Chương 73: The Leg That Doesn’t Lie

The next day, Brakka decided that Zayn had talked too much for someone who was still standing only by mistake. She entered the open cage with a bag full of bone, leather, tools, and bad temper. Zayn was sitting against the rebuilt post, Narek's little carving tucked away at the bottom of his empty satchel, the half-mask over his face, his arms still bandaged. He had slept little, but better than the nights before.

Which meant he had only woken up violently three times, broken into two cold sweats, and felt like vomiting for a stretch brief enough to qualify as diplomatic progress with his own body. Brakka dropped her bag to the ground. The tools rolled across a hide. Fine knives. Hooks. Bone needles. Leather straps. Carved splints. A small pot of green paste. Another of black grease. Zayn looked at the equipment. Then at the bear-woman.

"I should warn you, if this is some local attempt at seduction, humans usually use fewer sharp objects." Brakka did not even look up.

"Leg."

"It's attached to me. I'd like to keep that arrangement."

"Leg. Now." Zayn sighed. He slowly undid the rope and strips of leather holding his makeshift splint together. The dirty planks fell to one side with a dry sound. The moment they stopped supporting his ankle, the pain ran all the way up to his knee. He clenched his teeth. Brakka noticed. Of course she did. She grabbed his leg without gentleness and felt around the ankle, the shin, then the calf. Zayn inhaled sharply when her fingers pressed near one swollen area.

"There," she said.

"Wonderful news. Your talent for locating suffering is remarkable." She pressed again. Harder. Zayn bent forward, jaw tight.

"If that was a request for silence, it lacks subtlety."

"You answer too fast when you're in pain."

"Really? I thought I was naturally charming." She snorted.

"You hide behind words. Bad reflex. Words don't hold bones together." She took out a thin blade and cut away the infected cloth around the wound. The smell rose at once. Old blood. A trace of pus. Tired flesh. Zayn barely turned his head. He had known worse. Which was not a victory, only a sad sentence. Brakka cleaned the wound with a decoction so vicious that he nearly tore her wrist off by reflex. His hand moved. So did hers. She stopped him instantly. Not by hitting him.

By pressing two fingers into a nerve near his knee. The pain changed languages. Zayn froze. Brakka said calmly,"One more time, and I break the other one for balance." He exhaled through his teeth.

"Your medicine has excellent customer service."

"You're still alive. So yes." She resumed the examination. Around the open cage, a few members of the clan had stopped. Not to mock him. Not really. Among them, apparently, watching a healer rebuild a body counted as an acceptable public event. Narek was there too, crouched near a post, ears lowered but eyes wide open. Zayn caught him from the corner of his eye.

"You here to watch me get repaired, or taking notes for my next humiliation sculpture?" Narek lifted his chin.

"Brakka says if you keep walking like that, your leg will become useless."

"She has a very encouraging way of talking about my future." Brakka said,"Your leg is badly set. Not dead. Not good." She pressed near the ankle. Zayn let out a strangled laugh.

"What nuanced joy."

"It'll have to be redone." Silence. This time, the words landed less easily. Zayn looked at Brakka.

"Redone."

"Yes."

"That's a very short word for something that probably includes a lot of screaming."

"Yes." At least she was honest. Brakka took two clean pieces of wood and set them beside his leg, then pulled out a thick leather strap.

"Not today. Your body is too poor. Too much fever. Too many holes. Too little fat. If I set it now, you pass out. Maybe you don't come back."

"I'm touched by your commitment to postponing my medical failure." Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.

"You'll eat. Sleep. Drink. Three days. Maybe five. After that, I cut, clean, and set it straight." Zayn stared at her. The idea displeased him more than a death threat would have. A death threat was simple. A blade, a flight, a bite, an error to provoke. Letting someone truly treat him meant being still. Being dependent. Letting someone else decide where to cut so that later he could walk. He already hated it. Brakka read his face with infuriating ease.

"You want to keep the pain because it's yours." He did not answer.

"Bad reflex too."

"Do you keep a list?"

"Yes. You are almost entirely made of bad reflexes." Narek let out a small laugh. Zayn slowly turned his head toward him. The boy straightened at once.

"Sorry."

"Too late. You're on my list."

"What list?"

"The list of people I'll tell an extremely dishonest version of my courage to once I recover the ability to run." Narek hesitated. Then smiled. Brakka tightened the new splint around Zayn's leg. The pain was sharp. Not brutal. Stable. The support was better. Much better. Zayn said nothing. Brakka noticed the change in his breathing anyway.

"There. Now you can walk like a prisoner, not like an arrogant corpse."

"You should write poetry. People would read it under threat." She packed away her tools. Then placed a small piece of dark root in front of him.

"Chew. Don't swallow. For the fever." Zayn looked at the root.

"Poison?"

"Yes." He lifted his eyes. Brakka added,"Small amount helps. Large amount kills. Like many things." He took the root.

"Your pharmacology is very philosophical." He chewed it. The taste flooded his mouth immediately. Bitter. Dry. Terrible. But normal. The mark on his tongue barely reacted. That detail calmed him more than he wanted to admit. Brakka stood, then turned to Narek.

"You. Not too many questions." Narek opened his mouth. She looked at him. He shut it. Brakka left the open cage. Zayn watched her go. Then cautiously settled his leg against the new splint. The pain was still there. But it had changed. Before, it lied everywhere, scattered, climbing at random. Now, it held a shape. He hated that improvement. Because it came from them. The old woman returned after the midday meal. This time, she did not set down three stones. She set down a single rope. Short.

Braided from three different materials: gray fur, dark fiber, brown leather. Zayn looked at it.

"I'm gradually learning that every object placed in front of me announces an unpleasant conversation." The old woman sat down.

"Then you are learning." She had not come alone. Korr stood behind her, and Saeva beside her with her arms crossed. Odran was farther away, near the wolf-dogs, like a threat that did not need to be close to be understood. The old woman touched the rope.

"This clan is Mist-Fangs. Not beastmen." Zayn tilted his head slightly.

"You mean you don't like being thrown into the same bag."

"Bag?"

"Same name for different things."

"Yes. Bad bag." Narek, lingering a little too close despite Brakka's order, was listening as well. The old woman went on:"In the west there are wolf-clans, cat-clans, bear-clans, raptor-clans, river-clans, horn-clans, many others. Some speak together. Some kill each other. Some do both in the proper order." Zayn nodded slowly.

"So like humans, but with more visible teeth." Saeva said,"Humans hide teeth too."

"Yes. But they call it diplomacy." The old woman did not smile.

"The Mist-Fangs guard the low-wood frontier. We do not speak for the whole west. If you bring shame here, it is not all the west that kills you. First, us."

"Reassuring nuance." She lifted the rope.

"You saved two little ones. You also drew in a beast. You ate our food. You gave lies. You gave truths. Too mixed."

"It's a personal specialty."

"The debt is mixed too." She tossed the rope at his feet.

"You are not a member. You are not a guest. You are no longer only found meat. You are a kept debt." Zayn looked at the rope.

"Fascinating administrative category." Korr spoke at last.

"That means if someone outside the clan asks for your head, we decide before him." The silence that followed should have felt like a threat. It was. But not only that. We decide before him. That meant: the Ashes do not decide alone. Humans do not either. Demons neither. Even if they killed him tomorrow, it would be their decision, in their camp, according to their debt. There was a form of protection in that brutality. A very thin protection. Sharp. Dangerous to touch.

"And if I leave?" Zayn asked. Korr answered,"You don't leave."

"Hypothetically." Saeva said,"You would die quickly."

"I'm beginning to find your faith in me offensive." The old woman resumed:"If you leave before the debt is closed, the Mist-Fangs may hunt you. If you stay and pay, we will see."

"Pay how?"

"First, you heal." Zayn blinked slowly.

"That counts as payment?" Brakka, passing by with a basket, tossed over her shoulder without stopping,"For you, yes. It's a lot of work." A few laughs went around. Zayn closed his eyes for a second.

"I am surrounded by people who are cruel and medically invested." The old woman pointed at the rope again.

"Then, you learn not to stain what keeps you alive." The sentence struck closer than he wanted. Zayn lowered his eyes to the rope. He thought of the flesh burned beyond the camp. Of his emptied satchel. Of his hunger for reserve. Of the fear that rose when he had nothing forbidden left to hide.

"And if what keeps me alive is already dirty?" The old woman looked at him for a long time.

"Then you must learn whether you want to live like a wound or like a scar." No one spoke. Not even Zayn. He hated the sentence. Not because it was false. Because he did not yet have an answer. The old woman stood.

"The rope stays here. Do not wear it. Do not burn it. Look at it."

"Your pedagogy is passive-aggressive."

"So is your survival." She left. Korr stayed a little longer. He looked at Zayn and then said,"Tonight the hunters sing the names of those who did not return from the last season. You will listen."

"Is that an order?"

"Yes."

"Why?" Korr answered,"Because you must learn that here, the dead are not only things behind you." Then he left. Zayn remained staring at the rope. For a long time. That evening, the camp gathered around the central fire. Not all at once. Not in ranks. The Mist-Fangs did not have that human way of turning every important moment into a neatly aligned ceremony. They arranged themselves according to ties, families, ages, wounds. The children in front. Hunters behind. Elders close to the fire.

Watchers always high enough to see beyond the flames. Zayn remained in his open cage, but his cage had been moved close enough to hear. He could have refused to listen. He listened. The songs began without instruments. One deep voice. Then another. Then many. He did not understand the language. Not yet. But he understood repetition. A name. A phrase. Hands striking the chest. A silence. Another name. Narek sat down near the cage's edge without speaking.

After the third name, he murmured a translation:"She ran through rain to warn the camp." A fourth name.

"That was my uncle. He laughed too loud." A fifth.

"She killed three beasts before she fell. Saeva says that's false. Only two. But no one corrects it in the song." Zayn turned his head slightly toward him.

"Why?" Narek shrugged.

"Because she liked saying three." Zayn looked at the fire. A lie kept out of affection. Not to hide a crime. Not to manipulate a report. Just to let a dead woman remain the way she would have liked to be told. It was stupid. Humanly stupid, even among people who insisted heavily that they were not. He did not know what to do with that information. The chant continued. The names piled up. Not like a casualty list. Like a structure. The dead still held something in the camp. Invisible places. Habits. Jokes.

Scars told too often. Zayn thought of the ones he had left behind. Harven. Daera. The messenger. The Ashes. The trackers. The nameless ones he had killed because they were in the way, because they had seen him, because they had held pincers, because they had been weak at the wrong moment. They did not make a song. They made a filthy inventory. Narek asked,"Do humans sing their dead?" Zayn did not answer at once.

"Sometimes."

"You?"

"No."

"Why?" Because no one had taught him. Because maybe the dead he remembered would not want to be held by his voice. Because singing a name meant accepting that it had weight, and weight slowed the people who ran. He only said,"Bad voice." Narek seemed to accept that. Then he asked,"Do you know names of dead people?" Zayn stared at the fire. Too long.

"Yes."

"You can say one. Not sing. Say." Zayn felt his throat tighten. Not visibly. Not enough for Saeva, from the far side of the fire, to miss it. He hated this camp. Truly. They asked too many simple questions. He looked at the braided rope lying near him. Then the fire. Then Narek.

"Harven," he said at last. The name came out low. Almost rough. Narek repeated it, with his accent:"Harven." The name entered the sound of the fire. Not into the song. Not really. But it no longer remained only inside Zayn's head. That was worse. And perhaps less heavy.

"Who was he?" Narek asked. Zayn gave a humorless smile.

"Someone who probably would have hated being summarized by me."

"How did he die?"

"Badly." Narek waited for more. None came. For once, the adolescent did not push. He remained seated. The chant went on. Later, Brakka brought Zayn a bowl without comment. Saeva passed behind Narek and laid a hand briefly on his shoulder before moving on. Odran added a log to the fire. Korr did not look at Zayn, but neither did he stop him from listening to the final name. When the chant ended, the night seemed larger. Zayn stayed awake a long time. The fever in his arms throbbed under the bandages.

His leg pulsed against the new splint. The mark on his tongue stayed silent. The braided rope rested beside him. Not tied. Not worn. Just there. Like a reminder that, in this camp, even a prison might begin to make something other than a flight. Zayn closed his eyes. And this time, before sleeping, he thought of Harven without hearing his stolen voice.