Page 79 of These Immortal Truths
The line of his jaw softens, a flash of regret before he closes his eyes. “Don’t be ridiculous. You know that’s not how I meant it.”
“But that’s what you said,” she retorts, the accusation sharp. “So, am I a responsibility or not?”
“You’re more. You must know that. I’ve made my feelings for you no secret.”
“More,” she echoes. “But, under everything else, that’s still what I am to you.” She shakes her head, retreating another step. “I don’t want to be your responsibility, Khiran. I want to be your equal.”
He has no response.
Even if he did, Anna’s not sure she’d hear it. She turns on her heel, slams the bedroom door loud enough for it to echo the anger in her heart. Her shoulder blades press against the wood, her body slipping to the floor. No footsteps follow. Anna’s not sure if she’s more relieved or heartbroken.
Eira’s voice is soft, a murmur she can barely catch. “Perhaps it’s best for you to stay away for a bit. Give her some time.”
Anna feels the weight of his answering silence long after he’s left.
Eira adamantly refuses to tell her what Khiran’s hiding. The first time Anna asks, all she receives is an exasperated glare for her trouble. The second time, Eira sighs. “He would never forgive me. Do you understand how steep a price that becomes when we live as we do?”
When Anna first came under Eira’s care, she didn’t—couldn’t—but time is the best teacher.Neverbecomes so much heavier when eternity is stretched out before you.
Anna doesn’t ask again.
Instead, she focuses on the children. Her task is simple: travel Eira’s paths and lead the hungry and abandoned back. It sounds far easier than it is. She knows now why Khiran tried to steer her away—can see the mercy in it.
Anna has lived through famine, but she has never been forced to confront its horrors so directly. In France, she had stuck to the fields and forest and avoided the larger cities and towns almost completely. The worst she witnessed was the hunger in Piers’ face, and the pain of knowing he was left to die alone in the woods so that his family’s plates would be a little less empty. Anna has always been limited to one place, one tragedy, at a time.
Eira’s paths give her no such luxury.
There are bodies lining the streets, skeletal remains with eyes open and staring. The living walk by them numbly, dust kicking up behind their bare feet, balancing on the brink of starvation themselves. Anna knows, without needing to ask, why so many are without shoes. She can see it in their bony faces, in the bloated bellies of the children, and knows they sacrificed the leather to feed their stomachs.
Every day leads her somewhere new. A new town. A new country. Many are under Soviet Russia’s control. One day, the trail takes her to Samara, and Anna makes the mistake of going too close to town. Close enough to see what’s being sold as food. Anna’s stomach lurches, barely making it far enough out of eyesight before retching behind a tree. She knows the image of butchered limbs will haunt her for lifetimes.
Anna has seen hunger—has felt it—but never like this.
She coaxes orphaned children from the shadowed corners of the streets with biscuits from her pockets and the promise of more should they follow. Only the young ones, Eira warned her. The ones too young to recognize the magic working under their feet. Some of them don’t trust her intentions enough to come with her. Most of them are too hungry, too desperate, to risk staying. Some of them are so weak, Anna has to carry them back herself. The pressure on her heart feels heavier than the weight of their bodies.
A month later, Anna looks over the dozens of children sprawled out in the living room—a patchwork of yarn and quilts decorating the floor—and feels her stomach twist.
“There’s too many,” Anna breathes, heart seizing. “What will we do when there’s no more room?”
“We’ll need tents.”
It’s a good solution for now, when the days and nights are warm enough to feel comfortable, but Anna remembers how unforgiving the winters can be. The thought of an army of half-starved children camping in the meadow while the snow falls thick enough to bury them makes her heart lurch. “And in winter?”
Eira is silent for so long, Anna fears her answer. “The older ones will stay until the weather turns. Then we’ll have to send them off.”
“Send them off?” Anna echoes, horrified. “Back into the jaws of starvation? You may as well place them between the teeth of wolves.”
“Not back,” Eira says, shaking head. “Elsewhere. Somewhere unaffected by the famine. Somewhere warm.”
“You’re suggesting we abandon them to a foreign country andexpect them to find a way to survive? We’d be leading them into more heartache and misery.”
“We’d be giving them a chance.” Eira’s face is sympathetic—Anna can see the truth haunting her eyes. “We can’t save them all. Youknowthis.” She brings an aged hand to her temple, turning her back to the children lining the floor and heading into the kitchen.
Anna follows, unable to let the conversation die. “We can’t just leave them to fend for themselves, Eira.”
“If you have any ideas, I’m open to hearing them,” she grumbles, reaching for the jar of her favorite summer tea blend. “Until then, kindly spare me the lecture.”
“I’ll stay with them. If I know it, I can teach them the local language—”
