Alluvial. Valos of Sonhadra Book 1

Chapter 13

PETRICHOR

The hollows on her body fill out as they should, and I talk softly to her—more in an attempt to keep myself awake than to fill the quiet. I want her to be able to rest, but I can also see that even slipping into unconsciousness, she is liking the sound of my voice, and it warms me to see her relax even further when I drop down on my elbows so that our chests touch, and she can feel everything I'm saying to her too.

Feel everything. Her stomach!

I roll off of her immediately, then laugh at myself. At this stage, the Sproutling will be exactly that; a tiny sprout, and thankfully, it and its mother will be fine despite my cloddish inattention. It isn't as if I'm not familiar with young; a constant circle of life is teaming within the Salachar forest that the Kahav call home.

The Kahav. There are only three of us still lifegreen. I let my eyes climb up my azibo's now beautifully curved body, and think now there are four. My hand finds her stomach, and in sleep, her hands slowly move to cover mine. Five.

Her husbandman makes six.

We've doubled our number thanks to them. And someday, she might bear Ammos, or Maceous', or my own Sproutlings, and the Kahav will flourish once more.

I roll my eyes skyward and mutter, "May the Ruler never return." Something the Ruler did killed off all the females. Like an early frost, they succumbed overnight. It was devastating. Woven males followed, wilting after their females.

The memories make me feel even more depleted, and my fingers tremble as I reach to pluck the most beautiful bloom from where it is growing over my heartstone. I gently sweep her hair back from her face, and tuck it behind her ear.

I doze next to her for a time, but I know her husbandman will want to be assured of her renewed condition, so I struggle to rise without disturbing her. Exhausted, I stumble out of the room, and go in search of the others. Upon reaching them, I manage the shaky announcement, "She has a Sproutling."

Maceous looks unimpressed. "We could have told you that."

Archly I challenge, "And you would know this how?"

"Because it pulls at us."

"You're not woven to her," I say in consternation, my head feeling thick and my thoughts sluggish.

"We are to him," Bortammos says pointedly. "His leg bled on our heartstones." I turn around, and there is our new husbandman; mouth stuffed with gaius-gum. It will help control the amount of pain he is obviously experiencing, which is evidenced in the way he is clutching the injury site from the strange weapon the warring tribesman attacked him with. Gaius-gum will also keep his jaws stuck fast, keep him from calling out and alarming her, which from the sound of his muffled snarling, he might attempt to do.

I shuffle in his direction. To the others, I pose a question. "Why don't I sense the Sproutling?"

Ammos removes a terran weed from between his lips. "Hmm. The Sproutling takes after our new tribesman. Greatly."

Pondering what that could mean, and feeling weary in a way I've never experienced, I approach our aggressive new tribesmember. Even injured to the point he's been rendered lame, he's full of fury and indignant rage.

"Husbandman," I start.

"FuCK awff!" he snarls.

Bortammos turns to me, eyes and expression arrayed in a clear wince. "He's issued an aggressive order for you to depart."

"That," I nod slowly, not taking my eyes from the injured man, "I gathered." I can understand him as clearly as I do her, because she blooded me, and the pair shares a language. For the same reason, Ammos and Mace will understand her thanks to her husbandman blooding them. The gaius-gum adds a challenge, however, and I appreciate Ammos' effort to assist. I imagine in the time I spent with our azibo, this new tribesmember offered opportunity aplenty for them to learn his new nuance in speech.

"He has an attitude," Mace offers, his tone dry as soot. "And we knew the first feeding would be taxing, but you look as if the lightest gale could send you crashing down."

I try to nod, but feel as if my balance is interfering with even this. "It is lucky their tribesman is even conscious if he's carried the sole feeding responsibility. She depleted me of nectar," both Mace and Ammos swing me shocked gazes. "I venture he is too and this is why she's in the condition she is. He can't feed her." My vision feels like it's furling black at the edges, and I try to blink it away. "Oh. Beware; she doesn't sip pollen. She sucks."

I bob my head at their wide-eyed expressions. When the three of us fall silent and focus on her husbandman, his eyes narrow and he puffs up, a feat to behold when he has no fur, or scales, or spines with which to offer such a defensive display.

"Tfry itf, affhoes!"

Ammos replaces his stalk of terran weed and peers at him. "It's strange that there is no translation for this last one. Affhoes. I like the sound of it, I just don't know what it means."

"Something vile, I'd imagine," Mace offers.

"I know," Ammos says easily. "It's about time we learned new curse words. It's been ages and everything we say has gone stale."

Yet another reason we found ourselves in our Guardian forms more and more. Everything had gone stale. "What do we do with him?"

Mace stands and Ryan, I try to teach myself, begins that odd growling speech again. Mace pays him no mind. "He's worried for the azibo. It should settle him to be reunited with her."

"But he'll wake her—"

"I don't think he will." Mace points to Ryan, then points in the direction of our azibo, trying to put him at ease as to where and why he's about to be moved. They seem to be coming to an uneasy truce before Mace begins to lift him.

Remembering what I have clutched in my hand, I hold the tiny items out to Ammos. "Do you think you can make something in her size?"

Ryan takes one look at what I'm holding, and he loses his grip on sanity.