you lent him this, and asked if I’d get it back to you. Marichu brought him in. She handled herself,” he said in a way that told Fallon he did, indeed, have a little thing there.
“Thanks. The boy’s okay?”
“In the barracks. One of our new recruits.”
Nodding, she clipped the knife to her belt. “Train him strong. I’ll see you in New Hope.”
“Hey, Fallon,” he said as she walked to the door. “We’ve got them on the run.”
“Let’s keep it that way.”
* * *
She got home at dusk to find her mother stirring something that smelled like heaven on the stove. So normal, she thought, after the blood and the battle, after a day of wonders.
Grateful, she rushed over to wrap her arms around Lana, press hard against her back.
“There’s my girl.”
“Here’s my mom.”
Lana turned, hugged just as hard before drawing back with a smile. The smile changed as she studied Fallon’s face, a face she cupped in her hands as she said, “Your first time.”
“What—”
“Duncan. Of course Duncan.”
“I—you— How do you know?”
“I had a first time, too. You’ve got knowledge in your eyes, along with the stars. He made you happy.”
“Yes.” The initial awkwardness dropped away. “I love him. He loves me.”
“I know.”
“It was wonderful.” As it rushed into her again, Fallon spun in a circle. “I didn’t know I could feel so much. You can read stories, or listen to soldiers’ sex talk, I could even see the way you and Dad look at each other, but I couldn’t know. I couldn’t know until he touched me.”
With a sigh, she laid a hand on her heart. “And then he did. When we’re together like that, I’m not the Savior or The One, or anything but … I’m just me.”
“I know,” Lana said again.
“It’s like that with Dad, for you?”
On a sigh of her own, Lana put a kettle on, chose teas. “All the months we were together, the time before you were born, and after, he never touched me, never asked. He wanted me, and I knew. Just as he knew I needed my grieving time for Max. And through that time, I fell in love, slowly and completely.”
She got out cups, and the honey Fallon loved. “It was the day Mallick came. The new year. The end of Year One. When we were alone again, the three of us, I told him I loved him and wanted our lives together to really begin. That was our first time together. And when he touched me, finally, I was just me.”
“You never told me.”
“It would have been just a pretty story before. Now you understand. We’re lucky, you and I, to love and be loved by good men. Through all this, the war, the loss, the victories, we can still be women in love with good men.”
She set out the tea, added cookies, and sat to talk, to listen.
“I wasn’t sure I’d know what to do—I mean other than the mechanics. There’s so much more.”
On a laugh, Lana bit into a cookie. “Thank the goddess for that.”
“Or that it would feel so good. Everything. We were still banged up and bloody, and it didn’t matter.”
“Might have added to it,” Lana replied.
“Then in the shower, we…” She trailed off, stirred honey into her tea. “Is it weird hearing this?”
“I’m patting myself on the back right now for being the kind of mother whose daughter feels comfortable talking to her about this. But … let’s not share the details with your father.”
Talk about awkward, Fallon thought. “Will he know, like you?”
“Unlikely. Let me ease him into it.”
Better, Fallon thought, much better to leave that part to her mother. “Good idea. Oh, I forgot. When we, the first time, when we— Well, the light just exploded. It burst everywhere, and through me, through him. Outside, the tree behind the memorial stone changed. It’s a tree of life, like Mallick’s.”
“Ah.” Lana sat back. “That explains it. Our memorial tree, it did the same. I thought it was a sign of victory, but now I see. Then again, love’s a victory.” She put her hand over Fallon’s. “Without it, all the battles mean nothing.”
“There’ll be more battles.”
“But you’ll go into them with one more thing to fight for.”
“I was worried it would make me weak, but I was wrong. I feel stronger. I’ll need to be. There are things coming—I can’t see clearly, but coming. A flame from the north, a madness brewing, a blackened soul behind a mask of innocence. Can you see? A