gathering_blue_novel-2

illness and death. So much had happened. So much had changed. She assumed
that she would not be returning now that her status seemed different. But
because they had called to her in a friendly way, Kira moved through the shed,
through the clatter of the wooden looms at work, and picked up the scraps from
the floor. One loom was silent, she noticed. No one was working there today.
Fourth from the end, she counted. Usually Camilla was there.
She paused by the empty loom and waited until a nearby worker had stopped
to reset her shuttle.
"Where is Camilla?" Kira asked curiously. Sometimes, of course, the women
left briefly, to wed, to give birth, or simply assigned to some other temporary
task.
The weaver glanced over, her hands still occupied. Her feet began to move
again on the treadle. "She fell, took a clumsy fall, over at the stream." She
gestured with her head. "Doing washing. The rocks were mossy."
"Yes, it's slippery there." Kira knew. She had slipped herself sometimes at the
stream, at the washing place.
The woman shrugged. "She broke her arm real bad. Can't be fixed. Can't be
made straight. No more good for weaving. Her hubby tried real hard to straighten
up the arm 'cause he needs her. For the tykes and such. But she'll probably go to
the Field."
Kira shuddered, imagining the torturing pain of the broken arm as the hubby
tried to pull it into a healing shape.
"She has five tykes, Camilla does. Now she can't care for them, or work.
They'll be given away. You want one?" The woman grinned at Kira. She had few
teeth.
Kira shook her head. She smiled wanly and continued down the aisle between
the looms.
"You want her loom?" the woman called after her. "They'll be needing
somebody to take it. You're probably ready to weave."
But Kira shook her head again. She had wanted to weave, once. The weaving
women had always been kind to her. But her future seemed different now.
The looms clattered on. From the shade of the shed, Kira noticed that the sun