Unfamiliar Territory

“You’re lying.” Gust spat at the ground as he said it. A new favorite ‘quirk’ of his, I could only guess. “Daddy would never leave us with you, fox.”

He stood between me and the rest of the kids. When I took a step forward, one of the younger girls flinched and Gust brandished his stick. Twig or not, he knew how to make that thing hurt. And I was still in no condition to fight him off, as sad as that was.

I held up a hand. “Look, Gust, right? Your dad has to work and Kat is gonna be...out for a while. So—”

“She’s out to kill your ally,” he sneered.

“Hornroot is not my ally!” I insisted, patting my chest with my free hand, the other firmly gripping his grandfather’s cane. “He scratched me up and called me names, if you’ll remember.”

“Just a stupid trick.” Gust shrugged and gave me the most irritating smirk I had ever seen. “Probably one of your ideas, fox.”

“Yeah, nice try, fox!” one of the other boys piped in, no doubt growing confident in his older brother’s shadow.

I ran a hand through my hair. It was like high-school again. Only I was getting picked on by kids nearly ten years younger than me.

But I was still at a physical disadvantage. If they all ganged up to beat on me, I wouldn’t be able to put up much of a struggle.

Gust took a step towards me, holding the stick in his hands like a sword.

I took a step back. Maybe he had the same idea.

“No, daddy wouldn’t leave you here—alone with us—unless...” He didn’t finish. He didn’t need to. He had the same idea.

“Get ’em, Gust!” the boy who spoke up before jeered.

“Make sure you really stick it to him,” one of the girls joined in, grinning at her own terrible joke.

Gust charged me. He was fast for a kid with short legs. It didn’t help that I stumbled in my panic to get away. The cane slipped from my hands and my legs almost immediately gave out on me.

I was on the ground—weak and defenseless—as the manic child closed the distance with his stick.

“Die, fox!”

“Gust, stop it! I am very disappointed in you!”

He almost stumbled in his haste to come to a halt. The stick flew from his hand, hitting the grass just a few feet away from me. I caught a quick look at his face—pale. His dark eyes grew wide before he turned on the one who shouted. One of his sisters, the oldest in appearance, with red bows in her hair.

“Why’d you say that?” he asked, his shoulders shaking. I could hear the heat in his words. “Maple, why did you say that?”

Maple gripped her small hands together. It was the only sign that she was nervous. Otherwise, her feet were planted firmly in the ground and she looked back at her brother without flinching or blinking. It reminded me of how Kat once stood up to her classmates.

“B-Because!” she returned.

Okay, maybe not exactly like Kat. She would have had a better come-back.

Gust reached down, grabbed his stick, and started advancing on Maple in quick strides. He moved so fast I didn’t have a chance to think of what to say before he was in her face.

“Don’t talk like mom!” he shouted. Maple flinched, but he didn’t stop. “You think cause you’re the oldest that you know better, but you don’t! Daddy told me what you did. You gave that...that...” He pointed his stick back at me. “You gave that fox Lionel! You’re stupid, Maple! You’re stupid, stupid, stupid! You let that fox trick you cause you’re stupid and cause you don’t really care about mom!”

Maple lowered her eyes to the ground. My heart sank. She had shown weakness. She had given Gust just what he needed. He was already starting to stand a little straighter as he got closer to her face.

“I bet you were glad she left. I bet you think you can be daddy’s favorite now that she’s gone!”

Their brothers and sisters wouldn’t say anything. One of the girls was holding their youngest brother, a toddler, and she looked more scared than Maple. The other two—twins’ maybe, by how very similar they appeared—just watched Gust scream. Maybe they looked uncomfortable, but they wouldn’t say anything.

Whether they’re kids, teens, or adults, people didn’t get involved unless it directly affected them. There were a lot of students who had their fun making up jokes or stories about the Tea Drinkers, who were rough with me or Mary, but how many more just kept their mouth closed and looked the other way? They were no better than the ones who did the bullying. Bullies by association. Bullies for standing there, for looking the other way.

“You’re stupid. You think you can be mommy, but you can’t!”

I gritted my teeth. My fingers dug in the dirt. I could move my legs and arms—I didn’t know how, but I could stand on my own. Gust half turned to me, fear and surprise written on his face.

Good, let’s see how he liked it.

“Hey, Gust, why don’t you—”

There was a sound—a familiar sound—like a weak thunderclap. I tensed in reflex and brought a hand to my face. But there wasn’t a stinging pain that followed.

No, this time, someone else had been slapped.

Gust was on the ground, holding a hand to his cheek. Even from where I stood behind him, I could see the already reddened skin beneath his hand. That would hurt for awhile.

The twins gasped in unison, something I would have found funny if it were under different circumstances. The other girl had buried her face in the toddler’s stomach, her younger brother taking the opportunity to pull at her long, wavy hair.

“Why...Why did you...” Gust sniffed.

I had to take a moment to register the sound. Was he crying? Well, if he was younger than Maple, he couldn’t be older than nine. I had almost forgotten that he was still a kid. I looked down at my fists and unclenched him. Just what had I planned to do?

“That hurt!” Gust exclaimed, pounding his free hand into the ground. “Why did you do that?!”

“Cause you’re stupid,” Maple said. Her hand had fallen to her side. It was trembling, but I saw no regret in those dark eyes as she stared down at her younger brother. I was sure he could see it as well because he did not say anything back.

They stared at one another in silence for a few moments more before Maple walked around him—towards me. I stiffened as she approached—not sure why, maybe reflex—and almost fell back to the ground.

Whatever strength I had before was quickly draining away. Maple grabbed my arm before I had another embarrassing spill. Her grip was surprisingly strong. With one hand still holding me, she kneeled down and picked up the cane. She only let go of me after I was firmly holding it in both hands.

“Be careful with grandpa’s cane,” she said, barely louder than a whisper. Her head was down. She hadn’t once looked up from the ground.

“Yeah, sorry. I will.”

She nodded. “I’m going inside,” she said, louder, so her siblings could hear. Without another word, she walked past me and stepped inside the cabin, quietly closing the sliding glass door behind her. Part of me wished she had slammed it.

The others followed after her. The twins shot me ugly looks as they passed, the youngest girl kept her head down like Maple, and the toddler was still preoccupied with her hair.

Gust had gotten to his knees but didn’t seem inclined to move further. His head was bowed, the hands on his knees were clenched into white balls. I wasn’t sure whether to leave him there or call out to him. I wasn’t his dad, but I wasn’t his enemy, either.

I took a hobbled step towards him. “Hey, Gust, I know this might not sound like much, coming from a fox, but if you’re angry you shouldn’t take it out on Maple. She’s family. Family has to stick together.”

“Mom didn’t stick with us.”

I instantly regretted my words as soon as he responded. He kept his back to me, hunched up, more vulnerable than I had yet to see him. And I had to give him that ‘advice’. What was I thinking, anyways? Ever since I started going to that new school, I lost my ability with words. Couldn’t say the right thing, if I could say anything at all.

“You didn’t stick with your family either, fox,” he went on.

“I didn’t really have a choice,” I said.

Gust was quiet. Maybe he didn’t have a ready answer to that. How much did he know about Kat and I’s situations? Did he think we chose to be like this? Is that what his dad thought, what the other Masters thought? How would they react if they knew what Mallard had done to make us how we were?

I shifted my stance with the cane. My legs were shaking. I needed to sit down soon before I collapsed. I thought about telling him about what was going on with me, Kat, and everything else. But even as the idea came into being, I could feel the invisible hand on my throat. It wasn’t tight--just a touch, a reminder. I thought of something else, and the hand vanished.

“Maybe your mom didn’t have a choice either,” I said.

“What do you know.” It wasn’t a question, more like a statement. An insult. He turned to face me and I held my tongue. He was crying still--the tears flowed freely down his face. Like his anger, he wasn’t afraid to show it. “You don’t know anything.”

I did my best to not break from his dark look as I pulled Lionel from my pocket. He broke the staring contest himself when his eyes fell on it.

“I know she made this. She made one for each of you.”

“She did. They were for us and not for lying foxes like you.”

“Your sister gave this to me because she thought I needed it more than she did—”

“She gave it to you cause you tricked her!” he shot, suddenly leaping to his feet. “You lied and tricked and made her give it to you!”

I thought about trying to ask why I would go through all the trouble for a doll. But, for all I knew, it was the sentimental value I could have theoretically been after. Either way, it wouldn’t calm down Gust’s anger. Probably nothing I said would, but I would feel better if I told him what I knew was the truth.

“Maple told me that she didn’t need it anymore—”

“Liar!”

Gust took a step closer, the stick was back in his hand. I flinched. Maybe I should quit while I was still in one piece.

“She said that Lionel was best for people who were alone—”

“Shut-up!”

He was running at me, his stick swinging wide. I was out of time.

“She doesn’t need him anymore because she has you!”

I couldn’t tell if the snapping noise was Gust’s stick as it broke in half, or one of the bones in my arm as he broke it against me. I crumpled like a blade of grass, hitting the ground hard. It was a weird mixture of sensations—pain coupled with the relief of being off my feet. I reflected on it for just a moment before I remembered my current position and tried to scramble away.

But Gust wasn’t going in for the kill, or even for another whack with his destroyed stick. He stood still, his ruined weapon on the ground beside him, and simply watched my pathetic attempts to escape him. It was futile to try and move anyways. My body was already shutting down again.

When I stopped, my arms barely keeping me from lying fully against the ground, he spoke. “What did you say?”

It took me a moment to remember what I had said during my attempt to defend myself. “Maple has you, Gust, and all your brothers and sisters. She doesn’t need Leopold to make her happy because she isn’t alone anymore.”

The doll in question wasn’t in my hand anymore. It was right behind Gust. While I still had the cane, I must have dropped Lionel in my haste to get away. It was probably best to not let Gust know, he didn’t need any more fuel for his fire.

“She said that?”

Gust still hadn’t moved an inch. Was he really taking me seriously for once? Best to play it safe.

“If you don’t believe me you can ask her yourself.”

He straightened up at that. “I will.” He spat at the ground again. His cheeks were still wet. “You won’t trick me that easy.”

“Right, of course.”

He took a step back. My entire body froze up as his bare foot stepped on Lionel. I tried my best to control my breathing as he turned, knelt down, and picked the dirty rabbit from the ground. With his other hand he picked up his stick before he stood back up.

He faced away from me as he examined the little doll in his hand. My eyes were on the stick that he kept at his side. Before I could think of what to say to try and amend the situation, he spun around and tossed Lionel. I flailed, but managed to catch the little rabbit before it fell again.

That superior smirk flashed across his face again. “Take care of that rabbit, fox, or your hide is mine!”

He then turned and ran back in the direction of the house. I looked down at Lionel, brushed some loose dirt from his face, and tucked him into my shirt pocket before collapsing the rest of the way against the ground. I took in a deep breath and let it back out.

It had been a long morning. I was sure Dr. Quincy would forgive me if I rested my eyes for just a little while.

“Foxy.”

There was a girl above me. She was kneeled over me, letting her loose, curly hair fall around her face. It used to be dyed a strange color. I could still see the remnants—but the roots were now a dirty blonde color. Was that her natural hair?

Her eyes were still that unnatural green—almost glowing.

She tilted her head to the side. “You alright?”

It’s your fault! It’s all your fault!

I turned my head away.

I blamed her for making me fall for her. Like Gust, like a child, I lashed out at her for my own problems. My own issues. Did she come here to watch me suffer? Watch me flail and fumble and fall?

“Yeah,” I answered, before the silence became suspicious. “I’m fine.”

“Liar.”

I clenched my fists. I closed my eyes as if it would make the feeling of her watching me go away.

I waited too long.

“Why did you come back?”

Might as well know for sure.

“I saw Master walking down the mountain, towards the town. I assumed he had to work and that, without me here, he would be forced to ask you to watch after the children. I came to make sure they were okay.”

I angled my head up towards the sky before opening my eyes.

It was very blue--not a cloud in sight. There were a lot of trees around and on the mountain--but as high up as we were, there was nothing to inhibit the view. I almost didn’t blame Dr. Quincy for spending all his nights out here.

“They’re okay. At least, I think they are. I don’t really have the energy to go check.”

“Sorry.”

I almost looked at her. Was she really sorry, like that time when she thought I had died? Or she was just saying it sarcastically, like how she always talked.

I shook my head, small rocks rubbing against the back of my skull as I did.

No, don’t get angry. Not at her. Not for something this stupid. There were plenty of other things to be angry about, but not this.

A cloud rolled into my field of view. It was thin, stretched out, and threatening to blend back into the blue background. When I took in a deep breath, through my nose, I could smell those familiar scents of nature. The grass, the dirt, sweat, soap, blood.

Blood...

“I also came to make sure you were okay.”

I sat up and spun around to face where her voice was coming from. She was squatting close to the ground, knees tucked up, arms wrapped around her legs. It almost looked natural--the way she covered herself, but I could still smell it.

“Are you okay?”

No room to think about what she said. What she meant. Probably another tease. More sarcasm.

She brought her legs closer to her chest. At the same time, she tilted her head, tried to distract me with her eyes. Fake or not, it almost worked. I almost dropped it.

“No, I’m not okay,” she said.

“You...You’re not?”

“No.”

What was I expecting? That she’d lie, try to distract me from the subject of her well being?

Whatever it was, I was not expecting this--for her to actually tell me the truth.

“Well, is there anything I can do? How can I help?”

“Help?” She tilted her head back and looked up at the blue sky.

I joined her, for just a moment. The thin cloud was gone.

“You can’t help.”

She was still gazing up at the sky. Her arms still wrapped around her, so I couldn’t see the injury. But I knew it was there. I could smell it. Raw, jagged, stinging. It had become so strong I couldn’t help but scrunch up my nose. Was her wound getting worse, or were my senses getting stronger? Was that even possible? Another side effect from the tea?

I shook my head again, as if it would dislodge the lingering thoughts and questions. She had said something. What was it again? ‘You can’t help’.

“Why not?”

I froze on the spot when she suddenly turned her glowing eyes back to me. I clenched my teeth as she moved her arm and the smell of blood became almost overpowering.

The side of her shirt was drenched in red. It was torn near the center of the dark stain, sliced open like she had been attacked with a bladed weapon. It was almost an afterthought, that she was wearing her cat face shirt. Was it her favorite shirt? Or was she glad one of the things that reminded her of the club was now ruined?

“Because it’s your fault,” she answered.

Her face was expressionless, her mouth set in a thin line. Her eyes were observing me, waiting for my reaction.

It’s your fault!

“H-How...”

My throat was closing up. I sat up to try and breathe easier and saw the cane lying on the ground, right next to me. I had to have dropped it when Gust tossed Leopold at me.

Maple asked me to take care of her grandpa’s cane. Gust asked me to take care of his sister’s doll. I couldn’t even take care of two inanimate objects, let alone myself. Let alone someone I once liked.

“Sorry.”

“You should be.”

Someone poked me in the chest. I almost fell all the way back against the ground in my attempts to scoot away.

She had appeared--crouched right in front of me--without me noticing, without making a sound. It was more frightening then Mutt’s bouts of rage. She could kill me without me ever knowing.

“You, alone with six children,” she went on, seemingly unfazed by my over-the-top reaction, “about half of them intent on doing you harm. I was so distracted that I didn’t notice the owl until he was practically on top of me. I was too fast for him to land anything lethal, but he still got away with this.”

She pointed to the wound. Even this close, the smell didn’t get much worse. But it still invaded my nose, overwhelmed my senses, and made me hold my breath. I was one step away from forgoing politeness to try and cover my nose.

It was so potent I almost didn’t catch what she was saying. Was she still messing with me? Was she really that concerned about my well-being?

Maybe she was just worried about her own. Mallard wouldn’t exactly be thrilled if he learned I had been offed while under her watch.

“Sorry for worrying you,” I mumbled, turning my head. It didn’t do much to dull the smell.

“You should be,” she repeated.

I stifled a groan. Why did she approach me? Just to make me feel bad for her getting attacked? To drop that subtle reminder about how our last talk went?

Well, I feel bad, okay? I still think about what I said, how I felt when I said it, how you reacted, and I wish I could just die. Happy? Damage done, you can go now.

“Something on your mind?”

I bit down on my tongue before I said something I would regret. “Shouldn’t you go do something about your injury?”

Subtle, but I knew she would get the idea. Leave. You’ve done what you came to do, so just leave me alone.

She stood back up, but instead of walking, she gently patted the torn shreds of her shirt against her injured side. I winced, but she didn’t even make a face. Just the same old expressionless Kat.

“It wasn’t that deep. It will heal on its own.”

I gripped the blades of grass under one of my hands. What did she even mean by that? It looked and smelled pretty bad to me.

“Well, maybe you should check on the kids. I haven’t seen them since they left.”

There it was, a crack in the wall. A half-smile as our eyes met. “You want me to leave, Foxy?”

I stared down at the ground. The life so high up here was very sparse. No trees to block the view, hardly any grass on the ground. I pulled out what little my hand had found.

Did I have to make it obvious? Why was she making this so difficult?

“You’re stronger than I thought you would be,” she said, sounding farther away. When I glanced up, I saw that she was walking back down the mountain. I almost called out to her before she went on: “I thought you’d have trouble with them. But it looks like you’re doing just fine.”

I watched the back of her head until I could no longer see it. She never turned around or said anything more. When she was gone, I reached for the cane and used it to help stand back up. The weakness from just a few minutes ago was gone. Thinking back, it had ended about the same time I smelled Kat’s blood.

Coincidence? Probably not. Just another side effect of the tea.

I still never got around to asking her about Mutt or Stallion. Was I just that easily distracted?

No. It was probably because I didn’t want to know. Seeing Kat, injured for my sake. Protecting me despite having a hand in putting me in danger in the first place. It put a feeling deep in my chest and stomach. It made me sick. It made me sad when I wanted to be angry. It reminded me that I couldn’t hate them, no matter how much they deserved it. No matter how much I wanted to. And it made me sick.

What was I to them? Where did I fit in this new world? What was I supposed to do? Who was I supposed to consider a friend? An enemy? Where would I go, from here?

As I hobbled to the sliding glass door, I saw Maple. She was sitting up on one of the kitchen chairs, her youngest brother in her lap, the youngest sister sitting in another chair nearby. A large picture book was open on the table, spread out in between them. I couldn’t hear from where I was, but I could see Maple’s lips moving as her sister’s eyes stared down at the pages in wonder and as her brother was trying his best to pull off one of her red bow ties.

I stopped just before the door. It didn’t take them long to realize someone was watching. When the two girls looked up, the younger sister immediately paled and stared back down at the book, but Maple smiled and waved for me to come in. I smiled too, despite the sick and empty feelings.

If there was nothing else, there, at least, was this.