Nevermor (22 page)

“Judge it,
Rifter,” Mech asserted.  “Who won the bet?”

Rifter was tired
of the whole thing by now.  His mind was elsewhere, considering Wren, and their
disagreement meant little to him.

“If the three of
you can’t determine it, I call it a draw.  You’ll just have to try again next
time.”

It was clear
that the twins weren’t happy with that, but Finn was smiling as though he’d
counted it a triumph.

“I guess that
settles it,” Finn said with a large grin.  He looked back at them as the twins
fumed, his face covered in blood.  “I guess we ought to hunt something to eat
now.”

1

It was almost
too quiet in the underground without them, but once Wren had assured herself
that the boys would not be back for a while, she took advantage of her
solitude.  She took a thin cloak that was hanging from a root in the wall and
went to the place deeper in the tunnels where the spring ran through.  She
washed her gown and put on the cloak instead, then went outside to hang her wet
garment in the breeze.

After that, she
bathed herself in the cold water, which was frigid at first but not so bad
after a bit.  She was used to a cold bath on occasion, especially in winter. 
The temperature did not bother her much.  Her hair had been full of sand and
grass from the beach, and she was glad to be rid of it.

Once she was
done getting the dirt from her face and the tangles from her hair, she began
her job of cleaning up the den, which started with gathering up every cloth
item that she could get her hands on, washing them all and hanging them outside
to dry.

There was not
any sweeping she could do because they had nothing that even half-resembled a
broom.  Instead, she set herself to organizing things in the den, which was a
task she needed gloves for.  She found one easily enough, but could not find
its partner.  She picked up everything that was lying around, even though some
of it was rotten garbage, trying to at least make the arrangement look neater.

I’ll bet they’ve
never cleaned this place
.  Was that possible?  How many years of clutter was
before her?  Each time she lifted up a crumpled mass, dust rolled off of it,
and occasionally, black beetles darted out.

Despite the dirt
and the irreverent crawlers, there were a few gems to be found among the mess. 
She found a few books, which she took to be Sly’s.  They were a strange
assortment – subjects ranging from philosophy to steam power to a romance
novel.  She wondered where he had gotten them.  By what he had told her, she
found it a bit hard to believe that Rifter would allow him to have them. 
Hadn’t Sly said that Rifter only wanted to live in the present?

Wren rearranged
the furniture – the tree stump chairs and table – moved them into what she
thought was a more efficient formation.  She found a clay vase that was broken
around the top, but she knew a good use for it.  She went outside and found a
few fragrant flowers and greenery, and set the vase on the low, wide table.

Some of the
things she had washed were dry by then, including her gown, so she brought
those things back in, folded them or hung them up, and then put her own dress
back on.  She wished that she had been able to bring more of her clothes with
her, even though she didn’t have much to call her own in the first place.  She
wondered if she might make some new ones out of skins.  That excited her.  Back
home, only the rich women had furs.

When she was
done, she looked over her work and thought it looked very nice indeed.

It just needed a
woman’s touch
,
she thought to herself with a smile.  How could she fail her test after they
saw it?

Since they were
not back, she sat down and flipped through one or two of the books, but they
couldn’t seem to keep her attention.  Something was going through her head – a
rule begging to be broken.  Wren wanted to explore, to look into their rooms.

She knew she
shouldn’t.  To do so would be wrong.  She shouldn’t have even been entertaining
the idea.

I wonder if it
would be wrong for me to only have a glance?
  She had already seen into Toss’
room, and it might help her to learn something about them if she could see how
they lived.

I shouldn’t, but
what else am I going to do?  I’ll only look.  I won’t go in.

Unable to shut
down her curiosity, she slipped into the bear tunnel and pulled back the first
curtain just a hair to peek inside.

There was a
small hole in the ceiling that let in a bit of light, but otherwise it was dark
in the hollow.  It was particularly messy inside this space.  There was a cot
against the wall, the blankets strewn all over, but the greater part of the
area was taken up by different surfaces that were scattered with
junk
. 
Wren considered it to be junk in her eyes, at least.  There were pieces of wood
and metal and stone.  They didn’t look like much of anything to her, but
someone had certainly been busy.

By process of
elimination, she guessed that this space belonged to Finn, simply because it
must not have belonged to the others.

He builds things
.  But she
couldn’t say what.

After taking it
in as a whole, she backed out without going inside.  She had no business doing
that.  She didn’t go into the next space either, and it was a lucky thing that
she didn’t, because it was not until she looked around that she noticed there
was a string tied low across the doorway between two roots, and if she had gone
inside, she surely would have broken it.  It was carefully placed and would be
a telltale sign that someone had crossed the line and come into this room that
wasn’t theirs.

There was no
question in her mind who this corner belonged to.  It could only have been Nix
– especially after she saw the inside of it.  She’d wondered if she might learn
something about him if she looked, but there was nothing new here.  It was
clear that all he cared about was violence.

There were a few
skulls mounted on the walls, decorating the space.  There was a hammock in the
corner, and beneath it there was a large chest, but it was closed.  The table
there was stocked with parts of guns and ammunition, a few knives and materials
for making arrows.  Instruments of death – all of them.  She’d seen enough.

Wren left that
space and moved on to the next, but that was as far as she got before she heard
the voices of the boys echoing through the tunnels to reach her.

She quickly
abandoned what she was doing and went back to the den to stand in the midst of
what she had done to make the room more presentable.  She was ready to accept
their praise for her good work, but when they came inside, they did not even
seem to notice.

“Hullo, Wren!”
Finn said to her as he went past.  He took a bite out of an apple, and she
noticed that he had a few others in his grimy hands.  The boys were all as
dirty as ever, and they stank of something soured and rotten.

The rest of them
were holding other fruits and vegetables.  Sly had a few herbs, some of which
she had never seen, and they dumped them all in a pile on the low tree stump
table.  Sly began to pull a few strange-colored eggs out of his pocket, but
Finn elbowed him accidentally and he nearly dropped his spoils.  When Sly protested,
Finn snatched up another of the eggs and threw it at him purposefully, but it
hit Toss instead.  It burst everywhere and Wren flinched.  They only laughed.

She was busy
watching them make a mess when the twins approached her.

She was startled
when she turned to see them standing there, gazing at her with secret smiles on
their mouths, but before she asked them what they wanted, they had each taken
their hands from behind their backs and presented her with something.

If she had been
hoping for flowers, she was quickly disillusioned.

Mech held up two
large rabbits by the ears – very dead – and Mach had a strange bird by the
feet, also as dead as could be.

“We brought
dinner,” they announced at the same time, but then looked away from each other
in disgust.

The fur and
feathers were covered in blood.  She did not want to touch those things, but
before she could protest, they thrust the dead creatures into her hands, and
she had no choice but to take them or else have them fall to the floor – which
she had a good mind to do anyway.  She was used to dealing with meat, but only
after
it had been dressed.

I’m supposed to…
  She felt like
retching, but she swallowed hard to keep it down.

 Rifter was the
last one to come inside, and she had nearly missed him as she was looking down
at the slain creatures in her hands.  The first thing he did was walk toward
the wall where there was a small opening in a tangle of roots.  He took
something out from within his coat and placed it inside.  When Wren noticed a
faint light, she knew that it was the fairy.

“What happened?”
she asked. 
I shouldn’t care.  That fairy couldn’t care less about me.

“The beast
swallowed her down, but she’ll be fine,” he said.

“Beast?”  She
had thought that they’d only gone hunting for food.  Not monsters.

“I’m starved,”
Rifter said, changing the subject.  Finn tossed him an apple.  He bit into it
promptly, an enormous mouthful.  His hands were so dirty that they were brown,
but he didn’t seem to care.  “How long do you think it will be?” he mumbled.

Wren just stared
at him blankly a moment.  “You expect me to cook these?”

“That is
generally what we do with them,” he responded.

“But!  These
still have the skins!  And the heads!  I can’t do anything with them like
this!”

Rifter tilted
his head to look at her inquisitively, as if he didn’t understand her distress.

“You said you
could clean and cook,” he reminded her, “so you should
clean
them and
cook
them.”

He didn’t seem
to know why she was confused.  She looked down at the animals whose dead eyes
were peering back at her, and she felt disgusted.  She finally realized what he
must have thought when they’d made the deal about her test earlier.  When she’d
said she could
clean
, he’d thought she meant that she would be able to
skin what they killed and then cook it – not that she would be picking up the
mess in the room or washing their clothes.

Wren pursed her
lips in disgust, but didn’t say anything more.  This was her test, and she had
to pass it – but she didn’t have to like it.

With her lips
tight and a dead thing in each hand, she moved down toward the spring, where
the water would wash the blood and entrails away.  She fumed silently at them
all, but she would do what she had to.

“Hey, what
happened to the room?” she heard one of them say as she was leaving the den.

She was too
annoyed with them to answer.

2

It took Wren a
while to figure out how to go about her task.  None of the others helped her,
only lounged about, and she saw them periodically as she moved through the
underground, getting knives and surfaces she might use to put the meat on. 
Aside from her frustration toward them in the beginning, she found that she
couldn’t blame them for leaving her to it.  They had already done their part,
after all.

Plucking the
bird had not been easy, and cleaning the rabbits had been even worse.  She
hadn’t even know where to start with that, but she did get a bit of help from
Toss, who indicated to her how she should do it – that she should hang the
rabbits up and skin them from the feet to the head – but he didn’t engaged her
directly, as if he didn’t want the others – or Rifter – to know that he had
helped.

The others
stayed clear of her for the most part, though Finn came snooping around a
couple of times to see how it was coming along.  She guessed he was getting
hungry again.  Sly was reading from a perch in the den, and Nix had gone
outside, perhaps to avoid seeing her.  The twins had retreated to their room to
hold a secret meeting between themselves.  Wren did not know where Rifter was,
but she could hear the music from his flute drifting through the tunnels and to
her ears.  Somehow, the notes made her feel more at ease.

When she had
finished, she hadn’t come away with a lot of meat, especially for feeding seven
hungry boys.  In order to cover that up, and also hide her mistakes, she
decided to make a stew.  She chopped all the vegetables, adding them to thicken
the mixture.  She tested the herbs that they had brought, finding that many of
them were fragrant and strong.  She chose the best of them and seasoned
liberally.

After a couple
of hours, it was all ready.  She called them in and was glad to see that by
that time, most of them had changed their clothes and cleaned up enough that
she didn’t have to smell that terrible stench they’d brought back with them.

When she was
ready to serve it to them, she was surprised to see that they all had their own
dish, which they brought out from their own rooms instead of storing them all
together.  Toss’s dish was made of hammered metal, and she guessed he had made
it himself.  Sly’s was made of clay with etchings around the rim, and it looked
like some sort of ancient relic.  Perhaps it was something he’d found. 
Rifter’s was made of gold, but she wasn’t sure why that astounded her.