The next morning, Niimmo had vanished, taking half the meat with him.
7
Jool had been gone for ten days now. Ten days of not knowing if he lived.
Three days ago, the cough returned.
The tickle built in her lungs, but she did her best to ignore it, choosing instead to stare at the barrier of the mountains, a shawl clutched tight around her shoulders.
Ten days.
Had he even made it one night in that dangerous place?
She shouldn’t have lied about the perils that existed. She’d made him think everything was dead in the hopes he’d stay.
But he left her anyway.
And she missed him so badly. Had nightmares about the things that lived in those mountains. Giant rats, ferocious felines, and then there were the unnatural things. Rumors claimed there existed monsters with glowing eyes.
So many things to kill a man who sometimes tripped over his own feet when distracted. How she loved him. She recalled their first meeting, his cravat askew, his gaze completely focused on a book. Until he saw her.
Onaria only ever thought of herself as an ordinary woman. Her features simple, pleasant, her hair usually constrained in a few tightly woven plaits. She’d worn a plain blouse and slacks that day. Nothing ornate or revealing.
Yet his eyes had widened. He’d smiled, such a charming thing, which turned into a blush and a ducked head that made her fall in love.
Love at first sight for her. And apparently for him, too. He’d held her close after making love and told her how he’d loved her for so long but feared her rejection. For some reason, he thought her wildly attractive, irresistible, deserving of only the best.
“Which is why I married you.” Her reply to the most beautiful thing anyone had ever said to her.
Yet the man who loved her so much had departed, and with every morning she rose without him, what little hope she had left diminished further.
The pressure in her lungs built, and she knew to brace herself as the choking heaved forth, expelling air painfully. Her entire body tensed and cramped with the cough.
When she was done, blood spattered the ground. She wiped her hand across her lips, and it came away red.
The only bright thing left in this world, and it represented the worst omen.
The reprieve she’d enjoyed had ended. How long did she have now? Weeks? Days?
It reminded her of the vial he’d left behind. An innocuous little jar with metal shavings in it. He claimed he’d used it to ease her symptoms. Doubtful. There was no medicine to help the cough, and yet in all her time nursing, she’d never heard of the bloody cough stopping once it started. It usually got worse.
Like now. It throbbed, a constant painful reminder every time she breathed.
Mix it in water.
The idea seemed ludicrous. She didn’t believe for a moment it would help. Yet she found herself pouring a glass of boiled water, taking the vial, and shaking it over the liquid, watching as it floated on the surface, a glinting metallic sheen.
The tickle in her lungs started anew, and her eyes watered as she sought to hold on. Not again. If she started down that road, it ended in her dying. She didn’t want to die before seeing her husband again.
Lifting the glass, Onaria took a deep breath and downed the mixture.
Felt the grit as it hit her tongue and then irritated her throat. An irritation that heated. Slamming down the glass, she grabbed at her throat, unable to gasp for air, the warmth within increasing.
She hit the floor on her knees, and rocked, panic filling her, and yet she couldn’t scream. Couldn’t remember if this happened the last time he fed some to her. Had she thought it just a symptom of the cough?
Suddenly air filled her lungs, the heat in her throat eased, and the pain went with it, as did the tickle. By the time she’d drunk another glass of water, sluicing the grit free, and walked back outside, even her rib cage felt better.
Perhaps she enjoyed a placebo effect from taking the powder. Or maybe Jool truly was on to something miraculous.
She stared at the mountains and whispered, “Please, find what you’re looking for, and come back to me.” Because she only had, at best, two more doses left.
8
The last of the meat was tough and took a lot of water to wash down. Jool hadn’t had any luck in trapping a rat of his own. At least he was more aware of them. He’d even spotted other animals, not all of them as violently inclined as the rat. But just as quick.
If only he could have followed Niimmo. A few lessons in survival would have been welcome. Learning by trial and error, mostly error, proved exhausting and almost cost his life a few times.
The longer he spent in the wilds, the more he truly grasped the impossibility of bringing a large group of people out here to live. The valleys he’d found thus far, while getting successively better the deeper he went, couldn’t sustain too many. The growth was sparse and stunted, more from the proximity of the mountains and lack of sunlight than the pollution he’d wager.
With no plants to feed on, his lack of hunting skill chafed.
He resorted to drinking pretty much only water as he found his way up and over the next mountain of rock. The next valley, the third since he’d begun, proved less decimated, with actual trees that stood tall. Bushes with berries on them. Tart and staining the hands, but not poisonous. Or so he’d hoped when he’d seen a bird feeding off it before it startled, flapping its wings and flying away.
Another chance to eat and he’d not even brought out a rock for a throw. He had a pocket full now, and he’d been practising his aim. Now if he could only remember to arm himself quick enough to hunt.
He’d yet to see another person since his encounter with Niimmo. Then again, someone could have been shadowing him and he’d never know.
His footsteps never seemed to land lightly, and he stumbled over the hint of a rough patch on the ground. Yet, at the same time, he grew stronger. By the time he’d passed the fourth mountain range, he caught his first creature. By accident. He startled it in a bush and fell on it when it tried to run.
He cringed when he wrung its neck. Then said thanks when he ate it roasted over a fire. Half burnt, half raw, still delicious because he’d done it.
He could survive. There was a certain amount of pride in that realization, then guilt as he remembered Onaria.
She waited for him. Waited for a miracle. He couldn’t turn back until he had one.
The next mountain range proved most challenging of all, mostly because he didn’t find a pass going through it, and it rose in a sheer cliff that even a spider might hesitate to climb. Had he found the end of his path?
He walked along the ledge he’d climbed to until he reached a bumpy area. Clinging and fitting his toes in tiny crevices, he inched across and a bit higher to another ledge, calling himself all kinds of crazy. He’d be better off heading back down to the valley and following it to another spot. But no, something urged him to keep going.
Just a little farther.
The stone beneath him shifted just as his fingers found purchase. His foot slipped free, and his body wrenched. The tips of his digits dug into the rock, the only thing holding him. The only thing keeping him from death, so he’d better not let go.
He gasped for breath as his legs hung uselessly.
Don’t let go. Don’t. Let. Go.