Healing Her Patient: Kindred Tales #33 by Evangeline Anderson

Author:Evangeline Anderson [Anderson, Evangeline]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2021-03-26T18:30:00+00:00

Twenty-Five

There was indeed a dead animal lying just outside the gates when Brav and the H’raken men went to check. It looked a little like the Earth animal called an antelope, though it was as big as a cow and had thick, twisting horns as long as Brav’s arm. They dragged it back to the butchering hut and everyone took a shiny cleaver or knife from the case, which was apparently kept there for just that reason.

Butchering was dirty, messy work but the long leather apron he wore protected Brav’s new trousers from the worst of it. He’d been on plenty of hunting expeditions before and this wasn’t his first time breaking down an animal, so it didn’t bother him.

The H’raken males who were on the butchering crew appeared to have the same stoic, “get it done” mentality that Brav did, so the work went fast. In fact, they were finished before lunch with the meat chopped and stored in a cool unit, which was apparently powered by a special link to the Mother Stone, until it was time to prepare for the feast that night.

“What do we do next?” Brav asked Kozen as they washed the dark green blood off their hands and leather aprons and then hung them to dry.

“Well…” The H’raken leader squinted his eyes, as though thinking. “I dislike to do it, but we really ought to go and harvest the fruit of the tunga trees today. When I came to get you and the other half of your heart yesterday, I noticed that it was looking very ripe.”

“Why do you, uh, ‘dislike to do it’?” Brav asked, frowning. “Is it dangerous to go outside the walls of the town?” he asked, guessing.

“It can be if one is not careful,” Kozen said carefully. “But as long as we stay together in a group and no one breaks or tastes any of the tunga fruit, it should be all right.”

“Why can’t we taste the fruit?” Brav asked curiously. “Is it sacred or something? You save it for a feast or a festival or something like that?”

“Why no, Friend Bravik—we save it for the Riivers,” Kozen said mildly. “For it tastes like meat and can sometimes satiate their hunger. In fact, some call the fruit of the tunga tree ‘flesh fruit’ for that reason.”

“Who or what are these Riivers, anyway?” Brav demanded. “I keep hearing them mentioned but nobody will talk about them.”

“Because it is forbidden to speak of them within the township,” Kozen said firmly. “I should not even have said as much as I did. Come, let us pluck some fruit for our Midday meal and then we will go and harvest.”

Brav was in no way satisfied by the answer, but he had to accept it. Well, maybe he would catch a glimpse of the elusive creatures when they were outside the walls of the village. Or maybe he would just spend the day harvesting fruit they apparently couldn’t eat, he thought dryly.

Whatever the Riivers were, they must not have been very nice.

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