CHAPTER 56
Moonsday, Maius 28
“Sweetwater,” the girl said as soon as Jackson entered the room with her next meal.
He set the plate and the glass of milk on the desk before turning to give her his attention. “What about it?”
She could barely sit still with wanting to know, but now that he was here, did she dare ask? “You’ve seen it.”
“Yes. It’s outside.”
“I know it’s outside. Everything is outside. But you’ve seen this place. You took pictures of it.” Something about the place pulled at her, settled her, lifted her. She wanted, needed, confirmation that this wasn’t a made-up place, that the photographs weren’t some kind of trick, because she could live in that place. Truly live beyond the four walls of a room. He said she could ask for anything she wanted, but she wasn’t sure she could ask for that much.
She felt her courage wilting under his stare.
He moved until he stood by the bed and could see the photos that she’d put in order so that the land flowed properly. Then he crouched so she didn’t have to look up at him.
“Sweet blood,” he said gently. “We live in the terra indigene settlement at Sweetwater. This”—he touched one photograph, then raised his other hand and pointed at her covered window—“is outside.”
She trembled.
“Do you want to see it?” Jackson asked.
She nodded.
He stood, walked to the door, and opened it. “Come on.”
She hesitated in the bedroom doorway, then rushed to follow him, barely noticing the big room that might have been the main living area if it had had any furniture.
Another door. Sunlight beyond an open, roofed area. Porch. Steps. And then . . .
She stood in one of the photographs. Grass and trees and the mountains rising as a natural barrier. The glint of sunlight on water. She wanted to touch it all, smell it all.
“That’s far enough,” Jackson said.
She turned to look at him, feeling crushed. Then she noticed the distance between them. Not that far, not really, but he still stood on the bottom step and she didn’t remember moving away from him. “But . . .” A weak protest.
“A pup doesn’t stray far from the den on her first outing. There’s a lot to learn, so she explores a little more each day.” When she didn’t move, he added, “Come back now.”
She obeyed because she didn’t know what else to do.
“Sit there.” He pointed to the top step.
She sat—and Jackson sat beside her.
He allowed her to sit on the step in the sunlight for a little while. He didn’t say much. He couldn’t tell her the names of the different trees. Wolves didn’t care about such things, but the Intuit village down the road had a bookstore and might have books that named such things if she wanted to learn about them.
She wanted to learn.
When he’d decided she’d had enough sun for her first day out of the den, he didn’t make her go back to her room. She sat on the porch, and he brought her the meal she’d forgotten about. She watched how the little bit of the world that she could see stayed the same and yet kept changing, just as she had to change position on the porch to remain in the shade.
Jackson stayed with her the whole time, fending off the young Wolves who wanted to give her a thorough sniff and might accidentally scrape her skin with a nail as they jostled one another.
Finally tired of looking, seeing, feeling, she agreed to go back to her room—especially when she saw Jackson remove the white paper that had kept her from seeing out the window.
“You can see more tomorrow,” he said when she hesitated in the bedroom doorway.
“Hope,” she said, hearing a truth in the word.
He cocked his head. “What?”
She gave him a brilliant smile. “My name is Hope.”