Unlikely

by Frances Pauli

They slipped out of the next pocket as rapidly as they entered it. This time, they rejoined normal space, emerged from the bushes beside the shadow of the same crumbling staircase where they’d met two nights before. Satina noticed the difference as soon as she stepped through the membrane. The stair had been tagged far more obviously. It gleamed with huge, magically painted Starlight symbols.

  Marten growled beside her. The noise was the first he’d made since Hamis banished them from the Tinker camp. She risked a look at him, pressing her nails into her palms for courage. His rage seemed aimed elsewhere. His eyes focused on the stair, and she saw fire in them.

  “Marten.” The bravery didn’t extend to touching him. “I’m so sorry.”

  “Not your fault.” Despite the words, his tone was clipped.

  “The boy, I—”

  “The trap wasn’t meant to last. He’d have been free in time to do this either way.”

  So she hadn’t aided the boy’s crime much. Somehow, it didn’t make her feel any better, not with Marten looking everywhere but directly at her. Not with the ice in his voice, the self-loathing. His shoulders curled into a slump.

  That posture, the defeat he embraced so quickly, wriggled under her skin. The Starlights, the Shades even, they did this to people. To anyone. And the Gentry fiend? They’d shot her down like a game bird. “We have to stop them.” It seemed the obvious thing to say, the only just answer, but Marten looked at her like she’d just sprouted a tail.

  “Oh really?”

  “What else can we do?”

  “Well, I was leaning toward nothing.”

  “Nothing?” She’d heard that wrong, or he’d meant it as a joke. The Starlights had his town in a chokehold. What they’d done to the Gentry couldn’t be ignored.

  “That’s right.” He swept past her, stopped at the roadside long enough to squint at the sky, and then started off through the ruts toward Westwood.

  Satina scurried after him. They walked toward town without speaking. When they’d reached the outlying fields the sky darkened with thick clouds that spoke of both rain and an early dusk. The fences had been tagged already, and she knew Marten saw the marks. He said nothing, not until they neared the stable and the chapel steeple stretching toward the incoming storm.

  “If you were planning to move on, I suspect now would be a good time.”

  “What?” She stopped walking, stood in one of the wider ruts and stared at him.

  “You know,” he waved an arm half-heartedly. “Move along. Get while the going is good. Abandon ship.”

  It stung, even with his lilting tease behind the words. He meant it. She couldn’t miss his sincerity. Shove off, he meant. Get lost. Her mouth opened to retort, but a voice from the road ahead preempted her reply. It shouted at them from the edge of town.

  “Halt!”

  They hadn’t really been moving. Still, Marten froze in place. They both waited without twitching while two blue-booted men approached. They’d drawn short swords, and wore scraps of armor that she hadn’t seen among the gang’s attire previously. Crude metal cups topped their shoulders, and one man had an armored plate bound to his sword arm.

  “It’s the half-bloods,” he snarled to his fellow. “Vane’s been looking for you, shopkeeper. They’ll be needing more tools. Shovels, I reckon. Picks, whatever you’re hiding.”

  To raze the castle ruins and find—what? The menhir flashed in her mind’s eye, and she was certain there was more power hiding there, things Hadja and Marten had not found that would prove deadly in the Starlight’s hands. And Marten wanted to do nothing.

  “Not hiding, certainly.” Marten shuffled now to the side, effectively putting himself between her and the gang members. “I’m sure we can work something out.”

  “What about her?” The second guard stuck a finger in her direction. “Vane said—”

  “She’s just on her way home,” Marten interrupted him. He cast a look her way, low down and pleading for her to take his hint and run. “Down past the blacksmith,” his voice sharpened. “On the road that leads east to the mountains.”

  “Shut up.” The man kicked out. His boot landed on Marten’s thigh and sent him stumbling. “No one asked you where she lived, Skinner.”

  “Stop it!” Satina moved to help him, but he shrugged her off, pulled away and turned a blazing expression on her.

  “Go home,” he said. “I’ll take one of these gentlemen to the store and help him, and I’m sure the other will continue to do his job here as he’s been instructed.”

  He’d worked out a nice escape plan for her, and without consulting her for an opinion. Now the guards exchanged looks and processed what he’d said. Maybe he’d guessed correctly and they had orders to watch the road. More likely they’d been ordered to watch for two half-bloods wandering in from an errant pocket.

  “I’ll see you later tonight, then.” She didn’t wait for him to answer, or for the Starlights to decide on a course of action. Leaving Marten alone with them would have been her last choice, but he’d dug a trench for her that pointed directly toward Hadja’s, or if she read him correctly, toward the mountains far outside of town. She balled her skirts into her fists, lifted them enough to give her boots more freedom, and trotted away, half expecting the guard to snatch her mid-flight and drag her back.

  Instead, they let her be, allowed her to run for it while Marten was still firmly in their clutches. She chewed her lip and rounded the corner in front of the smithy. They’d kicked him on the leg he already favored. Had they done the original damage yesterday as well? She ground each step into the road and snarled at nothing in particular. She had nothing to lash out with or against, no fighting skill at all. She was a Granter. She didn’t work with weapons.

  Regardless, she had no intention of taking Marten’s orders, of running and leaving him or his town to the Starlights’ fate. She’d seen the fiend fall, would see it again whenever she closed her eyes. She planned on fighting, by herself if necessary. Otherwise, if the gangs could rout her at every turn, if they could dog her steps, destroy everyone she tried to assist, how could she call herself a Granter?

  If she couldn’t help this town, how could she help anyone?

  She didn’t know if it was the Starlights, or Marten or that arrow standing from the fiend’s chest, but something had hardened into a stubborn knot inside her. She didn’t want to run anymore. She wanted to chase the gang out of Westwood. Even as she jogged past the blacksmith’s shop, as she ducked her head to avoid the gazes of the Starlights inside the shed, waiting for their turn at armoring, she knew she had to try. She had to help the whole town, to face down a gang and survive.

  She was pretty sure no one ever had.

  The girl, Maera, hid in the grass on Hadja’s side of the fence. She hunkered down in the weeds and herbs where the men in her father’s shed couldn’t find her. When Satina passed, Maera turned in her direction. The girl smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes, one of which had a purple bruise around it. A shout from the smithy had her back to hiding in an instant, and Satina marched on to Hadja’s herbed path, grateful for the soothing aromas.

  It had already started, the Starlight invasion. How many more children would suffer bruises, or worse?

  She stomped up the path, huffing the scent of herbs until she felt light-headed. Hadja stood up as she swept by. The woman said something, but Satina didn’t catch it. She didn’t slow down, didn’t calm down, until the cottage warmth enveloped her and the scent of something roasting momentarily triumphed over her rage. She hadn’t eaten all day, and her stomach rumbled in protest.

  It held nothing but the Tinker’s alcohol, and the scent of meat was nearly too much for her. She grabbed for the nearest stool and flopped into it, lowering her head to the table. The door opened and Hadja’s soft footsteps padded inside. Satina didn’t even look up. She listened to the woman moving about the cottage and let the smells drive her thoughts away from gangs and Old Magic for just a moment.


  Hadja returned to the table. She set a bowl down, followed by a second. Then she perched on the open stool and waited for her cooking to lure Satina back to lucidity. It didn’t take long. The scent of garlic and sage pulled her head up as firmly as if a hand lifted her. She slid the bowl over and inhaled the fumes before digging in.

  They ate together without questions, but the air hummed with expectation. Hadja had patience, but she also had a power of her own, maybe not magic, but compelling just the same. When Satina’s scoops slowed enough that she could breathe between bites, she found the woman’s eyes drifting to her. The old fingers folded under Hadja’s chin, and the urge to speak overwhelmed her.

  “The gang has found your castle ruins.” She took another bite, hoping for some reaction, but Hadja only nodded and pressed her lips tighter. “They shot one of the Gentry. I don’t know if she lived or died.”

  That time she earned a grunt.

  “They’re going to dig there. They’ll never leave now. The whole town will suffer or—”

  “Or learn to live under gang rule. Yes. I’ve seen it elsewhere too, missy. You’re not the only one who’s traveled.”

  “What do we do?” Her hands shook now, and she set down the spoon.

  “We?” Hadja laughed. “Are you planning on staying to help?”

  “Of course.” She jumped from the stool when Hadja’s fist banged against the table. The woman’s face split into a grin.

  “Good! There now, sit back down.”

  Satina shook her head. She saw a fight in the woman’s eyes, saw the same things she felt reflected back. “Marten wants to give up. He wants to…”

  “Don’t judge him too harshly.” Hadja waved her to sit. “Sit down. The man has been through more than his share of fighting, he’s lost more than his share too. Can’t blame him for not wanting to lose more.”

  “But they’ll take over his shop. They’re already stealing from him.”

  “Wasn’t talking about the shop.” Hadja stared at her, waited. Her eyes pierced Satina’s front as if it were mist.

  “He told me to go away.” The sob burst from deep in her chest. Her eyes spilled tears she didn’t know she’d been checking. “He. Told. Me. To. Leave.” She gasped the words between shivers.

  Hadja’s hand covered hers. The woman’s gaze softened. Her voice soothed instead of scolding. “Come now. Come on. Why do you suppose he did that?”

  “He’s mad at me for letting the boy go.” She sniffed and wiped at her eyes with her free hand. “He blames me for bringing the Starlights.”

  “Not likely, that. Try again.”

  “Well, maybe he doesn’t want me to get hurt.”

  “Now see, I knew you were a smart girl. Eat. I’ll get you a cloth.”

  She stood and wandered into the back room. Satina obeyed her orders and cleaned the rest of her bowl. She felt better with something solid in her stomach. But her eyes burned now from the trickle of tears that continued to run their course. When Hadja returned and handed her a scrap of fabric, she wiped her face and blew her nose into the square.

  “Better?”

  “Thank you.”

  “Now.” Hadja sat and banged her elbows onto the tabletop. She stuck her chin into her palms and pursed her lips. “Now we need a plan.”

  “What?”

  “Well, we can’t exactly storm up to this Vane fellow, just the two of us, and demand he gets out of town.”

  “But we can do something.” Together. She felt lighter with an ally. The task seemed less impossible. “You have an idea?”

  “Nope.” Hadja dashed her plans, but the old woman’s eyes still sparked with rebellion. “But we’ve a wealth of power between us. Has to be something we can come up with to stop a little band of Starlights.”

  “Are you a Shade?”

  “Wh—where did you get an idea like that?” Hadja snorted. She didn’t look away, or flush or give any sign of guilt. “No time for either of that lot.”

  “There’s a symbol in your cellar. I couldn’t help but notice them.”

  “Eh. Well, next time look closer. Those aren’t gang symbols, goodmother.” She sat up taller and her eyes glazed a bit, lured away by some thought Satina couldn’t guess at. “Where do you think that lot came up with their flashy badges?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Well, I do. They stole them, like everything else they claim.”

  The thatch pattered as the clouds finally gave up their rain. Satina eyed the rafters, expecting the force to breach the cottage’s defenses. Nothing dripped under the first assault, however. She frowned and eyed her bowl without realizing it. Hadja whisked it away to be refilled.

  “So the symbols in your cellar are something else, and the gangs took them?”

  “Twisted them, you might say. Even the gangs come from something older. Did your parents teach you nothing of the Powers? You’d think with your blood…oh.”

  The woman trailed off, and Satina waited, twisting her fingers together and finding more filth than she liked under her nails. So long on the road, and so little time to worry about things like clean nails.

  “Well,” Hadja brought her more food, but this time she just stared at it. “Don’t you worry. Our Skinner will come around eventually.”

  “He’s not really a Skinner, is he?”

  “Sure he is. Sure.”

  “I don’t understand. He only meant to teach that boy a lesson, and he doesn’t really hurt anyone.”

  “Maybe it’s not the man you don’t understand. Maybe it’s the word itself.”

  Skinner. Had it come from something older as well? If it had, if it meant more than she believed, what did that make her? What did Granter really stand for? What else had her education lacked? She could see the understanding of that in Hadja’s eyes, and dropped hers back to the bowl of meat she didn’t feel like eating.

  “You’ve had a rough morning,” Hadja said. “And a night on the ground, no doubt. Why not take some rest in a real bed?”

  “What about the gang? We have to—”

  “Sleep, child. You’re out of steam. We’ll have time to plan later.”

  Satina nodded. Her bones complained already about the night on the ground, and her muscles had gone soft and unresponsive.

  “There you go. Good.” Hadja helped her up, steered her toward the curtain. “Don’t you worry. You get some rest, and I’ll do some thinking.”

  “Think for both of us.” Satina stumbled through the curtain without pulling it aside. It veiled her for a moment, a thick shroud she could hardly breathe through. The rough fabric scratched her bare arms. She pushed on, straight in where she knew the bed waited, and the curtain dragged back over her head and into its proper position.

  The last thing she heard before sleep swept her away was Hadja’s chuckle, her soft steps back to the kitchen. She could do the thinking tonight. Satina closed her eyes and was out.

  Chapter Ten