They took Jaz around the plantations, the stables and pens. The crops and greenhouses. They introduced her to some of the community whilst showing her how they planted and sowed, explaining the process to her. Jaz kept everyone at arm's length but was grateful for the effort that they, Skye and Alf in particular, put in to getting her to feel at home. She didn't feel like she was a prisoner anymore, as such, but she certainly didn't feel at home yet.
She still wasn't allowed to contact her family or friends. On Friday she asked Edda about it.
“It's not possible now,” Edda said, shaking her head. “I promise soon, but it isn't down to me.”
Jaz frowned at her and retorted, “Then don't promise something you can't keep.” She went to her room and didn't come out until the next morning.
Edda wasn't there and by the time Jaz got back from work and her walk, neither she nor Edda spoke of their quarrel again.
Jaz wasn't one to hold grudges. Even if she tried. She was terrible at staying angry at people for long. But she didn't forget when someone burned her. Even if it seemed she had forgiven them the memory would stay there. It's hard to forgive, much harder to forget, her mother, Rachel, would always say.
Jaz didn't know it yet, but her immunity to grudges was about to be tested.
It was coming up to eleven o'clock that Sunday, when Jaz observed two things.
The first thing she had overheard half an hour before.
Garth, who was the head of construction, was having an in depth discussion with Carr -the group leader who had worked Jaz hard. Garth was asking him about the building plan. He was holding what looked like drawings of the project.
She was walking past when Garth said, “We won't be able to finish it in two days. He must be joking!”
“The Pack Leader never jokes about work,” Carr said. “He knows you can do it.”
“I don't see him coming down here and-”
The threatening look that Carr shot Garth stopped him mid-sentence.
Carr said, “Nik trusts you to do it for him.” Hearing his name caused Jaz's shoulders to stiffen as she turned her back on them. “He's very busy and appreciates all our efforts.”
Jaz didn't hear any more of their conversation, her mind reeling.
She sat down on a log, staring at nothing as she absorbed this new information. Nik? Nik who was Lora's husband, is the Pack Leader? My brother-in-law? So where the hell is he then? Why hasn't he even spoken to me?
Something was trying to poke its way out of her subconscious but she couldn't pull it out.
The next thing she discovered was revealed soon after.
She was watching the others work whilst on her break. The walls of the building were fully up, cladded with oak planks. There was an engraving on a recently nailed plank on the side. She hadn't noticed it before but the moment she laid eyes on it, she recognized it immediately and her heart skipped a beat.
It was an oval insignia with a vine of roses and thorns interwoven with the foreign letters. The joined 'X', the one lined 'I' and the sharp 'R'. She didn't know what they meant but she'd definitely seen them more than once before.
On Lora's Diary; and she was sure she'd seen the letters somewhere else before. But for the life of her she hadn't been able to remember where. It was really frustrating.
Ronnie sidled over to where she was and sat by her side. She looked at him several times, opening and closing her mouth.
He saw her searching eyes and frowned self-consciously. “What?”
She paused. “Who's Nik?”
He stared at her as if he'd been winded.
This made alarm bells ring in her brain. “Is he the Pack Leader?”
Ronnie stared at her. His eyelids softened. “Yes,” he answered.
Jaz nodded. She had to be sure. Rather than delve in further -though she wasn't sure exactly what she wanted to ask, but knew there was something- she changed topic. “What does that mean?” She pointed to the insignia and Ronnie looked that way, relief trickling into his face at the change of subject.
He gazed back at her, thinking about it for a moment. “It's our crest.”
“Of your community?”
He shook his head. “Of our species.”
Jaz tried not to look as uncomfortable as she felt when he said that. Especially with the way he'd emphasized 'our'. “What does it mean?”
He furrowed his brow.
Jaz thought the grown-up expression looked so cute on his chubby childish face. “The letters?” she encouraged.
“Oh, it's Norse. Like, you know, from Viking times or something? It's the word 'Dyr' in the Runic alphabet. It means Beast.”
“Oh.” She eyed it and then said casually, “I think I've seen it before.”
Ronnie nodded, smiling. “Yeah, probably, we have it everywhere. Inside the main building, outside on a few of the walls, the Pack Leader even has it on a-” He stopped dead.
Jaz stared at him with wide, hungry eyes. “What were you gonna say?” she demanded.
Ronnie shook his head. “Nothing, it's nothing.”
“Tell me, Ronnie.”
He shook his head, even quicker.
“He has it on a...? On a what?” And then the answer came to her. Her face drooped. She stared, not seeing the building in front.
She'd seen it before but had never processed it in her brain. It had always been in the background. Now she knew. “The ring...” Her voice was strained. It barely came out in a whisper.