~

Chapter Fifty-three

~

So I got her on the jet. She wasn’t sayin’ much, which is scary for a hen. But I appreciated the quiet. I think her papa should’ve come with her. Just like Ike needs support, she needs some too. But I’m not too bright about folk, so I could be wrong.

Maybe better he headed to talk to some OI president about a job. Jobs are important too. Not like as a nine-to-fiver he’s independently wealthy and can go off and create a new life on his own.

That thought may have been arrogant of me. Maybe I have too much pride in what I’ve accomplished. Created.

“Ya doin’ okay?” Jam asked me. I hate my thoughts bein’ interrupted. He whispered, “Have ya givin’ her any kudos?”

I shot him a look, best I could with the stiff neck and huge bandage. “What?”

“She’s kinda beaten down lookin’,” he whispered.

“I’m four feet away,” she said from across the aisle.

Who knew ogres could hear so well. I thought it’s kinda loud in here at cruisin’ speed. Maybe my concussion. Maybe I needed to pop my ears. I dropped my jaw, to find out, but that hurt. Everythin’ hurts. I’d stay with pressurized ears.

“So, ya’re not beaten down?” I asked.

She didn’t look my way. “Why would I feel beaten down?”

“He said it. Not me.”

“Ya stink,” Jam said. “Tell her she’s doin’ the right thin’.”

Didn’t she just hear him before? Besides, I’m not certain she’s doin’ the right thin’. Bliar reported back that his fool youngling had accepted his demand. So they would be together, to work, together.

I’m about fifty-percent certain it’s the right thin’. All the other options ranked less than ten-percent.

She didn’t think I was doin’ some henish matchmakin’ thin’, would she?

She asked why I thought it was the right thin’ to do. I had no answer she’d like, except that it felt right. Considerin’ how little she values my opinion, she’d need a better reason. So I thought about it.

“If ya’re havin’ to think about it, I’m gonna kill ya,” she said.

“The way I’m feelin’, it won’t take much to put me outta my misery. And it would be appreciated.” What’s with troll doctors and their aversion to pain killers?

Jam, who had leaned forward to look at her across the narrow aisle, ruffled his brow up somehow. May be a troll way to pop their ears, whatta I know.

She finally shifted in her seat to look at me. “So ya have no idea. Ya’re just poppin’ off yar mouth as usual.”

“Usually, I have a perfectly good architectural design sittin’ in front of me to refer to for answers. None of us have one of those right now. Ya don’t. Ike don’t. Bliar don’t either. More important to figger what ya think ya could add to the situation one minute at a time, and then do it.”

“Ya sounded really confident when ya were tellin’ me what to do,” she whined.

“I come across confident, sometimes,” I said.

“I liked ya better when ya kept yar mouth shut because ya couldn’t get words out.”

“Amen,” Jam mumbled.

I didn’t have the energy to give him the eye. Couldn’t turn my head that sharp, anyway.

My hand caressed the smooth curve of the cane the hospital gave me. I should hit ’em both with it.

The shiny ebony reminded me of the heirloom bow the elder Ike had crafted five hundred years ago, which hung above Grandpa’s mantle. I tried to count generations. Think that made the elder Ike my grandpa’s great grandpa. That’s a lot of grands.

~

Nuel

~

My emotions and thoughts remained all over the map. Jam, despite his good intentions, wasn’t helpin’ in the slightest. Learnin’ Kriz is as confused as me, was a sucker punch in the gut. Sittin’ here this long, I’d think some sense would be comin’ to me, but nothin’ was.

I think I intentionally baited Kriz to battle, but he didn’t bite. Pretty sure he didn’t have the energy. He still looked a lot like a character in a comic strip. Flattened by a semi. Then run over again. Lit on fire. Put out with a club.

So an all-out fight wasn’t gonna help me figger thin’s out. The hen to my left ignored the view out her window, was readin’, so she agreed to exchange seats with me. Hopefully I wouldn’t be able to hear their whispers, as I gawked at the snow-covered peaks below.

Wow. It’d been three hours already. The pilot would be nosin’ down for the Lake in a few. Probably already was. I equalized my ears with a forced yawn, and the pitch of the cabin noise sharpened.

As the sleek jet pummeled down the short runway thirty minutes later, I hoped my eyes wouldn’t continue to well up every ten minutes, like they had been. As we taxied, I texted Papa that I’d arrived safe. He replied back with a heart emoticon. Bulls are good at keepin’ unnecessary commentary to a minimum. That is one positive constant in the universe.

The copilot dropped the forward door and the cold rushed in. Bitter cold I hadn’t expected. It felt nearly summer up North. The other eight passengers hurried to exit. Everyone’s eyes cocked different than they had two weeks ago, human and giant. Jam grabbed my duffle for me. I waited with Kriz, who would’ve gotten run over by a sleepy sloth.

By the time Kriz clamored down the four steps carefully with his cane, the others had already grabbed their larger bags and disappeared into the terminal.

It amused me, no, touched me how Jam hovered inches away from Kriz to anticipate his every need. That relationship sure had changed. What would it feel like between me and Ike?

Zia was there, squealin’, flappin’ her wings to fly off, stressed that she couldn’t grab Kriz and swing him around with joy. I would kill to feel that much joy, seein’ Ike. Or die, to know Ike felt like that about me. Probably more the latter. Didn’t know if that’s a character flaw, or not.

Zia’s red toenails shined from the ice she stood on. Made me smile. It was stinkin’ freezin’ and the hen was still barefoot. Finally done crushin’ her tusks into Kriz’, she gave Jam an energetic hug, then looked my way, with an absence of confidence, whether I’d welcome a familiar greetin’.

It wounded me a bit. But it’s my fault. I’m a horrible ogre. I pulled deep down to spread a smile on my face, and reached out my good arm.

The hen lifted me and spun me around once, before ploddin’ me in the head with a tusk, like one would a siblin’. And just like that my eyes welled up again. Had nothin’ to do with the bruise on my scalp. Maybe some. A little for the pain she inflicted in my shoulder.

If I can help it, I’m never gonna get shot again.