Tara Runeweaver's Arc

Chapter 16 of 19

Morning came slow after the tent. Tara walked back to the hall and found a new thing inside the door. A crib of antler and wood stood by the hearth, draped in white fur. Bjorn's mother did not look up from her work. The message was plain. She expected a child, and soon. Tara kept a small stone in her palm all that day. Bjorn had pressed it into her hand at dawn. His initials were scratched into one side. The stone stayed warm even when her fingers went cold. She held it through every quiet moment and waited for her body to tell her something. Outside the hall, Bjorn's mother stood at the tall ice pillar in the yard. She traced the carved notches with one finger. The clan gathered to watch. The old woman read the ice the way other women read bones. She turned and met Tara's eyes across the trampled snow. "Not yet," she said. Loud enough for the warband to hear. "But the signs are turning. Come spring." Tara closed her hand around the warm stone. Not yet. The word landed soft, not cruel. Bjorn stepped up beside her and did not move away. He stood close, shoulder against her shoulder, the way she had once measured winning. The crib waited by the fire. The clan went back to their work. Something had been answered, and something else had just begun.