Emma, pt. 14

Want to start at the beginning? - Emma, pt 1.

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The bow Emma held was smooth, the wood flexible. She’d been surprised; the bows her father had taught her to use were smaller and more rigid. This bow would allow her to hit a target farther away, but it would also require more control and strength to use.

Sil crouched silently next to her, watching the far field as he aimed his bow.

When Emma had asked if she could learn to use the larger bows she’d expected Lison to teach her. She imagined his arms wrapped around hers, helping her aim the bow; she’d pictured his fingers brushing against hers as she worked the tight string. 

When she proposed it he agreed it was a good idea for her to learn, but confessed to being a horrible shot. So Emma now found herself out in the woods with Sil, hunting kinibs.

They’d spend the early morning traveling down the road, getting far ahead of the main caravan. It was the sixth day of their trip, and the second day that Emma had been able to convince Rilen to ride Juniper with her.

Emma was thankful that Rilen had agreed to come with her this morning, as she had no desire to be alone with Sil. Rilen stood halfway between the horses and the spot where Emma and Sil were crouched. Emma kept looking over at Rilen, trying to signal her to come closer. Rilen shook her head, but after a few minutes finally rolled her eyes and crouched next to her friend, her feet sinking slightly into the muddy ground.

“Keep your elbow in,” Sil jabbed a finger painfully into Emma’s arm, “you said you’d used a bow before.”

Emma exhaled heavily, “I have, but this is harder to pull.”

The air was colder than it had been for most of their trip, the sky gray and dark. Normally Emma would be excited for an impending thunderstorm, but today it seemed only a bother.

The arrow loosed from Sil’s bow, making no noise and sprouting in the side of a kinib less than a heartbeat later. The small creature simply stopped moving, the arrow jutting out of its side, creating the illusion that it was pinned to the ground.

Rilen made a small squeak, and turned away.

“Why aren’t the rest running away?” Emma asked.

The other kinibs had halted, freezing in place. A moment later they were moving again, running up and down tree trunks, grabbing fleshy fruits in their paws, then darting to their holes in the ground, only to emerge seconds later.  

They had long, thin bodies, covered in a think fur. Emma knew their pelts were soft and fine, they were often used in dwin fashion. They ranged in color from a light tan to a deep black, every one of them dotted with gray and silver. Small pointed ears hid under the mounds of fur that ringed their faces. Their long, bushy tails twitched back and forth as they ran, expressing excitement and fear when their small rodent faces did not.  

“They don’t have much time. They’ll soon be competing with birds and other scavengers for the fruit. The only thing they care about right now is hording as much as they can.” Sil loosed another arrow and downed a second one.

Emma felt Rilen shifting beside her. She turned to her friend; Rilen sat with her arms crossed staring at the kinibs with sad eyes.

“Couldn’t you just shoot at targets?” Rilen asked.

Sil turned around, setting his bow next to him, “No one needs to learn how to plant an arrow into a stationary block of wood.”

“You’ve eaten kinib before Rilen,” Emma said.

“Yeah, but I’ve never killed one.”

“Well you won’t have to,” Emma felt guilty for dragging Rilen out with her, now seeing the boredom and discomfort on her friend’s face. She put her hand over Rilen’s, “Thank you for coming out, we won’t be much longer.”

“We can go back right now if you’ve decided not to kill any kinibs.” Sil watched her without emotion.

Emma looked back over the field to the small creatures running up and down the trees.

“They are very cute,” she said, then took a breath and rounded her bow in front of her, pointing it at one kinib sitting nearly motionless just outside his hole.

She pulled back the string, the memory of Sil’s sharp jab causing her to pull her elbow in line with the arrow. The arrow loosed and struck the small rodent in the shoulder, flattening it to the ground.

“They are also really good in stew.” She said, casting an apologetic look at Rilen, “We can go back now if you want, I think I understand how to use this.” She put the bow down.

Rilen bit the inside of her lip, thinking. “They do make a good stew.  And three of them will barely be enough to feed the three of us.”

Emma smiled at Rilen.

“You should do the shooting for a while Emma, get practice.” Sil said, resting one tip of his bow on the ground and leaning into it.

“Alright.”

Emma’s next shot missed; she’d tried for one as it ran down a tree trunk, but had overcompensated for its speed. The arrow landed in the trunk just below the kinib and the animal scurried to the other side of the tree.

Her next few shots hit their targets, including one difficult shot as a kinib darted over the ground.

“I don’t see it,” Sil said, not directing his words to anyone in particular, squinting as he watched the kinibs, “people always say little rodents like those are cute, but they just look like rats to me.”

Emma had to stifle a giggle. She had been thinking about how much the kinibs’ pinched faces resembled Sil. She cast her eyes to him briefly, looking at the sharp, boney edges of his face, and the long nose that seemed to drawn in the rest of his features. Even his wild red hair looked like the tufts of fur that lined the kinibs faces, and his freckles created the illusion of whiskers.  

She smiled to herself and returned to her task.

After almost a dozen kinibs were down, Sil shot again, taking down three more in quick succession. Emma watched, amazed at how quickly he could draw and aim, seemingly without effort.

In the field the kinibs still horded their fruits, completely ignoring the dead around them and the arrow shafts.

“We can beat the others to the camp, get these ready for cooking,” Sil said as he stood, walking toward the clearing.

Emma and Rilen walked back to the horses to get sacks for the kinibs.

“So, was it worth learning how to use that?” Rilen asked as they walked to the horses, pointing at the bow in Emma’s hand.

“Very much, this has a lot more power,” she glanced back to see Sil almost to the kinibs, “but I would have prefered that Lison teach me.”

The horses stood next to each other, their noses down in the grass. They were off the road, but close enough that Emma could see it through the sparse trees. She patted Juniper on the neck when they approached.

“Lison is a lot more –” Rilen paused, “agreeable than Sil.”

Emma rolled her eyes and scoffed as she tied the bow to her saddle.

Rilen looked at her curiously, but said nothing.

Emma and Rilen each took a large sack from the saddlebag on Juniper’s side, and as they turned away from the horse Emma sighed in frustration.

“I can’t be reading too much into what Lison is doing? Can I? It really seems that he likes me, right?” Emma looked to Rilen, who only nodded, “But we’ve barely kissed, and when I try to even do that he backs off.”

“Maybe he’s just trying to be respectful.”

Emma didn’t say anything and absently watched Sil remove the arrows from kinibs. She wondered why, if Lison really did want to pursue more than flirtations, he would pass up a chance to spend the day alone with her.

The girls followed behind Sil, placing the kinibs in the sacks as more of the small animals scurried around them. The living kinibs seemed oblivious to them, except when Emma bent down for one of the red fruits. A kinib reached for the same fruit, then reared onto its back legs, screeching and hollering at her until she backed away.

When all the dead kinibs were in bags and all the arrows were retrieved, they returned to the horses.  

“I have seen cute animals,” Sil said, again not directly to either girl.

They walked most of the way back to the horses and he said nothing more, apparently not planning to. To break the silence Emma said, “Oh?”

He looked at her, his small blue eyes full of thought, “There was a cow on my parents’ farm. She had these big brown eyes the same color as her spotted hide.”

“Cow?” Emma asked.

They reached the horses. Sil helped the girls strap the sacks to the saddle as he spoke.

“A type of bovine, bigger than a kewel, but smaller than an ox.”

Emma nodded.

Sil made a platform with his hands next to Juniper. Emma looked at him, not sure what to do.

He turned to her, his expression expectant. “Would you rather I drop you up there like Lison does? Like you’re some little girl?”

Emma blushed and shook her head, reaching for Juniper and putting one foot unsteadily onto Sil’s hands. When she had a firm grip on the saddle he lifted her into the air, giving her the reach to wrap her legs around the horse.

Sil held his hands out for Rilen to use next. She looked up to Emma, worried and uncertain.

“Here.” Emma reached her hand down for Rilen to take.

Rilen had difficulty getting her legs on either side of the saddle, but Sil and Emma helped steady her.

“I don’t think I’m ever doing this again,” she whispered in Emma’s ear.

Sil mounted his horse and lead them out of the clearing and back toward the road. Rilen gripped Emma around the waist and rested her head against Emma’s back.

Emma was starting to get used to being on horseback for most of the day, the aches and pains she’d started the journey with were fading into memory.

The air was wet with a light spray of rain, one they couldn’t see, but that still soaked their hair and clothes. Emma took a deep breath, sucking in the clean, wet smell and closed her eyes for a second.

“There aren’t any cows on this side of the Clavehounds, are there?”

Emma opened her eyes to see Sil riding closer to them. The road was surrounded by a thin growth of trees, huge hills all around blocking whatever lay beyond.

“I’ve never seen one, but that doesn’t count for much,” she said.

“They’re big, sweet things. Wet noises and soft eyes.” Sil was looking into the distance.

“Are they work animals?” Emma asked.

“No, dairy and meat. My parents worked a dairy farm.”

Emma nodded.

He slowed his horse again so he was riding right next to Juniper. He turned his head to the girls and smiled as his talked.

“Goat butter and goat milk are fine, but I prefer cow. I guess because I grew up with it. It’s creamier and sweeter.”

The tone in Sil’s voice made Emma curious.  She’d never heard him be so open or so free with his words.  He wasn’t lecturing or scolding or brooding, he was sharing something personal.

“You said there was one cow in particular you thought was cute?” She asked.

He looked at her, his eyes examining her for a moment before he answered.

“I used to hide in the fields. I’d do my chores so early in the morning most would still consider it night, then I’d head out into the fields before my parents were awake. They knew I was out there, but didn’t bother to find me if I’d done my duties for the day.

“Waltrun’s Hold isn’t anything like this,” he gestured his hand to the bumpy hills around them and the clusters of trees, “it was as an open, flat place, all grass and sky. Only the north had forests, and they were always blanketed in snow.”

Emma pictured a map in her mind, a huge map in one of her mother’s books that showed the lands far to the east of the Clavehound Mountains. She thought Waltrun’s Hold was a land halfway between the mountains and the distant eastern sea.

“I’d lie out in the grass just watching clouds and birds and try not to think about going back home.”

Something about how he said it made Emma know there was pain there. She watched him, but his face never changed from the mildly pleasant expression.

“My cow would always find me out there. I was usually half asleep and she would press her huge wet nose into my face,” he brushed his cheek absently, “She’d follow me around, pushing her head into my hands, asking me to scratch her ears.”

He seemed to be finished, just riding and watching the road.

“She does sound very nice.” Emma said.

“When my father slaughtered her he told me he picked her out on purpose.” His face was flat again, back to its emotionless mask, “he said he knew I was treating her like a pet, like she was a friend or something. He told me that wasn’t right, that they were just animals.”

Rilen tightened her grip around Emma’s waist.

“He was right, I suppose. Still, I left home the next day. No real reason to be around those people anymore.”

He tilted his head to the side in what looked like a gesture of dismissal.

“How old were you?” Emma asked.

Sil furrowed his brow, thinking hard for a moment, then barking a laugh, “Well, hmm, you know it was so long ago,” he looked at her, “eight I guess, maybe nine.”

Emma’s eyes went wide and she heard Rilen suck in a gasp of air behind her.

“Nine!”

“I bet to a dwin that sounds like I’d just crawled out of my crib, doesn’t it? Well, it’s not that bad. It’s young to leave home for sure, most boys left home around fifteen or sixteen, but it’s not unheard of.”

The rain started pouring in earnest, splashing huge drops off the dusty road. Rilen lamented leaving her hat with the wagons.

“We should hustle to the campsite if we want to get these things skinned before the others catch up with us.” Sil kicked his horse and bolted ahead.

“Oh great.” Rilen said.

Emma kicked at Juniper and followed after. 

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Continue to part 15