"Cooked or raw?" Sasha asks Beth the next morning.
"Sorry?" Beth's mind is still bleary from getting far more sleep than she is used to and she can't quite wrap her head around what is being asked of her. All of the awake parts of her mind are still too focused on processing what had happened with Daryl last night.
"For breakfast," Sasha clarifies, "Cooked apples or raw apples?" Sasha gestures to the two buckets close to the fire.
"Thanks," Beth musters up a smile and grabs a raw apple out of one of the buckets.
"I'm sick of apples." Carl mutters, picking at a cooked apple, as she sits down next to him. "What's the point of a cooked apple if it's not in an apple pie?"
Beth just smiles at him and munches away on her breakfast, savouring the burst of sweet juice in her mouth as she bites into the fruit. She's only been here for one night, so the novelty of apples hasn't worn off on her yet.
It clearly has on the others though.
"I hear that." Glenn says to Carl in agreement. "If I try hard enough though, I can almost feel the pastry melting in my mouth around the apple. Can practically taste the cinnamon too."
"Beth, do you remember those apple things you used to make for us?" Maggie pipes up, moving from beside Glenn to sit next to her.
"Thanks for being so specific, Maggie." Beth shakes her head at her sister. Maggie could be referring to any one of the many apple things she used to make for their family before the dead started walking. Her daddy had loved apples, so she and her mom used to try a new apple recipe every Sunday.
"You would cook a whole apple, but wrap some pastry around it? It was like having our own little apple pie." The whimsical look on Maggie's face is almost laughable, but they've all been there - lusting after food that they can't have.
"Apple dumplings?" Beth swears she can hear Carl and Glenn practically salivating next to her.
"Yeah!" Maggie exclaims, but then she looks down at her own pastry-less apple sadly and adds, "I miss pastry."
"I miss cake." The words are out of Beth's mouth before she even realizes them. She hasn't thought about dessert in a long time.
"Crying over food that is long gone isn't going to help anyone." Rick chimes in as he walks up and grabs a raw apple. He calls everyone over for a meeting. "Now, Daryl and Beth managed to bag us some meat yesterday, but we all know that most of the game in this area is gone. It's time for us to move on from here."
There's a murmuring of agreement throughout the group.
"Where are we heading?" Tyreese asks from where he is standing next to his sister.
"We shouldn't head out without a plan," Noah adds.
"Staying here means starving to death," Carol joins in, moving to stand next to Daryl.
"We wouldn't starve. We have apples." Michonne points out, a teasing smile playing on her lips.
A groan rises up from the group at the thought of continuing to eat only apples.
Through the discussion, Beth's eyes move to Daryl. He's standing next to Carol quietly, tossing an apple from hand to hand. She can tell by his restlessness that he wants to get on. They've been standing still for too long, he's ready to move. His eyes rise to meet hers and she nods her head at him.
"Well while you all argue and try to figure this mess out, Beth and I are going back to her camp to grab supplies," Daryl grabs another apple out of the bucket as he walks and tosses it her way.
She catches it right before it's about to smack her in the nose. Beth rises to her feet, pats herself down to make sure she has all of her weapons, and follows him.
"Shouldn't someone go with you?" Maggie makes to stand up and follow them.
"We were by ourselves for weeks after the prison. We can handle it." Daryl says as he swings his pack and crossbow across his shoulders. He grabs the strap of Beth's dusty old bag and holds it out for her as she reaches him.
"We won't be long, my camp isn't too far away. We'll be back in a few hours." Beth raises a hand in farewell before slipping into the trees after Daryl, leaving the group stunned into silence in their wake.
It's eerily quiet in the forest.
No bird singing, no squirrels jumping about the trees, no hooves snapping fallen branches.
Occasionally, Beth thinks she can hear the rustling of nearby leaves, but nothing comes into sight. She knows there must be a few animals left in these trees, but if they've lasted this long without getting caught by humans or walkers, they know well enough to not let themselves be seen.
"Did you anticipate this?" Once they're far enough away from camp that Beth starts to feel like she can breathe again, she breaks the quiet hanging in the air between them.
"What?" Daryl asks from behind her. He's letting her lead the way to her camp, picking their path carefully through the trees.
"The walkers turning on animals and wiping the forest clean."
"It was always going to happen," Daryl moves up to walk alongside her. "Walkers have always gone after animals. They'll sink their teeth into anything with blood and a pumping heart."
Beth frowns, trying to remember if she's seen a walker eat anything other than human flesh. "I've never seen them go after animals before."
"Back before we met your family, a walker got a deer I'd been tracking for ages. When we were looking for Sophia too - that girl we were looking for at your farm-" Daryl breaks off, looking over at her just to make sure she knows what he's talking about, "had to cut open a walker's stomach to see what it ate. Found a squirrel."
Beth wrinkles her nose in disgust, but she gets it. They've all had to do horrible things since the world turned.
"It's how Rick found our group anyhow. Walkers took down his horse and he had to take shelter."
"I didn't know that." Beth wonders just how much she doesn't know about the time before the group reached their farm.
There's a beat of silence.
"So what are we going to do then? If walkers are going after animals, we're never going to find a place that hasn't been picked clean."
"Just got to find a place with less walkers, that's all."
Beth mulls it over before speaking, "I don't think places like that exist anymore."
Daryl nudges her shoulder with his, "Who's the negative one now?"
She smiles and presses her lips together, feeling her cheeks heat up just a little bit.
Beth almost wants to bring up the night before.
She wants to know what it means for her name to be falling out of Daryl's lips while he sleeps. She's aching to understand the significance behind their tangled fingers and the looks they exchange across camp.
But she doesn't.
She's aching to know but she's afraid. It's been so long and so much has happened within the group that she doesn't know about. She's not sure if this is something or if it's all in her head.
Maybe it could have been something if she hadn't been taken.
Or if she hadn't been shot and left for dead.
But those things had happened, driving a wedge between herself and Daryl and all the progress they had made and all the things that might have been.
So she finds herself asking something else that she's dying to know instead.
"How did you find the group again?"
Daryl stops walking.
Beth turns to face him and he's looking at her with such brokenness in his eyes that it takes everything in Beth to not slide her arms around his middle and hold him close.
But just as soon as that look had appeared, it's gone again, hidden behind the walls that Daryl has constructed around his entire being.
The walls that Beth had been so close to breaking her way through before everything went wrong.
He clears his throat. "The group I was with, they were following someone. They said he'd killed one of their group and they wanted pay back."
Somehow, Beth knows what he's going to say before the name comes out of his mouth.
"It was Rick."
Beth listens to the whole story carefully. Her stomach rolls as Daryl finally tells her about this other group, about 'claiming', and tracking Rick like it was a sport.
She clenches her fists and her dirty fingernails dig painfully into her calloused palms as he speaks about Terminus, how they were kept like cattle and raised for slaughter.
Her heart starts beating faster, thudding against her rib cage as he relays what it was like to see the car that took her again, how he had chased after it with Carol and everything leading up to that hostage exchange in the hospital corridor.
She'd heard some of that part already from Carol in the hospital, but it's so different coming from him.
And then his voice breaks ever so slightly when he tells her about carrying her body out of the hospital, how she felt like a broken doll in his arms, how Maggie fell to the ground in anguish.
Beth can't stop herself from moving to him and slipping her arms around his middle, holding him like she had outside the moonshine shack. She can feel the way his shuddering breaths move through his body and she holds him even tighter, tucking her head underneath his chin. It doesn't take long for his arms to snake around her too, his hands first cupping her elbows gently before surrounding her entirely.
After a moment, she lifts her head away from his chest and realizes how close their faces are.
Beth can see every fleck of colour in his eyes and feel his heart beat against her own as their bodies are melded together.
He's looking at her so deeply, like he can see straight through her body and into her very soul and all she can think is oh.
She can feel her heartbeat picking up and she knows he can feel it too, slamming against her ribcage and passing the sensation through into his body.
It's almost more than she can handle, but she can't move. She's caught in his gaze and in the memories of unfinished conversations.
Of what could have been and what should have been.
But then Daryl's arms are loosening and his hands are sliding back down her arms and he is stepping away from her, looking down at the ground.
He starts walking again.
"Daryl," Beth calls out his name, but he just keeps moving forward.
She tries again.
Nothing.
"You're going the wrong way."
That catches his attention.
She points to her right, not hiding the giggles that bubble up inside of her as he stalks sheepishly past her in the direction that she's pointing.
Once they reach her little camp, it doesn't take them long to pack up what few possessions she has. The small tent that she had scavenged months ago is a little bit torn and tattered, but it's better than nothing. The few blankets and extra clothes she had stashed in her tent are store away safely in her pack. Daryl packs away the few food cans that she had hidden under a tree root in his bag.
"Is it worth bringing these?" Beth asks, running a finger along the string of her noisemaker, strung between the trees.
Daryl thinks for a moment, "Probably not. We've got enough at camp."
Beth nods, biting her lip. It's really just a bunch of garbage: bits of broken glass, cans, and bottles. It's nothing to miss, but for some reason, Beth is finding it hard to leave behind. It had taken her so long to collect all of these things. It feels like a string of memories to her.
Daryl senses her hesitation. "Someone else might find it. Might help them out of a difficult spot."
"You're right. It could save a life." Beth lets out a deep breath and steps away from the noisemaker, shaking her head.
"We should fill up our bottles before we leave. There's a stream not too far away."
They're just heading down to the stream when Beth sees something on the ground and hears a noise close by.
"Beth?" Daryl questions as she stops walking.
Beth holds a finger to her lips, telling him to be quiet.
She never really thought she'd be the one reminding Daryl to be quiet on a hunt.
He probably doesn't realize this is a hunt though. She smiles to herself as she realizes that she saw the tracks and heard the noises that he missed. He taught her well - maybe a little too well.
She holds her hand up, telling him to stop walking without actually speaking to him. She can see the question in his eyes as he stays where he is and she keeps moving. It's clear that he doesn't want to let her out of his sight, but she wants to surprise him and she can tell by the tracks and noises that she won't be gone more than a few minutes. If it had been any animal but this, she would have let him come with her, but the temptation to see the look on his face when she holds out this kill is just too great.
Her eyes scan the ground, looking for the one final thing she needs to make this work. She spots it just a little off of the tracks and swoops low to pick up the forked stick before following the trail again.
Hardly five minutes have passed before she's back by Daryl's side.
"Beth, you can't just leave without an explanation like that," he sounds frustrated as she approaches him.
But then she moves her hands out from behind her back and holds out her kill.
A rattlesnake.
Daryl stops talking and just stands there quietly for a moment.
For a second, she is worried that he doesn't remember the last time they ate snake together, back when tensions were high, but right before things changed between them.
But then he starts laughing.
Beth thought that she might never hear that sound again. It had taken her so long to coax a laugh out of him when they were together and it had slowly gotten easier and easier, but with all the time apart, Beth had thought she would be back to square one.
She can't help but join in on the laughter.
They eat snake with roasted apples and a few cans of beans that night. Given the size of the group, there's not a lot of meat to go around, but it's better than nothing.
While they were out, the group had decided to stick around for one more night and head off in the morning. Some people had gone into town and raided the majority of the stores. They'd come back with enough canned goods to last them a week or so on the road. Maybe longer if they can find any of the remaining game.
As she picks away at her snake, Beth keeps looking up to see Daryl watching her from across the fire.
She's not sure if it's the flames or if she's imagining the heat and intensity in his gaze.
Or maybe it's something else entirely.
The only thing that Beth is sure of is that her eyes are funnelling the same heat straight back at him.
Author's Note: You guys! I have been so overwhelmed with all the support for this story! Seriously, all of your kind words have left me speechless. Thank you so much for your support! Please let me know what you think of this new chapter and have a lovely day! Remember that you can find me over on tumblr (fireandflood) and chat with me there too!
