“That’s the question of the day.” I study it again as Josie comes and thumps down next to us, a dejected look on her face. “It reminds me of donuts, actually.”
“Reminds me of a pizza cutter,” Josie chimes in, her chin resting on her hands. “Why do you have a pizza cutter?”
A pizza cutter? I touch the edge and it’s blunted, but it could easily be made sharp. Interesting. “My mate left me a treasure hunt,” I tell her. And because she looks so darn sad, I ask, “Want to help me look for the next clue?”
“Sure.”
The sa-khui are a people that don’t like to waste anything. Horns, hooves, furs, dried bladders, you name it - all of a kill can be put to use. And because even the bones are used, there’s a lot of storage. In fact, there’s an entire cave dedicated to storing items, and that’s where Josie and I find ourselves - sifting through basket after basket of cleaned, stored bones, just waiting to be carved into something useful. It’s kind of macabre, but after two years of living with the sa-khui? I’ve gotten over a lot of my squeamishness.
I’m picking through a handful of what look like dvisti ribs when Josie sighs. “What is it?” I ask.
“I miss Haeden,” she says, flinging aside a vertebrae into another basket. “It seems like he just got back and now he’s gone again.”
She’s not wrong - Haeden was gone for weeks on a trek to recover the new human women, and I feel a pang of guilt. Cashol’s been at my side the entire time. I…guess it’s been selfish of me to demand that he stay here when everyone else has to sacrifice. “You could go with him,” I suggest. “Liz goes hunting with Raahosh.”
“I suggested it.” Josie’s glum tone tells me how that conversation went. “He wants me to stay safe with the baby on the way.”
“Mmm. Well, it’s not the worst idea. Not that I think you’ll hurt yourself.” I run my hand over a long, smooth rib, debating taking it back to the cave with me. I need a new ladle and with a bit of carving, this could work well. “But give it a few months and you’ll run out of energy and you’ll be glad you’re here with the rest of us. Besides, he can probably get more done without distractions.”
“He is easily distracted,” she says dreamily.
This is getting close to TMI territory so I renew my digging into a fresh basket. I’m wearing my ugly little disc around my neck now, so I don’t lose it, and I’m growing fonder of it by the moment. I touch it often, just so I can remind myself that Cashol’s thinking of me. It helps.
“So how come Cashol finally decided to go out on a longer hunt? I thought you guys had some sort of agreement with Vektal or something.”
Did she not know that Haeden said something? Or maybe it was just a rumor. Either way, it doesn’t matter. “It was time. He needed to go out. The hunting’s gonna be hot and heavy until the winter gets here. Sorry, not winter. Brutal season. Whatever.”
“That’s what everyone keeps saying.” She pulls her basket closer and tucks it between her legs, then digs deep. “But you hate that he’s gone out, don’t you? I can tell.”
“It’s…hard.”
“Why?”
Josie’s innocent question doesn’t surprise me. She loves to talk. In fact, that’s one reason why I like her company so much - she’ll talk endlessly if given a subject, and it’s good to hear someone else fill the empty space. If it gets too quiet, I’ll start to miss Cashol even more. “For the same reason that Haeden makes you stay near the cave instead of going hunting with him, I suppose.” My basket’s turning out to be a big dud, so I brush my hands off and put it aside. “I worry.”
“That he’s going to get hurt? Haeden says Cashol’s good at hunting. A good tracker. Doesn’t have the sixth sense like Rokan does, but he can read a trail really well. But I kind of think Haeden’s one of the best hunters, so I might be biased. It’s easy to be biased when you’re mated to such a great guy.”
My lips twitch as Josie gives another dreamy sigh. Hard to believe she was cussing Haeden’s name a few short months ago. Resonance changes everything, though. Before, Cashol was just kind of…there. In the scenery. A nice guy in a sea of nice guys that wanted a mate. He’d never put the moves on me, never hit on me, but if I needed a hand with something, he was always one of the first to volunteer. That’s just how he is. He’s friendly and generous and so clever.