“Yeah. This is our life now,” she said, incredulous. Una sighed. “I still can’t believe it. I can’t believe what I did,” she said.
“I know,” Tristan replied in a leaden tone. “I tore one of them apart with my bare hands.”
“Me too.” Una pulled her knees against her chest, hugging herself tightly. “And it felt so good,” she said, her voice small.
Tristan nodded. “If it had been a person in front of me I would have done the same.” He groaned. “I’ve never felt anything like that. Never felt so”—he paused, searching for the right word—“fulfilled. And I hate this about myself, but I want more.”
“I know. I’m disgusted with myself, but I crave it, too. All that power. Tristan, are we sick?” she asked tremulously.
“No, you’re not sick,” Lily said, sitting up. She stood and joined them by the fire. “The Gift is what it is. It’s always a struggle not to give in to it.”
“What’s it like for you?” Tristan asked, a curious smile narrowing his blue eyes.
Lily swallowed. “I feel what all of you feel combined,” she replied, leaving out that she also felt the temptation to possess every one of them.
“So what’s it like fueling a whole army?” Una asked.
Lily thought about it, seeking the right way to put it. “Like being a mighty river, I guess. I could grind down mountains or wash whole cities out to sea. It’s a lot to take in.”
“If you’re the river, are we the fish?” Tristan guessed, smiling. Lily smiled back vaguely, not really agreeing or disagreeing. “You could show us, couldn’t you? You could share your memory of it with us,” he pressed.
Lily sensed Tristan’s hunger. Restraint had never been his forte, and she was grateful that she was the one in control of her awesome power—not him. But, she wondered, how would she use that power if Rowan weren’t there to remind her not to give in to it? She looked out the mouth of the cave and changed the subject. “They’re almost here,” she said, feeling Breakfast and Rowan before she could see them.
They came back in the late afternoon with a dead rabbit, and Rowan immediately began to teach them how to skin it.
“I know this is probably a dumb question, but why go hunting?” Una asked. “Why don’t we just eat the Woven we already killed?”
“They’re poisonous,” Rowan answered. “Only Woven can eat other Woven.”
“Seriously?” Lily asked, surprised. “How can that be? There are so many different breeds, you’d think some of them would be edible.”
Rowan shrugged. “I don’t know why they’re poisonous, they just are. Believe me, plenty of starving Outlanders have wished it were otherwise, and have died because it isn’t.”
Lily looked away while Rowan pulled the rabbit’s skin off in one brisk tug, like he was peeling a tube sock off a foot.
“It doesn’t make sense. Gorilla meat isn’t poisonous, and snake meat isn’t poisonous, but Woven gorilla-snake meat is?” Something about it bothered Lily and she couldn’t let it go. “Nature doesn’t work like that,” she said, frustrated.
“They’re not from nature,” Rowan replied, raising an eyebrow. “Remember, they were made by witches.”
“They were made by witches to build cities and haul heavy loads, and basically play the role that machinery plays in my world. Why would they also be made to be poisonous? Why go through the trouble of engineering them to be poisonous for no good reason?” she argued. She accidentally glanced down at the skinned rabbit and covered her mouth, gagging.
Rowan stifled a laugh at her reaction and shrugged again. “I don’t know, Lily. Maybe there is a reason. We just don’t know what it is.”