Finding dry deadwood was the easy part. After he had brought in larger branches and smaller branches, he fetched some dry leaves, grass and twigs for kindling. Setting them down inside the cave, he tried to remember what Cheiron had done on those occasions when the last coal in the fire had gone out.
Why is it, he mused, that when we are young we cannot wait to be adults, and then, when we are grown, we spend the rest of our lives having moments when we wished we were just children again? Is that what life is? Always wishing we were somewhere else, or were someone else, unable to accept what and who and where we are?
He selected the straightest branch he could find that was no thicker than his finger, and laid it to one side. Next, he made a small wad of crushed dry leaves and grass and put it on a little pile of small twigs. Picking up the straightest twig from where he had set it, he pressed the end against the wad of kindling, put his palms together with the stick between them, and began sliding his hands as if rubbing them together for warmth, spinning the tip of the twig against the kindling as he drilled for fire.
When a ribbon of smoke curled up from the kindling he suddenly remembered why he had never seen a fire inside the cave. Belatedly he snatched up the burning kindling and branches and set them just outside the cave entrance so that the chamber would not fill up with smoke. It went out, of course, but he didn't care, now that he knew he could get it going again.
With Cheiron gone off somewhere he needed a fire to keep beasts away. But that wasn't the real reason he did it. If Darla reappeared before morning she might get chilled, once the heat of the day had bled out of the rock. If she was a goddess, he wanted to stay on her good side.
He found half a dozen rocks the size of his head and piled them around in a makeshift hearth around the little fire as he added larger sticks to the kindling. Before long he had a decent fire blazing and carefully took the hottest rocks into the cave interior, settling himself on the ground with his back against the edge of the opening.
The fire would last a while. He could probably risk a nap while he waited for her to return. Now that he had seen Darla close her eyes, he found that he could manage the trick.
Yet sleep eluded him. Not because he was wound up like a catapult from the events of the day. It had been a bizarre afternoon, to be sure, but that was not it at all. He just wasn't tired. Under better circumstances he could have fallen asleep by drinking the dried juice of poppies in wine. Or, just enough wine. But he wasn't about to go off in search of poppies, and he had no wine anyway. It looked to be a long night.