"Cool."
Chapter 15
The onions are making me cry.
Chemistry. That's all. Strong onions, watering eyes, completely normal biological response to—
"You're holding the knife wrong."
Kestria's voice cuts through and I blink, refocusing on my hands—she's right, I've been sawing instead of rocking, pieces uneven, some paper-thin and some chunky enough to choke on.
"I'm distracted."
"I noticed." She bumps my hip with hers. "Here. Let me."
I hand over the knife and step back, wiping my eyes on my sleeve. The cooking fire's burning well—checked it three times, keep checking it—and the pot's simmering with the base I started an hour ago. Smells good. Should taste better once the onions go in. If she cuts them properly. She's cutting them properly. Did I add salt? I added salt. Pretty sure I added salt.
"You're spiraling."
"I'm not spiraling. I'm thinking."
"Your face does this thing when you spiral." Kestria scrapes onions off the board into the pot without looking atme. "Your eyebrows go all—" She scrunches her face in demonstration.
"That's not what I look like."
"That's exactly what you look like. What are you thinking about?"
The jar. The quarter jar. Fenna's wound closing because I had barely enough—spread too thin, took twelve extra minutes to break the fever—and what happens next time? When someone's bleeding gray and I'm standing there with one weak jar and a prayer? Who rations when a child is dying in front of you—
"Supplies."
"You're always thinking about supplies."
"Because we never have enough of them." I grab a root vegetable from the pile and scrub. Dirt, water, motion. "The moonbright paste. What I made from those leftover petals is barely a treatment. And that's all I have."
"I know."
"And you said that Keer hasn’t found anything either."
The vegetable's clean. I keep scrubbing anyway, dirt under my nails, water cold against my fingers. "Next attack happens, someone dies."
Kestria's quiet for a moment, stirring the pot. Onions sizzle when they hit the liquid.
"What do you need?"
"More moonbright. Obviously."
"Where do you get it?"
"There's a field. Near my—" The word catches. "Near the cottage. Where I used to—it grows there. Wild. Biggest patch I've ever found." Better concentration than anything cultivated, faster processing, proper growing conditions under old canopy. "If I can just get there and back without—"
"That's a long way. Full day there and back, at least."
"I know."
"What about where you were attacked? You found moonbright petals there, right?"
My hands stop on the vegetable.
