“Go fuck yourself!”
Sash stampedes across the room, crouches in front of me, and grabs me by the shoulders. “Go to sleep unless you want me to knock you out again.”
She hurls me down on my side. I roll over so that I’m facing away from her and stare at my blurry reflection in the wall. I should never have come back to the Delta.
Unable to believe how gullible I’ve been, I close my eyes. Why didn’t I recognize the truth sooner? No one in Krymzyn wants me here. Sash just blatantly lied to my face and has no intention of letting me anywhere near my daughter. As soon as I can get to Aven, I’m taking her with me and heading back to the Barrens. Far away from the deception of the Delta, I’ll raise her on my own and teach her how to take care of herself in the wild.
While planning my escape, I drift off to sleep. When I open my eyes again, I don’t know if I was out for five minutes, five hours, or five morrows. I flop over and glance around the cavern. Still keeping watch over me, Sash is sitting at the table.
“Your veins look a little better,” she says flatly. “Some of the blue has returned to your hair. Your eyes are still purple, but not as close to red as they were.”
“How long was I out?” I ask.
“It’s the next morrow,” she answers.
“Will you untie me now?”
“I don’t know,” she says. “What will you do if I do?”
“I won’t do anything.”
“I don’t want to fight with you,” she tells me.
“I think I’m past that,” I say.
She stands up from the stool and steps to the side of the bed. “One more morrow, and you would have been a Murkovin.”
“I know. Did they find Tela?”
“Not yet,” she answers. “A few of the Travelers went up the river to the north. They just got back a little while ago. The others are still out with Larn. They’re trying to follow the path you described.”
I shake my head. “I don’t know where she could be. We need to help them search for her.”
“You need more healthy sap first.”
She walks to the table, returns with a cup and pitcher, and sets them on the floor in front of me. After helping me sit up, she unties the rope from my feet and hands. As soon as I’m free, she jumps away from me and clenches her hands into fists. I ignore the cup, grab the pitcher, and swallow gulp after gulp. When the pitcher is empty, I set it on the floor.
“I’m sorry for the way I behaved,” I say. “I didn’t mean any of it.”
Probably deciding that I’m no longer a threat, she relaxes her muscles. “If you said the words, there must have been some truth in them.”
“There wasn’t,” I reply. “From the moment I started drinking the wild sap, every thought in my mind became distorted. We can talk more about it later. I want to see Aven first. Then we need to help find Tela.”
“We will.” She pauses for a moment. “After you tell me what really happened in the Barrens.”
Numbing with shame, I lower my eyes to the floor. So many of the thoughts I had after drinking the wild sap, the false accusations of Sash betraying me, were all lies from inside my mind. As much as I never want to hurt her, I have to tell her the truth.
“Tela was so badly injured,” I say, looking up at her, “that if I tried to carry her back to the Delta, she would have died. I found a cavern and then stole the sap transport that I told you and Larn about. The Murkovin were looking for us, so I didn’t want to leave Tela alone in the cave. I couldn’t come back for help.
“She was in a lot of pain most of the time and just slept for the first few morrows. By the time she felt strong enough to move, my traveling speed had slowed from the wild sap. I didn’t think I could outrun the Murkovin if I carried her. Tela and I talked about what to do. We both agreed that it was best to wait until she could travel.
“Every morrow that passed, my thoughts became darker and darker. I convinced myself of some horrible things that weren’t true. But they seemed real while I was out there.”
“Like what?” she asks.
“Did I make a mistake by leaving Earth?” I pause for a moment. “And did you use me just so you could understand all the Earth emotions you feel?”
She folds her arms in front of her. “How could you ever think that?”
“Have you ever had wild sap?” I ask.
“No,” she answers. “We’re taught as children that it’s impossible to control the extreme emotions after a few morrows.”
“Tela couldn’t control them,” I say. “I could, but only sometimes. It took me a while to get it under control.”
Trying to figure out how to explain the rest of what happened between Tela and me, I rub the back of my head.
“Is that it?” Sash asks, unfolding her arms.
“No,” I say. “We were getting ready to come back to the Delta when Darkness fell. Everything about the wild sap is stronger during Darkness. A lot of physical desires that are hard to control are released.
“There’s a small waterfall in the cavern we stayed in. Tela wanted to clean off before we left. After she got out of the fall, we kissed each other and hugged. It didn’t last long because I came to my senses and stopped us before it went any farther. She got mad that I pushed her away, hit me in the head with a rock, and knocked me out. I haven’t seen her since.”
Sash stares at me in disbelief. “You kissed Tela?”
“It was the wild sap,” I say. “I stopped almost as soon as it started. She didn’t know what she was
