He allowed his hand to rest on one of the buckles of the pack, under the pretence of checking its strength and resilience. “Evidently.”
She sighed, turning back to the road ahead of them. There was no true path to follow except those trampled down by animals looking to use the stream for a drink or possibly a food source if any fish were unfortunate enough to find themselves in water so shallow.
The trees remained about them, green and lush due to their proximity to the water, and he was grateful.
Penryn switched the lantern to her other hand, and he caught a glimpse of the red mark against her newly freed palm. He would offer to help her with that when next they stopped. Either her hands would need bandaging or something would have to be found to soften the handle, lest such sores be left to open and bleed from prolonged friction.
How could the sages be so careless?
The thought was not a welcome one. There was no place for him to be critical of such learned men, of their ways and methods.
He was to obey, and tend to what needed it, not criticise things he did not understand.
“I know I am different,” Penryn supplied at last. “That has been made perfectly clear to me for the whole of my life.” She gave him a helpless look, one that made his stomach clench oddly to view it. “I suppose I did not want you to think me strange, to... to think me some sort of...”
“The Lightkeep,” he finished for her, not understanding her reasoning when it was all so plain. It was simply a necessity of her station, something he had not considered a possibility before. It made him feel foolish to not have recognised it before, but was not a reflection on her or his opinion of her.
“No,” she answered, her eyes flashing in what could only be the embers of anger. “An aberration.”
That was her worry? She was something special, someone to be treasured, not a deviant that he could ever look upon with disgust or censure for something far outside her control.
He stopped, and she took a few steps more before doing so as well, although she did not choose to look at him.
“Penryn,” he said, his voice firm though not a command. That was not his place, and he would not forget it.
Another sigh, a subtle shift of her torso, her feet following reluctantly until she managed to look at him properly.
“I do not see you as an aberration. You are set apart, yes, because that is the nature of your position.” To pretend otherwise was nonsensical, even if he had promised to be her friend. “But I do not think less of you because you must walk instead of fly.” He tried a small smile, something to ease the mounting unhappiness between them, but her expression remained unchanged. “If you did not notice, upon a command from the sages and my instructors, I am not permitted use of my wings either.” He glanced down at his boots, dirt and bits of twigs and dried leaves already clinging to them. “I have never walked so much in my life.”
That did bring a small smile to her lips, and relief was sharp and welcome. “Nor have I,” she admitted. “We will be saying that every day, I expect. Or perhaps groaning it until our muscles are used to it.”
He took a step nearer. “I do not doubt it.”
Another step, and her smile remained, soft and easier than he had seen all day, and if she was someone else, he might have laid his hand upon her shoulder, a moment of familiarity, of soothing something that had not meant to be spoiled.
But she was not just anyone.
She was the Lightkeep, and she was not for him to touch.
His hand still wished to do so, and it felt strangely heavy as he refused the temptation, instead settling for a broader grin of his own. “Friends,” he repeated, using the offering he had apparently spurred that morning.
“Good,” Penryn answered briskly, turning to begin the walk anew. “I think we can manage more than a single day, can we not? It would be terribly disappointing otherwise.”
At first he thought she referred to the Journey, but when she tilted her head and her smile became a little more unsure, he realised her meaning. “Much longer than a day,” he assured her. His friends had been made through childhood games, or festivals within the clan, of people pouring together to see a new, stilted home built when a new family decided to forsake the caves in favour of attempting a life of farm work.
He might not have been as close to any of them as he had been, busy with their own lives and likely families of their own, but he would be glad to see all of them once more upon his return.
He would like to think the same of Penryn, although that thought came with a pang of worry for what was to come.
It was a far more pleasant thing to walk beside her when things were at ease between them, when his watchfulness could be for dangers rather than the minutia of her every expression, looking for the cause of what he’d done wrong. He was certain there would be quarrels between them yet, likely more than he would ever admit to the sages, but as long as they could be mended, and quickly too, perhaps that was all right.
He would prefer they find a different way, however. But he supposed it was not solely for him to decide.
Penryn glanced at him, her smile having retreated, but a softness remaining in her eyes that was welcome. “Tell me more about your family,” she urged, and Grimult shifted the pack on his shoulder. It was not uncomfortable, not yet,
