Tara wrapped up the carefully roasted quail, and, dizzy but determined, walked to Nemlii's dar. She bit her lips up when Nemlii's poked her head out of the tent, her blue eyes wide and searching.
"Feeling a little better, girlie?"
"I'm really sorry about running out like that…"
Nemlii smiled. "No harm done. Come in. The others are here already, doing their mending." She invited Tara inside the richly appointed dar and spread her arm out. "See, we've piles of shirts and leggings and swaddling, if you've a mind to be occupy your hands."
"Sure," Tara said. "Nemlii," she whispered, "I—What I said—I'd never steal from you," Tara shook her head in desperation, tears in her eyes.
"Hush, child," Nemlii murmured, taking the bird. "I know that."
Tara sat down between Daumani and Faalca, who with Shari went silent, their eyes bouncing around in curious, silent messages.
"Well, I'll just come out and say it," Faalca decided. "What happened with the baalak? You were gone a long while yesterday…"
Tara ducked her head and said, "We went out for some sunlight. I really, really needed it."
"Mmhmm," Shari purred. " 'Sunlight'."
"Shari!" Tara gasped, laughing a little and rolling her eyes at Shari, who turned everything into that. "Just sun, a little talk. Nothing… more." Tara would not tell her friends how Ushatar had described his dismal, brutal life in Isengard, which impossibly seemed more terrifying than her own short stay. Nor would she say how he was the only one who had heard her darkest thoughts, and didn't react like she was insane or evil, but helped her catch her breath again.
"He was good to you?" Faalca asked warily, catching Tara in a sharp, curious gaze. Tara had the feeling that Faalca would give Ushatar a hell of a fight if she replied in the negative.
"Yeah," Tara said, meeting the Orcess's gaze and noddling. "Yeah, he was."
"So…" Nemlii asked, shuffling over and sitting on her stone bench. "You plannin' on seeing him some more?"
Tara looked at the four open, excited faces, and she laughed again, flushing to the tips of her ears to be the center of such attention. "You all are terrible! Listen, it doesn't mean anything, only that he, I guess, wants me to feel better. And maybe…Maybe he's not just as I thought he was. But it don't mean anything, I'm not gonna be bringing my stuff back into his little cave or anything, so don't go looking to plan a party."
Shari clucked her tongue in disappointment. "Dammit, and here I thought I'd have reason to put my best on again."
"I think you're next, Shari," Tara laughed, turning the tables. "I don't have to be an Orc to tell you're ready to set up house."
Shari bit her bright pink tongue a little, excited, and said, "Well… There was someone walking by the stream with my sire yesterday… I don't know what they talked about, though I almost fell through old Kaala's dar trying to have a listen."
"Ask her who it was," Faalca grinned at Tara, nodding her sharp chin at Shari.
Tara had hardly opened her mouth before Shari gushed, "Draagh Durub's big son, Saalcaf."
But Tara did go back. Three days after she made things right with Nemlii, Ushatar came to get her again, while the clan was at its afternoon rest. This time, feeling more tired than usual, she let him carry her part-way up the tunnel, listening as he spoke softly of Brodha's family and laughed about the little dagu who chased him around now, trying to make him play 'monster' and wrestle them. He told her of the new ways he was learning to hunt that didn't hurt his back and leg as much as running down game.
"Am I hurting you?" Tara asked suddenly, stiffening up in his arms.
"Skai," he breathed softly. "Never. The day I can't carry you when you're tired is the day I jump off our cliff. I just want to last a while in the world, like Brodha tells me I can, so I don't overdo things like I would have before."
Tara bit her lip, feeling her heart flutter anxiously at the mention of their cliff, and his insistence that he'd always be there for her. Still-he seemed determined to help her, and Tara felt herself trusting him somewhat, as terrifying as he still was to her.
He picked up his stride as they reached the cave mouth, and Tara sighed to see light filtering into the darkness. "It's actually kind of nice to use my wits setting traps and such—"
Ushatar fell dead silent, stepping out into the day. Tara caught her breath, frowning. There was something wrong with the light. It was limpid, weak, and a sick yellow-grey, as if a violent storm was coming in, but many times darker. Tara could not be sure what light she saw wasn't some fell glow, not the good light of the sun at all.
He set her down immediately against the rocks. "I roar, I call you, I don't come back before you can count to fifty twice, you pick yourself up and run back to the cavern, you understand me? I don't care if it's your last bit of strength, you run. And then you tell Brodha."
"Where are you going?" Tara demanded, wild. It was as if the evil light rung the courage right out of her. Had I forgotten? Was I so stuck in my own troubles?
"Up to the cliff to have a look!" Ushatar called, but he was already bolting, the pain in his leg be damned. Tara wondered briefly how he did that, turned off all pain no matter how brutal. And then she leaned back against the comforting mountainside and wrung her hands, counting softly until she saw him jumping, sliding, and running back down the tree-covered rise.
"Come on, Tara, gotta go up in my arms now, sorry," Ushatar swept her up in one motion and bound back down into the Mountain, the few torches flashing by in a dizzying blur. He ran her to his little cave, the one they used to share. Very few Orcs were up and about, but the ones who saw him looked at him curiously.
But he said nothing, sitting her on a new thick bearskin blanket and beginning to arm himself. Tara held his knife, but Ushatar, who'd wore his bow on their walk, grabbed a second and third quiver of arrows and slung them on his shoulder. He took the other knife she knew, from Isengard, and tucked it in his belt. He breathed, "Bolk-izg dulug-izub, htol!" He pulled up two wooden spears off the floor, both fit out with iron spikes.
"Ushatar what the fuck is happening?" Tara demanded, shaking.
He closed his eyes, shook his head a little. "Nothing's fucking happening, or at least it won't be happening anymore if it tries to come here. Here ambal, toss me my blade."
She threw the blade in its sheath unto Ushatar's outstretched palm. "The Power?" she whispered.
He said nothing, but his lips curled into a black sneer, flashing fierce white fangs, before he caught himself. He tightened his jaw, even as his lips quivered with hate. "It's not gonna come here," Ushatar said, forcing over a rage so black Tara had never imagined it, and she drew away slightly. Ushatar frowned, then dropped his voice to a murmur. "I'm gonna see the Durub now, see what he makes of it. S'all right, Tara. This's why Orcs put what's precious to them deep in the earth. You're safe here."
"Ushatar!" Tara hissed, but he shot away from her, leaving her in his cave. Tara touched her face with shaking fingers, as if reassuring herself she was still alive, still whole. The War was following them. It would come with its fire and its battle-crazed barbarians, its tormented slaves demanding relief in blood. Tara felt her body go liquid in terror, and fall apart, as if all her joints were trying to crawl to hiding in separate places. The War was coming.
And, she realized somewhat belatedly, the father of her unborn child looked fit to run out and meet it.
