The woman stepped closer. “You all right, dear? Oh, what you crying for? I’m fine. Just fell off my... horse, was it?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Athan confirmed as Dnara sniffled.
“Hmm,” the woman hummed. “And, what’s a horse, exactly?”
“The animal behind you,” Athan replied stiffly.
“Ah!” The woman grinned. “Was gonna ask what it was next.”
“Dnara?” Athan quietly questioned as the breadth of what had happened became obvious.
“I didn’t mean to.” Dnara rubbed her arms as they tingled.
“Mean to what?” the woman asked.
“It’s okay,” Athan attempted to console Dnara, but she began crying in earnest then.
It was all too much. She had only wanted to be free. Freedom, it seemed, came with a price.
“Hey, now,” the woman lightly palmed Dnara’s shoulder then brought her into a hug. “It’s okay, dear.” The blackrope suddenly sounded like someone’s lost grandmother; kind and comforting. “It’s okay,” she continued to promise. “Have I forgotten you? Is that why you’re crying?”
Yes, Dnara thought. All she’d wanted was for the blackrope to forget her, to forget Athan, to forget everything and leave them alone. And the woman did.
Dnara should be happy to be forgotten and saved from the blackrope, but that happiness brought with it the guilt and fear that made her nauseous. Despite the woman’s blackrope clothes, the rope in her hands and the badge on her chest, Dnara clung to the woman and sobbed. The blackrope’s hands rubbed circles on Dnara’s back, as if she’d done it before for another frightened girl from a time now forever forgotten. The regret dug deeper and Dnara’s scars began to burn.
She didn’t want this. Not this. Not magic!
“Girl?” the woman asked as Dnara fought for breath.
“Dnara?” Athan caught her as the world went sideways and a shadow pulled her into the darkness.
The fear vanished. The guilt subsided. Here, she felt safe. Here, she could sleep.
12
“I’ve never seen the like,” Tobin, the cornbread peddler, said, his voice sounding far off as Dnara’s eyelids remained weighted down, too heavy to open. “Look, here,” he continued, speaking to someone nearby. A presence came closer, a shadow loomed, and Dnara tried to force an eye open. “They’re healing right before my eyes.”
“Strange.” It was Athan who spoke this time, and she calmed with a lesser sense of urgency to open her eyes. If he was here, she thought, then she was safe. “Is it normal, you think, for a mageborne to heal like that?”
“Wouldn’t know,” Tobin replied. “I’ve as much experience with magic as you, and I’ve learned to avoid it all the same.”
“Magic?” The next voice was another she recognized as she fought to wake up. It was the blackrope. “Magic...” the woman said again, more slowly.
“Do you remember something?” Athan asked, worry carried by his words.
“Hmm,” the blackrope hummed in thought. “For a second, maybe... But, it’s gone again. What’s magic?”
“Trouble,” Tobin muttered just as Dnara managed to open her eyes. The old cornbread seller grimaced at being caught with such words on his lips, then smiled as he patted her arm. “Sorry, dear. Good to see you awake.”
“Gave us quite a scare,” a new voice said; another woman. Unfamiliar. Dnara struggled to sit up and the woman came closer with a cup of warm liquid. “Slowly, now. Here, have a sip of this. Tea makes everything feel better.”
“Thank you,” Dnara said, her throat rough and words raspy. She looked around at all the faces illuminated by flickering lantern light then settled on Athan’s concerned gaze, hoping for clarification. “Where...? How...?” She managed only two hoarse words before her throat swelled in a demand for liquid.
“Ha!” The blackrope let out a laugh and slapped her boney knee. “She sounds like me.” Her laughter ended and genuine curiosity entered her steely blue eyes. “Are we related?”
Dnara sipped the tea and eyed the blackrope wearily, not sure if she hated the idea because the woman was, or had been, a blackrope, or if she liked the idea for the simple reason that she could then say she had family. Feeling confused, she remained silent and focused on swallowing. The tea tasted sweet, with a hint of mint and a floral undertone she couldn’t name.
“No, Jenny, you’re not related,” Athan replied.
“Jenny?” Dnara asked, finding her voice again.
Athan shrugged. “Had to call her something.”
“I like it,” Jenny said, her friendly smile returning. “A good name, Jenny.”
“Was my mother’s name,” Tobin explained.
Dnara stared at Jenny and swallowed another mouthful of tea. Although the hardened, cold-eyed blackrope had hardly looked like a Jenny, she supposed this kindly looking woman with weathered skin, friendly eyes and silver hair could pass for a Jenny. What a difference memories could make of a person, she thought. Though grateful to not have a black noose around her neck, Dnara wondered if a person’s entire life’s worth of memories had been a fair trade for escape.
Did Jenny have a family somewhere? Would they worry when she didn’t return? How long could a King’s Blackrope go missing before being noticed? Would her memories come back, or were they gone forever? All these questions swam around in Dnara’s mind, making her dizzy.
“How’s is it?” the older woman who had brought the tea asked, bringing Dnara’s spinning thoughts to an abrupt halt.
“Pardon?” Dnara asked, having not caught the woman’s words.
“The tea,” the woman clarified. “Would you like a bit more?”
“Yes, please.” Dnara handed the cup back with unsteady hands. “It’s good, ma’am.”
The woman tittered a bit at that. “You hear that, Tobin? I’m a ma’am.”
“That you are,” Tobin grinned then explained. “My wife, Penna. This is my house.”
Dnara took a longer glance around the one room cottage. A large stone fireplace took up most of the back wall, near to the raised, platform straw bed on which she sat. Jenny sat at a roughly hewn wood table on an equally old looking chair. Two small windows with slightly opaque glass told her the day had ended and dusk had settled in. Overhead, a raised thatched roof with limed beams made the cottage feel roomier than it was, and a sky-hatch raised by a supporting post near the fireplace let in a cool touch of air. If she could pick a place to live, out of all the lavish noble houses and bustling cities in all of Ellium, it would be a cottage like this, tucked into a valley between fields somewhere far away from anything magic.
“I brought you here after you fainted,” Athan added, then amended after a thought. “Actually, Jenny carried you on her horse.”
“Least I could do,” Jenny said, her calloused hands wringing and a sullen expression deepening the sun earned wrinkles on her face. “Feel terrible I do, having frightened you so much you done fainted. So sorry, I am.”
“It’s all right,” Athan assured.
“Yes, come now.” Penna patted Jenny’s shoulder. “Finish your soup, before it gets cold.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Jenny picked up her spoon.
“All these ma’am’s are enough to make an old woman blush.” Penna tapped Tobin’s shoulder as she passed. “Hope you’re taking note of it.”
“Yes, dear,” Tobin promised with an amused roll of the eyes.
“I’ll take ‘dear’, too.” Penna kissed his cheek before moving to the large fireplace where the teakettle rested. She paused to cough into a handkerchief she kept tucked into the band of her apron, then she glanced back to Tobin. “And why not give the girl some room to breathe, Tobin. Stop staring at her arms like she’s one of those oddities that comes with the fall carnival.”
Tobin’s pale cheeks flushed red as he grinned sheepishly at Dnara. “Sorry, I was only checking your arms to see how they’re healing.”
“It’s okay,” Dnara replied, taking a glance at the
scars to find them wider than before, but not red like they’d been after the incident with Jorn. “They’re healing faster than last time.” Her words brought her growing ease to a halt and a cold shiver raced up her spine. Glancing from Tobin to Penna to Athan, she tried to backtrack. “I mean-”
“It’s all right,” Athan assured. “I’ve explained things, or as much as I can. I had to when you showed up on the back of-” He glanced back to Jenny who sat stooped over a bowl of soup, intently slurping it in before it could get cold, like Penna had requested. Athan lowered his voice a bit anyhow. “On the back of a blackrope’s horse,” he finished.
“And a befuddled blackrope at that,” Tobin spoke just as quietly, but ended in a slightly amused guffaw.
“You shouldn’t have brought me here,” Dnara said to Athan, sounding more harsh than she intended, but a renewed fear had crawled its way across her skin. “I will bring trouble to their house just as I have brought trouble to you.”
“You haven’t brought me trouble,” Athan argued and stopped her from getting off the bed.
“The jar of sunberry jam would disagree,” she replied flatly.
Athan just laughed. “I admit, I would’ve loved to have had some jam with Penna’s award winning cornbread.”
Before Dnara could think of a rebuttal to Athan’s nonchalant attitude, the cabin’s door opened and Beothen entered. Dnara froze, thinking that surely the gate guard had come to retrieve the blackrope and finish the job of her capture himself. Athan, however, offered the man a smiled greeting.
“What news?” Athan asked as Beothen shut the door to the low light of early evening.
“All’s well,” Beothen said with a returned smile. “Not so much as a hushed rumor around town about a windstorm, and- Oh, you’re awake. Good to see.”
Beothen’s face couldn’t hide his unease, and his hand rested on the hilt of the sword at his waist. Dnara couldn’t blame the man. He seemed to be the only one in this cottage with enough sense to be afraid of her and whatever it was that had awakened since she lost her collar. She was afraid, too.
“What of our...friend?” Athan questioned to redirect Beothen’s focus.
Beothen glanced to the blackrope stooped over a bowl of soup then stepped closer to the huddle near the bed and answered in a lowered voice. “People had seen her in town, but none had caught her name. Blackropes ain’t exactly social types. Most I asked had assumed she simply left town on the hunt for prey, and none seemed sad to see her gone. Ain’t much love for blackropes outside the noble kin, fellow mage hunters, and debt collectors.”
“True, that,” Tobin said with the hint of a sneer as he glanced over his shoulder at Jenny. As Jenny politely asked Penna for more of the ‘wonderfully flavored’ soup, Tobin’s expression softened. “Still, she don’t seem all that bad.”
“You should’ve met her before,” Athan said. “She was ready to put one of those magicked coils around Dnara’s neck without even giving us a chance to explain things. All they care about is filling their quota, getting paid and hunting their next quarry. Noosing an unregistered mageborne would’ve lined her pockets and brought her favor at the Red Keep.”
“I’m no mageborne,” Dnara muttered, crossing her arms to hide her scars as best she could, even if her confidence in such a statement continued to diminish.
“It is strange to develop magic at your age,” Beothen said.
“You know of magic?” Athan asked, surprise in his eyes.
“Younger sister,” he said. “Decades ago, when she was but five. Parents took her to the Red Keep for training. Haven’t seen her since, but I get a letter from time to time. So, I’ve learned a bit about the mageborne and their ways.” He crossed his arms then and gave Athan a stern look. “I wish you would’ve not lied to me, forester. I could’ve helped. Thought we were friends.”
“We are,” Athan promised. “I thought only to protect her. After what happened at the river, I didn’t know who to trust. Should’ve known you wouldn’t draw your sword in fear at the first hint of magic. I’m sorry.”
Beothen glanced back to Dnara at the mention of the river incident, his unease once again showing past his friendly demeanor. “About that...” He looked back to Athan. “I found the guy you said the black- Jenny had mentioned. Turned out to be Reggie, a well-known, full-time drunkard and part-time thief. No one’s taking any truth from his ranting at the tavern, not that any would say he and that gang didn’t deserve a good walloping, demanding tolls from traveling tradesmen and the like.”
“Damned nuisance,” Tobin groused. “Three days ago, they cost a friend of mine two whole barrels of corn oil.”
“It was the first time I’ve run into them,” Athan said.
“They were keeping to the north passage, for the most part,” Beothen responded. “Going after Orc’kothi traders who’d just as soon pay a small toll than start a ruckus over some cornmeal.”
“Orcs and their code,” Tobin mused. “Probably took pity on the thieves and saw the toll as charity. Doubt they felt threatened by a bunch of scraggly men.”
“True that,” Beothen smirked. “But this past week, those scraggly men became more desperate as a couple late storms froze the mountain passes back over. So, Jorn and his ilk moved into the valley.” He scratched his beard and shook his head. “Honestly, mageborne or not, you did us a favor if the gang moves out of the area entirely.”
To her, it felt like no favor, and she shrank further into the corner of the mattress, wishing her cloak was on instead of draped over the back of the chair next to where Jenny sat sipping her soup. To her, it sounded more and more like everyone had lost their reasoning. Magic had never been a favor to her. It had, as Tobin poignantly said, been nothing but trouble.
“Was it really magic?” Tobin asked, even as Penna tutted her tongue at him in a reminder to stop pestering.
When Dnara remained silent, Athan took it upon himself to answer. “Don’t know what else it could’ve been. You should’ve see it. It was like some invisible giant, or a great wind, knocked Jorn in the gut, picking him up off his feet and dunking him into the river. The man flew, a good twenty yards, maybe more.”
“Hmm,” Beothen hummed as he scratched at his copper beard. “A wind, you say? And there was wind this time, too? Maybe it’s not magic, but some angered spirit that’s latched onto the girl?”
“What’s the damned difference?” Tobin questioned. “Mages use spirits for their magic, right?”
“True,” Beothen confirmed. “But it takes years to learn the correct spells and such to channel spirit energy into more potent casting magic, and even then, not all can. My sister can’t do more than simple mending, and she’s been training for twenty-eight years. The stuff you’re talking about, with Jorn and Jenny... That’s battle magic stuff.”
Battle magic? Dnara had heard enough, and she grew tired of being talked about as if not even there. She didn’t cast any spell, and she certainly didn’t channel some wind spirit! At least, she didn’t think...
But, she had been hearing that voice...
Dnara tossed aside the quilt covering her legs and scooted off the mattress. She needed air and silence to think. As Athan made to stop her, she muttered an excuse of having to use the toilet.
“It’s around the back of the house,” Penna informed as Dnara flung on her cloak and headed for the door. “Follow the flagstone path past the large oak.”
“Thank you,” she said, doing her best to offer a convincing smile before fleeing into the comforting shelter of the darkness beyond the cabin.
13
Dnara shut the cottage’s front door behind her and leaned back against the rough wood with a long exhale. Voices raised inside, and she imagined they were continuing the same conversation about magic and spirits and all manner of things she wanted no part of. Inhaling deeply of the cooling air, she pushed off the door and started down the flagstone path wrapping around to the back of the cottage. The sun had set, but offered its last ora
nge glow to the darkening sky, coupling with the night and giving birth to stars.
Stopping at the corner where the back of the cottage melded into a field with the oak tree standing watch, Dnara let her head fall back to stare upwards to the heavens, to where Faedra’s Sacred Halls were said to exist, beyond the vision of man. Shadows cast by passing clouds blotted out the early stars, before the moon rose to look after them. The jewel of Faedra’s crown, the moon, appeared less than a rising sliver of white in the growing darkness, still held captive by the Shadow King’s cloak. The moon would grow brighter each night, pulling free of Demroth’s embrace, until he would pull her back to him in their endless struggle to control the night and the fates of man.
Dnara sighed at the night, eyes closing to block out the stars. Perhaps she, too, had been caught up in their struggle, her fate no longer so assured as it had been living in the tower. Part of her missed that security, of every day being the same as the last, and strange as it may seem, part of her also missed the keeper who had offered such security in exchange for her freedom.
Her hands fisted tightly as an anger rose; anger at herself for having such thoughts. She should be grateful to be free. She should be running into the uncertainty as if it were a gift, even if she ran straight into the arms of magic and all it made her fear.
A gift.
Her eyes snapped open to the star-filled sky. That’s what the voice had called it. A gift.
A gift of what, or for what, she didn’t know. But maybe it was time she stopped asking so many questions and simply listened instead. If the voice was her imagination or real, in her head or carried by the wind, it didn’t matter as long as it could give her answers.
Unclenching her fists, she exhaled and strained to hear any hint of the wind. A light breeze blew through the trees, tickling her clammy palms and making the oak’s branches dance, but it carried no words. Only the crickets offered her company.
In that moment, she felt truly alone. With that came a fear, and an unexpected peace. She realized she had never been alone. Before Athan there had been the tower, and after the tower there had been Athan. A moment to herself in the mornings, or at the bathhouse, but not alone. Like her time in the tower, she had become content with letting Athan choose the path, following where he led, trusting him, depending on him to keep her safe.
When the Wind Speaks (Starstone Prophecies Book 1) Page 10
