‘I didn’t want to worry you. I know you worry.’
She doesn’t know whether to laugh, or cry. The noise that comes out is somewhere in between.
‘So, you just thought you’d not mention it?’
He looks at her. ‘There’s so much to mention. Sometimes, I just don’t know where to start. I don’t know how you’d bear it.’
She kisses him again. ‘You’d be surprised what I can bear.’
And with that, she turns, and blows out the light.
65
The skull, of course, is nothing but a signifier. The locals, however, will have you believe that it sings. Under the correct starlight. With the correct libations.
—Archivist Splitwater
The morning rises blue, filled with ice. The embers are low and black. Shipwright stirs them with a stick, tin cup against her lips, the tea sharp and hot.
Shroudweaver’s still sleeping, curled close to the fire, one hand twined with red threads which fidget and twitch. She thinks about waking him, pulls her boots on instead.
Cracked from weeks of walking. She works grease into the worst of it, kneads the leather until it’s loosened enough for her to slip her feet inside.
Beyond the ruins of the squat watchtower, the hills of the Barrowlands push upwards softly, preparing themselves for something more dramatic as they near Thell. The days stay clear, wisps of cloud torn across a sky that wakes blue, and plunges to night with a deep sudden red, flaring orange across the bright tips of the mountains. Blackness follows after, the sky thick with the swirl of stars, sharpened by the absence of lamps. The land below cold, dark and still.
She’s grown used to Thell on the horizon. Stark, angular, massive. Close enough that she can see the distant flash of bright pennants. They’ll be there by the afternoon. The thought fills her with a fear that sits in her throat like half-melted ice.
She doesn’t notice she’s biting her lip until blood fills her mouth. She washes it down with tea. Sweeter than usual.
She’ll have to wake him, she knows it. But not yet. The sky isstill blue. Shipwright scuffs her feet in the grass, and waits.
Eventually, Shroudweaver rouses warily, reluctantly. She stoops to stroke his hair, squatting next to his head. She offers him a mug of something hot and black, bitter and strong, and keeps another for herself.
‘Morning, sleepyhead. That’s the first good sleep you’ve had in weeks.’
Shroudweaver yawns, stretches. ‘I’m stiff as old sail.’
She ruffles his hair. ‘That’s because you’re decrepit. Get up, I’m bored of being awake without you.’
He smiles, and levers himself to a sitting position, feet still tucked in his bedroll.
Shipwright settles down next to him, taps his knee with finger. ‘You look like a grub.’
‘I feel like a grub,’ he says, knuckling sleep grit out of his eyes. Once he can see clearly, he takes a deep drink from the mug, and sighs appreciatively. ‘That’s better.’ He sips carefully. ‘I haven’t had this in ages. What’s it called again?’
She swirls the leaves in her cup. ‘Stillweed. Or that’s what my mother calls it. It loses something in translation.’
He drinks, eying her over the rim. ‘You’ll need to teach me a few phrases sometime.’
She laughs. ‘Why? So you can impress my parents?’
He looks away, blushes.
She elbows him. ‘Oh my. You want to impress my parents.’
He glares at her. ‘Is that so bad?’
She shakes her head, still chuckling. ‘No, but you can raise the dead. You saved the world, once. Maybe twice, soon. You’d be amazed how that lowers the bar.’
