Chapter Text
Autumn 1876.
Day 40
Location: Memorial Grove, the Forbidden West.
It is the evening before our departure back east, and yet I haven’t seen Kotallo since the trial. After bringing me to his lodgings – a humble abode built several stories up, into the gargantuan arena – Kotallo had left almost immediately. He’d lingered only long enough to tell me not to leave.
“For your safety,” he had insisted before closing the door.
I had been tempted to use the deadbolt. Part of me couldn’t face him after his revelations – that he had attacked the camp first, and that he was willing to have his fate sealed to mine in order to sway Sheriff Hekarro’s judgement in my favour.
For the first time in over a month I have been given the privacy to experience the many emotions I had to bury. For the first time I was able to grieve for the loss of nutty Professor Cope who had made many bad calls, agreeing for me to join the expedition included. For the first time I was given a quiet place to cry and the chance to begin making peace with watching Renn die before my eyes. I had been blaming myself and my inexperience for days as the cause for his death. But I was not responsible. I was not the one who made the call to attack.
Kotallo came and left several times, but I never saw him and I never heard him. The first time had felt jarring. He had left an offering of food and fresh clothes just as the swollen moon had risen over the mountains.
I had been bathing in the only separate room and the idea of being naked within close proximity to him only raises more complex emotions for me to deal with. Part of me wonders if a decent man like him would do indecent things with me.The clothes were simple, but well made with distinct Tenakth tailoring. The fabric is soft, but sturdy enough to endure the wilds. And it is with luck that they all fit me perfectly – after days of wearing a billowing shirt and pants that constantly slipped and caught on every branch, finally having something that fits is a blessing. After changing I had burst into tears on the floor, clutching the fabric to my chest until the sobs wouldn’t come and my throat felt raw. It is the power of small comforts... and perhaps small gestures.
And still Kotallo had not returned, so I slept. His bed was nothing more than a straw mattress on the floor, but surprisingly soft
and it smelled like him. It felt safe.When I woke again afternoon daylight streamed through the shutters. I pass the time eating the strange foods he left and watching the bustle of the grove below from the sun warm sheets.Below I have sketched the view from the window. Watching the markets has always been a small joy of mine and the hours slipped away with ease spying on the exchange of interactions.
I have also hastily drawn a portrait of the Sheriff on his throne, one that I might complete in time. Now it only gives me anxiety to think of him changing his mind. Where Kotallo is a tiger, tall and lethal with tightly packed muscle, Hekarro is a behemoth.
There was a soft knock at the door and Sophie felt her heart leap into her throat. Before she could find her voice the door was swinging inwards and Kotallo entered, ducking his head to pass through the entrance. Her lungs burned as she froze, forgetting how to breathe. Relief and anger raged in her chest as he looked at her.
He’s anxious. She was painfully aware that she was sitting in his bed, his sheets curled around her legs. It seemed he was too as he bowed his head to avoid her gaze.
For the life of her she couldn’t find her voice. A thick wedge had lodged itself in her windpipe and clenched tightly at her jaw. Anger flared in her eyes, but seeing him take a seat with an exhausted sigh made her heart twist. He put his life on the line for me. She remembered his galloping pulse beneath her fingers. He attacked the camp. She remembered Renn screaming at her to run, his hands clutching at his chest as blood flooded past his fingers.
“We leave at dawn,” Kotallo grumbled.
She looked away from him and nodded.
His fingers tugged at the bedsheet beneath him.
Say something, Sophie. Anything.
Kotallo flicked his gaze toward her and she was shocked by his own, complicated range of emotions. He almost seemed... angry.
She opened her mouth and he stood.
“I’ll be back in the morning.”
And then he was gone. Sophie remained still, watching the place he left and embraced the scalding absence. This is what you wanted, the snide voice in her head chimed. Not really. I’m sorry Kotallo.
÷÷÷
It felt good having a heavy backpack on her shoulders. Sophie had begun to relish the burn in her muscles, the feeling of growing stronger with each day. If nothing else, her short time in the west had hardened her body in surprising ways and places.
Autumn was beginning to settle on the foreign land. Cascades of orange and rustic red crowned the trees, and the air was as crisp as the falling leaves they hiked through. Sophie watched them spiral downwards in a beautiful arc to spill like blood on the path. Ahead, Kotallo teased the edge of her sight. There would be moments when Sophie would look down to find her footing through the heavy mist, the droplets growing heavy on her eyelashes, and when she would return her gaze to Kotallo he wouldn’t be there. Rationally, she knew that he had not left her. That it was only the mist that had swallowed him from her view. Her heart would still leap, and she’d quicken her pace until he returned to her view. He always moved so quietly that it was like searching for a ghost in this white wasteland, and she was certain he knew where she was before he returned to her view.
“Easy,” he’d murmur as she stumbled into the clearing of mist where just the two of them resided.
Even after returning to his stiff and standoffish demeanour, he still spoke to her in a protective tone. He had been willing to cast his lot with you, to take the same punishment if Hekarro found you guilty.
What possessed him to vouch for her?
You know why. It’s the same reason you keep returning to that drawing of him.
Sophie dug deeper into the burn of her muscles, hoping that pushing the intensity of their climb would quiet the unwanted voice in her head.
“Please tell me we don’t have to go over that mountain again,” she grumbled.
Kotallo didn’t look at her as they moved through the misty forest. “Not that same pass, but we will have to cross that range again.”
At least we’re talking again, even if he is still angry.
The forest they walked through was painfully quiet and Sophie watched the tense knot that held Kotallo’s shoulders together. Her stomach twisted with unease.
“Are we in danger?” she whispered, moving closer.
He pointedly looked away from her. It felt like a slap and she flinched, dropping further back.
“Rude,” she muttered lowly under her breath.
“It doesn’t matter what you think of me,” he snapped. “I’m just a savage from the West, huh?”
“Where is this coming from? You know that is not what I think.”
They entered a small clearing and Kotallo stormed ahead, his shoulders rising and falling as if he had ran a mile. Sophie held back, caught between the tempting flame of anger and dampening hurt.
He paced like a caged tiger and Sophie screwed her hands up into fists so tight her fingers tingled.
“I’m angry,” Kotallo growled, throwing down his spear and finally turned to face her. He looked as tortured as the day after her trial, sitting on the corner of the bed waiting for her to speak. But the fire curling his hand into a fist and the snarl in his voice scared her.
“What have you got to be angry about!”
“You’re doing the wrong thing,” he roared. The moment the words were out of his mouth she could tell he regretted it. He looked away, mouth tight as if it could stop the words from spilling out. “I can’t believe after all you’ve told me, that you want to return.”
“What choice did I have Kotallo?!”
“You should have trusted me.”
Her heart twisted as his voice shook.
“Hekarro was going to let you live, give you sanctuary in the West. But instead you couldn’t keep your mouth shut and –“
“Don’t,” her voice came out low and dripping with venom. “You don’t get to blame me for this!”
He stepped forward, eyes blazing as he looked down at her. Sophie turned away, furious that he would even dare come within her reach let alone up to her chest. His hand took hers and she thrashed, hitting his stupidly broad chest, while staggering away.
The audacity.
“Why did you attack them?” her chest heaved. “You gave the order, it had to be you – Hekarro’s favourite Marshal,” she sneered and took sick joy from the way he flinched. “Do you enjoy killing kids? Those snotty nosed boys deserved a beating, sure, but they were just scared and ignorant.”
He looked tired; the kind of tired look old soldiers had after returning from war. His proud shoulders sagged despite the blaze in his eyes.
“Those are the sons of men who funded wars to enslave my people. Those are the sons of men who butchered innocent women and children so they could claim a few more acres of land. They had no right to be at those cliffs, no right to be digging for those bones.” He stepped forward and Sophie felt her back hit a tree. “Those men don’t respect what they have, why would they respect others?” His voice dripped with vehement fury. “You’re right, I didn’t question them, I didn’t ask them to leave, I probably didn’t have to kill them. But I gave the order and if I didn’t it wouldn’t matter because you would still –“ His gaze dropped down to her lips and in a second he was gone.
Sophie panted, her body tingling as she watched his broad back flex. It was cold after the void he’d left. Slowly she went to her knees. The adrenaline had stopped pumping to her heart and its absence left a tingle where his body had been close.
“In the West, war is the rule. Peace, the exception,” Kotallo explained from the other side of the small clearing.
Sophie felt sick.
She was just a tiny boat in a giant ocean being tossed from wave to wave as the storm raged. Every time she tried to catch the wind and steer her own course it went wrong. She’d rigged her own stupid bet to win and ended up on a train to the Forbidden West instead of a boat back to England. Running from her family had got her nowhere, running from Kotallo had got her nowhere. And after struggling so hard to fight the life she had, she had single-handedly ensured her return to society.
The world grew misty as tears threatened to crash upon her cheeks. No. Not in front of him. She swallowed a sob and pushed herself back onto her feet. Without another glance in his direction Sophie started walking. You’ll have plenty of time to cry when your married, the indifferent voice in her head chimed. Maybe if you’re lucky you’ll be eaten before then.