DeerSkin by Robin Mckinley

Author:Robin Mckinley
Language: eng
Format: epub

have broken off upon the entry of another person.

Jobe stood up and served her a bowl of stew, and set another one down on the

floor for Ash. Lissar never quite got over her amazement at how swiftly and

delicately Ash could inhale large amounts of food; it was like a magic trick, the

mystic word is spoken, the hand gesture performed and presto! the food disappears,

without a crumb or speck left behind. Ash looked up hopefully at the bowl in

Lissar's hands.

"Come and sit," said a man Lissar did not know. She went and sat, but she did

not stay long; the conversation tried to start up again around her, but it lurched and

stumbled-barely more deft than a day-old puppy. She set her bowl on the floor for

Ash to perform her magic on, took a hunk of bread and a tall mug of malak-whose

name drifted into her mind as she tasted it for the first time, in, when?-said

"good-night," and left as silently as she had entered. A chorus of "good-night"

followed her, sounding both eager and sad, like a dog who is hoping for a kind word

and doubts its luck. She paused and looked back at them as they looked at her; and

realized that they were not anxious for her to Ieave even if they were uneasy in her

company. She smiled a little, not understanding, and returned to the puppies' pen.

Some of them in her absence had responded in the desired way to the

belly-rubbing, and some cleaning up was in order, since they did not differentiate

between one substance, like straw or sibling's body, and the next. Lissar thought,

frowning, that she would have to keep track of who needed more belly-rubbing. She

sighed; tiredness fell on her suddenly, with the arrival of food in her own belly. She

would figure it all out tomorrow.

The fire-pot had arrived while she was at supper, and there was a low,

heavy-bottomed jug of milk beside it.

The puppies were all asleep again in their heap, as soon as she set down the

cleaned-up ones. She wondered how the ones on the bottom were managing to

breathe. She laid out two more of the blankets Hela had brought for a mattress, and

lay down herself. Ash was standing by the closed door in alarm: You don't mean

we're spending the night in here with-them?

"Come," said Lissar. "You can lie next to the wall, and I will protect you."

She fell asleep in some anxiety, not knowing how she would awaken to feed the

puppies again. They could not be left all night, and she was too tired to remain

awake. But her anxiety made her sleep lightly, and the first uncertain murmuring

protests from the puppy-heap brought her awake at once, staring around a moment

in fright, feeling the ceiling leaning down close to her, not able to remember where

she was, or what it was that had awakened her. She staggered upright, the ceiling

returning to its normal position, and went to warm the milk. Ash, who could

ordinarily not be moved by force once she was comfortably asleep for the night, got

up at once and perched near her.

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