Woodson's Arc

Chapter 8 of 10

The days in the cave settled into a rhythm. Woodson stopped counting the exits by afternoon. Lunara had rescued him from the cold once, and now they lived by simple work. He hunted at first light. She knew which roots were safe and which would sicken a man. They ate what he brought back and she cooked over the fire he kept. At night they slept close, and he no longer woke to check the entrance every hour. His hand kept finding hers in the dark. One morning he came back with a hare and found Lunara waiting at the mouth of the cave. She had not pulled her hood over her antlers. She stood in the open, in plain sight, watching him climb the slope. "That's a risk," he said. "Anyone could see your antlers from below." "No one is below. You watch the trail all day." She stepped back inside. "I trust your eyes." He dropped the hare by the fire. Her words stayed with him. She trusted his eyes. She trusted his hands. He had spent his whole life keeping people at arm's reach so he had less to lose. Now he had one thing worth everything, sitting by his fire, skinning the hare he'd caught. "When I hunted you," he said, "I told myself it was just a job. Antlers for coin." Lunara did not look up from the blade. "I know what you were." "I'm telling you what I am now." He knelt across the fire from her. "I'm not leaving. Not when the threat comes, not after. I want this to be real, Lunara. You and me." She set the knife down. For a long moment she said nothing. She did not fill the silence the way most people would. "You harvested the bloom for me," she said at last. "You could have taken my antlers while I slept. You did neither." Her shimmering eyes held his. "That answered the question long before you asked it." "Then answer it out loud." "Yes." She reached across the fire and took his hand. "Yes, Woodson." He pulled her close and kissed her. Her antlers brushed his hood. They stayed like that until the fire burned low. Then Lunara drew back, and her calm returned like a door closing. After they had settled in together, she caressed Woodson's cheek. "There is something you should know," she said. "My antlers are not only wanted by hunters for coin." She met his eyes. "There is a story. That the one who wins them is granted one true love." Woodson went still. "That's why the well-funded ones come." "They will not stop." She folded her hands. "And now you have the one thing they will kill to take. Me." Outside, far down the wooded slope, a snowy owl lifted from the pines and turned toward them. It was Lunara’s owl.