Through The Valley

Chapter Eleven

R O B Y N 

Once, when she was eleven Robyn was tripped over by a boy during one of her lessons in Haven. Her pretty braid was caked in mud and the substance completely coated her shirt. On the verge of tears, she had run home, only for the same happened the next day. It was then that the village elder that cared for her sat her down in front of the fire to dry her shirt and told her that sometimes the best way to take out one's anger was to remain silent. Robyn never forgot that day and still followed this advice. 

Which was why in the next few hours after Dina and Jessie had left, she never spoke a word to Ellie. The taller girl was clearly regretful but had yet to utter a word about what was spoken about at the table choosing to instead show her around the community. While Ellie had been nothing but accommodating after having her home invaded so suddenly Robyn couldn't find it in her to let go of her rage. The whole walk around Jackson, Robyn had felt the stares of the community members, their piercing gazes cutting through her like a knife cut through flesh. 

It made her skin crawl. She could see the curiosity that filled their eyes, and the way their eyes widened whenever they caught sight of her scars. For her, her scars were a point of pride, humans were imperfect and so we make ourselves important in her, the Prophets eyes. Everyone over the age of fourteen had their scars, it was commonplace among the Seraphites. 

Yet no one in Jackson had them. Their faces were clear of all scars, their skin clean and smooth. For once in her life, she felt uncomfortable with the lines that marked her face. 

Ellie had clearly picked up on it, remarking that they would eat their lunch at her small bungalow before going to the armoury to have her weapons catalogued. In that regard Haven, the island she used to call home, and Jackson were similar. Every handgun, rifle, shotgun and other long-range weapons were carefully recorded, each household having a record of what weapons were located there. Ellie had said that each household was permitted a handgun if a member of the household could prove that they could handle such a weapon. Larger guns were kept under lock and key in the armoury, though you could take them out of Jackson as much as you wished too, other times they were loaned out to the members of patrol. The auburn-haired girl had assured her that Robyn would be able to keep her bow in the bungalow proving that she could use it. 

So, after a lunch of sandwiches alongside a glass of water, the two girls collected Robyn's quiver of arrows and bow and made their way over to the far-right corner of Jackson. The blonde noted how Ellie fiddled with her fingers a lot, cracking her knuckles and scratching the edges of her nails. 

"I'm sorry," Ellie blurted out. "I thought it would help if someone here knew the type of community you came from. Jessie and Dina won't breathe a word of it, I swear they're not that type of person." 

Robyn glanced at her with a slightly raised eyebrow.  She got the impression that Ellie didn't apologise often. While Robyn could see Ellie's reasoning, it didn't mean she liked it. After all she had spent months relying on Ellie for survival, and Ellie with her. They had built a friendship built purely on their trust in the other's ability to keep them alive in moments of vulnerability. They spent months taking shifts during the night so the other could sleep and carefully watching each other's back. Robyn had met Ellie during some of the most difficult moments of her life. Robyn had stumbled upon Ellie just a month after leaving Seattle and she knew Ellie's most sacred secret. 

Robyn had no such bond with Dina and Jessie, not matter how kind they had been to her in the past day she had known them. They were strangers, and she felt uncomfortable in the knowledge that they knew so much about her when she didn't know anything about them. After all Robyn knew Ellie's deepest secret. She was immune. Dina and Jessie had no knowledge of this.