Mattie stumbled away, trying to put a few feet between her and William. He was always deeply revolted when she vomited. He seemed to think that if only she had better control of her body then she wouldn’t get sick.
“I told you to stay . . .” he started, but by then she was heaving out her breakfast behind a boulder. “Disgusting.”
When she was finished, Mattie lay her cheek against the cool rock and wished for some water. Her throat felt scorched and her mouth was filled with a sour tang.
Then William grabbed her by the back of her collar and yanked her up, dragging her back by her heels. Her coat was buttoned up high against the cold and it pressed against her throat, making her choke and gag as he pulled. He tossed her roughly to the ground on her back a few feet away.
He climbed on top of her, kneeling, his knees holding her in place on either side. He grabbed the front of her coat with both fists and yanked her up halfway, shaking her.
“Are you expecting, Martha? Are you carrying my son and trying to keep it a secret?” William’s face was red, his mouth a curled snarl, spit flying from it onto her face. “Don’t think you can hide it from me! Don’t think you can use your witchcraft to bleed him from your body again.”
“No,” Mattie said, her voice a thin little thread. She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think, couldn’t make the words come out. “No, I wouldn’t.”
His weight pressed down on her middle and all her organs rattled in her rib cage with each shake.
“I didn’t—I wouldn’t—the smell—”
“What smell?” William said, shaking her again and making her teeth rattle.
“I can’t,” she said, clawing at his hands. “I can’t—”
Catch my breath. I can’t breathe.
He released the front of the coat abruptly and her head crashed back to the ground. Sharp rock bit into the back of her skull and warm liquid flowed into her hair. Stars shot across the vision of William looming over her.
“Explain,” he said in that voice that made Mattie think of frozen rivers, of icicles with long sharp points.
She tried to draw in a deep breath but the bottom of her ribs was trapped beneath William. If she didn’t explain soon his fury would crash over her, more terrible than before.
“Wasn’t . . . feeling . . . well . . . the climb,” she panted. “Then . . . smell from the cave. Rotten.”
His gaze sharpened. “I didn’t smell it.”
“I . . . check again.”
“You’re not hiding a pregnancy from me?”
Mattie shook her head, but this made her vision go crazy again. “I . . . wouldn’t. Wouldn’t.”
He leaned close, which took the pressure off her lungs, but his breath was hot on her face and made her stomach jerk again. She hoped to God that she wouldn’t be sick with him this close because he would really hurt her if she threw up on him.
“You’d better not be lying. You know what happens to girls who lie.”
Cold darkness. The sound of a door slamming closed. Fists swollen from beating desperately against the wood.
“The Box,” she whispered. “I’m not lying. I wouldn’t.”
He seemed to see what he wanted to see in her face because he abruptly climbed off. Mattie lay there for a moment. She felt blood trickling down her skull and hoped the wound wasn’t deep. Infection was always a risk with any open wound, and William became irritated when he had to look after her.
“Get up,” William said.
Mattie did, slowly, because the world tilted crazily and she still didn’t have her breath back. William watched her dispassionately, making no attempt to assist her.
He doesn’t cherish you. He doesn’t love you, she thought, but the same despairing thought followed that always did—Where can I go? What can I do?
She was completely dependent on him in every way.
As soon as Mattie was on her feet, William jerked her toward the cave mouth. Almost immediately they were bathed in the waft of fetid air. Mattie turned her head away, covering her mouth and nose with her scarf. Even William, normally so self-mastered, made a gagging noise.
Mattie couldn’t help a tiny little smile of satisfaction at that, and since her mouth was covered she allowed herself to have it. William would never know.
He pulled up his own scarf and took a few steps inside the cave. The cave’s deep shadow swallowed him up immediately.
“Smells like a cache,” he said. “But bears don’t usually keep a cache where they sleep, or in places where they can’t cover up the food.”