Leda

Chapter Forty-Three: Lake End

"Oræl, I'm starving!" Perched on a rock beside Brennac's northern shore, Leda clutched at her empty belly.

"Patience, as my Father used to tell me, is the secret to all good fishing."

"But hunger is its cause, so please...find something. Anything. I could eat this stone I'm so desperate." She leaned over, pretending to gnaw at the boulder.

Standing knee deep in lake water, her trousers rolled to her thighs, a sharpened stave of wood in her hand, Oræl threw back her head and laughed.

"Oh you think that's funny?" Leda asked. "You should take a look at yourself. A gill-less ræsling."

Oræl snorted. "Some ræsling. At least I'm not flapping around in a soldier's castoff shirt. Now give me a moment...just a moment of peace Leda, and I'll have us a fine, fat trout. And don't let that fire go out."

Leda hopped down from her rock and poked at the fire with a stick, one eye on Oræl as the crofter froze, her makeshift spear raised above her head. Leda half understood the fisherwoman; Oræl's stubbornness, her obstinacy reminded her of Hal. The crofter was resourceful too, keeping them fed with fish. She'd shown Leda which of the mushrooms, sprouting amongst tree roots and dead leaves, it was safe to eat. She knew how to strip the bark from dead, wet wood for kindling and how to start a fire with it. But there was a whole layer to Oræl that Leda somehow couldn't penetrate. The girl resisted any talk of family or lovers or home, as if the subjects were too painful for her to speak of. Leda thought of Hannac all the time: of Dal Reniac, of Edæc and Marc and her parents. Of Castor's guards and their mission to 'teach Halanya Hannac a lesson'. But perhaps they'd not really meant to destroy Hannac. Perhaps they'd taken it to possess it, as her father had sought to. And when she reached Hannac, she would plead with Castor: she'd appeal to his mercy. If it would spare the lives of her loved ones, she'd agree to marry him after all. She was prepared to do that if it would save Edæc, her mother and Hal.

With a sudden swoop and a ripple of water, Oræl plunged her spear into the lake. She pulled it out to reveal a shiny, silver trout wriggling on its tip. The croft girl waded back to shore, putting the fish out of its misery with the butt end of her knife. She gutted it with speed, setting it back on her stave and holding it over the fire.

"You do it with such ease," Leda observed with admiration.

Oræl shrugged. "Crofters learn to gut fish before they can walk."

"And I think that may be an exaggeration."

"Only just."

As dusk fell and the lake bank was plunged into darkness, the two women sat side by side licking the salt flesh of trout from their fingers. Leda turned, conscious of Oræl studying her against the firelight.

"What? What is it?"

Oræl continued to stare, blinking as a sudden spark exploded deep in the kindling. "Nothing, Leda," she said at last. "Nothing." But her voice was thick with the thousands of secrets she refused to betray.

"Get some sleep, Oræl," Leda said, wrapping the ends of her trousers around her bare feet. She drew closer to the fire, lying down on the sand and shingle of the beach. "We have far to walk tomorrow ˗ if we've any chance of reaching Hannac."

"It's like walking into a viper's nest."

"I have to do it."

Oræl lay down, curling her arms around Leda's waist. The crofter's breath was hot and sharp, her skin warm. Leda was so thankful for that, she could have wept.

"You don't have to do it." Oræl's voice worked into her dreams as she drifted off to sleep. "We could keep walking, you and I. We could carry on walking forever."