When Callum woke, the first thing he noticed was the smell of fried grit in the air. After days of lembas and yesterday's poisonous berries, it smelled like heaven. A hissing sound announced the addition of water to the fragrant grain.
"Mornin'", Rayla said, sitting by the fire, one hand busy stirring, the other, wounded arm draped limply over her thigh. It looked like she had changed her own bandage.
"Hey!", he replied, flushing. As he got up, he became aware of a kind of floaty emotional bliss, left over from the night before.
She gave him a loving glance. They had barely managed to keep each other awake to exchange the Askander, nodding off here and there while engaged in quiet conversation about nothing much.
"I suppose before we start walking, we should refill the canteens", he said.
"I'm not goin' near that river."
"You did it before…"
"Yeah I did - when it was predictable!"
He shrugged. "You know, at some point you're going to have to learn how to…"
"... swim?", she interrupted grumpily, "You know I can swim. That's not the problem. I'm worrin' ab..."
She abruptly stopped talking, staring into the distance. Then she shot up and placed the pot of hot grit soup on the ground. She grabbed it with a rag but still ended up burning herself slightly.
"What's wrong?", Callum asked, following her worried gaze. In a north-eastern direction, there was a light cloud of dust forming on the horizon. "Is that another storm?"
She started kicking their small bonfire apart. Zym scuttled out of the way of some still glowing pieces of wood.
"Ah, sorry, little guy!", Rayla said apologetically, extending her hands toward him as though she meant to pick him up. He sat far outside her reach, staring distrustfully.
"Doubt it. We need to pack up and get off this hill. That direction is the road to Veltis-Tiram. I'm pretty sure what we're seein' there is a Legion, marchin' west to the breach."
Callum sprung into action, assembling his backpack. Zym seemed to enjoy the activity after a day of sitting in place and got tangled up in their legs ever so often.
They skittered down the far side of the hill and had a quiet and quick breakfast.
Rayla bemoaned the lack of a wedge of sharp soft cheese, but Callum really enjoyed her cooking. She did it so rarely and elven dishes were fresh to his tongue. Sure, Katolins made grit soup, but the spices and preparation were different. Zym seemed to enjoy lapping the soup as well, although he would have very likely preferred a slab of meat. Or a bunch of bugs.
"I'd like to put a bit more distance between us and them. They send scouts a few miles ahead and into their wings. The Auxilia doesn't like surprise fights."
"Why bother with that here? It's Xadia, isn't it?"
"Sure, but why change a routine? It's all trainin'"
They started walking south-east, the mountains still ahead of them.
"That's gonna take us away from the river, Rayla", he said, looking over his shoulder, "Do we have enough water for that?"
She shook her canteens. Two of them were full, one empty, another nearly so.
"I have two full ones", she said, "That should do me for the day. How about you?"
"Likewise", he replied, feeling a bit better about the water situation, "I really wonder if Helmond and my Aunt made any progress at the border."
Rayla shook her head, feeling guilty having dallied again, "I don't think they made a difference. Otherwise that army wouldn't be going down there. I should say, they didn't make a difference, `yet`. Gotta stay positive here."
They kept walking in silence for a while.
Zym made a point of trotting next to Callum, eyeing him.
"What is it, little guy?"
The dragon blinked and looked ahead for a moment, then back at him. Callum decided to pick him up. After putting him on his shoulder, Zym looked much happier.
"Lazy bum", Callum said, snarkily.
"At least he's chosen you as his ride today", Rayla snickered, walking backwards comfortably.
"So, we're just going to walk a big arc around that legion?"
She waved her hand. "I'm not goin' to risk getting tangled up in there."
He snickered. "We got kinda tangled up yesterday! It was nice. Carefree."
She shrugged sadly.
"What's wrong?"
"Ah, with hindsight, I just feel like we've wasted more time. We could've probably made some progress walkin' rather than sittin' and talkin'"
"What about the storm though? We had a good reason to stay put, not just to swap gifts."
"I dunno. It doesn't help the guilt. Looking forward to when this is over.", she tapped her lower lip, "So, now that we've started the Bloom, should we also start the marriage thing?"
Callum blinked. "You don't `start` the marriage thing. It's not like the bloom, there's really no fixed timeline to it. Well; except maybe for engagement."
"Engagement, that's when we exchange that first set of rings?"
"Yeah.", he rubbed the back of his neck, "I guess that won't happen for a long while. Probably for the best, though."
The comment hurt her somehow. "Why is that? Couldn't the flowers just be like our rings?"
"Um... it would just feel weird, calling you my `fiance`."
"Oh.", she said, annoyed, "I guess that's not somethin' you wanna do with me?"
"It's just… there's a lot of stuff attached to this idea of marriage for me, like huge feasts... a-and… you know. Plus, married people are just so serious all the time."
She cocked her head. "We've been doin' some pretty serious thin's.", she gestured at his shoulder and at her arm, "I mean, the past two weeks alone! Both you and I were almost murdered! Twice! And I'm still not completely sure if I'm gonna be survivin' this stupid stab in my arm!"
His mien sagged, "Don't say stuff like that. We have it under control."
"Sure we do! Until we don't!"
She ran her hand over her face.
"Callum, I almost killed a bunch of people! We almost died! More than once! For all I know, I'm gonna be smashed into a grainy, purple mess in the next five minutes! I thought we could stand to live a little faster than other people, you know?! You really wanna waste our time with feasts and rings and all that?!"
"That's not w...", he started but she wasn't done.
"So I'm not your fiance, then! I... just thought you'd be happy to call me that, and mean it.", she
turned and stomped ahead, wanting to be alone.
The fact that his brain was still not done formulating the actual reason for his discomfort annoyed him. If he could just explain himself a little more! A bit of anger krept into his thoughts. She hadn't even given him time to say more on the topic.
Still. He hadn't seen her this angry for a while and felt like a jerk.
"Callum - you always know just what to say to ruin a perfectly good day", he thought sourly.