A Wavering Guarantee
Notes:
I am so sorry; I would have posted yesterday, but I was at graduation parties all. day. long., which was fun but exhausting. So not only did I not really have time to post yesterday, but I was too tired to make super great progress on the next chapter I need to work on 😅
As it is, we have another quiet chapter in which not much happens. Just some conversation :)
*****
They saw Nia the moment they walked into the camp, and the worry in her eyes made Janner sick with guilt. Or maybe he was just nauseous because he hadn’t eaten anything other than half a bowl of makeshift diggle broth that really hadn't been all that appetizing.
“Mama,” he greeted her pleasantly with a wave, smiling a little, but not too much. There was no need to pour salt on her wounds. “How…how are you?”
She walked toward him quickly, lines of grief and guilt and worry etched deeply into her face. “As alright as I can be, all things considered,” she stated briskly, a flicker of a smile that looked a bit more like a grimace fluttering over the lips. “How are you doing?”
Sara almost inaudibly whispered, “I’m gonna go,” and made her escape to sit with Leeli, who was putting something together for breakfast.
Janner watched her without thinking about it, noticing the way she brushed a wavy strand of hair back that had managed to escape from its braid and how she smiled and dipped her head before sitting down next to Leeli.
“I should say someone is doing well, perhaps a bit better than well,” Nia answered her question for him, her face smiling, even though the light did not reach her eyes.
A nervous chuckle escaped Janner’s throat and he wanted to do something with his hands, like rub the back of his neck or run his fingers through his hair to dispel the awkwardness in his mind, but he lacked the motivation to raise his arm up that high with the heavy cloak hindering him. It was beginning to make his shoulders and neck ache, anyway.
Instead, he simply clasped his hands tightly behind him and shook his head. “I mean, I guess I’m okay. I’m glad Sara’s here—more than glad, I guess—but with everything else…well, I'm actually more worried about you than—”
Nia shook her head and held a hand up as if to stop him. “Not now, Janner,” she said quietly, her eyes grieved. “Please. Don’t say anything. It’s better this way. Not thinking about it…it just spares you from part of the pain.” She smiled, but it was the sort of smile someone gave in an effort to fight through their grief, not to represent joy or happiness.
“But, Mama,” Janner began, guilt and concern weighing on his heart. “That’s—”
“We'll discuss it later, I promise. But let me take this from you; it’s too heavy. You’ll tire yourself out too soon if you aren’t careful.” She nearly wrested the cloak from around his shoulders (however she did allow him to undo the clasp himself) and bustled off with it, putting it in a neat pile with the rest of the cloaks they had turned into blankets the night before.
Janner was left standing there, shivering, not because of the cold but because of fear. He knew what was happening. He had seen it when his Papa had died, truly died, a few months earlier. Nia had put all her efforts into taking care of them and cleaning the house and making sure everyone was alright and helping out neighbors even more so than she normally would have. It was how she dealt with her grief. She simply shoved it away and shoved busy-ness and caring for others into its place so she wouldn’t have to think about it.
Now three people had died: Podo, Rudric, and Kalmar. Her father, her love (for a time, at least), and her son. All snatched away from her in a blink, a hateful blink that had no regard for humanity or love or the searing pain of loss. Suddenly, Janner wanted to scream for the grief and the sorrow and he wouldn’t care who heard him. He didn’t know if it was his brokenness that hurt him most or if it was Nia’s or Leeli’s—oh, Leeli. Precious Leeli who wept and poured her heart out before mending it by caring for others. At least she let people in so they could see her pain—or maybe it was all of them combined. What he did know was that his was the least, the most easily mended. Others’ sorrow mattered far more. And Nia’s was by far the most concerning. He wondered if she would open up to anyone, if there was someone who could convince her to spill everything out. Janner prayed there was.
“As the penmaker Limel Tins declared,” Oskar crowed suddenly from where the most of their group was sitting around a steaming pot of something. “‘Join us, my good fellow who stands quite a ways off! It’s nearly time for breakfasting.’”
Janner laughed and shook his head, figuring that if Oskar had been willing enough to draw his head out of the journal or book he had worked on unceasingly to both have breakfast and call him over, refusal would have been rather rude.
*****
“So why, exactly, are we planning on embarking on a walk to the First Well when who we came here for has already been given back to us?” Nia asked, an edge of frustration in her tone. Leeli clutched one of their mother’s knees tightly, and whether that was out of fear or an effort to placate her, Janner was unsure. He couldn’t help but shift uncomfortably at her comment, though. “And, Janner, please eat your porridge.”
Janner looked at the porridge Leeli and Sara (and Artham; since he was actually good at cooking) had made and did his best not to wrinkle his nose. Picking up his spoon and swirling it in the still-warm mixture of cooked oats and dried fruit, he scooped a morsel of the porridge onto the spoon and ate it. Nia practically glared at him from where she sat up against a trunk a few trees away, and he forced himself to take another bite as Artham answered her question. It wasn’t as though he didn’t like the porridge. He just…wasn’t hungry. And not being hungry made any food he ate nearly curdle in his mouth.
“Because, Nia,” Artham replied kindly. “It was what Kalmar wanted initially.”
Nia turned away from him at those words, and once again it hurt Janner to see his mother hiding something that pained her so.
Artham sighed. “Well, we really want to see if we can get some Water so we can heal Anniera.” He met Janner’s eyes after speaking and nodded in what looked like a diplomatic manner.
Smiling gratefully, Janner placed his bowl of porridge in the grass and cleared his throat before speaking. “So if anyone wants to go, we’re leaving as soon as breakfast is cleaned up? I guess?”
Nia looked at him sharply. “You’re going? Janner, what makes you think you’ll survive the walk through the Blackwood? And for that matter, what makes you think you’ll be able to walk through the Blackwood?”
“Mrs. Wingfeather,” Sara spoke up nervously. “He took a walk in the forest this morning before anyone was up, and he’s still alive.”
“And I’ll be watching over him,” Artham added, when the look of dismay on Nia's face failed to leave. Then he dropped his voice to a whisper and directed his words at Janner. “Of course, I’ll be watching everyone who comes to make sure they don’t get eaten by a toothy cow or something else, but I’ll pay special attention to you.”
Janner felt a smile tugging on the corners of his mouth. He had missed this Artham, the Artham who enjoyed jokes and making other people smile and had a bit of a sassy streak, too. It had appeared in Peet on occasion but rarely in Artham, even during the few times in the hold of the Enramere he had been lucid enough to recall. And then there had been so little time, so painfully little time between when Nia had allowed him out of the hold and when Artham had left for Skree. That had been it. There would be more times for him, for which he was glad, but that was it for Kalmar. Kal would never get a chance to develop a close relationship with their uncle, never.
Janner wished with all his heart that he could change that, somehow.
“And I’ll play my whistleharp to try and keep wild animals away,” Leeli chimed in cheerfully. Janner glanced at her, realizing for the first time that she did indeed have her whistleharp. “I don’t actually know if it’ll keep animals away or not, but we can find out!”
Nia laughed nervously on hearing that and pulled Leeli close briefly, perhaps to remind herself that her youngest was there and safe and alive. “That sounds lovely, but let’s not find out if your music would work exclusively, dear.”
Leeli sighed, politely stating, “Yes, Ma’am.”
All the while during the discussion of the Well, Oskar had trembled with delight and constantly looked everywhere. Janner had noticed it through the corner of his eye, his old friend vibrating like a geef. “And though I do not know if it is even a small comfort,” Oskar began, sounding as though he had just been dying to speak for the longest time. “I will write it down, Nia, so we can always remember exactly what happened and whose shoulders the blame for someone getting chewed by a creature lies on. Oh, but I'm sure that won't happen,” he added hurriedly. “You needn’t worry.”
Despite the “reassurance,” Nia visibly cringed at Oskar's suggestion and glanced at Artham who mouthed, don't worry, that's not going to happen. She breathed a shaky sigh of relief and finally said, “I suppose. How can I refuse everyone else seems all too willing? But keep in mind that I am agreeing to let you all go—and I will also come with you—on one condition.” She stared intently at each of them in turn, and Janner swallowed the nervousness inside of him when her gaze settled on him. “Everyone—and I repeat everyone—must come back alive.”
They all looked at each other with uncertainty, and it broke Janner’s heart to think that life had become so unstable lately that they were unwilling to guarantee Nia even that.
“We will,” he stated firmly, meeting her eyes. “Don’t worry, Mama. We won’t lose anyone else.”
They couldn’t.
*****
Notes:
Don't worry: I'm not foreshadowing any more death on their trip to the First Well or back from the Well or to anywhere else. There shouldn't be any potential death scenes for quite a while :) And even those potential death scenes likely won't end in dead. I don't plan on having anyone die in this fic. Wait, actually, scratch that - I do. But it's not for a while and you needn't worry^^
😭😭😭
Janner's going to have a hard time recovering if he can't eat his breakfast! What he really needs is food and rest! Or First Well water; that would do it, too.
Is Janner's pain and grief really the least and most easily mended, since he saw his brother in the Maker's World, or does he just think it is?
And are Leeli and Sara bad cooks? Sara probably didn't get much practice in the Fork! Factory!...
Artham said they're getting the water to heal Anniera. Are they already planning to pour it on the ground? And did he check with Janner before he said that?
@Ellie Mee reminded me that there are a whole bunch of fangs loose in the forest! If the fight isn't still gone from them (I doubt that would last long), they could be a bigger threat than the animals! Leeli's music will help with that, at least.
Who are you planning to kill? 😳 And is it in this fic, or in this series?