Page 77 of Corvak's Challenge

"Hmm?"

"Oh, just thinking aloud. Your mate looks very similar to Gren, but there must be something different in their physiology. He and his mate weren't able to conceive easily." She prods and feels my stomach again. "But I didn't tell you that."

"Um, okay."

"I can't communicate with your baby because there's no khui, but your body seems healthy enough. If you're getting sick in the mornings this early, it might be something to do with vitamins or electrolytes, which I'm clueless about." She lifts her hands and wiggles her fingers. "I'm practically a faith healer. But there's a fantastic herbal tea that the sa-khui make that helps with an upset stomach and you might try that."

"So there's nothing wrong?" I touch my stomach, still flat and completely normal looking.

"Not a thing." Veronica smiles up at me. "Extra nausea during pregnancy is normal when you're carrying a half-alien baby, I've noticed. Just take it easy and eat small bites of roots or porridge in the mornings."

"We haveporridge?" I'm stunned.

Veronica laughs and begins digging through a basket of supplies. "Don't get too excited—it's made from crushed seeds, but it still hits the spot pretty nicely. Do you want some hand-me-downs to wear? You look about the size I was before baby number two. I have some clothes that I no longer wear because my ass never recovered."

"Your ass is magnificent and I want to take a bite out of it," Ashtar calls from the other room in their tent, where he's watching their children. "Do not make me come over there and prove it to you."

"We're just talking," she yells back, a charming pink tinge flushing her cheeks. She pulls out a tunic with a decorative fringe and some flowers embroidered in the leather along the hem. "Try it on, see if it fits?"

Hours later, I'm wearing Veronica's soft, soft clothes, snuggled into a makeshift bed in a supply hut near the main firepit, where most of the cooking is done. There are baskets of roots and tea leaves stacked everywhere, and rolled up skins, along with piles and piles of bones that will be re-used to make utensils. There's barely room for a bed for us, a fact which leaves a lovely, kind woman named Gail absolutely chagrined. "Tomorrow morning, we're going to clean that hut out for the two of you. It's not right to make you have to sleep in our clutter. You can come stay with me and my mate Vaza tonight if you'd like."

It's sweet of her to offer, but after being around people all day, I kind of just want to be alone with Corvak, and I'm positive he feels the same. "The supply hut is more than generous, I promise."

We have a pallet of piled-up furs to sleep on, and a thin mattress made from feathers that goes on the stone-and-mortar floor. The moment the door-flap goes down and we pull the covers over our bodies, I'm hit with a wave of exhaustion. Corvak curls his arm around me, tugging me close, and I gratefully snuggle in against his chest.

"What do you think?" I ask in a low whisper.

His thumb strokes my bare arm under my short sleeve. "I think they like to talk a lot. And someone handed me food every time I made eye contact."

I smother my giggle, because he's not wrong. "We must look hungry and pitiful."

"But they are…kind," he admits. "And full of advice. And it is good advice. They are not all like Valmir."

Thank god for that. I'm sure Valmir is fine in small doses. I touch Corvak's bare chest. He's no longer wearing a deep rust-red tunic given to him earlier. It hangs on a hook nearby, and I have to admit, he looked really good in it. I don't know where it came from, though. I was pulled between people all day long, and I know he was, too. I pluck at his nipple, teasing. "They dressed you, too?"

He chuckles. "We must indeed look pitiful."

I sigh, because I know it has to wound his pride that we're taking handouts from people he considered enemies not so long ago. It was nice to not have to scratch out survival for a meal. To have a hot, delicious bowl of food handed to you. I don't mind working, but when there's no end in sight, it wears on you. I draw little circles on his chest, because he's quiet, and I don't want to influence his thoughts too much if he hates it here."I saw two women and a man attaching hides onto frames and scraping them. VeryClan of the Cave Bear,but I'd like to learn how to do that so we can make our own hides."

You know, just in case we don't stay.

"I want you to rest until you feel better," he says.

That doesn't tell me what he's thinking. "And…then we'll head off into the mountains again?"

He pauses in his stroking of my arm. "Do you want to?"

"I want to do what you want to do," I answer cagily, trying to keep emotion out of my voice. "I don't want to stay if you're miserable. We need to do what's best forbothof us. I'm willing to leave if that's what you need to be happy. I'm not emotionally attached to being here, but I do know that I'm going to be miserable as hell if you leave without me."

Corvak rolls over in bed to face me. His gaze locks onto mine, and he traces my jaw with his fingers. "I would never leave you behind.Never."

A knot forms in my throat. "Good."

"A few times today, I felt overwhelmed," he confesses. "There were so many people, so many faces, and everyone wanted to talk to me…and I did not know what to say. I do not know how to make friends."

"Just be yourself. Look at Valmir. He's not trying to impress anyone. He's an asshole and he doesn't give a shit. And they didn't kick him out. He's part of their family as much as anyone else."

He chuckles. "I noticed. I just…I want to be good at this. I want us to be a good family. I don't want you to feel disappointed in me."

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