Warning: Sensitive topic
Chapter Seven: Bright like blood
Another birthday came and past. In that year it was hard being the First, none of the other dalens could play with me, so I spent most of my time either helping Mama or doing things for the Keeper. Slowly I grew used to the feeling of being lonely, though it brought tears to my eyes at night. But I had the fade, and the spirits would always play with me, so it wasn't too bad.
But sometime after my seventh birthday the clan contracted a sickness. Mama was bed ridden with a fever, delirious. Elain, whom had recently given birth, was just as bad. Most of the clan had this sickness, and it worried me. The spirits comforted me, it would pass they'd tell me.
The Keeper wasn't so sure. It was beautiful that day, the sun was pleasantly warm. The breeze swept through, as if to make sure the sun didn't bake us too much. My hands were sticky with elf root, one bucket on each side of my tiny feet. I was still clumsy as I slid the dull knife through the plant, scraping out the gooey insides. It reminded me of snot, which made me wrinkle my nose. I was alone, the Keeper was off getting something. The others were doing their everyday tasks, though some, I recalled, prayed that day.
The day was too beautiful, the fade was peaceful against my skin. My fade friend was chatting away, her one eye watching me. I could feel the moment. It was a crack inside me, deep deep down, as if I broke the biggest bone ever inside me. It felt as if my chest was being ripped apart. Like I was reaching for something except I couldn't because I was missing an arm, or a hand, or a leg. My fade friend disappeared, her one eye didn't even look at me when she did. I curled in on myself, the pain so great. Why did it hurt?
My feet led me, as if this pain was a large rope to be followed. I passed my people working, past the halla, past other caravans until I was climbing the one I shared with Mama. Years later I would remember that the Keeper had all the other sick people in a separate caravan so not to spread it, everyone but Mama. The wood was warm as I climbed up it, the curtain soft as I pulled it aside, it was brown like everything else. It was silent.
Mama was pale. Her lips were blue. I pulled the blanket that pooled at her waist up to her chin. She didn't move. Her chest wasn't rising. My shaking hand moved over her mouth, like the Keeper taught me, but her blue lips didn't part. Mama's red hair was fanned out on the pillow, like flower stems. The wooden floor was hard as my knees fell onto them. Mama's fingers were freezing when I clenched them.
I was screaming, great bellowing sounds. I couldn't really tell, you know. It was just hard to breathe through my sinking chest. My body was shaking, my fingers pressing deep into Mama's cold skin. It smelled like someone peed. Like when the hunters kill something. I took great heaping gulps of breath, and my vision couldn't stay clear as tears fell. Others came. I didn't want them. Lightening cracked, splitting the air between them and us. Mama's hair looked like flower stems. Her pilloried Red stems.
The Keeper came, right through the lightening between us. That was okay. The lightening didn't have enough energy to stay. Everything was so slowly, I was slow. They wrapped Mama up. Hands held me back. Mama's head flapped like a fish when they picked her up. The flower stems left her hair. Everything was so cold and dark, and it felt like the insides of me were scooped out like the gooeyness in elf root.
Blood was on Mama's bed pallet, I couldn't look away from it. It was so bright. Bright like Mama's hair.
