The Book Gatherer

Chapter Fifteen

Firek carved another notch in his crutch. He let the drizzling rain wash off the tiny curls of woodchips as he counted all the notches he'd made. Sixteen, now. Sixteen days since he'd woken up a prisoner of a LAND gatherer girl. Over two weeks of his flock not catching up. Firek shook his head. He had to admit, Honi was doing a fine job keeping themselves lost while traveling back to her band. If Firek were healthy and free, he still wouldn't have been able to get back to his camp, not from the ground at least. He barely knew which direction was the waterfall they'd passed yesterday. That bothered him more than he was willing to admit.

He peered through the rain at Honi, where she sat underneath a tarp tied between two trees, safe from the rain. He'd laughed when she'd been so startled when rain had begun to fall. Firek had known rain was coming for the past two days, from the smell of the wind—tainted as it was in the forest—and the pattern of the clouds. It was more difficult to predict the weather down among the trees, as Firek couldn't see as much sky or feel as much wind, but there was nothing he could do about that. Though his wounds were healing, he was nowhere near strong enough to climb a tree, and he doubted Honi would even let him if he could. She smiled and said nice things, but Firek knew that they were still rivals, gatherers from different companies, and he would not hesitate to sabotage her if it meant he could be free.

He hoped she knew that too.

Underneath the tarp, Honi slowly set aside her pages and pen. Days before, Firek had caught sight of a bundle of dried pages—whiter than most—in her satchel, right next to the Holy Book's gold cover. She had snapped the satchel shut immediately when she had seen him looking, and to dispel the tension between them he'd asked if she were writing a story or something.

"What?" Her eyes blew up to the size of Jeje's spots, her face red and panicky. "What, no of course not! Why, ha, why would I be writing something?" She tried to laugh it off.

He smirked. "You are. You're writing a story! What's it about?"

She gaped at him, mouth opening and closing like a baby bird hoping for a worm.

"Well?"

"It's not original or anything," she finally said, some shock and fear sliding away. "Not real writing. Just something based off another book I read."

"Not real? If you wrote it, it's real, Honi. What's it about, though? The book you read, the story you're writing?"

She stared at him, then blinked rapidly. "It's uh, um, well, it's about, uhhh." She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Firek waited, amused. She looked him straight in the eyes. "It's based off a book I read, my favorite, which is about a girl who investigates weird stuff that happens in her band. She solves problems."

"Sounds like you, a little," Firek had said, grinning.

She'd blushed, but later in the evening, sitting around the fire, she'd cautiously taken out a few pages and a pen and began scribbling. She wouldn't let him read what she'd written so far, but Firek meant to convince her otherwise eventually.

Maybe I smile and say nice things as well, he thought with a sigh as Honi put her things away. I'm doing too good a job pretending to be friendly. He liked to feel the rain on his skin, as a little piece of sky, but the main reason he'd decided against joining Honi beneath the tarp was to keep some distance between them. She was his enemy. He needed to remember that. He gripped his crutch hard, digging the grooves he'd carved into his palm.

"Firek," Honi called, and Firek forgot his resolution.

"Yeah?" he called back.

She waved at him. "Come here."