Blood Red Road

don’t care, but I cain’t manage it. I turn my head away from her.
    It ain’t yer fault, I says. I’ll sort somethin out.
    I spend the rest of the mornin makin a dragger. I cut two of the springiest, strongest tree branches I can find. I lay ’em out on the ground an brace ’em crosswise with smaller branches to make it good an sturdy fer Em to lie on. I lash it all together with nettlecord rope. Then I make a yoke to go over my shoulders an pad it with our spare tunics.
    It’s ready by the middle of th’afternoon. I tie Emmi an our packs onto it. I swaddle my hands in cloth. The right one’s still sore from bein shot, so I wrap it in a clean bandage first. I don’t want it gittin worse.
    Then I start pullin. The dragger bumps an thumps over the ground, but Emmi don’t complain or whimper or cry. She don’t make a sound.
    The sun beats down. It’s merciless. Cruel. It makes me think cruel thoughts. Like:
    Why couldn’t they of killed Emmi, instead of Pa?
    Why couldn’t they of took Emmi, instead of Lugh?
    Emmi ain’t no use to nobody. Never was. Never will be.
    She’s slowin me down. Makin me lose time.
    My brain whispers. My heart whispers. My bones whisper.
    Leave her  …  leave her  …  walk away an leave her. What  …  to die? Don’t even think about it  …  she don’t matter  …  what matters is Lugh  …  go back to the cairn  …  head out across Sandsea  …  that’s the way they went  …  you could be there in a couple of hours if you walked fast  …
    I give myself a shake. Shut my ears to the whisperin. I cain’t leave Emmi. I gotta take her to Crosscreek to stay with Mercy.
    Lugh said I had to keep her safe. When I find him, I gotta be able to tell him that she’s okay. That I looked after her as good as him.
    As I pull the dragger behind me, I wonder where he is. If he’s afeared. If he misses me like I miss him.
    My missin him makes my whole body ache. It’s like … emptiness. Emptiness that’s beside me, inside me an around me, all the places where Lugh used to be. I ain’t never bin without him. Not fer a single moment from the day we was born. From before we was born.
    If they touch him, if they hurt him, I’ll kill ’em. Even if they don’t, I might kill ’em anyways, as punishment fer takin him.
    My shoulders ache. My hurt hand throbs. The sun beats down. I grit my teeth an make myself go faster.
    Why don’t Emmi cry? Why don’t she whine?
    I wish she would. Then I could yell at her.
    Then I could hate her.
    I push the mean thoughts away, deep inside to the darkest places of me, where nobody can see.
    An Emmi don’t cry. Not even once.

    Fifth day. Midnight.
    We lie on the ground, in a hollow beside the trackway. We’re wrapped in our dogskin cloaks. Emmi’s tucked herself into one side of me. Nero’s huddled on th’other side, fast to sleep, his head tucked unner his wing.
    It’s a warm spring night. A soft breeze lifts the hair on my forehead. In the distance, a wolfdog howls an another answers. They’re a long ways off. Naught to worry about.
    I stare up at the sky. At the thousands an millions of stars that crowd the night. I look fer the Great Bear. The Little Bear. The Dragon. The North Star.
    I think about Pa. About what he told us. That our destiny, the story of our lives is written in the stars. An that he knew how to read ’em.
    An then I think about what Lugh said.
    Ain’t you figgered it out yet? It’s all in his head. There ain’t nuthin written in the stars. There ain’t no great plan. The world goes on. Our lives jest go on  …  in this gawdfersaken place. An that’s it. Till the day we die .
    I think of Pa layin out his stick circles an doin his spells an his chants, tryin to make the rain come. How he kept sayin he read it in the stars, that the stars said the rain was comin an how the rain never did come.
    Well, not till after Pa was dead. Not till it was too late. That means eether Pa was readin the stars wrong or the stars was tellin him lies.
    Or maybe the truth is this. That Pa couldn’t read the stars because there ain’t nuthin there to read. An all his spells an chants was jest him bein so desperate fer rain that he’d try any old thing, no matter how crazy.
    I used to like lookin at the night sky. Liked to think how one day Pa might teach me to read what the stars had to say. Now they jest look cold an far away.
    I shiver.
    I reckon Lugh’s right. He always is.
    There ain’t nuthin written in