Aro brings a small handful of supplies, but I am too busy with the shovel to notice what she's doing until she and Oli get up and start looking around the forest floor for fallen leaves and twigs. They’re talking quietly with each other, focused entirely on what they’re doing, and it takes a little bit of pressure off of me that I don’t realize I was carrying. It felt as though I needed to act a certain way in front of my Bonded so she didn’t doubt me.
It’s stupid. She’s never once doubted me.
When the holes are finally deep enough, I move the bodies into them without any sort of ceremony.
I move my mother first, careful as I get her laid out on the churned-up dirt. Gabe moves Rachel as gently and respectfully as he can while Gray drags my father into the third hole. He's a lot less gentle about it than we are. I don't fault him for that.
I’m glad I don’t have to touch the man at all.
The first shovelful of dirt is hard to drop onto the blanket my mother is wrapped in, but after that, it's easy enough to finish the burial on autopilot. Once we have all three of them covered, I still can't find any words to say, but Oli and Aro both place markers over my mother and Rachel’s resting places, simple pieces of wood they have tied together to look like makeshift crosses.
They don't have one for my father and neither of them attempt to talk about why that is, thankfully.
I take a seat on the log that Oli and Aro had just vacated, landing a little too hard and with a thump noise as my body deflates like a balloon. I stare at that cross that marks my mother's grave, unblinking, and try to form some words or excuses for how I'm acting right now. I don't want anyone to question my loyalty to my Bonded Group.
I shouldn't worry about it in the first place.
Oli tucks herself into one side of me and Gabe sits on the other, his elbows resting on his knees as he stares at the freshly churned-up dirt in front of us without a word. Gray and Aro disappear for a little while before Aro comes back with a few small flowers, little bunches of white-petaled wildflowers that she places at the bases of each of the crosses.
I feel like I should explain to her why these people do not deserve flowers or any sort of kindness, but still, I can't find any words.
She walks over my father's grave like he is nothing, and I still feel nothing but cold towards him.
They keep skirting around my mother though, and Rachel.
I sit there for long enough that I lose all feeling in my legs, long enough that it starts to get dark around us and shadowy creatures come looking for whatever it is that has delayed us from returning to the camp.
Oli presses her face into August's neck and murmurs to him quietly, small, affectionate words that I'm sure North can hear and is reassured by. She still doesn't make a move to get back to camp.
I know we can't just sit here forever. Finally, I heave myself back onto my feet, pulling Oli with me and stretching out a hand to help Gabe up. I move to clap his shoulder, but he ignores it easily, moving forward to give me a hug. It’s the type that a footballer would give a teammate in a very casually masculine way, but it means a lot anyway.
Oli watches us both carefully, and when Gabe steps away, she tucks herself back into my side, threading her fingers through his. Once again, she becomes the solid link between us, the same way she's the solid link between the entire Bonded Group. She’s the single thing we can always and will always agree on, the person strong enough to survive anything.
Proof that I can survive this fucked-up mourning, the complex, traitorous enemies’ deaths that still have me feeling like a lost child in the woods.
“We don't have to go to dinner with everyone. We can just go to bed; it's not such a big deal,” Oli murmurs quietly, pressing her face into my chest and taking a deep inhale of my scent as though she's trying to imprint it onto her very being. It’s cute and good for a distraction. She’s always been particular about it.
“We can just go and grab a couple of those packs. The protein bars aren't too bad, and most of them have peanuts in them as well.”
“I hate peanuts,” I say and realize that their aim for normalcy is actually working, but I should never have doubted Oli's ability to fake it until we make it.
“How can you hate peanuts? That's just weird,” Oli says, her nose scrunching up, and I lean down to kiss it.
“You can have mine,” I say, the easy smile of mine that belongs to her sliding back onto my face as though nothing happened today.
Gabe scoffs and tugs at Oli’s hand. “She's a third of the size of me; if anyone should get extra peanuts, it's me. I’ll trade you the extra peanuts for the can of peaches.”
Oli giggles and tuts at him. “You need to eat your fruit, Gabe, or you’ll get scurvy. What happened to your salads of sadness? Not so worried about your figure now you're not playing football anymore?”
He groans at her and runs a hand through the mess of his hair where it's plastered to the back of his head. Digging the hole had done nothing to my appearance, thanks to my Gift pulling its own weight, but Gabe definitely looks like he's just dug a few graves in the middle of an Alaskan summer day.
When we get back to the campsite, we find Sawyer already waiting for us by his Bonded Group’s tent, only a few feet away from our own.
He's very clearly waiting for us because when he gets a look at the small huddle we make, he lets out a breath.
“You three sure take your time!”
Oli tenses under my arm, her eyebrows drawing down as she gets ready to snap back at him, but I don't need her to be defensive on my behalf. The only real guilt in me right now is at the fact that I'm dealing with this all so well.
“What's up, Benson?” I say as I squeeze Oli’s shoulder a little in reassurance.
“I can't get a hold of North or Gryphon at the moment, and I need to tell someone that I found something. Oli, can you get one of them to come here please?” he says, biting out the words.
Oli frowns like she's worried, but the moment she reaches out to the others, they answer right away.
North is quick with his answer, firm and sure. Get him to show you, Bonded, and send it through to us. There's been activity on the far side that Gryphon and I can't leave at the moment, thanks to some dissent.
None of us want to think about what that dissent looks like, but Sawyer shrugs, happy enough with these commands, and leads us over to his tent.
It's hot as hellfire in there with all of the technology running. A couple of big fans are trying to cool the systems down but still, the temperature in there is excruciating. I don't know how Sawyer can stand it.
“I got a message from an unknown number, and it took me a while to chase down where it came from. As soon as I did, it became pretty clear that it was your mother's final attempt at sending you a message. It was from one of your parents’ housekeeper’s phones, and it came through to the Councilman North Draven official line.”
I scowl at the screen, but my stomach clenches at this single line of text, five simple words that my mother had sent to me.
For all I know, the last words she had ever said. The words that send a chill through my blood.
The gods live among us.
”What does that even mean?” Sawyer says, and I'm reminded that while we've been open and honest about a lot of things, the gods are not one of them.