Page 21 of The Goddesses' Gifts

I tapped my chest again, “Ozanna.” Then I tapped him on the chest and said, “Oshruli.”

His pale brows came together while he thought and then shot up his forehead. Excited, he put both hands on his chest. “Oshruli?!”

I nodded and chuckled. “Yes, Oshruli.”

He hopped up on his feet and started jumping on the bed, his little fists in the air while he chanted, “Osh-ruli Osh-ruli!” I laughed, his joy contagious.

Maybe Lobikno wouldn’t be able to change the name after all. Ah well. What’s done is done.

It didn’t look like Oshruli was going to settle any time soon, so I tried opening the door, on the off chance it wasn’t locked. They hadn’t forgotten and nobody came to the door when I called out. Were they so confident in their facilities that they wouldn’t post someone to mind the prison?

Then I had to figure out ways to keep Oshruli occupied in the comfortless room. I tried not to handle him too much. Not because he was repulsive though, quite the opposite. I knew he’d been handled harshly and needed his trust more than I wanted to tickle his tummy. It was so, so close, but priorities.

I sang some songs, and he did his best to imitate my words. We played a dizzying game of chase, considering how small the room was, and used the bed as a bit of an obstacle. I’d leap, roll or crawl over the bed, and he’d crawl under it. After a while, I decided to mix it up. Instead of going over the bed, I decided to do a handstand on the bedframe. I watched as he scurried out, like a little bug, right under my nose. He stood there a moment, just waiting for me to land beside him. A few heartbeats later, he looked side to side, then back under the bed. It wasn’t until he stood up and we were nearly eye to eye that he noticed where I was. He startled for a moment and then laughed hysterically. I giggled.

Naturally he started trying to imitate me, and he caught on quickly. Then with the handstand mastered, we moved onto tumbling.

How could such a frail looking child have so much energy?

Thankfully a meal arrived, and we ate mushrooms in companionable silence. Oshruli was apparently as hungry as he looked. He ate voraciously, wolfing down the nutty bread and mushrooms like he hadn’t eaten in ages and didn’t trust that he’d get to again any time soon. I let him have his fill while I took only what I needed. Mushrooms weren’t my favorite, which was unfortunate because it seemed to be a staple at every meal …

Only then did I realize why Lhoris and Lobikno liked to call their people mushroom-eaters. What other crop would grow reliably in the dark, underground?

Then we went back to tumbling and it wasn’t long before I found myself exhausted and wondered how long we’d been playing. Thankfully, Oshruli started to slow down too. He hopped up on the bed and looked at me, expectantly. I flopped into it, which made him bounce an inch or two in the air. He giggled sleepily and curled up between my arm and torso. “You’re a cuddler like your uncle, huh?” He chattered away in elvish and I found myself saying “mhmm, yeah?” in the appropriate breaks. He talked and talked until the moment he fell asleep.

Overall, imprisonment notwithstanding, it was a good first day of motherhood.

CHAPTER 10

LOBIKNO

Lhoris and I started camping separately from each other after our chat. It made sense if we wanted to avoid another attempted murder. When I watched him from the shadows, he genuinely seemed to fare better without me, though I couldn’t say the same.

Without Lhoris’ odd behavior to keep me distracted, I was stuck with my own thoughts and worries. After the incident, when I’d spent so much time alone, I was mostly just numb. I worked with the kitchen staff to keep myself moving, so I wouldn’t just hole up in my room and rot on my bed. It felt a little like atonement, too. Not just for what I did to poor Ozanna and by extension my little brother. No, I had centuries of sins to make up for. Which were my own and which belonged to the assholes holding my leash?

And the fragile little bonds between me and my sons ached. So did the one to their monstrous mother, but that ache I could live with. I didn’t give a flying fuck how that bitch was doing. No, worry for my sons was what kept me from resting. The painful tug of their fear and sadness was getting worse by the day. I couldn’t help wondering if it was because we were getting closer or if something was wrong. Or really, more wrong than usual.

We’d make it to the fortress in a few hours at the pace we were going. The horses were dead fucking tired of it though, and I hated to push them so hard, but I’d rather eat horsemeat and walk back to Bergellon if it meant we all got back to Bergellon. With the end of this part of the journey in sight, it was probably a good idea to stop and give the beasts a break. Mine was starting to slow down, though I thought he was really trying to do what I asked.

I whistled at Lhoris’ back. He was a good way ahead of me, but he’d hear. We were close enough I could see his scowl when he brought his horse to a stop and turned to glare at me.

“Horse break,” I said gesturing to my nearly exhausted animal.

Lhoris glared at the horse, and then his own, but he eventually came to the same conclusion. There was a little spring nearby that would be fine for the animals. And I think the beasts knew it too. We were that close to where they considered home, and they turned to head toward it without our direction, fast enough I started to suspect my horse had just tricked me. But that might be giving him too much credit.

I wasn’t in the habit of getting to know the horses. Not when having a favorite could end up getting it killed. I liked the creatures too much to risk it. But this guy and I had been through a lot together these recent months. Maybe I was getting to know him whether or not I wanted to.

Lhoris and I took our rest on opposite sides of the spring while the horses did what they needed to.

Thank the gods I was already on the ground, stretching my sore legs and back when I felt it—a buzzing rip in my chest, like a scream of agony I could feel instead of hear. It knocked the fucking wind right out of me, and I toppled to my side, clutching at my heart.

No, not my heart, but what was attached to it.

The bonds to my boys trembled and throbbed with hot, ripping pain. I grasped for them, as if the bonds were actual things that I could catch and hold tight in my hands. To pull the child on the other end toward me. As if holding on to them could stop them from being torn away.

My back arched and I reached to the stars, trying to capture the fading threads as they dissipated and left great big howling holes in my soul. A low, harsh moan escaped my lips between the tiny gasps I could finally take. Or maybe they were sobs, I couldn’t tell. All I could really feel was a suspended moment of anguish that came to an abrupt, final stop. Bile burned the back of my throat and I rolled onto my side in time to vomit into the fallen leaves. My curling fingers dug into the damp soil and raked at the ground as I lifted onto my hands and knees.

I should have just killed myself before they were born. I should have killed myself instead of letting Lhoris talk me into trying to save them. I could have saved them so much suffering if I hadn’t been such a fucking coward!

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