan had interfered in her birth. Dárja thought about the old Jápmemeahttun stories of how the gods had given them the power to transform. Sitting on the horse, with Marnej behind her, she now bitterly wished that power had been enough for three souls. Perhaps then her oktoeadni would have survived. And she herself might have lived a life free of secrecy—free of the fearful knowledge that she would never give birth. Never become an almai.
Still, Dárja had to acknowledge that Marnej was helping her return north—return home. And what of his own home? What little she knew about Marnej had been pieced together from what she’d seen of the Brethren and what she’d overheard from Kalek and Okta. But their knowledge of Marnej was as an infant. He was now, in Olmmoš terms, a grown man and a stranger to her.
“Did you want to be a Piijkij?” Dárja asked, interrupting the rhythm of hooves and terrain.
Marnej shifted behind her, but said nothing. She briefly wondered if he had taken her question as another challenge. Dárja braced herself for what would likely be a biting answer.
“It’s all I know,” he said cautiously.
Relieved and curious, she asked, “But, did you like it?”
Marnej pulled back on the reins, slowing the horse’s pace as they entered a dense, shady grove of pines. “I liked being good at something.”
Dárja shivered. She told herself it was her cooling sweat and not Marnej’s disembodied voice drifting past her ear that disturbed her.
“I never killed a Jápmemeahttun outside of battle, if that’s what you’re wondering?” he said.
The vehemence of his response felt like a jab to her back. “Not even the day Irjan came at you, with the rest of us behind him?” she asked, defiance lurking in her tone.
“No,” he said.
The finality of his denial stretched out into silence until a crow squawked above them. Dárja took the bird’s harsh cawing as censure. Caw. See what you get for asking questions. Caw. The crow broke through the branches, spreading its wings, then disappeared somewhere behind them.
“I struck some blows,” Marnej said harshly. “Then you were in front of me. And then Irjan came between us.”
Dárja watched Marnej’s fingers curl around the reins. The blue veins on the back of his hands rippled.
“He wouldn’t fight,” he said with a snort.
Dárja told herself to ignore the slight. Let him believe what he wants. But she couldn’t ignore the accusation of cowardice.
“He wouldn’t fight you,” she said. Her emphasis on the last word.
“Because he’s my father?”
“Yes. You were—you are everything to him,” she said, her jealousy stinging like a fresh cut.
Marnej was grateful Dárja faced forward, unable to see his face. All he’d ever wanted was to belong. To have a father who loved him and longed for him . . . that was too much for him to accept. He swallowed the howl swelling in his chest. He knew he should hate the Brethren—those who’d trained him and those who’d taunted him. But he couldn’t. They were all he had.
“I knew I wasn’t like the others,” Marnej said, to the back of Dárja’s head. “Being Irjan’s son was a curse I didn’t understand as a boy. But as I grew up, I understood and I grew to hate him.”
Dárja’s back stiffened. Marnej tensed, preparing himself for another unwavering defense of his father. But it didn’t come. Dárja said nothing. But whatever gratification Marnej felt was fleeting as he relived the whispers, the suspicion that had slowly eaten away at him. He wanted someone to understand. He wanted her to understand.
“Every day I was judged by his actions,” he said in a rush. “I had to be better, stronger, and more loyal, just to be considered an equal to the others. But I wasn’t like the others. I heard the voices. I didn’t know what it meant, other than it made me different. Later, I worried the voices were a sign I was like my father. I thought it was the voices that had made him betray the Brethren.” He paused, knowing that he couldn’t turn his back on the truth now.
“But I still listened,” he said.
“What did the voices say?” Dárja asked, her profile coming into view.
“I used to think they were my mother,” Marnej said, his voice as soft as the feeling of Dárja’s hair brushing against his face. “A memory of her singing me to sleep.”
He cleared his throat. “When I got older, I convinced myself it was the gods talking to me. I told myself that they’d chosen me to remove my father’s stain upon the Brethren’s noble history.” He snorted. “I thought if I was loyal, beyond doubt, then I would be seen as myself and not the shadow of my father.”
“But they knew,” Dárja said, as if she’d always known this to be the truth.
Marnej shook his head as the betrayal sank into the deepest parts of him. “They knew,” he repeated, adding in a whisper, “the Avr knew and he let me believe.”
“He let you believe a lie,” Dárja said pointedly.
“He let me believe a lie,” Marnej agreed, lost in the enormity of what it all meant.
The wind picked up, bringing with it the rustle of birch leaves and the faint scent of smoke.
“I fought for them,” Marnej said, then stopped, unable to go on.
“It’s not fair,” Dárja said gently, her words almost disappearing with the wind.
A long interval followed before Marnej added, “I killed for them.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“WE NEED HORSES,” HERKO grumbled.
The Brethren had been traveling west on foot for five days. As individuals, they were exhausted. As a group, they were demoralized. For a time, Válde had been able to raise their spirits by appealing to their need for vengeance. He had taken their discord and directed it toward a worthy recipient—the Believers. But each step they took further eroded their eagerness for justice. They were hungry, tired, and besieged by the likelihood that they were the last of the Piijkij, the last of the Brethren of Hunters.
“We need horses,” Herko repeated.
“We heard you the first time,” Edo said. “But, as you might have noticed, Herko, we are in the middle of a forest and there are no horses around. So, if you feel the need to list the things we need but do not have, please keep it to yourself.”
“Prancing upstart,” Herko muttered.
Mures smirked at the comment but added nothing as he stepped over the gnarled roots of the rocky path they followed.
“Herko has a point,” Gáral piped up, slowing to stop. “It’s all well and good to cast us against the Believers, but there are needs that must be met before we can begin to act.”
Válde knew Gáral’s observation was directed at him. The man’s unflagging anger at not being accepted as their group’s leader made Válde want to cede the position and be done with the pettiness. But to do so would doom them to ruin. Of all the men in their group, Gáral was the most erratic. His emotions swayed like the grasses. At least with Herko, his motives were clear and consistent. Herko wanted comfort and ease, which for their calling seemed odd. But it was a dependable ambition.
Válde stopped walking. He surveyed the boulder-strewn section of forest they now traversed. He heard the sound of flowing water nearby. It sounded strong enough that he thought it might be a river and not some trickle of a jogaš.
“We should stop and rest here,” he said, looking directly at Gáral to see if he would object. “It sounds as if there is a river near where we
might have water to drink and a cool place to soak our feet.”
A murmur of approval rippled through the group. Válde led the way, listening to the sound of moving water with growing thirst. When they reached the river, it was bigger than he anticipated, and he moved them upstream to where the water widened into a pool around a rocky outcropping.
Some of the men dropped to the ground to lie upon their backs. Others went to the river’s edge to drink. Válde knelt on the bank and drew several handfuls of water to his mouth. He pushed past the warm water at the surface to the cool depths, then dribbled water on the nape of his neck, enjoying the refreshing feeling as the droplets slid down the length of his sweaty back.
Pointing into the eddy that fed the pool, Beartu said, “There are fish.”
Without hesitating, he cut a slim birch branch, then split its end and whittled a point with deft flicks of his sharp knife. Válde sat down upon the bank, joining the others to watch as Beartu tore off a length of his tunic, weaving it around the four prongs of his spear to widen the gap. Then the man stripped naked and slowly slipped into the pool.
“Careful, Beartu,” Mures called out. “The fish might think your dangling bit is a worm.”
The others chuckled, but Beartu ignored them. He bent over, peered into the swirling current, and raised his spear.
Válde saw a flash in the water. But Beartu stood frozen, stonelike, his spear poised. The jeers died down. Then the spear flew from Beartu’s hand, startling everyone. The fisherman pulled a trout from the water. Its brown-spotted flank twisted on the spear’s end.
“Catch us another,” someone called out as Beartu tossed the fish onto the riverbank where a round of cheers greeted it.
Beartu, however, was already engrossed in the task.
Válde scanned the stream’s edge, then reached down, and pulled up a handful of green stocks with their roots. He held them to his nose.
“There is wild onion here,” he said, holding up his find. “What else is there that we can eat?”
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