Mara did not have any answers. She suspected she may never have any answers.
Because what she did have was a two-year-old son, overtired from an exciting late night and energized by the novelty of his circumstances. Nick monopolized all of the adult attention in the room from the moment they arrived. He chattered, giggled, yelled, banged his fork against the table, whined, spilled a glass of milk, interrupted conversations, scattered his food across the table, and otherwise made his presence acutely known for the duration of the meal. Mara’s efforts to preoccupy him in pursuits less disruptive were soundly dismissed. Even Eli’s efforts at distraction fell short of effective.
By the time everyone was finished trying to eat, Mara had been reduced to a frazzled mass of parental shame, and if she’d had five minutes to actually talk with Lori or Eli, she would not have asked any of her burning, big-picture questions. She’d have spent the entire time apologizing for apparently being the least effective mother in recorded history. Not that it mattered, because she didn’t have five minutes. As soon as she released him from his seat, Nick tore off to Adeline’s toy box while the poor girl hurried after him, genuine fear on her little face.
Mara wrangled her son before he could wreak havoc on his new friend’s prized possessions, but not before Eli had gathered himself to head out the door. Going for supplies, he explained, after drawing her to the side of the sitting room to announce his departure. Apparently noticing the trepidation on her face, he asked–did she want to stay here at Lori’s or upstairs in her room?
What Mara really wanted was to go with him and leave her son behind. But that wasn’t an option, for obvious reasons, so she was left with the odious option of entertaining her maniacal offspring for hours alone in that tiny room, or entertaining her maniacal offspring for hours in Lori’s accommodating company in this lovely well-kept apartment.
“It’s no trouble at all if you want to stay,” Lori said, popping her head in from the kitchen to interrupt Mara’s internal battle. “I told him to tell you that. I love having company, and I don’t have to work in the barroom today. Adi and I will bore ourselves to death here if we’re left all alone. Eli, you were supposed to tell her that.”
Eli’s eyes locked with Mara’s, face twisting into a chagrined smile, like they were sharing some kind of inside joke. Were they? “I was getting to it.”
“Will you stay?” Lori prodded, eyes bright, smile sweet and genuine.
Eli grimaced, shot his friend a quelling look, took Mara by the elbow, and drew her to the far side of the room.
“You can say no,” he said, voice so low she had to lean in a little just to hear him. “If it’s too much, she’ll understand.”
It was too much, but not in the way he meant. Still, Mara decided to accept the offer. She didn’t want to further inconvenience their hostess, but it would be rude to decline and she couldn’t help but weigh the cost of staying against the thought of entertaining Nick in the small, featureless room upstairs.
“Are you sure she doesn’t mind?” she whispered, dubious.
“I’m sure.”
“You promise?”
He lifted a brow. “Should we brew her up a truth serum?”
Mara crossed her arms over her chest and fought to keep her face serious. “Are you always going to use that against me?”
“Only until I have something better to hold over your head.”
Huffing, she dropped her arms and tried to straighten her spine against the trial to come, even as her face lost the scrap for severity and broke into a smile. “Okay,” she said. “We’ll stay.”
~~~
Finally, a chance came to ask questions, about an hour into Mara’s stay with Lori. Adeline and Nick played quietly in the corner of the room–a game that mostly consisted of Adeline marching an army of dolls and carved figurines around the rug, regaling Nick with details about each hero’s qualities. The doll with hair of purple yarn was apparently a great sailor. The horse with the chipped ear was a steed of the old gods.
With this gentle litany in the background, Mara and Lori relaxed into their respective seats with two warm mugs of tea. Mara opened her mouth to ask questions, but she couldn’t decide how best to open the conversation. Now that you have a chance to relax, would you mind telling me everything you know about the rebellion? Yes, yes, I know I should probably already know these things, having been married for three years to a high-level officer–the heir to rebel high command, no less. But the thing is that he never told me anything.
That wouldn’t do.
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Before she could come up with something better, Adelie twisted around and asked her mother if she and her friend could have something to drink.
The moment passed, and it took some time for another to present itself. Perhaps if Nick and Adeline were in a more developed stage of friendship, their mothers might have had a moment to talk. But they were still new to each other, and therefore full of questions and insecurities, needy for adult input any time their play changed course.
“I need to get her into some kind of school,” Lori whispered after one such check-in, watching Adeline resume her seat on the rug by Nick. “She has so few children to play with, she’s always so unsure of herself when she does.”
Mara nodded, thinking of the balancing act back in the Capital. Nick hadn’t been old enough for school, but he should have had more children his age to play with. The problem was that she trusted so few other families enough to expose her child to them. And those she did trust–the other rebels–she couldn’t interact with for reasons of secrecy.
It must be doubly hard for Lori, who ran a business in an outlaw town and gathered information for the rebellion on the side.
“She’s so sweet,” Mara said, because it felt good to look at another mother and see some of her own struggle in the woman’s eyes, and to see that her kid was still a good kid. “You must be proud of her.”
“We are,” Lori sighed. “We want more for her.”
“Do you ever think of going somewhere else?” Mara asked, her mind taking off on a flight of possibility. What if Lori, Becca, and Adeline came with them to the Enclave? The thought made the prospect of heading back out seem less grim. The nights wouldn’t be so bad if she had five souls, and other women, with whom to share the darkness.
“No.” Lori’s answer was quick. Sure. “Cinder is home. The balancing act is hard sometimes, but we have friends here. We feel safe here. This is a better place to be than most, all told.”
“Will you always feel safe here?” Mara asked, thinking of the war, ever-present on the horizon since the day of the rebellion’s inception. Now, with Davy’s death, it was closer than ever.
“Perhaps not.” Lori’s eyes left the children to settle on Mara. “But the life we’ve built here is one we’re willing to fight for.”
Mara thought of her townhouse, of the life she had built with Davy. That life was never meant to last. They were meant to last. Their family was. But the life was a lie. One that neither of them would have fought for.
Nick interrupted the moment, holding a plush red bear up at her. Adeline stood behind him. “You need to hold the baby while we go out fishing,” she informed Mara.
Mara smiled, remembering her own childhood adventures–the ones that had taken place half in her mind and half in the safety of the sitting room, her parents occasionally conscripted to participate in the protracted drama of her imagination.
“Okay,” she said, accepting the doll. “I’ll take good care of him.”
“She’s a girl,” Adeline said with a scowl.
“Oh…” Mara didn’t dare look at Lori, who she could sense was holding back a laugh. If she did, she would laugh as well. “Well, she’s a beautiful little girl isn’t she? What’s her name?”
“Sinthabetharell,” the girl said crisply.
“My,” Mara choked out, cradling the doll in her arm, “what a beautiful name. You two enjoy your fishing trip. I’ll take good care of the baby.”
The second the children toddled off, Lori reached across and squeezed Mara’s arm, lips pressed so tightly together they turned white around the edges as she fought to contain her laughter.
“What in the Six Seasons was that name?” she whispered on a desperate giggle.
Mara let loose her own covert laughter, shoulders shaking, and the remainder of the visit passed in a similar rhythm. Nick and Adeline explored different ways to be absurd. Mara and Lori laughingly exchanged commiserative asides about the joys and trials of raising absurd children.
All told, it was a pleasant way to spend a morning. Mara wasn’t required, at any point, to don a heavy pack or walk until her feet bled. She didn’t even think about Davy very often, or the Enclave, or Eli, or her questions. All she had to be was a mother, talking to another mother.
Until, of course, Eli returned–sooner than expected, his arrival heralded by urgent knocking on the front door. Mara followed Lori as the woman hurried to the answer it, peering through the peephole before pulling it open.
Eli shut and barred the door behind him as he entered, and Mara’s mind leaped back to the night he’d shown up on her doorstep. It was mostly a blur, but she remembered that moment when he first arrived. That moment of knowing, just by the way he walked in, that something horrible had happened.
She stood back by the entrance to the sitting room, but his eyes found hers with unerring accuracy, and once again, she knew.
“Order patrol is on its way up the street.” He turned to Lori. “We have five minutes. Maybe ten.”
It shouldn’t have been a surprise that Lori was so calm. She must be accustomed to the periodic disturbances. Nonetheless, the woman’s serene expression made Mara feel as if she was going mad. Did she not understand what was at stake?
“We’ve got a warded safe room,” she told Mara with a soft smile. “If you get Nick, I’ll take you there.”
“I’ll get the bags,” Eli said.
“Hide your magical trace but leave the rooms untidy,” Lori told him. “We’ll say the folks staying there left this morning.”
“Your employees?”
“All shielded, all friendly. And none of them know who you are, anyway. We’ll tell them the same thing we tell the Order. You left this morning. Go, now, and meet us at the safe room.”
Before hurrying out the door, Eli met Mara’s eyes. “I’ll be right back,” he said, as if that might be something she needed to hear. “I promise.”
It felt almost as if he was using persuasion on her again, such was the calm that melted over her senses. Almost, but not quite. It was different this time. A calm that bubbled up from within instead of falling over her from above.
“It’s okay,” she said, truthfully. “I’m okay. Go.”