The tree's vomit, a mixture of clear sap and chunks of berries, began to crystallize in the corner. When he barfed up the first batch, Aurelie gagged right along with him. He told her his human name while she held his leaves back. It was Jermyn, like the river in Redayrah, a neutral nation that stood between the borders of Highfire and the Icelands.
To her surprise, his vomit didn't have the usual pungent reek of fresh vomit, but rather a thick sugary small that made her mouth water.
She had been so hungry by then, that she was not disgusted by the fact. Only the threat of death by berry poison stopped her. The smell had filled the entire cave. She couldn't stop thinking about tasting it. She swallowed. Her tongue was dry and felt tangy.
This wholly became the lowest point in Aurelie's life but she had not been embarrassed or squeamish. She felt the opposite, remembering Mr. Holver's teachings. Survival was number one. Always.
"I don't suppose we can go and find me something to eat now?" she asked. Her stomach no longer moaned, it ached and nudged her with a thunderstorm of stabbing pains.
"I don't think I can move right now," he said.
He still looked rather sickly. His leaves sagged like those of an unwatered plant and his bark looked to be turning grey. Aurelie noted that had she consumed the berries, she wouldn't just look sickly, but pale as a marble statue with lips the shade of blue. In other words, dead.
"I can . . ."
"No! You're not going alone."
Maybe if I pick the berries out when he leaves . . . she thought.
"I can't just dig my toes into the earth and feed myself, you know," she retorted irritably, "I have to actually eat."
"I know."
"Then why? I've stayed all this time, haven't I? You've passed out three times since this morning and I didn't even try to leave you."
"Just no."
"Why?" She could have run when he had been passed out from the pains in his stomach, but she stayed to be helpful.
"None of your business!"
"Yes, it is," Aurelie said. Her patience had dried up. "You kidnapped me, delayed my path, are keeping me from helping my aunt and uncle. And now you're starving me!" Her hands were shaking. She had never spent so long without food. Aunt Elizabeth prepared four meals a day, and Aurelie had fruits from the garden in-between them.
He turned lazily. "You can't save them," he said. There was no change in his voice. Not even a glint of sympathy. He said it as a cold matter-of-fact and she believed him. "If he's got them, you can't save them. No one can."
She folded her hands in her lap and sunk her head to hide the tears that had filled her eyes. She missed her aunt and uncle every second. Missed the warmth of their cabin, their little garden that she always found to be a nuisance to tend, being taken care of and desperately missed being clean and uninjured. She did not want to think about what happened to them. For that, she'd have to think of the pain they must have gone through, and she couldn't.
"But you can avenge them."
Aurelie glanced up, surprised by what he said. It looked as if Jermyn had been surprised by it himself. He turned away from her at the sight of her tears, seemingly uncomfortable.
"You'll help me?" She must have looked terribly distraught to have been able to garner the sympathy of a violent tree beast.
"No, certainly not. I'm not interested in these affairs. Also, I'm a damn tree, if you haven't noticed. What business do I have leaping in to fight a man who wields fire like a sword?" He shook his finger at her. "Two things I like to stay away from, fire and axes. Last time I checked, the King had both. You'll be smart to compile your own list."
"So what then?"
"Well, I'm hoping we can find you a cabin somewhere far away where you can live out your life and pop out a few nuisances."
"I think, with that option, you'll find yourself sorely disappointed."
"Yes, I thought you'd choose the stupid option."
Aurelie rolled your eyes. "You haven't even told me what it was yet."
"I know a boy who is part of the rebellion. A real member, not like that witch of yours."
"You know her?"
"What I know and what I don't know is none of your business." He raised the ridge of his brow.
"I think we're long past that, don't you?"
He stretched his lips downward. "Not really know."
"Alright, so I am supposed to believe you, a living tree who kidnapped me and has threatened to kill me on more than one occasionâoh, and you choked me too, let's not forget thatâover a friendly maid who had more to gain by betraying me than helping me?"
"How do you know?" He smiled lightly.
She narrowed her eyes, unsure of what to think. By his smug expression, it was quite easy to tell that he knew something. Either that or he was playing her for a fool. She wouldn't put the later past him. He already proved himself to be a sneak by the way he grabbed her near the bridge.
"There's a reward for my safe capture."
"And you think gold is worth more to a witch than your life?"
"She wasn't a witch."
"You wouldn't be able to tell a witch from a dog. Look at you, crying about missing dinner on your first day out of the house."
"I haven't eaten since yesterday."
"Oh, excuse me, it appears I was wrong. Yesterday, you say? That's fine then, you've proven to be a master survivalist." He stood, slowly and with great effort, still in the process of regaining his strength. "Marianne Darkem isn't someone you should be messing with. I would say you should even forget her name, but I assume, that'd just make you want to chase her down."
"I believe you, but I'd also like to know why."
He walked toward the opening of the cave. Aurelie rose to follow but he extended his hand to stop her.
"This is where you sleep."
"Please, I . . ." She seemed to have hurt him. He wasn't being violent like before, so she assumed that he wasn't angry, but his mood had changed since she brought up Marianne.
He walked through the opening and sent roots up to seal the door. "We'll talk in the morning."
*****
Aurelie woke up to something warm being poured over her legs. She shot up from the heap of stale-smelling clothes she slept on. Jermyn stood above her with a jug raised above her wound.
"What is that?" she asked, her eyes still a little blurry from sleep.
"Water. She said hot water would make the cloth come loose."
"Who did?"
"A customer."
Aurelie yawned, holding her palm over her mouth. "You have customers?"
"Yes."
He examined her leg, then tried to grab onto the ear of the knot she had fastened. His finger missed the cloth and scrapped her wound instead.
Aurelie hissed in pain. "Hold on, let me try."
She tugged at the bandage, checking whether it had come lose at all. It was still glued to her wound. She undid the knot, then held her hands out to Jermyn for the jug of water. "It's looser, but still stuck."
"She said it would be. Just leave it for a bit. Don't use all the water."
Aurelie set the jug down and smiled at Jermyn. "I smell bread."
He reached into a bag that he had tied around his waist and pulled out a loaf. Aurelie's mouth watered. She grabbed the bread and took a massive bite. The crust was still crunchy and fresh. Crumbs dropped down her chest and onto her lap.
"This is the best bread I've ever eaten," Aurelie said with a full mouth.
"Good, because it comes with a price."
Aurelie raised a brow, slowing her chewing. Her mind went straight to poison. But why would Jermyn keep her alive for almost two days, only to buy her bread, treat her wound and then poison her?
"What price?"
"Here's some honey." He removed a glass jar big as her foot from the same bag and set it down on the ground beside her.
Aurelie took the string off around the top of the jar and pulled the cloth off that had been sealing the honey. She proceeded to dunk her bread into the jar and letting the thick sticky liquid cling to her fingers.
"Eat, then I'll tell you."
"Well, I can't when you say it like that," she said, putting her bread down.
"Like what?"
"Like I'm selling you my soul for a piece of bread."
"And honey," he added with a cheeky grin.
"Jermyn, what are you going to have me do?"
"I'm hoping," He sat down, flattening the moist earth beneath him, "that you'll have me break this curse."
"What curse?"
Jermyn's head came an inch closer as he peered at her with one eyebrow raised. "Are ya blind? I'm a tree. What curse do you think?" he said.
Aurelie raised her palms. "It could be another curse, you know. Several, actually."
"Oh? Name a few that outweigh being turned into a tree."
"Being turned into a grouch."
He grunted. It sounded like something between an angry dog and a crack of an old, dry tree branch.
"Did Marianne curse you?" Aurelie asked.
He frowned.
"I'm only asking because you got mad after I mentioned her yesterday. Is that why? Did she do this to you?" Aurelie bit her bread again. She felt full, but the honeyed bread was delicious and she couldn't help herself.
"Yes. It was her."
"Why'd she do it?" Aurelie could guess why. He wasn't exactly the friendliest of beings she'd ever met If Aurelie had control of her fire, he'd probably be tending to blackened bark by now, especially after the way he swung her around by her neck. It still hurt when she turned her head to the side and felt bruised to the touch.
"Does it matter?"
"Suppose not. I don't see anything else to do but talk though, do you?"
He looked at her for a moment, considering what she said. "I don't like to talk about it. Dwelling on the past serves no purpose."
"I don't agree. Sometimes you have to dwell so that you can get past it."
"I'll get past it when I kill her."
She went cold all over when he said it. Kill her? That's what she traded for a piece of bread. The thought made her sick. "Jermyn," she said after a long silence, "I can'tâ"
"Who said you have to do it?"
"You said you wanted my help."
"I said help, not do my job for me."
"I can't help you kill someone. That's . . . no. You can't ask that of me."
He laughed. "I'd never thought I'd see the day a Dranoir walks away from a good murder!"
"I think you'll find I'm very different from my father." This further strengthened her incentive to get out of whatever it was that Jermyn had planned for Marianne. She never wanted to hurt anyone. How could she claim to be better or different if she helped kill someone for a piece of honeyed bread?
"I wasn't even talking about your father. You lot have been killing things for sport since the beginning of time. Emile Dranoir isn't even the most ruthless man the Dranoirs have produced over the years. Doesn't even come close," Jermyn looked incredibly smug saying that.
Is that supposed to convince me? She sat up straighter, hiding her sticky fingers. "Well, I haven't and I don't plan on changing that now."
The things he said about her family couldn't have been true. No, her aunt and uncle would have told her. It was Emile, her father, that had been the violent maniac.