Maren Goldweaver's Arc

Chapter 8 of 42

The grain cart rolled them past the second checkpoint at midmorning. Maren and Miller climbed out from under the sacks, paid the driver with a nod, and watched the green cart creak back toward the sectors. Then they walked. Fields gave way to thin woods. The road narrowed to a rut. By dusk her legs shook and the cub had gone limp against her chest, wings tucked, breath warm through her shirt. She had no house to knock on out here. Every contact she'd cultivated for six months lived west of the checkpoints. She ran the eastern names in her head anyway. A cousin of a clerk. A farmer who'd once carried a letter for her. Both too close to Registry ears. Both a day's walk in the wrong direction. If they slept on the open road, the trackers behind them would close the gap by morning. "No house," she said. "No," Miller said. "Then off the road." He nodded and pushed into the trees. They walked until the rut was gone from sight, then further, until a stand of pines closed around a patch of needles. Miller unrolled the one square of canvas he'd pulled from the cart. It covered a body and a half. He laid it flat and stepped back. Maren set the cub down in the center. The cub curled, wings folding like paper. She sat. Miller sat on the other edge, his back to hers. The canvas was narrow enough that his spine pressed against her shoulder blades. Neither of them spoke for a while. She listened for boots. She heard only wind and the cub's slow breath. She wanted to say something about Topper. About the house she'd gone to before. About what Miller had heard in that man's mouth. The words lined up and would not come out. Behind her, Miller shifted. He drew breath like he meant to speak. He didn't. She felt him settle again. She closed her eyes. The cub pushed its head against her thigh. Miller's back was warm. Her legs finally stopped shaking. She did not turn around. He did not turn around. The tension sat between their shoulders like a third body and neither of them moved it. "Two hours," Miller said. "Then I take watch." "Two hours," she agreed. Her hand found the file inside her coat. Still there. Red tag, four days east, a name she meant to reach before it was crossed out. She let go of it. Sleep took her between one breath and the next. Miller's back rose and fell against hers. The cub tucked deeper into her lap. Somewhere behind them, boots were still walking. They would deal with that at first light. For now, hidden by pines and a strip of cloth, the three of them slept.