A sense of numbness followed Alice as she stepped out of the shelter of the forest, a feeling that stayed with her all that night, and the next day, and the next. She completed the tasks that were asked of her, ate the food put in front of her, and politely responded to anything said to her, but the space where her heart beat felt empty. The thought of leaving Cora, of abandoning her to this foreign land, filled her with sorrow, yet she sensed even beyond that the undefined edges of some darker, more subterranean heartache.
Early one afternoon she was returning from the stream, two newly-scoured cooking-pots dangling from her hands, each foot taking one mechanical step in front of the other, when she saw Uncas, sitting on the porch step, looking for all the world like he was waiting just for her. He said nothing, but paused, then jerked his head in the direction of the woods just off to his side.
She stopped for a moment, temporarily startled. He nodded towards the woods again, this time giving her a more imploring look, his lips marked with a small smile of amusement. Alice knew she should be affronted by his impudence in making such an invitation; this was what custom dictated. But she was more intrigued by the fact that for a moment, her protective shell of listlessness had been broken, and that, if she were being completely honest, she was a little curious as to why he had sought her out.
He stood up stiffly – she could see that he was still not fully healed – and moved closer to her, taking the pots from her hands and leaving them in a neat stack on the porch. Turning back towards her, he held out his hand. She took it, feeling the warmth and strength of his fingers as they wrapped around hers.
They made their way slowly to the forest's edge, Alice trying to replicate Uncas's steady and deliberative steps and succeeding only fitfully.
A dozen paces past the treeline, she caught his eye, ready to ask where they were headed. He put a finger up to his lips and made a small hushing sound, as he pulled her further into the leafy depths of overhanging branches. A few moments later, he slowed, crouching slightly closer to the ground and placing each step silently into the earth before taking another, while indicating that she should do the same.
The air was still, golden light filtering brilliantly through to the forest floor. They stopped several feet from an ancient gnarled oak, whose tangled roots emerged half-formed from the earth and made deep hollows around the base of the tree. It was there that he pointed.
Alice saw, as she peered over the root's edge, the small, white-dappled form of a fawn. Curled up in such a way, it resembled nothing more than a statue, the down of its sorrel-colored fur merely a hatching of tiny brushstrokes. But it was alive, for it trembled slightly, even as its limbs stayed rigid. Huge black eyes stared up at her, the pupils round and dilated.
She turned to face him, the traces of a smile stirring along the corners of her mouth.
"Why doesn't it run?" she whispered.
"She's waiting," he replied.
"What for?"
"She's too young to go far, so her mother left her to look for food. She won't move at all until the doe comes back, no matter what happens."
"Not even if I got closer?"
Uncas paused, his eyes somehow softening as his gaze drifted down towards the ground.
"She'll stay exactly where she is. She won't go anywhere."
Alice turned back to look at the fawn again. It seemed almost cruel to frighten it further by moving closer. She watched for a moment the tiny expansions and contractions of its ribcage, the patterned whorl of fur along its spine. How small it was, how fragile! She felt an acute sense of wonder, as if the space around her had slowly been filled with a strange magic. A sweeping smile broke out across her face, her wide eyes ignited with a delicate illumination.
She turned towards him again, glancing down at their hands and realizing that they were still joined. The air between them suddenly seemed charged, full of something invisible yet potent. She didn't want to move, for fear of upsetting it.
He gazed down at her, looking at her in a way that she could never recall a man having looked at her before. She wanted it to stop immediately. She wanted it to go on forever.
A rapid fluttering of wings and rustled leaves from a nearby tree pulled them from their reverie; the spell had been broken.
"We should go back," she said, gently extracting her hand from his.
Uncas simply nodded, turning back towards the direction from which they had come, his face free of any expression.