Clove & Moose 18: The Delayed Deliveries

Clove and Moose is a serial fiction story. If you want to get caught up on what came before, click one of the buttons below.

Previously, on Clove & Moose: After the mysterious Cataclysm dried up the earth and its magic, Clove and her cat Moose travelled to find and repair pools of corrupted magic left behind in the Cataclysm’s wake. Along the way, she has picked up three travelling companions: Marissa, Jasper, and his trusty horse Miss Delilah. They've just arrived at Bone Gorge, where skeletons of ancient giants were discovered after the Cataclysm.

“Well,” Jasper announced as they cleaned up from breakfast one morning, “I can’t put it off any more.”

Clove looked to Marissa, who didn’t seem to have any idea what he was talking about either.

“Put what off?” Clove asked.

“The rest of my deliveries,” Jasper explained. “All that extra stuff in the cart. Gotta be done.”

“Oh.” Clove had almost forgotten that was Jasper’s original reason for coming to Bone Gorge. He’d delivered about half the crates in the first week they arrived, but he hadn’t mentioned it again. She had assumed the rest of the stuff was his personal supplies. “Why the rush now?”

“Gotta get paid.” His smile was almost sheepish. “Got nothing left to trade for food.”

There was no shortage of food to be had in Bone Gorge–including the hot apple pie, as advertised–but it wasn’t free. There were job boards posted around the campsites offering opportunities to earn meals or food vouchers, with an extensive trade network. Clove had been taking odd jobs almost every day–mending a rip in a tent, helping to move boxes, cleaning laundry down in the stream–to keep them fed, but she couldn’t always come up with nine human meals plus animal feed. She and Jasper had both insisted that Marissa should focus on the search for her family, while Jasper had been watching their camp and trading odds and ends to cover what meals Clove couldn’t earn. 

“You two want to come with me?” Jasper asked. “Going to the opposite end of camp. Could be fun.”

Clove was interested to see the other end of the gorge–she hadn’t had the free time to walk down there–but she knew she couldn’t afford it. “I need to go find work if we’re going to eat.”

“You need a day off,” Jasper said. “I’ll earn enough from the deliveries to feed us all for a week.”

“Alright.” Clove didn’t take that much convincing, once she knew where her next meal was coming from. “You coming, Marissa?”

“Nah, I need to keep looking for my fam. I’ll see you guys later.”

Clove thought that Marissa probably needed a day off too, but she didn’t think that suggestion would be very well received.

“Alright,” she said instead. “Be careful out there.”

“I’m not a kid, Clove. Can I take Moose with me?”

“Absolutely not. He’s coming with us on an adventure.” Clove scooped Moose up as she followed Jasper to the wagon.

A few minutes later they were rattling down the road through the camp, seated side by side on the driver’s box. 

“You worry about her.”

It wasn’t a question, but Clove took it as an opening. “I don’t think her family’s here."

“No.”

It was nice to hear some validation, so Clove continued. “And I think the sooner she accepts that, the sooner she can try to make a new plan.”

“Yeah.”

“But I don’t know how to tell her that.”

“Hmmm.”

“What do you think?”

“I think she’ll make her own conclusions when the time is right. We’ll be there for her when she does.”

“Will we?” Clove asked. She’d thought Jasper would leave once his deliveries were done. She was surprised he’d stayed as long as he had.

“Won’t we?” Jasper asked, glancing her way.

“I guess. I just wasn’t sure how long we would all be here.”

“Oh.”

They drove on in silence. Clove’s sense of adventure was dampened by the reminder that she might be losing her friends soon. She turned her attention to Moose, and he didn’t complain.

After a few minutes, Jasper brought them to a halt. “First stop.”

A woman emerged from a tent. “That you, Jasper?”

“None other.” He hopped down from the cart and headed to the back. “Got your supplies here.”

“You’re a lifesaver. I didn’t believe Nickel had really found you.”

“Sure did. Brought me everyone’s orders.” He unloaded a crate from the back of the cart. “Took a bit to get what you needed.”

He carried the cart into the tent, the woman following behind him. Clove stayed in her seat, petting Moose, suddenly thinking of a dozen questions she’d never thought to ask Jasper before.

The woman didn’t follow him back out. He hopped back into his seat and urged Miss Delilah on. “One down, four to go.”

“Great.” Clove cleared her throat awkwardly. “What exactly are you delivering anyway?”

“Whatever folks need,” Jasper said. “Medicine, mostly.”

“Medicine or like… ‘medicine’?” Clove made air quotes with the hand that wasn’t petting Moose. 

“Don’t follow.”

“Actual medicine, or is that a euphemism for drugs?”

“Actual medicine. Folks here are pretty far from the pharmacy.”

“But you put off their deliveries for this long?”

“Delivered the medicine first. The rest is miscellaneous supplies.”

“What did you bring her?” 

“Her grandmother’s china dishes. Left them at home because she thought she’d be back, but wanted them once she decided to stay here. I stopped by her place and gathered them up.”

“Huh.”

Moose fell asleep on Clove’s lap and she rested one hand on his side as they continued through the camp. The next three deliveries were similar to the first, but as they drove on, the camp grew quieter, with tents and trailers and shacks spread farther apart. Eventually they were driving along a narrow track with no one in sight.

“Have we gone too far?” Clove asked.

“Nope,” Jasper said. “Nickel’s at the end of the path.”

“Nickel? Old friend of yours?”

“Nicholas Nathaniel Norton, if you’d believe it. We grew up together. Hadn’t seen him in a decade. Then he turned up at my farm a few months back asking if I could make some deliveries.”

“And you dropped everything to do it?”

A shrug. “I was planning to head west anyway. Here we are.”

The last shelter they arrived at was not a tent or a trailer or a shack, but a cave. 

“You need any help?” Clove offered as Jasper pulled the last crate off the cart. This one seemed heavier than the others. 

“Nope. Won’t be but a moment.”

“Suit yourself.” Clove was just as happy to stay outside in the sunshine getting Moose snuggles.

Long minutes ticked by, but Clove didn’t mind. It was nice to have a few quiet minutes to herself. She hadn’t had many of those since they’d arrived at Bone Gorge. Maybe the income from these deliveries would let her take another day off sometime soon. Or maybe Marissa could take a day off from looking for her family once a week to pick up some work and let Clove take a break. 

Or maybe she would just keep working and not complain because at least there didn’t seem to be any pools of corrupt magic here in the gorge. She had tried not to think too much about whether that was significant and whether she should be worried about it. Surely a lack of corruption was a good thing, right?

Footsteps crunched behind her and she turned to see who was coming up the path. It took her a moment to place the man, but eventually she realized who he was.

“You!” she shouted and launched herself off her seat, disturbing Moose in the process. “You’re the man who touched the bones.”

“What I touch is none of your business.” He brushed past her and continued up the path toward the cave.

“I saw the orange glow,” Clove yelled, dogging his footsteps. “I know what that means.”

“Oh? You think you’re clever?” He whirled on her, looking her up and down, sparing a glance for Moose who had followed her over. “I’ve seen your kind before. Washed up hedgewitches clinging to their dregs of magic in a world that’s left you behind. You know nothing.”

He sneered, spat on the ground at her feet, and disappeared into the cave.

“Yeah well… you’re a jerk!” Clove yelled after him, shaking her fist. “Come on Moose, let’s go.”

She sat in the wagon fuming silently for only a minute before Jasper emerged from the cave. To her surprise, he looked as grouchy as she felt. 

“How’d it go?” she asked as he climbed onto the driver’s box.

“Not good. I should’ve known Nickel was up to something.”

Clove’s heart sank. “What do you mean?”

“Bloody idiot’s started a cult.”

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Katie Conrad is a speculative fiction writer living in Halifax, Nova Scotia. You can find her on bluesky and instagram.