Chap felt himself—felt her—rush out toward Osha.
The memory vanished, sucked into darkness as if Leanâlhâm had forcefully willed it away.
Chap still experienced the strange relief that had hit her in that moment, whenever it had occurred. And now Leanâlhâm still hoped—looked—for Osha. Chap noticed Brot’an gazing back toward the ships in port as well and eyeing the newly arrived one that Leanâlhâm had watched so eagerly.
Chap stumbled as one of his paws’ claws caught in a cracked cobblestone. He righted himself, paying more attention, as they climbed the steep road up another city block.
Whatever Brot’an was looking for, it was not a glimpse of Osha.
Midmorning the next day, the girl whom everyone called Leanâlhâm stood on the deck of a large human merchant vessel and leaned out over the portside rail. She looked as far as she could up and down the closest pier and out across the tangle of all the vessels up and down the shoreline. She could see so few of them clearly.
“Leanâlhâm!”
She heard Léshil’s call from the doorway below the aftcastle but pretended that she did not. It was impolite and against her nature, but she could not help it as she searched as far as she could see. All her current companions seemed relieved over a peaceful night spent in the small inn, followed by an uneventful boarding. The ship would set sail shortly, and everyone was relieved but her ... and perhaps Léshil, but for a different reason.
She leaned out even farther, certain that if they could delay a little longer, Osha would come running down the ramp of some newly arrived ship. She could call out to him, and he would see her, and the captain of this vessel would have to lower the boarding ramp for him.
“Come on,” Leesil called. “We need to get below and settle.”
Unlike the others, she did not believe that Osha had intentionally remained behind in Calm Seatt. He would not do that, not to her. He was the only one who understood how she felt, cast adrift in this foreign world.
She knew that Brot’ân’duivé believed her sadness was a longing for the home she had left behind. Perceptive as the greimasg’äh might be, he was wrong in this.
Yes, she missed her lost life in that one central enclave. She still mourned her grandfather and uncle—the wise and kind elder Gleannéohkân’thva, and the most honorable Sgäilsheilleache, once hero of their people. Because of her mixed blood, even her own clan had looked at her with polite embarrassment, but those two had loved her and made her a place among the people. She had sometimes suspected the only reason Sgäilsheilleache chose to live with them in between his duties was to show his acceptance of her—and he was adamant about this.
Sgäilsheilleache was—had been—anmaglâhk and admired for his adherence to the people’s ways, even above his oath to his caste. His given word was unquestioned, and because of him, if any among the enclave thought she did not belong, they kept silent.
But both her grandfather and uncle had passed on to the ancestors. Only Osha remained, the last one who fully accepted her as she was, even if she did not know who she was anymore.
Brot’ân’duivé was never unkind and always looked out for her welfare. But he was like one of the humans’ creations she had come to know—like a portcullis, all cold gears, chains, pulleys, and turning mechanisms.
Osha gave open warmth, even in the secrecy of whatever shame and grief he now bore. He would not abandon her, and as long as he was with her, it did not matter that she no longer had a place to call home. For in spite of her grandfather’s and uncle’s love, in more recent years up to the last season before she had fled her people’s land, she had been more and more reminded that she did not belong.
When had she first realized this? Years ago, in her homeland, she had been alone while cutting fruit by the communal ovens.
That warm dawn had promised a bright day. She perspired lightly, though night’s shadows had not fully faded among the trees, and wiped her forehead with the back of her small hand. She was happy for one moment, alone without the occasional stares of others. She hummed a tune her grandfather had taught her as a child and—
A disturbing sensation made her skin seem to tighten, and she cringed as if being watched. She tried not to turn, not to acknowledge the watcher. She waited until whomever went about his or her business. Soon enough the whole enclave would awaken, and with much to do, no one would give her much notice.
The sensation only grew more intense.
Leanâlhâm glanced sidelong about the lawn and between the tree homes. There was no one within sight, but the sensation did not pass. It seemed to pull her attention to the trees beyond the enclave. Two sparks appeared in the forest’s shadows, and she cringed in retreat, knowing what they were.
The eyes of a majay-hì watched her.
It was barely visible, for its dark coat blended deeply in the shadows of the leaves around it. Its head took shape as she stared into its sparkling crystal-blue eyes.
That color made them appear so cold.
It made no sound and did not move even once. It only kept watching her without blinking.
But she decided that she could not—would not—retreat. She did her best to go back to preparing the food. Not long after, the sensation faded, but when it did, she was shaking too much to hold the chopping blade steady and had to set it down.
In the year that followed, this happened again and again, though rarely the same majay-hì twice. She would feel eyes upon her, find no one present, and turn to look beyond the enclave’s bounds.
Sparkling blue eyes always waited in the brush ... staring at her.
Along with other sacred beings like the clhuassas—the “listeners”—akin to both a deer and an elk but larger, the majay-hì were the guardians of her people’s land, an ancient “people” themselves. Her uncle and grandfather’s influence would not convince them. And that was how she realized why they came.
The majay-hì defended the land, the people ... and she did not truly belong among them.
She was of mixed blood.
Those eyes, that judgment, had been the beginning of something far worse to come.
Léshil’s footsteps sounded on the deck behind Leanâlhâm, and still she did not acknowledge him. At least here, in this strange world of rough humans, she was an oddity for being an an’Cróan rather than a mixed-blood. Or, even better, they mistook her for one of those other “elves” they called the Lhoin’na. Few here would have ever even heard of the an’Cróan.
And she no longer suffered judgment in the eyes of the majay-hì.
Leaning farther out over the rail, she was desperate for a glimpse of Osha—she knew he would arrive any moment. Then she felt it again, that crawling sensation on her skin.
Here in this faraway place, where being watched by the majay-hì could not happen, her panic came again. She spun about, still gripping the railing fiercely.
Léshil nearly jumped back, eyes widening. “What? What’s wrong?”
She peered around him to look for nonexistent trees and brush and the bright eyes that would be watching her. In the dark shadows of the stairwell below the aftcastle, she found them.
The majay-hì whom the others called Chap stood below the deck’s edge watching her with unblinking crystalline blue eyes.
Léshil followed her gaze, and his handsome face wrinkled in a scowl.
“What are you doing?” he snapped at the majay-hì. “Get out of her head and stop bothering her!”
Leanâlhâm’s fear broke a little at Léshil’s offensive tone toward a sacred being.
Léshil stiffened, one eye twitching as his head flinched, but he still glowered at the majay-hì.
“All right, fine, you’re not doing anything,” he muttered through clenched teeth. “But I didn’t come after her to have to chase you down as well. Get your mangy butt below!”