The bodies of two hares lay on the ground. Elyn hacked away at the carcasses, trying to remove the skin without damaging the flesh. His long fingers slipped on the carcass and Wren heard him swear under his breath. Her stomach growled. It had been two days since she had anything to eat past a few of the hard biscuits they had found in a sack in the back of the wagon.  

It was fortunate they only had a day or two's worth of travel left to get to Agatine. The skins of water that had been their lifeline were almost gone, which meant they had to pick up their pace. Even the camel looked tired. He laid flat out on his side next to where they'd stopped the wagon, glad to be free of his harness. He'd wandered back into camp in the early hours of the morning and gone to eat the dried grass that poked up out of the ground like nothing had happened. Wren envied him.

Where Rannok had gone off to was anyone's guess. Wren hoped, as she always did, that he would not come back. It was a small hope, in the back of her mind where she could easily ignore it since it made her feel so awful. But she knew that he would, because he always came back and it always made her just a little bit disappointed.

It wasn't as if she wanted him to die. She just wished he didn't exist. Every minute they spent in each other's presence was another minute where Wren had to think about the mother and home and village he'd stolen from her.

"Can you help me?" Elyn asked. Wren jumped lightly down from the cart, wings splaying out slightly to catch the wind. She grabbed one of the hares and used the knife to cut around its head. They'd strip the skin off and roast them, and while they'd taste pretty terrible, they'd at least assuage their hunger.

Wren didn't even know how hares managed to live out here. It was hard enough for her and Elyn and Rannok to stay away from animals that wanted to eat them. Then again, she supposed they'd failed in that regard. The skin slipped easily from the carcass as she tugged it down and off the rabbit's legs, like she was slipping off a cloak. 

They finished dressing the meat and Elyn went to go fish the flint from the sack of his belongings. She went to gathering sticks and dried bunches of grass from all around them and forming them into a little pile. Elyn flicked a spark at it and the flames flickered to life, then died down to a warm glow.

He speared one of the rabbits on a stick and propped it over the fire. The flames licked at it and the meat hissed and popped. Wren's mouth watered at the scent. She watched them roast for a few minutes, anxious for when they'd be cooked enough to pull them off the fire.

A dot appeared on the horizon, like a great bird coasting on the breeze. Suddenly she wasn't so hungry anymore. Wren turned her back and slipped back into the wagon. She grabbed the curtain to pull it closed behind her.

Elyn let out a protracted sigh and pointedly rolled his eyes as he propped the second rabbit over the fire.

"Do you have a problem?" Wren asked, arms folded, face set in a frown.

"I wish we could all get along, is all," Elyn said as he poked at the rabbit. Wren opened her mouth to say something when Rannok landed with a small thud a few feet away and folded his wings across his back.

"How far are we?" Elyn asked him as Rannok stooped over one of the rabbits. He had another clutched in his fist, beady eyes staring off into nothing. Wren tried not to look at it.

"I can see the skyline once I get up there," Rannok said, grey eyes bright. "I don't think we're that far as long as we can get Jojo moving." He gave the creature a look. It groaned at him and rolled back up onto its stomach, chewing its cud idly. 

Elyn nodded and a slim smile crept across his face. He pulled the first rabbit off the fire and pulled a chunk of its flesh free, then stuffed it into his mouth. The scent of it snaked into Wren's nostrils. Her stomach gave another mighty growl and she jumped down from the wagon while avoiding Rannok's gaze entirely.

"Can we talk?" he asked her. The featherlets across Wren's back rose on edge. She grabbed a chunk of the rabbit off the stake and chewed. It was warm and rich as she swallowed. Rannok gave her a hard look.

"Are you going to answer?" he asked. She shrugged her shoulders and continued to eat. Rannok dropped the second rabbit in the dirt and folded his arms.

"We can't ignore each other forever," he said.

"Please leave me alone," she replied, not meeting his eyes. 

Elyn grabbed the unskinned rabbit and skittered off to the other side of the wagon, face flushed. Wren's stomach dropped into her feet. She had half a mind to call him back. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up. She did her best to ignore Rannok, a difficult task as he stood over her, glowering.

"You're acting like a child," Rannok said. Wren said nothing in return. The air between them grew thick and hung in the air like a wet blanket. Wren's face got hot and her fists clenched.

"Go away," she replied. 

"No. I'm done doing this. In case you didn't notice we're stuck together whether you like it or not," Rannok said, barely moving from the spot he was in. He sat down across the tiny fire and started eating the other rabbit like nothing had happened. Wren kept her mouth shut and stared at her food. She did her best to keep her pain off her face. It permeated everything she did and it crawled into her lungs like smoke. The memories made her head hurt and so she tried not to remember them.

"Wren."

She looked up at him and scowled. Tears brimmed in her eyes and she willed them to stay put. Everything she had, he'd taken it all from her. She wiped at her face and went back to picking at the rabbit. He didn't understand, and that was fine. She couldn't make him. But she didn't need to acknowledge him, either.

"You took everything from me," she said in a tiny voice. She stuck the rabbit stick into the ground and hugged her arms around her knees. He winced as if she'd just hit him and shook his head.

"She was already dead," he said. He didn't meet her face with his eyes but stared off to a point directly to her left instead. 

"Don't talk about her," Wren said. Her jaw flexed. He didn't have any right to think about her, as if he'd tried to do anything to help other than lie to her until they were too far away for Wren to catch so much as a fleeting memory.

"Wren, she was dead. There was nothing I could have done. She was gone. I'm sorry I lied to you but--"

"--I could have had something," Wren said in a voice that was more a screech than anything else. "I could have had her bangles or one of her hair clips or said goodbye to her. Instead you lied to me. You lied to my face, Rannok. Just like you lied about the fireworks." She snapped her mouth shut and went to stand, turning her back on him and his dishonesty. The space between them grew cavernous.

"They would have killed you," he said. She turned to stare at him. How dare he question what she'd lost. What he'd done. She didn't have the energy to be mad. She'd burnt it out so long ago that she wasn't even sure all the anger in the caravan was really anger instead of apathy. 

"My family--"

"I lost mine too," he snapped as he stood as well. "They chased me out of the village with clubs. They killed my cousin and they probably killed Kana and Hael after I left."

Wren's face fell a little upon hearing their names. She'd almost forgotten he'd had siblings. All younger than him, young enough that Kana was just a baby when she'd left. Hael was four and tried to climb in her lap every time she sat down. The sound of his tiny voice mispronouncing Rannok's name rang in her ears. Her heart ached for them.

"You didn't know that, did you?" he said quietly. "You didn't get to watch while they beat your friend's face in. You didn't hear him scream while he died. Because you're the only one whose pain is important."

She thought she was past being angry, but it came roaring back in a torrent that hit her in the chest and then spread up to her face, which burned in indignation. She took a few steps closer to him, fists shaking, until she was right in his face. She pushed his chest with the palm of her hand and he stumbled backward.

"Don't you dare try to tell me what's important," she said as fury crawled up her throat and spilled out of her mouth. It died on her tongue before she could say anything else. Rannok wasn't worth the effort. He shook his head and sighed.

"Forget I even said anything," he said, but she had already turned and stomped away back to the wagon. It was the middle of the day, and hotter than the beaches of hell inside, but she didn't care. The call for her village had gotten less in the two weeks since they'd left. It had weakened even before that, though she hadn't realized it until recently. He was probably right, they probably would have killed her. She wouldn't have been able to run fast or far enough and someone would have gotten to her, or she would have died in the desert. Her stomach felt like she'd swallowed a brick. She wasn't quite sure how she didn't realize it until now.

She curled in a heap in the corner and let the tears come. It wasn't all his fault, but it was at least partially. And that meant she had something to be angry at, something to blame other than herself or circumstance. And having someone to blame everything on felt good. So good it scared her. It fed a fire in her so ferocious it seared her heart. 

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Do you think these two should talk and work their issues out, since they're stuck together? If you were Wren, how would you feel?