A mouse, Littler Keeper?
I did not think that out loud, Protector.
He falls silent. Strange lines were crossed the day I was dragged to the Blood Tree, and as though we pretend things are as they once were, we both know, I think, that we are on some previously unknown borrowed time. The longer we are gone from the village the more it takes from me to keep him with me, the tighter I am bindinghim to me in ways I don’t understand, in ways it is best that I don’t examine too closely.
“BoneKeeper?” It is Ellie’s voice, hesitant and respectful, and I call her in, feeling significantly more cheerful than before.
“Ellie! Come, come! Thank you for humoring me.”
She enters cautiously, looking around her with careful eyes. My tent is large, and won’t be cramped with two of us — would not be with four, even. There is room for the small fire, a bedroll on the far side, a folding, low table for meals, and a second for odds and ends. She shifts awkwardly from foot to foot, her hands full of blankets and a bedroll.
“Are youcertain, Keeper?” Her voice is low, and she seems uncomfortable.
“It would be a favor to me, Ellie, but don’t feel you have to. I’m…the coming rains make me…I don’t feel…” I let my words trail off and leave them open to her interpretation, but it’s enough, and she regains some of the confidence I saw earlier in the clearing, far from the hierarchy of camp.
“In that case, I’ll set up. Here? Or…where do you prefer? By the door?”
“Absolutely not! By the fire? Or, it’s actually warmer back by my bed. You can set up by me if you wish?”
“You’re very strange, Keeper,” she replies cryptically, and stays hovering by the flaps of the tent before making a decision and rolling her eyes comically. “In for the frying pan, in for the fire,” she mumbles, then walks forward and quickly and efficiently sets up her little sleeping area near my own. “What?” she asks, clearly worried by the look on my face, and I shrug.
“It still takes me ages to get everything packed up and unpacked, and you’re doing it in an eighth of the time to better effect. I find myself oddly jealous.”
Grinning, she shakes her head. “Well, Keeper, I’m here now, so I’ll give you all the tricks of my trade, as it were. Unless you’ll just let me do it for you? No? I thought not. You are unexpected.”
“You keep saying that. I feel like a horse with six legs the way some of you look at me.”
Surprisingly, she frowns, before tilting her head and looking me over carefully. “Keeper, I mean no offense, but have you had a full bath since you’ve been with us?”
“We haven’t stopped at a pond, so no. Am I terrible?”
Laughing, she looks around the tent for something. “No, of course not. No worse than a full ninety percent of the camp. But I mean a bath. A soak.” The confusion on my face must be obvious, because her answering grin is like a candle. “Oh, blood and stone. You’re in for a treat then. I can wash and braid your hair as well, if you’re not too tired? Just leave me to it. I’ll sort it.”
WIthin an hour, there’s a round sort of pot in my tent, brought in by three very reluctant men who were clearly bullied into the task by an oddly confident Ellie. They fill it with steaming hot buckets of seemingly endless water before she shoos them out and studies it critically. “Do you have any oils or soaps, Keeper?” she asks thoughtfully, then shakes her head, amused at my obvious confusion. “It’s fine. Even Fifth Tiers have some. I’ll give you some of mine.” She holds her hands up at my protests. “Think of it as a favor to me. I mean this in the nicest possible way, but you smell like horse and hay.”
Digging through her small pack, she pulls out a sachet of dried leaves, and a small vial of oil and empties both fully into the water, nodding in satisfaction. “This will do. Into the tub.”
I…don’t move.
“Keeper?”
Feeling absolutely ridiculous, I bite my lip. “I…I’ll be cooked like a chicken, no?”
Ellie bursts into laughter, the bright, startled sound of a starling. “No, Keeper!” She chortles, tears streaming down her face.
“You’re crying!” I say, shocked, and she wipes her face, breath hitching.
“From laughter only. I promise.”
“The waste of water…” My words trail off, and she tilts her head, face soft, not pushing for any answers to her obvious questions.
“Is joy ever a waste? Now, then. Off with the clothes. I’ll have them washed overnight. Into the tub. I promise you you will not cook.”
It takes me a long moment, but eventually I start to strip down before pausing again. This time she says nothing, just turns her back to give me privacy as I quickly remove the rest of my things and clamber awkwardly into the steaming water.
An eternity later,wrapped in a length of heavy cloth, skin scrubbed to pale pink, eyelids feeling heavy enough to crush mountains, I’m more relaxed than I have ever been in my known life. Ellie is silent behind me, running a comb through my hair in slow, careful movements.
“Ellie?” I mumble, feeling as though all my bones have melted. “If I die now, I’ll leave this world in sheer happiness.”
