Page 46 of Rauf: Minotaur Mates

I heated up water in the kettle and made tea.

Two cups. I left mine on the counter and took the other outside before I could talk myself out of it.

The chair was empty. It had been moved away from the door and angled toward the street, and the blanket sat neatly folded on the seat. Rauf was nowhere in sight.

I looked across the road, then along it in both directions. People were starting their day. A man carried a crate past the corner without giving me a second glance.

At least he’d used the blanket. I left the tea beside mine on the counter, then brought in the blanket and chair. I drank the warmer cup while I found something to eat.

With nothing better to do, I took my bag and went to Otho’s. He’d have work for me, and if anyone knew what was happening, it would be someone at the clinic. I could be useful and nosy at the same time.

Otho handed me a stack of clean cloths almost as soon as I walked in.

“Put those away, then come give me a hand.”

I did as I was told. For once, I was glad someone knew what I should be doing.

The news found me before I had to ask. A minotaur sitting with his boot off was complaining about the men who’d gone out to the cave that morning. Otho was cleaning a sore place on his lower leg.

“Kazan too?” I asked, pausing beside the open cupboard.

“Kazan, Lorkin, Zarcal. Korfas took half the males I passed on the way here.” The patient shifted his foot and earned a sharp look from Otho. “The Butchers are showing them where to go.”

“Rauf went with them?”

Otho held out his hand for another cloth. “He’s leading them.”

I gave him one and turned back to the cupboard. Of course Rauf had gone. I’d told him to find the guy, hadn’t I? I just hadn’t thought about him spending the night outside our house and then heading straight back to that cave.

“I’m not sure I’d trust a Butcher at my back,” the patient muttered.

“Oh, shut it,” Otho snapped. “Without them, we wouldn’t have this planet and you know it.”

The man looked away. I finished putting the cloths on the shelf a little more slowly than I needed to.

The question was burning on the tip of my tongue. Why were they called Butchers? What made them so different than everyone else? But it felt like prying.

If anyone was going to tell me, I wanted it to be Rauf.

Otho kept me busy for the rest of the day. I fetched supplies, helped clean up between patients, and listened to a man insist that his hand didn’t hurt while refusing to let either of us touch it.

I managed whole half hours without thinking about Rauf. I only knew because I’d look at the time when I caught myself wondering whether he was back yet.

By the time Otho let me go, I was hungry and looking forward to sitting down. I walked home thinking about what we had in the kitchen and whether Robin would be up for finding something at the market instead.

The front door wasn’t quite shut.

I pushed it open and stopped.

Every cupboard in the kitchen hung open. A sack lay on the counter beside empty shelves, with a trail of grain spilling from a split seam. Plates had been knocked onto the floor and broken. The chair I’d brought in that morning was on its side by the doorway.

“Robin?”

No answer.

I took a step inside. The drawers beneath the counter had been pulled open. Cloths and utensils lay in a heap where someone had swept them out of the way. The folded blanket was gone from the chair.

“Julia?”