A Single Stone by Meg McKinlay Read Free Book Online

free hand. “Off you go.”
    As the girl scampered away, Irina passed the bottle to Kari. It was less than a third full, perhaps a dozen small spoonfuls. “Just a little at a time. Don’t let her hurry you. She’ll cry for more but you have to be firm. You have to–”
    “I know.” There was an impatient edge to Kari’s voice. No tunneller needed Irina to tell her about feeding schedules. About wanting more – always more – until eventually you learned to hold the hunger at arm’s reach so that it hovered outside you. Still there, but bearable. Worth it.
    As if on cue, the baby drew in a swift breath and wailed, an outraged sound that rang up to the ceiling timbers and spread out to fill the room.
    “She can smell it.” Irina motioned to a chair by the window. “Sit down. I’ll bring her in a minute.”
    When Kari hesitated, Irina clicked her tongue. “Go on. It won’t hurt her to wait.” She fussed with the baby for a few minutes, checking her wrappings and stretching the measuring tape against her, then carried her to the chair.
    Kari cradled the baby and scooped spoonfuls of milk into her mouth. The delicate lips pursed in and out in a sucking motion. Sometimes they knocked against the spoon, spilling droplets of milk across her cheeks and chin.
    When she had settled into a rhythm, Kari relaxed and sighed. “She’s so small.”
    Jena put a hand on Kari’s shoulder, gave her the slightest of squeezes.
    “I wonder if she’ll be a cleanskin?”
    “If the rock allows it.”
    “Of course,” Kari said quickly. “I just … I hope so. It would be easier.”
    They fell silent for a while, the only sound the occasional snort or splutter as Kari spooned drops of milk into the baby’s mouth. Jena placed a hand on the tiny head. It was so perfect like this, so right. There was something in her that wanted to close the circle – one hand on Kari, the other on the baby, making a space into which no one else could enter, if only for this moment.
    There was an odd movement, then, the baby’s scalp seeming to pulse beneath Jena’s hand. As her fingers probed gently, she remembered. There were thin plates here that took time to knit together. Until the bone sealed itself there was this fragile border between inside and out. And so you could feel it –
the heart beating in the head
. Was it her own papa who had told her this, or Papa Dietz? She had been so young when Kari’s family took her in she sometimes had trouble separating memories of one from the other. But she did know this: that it would take only the slightest pressure to rupture it. It made her queasy to think on it.
    She looked past Kari, through the window on the far side of the room. Light slanted through the open shutters and played across the nearby beds. Outside, people hurried past, heading for the centre of the village. A thin line of smoke rose above the Square and it was towards this that they flocked, but there was no threat this time, no cause for alarm.
    Kari inclined her head in the direction of Jena’s gaze. “Do you think they’ll roast a bird?”
    “Maybe two.” It had been a day. It was the least the village could do to welcome such a daughter.
    The baby began to fret. The bottle was empty. Kari dropped the spoon inside, where it came to rest with a hollow clatter. Then she smiled down at her sister, her arms tightening around her.
    “All gone,” she cooed softly. “No more.”

    “Another bowl?”
    Father knows what Lia’s answer will be. He ladles more stew from the pot without waiting for a reply.
    Lia breathes in the steam that rises from the glistening surface. The stew is mouth-watering – rich and full of flavour. Ripe tomatoes have coloured it a deep red and Father has added juicy chunks of orange and yellow peppers. Lia has seen where these grow; there is a farm on the other side of Shorehaven she passes on her way to the mountain. Brightly coloured vegetables stand in seemingly endless rows, their skins