The Continent (The Continent #1)(32)

“Strange,” he says, but does not elaborate.

I sit up and cross my arms over my chest. “Do you not have your own name for this place?”

He looks around the small shelter. “For…this place?”

“I’m sorry. For the Continent. I’d have thought the natives would give it a grander name.”

He sits back on his heels. “In the old words, we only ever called it inzua—home.”

“Home,” I say, and the word is like a dagger, threatening to loose all the feelings inside that I am trying so desperately to suppress. I smooth it away, erase it, push it from my mind.

“Inzua,” he repeats. “A very old word indeed. Hayato—the village to which we travel—is very like to a ‘capital’ city, though every settlement of the Aven’ei is equal in importance.” He removes a knife from the case before him and begins to sharpen it; this one is longer than those I saw at the Topi camp, and shaped differently, too, with a blade curving smoothly up to the tip.

“Is there something I might do?” I say. “I would like to help, if I can.”

He shifts on one foot and peers over his shoulder at me. “Can you skin a hare?”

“I—well, no. I mean, it isn’t that I can’t skin an animal, it’s just that I’ve never done it before.”

He rests his knife against the half-shorn hide. “How exactly did you eat in the Spire?”

“What do you mean?”

“Did you not eat such things as hares?” he asks.

“I prefer lamb,” I say. “But I did once have a lovely rabbit stew, although now that I think of it, I’m not sure if a rabbit and a hare are quite the same.”

He looks at me, his mouth open slightly. “I think you misunderstand my question. I mean to ask how you procured your food.”

“Oh,” I say. “Well…our meals are managed and prepared by the kitchen staff, who are specially trained in culinary matters.”

“These are slaves?”

“What? No! Of course not,” I say, flummoxed. “They are paid quite handsomely, I assure you.”

He picks up the knife and runs it smoothly beneath the animal’s pelt. “In my village, a child of five can trap, skin, and prepare a hare for supper.”

“I suppose you think me ridiculous.”

He frowns. “I do not judge you for failing to learn what was never taught, girl.”

“It’s Vaela,” I say.

“What?”

“My name. It’s Vaela.”

He says nothing further but turns back to his work. When he has finished, he sets the first animal aside and gestures to the second with his knife. “Come over here, and I will teach you.”

“To skin the rabbit?”

“The hare,” he corrects. “There is indeed a difference between the two. You see? You are learning already.”

If the gnawing hunger of the past few days were not so fresh in my mind, the process of preparing the hare for dinner might have been enough to destroy my appetite. Thankfully, once cooked, the flesh resembles any other kind of roasted meat. As a meal, it is chewy, stringy, and entirely different from the succulent rabbit in the stew of my memory, but it is also warm, hearty, and nutritious, so I devour my portion with grateful enthusiasm.

“You seem to wear many hats,” I say, sitting back against the wall of the cave. “Warrior, hunter, woodsman, medic, chef.” I tick off the titles on my fingers. “Thank you, Noro, for everything.”

“I do what must be done when it is required of me.”

“I’m afraid my own abilities are rather less useful.”

He looks over at me with interest. “And what skills have you?”

I hold up my hands. “None so practical as yours. I am an apprentice cartographer.”

“I do not know this word.”

“I’m a mapmaker.”

“A tactician!” he says, impressed. “This, I would not have guessed.”

“No, not a tactician,” I say. “I draw maps to record the geography. To create an accurate picture of the land.”

He frowns. “The maps have no strategic purpose?”

“They are educational. Informative. And quite beautiful, in their way.”

He tosses a tiny rib bone into the fire. “This seems like a waste of time, to draw a map for no reason.”

“It is not a waste of time at all,” I say, bristling. “And you’ll pardon me to say that I think your opinion is wholly influenced by the fact that you come from a nation at war. When a society has no use for such brutality, its citizens are able to indulge in more enriching pursuits.”

“Of course. Like touring around in your he-lo-planes and watching others who are at war.” I open my mouth, then close it. He smiles. “No argument, girl? I am surprised.”

“I actually agree with you on that point,” I say. “Though you are altogether wrong in your dismissal of cartography. It is an entirely worthy pursuit.”

He stretches out before the fire, propping himself up on one elbow. “What makes it worthy?”

I gape at him. “It’s—it’s—there’s an entire science devoted to mapmaking. It requires a great deal of diligence, of meticulous attention to detail—an understanding of geology and topography, of course, and there is an artistic element, to be certain—”