Ander - Part 6: Subchapter 17
17
Danado wasn't in the tent the Foxes had built for him. He was sitting with his back propped up against the big old oak tree growing behind Ander's house. He had slipped away quietly while everyone was busy talking to Sorrin and the others, asking how the work at the pass was going. Nobody saw him leave.
It was cold back here, but he didn't mind it that much. He just wanted to be alone for a while, sitting in the dark with the pulsating glow from the fire slipping past the corners of the house, the pointed shadows of the tents stretching out like fat arrows across the snow. There were lights burning in the valley below, too, each one a house, each one a family. Mothers, fathers, sons and daughters...
Brothers and sisters.
Danado barely managed to stifle a moan. He sniffed and wiped his eyes, both angry and miserable at the same time. He didn't want the others to hear him back here. They'd swarm all over him, trying to make him feel better, but they'd only end up making him feel worse. Their concern, their pity, their soft voices... He knew they meant well, but it was all just one big giant reminder of his sister's death.
Poor Dan. His sister died in his arms. Let's all be nice to him because his sister is dead. Let's give him our warmest smiles because his sister is dead. Let's do our best not to make him feel even worse because his sister is dead.
Dead. Dead. Dead.
Danado stuck his fingertips in the snow. It only took a few seconds for the cold to seep through the bandages and gnaw at the stumps. The cold turned into pain, and the pain turned into a numb throb. He lifted his hands and stared at the fingers that used to be just a bit longer than they were now. He could feel his heartbeat inside, pushing against the bandages, aching and stinging, but at least he wasn't thinking of Lana anymore. At least for now.
Looking through his hooked fingers like this, they made shadowy lines across the entire valley, like the bars of a cage.
Danado sighed and folded his hands across his chest. He didn't really know what to make of this place. Everything about it made him feel weird. He didn't like being so much taller than everyone else, for one. Back home, he was always one of the smaller Wolves. He'd scurry from place to place, keeping his head down, doing his very best to stay invisible. But here? He felt like a clumsy giant, everyone craning their necks to look up at him. And then there were the Foxes themselves, going out of their way to make sure he was comfortable, loading him down with gifts, making him feel decidedly uncomfortable in the process.
That tent they made... He didn't think he'd be able to sleep in there. It would be the first time in his entire life he'd ever sleep in a tent for one. It was just too much. He'd rather sleep out here, beneath the stars, than spend an entire night tossing and turning in a tent without a partition hanging in the middle, a tent without his sister slumbering on the other side.
Because she was dead.
Danado pressed his palms against his eyes and held them there in a useless attempt to shut the images away. It worked for a little while. All he could see was darkness, and strange green splotches floating around like snowflakes in a black ocean. The problem was, the act of trying not to think of something forced you to think about the thing you're trying not to think about, and that was what made it futile. The darkness gave way to mourning light, and the green shapes turned into real snowflakes, clinging to sheer walls of stone on either side, rising up to heaven, and at the very end, caught between the earth and the cloudless sky... a single column of smoke, waving goodbye.
He had made peace with it. He had made a silent promise to himself and his sister that he wouldn't dwell on it any longer. He had cast aside his hatred and his anger. He had decided he would look forward instead, because that's what she would have wanted. But...
That didn't make it hurt any less.
Danado leaned his head against the rough bark of the tree, too tired to cry, too troubled to sleep, and he listened to the voices coming from the other side of the house, worlds and worlds away.
"Dear gods, boy! Your face is an absolute mess! Come here."
"Bethany-Kai, no! What are you - Ack! Stop that!"
"There, much better. You don't want to look like a pig in front of your girlfriend, do you?"
The singing, the laughing, the good cheer. He didn't belong in a place like this. He'd just infect it with his misery, and he didn't want to do that. Better to stay away, back here, alone.
Easier.
"Danado?"
He stiffened against the tree, feeling like he'd been caught doing some criminal act. There was a dark shadow peeking around the corner of Ander's house, a black silhouette against the faded firelight, much too small to be a Wolf. It stepped around, or rather, it seemed to flow around the corner like water, and Danado realized it was Bethany-Kai's crazy doka, Layla.
"What are you doing back here?" she asked, swishing her tail back and forth. "You're missing all the fun!"
"I was just... doing nothing," he said truthfully, hoping she would go away.
No such luck.
"What are you moping back here in the dark for, doing nothing? That's no fun."
"That's because I'm not in a fun mood right now."
"Of course you're not. Sitting back here all alone, in the snow, nobody would be in a fun mood. Why don't you come back with me and sit by the fire for a bit? Get nice and warm, maybe have a little something to eat?"
"No. I'd rather just stay here."
"Aw, come on! Don't be such a gloomy Gus! It'll make you feel bett -"
"What is wrong with you!?" Danado shouted, unable to keep it in any longer. "Back at the house, I told you exactly how your family would probably die because of us, but instead of leaving me the hell alone, you clung to me like some disease! And now you're back again, actively seeking me out!? Are you touched in the head!?"
"Aha! I knew it!"
"Knew what?"
"You were trying to scare me away. That's why you said those awful things, so you could be all alone in your little bubble."
"So?"
"So, that means you didn't do it to be mean. You're just sad, that's all."
"The things I said are still true, regardless of the reason I said them. You shouldn't be so happy all the time."
She planted her hands on her hips in a rather startling imitation of her mother. "If I didn't know any better I'd say you were deliberately trying to sabotage the little welcoming party I worked so hard to throw together. And on such short notice, too! You were right there the whole time, you sulky bastard! You saw me work my tail to the bone! I must have run up and down this godsdamn hill half a dozen times! All for -" Her posture suddenly changed. Her ears fell and her tail stopped swishing. "I did it for you, you know. Well, for everyone, I guess, but... mostly for you."
"What?" This was Danado's first time seeing her_not_ looking disgustingly happy, and there was something fundamentally wrong about it. That big, bushy tail of hers shouldn't be dragging along the ground like that. Her ears shouldn't be lying flat against her head like that. Her hands shouldn't be clasped over her chest like that. She shouldn't be biting down on her lip like that. This was exactly what he had wished for from the depths of his loneliness, to strike back, to defend himself, to make her smile go away, to make her just as miserable as he was, because it was the contrast of her happiness that shone such a glaring beam of light on his own despair, making it feel even worse in her presence.
But it was wrong.
It was just... wrong.
"Why would you try so hard to make me happy?" he asked, not understanding, not sure if he was even capable of understanding.
Layla raised her head and, even in the dark, he could see the single tear running down her cheek, catching the light of the moon and the stars. "Because I want to see you smile, dummy. That's all."
"I..." Danado swallowed the lump in his throat. "I can't do it, Layla. I'm sorry, I just can't. Any smile I give you right now would only be fake, and I don't think that's what you want. It's not what I want, either."
She bowed her head. "I understand."
"I can't go back there. I can't stand to be around so many people. I can't be surrounded by all that laughter. I can't stand to see so many smiles all around me. To go back in there, I would have to wear a smile of my own, and I can't do that. I can't put on a fake smile. Not for you, not for anyone. Please don't ask me to. I just want to stay here for a while."
"Okay."
He thought that would be the end of it. He thought she'd just turn around and go away, but then... "Do you mind if I join you?"
"Join?"
"It's just me, by myself. I promise I won't bother you. No crowds, no fake smiles. I won't hug you like last time. I won't even talk if that's what you want. I'll just sit quietly with you for a little while. Please?"
Danado didn't understand what was going on, but the throbbing pain in his fingertips was speeding up by the second, and that could only mean his heart was speeding up, too. "If you really want to, then... I guess I can't stop you."
"Well okay, if you insist so strongly." She smiled and skipped through the snow, once again moving like water through the air, unhindered by anything as mundane as banks or riverbeds. The wind itself was her riverbed. Danado expected her to stop at some point, perhaps lean against the wall, but she came right up to the tree and sat down next to him, so close they were almost touching. "My word, you can see the entire valley from here..." she whispered, her eyes glinting in the soft moonlight.
Danado watched her from the corner of his eye, not quite daring to meet her gaze head-on. Everything about her just seemed so intense. Even the way she breathed, moving ever so slightly in the dark, made him feel like he was standing too close to a perilous drop-off, like he might just keel over and fall to his death if he wasn't careful.
"Danado?" she said, her words transformed into soft plumes of white vapour in the cold, black night.
"Yes?"
She looked at him, her eyes so bright they were almost blinding. "If you really, _really_want me to leave, I'll understand. All you need to do is tell me."
Danado frowned. "You never let that stop you before, so how would this be any different?"
Layla giggled. It was a soft sound. "You silly Wolf. You've never told me to leave."
"I haven't?"
"Nope. Not once."
"That can't be right. I..." Danado's voice trailed off, simply fading away with the vapour of his breath. He thought back through their conversation just now. He must_have told her at some point to leave him alone, but he couldn't be sure. Then again, what difference did it make if he'd actually said it or not? He doesn't want her here, and she _knows he doesn't want her here, so all he had to do was tell her to leave and everything would be fine. She'd actually given him a splendid out, and he intended to take it. It wouldn't even be 'mean' of him to do so, because she was the one telling him to do it. What's more, she was right. She was completely and totally right. If he wanted to get rid of her, he'd have to say it directly. He'd just have to look her in the eye and tell her to leave him alone. He'd just...
"Layla?"
"Mm-hm?"
"Would you please..." They weren't touching. They definitely weren't touching. He was absolutely sure they weren't touching in any way. And yet... it was as if the air between them wasn't just empty space. It was warm. It couldn't be, there was snow everywhere, but that's really what it felt like. It felt like the cold air was warm, and he was touching it, and the air was touching her. Looking at it that way, it was as if they were touching over a distance.
"Yes?"
The way she was looking at him. Back here she was more shadow than substance, more dark than light, and yet she seemed to shine brighter than the fire he had fled from.
"Would you..." Leave me alone. I just want to be alone. I want to be alone forever. I want to... I want... I want you to... to... "... stay with me? Just for a little while?"
She smiled. "Of course!"
The corner of Danado's mouth almost twitched into a smile and he looked away, embarrassed.
What the hell just happened? He was sure he was going to ask her to leave him be, but what came out of his mouth was the exact opposite.
She scootched a little closer, and now the fabric of her dress really was brushing up against his elbow. They really were touching. "What was that?"
"What was what?"
"That thing I spied on your face. Was that a smile?"
"No."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes."
"Are you absolutely positively one hundred percent sure?"
"Yes."
"Oh." Her ears fell flat again and the shine in her eyes dulled. It was just a tiny bit, but Danado somehow felt like he had just done something blasphemous, like scratching his name into the Cora statue, something that can never be forgiven.
"I'm sorry," he said, feeling like a total idiot. Recently, it felt like everything he said or did had to be followed with an apology.
"I'm the one who should be sorry." She flicked her tail into her lap and it gently flowed over the twin hills that were her legs. Bright orange, blazing like fire.
"Why? You haven't done anything wrong."
"I haven't done anything right, either. Ever since you got here, I've been trying to... never mind. It's silly."
"What is it?"
"It doesn't matter. I failed."
Her voice. Every syllable used to be so happy, but now it was like listening to a badly tuned musical instrument. The sadness in it jagged on his ear, telling him it was just plain wrong, and that he was to blame. He wasn't sure how, exactly, but he knew it was true. She was sad because of him.
I knew this would happen. This is why I wanted to be alone. I didn't want to bring everyone else down with me.
Danado balled his hands into fists. "You're the one who came over here, you're the one who sat down, you're the one who insisted on talking to me, and now you decide to bind your tongue? How does that make sense? What are you even doing here? What are you trying to accomplish? I wanted to be left a-"
"I'm trying to make you smile, you big dumb stupid Wolf! That's all I want!"
Danado looked at the girl sitting next to him, this small girl with the disproportionately floofy tail, this girl who had abandoned the warmth and cheer of the party to come and sit with him in the dark and the cold, this girl who said she wanted to make him smile, and he asked her a very stupid question.
"_Why!?_You keep saying that, but what does it mean!? Why are you so obsessed with making me smile!?"
"Uuurgh!" She punched him in the shoulder, and it wasn't a little punch either.
"Ow! What was that for!?" Danado asked, rubbing the spot she had struck with those surprisingly powerful little hands.
"That's for being such a picklepuss! Ever since you got here you've done nothing but mope and sulk and be sad and I hate it! I hate it! Picklepuss, picklepuss, PICKLEPUSS!!"
Picklepuss?
"Why do you care? What's it to you whether I sulk? Don't go sticking your perky little nose where it doesn't belong!"
"You're the ones who stuck your noses into our valley! You're the ones who came to us seeking solace and sanctuary! You're the ones bringing the wrath of your people down on all our heads! You're the ones who have cast our home into war for the first time in its history! So you're the one who shouldn't go sticking your nose where it doesn't -" She covered her mouth. "I'm sorry..." she whispered. "I am so sorry. I shouldn't have said that. I didn't mean that at all."
She turned her head away in shame, but it was Danado who felt ashamed of himself. He was so lost in his grief that he had almost forgotten that none of this might still be standing by the next turn of the moon. All the lights down in the valley, each one a house, each one a family - mothers and fathers, sons and daughters, brothers and sisters - all of it might be ash and blood before long. And who was the one who had made a point of driving it home to her? Who was the one who went out of his way to make her understand exactly how fragile their lives were, how hopeless the world had become?
He was.
He reached out to her, not knowing what the hell he planned to do, but the sight of his own bandaged hand gave him pause. The fingertips were red.
"I thought that, maybe, if I could get you to smile, then that would mean the threat couldn't be so bad," Layla said. "I thought, 'How hard can it be to make one Wolf smile? Just once?' I tried, but... nothing worked. Nilia and Sorrin seem like a grumpy bunch, but even they can smile for the ones they care about. You though... I knew it the moment I saw you. You can't smile to save your life. You can't even be bothered to put on a fake one for those who are so worried about you. Hour after hour I watched your face, and hour after hour I felt my own despair deepen because of it. Your face tells a story all on its own, Danado, one of terrible sorrow. That's how I know it's even worse than everyone thinks. That's how I know it's even worse than you said it was. My friends and family, the thought of losing them is something I can't even comprehend. I try to think what it would feel like, and it's like my imagination just hits a big black wall. I don't ever want to know what's on the other side of that wall. It frightens me like I've never been frightened before."
Her back seemed so small, her shoulders so slim. He wanted to comfort her, but how? His hands were hard and ugly, cold to the bone and no good for a gentle touch. His tongue was clumsy and incapable of stringing any words of honey.
I'm the one who did this, he thought, incredulous. That's why she hugged me, that's why she tried to make me smile, because I basically told her there was no reason for anyone to ever smile again...
"I was naïve," she said, the shadow of her mouth moving ever so slightly in the gloom, "thinking that making you smile could actually change anything. They'd still be there on the other side of the mountain, the exact same number with the exact same intentions, planning to kill every last one of us. That's why you're so sad. I was stupid for thinking it could work the other way around, that if I could make you happy, that would somehow make the danger less real. I was worse than stupid. I was crazy, and maybe I was crazy because I'm afraid. I'm _so_afraid, Danado. I try to be brave, I try so hard, but I just can't do it. My people have a saying, 'whistling past the graveyard'. It means to act cheerful while you're actually shaking in your boots. That's all this stupid party really is. Everyone is just whistling past the graveyard, and I'm the loudest one of the bunch. I guess that's why I tried so hard to make you smile. It's just another way to whistle, to make my fear seem smaller than it actually is. Talk about selfish, right? To try and do something like that just to make myself feel better... I'm sorry. I've bothered you enough. I shouldn't have forced myself on you like this. I'll just go..."
She got up to leave and Danado grabbed her by the wrist. His body had moved before his mind could think, almost like a reflex, and now they were both stuck in this strange moment in time, Layla in half-rise, Danado with his back against the oak tree, neither of them with a word to say. Except...
Maybe he did have words. If he could find the courage to say them.
"You're not the selfish one," he said. "I am." He put his hand back in his lap, feeling not only ashamed of his behaviour, but because he had dared to touch something so pure and clean with this mangled abomination at the end of his wrist.
He would have understood if she had simply walked on like she had intended, but she didn't. She sat back down and put her hand on his shoulder, so warm it felt like he was being touched by living embers. "Why do you say that?" she asked, and Danado once again found himself incapable of anything but the truth.
"The reason I'm sad isn't because I had to leave my home, or because my people seek my death, or because they might swarm over the mountain and slaughter every living thing in this valley - you, your family, your friends and neighbours, everyone you've ever known or spoken to, and the Wolves who risked their lives to save mine. The reason I'm sad is because..." He sighed. "I miss Lana."
He turned his head away, knowing what would surely come.
Your sister? One Wolf!? One!? My whole family might get killed because of you! My father, my mother, my sister, my friends! Everyone in this valley! Thousands of Foxes! That includes all your friends! Nilia, Mellah, Sorrin, Hezzi, Renna! I thought that's why you were being so sad, but it turns out you only care about yourself and one Wolf who's already dead! Instead of grieving over one single lost life, why not get off your tail and do something to help save the ones who are still alive! You're nothing but a selfish, pathetic coward!
That's why he was so surprised when he felt her arms around his body, so light, so warm. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I'm so, so sorry..."
"Layla? What are you...?" Something hot touched his shoulder, and he realised she was crying. She was crying... for him?
Danado froze. He didn't have any idea what to do, or even what was going on. Perfect strangers don't just snuggle up to you and give you a hug and start crying into your shoulder. At least not back home they don't.
"I love my sister, too," she whispered. Her breath wasn't as warm as her tears, but it spread out farther, caressing his neck like an invisible feather. "I love her more than anything in the whole wide world. If anything ever happened to her... I don't even know what I'd do. I've had time to think about it, though. All day long. That's why I've been so afraid, but you... you already lived through it. I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have tried so hard to make you smile."
"N-No, it's okay. You don't have to shed tears for a stranger like me."
"You Wolves. You live together in some giant village from what I hear, but it's like you're all living by yourselves in these tiny little cages that just happen to be stacked next to each other. You stopped being a stranger the moment you set foot in this valley."
"But... I..." He wanted to put his hands around her. He wanted to do it so badly it almost hurt. She was right up against him, all he'd have to do was return her embrace, but...
What if he bled all over her? What if she recoiled at his touch?
"I understand why you wanted to be alone now," she said. "Sitting with all those people whose names you don't even know, eating and drinking, laughing and telling jokes, all while your heart is so heavy with grief. No wonder you wanted to get away for a while. I'm sorry I tried to drag you back."
"Please stop apologising," Danado said. "I'm happy you found me. Otherwise I would've just... sat here, and done nothing for hours. Probably get buried in snow, and for no profit. I'd be just as miserable as I was at the start. But talking to you has made me feel... not so miserable. Not miserable at all, actually."
She looked up at him, and even the slight movement of her head against his body was enough to make his stomach do a flip. "Really?"
"Really. I... I think you should know that - I mean, I want to tell you that -"
Oh, to hell with it.
He wrapped his arms around her slender body, being very careful not to actually touch her with the bandaged parts of his hands. It must be like getting hugged by an exceptionally stiff tree, but Danado didn't care. He needed to touch her back, even if only for a second. "Thank you," he said. "After my sister died, I thought that was it. I thought I was alone now. Even after everything my friends did for me, I was too blinded by grief to see it. But I'm not alone. I was never alone. So... thank you for opening my eyes. Thank you."
He pulled back a little and looked down at her face, and what he saw made his heart lurch in his chest. She was crying much harder than before. Tears were leaking form her eyes in silent streams. What did he do? Did he say something wrong? Did he upset her somehow? Did he -
"I did it..." she whispered, a smile slowly spreading across her lips. "I can't believe it, but I finally did it..."
"Did what?"
"Danado, you're smiling. You're finally smiling!"
"I am?" He actually had to touch his face in order to confirm it, and yes, Layla wasn't lying. It had slipped onto his face at some point and stayed there; a small smile.
She buried her face against his chest and clutched at his clothes, squeezing him with such panicky tightness he could feel her shaking. "You have no idea what a relief this is," she said. "If the biggest sadsack Wolf to ever step foot in Grovenglen can smile, then surely it means there must be hope, right? There _has_to be."
"Yes, there is hope." Danado said, feeling her warmth. "You create it somehow. I don't understand how you can do such a thing, but you do."
"Danado?"
"Yes?"
"You'll smile for me again, won't you? If things look really bad, you'll smile again and make me feel better, right?"
"You make it kind of hard not to." Holding each other in the dark, they were nothing more than shapes to each other, but there was more than what the eyes could see. So much more. They were the sounds of breathing, of hearts beating. They were the scent of fresh tears, spilled out of sorrow and joy. They were the warmth of each other's bodies, radiating outward and into each other.
And they were getting closer.
Danado's heartbeat trebled and his muscles tensed. It wasn't his imagination. Her shadow was getting closer. The gleam of moonlight in her eyes was getting brighter. The tide of her breath washed over his nose, his mouth, as soft and warm as the flowing tail she had snaked across the back of his neck.
"Where on earth is Layla?" Bethany-Kai's voice broke through the background noise of the party like a hammer.
Danado and Layla both froze, their noses almost (but not quite) touching, and they listened.
"Rufio! Where has that daughter of yours gone to?"
"Which one?"
"The missing one!"
"I dunno. Probably 'round here someplace."
"Wow, that really narrows it down, Rufie."
Layla covered her mouth, closed her eyes, and giggled into her palms, shaking with the effort of keeping it all bottled in. Danado felt every movement, every expansion and contraction of her stomach muscles. It was the most beautiful and terrifying sensation he has ever felt, like he was about to melt and explode all at the same time.
She gave him one final squeeze. "I'm sorry, Danado. It seems my absence has been noticed. I'd better get back before Mother comes looking for me."
"Right, right." The thought of Bethany-Kai rounding that corner and seeing him entwined with her doka like this was too real for comfort. For some reason that vixen genuinely scared him. Still, he couldn't help but feel a pang of regret as Layla pulled away from him. The small space around him suddenly seemed just a little bit darker, just a little bit colder, just a little bit more lonely for her departure.
"Goodbye, Danado. I'll see you around sometime."
"You can call me Dan. And thanks again." He swallowed, put his hands in his lap, and said two words that almost refused to leave his throat. He had to force them out. "Goodbye. Layla."
She disappeared, but Danado couldn't watch her leave, even though he was sorely tempted just to see that tail of hers swish around like a fuzzy river, winding from side to side. Instead, he looked straight ahead at the glimmering lights of Grovenglen and listened to the sound of her feet crunching through the snow.
Okay... he thought. That was... intense. That was... damn, I don't even know...
The crunching stopped for a second, then returned at roughly ten times the speed, getting louder and louder.
He turned his head. "Lay -?" That was as far as he got before Layla seized his face and planted a kiss on his cheek, pressing her lips right up against the corner of his mouth, hotter than white hot coals.
Danado didn't know how long they stayed like that. His sense of time was knocked for a loop just as hard as the rest of him. It was probably no more than a few seconds, but he could still feel her lips on his face even after she pulled away, as if it was still happening.
She traced the line of his jaw with her fingers and looked into his eyes, smiling so beautifully.
Danado's tongue seemed to be faulty, because he simply could not get it to move. He just sat there, staring with his mouth open, frozen in shock.
Layla giggled and turned around, lightly dragging the tip of her tail beneath his chin. "Don't be a stranger, okay?" she said and walked away, slowly merging with the shadows until she reached the end of the house and stepped into the cone of dancing firelight. She looked back, resplendent, and tipped him a wink.
Danado raised a numb, shaking hand in farewell, and then she slipped around the corner just as suddenly as she had arrived, flowing like water, and was gone.
He was still smiling.
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