Chapter 23: A Last Kiss
#23 of The Mating Season 5
Chapter 23: A Last Kiss
So it was done. Nontikmah finally got what she wanted. She finally saved the day, thought Kilyan bitterly as he stabbed the shovel in the earth. It was a good shovel. Had cost Kilyan a pretty penny. Kilyan had insisted on doing it all alone. He alone banged on the blacksmith's door in the middle of the night and he alone purchased the shovel. He alone carried Nontikmah's bandage-bound body to the top of the sun village cemetery. And he alone began the long task of digging the grave.
As the shovel grated against the rocky earth, as a dark and rich pile of sandy soil began to tower at Kilyan's side, Kilyan's mind spun with bitter thoughts and tender memories. How lovely Nontikmah had looked - so small and white and sleek - that night he made love to her. The second time was the worst. And so bittersweet he could still taste it. Wracked with guilt and yet a complete victim of his own blossoming love for her, he remembered kissing her breasts, her belly, her thighs, and then the wet, hot place between them, her moist sex and how it squirmed for him! She had looked up at him with glowing eyes as he rocked his hips against her; her enormous bosom had massaged his chest with its softness. And he, so taken with her beauty and the sweet fragrance of her soul, had forgotten to pull out when he came. He was frantic and tried to back off, but it was too late. And as he looked down at her with a guilty blush, Nontikmah told him it was alright: whether she had a child or not, she would never come knocking at his hut to bother him.
Kilyan had been stung by her nonchalance. Did she really think he wouldn't want anything to do with that child's life should she have one? Did she really think so lowly of him? Of course not. Looking down at her, he had realized in that moment that there was another reason she would not come to him should she birth his pup. He had wanted to ask what was the matter, why wouldn't she contact him if it came to that? But Nontikmah, sensing his confusion, had kissed him so tenderly he soon forgot. And he made love to her a third time, pushing inside of her until the first pale fingers of dawn reached through her window.
"I should have asked you why," Kilyan said wretchedly as he stabbed the shovel yet again in the hole. The hole was rising around his waist now and he paused to drag his wrist across his sweaty brow. "I should've demanded to know why you wouldn't come to me if you had my pup! Then I would've taken you home with me and Melomiel would be alive and Sylas would've stayed away from Wynn - and the fox kingdom would've crumbled to dust."
Kilyan sneered at Nontikmah's body, which was bound still in the ceremonial bandages for the burial. "You and your damned fox kingdom!" he said breathlessly. "You put it before the life of our child! You stupid bitch - you - it didn't have to be this way! God, no wonder every male you ever met ran from you! Kitari probably knew you were the fox queen and didn't want any child of his being sacrificed for the kingdom! Kitari probably said fuck the kingdom and ran for the hills - as any male should when faced with a female like you!"
Kilyan suddenly chucked the shovel hard at the ground and just stood there glaring at Nontikmah's body. He knew he was only speaking out of anger, that Nontikmah's memory did not deserve the abuse he was hurling at it, that she had been brainwashed by the law of the fox kingdom and was therefore as much a victim of it as Melomiel. But Kilyan couldn't help himself. He was so angry! He was angry about everything that had happened because he felt as if he could have somehow stopped it. But collapsing on his tail at the bottom of the grave, Kilyan knew that wasn't true.
Kilyan sat at the bottom of Nontikmah's grave a long time, his elbows resting on his knees, his head bowed as a few tears fell straight from the tips of his lashes to the rocky mud. The sun was coming up, and he knew he should move faster: burying a wolf after more than one day was considered taboo. There was even an old story stating that if bodies were not buried before daylight the next day, their spirits were trapped on earth. If he didn't make it in time, the elders of the sun village might force him to cremate Nontikmah. Kilyan didn't want it to come to that. Cremation was considered a dishonor in the more advanced villages, and though Kilyan -- as ever -- did not believe in a lot of old wolf traditions, he realized that Nontikmah most likely had, so he rose to his feet and set to work again.
Kilyan did not know it, but Nontikmah's shadowy form was standing in the grave with him, nothing more than spirit and essence now, a being lacking all the senses that gave it life. From her plane of existence, looking at Kilyan was like looking through fog. She reached out as if to find him and touched an uncertain paw to his muscly arm as he bent once more to scoop and toss.
In her death, the glamour had faded, and Nontikmah's body was no longer that of Nontikmah the fox queen but Tikka the wolf peasant. Draped lifeless across Kel's arms, she had become gray and matted and dull and thin, and her ragged mane had hung like cobwebs. In her death, she was Tikka again, and it was Tikka who stood over Kilyan as he worked steadily into the dawn, blinded by his anger and his tears.
"I'm sorry I lied to you, Kilyan," the specter whispered, and her melodic voice echoed against the dark walls of the grave as if she had spoken down a well. "But . . . I thought . . . I thought I was protecting you. You see, I believed in the fox kingdom." She touched a small paw to her chest as she spoke, regarding Kilyan sympathetically. "I believed in it and devoted my life to it. And Melomiel's death . . . it would have been considered an honor among foxes. I didn't expect a wolf to understand."
Kilyan kept shoveling, unable to hear or see the shadow as it addressed him. Satisfied at last with the depth of the grave, he tossed the shovel out of it, then grabbed hold of a rope he had secured to a nearby tree and pulled himself out. The specter floated up and out of the grave, following Kilyan as he approached the bandaged body of the witch.
"I lied because I love you," the ghost went on earnestly. "I fell so helplessly in love that night. Kilyan? Damn it, why can't you hear m-me --"
After standing over the body with his fists clenched for a time, Kilyan gathered Nontikmah's limp and bandaged form into his arms. He walked to the edge of the grave, and after closing his eyes a moment, he let her body tumble from his grasp. The thick bandaging did its job: Nontikmah's body was cushioned by it and therefore made barely a sound when it fell atop the muddy, rain-softened earth. Swallowing hard, Kilyan took up the shovel again and set to work filling the grave. The sun was coming up now, but he ignored the sudden heat that touched his shoulder as he worked at a steady pace: scoop, drop, scoop, drop.
"Hurry, Kilyan!" hissed the shadow. It clenched small fists as it urged, "Hurry! If I'm not covered before the sun comes, I'll be stuck here forever --"
Kilyan blinked, and without knowing why, he scooped faster. He was breathless and drenched with sweat by the time he was patting the grave's fresh mound with the flat of his shovel. With his foot braced against the shovel's bottom, he rested his forehead on the handle and closed his eyes. At least whether the traditions were true or not, Nontikmah was now laid to rest.
"Thank you, Kilyan," said the shadow, sagging in relief. Its small feet lifted from the grass and it floated closer to Kilyan. It kissed Kilyan's cheek and whispered, "Now I can rest." As it spoke, the sun rose fully at last, and the shadow faded away.
Kilyan lifted his head as the ghostly voice for the first time reached his ear. It had been Nontikmah's voice. He touched a paw to his cheek, where it felt as if an icy breeze had brushed him. His green eyes filling with realization, he laid a little flower on the grave as he said, "I love you too, Nontikmah."