Trina's Sacrifice by Catherine Peace

Author:Catherine Peace
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Were Swans, Shifters, Maori, Family, Danger, Arranged Marriage, Second Chance, First Love, Coming of Age
Publisher: Inkspell Publishing
Published: 2023-06-27T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

The Whakamanu's mourning ritual would last the next three nights. Pou had given Trina a primer on their culture, starting with the tangihanga, and it struck her how similar their death rituals were. Though the Kaqtukaq's salites didn't last for three nights, they buried their dead in similar fashion—legs tucked against the chest, head resting on the knees, almost a fetal position. A small part of her was grateful that Hapa and Matā were buried in way their own families would have done for them. Perhaps the Thunderbird or Tane-mahuta, or whatever the spirit was that connected all swans, had granted them a death among people similar to their own, if it'd had to happen at all.

She still blamed her father's pride. How many had they lost to his attempt to maintain appearances? Had he just accepted Margot’s choice instead of shifting blame to the wolves at every opportunity, they may not have needed to bury so many.

And now, standing among the Whakamanu, surrounded by them without the buffer of Carney's eternal optimism, she bore the brunt of their suspicions. She wasn't the woman who had left her family, abandoned her baby sister, traveled across a fucking ocean with a man she both barely knew and knew better than almost anyone else. She was an avatar of her father, the man who’d singlehandedly ruined more lives than Trina could count.

This isn’t what I wanted.

The village had erupted into a flurry of activity after the Tane's announcement, but a woman with a child no older than a couple years, caught her attention. The woman's shoulders shook with sobs that were lost in the cacophony of the other villagers. A couple other people consoled her. The child's hair was almost the color of smoke, like flint. Like ... Matā. Oh shit.

"Come with me," Pou said. He pulled Trina behind him, toward a building at the edge of the clearing. The home he shared with his sisters and mother. She swallowed hard as he led her across the threshold into a dirt-floor hut. Dry straw cracked beneath her feet. A fire burned in a small hearth, providing far more heat than expected. A last shiver rolled through her before the chill finally left her skin. But this ... there wasn't furniture. No bed. Most definitely no privacy.

She shrugged out of the cloak and set it aside. The rest of Pou's family sat around the hut, all with shades of green except his mother, whose hair was the color of a garnet. A pure red like an apple, or blood. She patted the floor and Pou and Trina sat obediently.

Potae began speaking, but Pou stopped her. He gestured to his throat, to that spot that revealed their shared language, and Trina warmed despite herself. Potae narrowed her crimson eyes, then pressed against her throat. A small click sounded, and the older woman's eyebrows raised in surprise. "This is ..."

"Trina taught me," Pou said with obvious pride.

"Trina," his mother repeated. "And what brought you here?"

Absentmindedly, she slid her hand to her belly.

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