Free Dead and Buryd: A Dystopian Action Adventure Novel (Out of Orbit Book 1) by Chele Cooke

from the back of the metal. It was decent enough, but the quality of the Lennox family cooking had definitely dropped off since her mother’s death.
    Lifting the lid and removing the tray that lay across the top of the trunk, she placed it on the rough-hewn wooden table that took up most of the simple kitchen. The kitchen wasn’t used much anymore, the different pots and utensils that her mother had made such good use of during her life, abandoned. Her father preferred to make simple meals in large quantity so that they would last for a number of days.
    She dug through the contents of the trunk, finally finding what she was looking for. Down near the bottom, clearly not used all that often by her father and brother, a small cloth satchel held a number of paper packets filled with spices. Her mother had been obsessed with collecting spices. Whenever the Kahle camped near another tribe, she would insist on going over with some trade in the hopes of finding something the Kahle couldn’t find on their trail.
    Georgianna took each packet out in turn, carefully opening each one and sniffing it tentatively. She had never had the flare for cooking her mother had, no matter how much her mother had tried teaching her. Georgianna wasn’t good at automatically knowing which kind of spice a dish needed to really bring out the flavour, nor did she know how to counteract things when they went wrong. While Georgianna was a good medic, she was not good at reviving injured food.
    She tested a number of spices and herbs, sprinkling them over the stew in turn. She closed each packet just as carefully as she’d opened it and placed them back in the satchel, going to the stew and stirring it carefully. Lifting the spoon, she sucked on the back thoughtfully, wondering what it was her mother would have done. There was something wrong with it: it was full and tasted of the meat, but there was something missing, some flavour that, as a child, would have had Georgianna initially wrinkling her nose.
    Blinking for a moment, she wondered if it could really be that easy? She reached into the trunk and pulled out a dark green cantina. Opening it, she sniffed and immediately wrinkled her nose. Dark berry wine. That was it. She liked the taste of the wine, and she had certainly become more accustomed to it as she got older, but there was still that slightly acidic smell that she had never fully gotten used to.
    She stood over the stew for a moment, wondering how much she was supposed to put in: too much and it would overpower everything; too little and what was the point? Grimacing as she tipped the cantina, she waited for three healthy glugs to spill from the mouth before she brought it away, replacing the cap and returning it to the trunk.
    Her third tasting yielded better results. While it still didn’t taste like her mother’s—she was pretty sure nothing ever would—at least it tasted of more than meat and root vegetables. She stirred the concoction once more before placing the spoon to the side and returning to the front porch, leaning over her father’s shoulders and kissing his cheek.
    “You smell like your mother,” her father commented with a fond smile.
    “Of dark berry wine?” Georgianna asked.
    For a moment, her father pondered the idea, before he slowly nodded.
    “I think that may have been part of it.”
    Georgianna climbed past her father and slumped down onto the dry earth near his feet. Braedon, who had been playing with a couple of carved wooden horses from Halden’s childhood, picked up his toys and rushed over, wriggling himself into Georgianna’s lap so that she could wrap her arms around his waist and rest her chin on top of his head.
    “How’ve you been Da’?” she asked.
    Her father shrugged. He looked older than he used to, far older than he should have looked. Georgianna could remember her father scooping both her and Halden up under his arms, carrying them through camp when they misbehaved. He wasn’t a giant,