In All Places (Stripling Warrior) Read online

  I couldn’t fight my feelings for Gideon, but I wouldn’t dishonor Zeke or my family.

  “Keturah.” His voice was gentle and so familiar, and somehow it belonged there in that garden with me.

  I uncurled and looked up to see Gideon. At the sight of his face, my mind calmed, my heart unclenched, and I felt traitorous all the more for it.

  He went to his heels beside me and brushed some dirt from my forehead. Then he wiped the lone tear from my cheek. Answering the question in my eyes, he said, “I felt like I should come find you.”

  A bird took flight, and my eyes tracked it upward. The sky was still brilliant blue.

  Gideon touched my arm, and I looked back down at him.

  “Did you get any answers?”

  I shook my head.

  “You will. I’m waiting on mine too.” After a moment he said, “Do you want to pray together?”

  Yes! I wanted our combined faith to carry mine. I wanted to lean on Gideon’s strength. Instead, I just shook my head. I could not think of a worse betrayal of Zeke than to pray with another man about our future.

  He seemed to understand. He rose and helped me to my feet, and after he held me for a long, long time, he walked me back to camp where I collected my weapons before we started toward the training ground.

  I would not let an empty stomach keep me from doing what I knew to be right. I would deliver my countrymen from the hands of the Lamanites. And God would deliver me.

  Chapter 4

  “Heads up, Ket.”

  We were halfway to the training ground. Hunger clawed at my stomach, my head ached from crying, and Gideon tossed a ball up between us. He wanted me to hit it back, but I snatched it from the air.

  “I don’t feel like it,” I told him.

  “Come on, Ket.”

  I hadn’t even known he carried a ball like the other boys did. He never refused to play when someone else brought out a ball, but he never initiated a game either.

  He took the ball from my hand and tossed it into the air again. After he hit it a few times with his knees and feet and elbows, he knocked it back in my direction.

  “What’s the point?” I snatched it from the air again.

  When he tried to take it back, I held it out of his reach— as far out of his reach as I could.

  “Life is not meant to be a drudgery, even during hardship. Men are that they might have joy, Keturah.”

  I stopped walking and put my hands on my hips. “And what about women?”

  He made a grab for the ball again, but I quickly put it behind my back. In a playful attempt to get it back that was completely out of character for him, he snaked an arm around my waist and pried the ball from my fingers. But he didn’t let go of my hands.

  “Women are that men might have joy, too,” he said.

  A little gasp came from my throat, and I did something I hadn’t done in a long time, maybe since I had been at home with Cana. I giggled. I tried not to. I ducked my head so Gideon wouldn’t see my smile. He was so close, with his arm still around me, that my forehead rested on his chest, and I could feel his low chuckle.

  It was entirely too wonderful.

  “Let me go,” I said as I tried to wriggle away.

  “I don’t want to,” he said, and he had no trouble holding me in place—maybe because he was strong, maybe because I wasn’t trying very hard to get away.

  We were both laughing when I noticed Seth and some of his men coming up the path.

  “Really, let me go,” I said. “They will see.”

  “I don’t care who sees,” Gideon said, but he gave my hands a final squeeze and let me go.

  In a moment, Seth and the others had stopped before us and we all stood awkwardly staring at each other. I sent a look to Gideon, a reprimand for embarrassing me. Gideon tried to wipe the grin off his face, he really did, but he just couldn’t. He raised his brows at me, and I covered my mouth to keep from laughing.

  “Are you two going to the training ground?” Seth asked, looking between us.

  I nodded and pulled my bow more securely onto my shoulder.

  Gideon glanced at the sun. “Actually, no. I have to return to Captain Helaman at the government building.” He turned to me. “Have fun,” he said. Then he leaned close to my ear and whispered, “That’s an order.”

  He tossed the ball up and caught it as he left.

  Seth’s kohl-lined eyes were watching me closely.

  “You all go ahead,” he said to his men.

  None of them argued, and they moved away quickly, passing me without a word.

  Seth and I stared at each other until the sounds of the men faded.

  “You’re mad at me,” I said.

  He sighed and slowly shook his head. “I’m not mad.” He stepped closer. “Gid’s different than the rest of us.”

  “I know.”

  “He could be Chief Captain over the entire Nephite army,” he said emphatically.

  “So you’ve told me before.”

  “If you love him, don’t jeopardize it for him.”

  “What do you care?”

  “Obviously more than you do.”

  I stared at him again, and then turned on my heel and followed the others toward the training ground. It was only a moment before I heard Seth hustling to catch up.

  “Ket, wait.”

  When he was at my side, I said, “I didn’t provoke that.” I waved behind us. “Back there.”

  “You provoke it just by being you. You still have no idea what you do to men.”

  I gave him the dirtiest look I could find, reaching deep inside myself for a scowl that would make him back off. Gideon had been trying to comfort me. He had made a deliberate effort to remind me of the sweetness in life. I wouldn’t let Seth make it into something it wasn’t, something ugly and common. I didn’t know what I did to men?

  “I guess you would know.”

  It was a cruel thing to say. His shoulders stiffened, and I knew it had been too cruel. I wasn’t unaware that he himself had feelings for me, nor was I without feelings for him.

  “I’m sorry. Seth, forgive me.”

  He swallowed. “Not necessary. I shouldn’t have said anything. I should have given Gid the credit to make his own decisions, and I should have had more faith in you.”

  I bumped his shoulder with mine. “I think it was the hunger talking, for both of us.”

  We entered the training ground. As strange as I knew it was, the familiar sounds of swords and spears and boys yelling were comforting to me.

  “Let’s put our aggression to good use,” Seth said, and he led me across the field.

  It had been quite a while since Micah had returned from his embassy to the governor when I saw a group of Kenai’s men hurrying through the city toward the command station, which was now housed in one of Cumeni’s government buildings.

  I recognized them all but only knew one of them. I groaned, but approached them anyway. I hated any interaction with Mahonri. When I fell in alongside him, he glanced at me. I couldn’t tell what he was thinking. He was as ornery and difficult to communicate with as Lamech, except Lamech had the forgivable excuse of being young.

  “Where’s Kenai?” I asked, not really sure what information I wanted from him. I just knew he had some information, important information from the looks of it, and I wanted it.

  “How should I know? Kenai doesn’t report to me.”

  “Hmm…” I said. I would have to try a different tack. “Where are you going?”

  He didn’t answer. The men he was with looked between us with varying degrees of amusement. They had obviously been putting up with him for a while and were probably wondering why the stubborn Mahonri was the one I had chosen to speak to.

  “Look,” I told him. “The faster you tell me what news you have, the faster I’ll leave you alone.”

  “Or you could just leave me alone right now.”

  He was such an irritating person.

  “You will find
out soon enough,” he added, giving me a dismissing once-over that clearly implied he did not think I was anything special. He wasn’t going to tell me just because I was pretty.

  Instead of being insulted, I felt a respect for him blossom inside me. Still, I was about to argue when my eyes flicked to movement beyond Mahonri. One of the other boys appeared to be pantomiming the eating of food, bringing his fingers to his open mouth. Another boy pushed him playfully, and someone else laughed.

  When Mahonri turned to see who dared to laugh in his presence, I inserted a note of dejection into my voice and said, “Nevermind. I will go find Kenai myself.”

  Could it be true? Provisions were on the way?

  I went to Kenai’s camp. He took one look at my face and said, “How do you hear these things?”

  “So it’s true?” I exclaimed, already planning my first meal.

  “Who told you?”

  “Nobody told me.”

  He groaned. “Well, thanks to your wiles, I’m going to have to reprimand a unit of men.”

  “Nobody told me.”

  “Listen, Ket, if word gets out prematurely, it could cause problems.” He made sure to catch my eye. “We’ve got to get everything in and secured and organized for distribution.”

  “Nobody told me,” I repeated, but I had trouble keeping a sly smile from my lips.

  He glanced heavenward and then gave me a stern look. “Just when I thought you had grown up. Don’t breathe a word of the news yet.”

  I thought it would be the kind of news they would want to shout from the highest tower, but when the first of the provisions were distributed in the still small rations, I could see what Kenai had meant.

  Everyone was in a panic for more food—it was all I could think about too—but the rations were still very small.

  “We wouldn’t be able to hold it down if we gorged ourselves on food,” Lib informed me as we fixed our meal together.

  “And besides that, there are now two thousand extra men to share the provisions with,” Ethanim pointed out.

  That was true. I had only thought of the troops who had guarded the provisions to us as a blessing, not a liability.

  “Remember how we put the Lamanite prisoners on a small ration?” Lib went on.

  “I thought that was because we don’t like Lamanite dogs,” said Reb.

  “It was because their stomachs weren’t prepared to process food again,” said Lib.

  “And because we didn’t want them at their full strength,” added Gideon.

  I thought about this as I portioned out the meal to my unit brothers, about sharing food even with those we didn’t like, about not being ready to receive it, about needing it in order to be at full strength.

  “Let’s pray,” said Lib, and we all knelt while Corban offered up a grateful prayer.

  And then, on Lib’s advice, we tried to eat slowly.

  With time, our rations increased little by little as we became ready.

  A few days before we planned to march on Manti, Zeke came to my camp to take me for a walk. He had long since stopped asking me to walk with him, and he just waited patiently while I got ready. I had been sitting with the others checking over all our weapons, and I thanked heaven I was sitting between Lib and Ethanim and not next to Gideon.

  The day was warm, though the breeze was cool and carried with it the first hint of the change of seasons.

  “What are you thinking about?” Zeke asked me as we left the camps and walked out onto the terrace.

  He probably assumed my mind was on the upcoming campaign, the march on Manti. We still did not talk much when we walked together. Talking gave us too much opportunity to disagree.

  “I was thinking about the word of God.”

  “What about it?” he asked.

  “Well,” I began, a little uncomfortably. “When the provisions were low I asked Lib to take me to a private place so I could pray.”

  Zeke remained silent, listening.

  “I wanted so much to find strength in my hunger, to find the meaning in it all.”

  “And did you?”

  He asked this so casually. I had nearly forgotten how comfortable he was talking about the things of God, and I remembered how knowledgeable he was too. Perhaps if I had approached him earlier, he could have helped me to see my way.

  I took a breath. “I had this impression about the living waters. You know? How they are a representation of the love of God. And I remembered how Nephi said to feast upon the word of Christ, as if it were food, or sustenance. I guess my mind was really on food.”

  His brows knit together as he considered it too. “But that was meant to describe the way we must approach the scriptures—feasting, eating heavily from many courses and varieties, taking it into ourselves and making it a part of us.”

  “I know.” I shrugged. “It was only that if water is the love of God and food is the word of God, wouldn’t His love and His word sustain us in difficult times?”

  He searched my face as if he were looking for something familiar in it.

  “What?” I said a little defensively.

  He only shook his head. “I’m glad you received an answer to your questions.”

  I thought of the other questions I had asked that day and tried to keep the heat from rising in my cheeks.

  We had entered the woods, and I loved the familiarity of it—the smell of the pine, the shadows, the softness of spongy ground. It was almost as if we were back home together in Melek.

  In the coolness of the trees, I searched Zeke’s face. He was my oldest friend. Trustworthy in every way. Deserving of the truth.

  I licked my lips. “There is something else. When I was praying, there in the garden, I wanted very much to know how to stop hurting you.”

  “Is it so hard to figure out?” he asked quietly. “I wonder that you had need to ask the Almighty.”

  I ducked under a branch, even as the ground became steep. “It is hard for me, yes. Sometimes it doesn’t seem to matter what I do, you get angry. You take it the wrong way. We’ve no trust between us anymore. I don’t want it to be like this between us when we are married. I hate that it is like this between us now.”

  He glanced down at me. His quiet words seemed to bring the forest to utter stillness. “I have not asked you to marry me, Keturah.”

  But he would. I laughed. “You can’t tell me you mean to go against our families’ wishes.”

  “Is that all it would be for you? Obedience?”

  I stopped walking and leaned my back against a tree. Taking my water skin from my belt, I said, “Zeke, of course not.”

  He stopped and turned to face me. He looked at me as if he didn’t recognize me but felt like he should.

  I drank and then returned the water skin to my belt and offered him a smile. “How could you even think it?”

  He raised one brow, but not unkindly, and moved closer to me.

  “So what have you been thinking about?” I asked him.

  He smiled. “It’s none of your—”

  “Yes it is! I told you what I was thinking!” And I reached out and pinched him.

  He pinched me back so quickly, so instinctively, that I laughed out loud. Had I forgotten how he could tease? How his eyes could be bright with humor? He laughed too, and it felt good to be laughing with him. I had missed it so much, and I turned away from him for a moment so he wouldn’t see the tears that stung my eyes.

  If tears fell from my eyes, this would end. Even if they were tears of happiness.

  This was exactly the way it had been before, but it wasn’t until later when I was alone in my tent that I would realize how very sad that was. It had been three years since the stripling warriors had left for the war. Zeke and I had grown, learned, been tried, and progressed in many ways, maybe every way possible except one—our relationship had not progressed.

  Later when I was alone in my tent, I would tell myself a strong relationship would have been able to withstand all that had happened.r />
  And what had happened? All Zeke had ever done was love me.

  “Just tell me,” I laughed, trying desperately to hide the deep ache that filled my chest. Lately, God had filled me with such peace and light that this feeling scared me.

  “I was thinking of how you’ve changed,” he said slowly, as if he thought he might make me mad, as if he were bracing himself for my angry outburst.

  And the fact that there was no outburst coming was evidence that I had changed.

  I eased my hand into his, and still the ache in my heart did not calm. The familiar clasp of our hands kept the tears stinging at my eyes, but I blinked them back.

  I swallowed hard. “It seems God can even change the heart of a brat like me,” I said. I tried to keep it light. It even sounded light, I thought. I may have fooled Zeke, but I did not fool myself. God had touched my heart, and I could not deny it.

  “I never thought you were a brat,” he said sincerely. He touched my hair. “Honestly, I never meant to make you feel that way.”

  “I know,” I said. “It was the way I felt about myself—that someone as good and sincere as you could never truly love someone as undeserving as me. I’m impulsive and too headstrong. I talk when I should be silent. I thought you had convinced yourself you loved me because of duty to your family. And when you did not support me—”

  “But I did support you!” he cut in. “I asked Helaman to intercede with your Mother. I counseled with Lib and Seth, Micah, your mother, Kalem and my father. All to ease your way, to make your dream possible! Don’t stand there and tell me I didn’t support you.”

  I was not the only one with tears that threatened to fall.

  I took a breath. “When I thought you didn’t support me, didn’t understand me.”

  “Not like Gid?”

  I instantly gripped his hand tight so he wouldn’t let go of me. My mind raced for the perfect thing to say. But I wasn’t perfect, and I couldn’t find it.

  “That is in the past,” I finally said. “We cannot stay the same as we were. You think I have changed, but you have too. Sometimes, I feel we are strangers. I hate it.”

  I held tight to his hand. He couldn’t go anywhere without me. I wouldn’t let him. I reached up with my other hand and fingered the crinkles at the corners of his eyes and the hard angles of his jaw, hoping somehow that my touch said what my words could not.