Chapter 17
The Ursidrean column crossed the rocky steppes leading back to their own territory. Chris paused on the ridge and laid her hand on Emily’s arm. “This is where we separate.”
Emily stopped. “Do you have to go?”
Chris nodded. “This is the last place we can turn off to enter our own territory, and we’ve been gone too long already. If we wait much longer, I won’t be able to travel at all.”
Emily squeezed her hand. “I wish you didn’t have to go. These weeks we’ve spent together have been so precious to me. You can’t imagine....” She broke off.
Chris gazed into her eyes. “I feel the same way. You don’t know how grateful I am to you for bringing us out here.”
Emily glanced around. “Really? I don’t know why you’re grateful for me dragging you away from your family to stop a war that was never going to start.”
Chris shook her head. “If you hadn’t, our factions wouldn’t be talking peace right now. Because of you, we’ll spend the next hundred years working together to make Angondra a better place for everyone. I know Turk is grateful, too.”
Emily tried to laugh, but she had to swallow the lump in her throat just to talk. “He says he doesn’t want to be Alpha, but now he’s on his way home to take over the negotiations. He’ll be more Alpha than Caleb.”
Chris smiled. “That’s why he’s grateful. He always thought he was happy by himself in the mountains—with me, I mean. But now he has a new sense of purpose. He has more hope for our future, and he’s inspired to lead our people into a new era of peace. I’ve never seen him like this before. He’s a different person.”
“What about you?” Emily asked. “Are you going to be happy in the village, being the Alpha’s wife?”
“I’ll have Marissa to commiserate with,” Chris replied. “And I’ll have the rest of my family, too. It’s you I’m worried about.”
“Me? Why?” Emily asked.
“You’re going back to Harbeiz,” Chris replied. “Faruk will be just as mixed up in politics as Donen. Donen is making him his right-hand man renegotiating the borders between the three factions. You might not see much of him, and he was always unhappy in the city. He loved the mountains as much as Turk loved the forest.”
“He may not have liked the city much,” Emily agreed, “but his heart was always on the border. Now the border means something different. It doesn’t mean war and conflict and destruction. It means cooperation and friendship. Faruk is as excited about the future as the rest of us.” She laughed. “I’m as excited about the future as the rest of us, too.”
“Do you think you’ll see Frieda again?” Chris asked.
“I don’t know,” Emily replied. “But in a way, I found her the way I wanted to. I know where she is, and I know she’s happy and settled there. If I really need to see her and talk to her, I know where to find her.”
“Traveling to Aqinas territory would be a much bigger trip than this one,” Chris told her. “It’s a lot farther away.”
“Going into the water and finding out how the Aqinas live would be a much bigger challenge than traveling there,” Emily replied. “I still don’t understand half of what Fritz and Sasha told us.”
Chris nodded. “It sounds like the water dissolves all the barriers between people we take for granted. They know everything everyone else is thinking and feeling, and there’s nothing to separate anybody from everyone else.” She shivered. “It's sounds scary.”
Emily shrugged. “Sasha said it was wonderful, and they were most insistent that Frieda was happy there. Maybe once you get used to it, it’s better than being separate the way we are. It wouldn't be as lonely, anyway.”
Chris gazed at the horizon. “I like it the way it is. If we weren’t separate, coming together with other people wouldn't be so precious and wonderful.”
Emily touched her arm. “You mean like you and Turk? I understand what you mean.”
“And you, too,” Chris replied. “I wouldn’t give up the connection between you and me for anything.”
Emily gave her a hug. “Me, too.”
Chris took a step back. “Promise me we’ll see each other again. In a few years, when your children get older, you'll come and find me, won't you?”
Emily laid her hand on her cheek. “I promise.”
“Faruk will come to Lycaon territory to negotiate the border with Caleb and Turk,” Chris went on. “You’ll come with him, and we'll spend some time together.”
Emily nodded, but she couldn’t speak with the lump in her throat. Her eyes stung, but she couldn’t stop smiling.
“I know Faruk will take good care of you.” Chris tore herself out of Emily’s arms and took another step away.
Emily raised her hand. “I love you. I’ll see you soon.”
Turk took Chris’s hand, and they headed down the hill. They waved at the corner where the path angled into the trees, and then they were gone. Emily turned back to join the Ursidrean column and found Faruk standing behind her. She took his hand and started walking.
He fell in at her side. “We could go with them. We could spend some time in the village with her and Caleb.”
Emily shook her head. “Let’s go home. We've been gone too long already.”
( The End )