Page 56 of Humans Don't Have Horns
She swears in frustration, pacing the tent again. “Why won’t Amada protect us from them, then? You are sending us on a suicide mission.”
Bahar, and even Kala, will fight in the battle. Kala is still breastfeeding. That is how desperate they are for warriors to fight. The Mongans are the only ones who still remember the Oblivion from their own experience and not from the made-up narrative Aldon spread. There is no more lethal predator than the demichads, and their quantities are alarming. So I understand why she is so concerned. The only one who doesn’t appear worried is Daton, but I’m not sure that testifies to his judgment. Heshouldbe worried.
Emek seems to give up on answers on my part and walks to step out of the tent. “You should talk to Niska. Try to make her hate you a bit less,” she says. I stare daggers at her and don’t bother to dignify her statement with a response.It’s not my job to make Daton’s girlfriends not hate me, I think bitterly.
***
That evening, as Daton and I sit below the stars, we barely talk. There is plenty to discuss. About the day’s events and the days to follow, but the quiet feels comforting. And I know he avoids talking to me about my sister and brother. He views them so badly that whenever he speaks of them, I feel compelled to defend them, even though I agree with most of what he says. And while I am disappointed in them both, I remember better versions of them. And there are parts of my mother in them, especially in Siean, that won’t let me give up on them completely.
“Emek came to me today. She’s scared. I had no way to make her feel less discouraged.”
He grunts, “Being scared won’t help her, and coming to you for answers she knows you can’t give her won’t help her either.”
I hate how at peace he is with all this. “But I should have answers. She said I’m sending you all on a suicide mission, and I can’t even contradict her.”
Daton huffs his dismissal. “War is unpredictable. Only a vain fool has answers for how it will end.”
“Still, I should be able to reassure them. To have a better plan than your warriors being at risk not only from the demichads but also from my own blood. It’s as if Amada couldn’t have chosen more poorly even if she had tried. Even my brother or my sister would have done a better job!” I exclaim in frustration.
He gives me a stern look, and says through his teeth, “The only reason your brother and sister still breathe is you.” I don’t like the meaning of his words at all. I don’t want to face how badly he wants to kill them. So I don’t respond. “The only reason the Aldonians, Renyans, and Kozaries arrived here is you. The only reason their entrails aren’t decorating the camp is also you. I don’t know what will happen in the battle, but there is literally no other Shavir breathing I would ever trust enough to go into that battle to begin with,” Daton says.
“Your trust has nothing to do with my role in Amada’s scheme,” I mutter. I feel like I hit a soft spot, because that gets him rigid.
“Despite common perception these days, I trust you and submit my people to your plan regardless of my feelings for you. I’m not a fucking teenager. For fuck’s sake. That whole thing with the salt. It makes sense to me. I’ve had enough unwanted opportunities to touch the gross things, to feel them. It’s like touching raw meat. But I would never have come up with that idea. Not in a million years.
“And you managed to bring back the horns from Renya and Kozari both. No matter how many of them I killed, I could never even get close to achieving something like that. And now they’re working together to create the water irrigation system.
“And you care, Lian, cared enough to learn our ways. Before the Oblivion, we lived among the Shavirs, and though we learned their language, their ways, we were never significant enough for anyone to make an effort to learn our language or our ways. And we are out of the swamps. Do you understand what that means? I could never protect them out of the swamps. The people see you, and they start hoping. Hoping that the Shavirs won’t always hunt us down like animals. That if we survive the battle, we could stay outside of the swamps. That things could get back to the way they were before the Oblivion. So that is why I have faith in you. It’s bigger than you and me. It’s more than just us.” He sounds super pissed now, but all that echoes in my mind is that he just said he has feelings for me.
I’m overwhelmed by his praise and faith. And the need to deflect the sudden intimacy overwhelms me so much that I mutter, “Emek also said I should try to make Niska hate me less.”
This distraction works in a way, because it annoys him even more. “Emek needs to mind her own fucking business. And leave Niska to me,” he grunts. “She’s acting like a fucking brat, but then, I’m to blame. I should have been a better father to her.”
“A father?” I almost choke on the words. Did he hide his daughter from me? I think I’m starting to hyperventilate.
He frowns at my outrage. “I adopted her after her mom took off. Forty years ago.” He shrugs.
“You never told me you have a daughter. How could you just skip that?” I cry out.
“I didn’t?” He scrubs the back of his neck as if trying to remember. I try to speak, but I’m too shocked to utter anything coherent. He has shared the most private sides of himself with me. I know in my gut that what he let me see is rare. Like a hidden treasure only I got to glimpse. I see how he keeps everyone at arm’s length. He’s aloof, even. I have no doubt he would kill and die for them. And still, I received a piece no one else did. Maybe I just imagined it though. Because this, to not mention something like this? I can’t wrap my mind around it.
“She’s my second, and she earned it in combat. But you know how people get, especially when a younger woman tops them. I guess itbecame a habit of mine not to act as if she’s my kin. I don’t know. And she’s been pissing me off too much. I didn’t feel like talking about it, I guess.” Then he frowns. “Wait, what did you think she was to me?” he asks as if it’s obvious she could only be his daughter and I was doing weird Shavir thinking here.
“Your lover,” I grunt. Even the word makes me sick. I’ve been reduced to this jealousy-stricken creature, for a man I refuse to be with.
“Don’t be ridiculous. She’s seventy years younger than me.” He sounds outraged.
“I’m almost thirty years younger than her,” I cry out.
“You’re a Shavir.” He shrugs dismissively. “You’re like a hundred and fifty years old in Mongan years.”
I slap him hard on the chest, which is rock-hard and doesn’t even budge.
“What’s that for?” He looks at me, baffled.
“Tell me everything about you being a father, you asshole.”
He bursts into laughter at my angry, demanding voice and rare use of curse words. It melts me every time, his laugh. I want to bottle it. I want to always make him smile and see his eyes light up. It’s the transformation from the darkest hour of a cloudy night to a starry night. The kind of night that envelops you with its silver light. And it scares me every time to realize it. It’s too much. How can I ever rebound when he hurts me again?
