by J. K. Holt
Tess offered a meager smile in return. “That’s more than I could hope for, given the situation.” She pulled her legs close to her body, and shifted herself forward so she was balancing on the balls of her feet, an old posture she used to take as a child in the foster system; both comfortable and able to flee at any moment. “We left off at Dray, and what I did to save him that day.”
“Aye,” Fish said.
“So, that leads us to Loren. He… well, I was honest about the information I obtained from him. But I was less honest about the how of it all. Dray had approached me and asked me to try to do to Loren what I’d done for him that day. I guess ‘rooting around in his unconscious’ is the best way to put it. And I agreed.”
“Wait- Dray knew you did that?” Rosie asked.
“Yes. After the fact, he had some awareness about it. And whatever questions he had were answered when I owned up to it. I didn’t know how I did it but I had, in fact, done it. And he seemed to accept that as well as anyone. Though he didn’t know about the rest of what I’d told you.”
“The whole magically appearing bit?” Rosie asked sardonically.
“Right, that part. Though I’m sure he knows now, since I left instructions for Tulla or Gowan to tell him,” Tess admitted, grimacing at the prospect. “Anyways. I tried for a while to do that with Loren but couldn’t get anywhere. Or I should say, I pulled him just back from death. And then, the night before we all met up, I tried a different tactic, pretending to be someone who was working with the lampreys, and… I forced his hand.”
“So… you pulled this information from him before he’d regained consciousness?” Fish asked.
“Yes.”
Rosie hissed. “You should have told us. He’s liable to be even more aggressive, if he knows what we’re up to.”
“No, it’s not like that,” Tess said. “Listen. From the start, I told Dray who I was when I entered his mind. He knew, even then, that it was me helping him. And even then, it was fuzzy for him when he came back to himself. I really don’t believe that Loren knows I was in his mind. I don’t know if he remembers it at all. But if he does, it won’t be me he thinks of. Honestly, I have no idea who he would think it was.”
“And that’s how you found out about the scholar, and where he was located?” Fish asked.
“Right again.”
“So,” Rosie said, “we’re to believe that you were doing something similar with Loren when I caught you last night?”
“I’m not sure what you’ll believe, but yes, that’s what I was attempting to do,” Tess admitted. “I haven’t tried to enter his mind while he was only sleeping before, but I knew that we were running out of time before you saw him as more of a liability than anything else. And I needed to try.”
A silence stretched between them while Tess waited their responses, but Rosie only cocked her head. “And?”
“Oh! And…well, it was different. I entered into one of his dreams. I wasn’t able to speak to him directly like before, or hold his attention. It was like I wasn’t even there.”
“So, useless then.” Rosie said.
Tess paused, her attention caught on a detail. “I wouldn’t say that exactly. Different, yes. But I think I still learned something.” She shifted, lowering her legs into Indian style as she held their gazes. “He’s afraid, of letting someone down. He’s certainly not the one in charge, but he answers to someone powerful, I think. Maybe I can find out who, in time. And, I think his real name is Reydon. At least that’s what someone called him in the dream.”
Fish mouthed the name on his tongue, looking soured. Rosie, on the other hand, raised her eyebrows. “So… potentially useful then.”
“Yes. Potentially. Though, understand that this only works, or I think it’s only continuing to work, because he doesn’t know I’m doing it. If he figured it out- well, I think it’s likely that he’d stop letting me in at all. And he’d probably decide not to travel with us so easily.”
“Meaning?”
“I think he has the feeling that we’re heading in the direction he wants to go anyways. As I said, I have no idea what he remembers from when I was in his head while he was unconscious, but he was the one who suggested Green Springs. Maybe he still thinks he’s going there to meet someone. Also, I’m going that way too. And I have the distinct feeling that he thinks I might be valuable to the lampreys.”
“Valuable? How?” Rosie asked.
“It’s to do with me not being blurred on the ship, though I should have been. He knows there’s something different about me now. Something he thinks may help with whatever plot he’s a part of with the lampreys, though I’ve no idea how.”
The group mulled it over for a moment before Fish got to his feet. “I need to check on him. Back in a moment.”
He shut the door quietly behind him, and Tess noticed Rosie staring at her intently, moving her jaw as if chewing on something she had to say. “What?”
The firelight played off of Rosie’s own aura, swirling in impossibly lazy patterns around it, tiny sparks erupting as it pulsed out from her. Rosie’s aura always looked barely contained, fighting to push past its tight boundary around her skin. She was dazzling. And at the moment, slightly scary as well.
Rosie pulled her elbows to her knees, studying Tess. “Something you said last night, about seeing Russ being blurred. You watched it happen, right? Watched his energy get pulled into that ball? But Dray- you saved him.”
“Yes, but I didn’t know what I was doing when I saved him. I still don’t know how I did it, not entirely. And when it happened to Russ, they were holding me. I couldn’t get to him. I’m so sorry. I so badly wish I could have helped him. You know he was trying to protect me.” Tess reached out a hand, but Rosie pulled herself back, retreating closer to the fire.
“But if his energy is still in that marble, isn’t it possible… I mean, can’t we find it again, and smash it like you did for Dray, and fix him? That could work, couldn’t it?” Rosie’s voice caught in her throat, and her eyes pled Tess to give her hope.
Tess’s gut wrenched at the sight. “I have no idea, Rosie. Truly. I don’t know any more about how this works than what I’ve told you.”
“But it’s possible?”
The door creaked and Fish slipped into the room, shifting the energy. Rosie’s manner changed, a scowl reappearing on her face as if it had remained there since he’d left.
“He’s still asleep, or at least pretending to be,” Fish said, settling down once again. “I don’t suppose it matters which.”
“Alright,” Tess said. “What’s left to discuss?”
“Our route,” Rosie said. “Around Barrowville, or through. I still vote for going around. Tess, I understand why you think Loren will go quietly, but we can’t risk it. Not in a town that size. If he chose to, he could turn on us, and we’d not be able to stop it.”
“Never been this far north myself,” Fish said. “Though Russ would tell me stories. Isn’t Barrowville the town that sells those hot buttered biscuits with bacon? The ones he used to say melt in your mouth?”
“Aye,” Rosie said, mouth quirking at the memory.
Fish considered. “Wish I could taste them. But I agree, it’s too dangerous right now.”
“And you, Tess?” Rosie said.
Tess shrugged. “You don’t need me to vote. It’s already two out of three.”
“We do, though. You get a vote, same as us. And I want to know what you think.” Rosie said.
“Oh,” Tess said, surprised by the gesture. “Then count me with you. Your argument makes sense. We’ll go around.”
“Right, it’s settled. I’ve been up here a few times, gone around the town only once. I think I remember the way. We’ll turn west by midday tomorrow, give Barrowville a wide berth. Not sure about lodging, but we’ll make do.”
“Needs must,” Fish said. “To bed, then?”
“Alright. But we need to start trading off who stays in the room with Loren,” Rosie
said. “Or should I say Reydon. He’s going to start looking for weaknesses at some point. No need to give him the same old routine. Switch it up, keep him on his toes. That’s our best bet.”
Fish scowled. “I don’t like the idea of him getting the drop on either of you.”
Rosie laughed, a steel edge to it. “Just let him try.”
∞ ∞ ∞
Fish and Tess shared a room, Rosie bunking with Loren. Loren’s limp had worsened by morning, though Fish maintained, through a cursory inspection, that the bone was only bruised and not broken. Nevertheless, Loren needed help getting to the horses, which Tess provided. He draped his long, sinewy arm around Tess’s shoulders, and she gritted her teeth, ignoring his tight grip and concentrating on the task at hand. For his part, Loren bore most of his weight, inhaling sharply as they descended the stairs. Without thinking, Tess slipped her own arm around his back, hugging his side to bear more. When they’d reached his horse, Tess was surprised to find her arm there, as if it was a traitor to her body. She withdrew it quickly, and Loren pulled his own arm away in response. He grunted a thanks, and she nodded her head quickly and turned away.
Once upon his horse, Loren held out his hands to Fish. “No,” Fish responded. “We’ll just tie the horses together again. You alright with that, Tess?”
“Not a problem.”
“Good,” Fish said, patting the rump of Loren’s horse. “Try your best not to fall off today, if possible.”
A grudge of a smile graced Loren’s face for a moment. “No promises.”
The precipitation had stopped overnight, but the temperature was still despairingly cold. In silent agreement, they began the horses at a slow walk, wary of the ice underfoot.
It was so bright that Tess’s eyes watered. Everywhere, the ice took the sun and fragmented it, reflected it, so that a thousand tiny suns shone from every wet surface. It was completely disorienting and achingly beautiful. The group rode in silence, staring in wonder at the transformed landscape.
Tess puffed huge plumes of steam from her mouth, remembering her attempts during childhood to make smoke rings from her exhalations like Maggie’s father could do with his cigars. She’d never been successful.
Loren was staring at her. “What?” she said, cross to be caught daydreaming.
He shrugged. “Nothing. You looked like you were somewhere else.”
“I was thinking about my grandfather,” Tess said, surprised as the truth left her lips.
“Is he dead?”
“Yes. Just like my mother.”
A frown tugged at Loren’s mouth. “I’m sorry.”
“Are you?” Tess asked. “I have a hard time imagining that you could care.”
Loren sneered and shook his head, as if she was being childish. “This again.”
“How can you be so cold?” Tess asked, unable to help herself. “How can you use people and then toss them aside, like they’re nothing? And then have the audacity to act like you give a crap about other people?”
Tommy tossed his head, and Tess realized she’d been clinging to his mane, her grip tightening as her anger grew. She loosened, patting him on the neck in apology. She took a moment to breathe in, out, slowing her heartbeat and calming her mind. When she spoke next, her speech was measured and even.
“I don’t mind riding next to you if it means I don’t have to feel bad about your wrists being rubbed raw, or worrying that you’ll get thrown from your horse again. But I do need you to spare me the pretend sympathy. It feels so insincere. I think I’d just rather that you be who you are. If you don’t care about other people, stop acting like you do. At least that’s honest.”
He smiled, a pained and fragile thing. “You don’t know me.”
Tess huffed. “Does anyone?”
As the moments dragged on, it became clear Loren wasn’t going to answer. Perhaps her question was rhetorical, after all.
Tess wondered at her own masochism. What did she think she could do, talk some humanity into him? As if his disregard for her life was something she thought she could convince him to change. How ridiculous it seemed when she thought it through.
In life, Maggie’s kindness had been infectious. She could smile at the miserly old man on the park bench and it would be like the sun had shone down on him for the first time in years. She could pull warmth from an ice cube. It had seemed then, through Tess’s young eyes, that Maggie created humanity in others where before it had not existed, like her soul was a spark that could bring forth other lights in the dark.
Maggie had been magical in so many ways. Clearly, Tess did not have the same gift. Her sorrow amplified at the realization, like she was even further away from her mother than she’d been before. By not carrying the same gifts, another piece of Maggie was dead, fading into the ether, lost.
Tess couldn’t stand to lose any more pieces of her mother. More to herself, she spoke. “She loved strawberry milk. And the beach. And the trees. And the mountains. Sometimes, she’d laugh so hard she’d cry. And the tears would just run down her face. She sang me songs at bedtime even when I was a teenager and moaned about how much she babied me. And she could put out a candle with her bare fingers. She was fearless like that.”
She could tell Loren was listening from the way he’d straightened slightly in the saddle, like an antenna tuning in to the signal. And in some small way, Tess felt like her mother’s memory grew nearer, pushing towards the surface of her consciousness once again, and she was less alone. “She was short, but when she walked into a room, she was magnified in the space. People wanted to be near her. She made everyone feel special. And she was beautiful, but never intimidating, because somehow her beauty was reflected in every person around her, so that they saw the beauty within themselves. That’s just who she was. And if she were here, maybe she could help me see the beauty in you, whatever it was, if anything, that Fish saw that made him love you. If even some small part of it was genuine, she would know it. She would have it in her heart to love that part of you. And a part of me is dead now because she’s dead. So I’m grieving two losses, really, which seems spectacularly unfair.”
She was crying, and didn’t care, which surprised her. And the whole world seemed to cry with her, as the day warmed. The trees dripped their own frozen tears, silent in their mourning as the birds trilled soft, sad songs. And Loren no longer mattered, really, because he wasn’t what it was all about. She allowed the pain to overtake her for a moment, to feel the loss as she hadn’t in many weeks.
Loren stayed silent, and in some ways unknown he seemed more a witness to her pain than a magnifier of it.
She wasn’t fully put back together again when they approached the river, overflowing its banks with icy runoff water. Rosie pointed north into the distance, where for the first time in the clear air the light blue outline of mountains were visible- the Misties, which they’d need to begin climbing within the week, and the source of the river water, high with snowmelt. Both the temperature of the water and the speed of the current made it impossible to wade across, so they followed the meandering road until it reached a stout wooden bridge, well-constructed but low lying, so that the water flirted with the lowest boards as it raged beneath.
Rosie passed first, her horse sliding nervously on the far planks, but alighting on the other side no worse for wear. There were no side railings, which made Tess uneasy, and the crossing was narrow. She glanced at Loren, his horse still tied to her own. He shook his head. “We should untie them first, go one after the other.”
Tess looked again. “We’ll go slowly. It can fit two horses abreast.”
She and Tommy kept to the left flank, towards the current, and she swallowed her fear and nudged Tommy forward. Tommy pawed the ground, skittish, but was eventually encouraged enough to trod ahead, Loren’s horse following a step behind. They crested the bridge and Tess breathed a sigh. Nearly there.
A noise tore Tess’s gaze to the left, and it took her a moment to isolate the source in the frothing
waters- a large hunk of a tree, recently torn from the riverbank, was bouncing off the banks as it bore down on the bridge. She had only a second to react, yelling at Loren to move before it hit. The impact shook the bridge, reverberating the boards beneath their feet, and Tommy spooked. He reared, and Tess kept hold, but when he came down she began to slip, and he bolted forward.
She fell hard, landing on her left side, rolling a split second before Tommy’s foot came down where her head had just been. Unfortunately, there was no more bridge to roll onto, and she realized her mistake as the floor fell out before her and gravity took her, pulling her down to the raging water below.
Chapter Eight
The sensation of falling was not new to Tess, nor was it any more welcome. As she felt herself roll from the bridge, she threw out her hand in desperation, grasping the edge of the planks above. Tess clenched, pulling with all her might, but it was not enough. Her feet caught in the river, the water and debris yanking at her legs so that they were pulled beneath the bridge by the angry vacuum.
It forced her body perpendicular to the bridge, and she gasped as the frigid cold engulfed her. Not this, she thought. Not now. Not again. Dray was not here this time to pull her from the cold, and she stifled the urge to scream as her muscles clenched in response. She managed to suck in a breath, and then another, though it seemed that her whole body was screaming in pain.
She could hear someone yelling, but the sound was distorted by the raging waters and it seemed so terribly, terribly far away. If she let go now, she would be pulled below and pushed beneath the bridge. She had no way of knowing how deep the water was, which was the most worrisome part. Her clothes, layered to keep her warm, were now extra weight, designed to pull her down and keep her there. She wasn’t sure she would surface again.
The consideration did not seem to matter much at the moment, however. A branch hit her, her head was pulled below, and she nearly let go, but at the last moment she gathered whatever strength left to pull herself back. She coughed, heaving as her lungs found air again, and whimpered softly for her mother. Then another surge hit her and her hands slipped. She lost her purchase to the bridge and was swept underneath.
