He looked around, taking in the resources here. Not much but rock and dead wood to make a fire. That would do for tonight and at least there would be no animals to contend with in the dead lands. Tomorrow they would reach richer land.
“Can you collect wood for our fire? Whatever you can carry.”
“Yes,” she said, and, without hesitation, she set off.
He wasn’t afraid of her running off, where would she go? But it was probably a good idea to make certain she understood.
“Rowan,” he called out. He would call her by her name, not address her as breeder as they did at the colony.
She stopped and turned, probably noticing the tone of his voice. He covered the few paces between them and stood inches from her, his full height topping her by over a foot.
“Do not run. If you run and force me to chase you, I will punish you. I intend you no harm but you must do as I say and not cause me any trouble, do you understand?”
“Yes, I understand,” she said. “I did not intend to attempt escape. There is nowhere for me to go.”
He nodded and watched as she walked toward a fallen tree and began to break off brittle branches. He then went to collect the ax strapped to the wagon to chop larger pieces of wood.
* * *
He did not seem awful, Rowan thought. He hadn’t yet tried to have her and had even given her drink before he had taken any himself. Or perhaps he was testing if it were poisoned. No, that did not make sense. The colony would not poison a breeder. They were too valuable. Why did they give her to an outsider to mate with though? And why allow her to leave with him? Why not force them to breed at the colony?
She turned to look at Silas who worked behind her. He had taken his shirt off and was wielding an ax. His muscles rippled, his stomach, arms, and shoulders tight, his skin browned from the sun. The tattoo she had glimpsed earlier she saw in full now. It was red and black and the pattern covered half of his torso, the whole of one arm and the side of his neck, snaking around his side to take up a portion of his back as well. She wondered what it meant and also wondered how much it had hurt him. The closest thing she had seen to a tattoo was the laser tracking image over the locator chip Commander Norrin had had placed on her wrist. All breeders had one once they came of age during their examination.
She wondered what would happen to the captain, having to smile at how he had looked in the end, his pants down around his ankles, his penis shriveled after Silas’ attack. She hoped he got whipped publically but doubted that would happen. He deserved that and so much more and she wondered how much of what Captain Amro did to the breeders Commander Norrin already knew.
As she collected wood, she came upon a living tree some distance away. She smiled, recognizing the fruit. It was a delicacy, one that was abundant for two weeks of the year and then disappeared. She set the firewood down and walked toward it, her excitement growing. Pomegranates were not only delicious, they contained a memory for her, one of the few of her mother. She too was a breeder, or had been. She had died in her fortieth year after birthing seventeen children, only two of whom had been born breeders themselves. But her sister, the one other breeder, had died within a year of her birth. That was her mother’s last child. Rowan remembered that well, and preferred to remember the six years before it. Those were almost happy years. Even though her brothers and sisters were taken from them, she was allowed to stay with her mother, with the rest of the breeders.
She remembered eating pomegranates under the tree in the courtyard with her mother. Her baby sister was only seven months old then and her mother would squeeze the juice into her mouth to her sister’s absolute delight. Rowan smiled at the bittersweet memory, missing them both now.
“What are you doing?” came Silas’ voice from behind her, startling her.
She turned to look at him as he pulled his shirt on and was just able to meet his gaze.
“Pomegranates,” she said. “Help me gather them, they are precious fruit.”
Silas looked at them while she watched him, curious that he’d never seen them before. He plucked one from the tree and brought it to his nose to smell. She smiled and bent to pick up a fallen one that had split and tore it open, the red juices spilling from it, staining her hands and wrists.
“You eat the seeds,” she said to him. He watched her. “Like this.” She brought it to her mouth and bit into it, closing her eyes with pleasure as juice burst into her mouth. Wiping her face, she handed him the other half. “Try.”
He looked at it, hesitated for a moment, then brought it to his mouth. He made a sound of utter satisfaction a moment later. “They’re delicious,” he said, taking another bite. “We don’t have these by the village.”