Thorns of Decision (Dusk Gate Chronicles) (21 page)

 Linnea rolled her eyes. “There’s always some excuse for not just coming out and taking a chance, isn’t there? I’d go on a walk with him. Or a horseback ride.”

“So why don’t you ask him?”

Linnea raised her eyebrows. “Do girls do that in your world? Ask boys?”

She shrugged. “Some girls.” She hadn’t. Abigail had. “Maybe more should.”

“I don’t know. Here it would be weird, definitely. I’d scare him off for sure. And I think enough boys are already scared after they heard that Tolliver asked to court me. Things have dried up quite a bit since then.”

“Well, you don’t need a hundred boys, Nay. Just the right one.”

“Is William the right one for you?”

Crap.
She should have been more careful about letting
that
conversation circle back. “I don’t know, Nay. I like him. We’re courting.”

“Can you imagine a future with him? More than just courting?”

Quinn swallowed hard. What was it with Linnea – and Thomas – pushing her thoughts to the future instead of staying grounded in now?

Being inside her own head was challenging enough. Although she’d tried her hardest
not
to let her mind go beyond the present, if she was honest, it had. The other night, they’d been in the common room after dinner, all of them just hanging out, and William had been holding baby Hannah, lifting her over his head, blowing raspberries on her tummy as she giggled wildly, and Quinn’s imagination had slipped just a little too far into an unlikely future. It hadn’t helped when he’d looked up at Quinn, his eyes meeting hers, smiling the lopsided smile that made her heart turn into a puddle in her chest.

“Yeah, Linnea, sometimes I can.”

When the first houses outside of Mistle Village came into view, Quinn sucked in a breath at the familiarity. She hadn’t been to the little village since her first trip to Eirentheos, but at the sight of the first little stone house with smoke curling from its chimney, she knew she could have led Dusk all the way to the other side of the village, to the paddock outside the clinic without any further directions.

A thrill of recognition and excitement rippled through her middle when the low, white building appeared in front of them, and Dusk and Snow followed the wagons through the opening in the wooden fence. Jacob and William brought both wagons right up in front of the big, covered porch while Quinn and Linnea walked their horses around the side of the clinic, continuing through the large, grassy paddock until they were just outside the small stable in the back.

Essie came out almost as soon as they had dismounted, and Quinn smiled as soon as she saw the familiar brown braid that had fallen over the shoulder of Essie’s simple, cotton dress. On her first trip here, Quinn had spent a lot of time helping Essie in her kitchen and around the clinic, and she’d come to like Jacob’s young, energetic wife who was also a healer.

 “How was your trip?” Essie asked, stepping right in to help unbuckle Dusk’s saddle. “I was starting to get worried it might rain while you were still traveling.”

“It was really nice, actually,” Linnea said, though now she was rubbing her arms against a breeze that had picked up. “Although, I think we really are going to get a storm here, soon. We should probably get the horses settled in their stalls.”

Essie nodded, moving toward the wagon with the children. “I made some stew and fresh bread for lunch. Come on inside when you’re finished.”

*          *          *

When the storm did hit, less than half an hour after they made it inside Jacob and Essie’s warm, homey kitchen, it was unlike anything Quinn had ever seen.

Growing up in the mountains of Colorado, she had experienced more than her share of blizzards, and sometimes in the summer they would get sudden, heavy rains that led to flash flood warnings in the small canyon area where Bristlecone was located, but the storm that raged outside the little clinic was a new experience.

While William and Jacob worked to get Eldon Hardridge settled in one of the small bed areas in the clinic, Linnea, Quinn, and Essie had taken the children into the half of the building that made up Jacob and Essie’s home. They brought Payla into the cozy living room for now, though she was made to rest on the couch, and Essie brought over a steaming mug of clear broth for her to drink.

When the first ominous, pitch-black clouds had appeared on the horizon, Quinn and Linnea followed Essie outside, and ran the entire circumference of the wraparound porch, closing heavy, wooden shutters over all of the windows.

They’d just gotten inside, and Essie was getting a fire going in the living room hearth when the first roar of thunder shook the house, causing the dishes in the cupboards to rattle. Quinn shivered at the noise.

The older children, and the tiny toddler, George, didn’t seem too bothered by the crashing and banging overhead, but little Arianna, who was three, cowered in the corner of the couch, tears brimming over the edges of her eyelids.

When a new sound started, the heavy pattering of millions of raindrops slamming against the wooden roof, Arianna began to cry in earnest.

Quinn was a little freaked out herself, especially when the wind began whipping across the outside walls, and the heavy shutters knocked against the window frames. Climbing up on the couch next to the little girl, she pulled her into her lap.

“Hey, sweetheart,” she said. “Everything’s okay. We’re all okay.” After a few minutes, the little girl relaxed into her lap, her head against Quinn’s shoulder, and they sat there, staring at the flickering flames of the fire while the storm raged outside. Nearby, Linnea had pulled out a deck of cards and was playing a game with the three older children, and George had toddled into the kitchen with Essie. Quinn could hear her in there asking him to hand her plates and spoons as she washed the dishes.

These kinds of storms must be commonplace in Eirentheos.

Another roar of thunder boomed overhead. It was enough to make the couch underneath her shift an inch or so across the floor. Arianna clutched tightly to Quinn’s shirt, and as she did, an unexpected emotion slammed into Quinn with a thud that resounded more deeply that even the thunder outside.

She was homesick.

Suddenly, more than anything else in the world, she wanted to be in the cozy living room of her own house, with soft snow falling on the lawn outside, visible through windows that weren’t shuttered closed. She wanted her own little sister to be curled on her lap, reaching her hand up into her hair the way she always did, stroking the back of Quinn’s neck.

She missed the comforting sound of the television, even if it was only on so that Annie could watch Fireman Sam while she snuggled with Quinn. She wanted to be able to look over across the room and see her sweet little brother, Owen, buried in one of his non-fiction books, oblivious to the world around him, but there. She wanted to make some popcorn in the microwave and text Abigail on her cell phone, to hear the latest news about Adam.

She wanted her mom – to be able to tell her mom about the day she’d had, about the way Dusk had snuffed impertinently when she’d put her in the stable, refusing to acknowledge Quinn until she’d held out an apple.

She didn’t want to be here, an hour horseback ride and who knew how many days away from everything that was familiar.

She didn’t realize that tears had started dripping down her cheeks until the door between the living room and the clinic opened, and William walked in. As soon as he saw her, his face changed, taking on a look of concern. He looked around the room at everyone engaged in their various activities, and then at the little girl in her lap, still staring into the fire, oblivious to Quinn’s tears.

“Hey guys,” he called to the kids. “Your dad is all settled in now. Why don’t you all run in and see him?”

As soon as Arianna had jumped off her lap and run into the other room, William took Quinn’s hand and whisked her off to the guest bedroom down the hall where she and Linnea had stowed their belongings. By the time they got there, the stream of tears had turned into a torrent, and she was crying in earnest, great heaving sobs keeping time with the rumble of thunder outside.

William didn’t say a word. Instead, he wrapped his arms around her and held her tight against his chest, rocking slowly back and forth and stroking her hair. She cried and cried, until she didn’t think she could cry anymore, but as soon as she pulled back from him just a little, another sob broke loose from the depths of her gut, and a fresh wave of tears burst out, completely uncontrolled.

Finally, finally, when her eyes were red and raw, and there was a dull ache in the back of her throat, she was able to draw in a ragged breath, pull herself back and look at him.

“I’m ... I’m sorry,” she said, tracing her finger against the enormous damp circle in the middle of his shirt. “I don’t even know what that was.”

He put his finger under her chin, gently tipping her face upwards until she was looking into his eyes, which reflected a sense of understanding that sent an entirely new emotion rippling down through her, all the way to her toes. “Missing home?” he asked.

Her eyes widened. “How did you...”

His smile so gentle, so relaxed that she felt completely safe with him as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a handkerchief, using it to dab the last few tears from her cheeks. “Let’s just say I’m a little familiar with that kind of storm,” he said. “Are you feeling any better now?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I’m not crying anymore, anyway. I think I just feel drained.”

He took her in his arms again, running his fingers down her back. “That sounds about right,” he murmured against her hair.

It was better, standing there wrapped in his arms, her ear against his chest so she could hear his heartbeat, even if it was a little damp.

“How do you do it all the time?” she asked, the sound of her voice muffled by his shirt.

“What?”

“Leave home, stay in another world and miss everything that’s going on with your family?”

He combed his fingers through the thick waves of her hair. “It’s not easy, Quinn. It’s never been easy. And, even though, in reality I do miss a lot of time with my family, I’ve never actually been in your world for as long of a time as you’ve been here. I’ve never been away from my own world for more than five nights. I’ve honestly wondered before how you were doing so well with it.”

She looked up at him, frowning.

“It’s kind of the opposite problem, isn’t it?” he asked. “While your family isn’t off living life without you, you’re still stuck here for a really long time, without all of the things you’re used to. With me ... yeah, I miss what’s going on here, but I don’t have to feel it so much. I pretty much only ever spend the night in your world on school nights, and I’m home for at least twenty days in between. You, on the other hand, have spent
so much
time away, and you’ve barely been home more than a few nights running, ever since you came back here for Simon’s wedding. I wondered when it was going to get to you.”

“I hadn’t thought of it that way,” she said.

Another enormous clap of thunder rattled the roof; the reverberations resonated deep inside her chest.

“There’s not going to be a tornado or something is there?”

“No.” He smiled. “We don’t usually get anything like that in this part of the kingdom. We do get some pretty amazing thunderstorms around this time of the cycle, though.”

“
Usually
?”

He leaned in and kissed the top of her head. “We won’t, Quinn. Relax. I kind of like heavy thunder, myself.”

She raised an eyebrow. “We don’t really get storms like this in Bristlecone.”

“Even in the summer?”