[PSL] in this sense the open jaws of wild beasts will appear no less pleasing than their prototypes

[katabasis]

The bread that is over-baked so that it cracks and bursts asunder hath not the form desired by the baker; yet none the less it hath a beauty of its own, and is most tempting to the palate. Figs bursting in their ripeness, olives near even unto decay, have yet in their broken ripeness a distinctive beauty.

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[aletheian]

Thomas translates this, and further negotiations - he offers no input because he doesn't have any; there is some tension between Victor and Masson but he navigates away from it, deferring to the man in charge. Like the unbalance in his own mind, there are two sides to this situation, the allure of rest and the need to keep hold of momentum, both shadowed with ever-present danger. Thomas has spent so long holding still, being silent, simply enduring-- the drive to keep moving now is an itch under is skin.

The Frenchmen don't have much in the way of transportable food, but offer a modest hunk of raw deer meat wrapped tightly in a cleaned membrane of some kind, gut or intestine. A waterskin, the canvas and rope, and shot and powder from Leroux personally ("Give it over," he insists haltingly at Masson's less than enthusiastic reaction, "I bought it.") make up the rest of what they'll part with in trade for one of the pistols. The fine one from Oglethorpe's house, chosen for what Thomas suspects is its high resale value, and he's personally somewhat relieved to be rid of it. If guns of that make are recognizable or not, he doesn't know, but better it be here than with them if they are.

Business sorted, Thomas crouches down again in front of Leroux to thank him and talk a little more about the practicalities of looking after himself-- "You're not guaranteed anything just because you got up, you have to be mindful or you'll squander your body's hard work to get this far" --and then it's joining the others to finish packing up.

"You don't think they'll follow us, do you?" Sophie is asking, so very quiet.

[katabasis]

"Unlikely. If they cared to keep us here, they could have been considerably more hospitality." An offer to equipment them better in exchange for another day in camp to oversee the sick man's condition, or hours spent on some manufactured task. James works alongside Charlotte to divide their supplies as evenly as possible, then pack them away into their respective bundles. "It seems likely they're as happy to see us gone as we are to leave."

It's a reasonable thing to do. Clearly the eight of them are trouble of some kind, but is the risk worth whatever might be earned from it? Particularly when profiting off them would require the confirmation of an unknowable rumor and a long trek back toward civilization. Or maybe they are simply a kind of decent - sure that there is something wrong, trusting that a group made up largely of white women in the middle of the woods must somehow be victimized, and respectable enough not to press too hard at taking advantage of the obvious.

He's suspects the former - that their company is simply too more trouble than Masson perceives them to be worth. That's fine. They're leaving and so the motivations of the Frenchmen make absolutely no difference.

It takes considerably less time to break down the canvas in clear weather than it did to set up during the storm. Strange - how the folding and packing away of that flimsy shelter makes them seem so suddenly vulnerable there at the edge of the camp. Once again, they're untethered: trespassers. Bettina seems sharp and brittle in the open air, her pale hair tangled and her face very pale. She's staring, too secretly wild to be mistaken for anything but ready to be gone- gone-- gone---

James helps Richard haul Bes upright, checks the pistol at his waist, then hauls one of the packs up onto his shoulder. "Ready?" He should be asking the woman with the bullet hole in her leg, but he's looking at Thomas.

[aletheian]

He hopes that James is right, that because it would be much more difficult to hamper them once they're on their way and on guard instead of just holding a gun to someone's head while they're all here, nothing will come of it. That these strange men are tolerant at all hits on both the habits that have been beaten into Thomas (everyone dully cooperative at all times) and the instincts trained into his nerves (kindness is deceptive, no one is to be trusted), and so he doesn't know how to gauge the odds. He is immeasurably thankful for the respite and the small trade of supplies, but if anyone lurks in their wake or makes another remark about one of the girls, it won't weigh on his conscience to end any of their lives.

Are their adolescent patron saints are still out there, watching, he wonders.

For so long, Thomas had found himself incapable of imagining what the woods outside the plantation might be like - his world for years had been walls with no windows, peeling hospital plaster and cold stone, and it stole something intangible from him. When he found himself able to, bit by bit, memories of the countryside and visualizations of fairytales found him, timid daydreams of alien forests and shorelines. In his mind it was always beautiful, peaceful, but empty. That thing stolen away, leaving him isolated even in imagination.

The reality of it is terrific - causing terror, great intensity, extremely good, all of it - so alive. From worms and birds to the deer that past them, whole communities and cultures of native peoples wisely keeping their distance, imperial cast-offs wandering to define their own lives. It's beautiful enough to make him feel choked with an emotion he can't name if he thinks about it pointedly, and also-- so frightening, and he doesn't know why. Feelings he hasn't ever experienced before, can't qualify.

But he is feeling.

"Ready."