Hannah's Hero - Ruby Dixon

1

HANNAH

I sit alone in the supply tent, gazing at the baskets full of dried food. There are dozens of them, but I know it’s not enough. It’s never enough, because there seem to be new mouths to feed every day, no supermarkets full of food, and more snow. Always more snow. All of it worries me. So I sit down each morning to try and figure out how much food we have and how long it’ll last. There are thirteen baskets of the spicy trail mixed called “kah,” four small baskets of different types of leaves for tea, three large baskets of strips of dried meat, and one basket full of rendered fat. There’s the food that’s found on the beach or brought in by hunters, but we can’t count on that, so I assume every day that we’re going to eat what’s stored.

The headcount fluctuates too, which means I need to redo my counting every morning. Salukh and Pashov are about to head home the next time Veronica and Ashtar head out, so soon I’ll be able to take them out of the equation…unless someone new from the Croatoan village decides to show up and throw my theory out of whack. There are sixteen human women from our stranded group, four gladiators, three men from Clan Strong Arm, four men from Tall Horn, four from Shadow Cat. I dip the end of my sharpened bone stick into my pot of charcoal and make marks on the flat, pale animal skin I use for such counting. There’s Liz and her family—five marks. No, four since the baby isn’t eating our food. There’s Brooke and her mate, Taushen. There’s Harlow and Rukh and their son, Farli and Mardok, and now Gail and Vaza and their baby.

I calculate how much food can last how long to feed forty-four people. If we take one basket of meat and make a stew with two baskets of root vegetables and this planet’s version of dried seaweed—of which we have fourteen baskets combined—then we can feed everyone for…one meal. The awful, crawling feeling in my stomach returns as I do my daily tally. I stare at the baskets and baskets of food, but it doesn’t feel like enough. Maybe we can do two baskets of vegetables and half a basket of meat to make things go further.

Even though the hut is full of food, it’s less than a week’s supply. That’s not good.

I busy myself with my calculations, losing myself in the need to control the situation. I know I’m being overly controlling about it. I know no one worries as much as I do about the food situation. New meat is brought in every day, but we also have to eat several times a day, and as the weather gets colder and worse as time passes, I worry there won’t be enough. No one else seems to worry over such things, so I take it upon myself to try and handle the situation.

I tried to make Vektal realize how important it was, but he just gave me a lot of annoyed looks and did his best to avoid me until he returned home to his wife. I don’t think I’m that annoying about this kind of thing…am I? I gaze at the basket of dried meat and tap my bone “pencil” against my lip, thinking. How can I make this food stretch? What if we did three parts vegetables to one part meat? How many days of food would that garner us in case of emergency?

I frown to myself and make new scratch marks on my tally sheet, trying to figure things up, just like I do every morning. It keeps me away from the others and gives me something to do. If I’m working on math, I don’t have to think about home, and everything I lost.

If I’m hiding in the supply tent, I don’t have to think about my new home, either, and the hunter with the long braid that stares at me every time I venture near the fire.

Footsteps crunch up on the pebbled sand outside. “Oh Jesus, what is it now?” I hear Bridget’s annoyance. “Why are you following me? Again?”

“Because we must talk, Bree-shit.”

I smirk to myself at that. I know Bridget hates it, but it is pretty damn funny. I do feel bad for her, though. Ever since she hooked up with the hot bearded guy from the cat tribe, he hasn’t left her alone for a second. And she