“You didn’t walk away from all your fights unscathed, did you?”
Lynn startled and looked up.
Dani was inspecting her—or, more accurately, her many burns, scars, and other marks. Her gaze lingered on a rather pronounced scar just below Lynn’s rib cage. “What happened to give you that?”
Lynn touched the uneven patch of skin. “An unfortunate encounter with an iron rod.”
Dani’s expression didn’t change. Her gaze remained on the round, white mark. “Ouch.”
Lynn shrugged it off, as if being impaled hadn’t been the single most painful thing she had ever experienced—physically, anyway. The emotional pain of losing her father in the same collapse had been indescribably worse. “It healed, but I did get coughing sickness almost right after, so it took forever until I was on my feet again.”
Dani dried the dark hairs under her armpits. “I had that once. I’ve never felt so miserable in my life. Every time I’d breathe in, I thought I would drown. It was horrible.”
Lynn wrung her hair out. “It was the same for me. There was this gurgle in my lungs every time I breathed. I think that’s the closest I’ve gotten to dying without an attack.”
“I’m glad you made it.” Dani’s gaze had fallen away from Lynn’s body.
Lynn blinked. She didn’t know how to take that. The comment warmed her far more than a few simple words should. Focus, Lynn, focus. Don’t fall for it. Dani was just trying to assure she came along… Right? “Um… thanks.”
Dani smiled but didn’t look back up.
The silence that followed left Lynn feeling unbalanced—something she wasn’t familiar with. When she looked up, Dani was just drying the curls covering her sex, which made Lynn’s insides—and cheeks—even hotter. She quickly looked away and wrestled her damp body into woolen breeches and her sole cotton shirt. “I’m, um, gonna check out the upstairs. Find some food and such. Okay?”
Dani nodded. She was still entirely—gloriously—naked. “Okay.”
Lynn felt her gaze on her all the way down the hall, even though she knew the closed door would have blocked Dani’s view of her long ago.
Skeever followed her as she made her way to the family’s living room.
The moment she entered, her gaze was drawn to the boy’s covered body. It was still exactly where they’d left it. Of course, he’s dead. And yet a small part of her had hoped that maybe it hadn’t happened after all. She forced herself to focus on the family’s supplies instead.
They had definitely not been the first to fall victim to the family’s trap. A wall-to-wall shelving unit held an astonishing variety of items: pre- and post-war jewelry, clothes in various sizes, weapons, food, pots, pans, blankets, fishing gear, hunting traps, cutlery, plates, bottles, cans—pretty much everything that was in Lynn’s pack but in quantities that could have supplied a settlement twice as large as the Homestead.
Lynn walked along the shelves and ran her fingers along the neatly sorted piles and stacks. She wanted to take it all, but traveling with nothing more than what fit into and onto your backpack was essential. Anything more and you got slow and encumbered. Either was lethal in the Wilds. But she could upgrade what she already owned and eat well tonight. Whoever had owned all of this before was undoubtedly never going to use it again.
Lynn started with a new backpack. A sturdy backpack was critical, and hers was fraying on all sides. She slipped the empty cow-hide pack over her arms and checked how it settled against her back and onto her shoulders. The fit was comfortable, so it was time to fill it up.
By the time she was done sorting through the massive amount of inventory, she’d found replacements for two woolen sweaters and had added a second cotton shirt, two pairs of pants, and four pairs of socks to her wardrobe. She picked up a long, thin blade more suitable for filleting fish than fighting and added a slingshot and a pouch with pebbles to her arsenal.
A finely crafted bow made her hesitate. She was completely unfamiliar with long-range weapons, so taking it could be a boon if she learned to use it, but bows used up arrows, and she wasn’t a fletcher. Learning how to make decent ones and becoming proficient with the weapon could take months. She put the bow back on the shelf. As much as it pained her to leave behind something so precious, hauling something around without a foreseeable payout was against her personal philosophy.
I’ll sleep on it.
She did take some of the prettier pieces of jewelry—pre-war pieces specifically. In settlements, there were always people willing to trade for those. One of the family’s victims had carried a flat, thin pan to fry things on. She took it without hesitation, even though it was heavy. The family had also amassed quite a collection of containers, many of which in better shape than her cans, so she added them to her quickly filling pack.
Once she came to the food, she hesitated again. There was a small chance the family had poisoned some of it. It was far more likely they would have relied on their heavy gate to keep people out in the first place, but Lynn still discarded anything she found suspect.
She was slowly relaxing. Focusing on a task as mundane as sorting drained the tension from her shoulders and limbs. The heavy gate in front of the door shielded them from danger, and Lynn had found a lot of things that would make their lives easier. There was a lot of food here, and most of it didn’t need cooking like the monkey Dani had killed. Since Lynn hadn’t found where the family made fire yet—it certainly wasn’t indoors—cooking that was out. She supposed there was no time like the present to test the theory that the food was safe to eat.
“Dinner is served.” Lynn pushed the door shut behind her, accidently only just allowing Skeever to push in with his tail intact. “Sorry, boy.”
He already trotted along the walls of the small office, near incident forgotten.
Dani sat up from the bedding she’d settled on.
Lynn was relieved to note she was dressed again.
“Thanks.” Dani took the loaded plate Lynn offered. “Is it safe?” She inspected the various cheeses, carrots, jerky strips, bread, and apple slices Lynn had piled on.
“No guarantees. I tossed out anything I didn’t trust.” She slid off her new backpack and lowered herself down onto the bedding.
“Okay.” Dani licked her lips and settled the plate on her crossed legs so she could break open the chunk of bread and stuff it with cheese and jerky. “Did you find anything good?” She glanced at the bulging brown-and-white-patched pack.
“Yeah, I—” Lynn stopped and held her plate away from an inquisitive snout. “Skeeve, no!” She pushed him away. “Can we give him your monkey?”
“Huh?” Dani stared at her.
Lynn nodded toward Dani’s own pack. “The monkey. It’ll go bad.”
Dani followed her gaze down to the small carcass strapped to her pack. “Sorry. Yeah, sure.”
Lynn pushed up again. Her muscles resisted the motion but obeyed under protest. “Hold this.” She handed Dani her plate.
Dani took it, already chewing on a big bite of her sandwich.
“Come, Skeeve. Come here.” Lynn lured him away from Dani with a snap of her fingers, undid the string holding the monkey tied to the backpack, and took the meat into the hallway.
Skeever followed her with a wagging tail.
Lynn plucked most of the blood-soaked grass from inside the carcass, then tossed it to him. “Enjoy.” He started the laborious process of tearing meat from bone with vigor.