In The Lair of the Draca (Book 2)

In The Lair of the Draca (Book 2) Chapter 27: Plotting

Ziuta lifted her bowl of onion soup to her lips and drank. It was still bubbling from having boiled recently over the dinner fire, and she nearly burned her tongue, but Ziuta did not dare cry out. She kept her eyes properly down-cast, legs crossed, setting her bowl gently back on the eating mat and only taking dainty sips of spring water from her dinner mug after she had dabbed at her lips with a small square of cloth.

Tonight, she would do the unthinkable: she would be leaving Looks Thrice...again.

Ziuta had tortured herself for hours thinking of the pros and cons of slipping out of the village via the medium-sized hole in the side of the palisade, hating the thought of Gormaq's face were he to find out that she were missing, and yet hating even more the possibility of coming across Water Fly's bloated, corpulent body on the bank of Haven's Creek-- perhaps riddled with arrows, perhaps with the precious fins ripped away (Evening Folk who were lucky enough to kill a water-dragon often used the flippers for the fat they provided). Just considering the groups of stone-faced, superstitious men who might flood the creek in search of her beloved friend with weapons, swords, knives, and hooks made her heart balloon with dread; she could not allow it to happen.

She would not allow it to happen.

The rest of the family sat on their own eating mats, huddled around the dinner fire in an awkward, if not comfortable, quietness. Michek and Bichek helped themselves to more baby onions in that simultaneous fashion of theirs, stripping the softened leaves and munching delicately while the beaming Mother looked on in approval, relishing in the appreciative attention that her daughters gave her culinary delights. Ziuta glanced at Amek; the chubby-cheeked girl picked her onions out and laid them on a cloth beside her plate, but drank the broth. Sashek had finished her bowl moments earlier and sat observing the rest of them in that silent, regal fashion that was unique to her, tumbles of dandelion curls falling in gentle waves around her chin and fluffed around her bosom. Joo-Lee,  who had only recently begun to sit and join the family at meal-times, gently picked up the onions as though she did not know what to do with them. She might hold one up, dripping, and balance it on the tip of her nose; Sashek, who continued to take on the role as Joo-Lee's primary care-taker, would gently remove the onion and help Joo-Lee pop it into her mouth.

Ziuta stared at her best friend with interest and a little bit of sadness. She felt bad that she had spent more time either alone or with her dragon friend than with the girl who had taken such pains to care from her on the strange world that was General Ames' star-ship. Joo-Lee was small, thin, and did not seem to have grown much at all-- except for her belly, which was swollen as though she were malnourished. (Ziuta feared this was because the earth-dragon had planted an egg inside of her...but no one in the family mentioned anything about it, and neither would she.) Joo-Lee ate, drank, and did all of the things which were expected of her, but she rarely spoke. Joo-Lee wandered the lodge or sat in a corner, her back to the world, as though she were a spirit with flesh-and-blood who had been doomed to roam the planet as a lost soul. She often twisted a single lock of auburn hair around one finger and rocked back and forth or murmured to herself. The girl was clearly disturbed. Mother had mentioned to Gormaq more than once that she thought it would be best if Pomoq visited the girl, but so far Gormaq had not acted on the suggestion.

Poor Joo-Lee!

Ziuta stared down at her bowl in shame. She was no longer hungry.

If it takes me a thousand years, I will find a way to get back to Earth...and Joo-Lee will be coming with me. I shall find someone-- a man, or a group of men-- who will be brave enough to try and repair the Disc of Secrets-- and Joo-Lee and I will live the life that we were promised.

Somehow.

Ziuta peeked timidly at Gormaq, who had dipped his mug into the tea-bag and glared back.