The Complete Marked Series Box Set

by March McCarron

  Yarrow’s imagination whorled. A dreamy smile crossed his lips as he envisioned himself doing impossible things—flying amidst clouds, throwing great balls of fire, lifting a carriage over his head one-handed.

  “Which kind are we?” Bray asked.

  Mr. Paggle shrugged. “I wouldn’t know. I suppose you’ll find out when we get to the Temple. The Chisanta are pretty closed-mouthed. Most people don’t know much about them.”

  Yarrow scooted his chair in closer. “And does the King?—”

  “Have to do what they say?” Mr. Paggle supplied with a loud, derisive snort. “Boy, where did you get that notion? No, no. The King always has Chisanta advisors, of course. He’d be a fool not to. But the Chisanta are separate from Trinitas. They don’t have any political power.”

  That was just as well. Yarrow had no interest in politics. “Well…are they really fighters, then?”

  “Oh sure, amazing fighters. I knew another driver once who said he saw a man with a sword—and the knowledge to use it, mind you—run at one of the Chisanta while his back was turned. And just like that,” he snapped his fingers again, “that fool was on the ground with a broken nose and the Chisanta had his weapon.”

  Yarrow realized his mouth was hanging open and shut it with a click of teeth.

  “But even more than fighters,” Mr. Paggle continued, “they are scholars and experts. A real smart bunch, always studying.”

  “What kind of things do they study?” Bray asked.

  “Everything there is: mechanics, history, sciences…” The driver leaned further back in his chair, draping his elbows over the armrest, and took another long draw from his pipe. “I hear they’ve got a fair-sized archeological dig going on out east. And there’s a Chiona gentleman doing some work on fireless light sources. A friend of mine saw it. Says it was like looking at a little star right here on earth.”

  “I don’t know anything about all that…” Bray said softly.

  Yarrow tipped his head in agreement. He had always had a fair head for numbers and, before he’d been pulled from school to help his father in the shop, he’d been at the top of his class. But that hardly seemed to qualify him for such scholarly enterprises.

  Mr. Paggle yawned. “Well, you’ll learn, won’t you?”

  The common room had thinned, but the volume in the room increased as some of the mourners at the bar became rowdy with drink. The noise recalled Mr. Paggle to the time, which he verified with his pocket watch.

  “We’d better be off to bed, at that,” he said, his voice becoming brisk again. “We’ll have an early morning.”

  Yarrow sighed with disappointment, but rose from the table all the same.

  Two hours later Yarrow lay wide awake in his bed, listening to the sound of Mr. Paggle’s rumbling snores and staring at the whitewashed ceiling. His mind worked too furiously for sleep—thinking about his family, about Bray, about the abilities he might be, at that moment, developing.

  He sat up, took his father’s pocketknife from the bedside table, and placed it before him on the bed. Then he stared at it, willing it to lift into the air with his mind. He stared until his eyes itched, but it remained resolutely stationary. He gave up with a sigh—he must not have that ability—and flopped back into the cold, empty bed.

  Yarrow had never had a mattress to himself before. The forms of warm, slumbering siblings usually pressed upon him as he slept. He tried arranging the pillows so they lay on either side of him, to emulate the presence of his missing family, but they were too soft and cool to accomplish the task. What were Ree and the others doing back home? Were they thinking of him?

  “Yarrow.” He heard whispered tentatively from the adjoining room.

  Mr. Paggle continued to snore undisturbed, so Yarrow slipped from his bed and padded to the door.

  “Yes?” he whispered back.

  “I can’t sleep,” Bray’s voice answered. “Can you?”

  “No.”

  “Want to take a walk?” she asked.

  Yarrow looked over his shoulder at Mr. Paggle. If he were to wake and find them missing, what would be the consequence? It certainly would be a breach in propriety, he and a girl of his own age wandering around, unchaperoned, at night.

  “All right. Meet you in a moment,” he whispered through the door.

  Yarrow slipped into his pants, coat, and boots as quietly as he could, and thanked the Spirits above that Mr. Paggle was a sound sleeper. His heart thundered in his chest, and he tried to tell it to be calm. “It’s just a walk,” he counseled. “Don’t be foolish.” But the stubborn organ beat rapidly all the same.

  He crept out of his room and into the hall, where he closed the door as slowly and quietly as possible. The click of the latch bolt sliding back into place sounded loud as a gong to Yarrow, but Mr. Paggle’s steady breathing continued unabated within.

  Bray waited for him at the head of the stair. She still wore her blue dress, but her russet hair now hung completely loose around her shoulders. She placed a finger to her lips and he nodded. They slipped down the stairs onto the landing, which was thankfully dark and empty. Bray waved for him to follow.

  They were passing the kitchens and nearly to the side door when she said, “Go on out, I’ll be there in a second.”

  Yarrow didn’t like to be separated, but she darted into the kitchen, giving him no opportunity to raise an objection. So he passed through the door, out into the cool, dark night, alone.

  The sky was wondrously clear, like soft dark velvet, freckled with the bright pinpricks of stars. Moisture clung to the grass and the insects trilled their evening song, a medley of buzzes, chirps, and hums. The air still bore the distinct smell of charred wood. And flesh, Yarrow’s mind added.

  When Bray came through the door, she cradled a bottle of uncorked wine in the crook of her left arm. She smiled and held it out for him to see. “To help us sleep.”

  Yarrow looked at the bottle warily. “Did you pay for it?” he asked. His work in the shop had made him abhorrent of theft.

  “Of course I paid for it,” she said, her face losing its merriment.

  “If you did, why didn’t they give you glasses?” he challenged.

  She placed her free hand on her hip. “Are you calling me a thief and a liar, then?”

  Yarrow’s shoulders sank. “No. No, of course not. I’m sorry.”

  She looked for a long moment as if she wanted to say something harsh, but then her expression turned magnanimous. “I forgive you.”

  She took him by the arm and they began walking away from the inn, out into an abandoned field.

  “It’s a beautiful night,” Yarrow said, hoping to turn the conversation in a more pleasant direction. Bray took a long draught of wine, right from the bottle, and handed it to him. He took a swig too and thought of how sharing a drink was not unlike sharing a kiss…in principle. The wine was dry, tart; the flavor clung to his tongue and teeth.

  “Yes. I’ve never seen so many stars,” she replied. “Though the flatness in these parts makes me uncomfortable. It feels safer with a mountain at your back.”

  Yarrow chuckled. “Are you expecting an invasion?”

  She smiled, and towed him further into the night.

  They walked on quietly, passing the bottle of wine back and forth as they strolled, until Bray announced, “This looks like a good spot,” and sat down on the grass. She patted the ground next to her, and Yarrow followed her example. The dampness sent a chill up his spine.

  “If you lay down like this,” she lay flat on her back, “it’s like you can see the universe just the way the world would, if it had eyes.”

  Yarrow lay back, too. The combination of the vast sky above him, the wine, and the earthy, sweet smell of the girl beside him made his head spin.

  “I used to do this all the time, back home,” she said, softly.

  “How did your parents die?” he asked, then bit his tongue in self-reproach. Idiot!

  He heard her turn towards him, so he le
t his head fall to the side and met her gaze.

  “My mother died of influenza when I was young. My father in a mining accident, two years ago.”

  “Were you in an orphanage, then?” he asked.

  “No. I was with my uncle.” She turned her head back towards the sky; Yarrow could see the reflection of the stars in her eyes. A long pause followed. “He is not a nice man,” she said, simply.

  “Did he hurt you?” Yarrow whispered.

  She looked back at him, her eyes full of tears, and gave a silent nod. She wiped angrily at the wetness on her cheeks. Yarrow reached for her hand and held it tightly, hoping to impart some comfort with his touch, as he could think of none to supply with words.

  “I’m sorry,” she said with a sniff. “Let’s speak of happier things. Tell me about your family.”

  Yarrow repositioned himself in the grass, inching closer to her. “Well, we’re the butt of every town joke,” he said and laughed. “The Lamharts, and their endless supply of scruffy children. We run the general store in town, so we’ve got a steady income, but not near enough to keep such a large batch of kids presentable.”

  “You’ll miss them, won’t you?” she asked.

  “Yes, I will. I do. But they won’t really miss me.”

  “I’m sure that’s not true.”

  “It is.” He brushed his hair from his brow. “They’ll talk about me—their son, the Chisanta. But they won’t miss me, not really. I’m just one of many.”

  And then, because he feared he sounded spoiled and selfish after Bray’s own story, he added, “I know it sounds petty…”

  “No. It doesn’t,” she said, sincerity dripping from her lips, and she gave his hand a gentle squeeze.

  Bray sat up and crossed her legs. “Let’s play a game.”

  “What kind of game?”

  “The question game. You can ask me any question and I promise to answer honestly. And then I ask you a question.”

  Yarrow sat too, facing her. “That doesn’t sound very much like a game. How do you win?”

  “Don’t spoil my fun, Yarrow Lamhart.” She took a gulp of wine and handed the bottle back to him. “Ask me a question.”

  “Alright…” Yarrow searched his mind for an interesting query, but could think of none. “What is your middle name?”

  Bray groaned. “Of course you would ask that! It’s terribly embarrassing.”

  “Answer honestly, now,” Yarrow said, and shook his finger like a school marm. “It’s your game and your rules.”

  “Very well.” She took a deep breath, as if preparing to dive into a lake. “It’s Brentis.”

  “Brentis?” Yarrow asked and laughed so hard his gut ached. “Bray Brentis Marron?”

  “You shouldn’t laugh. It’s rude. Brentis was my grandfather’s name.” She crossed her arms. “Besides, what kind of name is Yarrow? I never heard it before.”

  Yarrow tried to stop laughing. His face felt as warm as a mid-summer sunburn. “True enough. I don’t think it is a name, really.”

  “What is it then?” Bray asked.

  “Is that your question?” Yarrow passed the bottle. “Because I’m not about to answer un-game-related questions.”

  Bray chuckled and nodded. “Yes, that’s my question.”

  He plucked a shoot of grass from the ground and began tying it in rings. “Yarrow is a kind of weed, actually.”

  Bray sucked her lips in to hold the laugh that, by her own admonishment, would have been rude. “Why would someone name their son after a weed?”

  “It saved my ma’s life when she was pregnant with me, so she developed a fondness for the stuff. She stepped in a bear trap, and my da used it to slow the bleeding while he got help. The doctor said she might have bled out without it.”

  Bray gaped at him with slightly unfocused eyes. “What does it look like…yarrow?”

  “Oh, it grows everywhere,” Yarrow said. “You’d recognize it.”

  Bray placed her hand on the grass and slowly pushed herself up onto unsteady feet. “Show me.”

  “What, now?”

  “Certainly. What if I’m ever bleeding in the woods?”

  Yarrow stood and the night spun before his eyes. Bray grabbed his shoulder to help him stay upright. He took hold of her hand and they began to walk.

  “Let’s look over by those trees,” he suggested.

  “It’s your question now.”

  “Do you think your parents made it to the Spirits’ Home?”

  Bray leaned into him. “Yes. Well, I think so. They were good people. But I guess you never know, do you?”

  He nodded gravely and the wind rustled his hair.

  “It’s unfair, isn’t it?” Bray paused to pull her petticoat from a briar bush. “That being good isn’t always enough. That it should come down to luck, in the end.”

  “My da always does this toast,” Yarrow said, and raised the nearly empty wine bottle in the air. “May I be good when I can, may my sins be light when I can’t, may my spirit fly swiftly, and may the bastard next door die with me and keep the Spiritblighter busy.”

  Bray laughed. “Oh, Yarrow, that’s awful.”

  The light petals of a plant caught Yarrow’s eye. “Here!” he announced triumphantly and knelt down to pull up a cluster of small white flowers. “It’s the leaves you want if you’re bleeding.”

  He guided Bray’s fingers to the feather-shaped blades.

  “It’s pretty,” she said. “I think it’s really more of a flower than a weed.”

  “Well, as a man, I’m not sure that’s much better.”

  Bray smiled. “I suppose not.”

  She broke the budded portion of the plant off and tucked it into her hair.

  They began to walk back towards the inn, and not a moment too soon. The fuzziness in Yarrow’s head was making it increasingly difficult to stay upright.

  “It’s my turn,” she said.

  Yarrow’s eyelids were beginning to droop. “Question away,” he said, his voice slurred.

  “Are you afraid?”

  “Of being Chisanta?”

  She nodded.

  Yarrow took hold of her hand again. “Yes.”

  “Me too,” she whispered.

  Chapter Three

  Bray woke to a sharp rap on the door. Mr. Paggle’s brisk voice called, “Up, up, up.”

  She groaned into her pillow. Her mouth tasted foul, her saliva sticky; she swallowed several times as she rolled over and rubbed her eyes against the glaring morning sun. As she sat up and cast her legs over the edge of the bed, the room spun and the contents of her stomach roiled. Heavy footfalls sounded through the adjoining door. How is Yarrow faring? Better than herself, she hoped.

  When she could delay no longer, she rose and dressed, slowly. The cold water in the basin washed away the last of her sleepiness and raised gooseflesh on her arms. Her fingers, as if of their own accord, pulled her hair back into a bun, tugging at her scalp.

  Her father’s ghost sprung from her memory. “You’ve got hair like sunlight, girl, why restrain it? Your ma never did.”

  Bray sighed and let the copper locks tumble back around her shoulders. “Very well, Da.” She’d prefer it off her neck, but there was no arguing with spirits, imaginary or no.

  From the nightstand she snatched a long leather strap. It was tied into a necklace and bore two silver rings. She slipped it over her head and was comforted by the cold weight against her sternum. She then put on, again, her rather uncomely dress—out of fashion, too short, and shabby as it was. She assessed her appearance in the full-length mirror, taking in her peaked face, the dark shadows under her eyes. The sight was not bolstering. She shrugged. Nothing to be done.

  The sun streamed brightly through the common room windows, painting the space in a welcoming light. She hopped down the last flight of stairs and spotted her companions at a far table. They each nursed a steaming cup of tea.

  “I’d love one of those,” she said, as she sunk down beside Yarrow
. Mr. Paggle poured her a mug and slid it across the table. The sound of the ceramic scraping against the grain in the wood made her head pound.

  She shot a glance at Yarrow, his face pale and eyes bleary. He met her gaze and hooked his mouth into a conspiratorial smile. His hair was in disarray; his jacket hung on the back of his chair, revealing a frayed charcoal waistcoat and a cream-colored shirt, sleeves rolled to the elbows.

  Mr. Paggle waved over the owner and began ordering them breakfast. “Eggs, sausage, hash browns…” The mere thought made Bray’s stomach roll over.

  “Do you feel as wretched as I do?” Yarrow whispered, taking advantage of their chaperone’s distraction.

  “Only if you feel very wretched indeed.”

  He laughed, then winced. “The tea is helping…a bit.”

  Bray followed his example and took a long draught.

  “Once we’ve breakfasted, we must be off in a hurry,” Mr. Paggle informed them. “I have a third charge to pick up by midday.”

  When the piping tray arrived, Bray only nibbled on toast at first. But the more food she ate, the better she began to feel. So in the end, she ate a full plate of eggs and sausage, drank two more cups of tea, and by the time they boarded the barouche, she felt nearly herself again.

  “Ho!” Bray heard Mr. Paggle call to the horses. The carriage slowed.

  “Guess we’re about to get company,” Yarrow said, leaning across her to look out the window. Bray peeked through the curtains as well. They had parked before a well-appointed manor, formidable in its size and opulence. It bore an impressive gray stone face and the grounds were the finest she had ever seen, complete with a lake and gazebo. Waiting on the immaculately manicured lawn stood a well-dressed boy. He hugged a set of well-dressed parents and shook hands with a butler.

  Bray frowned at him. The man who owned the mines in Mountsend lived in a home like this one. He, who set the unreasonable working hours and disregarded the safety of his men, yet paid them a pittance. He, who had held a lavish party on the very day of her father’s funeral, and the funerals of eight other men who’d lost their lives in his mine.