Chapter 5

“Where are you going?”
Aquila looked up. “To my room.”
“Why?”
“Because.”
“Because why?”
“I do not sleep in rooms with men.”
“But you have been sleeping in the same room as a man for the past few weeks.”
“Yes, but that was different. That man was helpless and on the brink of death for the longest time and needed round the clock care. This man is able to move and get out of bed, and this woman is moving out.” Aquila said all this and thought the conversation was over.
Trouble thought otherwise. “Why?”
Aquila dropped the bedding she had just picked up. Her fists went to her hips. “Why, why, why! Questions, questions, questions. Because I do not trust you, that is why. I may be short but I am twenty years old and my brothers warned me against men like you–“
Trouble was grinning from ear to ear. Aquila stopped mid-sentence and stomped her foot. He had done all that for some sort of reaction and had accomplished his goal.
“You insufferable dolt!”
Trouble laughed and held up a hand. “Move back into your room.”
Aquila scooped up the bedding and stormed out the door.

********

Aquila looked around the room. Her bed was made and very inviting, but she stepped onto the crate beneath the window.
The call of the nightingale was clear and soothing. Aquila reached up and pulled her braided hair free of the pins that held it wrapped around her head. Stepping down she quickly untwisted her braid and picked up the horse-hair brush. Aquila closed her eyes to enjoy it. She had kept her hair braided and twisted around her head since Trouble had arrived and as she stepped back up to the window, it danced in the wind happy to be free.
Here listening to the birds, kissing the wind, and relishing in the freedom of solitude, Aquila could have forgotten her house guest. Instead her mind was on happier times when her family was together.
Aiden, Taerith, Ilara, Daelia, Arnan, Wren, Zoe, and Sam...happy. Aquila wished to add her parents in that picture but she hardly remembered them. Her mother always smelled of lilacs and her father...of the fresh forest air. Those were the only things she could remember of them.
But just to be sixteen again. Everyone was at home, even Arnan who had left a few months before her seventeenth birthday. They were happy times. And oh, how she missed her late night talks with Wren. Their adventures into the woods that always got them into trouble with Aiden.
Aiden, the protective older brother. He hated it when they ran into the deeper parts of the forest. Many times they had sat on the settee and listened to his lectures on the dangers that lie in the forest.
Those were the days. Aquila sent a prayer up to God for each of her siblings. One day she would see them again, she knew it down deep in her heart.
Laying her dreams of brothers and sisters aside, she reached down into a pocket hidden in the folds of her robe and pulled out the small velvet pouch she kept with her at all times. She opened the flap and pulled out the cross pendant, wondering for the millionth time what it had meant to the man who was now dead. Why was it so important that the other men not get it? How could he have known to trust her? It was pretty to be sure and must have great value but there had to be more than that. Had he stolen it from them first? Aquila sighed. There were too many questions and not one answer.

*********

“Good morning.”
Aquila spun around, her hand going to her chest. “Trouble!”
Aquila had gone from nonchalant to aggravated and depressed. Trouble was not getting the hint.
Trouble grinned and winked. Aquila frowned. He was always doing things to unnerve her but this was the first time he had gone so far as to wink at her. Aiden and Taerith would have put this bold man in his place.
Aquila looked at the knife she was using to cut the meat and wondered if she should throw it at him. Instead she continued to work at the meat. She was keenly aware of the large figure leaning over the cabinet a few feet away studying her carefully. Should she have said something? Winked back? No, she was certain that winking back was not the proper response but what the proper response was was not something she had learned in her solitary years. “Breakfast is on the table.”
Silence followed as Trouble moved to the table and dove into his breakfast like a hungry lion wolfing up the prey it worked so hard to kill. Aquila was confused. “If you are so strong, why do you not go back to where you came from, wherever that is? You obviously do not need me and I would be much happier on my own.”
Silence was the answer. Aquila shook her head and moved on about her day. He would be gone in no time. He was now walking out of his room and doing most everything for himself except the cooking. In her mind he was already gone.

*********

The meat she was cutting was quickly becoming a shredded and torn mess. Now would have been a good time to complete the job.
Curiosity killed the cat, so they said. It was not something to play with in situations like this, but sometimes it took over the strongest of opponents. It would win for a little while...this time.

**********

Aquila winced. She had jabbed the needle into her finger for the fifth time. Trouble was sitting on the chaise watching her rather intently. This made her nervous.
“Why do you live here alone?”
Aquila frowned. “I do not live alone. You met Leo. And I am sure you have not forgotten my live-in pest who calls himself Trouble.”
“No, I meant before me. Why did you live here alone with Leo?”
“Because I wanted to, that is why. Leo does not ask questions.”
“What happened to your parents?”
“They died when I was young.”
“Any brothers and sisters?”
“I refuse to answer any more of your questions,” Aquila adamantly stated.
“Why?”
“Because you are annoying and it is my business,” she automatically replied.
“And I just got you to answer another one of my questions.”
“All right, Mr. Trouble, here are a few of my own. Where are you from?”
“Can not say.”
“What happened to your parents?”
“Not sure. As far as I know they are still alive. I have not talked with them in ten years.”
“Why not?”
“Can not say.”
“Brothers or sisters?”
“None,” he shook his head.
“Friends?”
“None.”
“Why not?”
“My job does not afford any.”
Aquila hesitated but had to ask. “What is your job?”
“Can not say.”
Silence ensued. Aquila nervously fidgeted with her needlework. What was his job that he could not tell? Why did it refuse him any friends? Should she be scared and send him away? Why did she not send him away anyway? He obviously did not need her help living. How did she go about kicking him out of the house? She could just tell him to get out, but he could refuse. What then?
All of this was too exhausting to think about now. She was due to write a letter to Wren, and then and there decided to write Aiden as well. He would want to know about this house guest.
“By the way, where is your friend Leo?” Trouble looked around as if he would magically appear.
Aquila thought about that for a moment. “Come to think about it, I have not seen him since you started walking around.”

*********

Aiden,
I have a house guest. He is tall, big, and suspicious.
I am not sure what to do.

Aquila.

**********

Her long black hair shone in the pale moonlight with hints of red among the tangled mass beneath her frail body. Why did she wear it twisted around her head all the time? Was it that it made her look smaller and she feared looking so?
She was a peaceful sleeper. Somebody needed to tell her she looked better with her hair down. But who cares? When the job was through, no one would.
The job. It should have been completed by now. The Boss would have expected a letter by now informing him the job had been successful. If news was not sent in the next two or three days, someone else would be given the job, but would no doubt be paid twice, as there would be two to take out this time.
This was not a big deal. No one had even managed to take out the Woman. Everyone who had tried had never been seen or heard from again. It would e no different this time.

********

Aquila skipped down the path to the river. Freedom smelled and felt good. She had been worried when she told him she was going into town that he would want to come along, but he had never said anything of the sort. He had just shrugged and told her to have a good time. She now laughed giddily, free from his company.
One by one, she checked her traps. The first two were occupied. As Aquila was opening the second trap her neck tensed and the hairs rose on end. She carefully looked around. It felt as if someone was watching her. A few seconds later and the feeling was gone. No one was in sight, so Aquila shrugged it off as her own imagination playing tricks on her.
All of her traps, including the new and bigger trap she had purchased the last time, was occupied and Aquila wondered if she would be able to get them all into town. The hippocerf, that she had caught in her new trap, would prove to be the biggest challenge, as she was already carrying all the smaller animals. It was a beautiful thing. The coat was a shiny brown with a white tail and stomach. By the looks of it, the meat on the bones was thicker than most everything else and would make good jerky. The coat would bring a high price in the market. The shop would not pay that much though, so she would have to plan a trip North to Tapairo City where they held the Trappers' Market.
Deciding it would be wiser to take the other animals into town and come back for the hippocerf later, she continued on into town. As she neared Michelle's home, she remembered that it had been put up for sale the last time she was in town and there was a good chance it had already been sold. It was a very nice house. She would have to be careful when approaching. They might think her to be a trespasser.
It was dark and the drapes were closed but light could be seen through the drapes. It had been sold. Aquila softly tiptoed around back and into the barn. She lit the lantern she had left in there and began cutting the animals open. The blood had dried up most of the way so it was just separating all the guts and innards and cutting the meat off of the furs. She did a quick job of it and quickly salted the furs.
Aquila was about to begin cutting the meat into small pieces when she heard footsteps coming up to the barn door. She grabbed an old hoe and watched carefully in the dim light. The barn door opened slightly and a lamp held by a small feminine hand came through before a woman stepped in. She wore a modestly cut brown cotton dress that just barely touched the tops of her black boots. A white shawl was wrapped snuggly around her thin shoulders. The woman stood there for a moment, watching her with her large brown eyes. Then she stepped forward. “You must be Aquila. Mistress Altador told us that you would be visiting. Well, the mountain air still falls at night no matter what time of year it is and I thought you might feel better out here with a warm blanket but I did not know if you had brought one with you.”
“Thank you for your concern, Mistress—“
“Colwert. Mistress Nadia Colwert,” the woman supplied.
“Thank you, Mistress Colwert, but I have found the hay to be sufficient enough to sustain me,” Aquila graciously declined.
“If you need anything just knock on the back door. Our bedroom is just beside the back door and I will hear it. My husband is a hard sleeper so it will not wake him.”
“All right. Again, thank you.”
Mistress Colwert smiled and nodded before rising and leaving. Aquila finished cutting up the meat into small pieces and then decided to retire. It had to already be around eleven o'clock.

*********

Aquila opened one eye and groaned. Morning had come too soon. Stretching her arms out above her head, she pushed with her feet until she touched something thick and sturdy. She grabbed the hoe and came to her feet in one graceful movement ready to attack whatever had joined her that night.
She jumped when there at the foot of her makeshift bed was a brown shiny hippocerf with a white tail and stomach. It was undoubtedly, by the marks on its leg, the same one she had seen in her trap. Someone had been following her. Aquila warily looked around the barn. Everything was still and no one else seemed to be inside but she was taking no chances. She carefully searched every nook and cranny that might possibly hide a human and even some that would not.
Her search came up fruitless. She could not even find any traces of a human having been there and yet she knew that the dead hippocerf could not have come in on its own. She would need to be careful from now on.