Welcome

For four more days I stayed with the group calling themselves the Damsir Collective. They asked me for nothing, and I gave nothing. The sun would rise, I would help with some simple tasks if there was no one else around, and the sun would set. There would be songs, poorly played and worse performed, but no one seemed to mind. Every so often, they’d beg Dae to join, but he’d shake his head and say another time.

All but a few of the travelers in the convoy were members, and together, they offered a wide selection of goods to small townships and villages. It was less competitive, took longer, and offered them less in profits, but they lived a stable life. A free life. Part of me wished that Harvi could have met them, heard their stories, spoke their words. She would’ve loved them all.

Off the main trade routes was usually less safe, but in the north, it was rare to find highwaymen. Savage wildlife, few natural water sources, and well-armed convoys like this one made it hard for them to get a foothold. But not impossible. There had been stories in recent years of a more organized outfit, matching traveling groups like Damsir, but little was known about these rumors.

I knew this only because I had been told it. In fact, most of what I knew about the world had been told to me by a man peddling wares or a woman with a feather behind her ear. I didn’t care for how much of it was true or not, I just remembered it. Sometimes, I dreamt of a place where Harvi’s brightness hadn’t touched. A dark place, safe from the phantom whispers, where I could start over as someone new, where her memory couldn’t find me. I longed for such a place.

Most of my own time was spent in the back of the wagon, staring at the cracks in the walls. It helped me focus on keeping the weak thoughts out. Like how I should turn back, how I had been a terrible guest, how I let my wife die. Yes, some were worse than others, but they all stoked the embers that burned inside me from morn to evening.

Cara’dina and Dae avoided asking me any questions. They kept to themselves mostly, and I did the same. When Cara was in a good mood, she would join me in the back and ruffle through the crates I shared the space with. Most of their wares were from fur-trapping. Cloaks and blankets, handmade to keep for decades. There were a few bone tools left, spoons, small hatchets and blades, and even a mug made from a skull. The most intriguing of their stock was definitely the baubles. I’d never seen real gemstones in my life before, and couldn’t tell how valuable they were. Still, seeing them up close, glittering in the light, made me yearn for a pretty neck to place it on. I didn’t let myself imagine Harvi wearing one. I tried not to imagine her at all, and so I thought of her more.

When I thought of her, I tried to keep busy. This made me seem more invested in the wellbeing of others than I was, and I feel, gave the convoy the wrong idea about me. Under a thick layer of numbness was a festering wound. Below that, was some shred of care for them, despite how little I knew of them.

One late afternoon, having stopped travel early, I was chopping potatoes for Cara out of a sense of duty instilled by my mother as a child. I remember watching her hands work a pheasant, a lucky kill from a member of the mercenary group hired to guard them. They all behaved as family by this point, having been together so long. So, when they’d killed it, they knew who to bring it to for good eating.

Cara beat the poor creature’s breast meat and rubbed some of the best seasonings the convoy had into its flesh. Her hands were dexterous and driven by contentment. Her cheeks allowed a gentle smile, a tired woman that had been granted a single mercy, and was pleased by it. I envied her.

“Degger, stay ta us?” She asked, shooting me a glance, still rubbing the mixture of seasonings into the bird.

I was hesitant to say anything, but I knew she wouldn’t let it go. I stopped chopping the potatoes and gathered what little thoughts I had. I hadn’t spoken much since…and it was like I’d forgotten how to arrange words.

“No? Agh-ya. ‘Tis is okay. Welcome wit’ us. Yes?”

“Thanks,” I managed. “More potatoes?”

Cara’dina didn’t look once to the chopping board, and instead focused intently on me. The little smile she wore faded from one side and looked like half her mouth had something to say about my avoidance. I rolled my shoulders and a bead of sweat ran along my cheek, it felt tight in the back of the carriage. Warm. Finally, she broke the gaze and dunked her hands in a pail of water.

“Teekni, Degger. Enough potatoes,” she waved her hand.

Without another word, I stepped down from the back of the carriage and grabbed my shovel, heart knocking in my chest. Sharp breaths were all I could manage as the feeling of tightness became like a fierce grip around my lungs. A few drunken men were singing some raucous tavern song as I stomped by a fire on the outskirts of the camp. Their eyes followed me in concern, song disrupted by my presence.

One of them called out to me, but I ignored it.

The woods greeted me with still air, only the first fallen leaves crunching under my boots. My pace quickened. I had to get some distance, had to be free of this sensation, but it only worsened with each frantic footfall. Blackness swelled around my vision. I couldn’t see anything but what was directly in front of me. My breathing quickened and I slammed into a tree. I collapsed painfully on the blade of my shovel and desperately tried to control my heartbeat. Within seconds, I passed out.