Daughter of Witches

by Patricia C. Wrede

  The quarters were crowded for five people, but no one complained. Jaren coiled down against the beam nearest the exit and looked expectantly at Mist. “What now?” he asked.

  “We must find a way out of Drinn. Today, or tonight,” Mist said. Her eyes were closed; she seemed far more exhausted than the effort of dodging Templemen should have warranted.

  Shandy snorted skeptically. “How do you think you can do that? The Templemen watch the gates in double shifts, and nobody could sneak out even when there was only two of them.”

  “We must find a way,” Mist repeated in a low voice. Her eyes opened in a long, slow motion. Ranira saw something like desperation in them. “I cannot hold out longer than that.”

  “What do you mean?” Arelnath demanded. “Protective spells are not that draining. With food and water, this place should be safe until the middle of this Mother-lost Festival. By then it should be easier to slip past the guards, and there’s not much point in leaving earlier. Venran won’t be at our meeting place for another four days, at least, and it’s certainly possible that his caravan may be delayed.”

  “If we wait beyond tonight, there is no place in the city that will be safe for us.” Mist said. “The Temple watches constantly and that pressure is draining, since I do not dare use any but the most subtle spells. Even those I cannot keep secret for long. Yet, without them, we would be detected at once. I do not know how they channel such power. You have had some training; can you not feel it?”

  Arelnath frowned in concentration. “No, but I have very little skill. I will have to trust to your abilities.”

  “The watchers must rest sometime,” Jaren said thoughtfully. “Magic is so hated that there cannot be many priests in Drinn with the knowledge to trace us. Can you not rest when they do?”

  Mist shook her head. “It is easier then, but not enough. I must be prepared for them to begin again. I fear, too, that they prepare some other magic against us; I have felt the edges of it brushing by. We must be out of Drinn before they are ready.”

  “Then we will leave tonight,” Jaren said calmly.

  “How?” Ranira asked pointedly.

  “When the streets fill with people, it will be easier to avoid the guards,” Jaren said, “and it should not be hard to find some of those brown robes and a couple of veils. You…”

  “Jaren, I will not wear one of those things!” Arelnath interrupted. “I am a Cilhar warrior. I will not pretend to be a brainless slave. I thought we settled this when I agreed to this harebrained scheme of yours!”

  “I, too, am Cilhar, and I do not ask lightly,” Jaren said, ignoring Arelnath’s last comment. “But the Templemen are looking for a man, a youth, and two women. They are not looking for a family of pilgrims with three women and a young boy. It will be far easier to avoid them if you go veiled, at least until we are out of the city.”

  Arelnath’s mouth set in a stubborn line, but before she could respond, Shandy broke in. “Women don’t have short hair,” he said scornfully. “A veil won’t hide that. Anyway, no one leaves during Festival. Don’t you know anything?”

  “If we knew more of Drinn, we would have no need to be here.” Jaren said.

  Arelnath snorted. “I thought you had been in Drinn before! Why don’t you know all this?”

  “I have been in Drinn before,” Jaren said. “Exactly once. But I wasn’t interested enough in local customs to ask many questions.”

  “Now he tells us!” Arelnath said.

  “We had to come,” Jaren said. “It doesn’t matter now. Shandy, I can’t believe the gates are completely closed. How could the priests feed all these people?”

  Ranira said, “The gates are only opened for a few hours a day to let the farmers in with food. No one goes out at all. And there are always two Temple guards there; probably more than that since we got away.” She looked at Mist. “Unless your magic can kill the Templemen, we can’t get out that way.”

  “I am a healer,” Mist said. “There are rules that govern such magic. It would be my death to strike them. A healer cannot kill.”

  Arelnath gave Mist an odd look, but said nothing. Jaren looked briefly from Mist to Ranira and then back to Arelnath. “I see. We shall have to find another way, then.”

  The two foreigners began discussing alternative ways of getting out of the city, with Shandy putting in an occasional word of advice while Mist leaned against the wall, resting. Ranira retreated as well as she could into the shadowed edges of the cave and curled into an unhappy ball. In the frantic race for safety, she had all but forgotten her own disheveled condition. Her skirts were in filthy rags, the bodice of her gown was hardly better, and she had no veil at all. It might not bother foreign women, but Ranira felt naked without one.

  She glanced toward Mist, then her eyes slid away from the woman’s uncovered face. Curiously, she was more disturbed by Mist’s unveiled condition than by Arelnath’s. Once she got over the shock of seeing a woman dressed in male attire, it was easy for Ranira to accept Arelnath as someone foreign, unusual, not bound by the Temple codes. Mist, on the other hand, might easily have passed for one of the noblewomen of Drinn. Yet, watching her, Ranira saw that she felt no reluctance to walk unveiled, and that disturbed Ranira more than she had at first realized.

  A tiny thread of doubt wove through Ranira’s thought. She knew very little about the three foreigners. Why did they want to spend Midwinter Festival in Drinn? A more troubling thought then occurred to her. Why had she automatically sent Shandy to find them when she was drugged and injured? And how had she known where Shandy would find them? Had they put some spell on her?

  The sound of her own name jerked her thoughts back to the present. “… Ranira, at least,” Jaren was arguing. “She can’t walk around in that costume much longer; it is much too obvious. Anyone who sees it will recognize her.”

  “True,” Arelnath agreed, glancing at Ranira. “We will try to get a robe for her, then.”

  “And a veil,” Ranira put in, then bit her lip. She did not know how hard it would be to steal clothing, but adding another item could hardly make it safer.

  “A veil,” Arelnath said in a flat voice. “Do you know what you ask? It is unlikely we will find robes and a veil in the same place, and the guards will certainly be watching more carefully than usual. Is it necessary?”

  “I’m sorry,” Ranira said. “I didn’t think.”

  “I can get a veil,” Shandy put in. “It’ll be easy, Renra.”

  “There is no need,” Mist’s voice said quietly. “I would have offered sooner, had I thought you were uncomfortable. Here. I have no further need to wear this, and it will put you more at ease.” From a pocket in her skirt she drew the short veil she had worn and handed it to Ranira.

  Ranira reached for the veil and tied it in place. In spite of Jaren’s amused glance and Arelnath’s unconcealed contempt, she felt better immediately, and the thanks she offered Mist were sincere. When she had finished, Arelnath turned to Mist. “If you are rested enough, lady, we can discuss ways of leaving the city,” she said.

  Mist nodded, and Arelnath went on. “There are only two ways to leave Drinn: through the city gates or on the river. The gates will be carefully watched. We might be able to contrive a way of slipping past the guards but from what Shandy and Ranira say, it is not likely. That leaves the river.”

  “If we cannot slip five people past the Temple guards, I do not see how we can slip five people and a boat past them,” Mist said.

  Arelnath grinned, and shook her head. “No boat. The city walls come right down to the water; even if we could steal a boat, we couldn’t get it out of the city. But the river goes under the walls, and I don’t think the Temple of Chaldon will expect us to swim for it in midwinter. I think we should try.”

  Visions of dark water rose in front of Ranira’s eyes as she stared at Arelnath, appalled. “Swim the river? You can’t be serious!” she gasped.

  “Why not? The current is steady, but not too swift, and the
banks are high enough to hide us until we are well past the farms outside the walls. The water will be cold, but as long as we do not stay in it too long, we should not have to worry about freezing.”

  “If the Temple snakes let you live,” Ranira said. “Why do you think the river is left unguarded?”

  “Snakes?” Arelnath asked. “In midwinter? Drinn is not far enough south for that.”

  “The Temple snakes do not sleep in winter.” Ranira shivered. “They do not have to. They live in a pit below the lowest chambers in the House of Correction, and every night they are loosed into the river. They return in the morning, because they know the Templemen will feed them. They are fast and silent and deadly. No one can swim the river and live.”

  “But you jumped into the river to escape,” Jaren objected.

  Ranira looked away. “I jumped into the river to die,” she corrected him. There was a moment’s silence, then she added, “I saw a man die of the bite of a river-snake once. It is a painful and lingering way to reach the Gates of Mist. I was lucky.”

  “If the Temple releases the snakes each night, it will take time for them to swim the entire length of Drinn,” Arelnath mused. “When are they set free?”

  “When the evening trumpet blows to close the gates,” Ranira said. “But they do not all return to the Temple each day, even in winter. There are always some in the river.”

  “Of course, but there will certainly be far fewer of them if we start from close by the city walls at the time when the gates are closing,” Arelnath said impatiently. She turned to Mist. “Have you strength enough to control snakes as well as horses?”

  Mist hesitated. “Control is not necessary; only warning. I do not know if I can keep the spell undetected, but the charm itself is simple.”

  “What do horses have to do with snakes?” Shandy demanded abruptly.

  “Nothing,” Jaren told him. The blond man smiled. “Only that Mist was responsible for the confusion that Ranira’s carriage horses caused this morning. If she can do as well with snakes, we will have little to fear from them.”

  “You made the horses rear?” Ranira said. “You were chained at the back of the carriage! How could you have frightened them?”

  “It was not difficult,” Mist replied quietly. “The spell is a minor one, and the horses were already nervous in that crowd. Frightening blameless animals was not pleasant. I do not wish to do so again unless I must.”

  “But how did you get out of the chains?” Ranira persisted. “The Temple forges use a metal that is proof against witchcraft. Or so they claim.”

  Jaren’s laugh rang out in the enclosed space. “So they may, little sister. But the locks are as easy to open as any other smith’s. Easier. Your Temple trusts too much to its reputation, and I have some little skill at lock-picking.” His hand brushed his boot top; a moment later he displayed a piece of stiff wire about twice as long as Ranira’s forefinger. “It was not so mysterious as you think.”

  “Particularly since everyone was staring at Ranira just then,” Arelnath commented. “I’ll wager the Temple guards did not even miss us. They were too busy trying to find a way down to the river.”

  “Which we intend to swim,” Jaren said. “If you can keep the snakes away, Mist, it won’t matter whether the Temple notices the spell. By the time they can reach us, we will be out of the city.”

  Mist seemed troubled by Jaren’s confidence, but she did not speak. Beside her, Shandy shifted uncomfortably. “I guess Ranira and I can show you how to get to the river, if you really want to,” he said after a moment. “But I’m not going near those snakes.”

  The frown on Mist’s face vanished in a wave of surprise. “Won’t you come with us? I do not think you will be able to dodge the Temple guards for long if you stay. The snakes will not harm you; I will see to that.”

  Shandy ducked his head and mumbled something. “What is it, Shandy?” Mist asked gently.

  “I don’t like witches, and I don’t like snakes,” Shandy said sullenly. He hesitated. “And I can’t swim.”

  “Neither can I,” Ranira said as Arelnath frowned. She glared at the two foreigners. “It is hardly a common skill in Drinn, though it may be so in your home.”

  “Jaren and I can carry you, if that is your only worry,” Arelnath said abruptly. As she turned away, Ranira heard her mutter, “I wouldn’t leave anyone in this Mother-lost city.”

  “Carry us?” Ranira said incredulously. “In the river?”

  “Well, not exactly,” Jaren said. “It is more like towing, but you won’t drown. So, tell us—will you come?”

  Ranira hesitated. She still did not completely trust the foreigners’ magic, in spite of the dramatic demonstrations she had seen and experienced, and the idea of leaving Drinn with them disturbed her. The only one of the three non-Chalders that she really liked was Jaren. Arelnath was too touchy, and Mist’s witchcraft troubled Ranira despite the healer’s kindness. Yet she had no real choice. To remain in the city was a guarantee that she would be recaptured by the Temple. Outside Drinn, she at least had a chance.

  She looked over at Shandy. The boy’s eyes were on hers, but Ranira could not read any expression in them in the dim candlelight. Shandy would be caught by the Templemen soon, she was sure; his luck had already stretched far beyond that of most other street children. At best, he would be bonded. If the Temple discovered his role in her escape, he would certainly be tortured, or perhaps even sacrificed. She knew Shandy would join her, however reluctantly, if she left Drinn, and that knowledge decided her. “I will come,” she said, firmly setting her doubts aside.

  “Renra!” Shandy exclaimed, aghast. “You’re going to leave Drinn? In the river? With witches and snakes and everything?”

  “Yes, and so are you,” Ranira said. “How long do you think we’ll stay alive with the Temple after us, if we don’t go?”

  “Ah, Renra,” Shandy protested. “I haven’t got caught yet, have I?”

  “No, but you haven’t had the Eyes of Chaldon after you before, either,” she said tartly. “And they will be, as soon as the Temple finds out you helped me get away.”

  Shandy’s mouth opened, but no words came out.

  “Well, that seems to be settled,” Jaren said after a moment. He stretched his legs carefully, to avoid kicking one of the others in the cramped quarters. “There are still a few things puzzling me, though. Perhaps you could explain how you came to be involved in all this, Ranira.”

  Ranira looked at Jaren in surprise, but his interest seemed sincere. With a shrug, she began her story. The three foreigners listened intently. When she finished, Arelnath looked at her. “What is an Eye of Chaldon?” she asked. “And why are you so afraid of them?”

  “The Eyes?” Ranira repeated. “They are special servants of Chaldon. They do not take part in the Temple rites, though some of them are always at the sacrifices. No one knows how many there are. They go all over the Empire, looking for witches and people who disobey Temple edicts.” She shivered. “No one can keep a secret from them. They find out everything, and when they return to the Temple, they tell the god all they have learned.”

  “The Eyes of Chaldon, indeed,” Jaren murmured. “I begin to see.”

  Ranira nodded. ‘‘And their commands are the voice of Chaldon. Whatever they say must be done. They can order a whole village burned for sheltering a witch —or even on the suspicion of it.”

  “They do not sound like pleasant people,” Jaren said. “No wonder you are afraid of them.” He himself did not sound very worried.

  Ranira looked at him sharply. “I have answered your question; now I have one of my own. Will you tell me why you are in Drinn?”

  Jaren shot a thoughtful glance at Mist. The woman shook her head regretfully. “I am sorry, Ranira, but we cannot tell you until we are out of Drinn,” Mist said. “It would be too dangerous, for you as well as for us. The Temple suspects already, but is not sure.”

  “How can I be in any more danger than I alrea
dy am?” Ranira demanded. “I have publicly cursed the High Master of the Eyes of Chaldon—which is punishable by beheading; I have consorted with witches— which is burning; I have killed a Templeman—which is death by torture; and I have run away from being the Bride of Chaldon. I don’t think they have a punishment awful enough for that. They’ll probably throw me to the snakes, at least. How many times can they kill me?” She glared at Mist.

  Arelnath laughed dryly. “She’s right, Mist. The Temple isn’t going to look for her any harder because she knows your secrets. She deserves to know.”

  Ranira turned, surprised by this unexpected support. Mist sighed. “Do you agree, Jaren? Very well. Ranira, what do you know of the Melyranne Sea and the lands around it? Have you ever heard of the Temple of the Third Moon?”

  “Third Moon?” Shandy said scornfully, before Ranira could answer. “There’s only two moons, Kaldarin and Elewyth. Everybody knows that!”

  “There are only two moons now,” Mist said. “But once there were three. One was destroyed, so long ago that we know nothing of the cause. There are pieces of it all over the world, but they are hard to find.” Unconsciously, the woman’s hand moved upward to close around a small white stone dangling from a chain around her neck. Ranira recognized the gesture; it was the same one Mist had used when she was healing Jaren, only then her veil had hidden the stone from Ranira’s eyes.

  “Three moons?” Shandy said, wavering between disbelief and awe.

  Mist nodded, and the boy blinked and lapsed into thoughtful silence. She looked at Ranira. “You have not answered my question. Do you know of the Temple?”

  “No.” Ranira shook her head. “The Melyranne Sea is east, beyond the boundaries of the Empire of Chaldreth, but I have never heard of those other places.” Shandy started to speak, but Ranira frowned him into silence. She was not going to let him antagonize these people again, just when they might be ready to tell her something.