Transcendence (31 page)

I feel a strange combination of both light and heavy in my chest. I am grateful that Beh is still all right, but I also know I will have to start all over again on the fire. My arms and knees already ache, but I can’t afford to rest. I can’t take days to get another fire going.

I eat a few of the acorns and chew on dried meat to give myself some strength. Beh tries to sit up but looks so tired. She runs her hand through my hair as I place my forehead against her shoulder for a minute. With a long sigh, I move back to the fire-making tools to begin again. I use an old fur on the ground as a little padding for my knees.

Before long, my shoulders burn with the pain of overuse; sweat drips from my forehead, and I still do not have a fire. Beh moves up slowly, making soft noises as she approaches me, but I try not to look or allow myself to get distracted again.

I need this fire. Beh needs it. I have to provide for her.

The thoughts keep me focused through the pain in my muscles. My palms push the stick toward the bark over and over again, continuing the friction to increase the heat. My eyes twinge as sweat runs into them, but I keep going—never slowing down, never stopping. After what feels like days, I can see the tiniest bit of smoke right at the edge of the little hole where the stick meets the bark.

It is then Beh makes a loud, sharp sound, and the stick flies out of my hand.

With a cry, I grab for the bit of hair and bark, but it is too late—the pressure lost, the heat diffused. I feel my shoulders slump forward as the exhaustion comes over me, and my eyes slowly turn to my mate, whose sounds startled me.

“
Beh!” I cry as I look into her smiling face and wonder if her head doesn’t work right anymore. She has to understand the importance of fire, and she has to know I will have to start over again now.

She holds out her hand and makes more noise, smiling and waving her other hand toward the back of the cave. When I look to her palm, I see the little round thing that came off of the funny leggings she was wearing when I first found her. It’s not very shiny anymore because it’s covered in dust. It must have been lost in the dirt on the floor of the cave.

I narrow my eyes in confusion. She is excited because she found the little round thing, and this excitement is enough to warrant startling me? Does she not realize our fire is out? I want to grab her and shake her in frustration, but I realize she might still be sick.

She makes more noise and then laughs.

My mate is very, very strange, and sometimes it’s extremely frustrating.

I slump to the floor, tired and sore with a blister on my palm. I grip my hair with my hands and pull at it a bit. I bring my knees up to my chest to drop my head down on them. Beh continues with her noises, and though I want to be annoyed by them, I am not. She’s still making noises, which means she is awake and all right.

But for how long?

As if in answer, a gust of wind finds its way from the entrance to blow against my sweat-covered skin, chilling me quickly. I need to get a fur to cover the entrance, which would help with warmth in the small cave. Still, we need fire more than anything to provide us with heat, a place to cook, and also a way of warding off any predators that may seek shelter for winter in our cave.

“
Ehd!”

I open my eyes to look up at her. She points to me, then to the round thing, and then to the fire-stick, bark, and tinder. She is making noises faster now, holding the little round thing up and pointing at my waist. I tilt my head and lay it on top of my knees as I watch her animated display. When she points at my lower body again, I wonder if she wants me to put a baby in her now.

It might keep us warm, so she does have a point.

I get up and move closer to her, placing my hand on the side of her face and running my nose over hers. I run my hand over her shoulder and down her arm, stopping at her wrist. I wrap my fingers around it and start pulling her back toward the furs.

“
No, Ehd.”

Beh’s sound doesn’t seem angry, but I still cringe and take a step back from her. When I look to her, she is holding up the round thing and reaching for my waist. In the fold of my wrap is my flint knife, which she takes out and holds up next to the round thing. She makes more noise and moves closer to the fire-starting materials.

I start to sit back down, but she grabs my hand and brings me next to her. The noises continue as she points at the fire-starting things, the flint knife, and the round thing over and over again. She makes eye contact with me and says my name-sound.

“
Beh,” I respond.

She sighs and shakes her head rapidly. With another deep breath, she positions her hands—one holding the round thing and the other my knife—right over the top of the flat piece of bark and the tinder lying on top of it. She rubs the little round thing over my knife, and a small dark scratch appears over the surface.

I grunt and grab it away from her. She makes a lot more noise, but when she reaches for it, I will not give it back. I need that knife; it’s my best one. I don’t want it marked up or broken by the little round thing. With a huff, she gets up and goes to the back of the cave, picks up another piece of flint—the axe I use for chopping wood—and returns to the fire area. Her eyes meet mine with a glare, and her jaw is tense. She raises her eyebrows when I narrow my eyes, but I make no move to stop her this time.

She rubs the flint with the round thing again and makes a dark mark on the surface of the axe. She does it again and again. Her eyes narrow and the muscles in her arm tense. She lets out a little growling sound, which I find very, very enticing.

In my distraction, I almost miss what she does next.

Her frustration growing, she slams the little round thing against the flint hard, and a tiny spark of light flies into the air before it is quickly extinguished.

Beh lets out a whoop much like the one she made earlier, startling me again. My eyes grow wide as she hits the round thing against the piece of flint again, producing another spark that lands on the bark below with a tiny wisp of smoke.

“
Hoh!”

Beh’s eyes turn to mine, and she smiles broadly as I look from her to the things in her hands to the tinder below. I move my face down closer as she strikes the flint again, and when the spark drops to the bark, I blow softly…and the spark goes out.

I look quickly to Beh’s eyes, and the sounds from her mouth are quiet. Her eyes narrow and focus in concentration as she leans over. She moves to strike the flint again, and a spark flies into the air and hits my nose.

“
Ahh!”

I jump back in pain and surprise, rubbing at the burned spot.

Beh’s sounds are louder as she drops the flint and round thing and then brushes at my nose. It doesn’t really hurt but does surprise me. I look up at my mate through my lashes as she looks over my face and then runs her thumb over my cheek.

It’s distracting, but as she picks up the flint and round thing again, I remember more pressing issues, and we go back to trying to start a fire. Beh strikes the flint, and after a couple more times the spark hits the tinder directly, and when I blow, a tiny flame arises. Only a few minutes later, I add a few thin sticks and move the burning bark to the stone circle. A few minutes after that, there is a roaring fire blazing.

Leaning back on my heels, I look at the fire. Now that the task is complete, I have no idea what to think of how it was accomplished. I have never seen a fire started so quickly except in a lightning storm like the one that burned the forest and killed my tribe.

Like the hide on a stick, I have no idea how Beh would ever think to do such a thing to make a fire. How can fire come from the little round thing? Is that what her tribe uses to make a fire? Is that why it is part of her leggings?

There are too many questions in my head and no way to get any answers. I drop down to my backside and feel the tension begin to flow out of my body as I breathe deeply. We have fire again, and my mate is awake.

I glance at my mate who is sitting on the grass mat and smiling broadly. Her eyes turn to mine, and they seem to glow in the firelight. I crawl over to her and wrap my arms tightly around her middle, placing my head in her lap and my face against her stomach. I hug her tightly in gratitude and awe as she strokes my hair and makes soft, whispering sounds.

Finally, I know we will be all right.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

As the first flakes of snow begin to fall from the sky, I look out across the cold steppes with more comfort than I would usually feel at this time of year. When I work my way around the hide that partially covers the entrance to our cave, I see the reason why and smile.

Beh makes quiet, rhythmic sounds as she stirs cooked grains, cattail roots, and rabbit meat together in one of her clay pots. She has made another one, a larger one, and it lies in the coals of the fire just outside the cave. With the hide on a stick, we dragged back the large pot from the lake, and Beh bathed me, using warm water heated in a clay pot over a fire. That way, Beh can wash both of us off without freezing me half to death in the process. With Beh’s firemaker, it is easy to have a fire anywhere we go, even down by the lake.

I have no idea why my mate likes washing so much or why she pushes me to do it as well, but it seems to make her happy. When my mate is happy, she smiles and lies down in our furs at night with her legs spread as I take her slowly, filling her with my seed to start a child.

Beh calls out to me, and I turn from the darkening sky and move back inside. She holds one of her clay bowls up to show me our food is ready to be eaten. I look around the cave and marvel at how much we have gathered over recent days using the fires by the lake to quickly dry fish and rabbit as well as using the hide on a stick to return far more than we could carry on our own. There are clay containers and wrapped hides full of food, enough to take us through the winter even if we already had a handful of children. There almost isn’t even enough room for it all. The stacks of grains, dried meat, and hides are encroaching on the cave’s living space.

Beh calls me again, bringing me from my thoughts.

My heart beats faster just looking at her.

I go to her and kneel beside her for a moment before I lay down on my side and place my head in her lap. Sometimes I prefer just having her scent all around me to the meals she makes. I roll to look up at her and am graced with her smile and her fingers on my cheek. I also notice that she has discarded the leather ties around her waist and between her legs that catch her blood and again wears the little pink cloth instead.

I hope she has no more bleeding times. I tell myself the reason for my thoughts is because I want her to get round with a baby growing in her, but I also don’t like it when she pushes me away when she has her bleeding time. My mate likes everything to be clean and dry, and putting my penis in her while she is bleeding is clearly not an option.

There are other times, though, even when she is not bleeding, that she still refuses to let me put a baby in her. I think maybe she is tired on those days since we have gotten so much of the work done for winter, but there are other days where the hard work doesn’t seem to bother her. There was also a day when she didn’t let me touch her, and I just kept her inside with me all day and brought her everything she needed.

She still would not let me try to put a baby inside of her. Not even a little bit.

I reach up and run the backs of my fingers over her cheek. I can feel my own heart starting to beat faster in my chest as I wonder if she will receive me tonight—if this would be the time a baby starts growing inside of her. I turn my head to kiss her thigh, eliciting a giggle from my mate.

“
Kiss?” Beh smiles down at me.

“
Khizz!” I sit up so I can reach her better and place my lips over hers. Placing my hands on either side of her head, I warm her lips with mine. She has definitely been sampling our meal, and I can taste it on her tongue.

Beh’s hands trail up my back and grip my shoulders. I continue to run my lips over hers as my hand slides down her neck and over her breast. When I seek out the opening to her fur, she pushes my hand away and makes some sounds. Reaching around me, she brings back a bowl full of food and places it in my hands.

I sigh and take the bowl with a pout. I am hungry, if I am to admit it to myself, but I would rather hold Beh in my arms and maybe choose to return to the furs early this night—just to avoid the cold, of course. As I tip the bowl into my mouth, I feel Beh’s soft fingers pushing a strand of my hair off my face and around my ear.

It tickles.

I reach over and do the same to her, winding a long strand of her soft hair around the curve of her ear. I follow the strand all the way down her shoulder and back with my fingers until I reach the end. Beh smiles and I can see her cheeks turn red in the firelight as she glances away. I scoot a little closer to her, abandoning the bowl to the side as I reach up and push more of her hair away from her face and off her shoulder.

She reaches out and does the same to me again.

I feel my lips turning up into a smile as we go back and forth, moving closer and closer together each time we reach for one another. Finally, I am close enough that I run my nose over her cheek as she tucks more of my hair off my forehead and behind my ear. My hand moves from its loose position on her waist to a more firm position on her thigh, pushing her fur open so I can touch her skin.