Heart Journey by Robin Owens Read Free Book Online

more north than she’d been for a while. The roads were smooth for foot and glider and PublicCarrier traffic.
    She breathed deep of the city air, with city scents. Smells of Earthan and hybrid flowers that didn’t grow well in the wild, cut and trimmed hedges that had a subtly different fragrance than when they tangled outside the city.
    Shunuk caught up with her as she turned down the road bordering Straif T’Blackthorn’s estate. She hadn’t seen her Fam this morning. Now he trotted beside her, mouth open as if laughing.
    “I hope you had a good evening,” she said.
    I did, he said. His tongue lolled. Many excellent, intelligent fox in the city. Good to hunt with, good to share food, good to talk with.
    “I’m glad.”
    You’re not. He gave a short bark. But I love you best.
    “Glad someone does.” She’d been having doubts about Raz Cherry as a travel companion. He’d gloried in the applause of the show she’d seen last night. And he’d done extremely well, was a superb actor.
    It annoyed her that she was having doubts about anything.
    Doubts about Helendula, too. When Straif Blackthorn had returned Del’s scry this morning, he’d told her that he and his HeartMate, Mitchella, had come to love Helendula and wanted to adopt her.
    That statement had closed Del’s throat even as she studied the landscape globe she’d made for the child during her long and restless night. She’d stood, stunned, options crashing through her mind, unable to puzzle out what she felt. She’d been getting accustomed to the thought of having a child, working on how she’d fit little Helendula into her life. How she could compromise to give them both what they needed.
    Then Straif had pressed for her to come and see them, meet Helendula. Gestured to the background of the scry where his wife held a toddler. The baby Del had hardly known was gone, had become a child with a tragedy in her past.
    Would it be selfish or selfless if Del left Helendula with the Blackthorns?

Four

    S hunuk wove a pattern in front of Del, drawing her mind back to the present. He angled his narrow muzzle at her. I heard that your kit has found a home with folk who take abandoned kits.
    Del winced. If she’d been in town, she’d have cared for Helendula. She hadn’t meant to abandon the baby. The thought hurt. At least there had been gilt enough to give the child the best. She owed Straif a big debt, but she didn’t owe him Helendula.
    Shunuk coughed and Del understood that he wanted more than a grunt as an answer. “That’s right,” she said. “You remember Straif T’Blackthorn? He joined us a few times when we were on the road. Made me set up a permanent message cache at the Steep Springs communications center.”
    The man who smelled like celtaroon leather and wood shavings and grief. You played with him.
    Del chuckled. “Yes, I did.” Drawing her brows together, she looked down at Shunuk. “He’s mated for life now, so be careful when we meet them.”
    Another short bark. I am not going into T’Blackthorn Residence.
    Del stopped. “Don’t you want to meet Helendula?” She’d been counting on Shunuk for support.
    Young child will smell like all other young children. His nose wrinkled.
    After a deep breath, Del said, “We may be taking that young child with us on some trips.”
    A ripple went down the fox’s back from neck to tail. Maybe. May stay here in Druida—
    “No!”
    Kit may stay with Blackthorns. I will meet her when she becomes our kit.
    Before she could say any more he raced to the greeniron gates set between high brick walls and slid through a gap between the bars that appeared too narrow for him.
    Del stopped at the gate, touched a scrystone in a pillar, cleared her throat, and said, “Helena D’Elecampane to see Straif and Mitchella Blackthorn and my cuz, Helendula Elecampane.”
    “You are expected,” the Residence said in a voice deeper than Straif’s.
    She bowed reflexively as she would to anyone who’d