Dnara turned her head to find the blackrope cast in backlit shadows from a low afternoon sun, her head bowed, eyes closed and lips smiling. Dnara opened her mouth to speak, finding it salted and bitter, raw from swallowed tears. “Jenny?” she managed on barely a rasp.
The blackrope’s eyes snapped open and she came to Dnara’s bedside, quick as the wind. “Oh, bless Faedra, you’re awake!” Jenny whispered through a smile. “Had us all worried again, you did. Water?”
“Please.”
Jenny helped her sit up then held a cup of water to her lips. “Slowly, now,” Jenny instructed. Dnara’s salted mouth couldn’t be satiated with one cupful, so Jenny refilled the cup and helped Dnara drink her fill. “One would think you’ve been lost out in the Uriman Desert,” Jenny quipped.
“I’ve been lost somewhere,” Dnara replied, her mind drifting back to the dark sea. Her body still felt like it was bobbing along the waves, up and down, and her lungs were heavy. But, unlike the times before, her arms didn’t hurt. Looking at them, she saw the bandages had been removed. “The scars didn’t bleed?”
“Not at all,” Jenny said. “This time, it was like you couldn’t catch your breath, like you were drowning. But your lips were so dry, and anytime we tried to give you water, you’d cough it back up. Athan bought you some lip balm from the market.” She nodded to the nightstand where a small round tin of beeswax balm rested. “He blushed something fierce when Penna told him to put the balm on your lips himself. But, he did. Played his flute for a bit, too, hoping to help you rest. You calmed right down, but then he had to go to a meeting with some fellow by the name of...Garrett, I think?”
Dnara did her best to keep up with Jenny’s jubilant talk, especially since the blackrope had rarely said more than four words at one time, usually ending in a question. It was then that Dnara noticed the renewed clarity in Jenny’s eyes; the appearance of a woman with her wits quite intact. “Jenny?” she asked, fear quivering her vocal chords. “Your mind seems... clear.”
Jenny immediately caught her meaning and the source of her fear. “It’s okay,” Jenny promised, setting down the empty cup and bringing the chair from the window to sit at her bedside. “I mean you no harm,” Jenny emphasized, resting one hand on the bed and fisting the other hand over her heart. “I swear to it.”
“You remember?” Dnara asked, needing to hear the truth of it. “Everything?”
“Everything,” Jenny confirmed. “Honestly, it’s been coming back to me in bits and pieces, ever since the blight let out that awful scream in Tobin’s fireplace. My name. Where I come from. What I do with those ropes.” A brief grimace marred the soft expression she’d been keeping. “Then, today, I was standing in the middle of the market with Tobin when a great wind swept up around me, and all my memories seemed to come back to me with it.”
Jenny looked down at her hands and let out a breath. “I didn’t want to say anything when I first noticed things were coming back, so I played along, asking ‘what’s that?’ about everything.” She let out a small chuckle. “Think I damn near drove Tobin to madness with my questions.”
Timidly, Dnara moved her fingers along the bed so they touched Jenny’s hand. “Why? Why didn’t you say anything?”
Jenny’s gaze rose and her expression sagged with sadness. “I wasn’t ready to see that look in your eyes, that fear. I couldn’t bear it.”
Try as she might, Dnara couldn’t completely remove the fear, even as Jenny’s words touched her heart. “I don’t understand. You’re a blackrope, and I’m...” It still felt strange to say it out loud.
“A mage?” Jenny finished for her. “I’ll tell you a secret, ain’t many people know.”
Jenny leaned in closer and held out her hand. Dnara’s heart sped, afraid there might suddenly be a coil of black rope clenched within Jenny’s grasp. Jenny turned her empty hand over, palm facing up, then shut it tightly before opening it again. When she did, a blue spark appeared, bathing her face in a soft glow before dwindling into shadow.
“You...” Dnara’s words were breathless, surprised. “You can do magic?”
“Aye. Only a little bit. Can’t do things a real mage can, not like them in the Red Tower.” Jenny withdrew the hand back to her lap and looked at the empty palm. “See, that’s irony of it. We don’t have enough magic to help people, but we have just enough to hurt them.” Her fingers slowly curled into a tight fist. “And oh, how we hurt people. Broken, we are, most of us, either by life or by the training we undergo, and the only relief we feel comes from breaking others.”
Jenny looked up from her hand then and shook her head. “Not that I’m wanting to excuse it. No, there ain’t no excuse for the things I’ve done. Not a single one.”
Within Jenny’s steely eyes, Dnara saw the search for something; a forgiveness or, at the least, an understanding. “What’s changed?”
“I don’t... I don’t rightly know,” Jenny answered, leaning back in the chair and thinking it over for a quiet moment. “When I found you outside the bathhouse, when you did whatever it was... You didn’t just take my memories away. You took away everything. And when the wind gave it all back this morning, I think... I think it kept all the anger for itself.”
Jenny drew in a long breath, and when she spoke again, her vision had been cast far from the room. “I had me a family once. A husband, and a little girl. Beautiful, she was. And happy. Oh, gods, we were so happy.” She stopped with a wince, swallowed hard then continued. “Had ourselves a little farm. Orc’kothi roundhorn goats. Ugly, stubborn things, but soft wool and better milk than cows. Annabelle loved the goats. She used to say ‘mama, let me ride the goats!’. So, my husband, Peter, made her this tiny saddle and taught one of our more patient nannies not to mind being ridden. Funniest thing I ever did see. She eventually fell off and into a mud puddle, and we all laughed together at that.”
Jenny paused in her story to laugh; a laughter syncopated by pain and on the cusp of tears. “Then, ...then one spring, the goats stopped producing kids. Many of them died, right there in the field, with babies still in their round bellies. The ones that lived, their milk went sour. But, I didn’t know. I didn’t know a damn thing...”
Her face fell into shadow and she sucked in an unsteady breath. “Annabelle drank some of that milk, straight from the bucket like she’d done since she were but five and started helping me with chores. But, everything had changed, and I wasn’t prepared for it. None of us were.
“The milk made her sick, sucked all the joy right from her eyes. She died within the week, along with the rest of our goats. And my husband, my sweet Peter,” she stopped, choking on the bitterness then pushed through it. “He went blightmad and tossed himself into the river with a net of stones around his ankle. Then, the king’s men came and burned down what was left. Within one season, I lost everything. Everything but the anger.”
In her palm, Jenny produced a spark. It crackled like blue lightning surrounded by an inky black cloud, setting Dnara back on edge. That magic felt very different from the magic brought to her by the wind. This felt dangerous. Hungry. Unnatural.
“Everything but the anger, and this,” Jenny finally said, her eyes lit by the blue lightning. “We all start that way, with a story of blight and misery, and we all end the same - angry and bitter with a touch of magic. Maybe it’s a form of blightmadness, or maybe it’s a curse from Demroth for not dying alongside our farms and families. Them mages at the Black Conclave who train us aren’t sure. Don’t matter, in the end, except that it’s bonded to us; left us with not but one purpose. We can track people better than the Elvan hunt their quarry, we are more fearless than the Orc’kothi, because we feel nothing but the anger, and we only feel relief from that anguish when a neck is in our ropes.”
Jenny’s fist closed, snuffing out the unnatural light. “We don’t see it.” Her eyes clenched shut and her voice quivered. “We don’t see it at all. We take the blight that destroyed our lives and we use it to destroy the lives of others.�
�
Her face ashen, jaw clenched and silver hair reflecting the dwindling sunlight, Jenny sat cast in the shadows of regret so deep it reminded Dnara of the great black sea she had nearly drowned in. Never had she seen someone so broken, so fully fractured it gave question as to how they could ever become whole again. The wind caressed Dnara’s cheek and wove its way into her hair, whispering words that gave voice to her heart. She reached out to Jenny across the sea, wanting to guide her back to shore.
“I’m terrified of what my magic can do,” Dnara admitted. “That it can hurt people; that I have hurt people, but I’m also learning how it can help people. Perhaps we can learn how to help people together?”
Jenny’s eyes fluttered open and stared at Dnara’s open hand like it was an unexpected gift. Kneeling down at the bedside, she took Dnara’s hand within her grasp and kissed Dnara’s fingers with her tears. Jenny’s shoulders, scarred and weary, shook in a sob.
“Gods, I want to,” Jenny said through the sniffling and tears. “Faedra be my witness, on the spirit of my husband and child, I must atone for what I’ve done these past years, for forgetting the joy I had in my life, for... Gods, for forgetting the sound of my Annabelle’s laugh.”
She lifted her head then, cheeks tearstained but lips smiling. “I’d forgotten her laugh. I don’t know what you did, but you gave it back to me. You took away the shadow covering my heart and clouding my eyes, and you gave my Annabelle back to me.”
An argument arose in Dnara’s throat, a sense of unworthiness plying to be heard, but so too arose the wind. The breeze tangling in her hair reprimanded with a few tugs of her bed-messed black locks. How it knew of her thoughts and self-doubt, she’d stopped questioning, and she understood its message as clearly as it understood her reservations. Giving in, because questioning everything had become a tiresome task, she gave Jenny a smile.
“I’m glad you are no longer trapped within shadow.” Not a full acceptance of her part in Jenny’s transformation, but the wind relented and let Dnara keep at least some of her desired humility. “I like seeing you smile,” she added, because it was the truth.
Jenny wiped her tears and nose with a handkerchief pulled from a pocket in the vest Penna had given her. “I like to smile,” she said. “Peter used to say he married me because of my smile.” The handkerchief stopped in its drying and her eyes widened. “Gods, I’d forgotten that, too.”
They shared another smile before Dnara asked, “What should I call you now?”
Jenny thought on that for a moment as she stood, stuffing the handkerchief back into its pocket. “I think I like Jenny,” she said, her gaze once again cast well beyond the walls of the room. “I think... I think I need to earn back my old name. I need to earn it back and clean it off, because it’s been stained with blood and blight.” She refocused on the room and down to Dnara’s spot on the bed. “And maybe, one day, my old name will be worthy of your lips. But, for now, I’ll keep Jenny.”
“All right, Jenny.” Dnara clutched the blanket over her legs before she asked her next question. “What will you do now?” And more importantly, to her, “Where will you go?”
“I’d like to stay,” Jenny quickly said. “If that’s okay? I figure, if I’m to start making amends, maybe the best place for me to do it is protecting the one person in this world who seems to have a way of fighting back against the blight.”
Although what Jenny said frightened her, the idea that she could somehow be the only thing, mage or otherwise, to have this effect on the blight, the thought of Jenny staying to protect her lightened her fears. “I’d like it if you stayed.”
Jenny let out a relieved breath. “Feels like I’ve been given a second chance. Just hope I can-” A soft knock on the door left her hopes unfinished. “That’s probably Athan. Said he’d be back around sundown.”
“Does he know?” she asked as Jenny walked to the door.
“No,” Jenny said as she opened the door to Athan’s worried expression. “But I guess I should tell him.”
Athan immediately looked past Jenny to the bed, his worry shifting to a smile at finding Dnara awake, then he met Jenny’s eyes with curiosity lifting his brow. “Tell me what?”
21
After telling her story for a second time, Jenny departed to stretch her legs. Left alone with Athan, a comfortable silence lingered; the calming sense of safety that came from being within his reach. Dnara’s eyes closed as she took in a few long breaths, accepting she had become dependent on his presence and no longer concerned enough about this new invisible collar to fight against it. This collar, made of soft smiles, kind eyes and reassuring words, wrapped around her more like a blanket than a piece of cold magicked steel.
He rose from the chair, and she could hear his footsteps against the stone as he paced, then the wooden chair being scooted closer to the bed and the light jingle of his belt pouches as he sat down. When she reopened her eyes, she found Athan watching her, his concern returning. “How do you feel?” he asked.
“My chest hurts a small bit,” she answered honestly. “But, I’m not as tired as last time, and my arms don’t burn.”
He took her arm in hand. “The scars didn’t reopen.”
He thumbed one long scar line that ran jaggedly from her wrist to the inside of her elbow. Her eyes closed and she focused on the sensation. The warmth of his hand became everything; a central focal point to which she could tie an anchor.
“It... The magic seemed different this time,” he said.
“It was,” she answered without opening her eyes. A quiet moment passed, and when she worked up the courage, she asked, “How is Elizabeth?”
“Healed,” he said, a note of caution in his voice. “At least, physically. Mentally... I don’t suppose anyone is prepared for the loss of a child, born or not.”
Dnara dove inward to clamp down on a tumultuous current of emotion quickly rising to the surface. “I tried,” she whispered, the ache of water back in her lungs. “But the sea was too deep and the blight too strong.”
“It’s not your fault,” he emphatically replied. “Elizabeth didn’t know she was with child, and Mayor Whitehall didn’t know she’d eloped.”
Her eyelids lifted. “Eloped?”
“Yeah. It’s a right mess.” Athan sat back in the chair and let out a tired sigh. “See, Mayor Whitehall had forbidden her to marry, afraid that, well, what did happen would happen. But, she fell in love with a soldier in the King’s Army. They were married in secret two months ago, before his deployment to the dredges of Fort Tomlay. It’s why Garrett couldn’t face...this. Not because she’s his twin, but because he’d encouraged her to defy their father and marry Thomas. Garrett had a guess at the cause of her sickness, and the guilt drove him from town.”
Dnara thought on his words, but none of them made her feel less guilty about the life that could not be saved. She could understand why Garrett had felt the need to run from Lee’s Mill. Glancing out the small window to the darkening sky, her legs had an urge to flee from the temple, from Lee’s Mill, and the memory of a now barren shore.
“Garrett tried to track Thomas down at Fort Tomlay,” Athan explained during Dnara’s gazing silence. “But, they’d moved Thomas to Fort Eastwind for some gods’ forsaken reason, and you can’t just cross through the Grey Marsh without an escort, and no King’s Army is going to escort a mayor’s son from a little dot on the map like Lee’s Mill. So, Garrett was forced to turn back, and left with few options, like the item I procured for him...”
Athan stopped again, and shame came to his eyes before they turned away from Dnara. “It’s a rare herb, and even harder to get this time of year. Maiden’s Thorn.”
Dnara set a hand on his arm. “He thought to rid her of the child?”
“Aye,” he sighed. “And I agreed to help. I didn’t know it was Elizabeth. Thought it was one of the women in town who are always fainting at the mere sight of the fool. Don’t make it any more right. A woman asking for it is one thing, bu
t when a man asks for it... I knew better, but Garrett...”
“You thought to help a friend,” Dnara offered as Athan’s shame grew and his eyes clenched shut.
“He looked so... terrified,” Athan said. “I’ve never seen the man so desperate. Thought maybe he loved the woman and was afraid she’d die from the pregnancy. Never once occurred to me that he hoped to save his sister.”
“But he didn’t take the herb from you?” Dnara asked, recalling the meeting in the temple square.
“No. His time away, looking for Thomas, had given him time to think it through. He realized Elizabeth would never forgive him.”
Dnara sat back against the pillow in thought. Garrett had come back, despite the guilt and the fear, and he’d only thought of his sister. It was a far different image of the man than her initial encounter had created. She had to wonder how long it had taken him to craft such an elegant porcelain mask of unshakable bravado, and what had led him to craft it in the first place.
“I wouldn’t have forgiven myself, either,” Athan said, his reddened eyes finally looking back to her. “Never again will my fingers touch that herb at naught but a woman’s request. I swear to it.”
It was clear the guilt at merely agreeing to procure the herb had been eating Athan’s spirit alive. She squeezed his arm and accepted his oath as words from a man who had learned a hard lesson. With trepid relief, he shared with her a smile.
“Thank you,” he mouthed, his voice too upset to speak.
“Jenny said you went to see him?” she asked after a quiet pause.
Athan nodded and cleared his throat to find his voice again. “He passed on his thanks to you for helping Elizabeth, and renewed his invitation to tea... Your invitation,” he emphasized with a smirk. “He followed me back to the temple and is with Elizabeth now. They’d both like to see you, once you’re feeling up to it.”
“Okay,” she replied, though not certain as to when she would feel up to facing either of the Whitehall siblings. A noise from beyond the window, a tolling bell, drew her curiosity away from more troubled thoughts. “A call to prayer?”
When the Wind Speaks (Starstone Prophecies Book 1) Page 18
