Chapter 9

Taylor

CW: death of a predator animal

Brexl was looking irritable and not at all relaxed as he scanned the forest while I searched the trees for mushrooms and the vines for berries. I’d never met anyone in my entire life who was so bad at taking a rest when they needed it.

His color had returned, and he was more active today than yesterday, but I still caught him holding his side and winching when he thought I wasn’t looking.

I plucked another berry off the vine and placed it in my satchel. When I turned to check on Brexl again, he straightened and let his arms that he had grumpily crossed over his chest fall to his sides.

With a sigh, I turned back to my work. I was happily harvesting another delicious mushroom when I heard a wet slicing sound followed by the yelp of a small animal. I ran thought the trees to find Brexl in his shifter form holding onto a dead rabbit-like creature.

This time, it was my turn to cross my arms over my chest with a sour expression on my face.

As soon as our eyes met his tail started to nervously thump the ground, and he wore a sheepishly apologetic expression much like a child who just got caught with their hand in the cookie jar.

“I didn’t move much. It was basically right in front of me.”

When I continued to stare at him, he added, “It would have been less restful to watch the animal scamper by instead of just going for the easy kill.”

I pinched the bridge of my nose and sighed.

“Sit.” I pointed to the fallen tree that he had been sitting on earlier, and he obediently sat down.

“Stay.” His shoulders slumped and he nodded his head.

“and thank you, for hunting that for us.” I couldn’t help but add. We did need food, and I wasn’t going to begrudge him for providing some.

Brexl gave me a proud smile before promising he’d stay put this time.

I returned to my work of gathering forageable food, but it wasn’t long before I heard the familiar wet slicing sound of Brexl’s claws sinking into an animal.

I huffed, and readied myself to deliver another speech on how important it is for an injured person to rest when I came out from behind a tree to find a dead jagwa hanging from his claws.

“Our foraging trip is over.” He said with a grimace that told me whatever he had to do to bring the jagwa down had caused him pain.

“That sounds good to me.” I swallowed hard as I watched blood from the animal’s neck drip down to the ground. It was a ferocious creature that resembled an earth jaguar, but instead of fur, it had thick green tendrils that resembled the vines that clung to nearly every tree in the forest. And yet there it was hanging from Brexl’s claws as if it were nothing.

His skill at killing things was unmatched by any of the other guys, and unfortunately for me, I had a weakness for a man with talent. His skills were impressive and on the few occasions that he’d threatened violence on my behalf, it excited me. I should probably unpack that sometime, but not today.

“Should we head back to the cave?” I suggested and Brexl nodded his head.

Once we’d returned to the spot we’d claimed on the beach, Brexl got to work skinning the animals and I laid out the mushrooms on a rock to dry in the sun.

Brexl had just finished skinning the rabbit and was about to start skinning the jagwa when I asked, “can you teach me how to skin an animal? I’ve watched you do it a of couple times now, but I’d like to learn the technique. I might be stuck alone in the woods sometime and get tired of surviving off of berries and mushrooms.”

“You’ll never be alone in the woods.” His tone was even, and measured and his expression was serious. I had meant it as a joke, but he did not take it as such.

It didn’t even take him half a day to rescue me from Scaron, I had no doubt that he could rescue me from anything or anyone.

“But I will show you how to skin an animal if you’d like.”

I watched as Brexl pointed to where he would cut the hide of the jagwa.

“If I cut it here, the skin will be harder to pull off, but here, down the middle, it will come off in one large piece instead of many smaller ones.”

“That makes sense,” I commented.

“Would you like to try?” Brexl beckoned me over and had me stand in front of him.

“You want to hold onto the pelt here and pull down.”

He placed his hand over mine, and together we pulled the pelt free from the meat and bones of the animal.

“You’re a natural,” he commented as we washed our hands in the ocean water.

“I’m not sure about that. You did most of the work.”

“You’re much better than I was when I first learned.” There was a hint of humor in his voice and a small smile that tugged at the side of his mouth.

“Uh huh, and how old were you when you learned how to do this, exactly?” I smiled back.

“My age is irrelevant,” he shrugged and smiled down at the ground.

“Irrelevant, my ass,” I laughed.

“I do not find your ass to be irrelevant at all.” His smile had grown even wider. He’d heard me use this phrase before, and he knew what it meant. He was being coy with me, and I was loving it.

“No? Neither do I.” I raised an eyebrow at him to playfully see where he would take the conversation.

He smiled and bashfully looked away.

I, too, looked out over the water, and although I knew it would be chilly, I still longed to take a dip. I hadn’t bathed in a few days, and I was feeling very grimy.

“Do you mind if I wash up in the water?”

Brexl nodded his head and I started to strip off my clothes. I laid them out on a nearby log and waded slowly into the cool depths.

It wasn’t as bad as I anticipated. It was only slightly chilly, instead of the cold water I’d expected to find.

I didn’t mind being naked in front of Brexl. We had a long life ahead of us, where we’d glow for each other every month. I didn’t want any awkwardness between us. So might as well get it out of the way now. I loved our little community, but everyone in our dekes was a gossip, and I wasn’t interested in Brexl and I being the top topic of conversation as we adjusted to our unique friendship.

I splashed the water onto my chest and face and peeked over my shoulder to find Brexl staring at me. He quickly looked away and busied himself with cleaning the jagwa.

“The water’s not bad. If you want to wash up, I won’t look,” I called over my shoulder.

I peered over at him again to find that Brexl had turned about three shades of dark blue.

“I’ll wash up later,” he called back.

“Suit yourself,” I replied as I dipped my hair into the water and ran my fingers through it in an attempt to get it clean.

I did the best I could to clean the rest of my body, and by the time I’d finished and gotten dressed, Brexl had started a fire and was roasting the meat for lunch.

“Can you watch the fire?” he asked as he adjusted a large bulge in his pants.

“Sure. Are you going somewhere?”

“I am going to get us some water from the stream.”

There was a small stream in the forest nearby where we’d refilled our water skins this morning. We hadn’t drunk much, so it was strange that he wanted to refill them already.

“Okay, I’ll stay here.”

Brexl gave me a tight nod and walked into the forest. It wasn’t until he disappeared through the trees that I noticed he’d forgotten the water skins.