It began to rain. Skye halted Chuffer and Shep under a stand of birches budding with leaves and dismounted wearily. She looked around and decided to stake the ponies next to a vacant food stall, hoping that the owners would not mind her trespass under its overhanging roof. The ponies stripped the greening branches ravenously; prompting her to untie the knotted grain sack she had taken from the wagon and feed each pony a measure of sweet feed from her tin drinking cup. Unfortunately, there had been no way to carry along the hay Kendrick had loaded this morning, and the shaggy ponies were hungry. They lipped and nipped at her fingers, searching for treats. They all would have water in abundance, but the oats laced with molasses would soon be gone. The small pouch of seed money Sierra had brought to the fair, to make change at their stall, was all Skye had to buy grain with. None of it was newly minted Northland silver like the coins Katarina had shown her. Hunched against the rain under the slanted roof of the stall, Skye sorted through her handful of worn coppers sprinkled with thin wafers of silver by the light of the moon. She wondered if these old Middleland coins, depicting bucolic sheep and goats from happier times, would be accepted as legal tender along the northern border. She would find out at the Trading Post in the morning. She would also ask if there had been sightings of Northlander soldiers with prisoners, or anyone in uniform who might have detained her mother. Surely someone would be able to show her which way they had gone. If she learned that her coins would be worth nothing in the Northlands, she would spend them on provisions here. Skye realized that she did not know how long it would take to get to Bordertown. It must be more than one day’s ride; she had overheard as much from the sledders who came down from the Northlands to train with Warren.
Skye spread her traveling cloak on the damp floor of the stall and reached for the goat cheese, bread, and dried apples Sierra had packed for their lunch. She was so sick with worry she feared she could not sleep, but the bread and most of the cheese disappeared quickly, and soon she was dozing, surrounded by the distant roar of the river and the close chuff, chuff of the sleeping mountain ponies.
As dawn broke, she woke with a start. She had used her mother’s bundle of garments as a pillow and something lumpy inside had given her a crick in the neck. She rubbed sleepily at the ache below her jawbone, discovering the pain was not what had awakened her. The ponies were acting fractious, stamping their feet on the sodden ground and pulling at the stake line. Adjusting her eyes to the dimness, Skye crept to the open doorway of the stall, just as Chuffer snorted another warning and Shep’s furry ears pricked, his eyes rolling back with fear. Skye froze. Someone or something was near. In the gloom, she could not make out what.
Suddenly they were upon her, five or six of them, dirty boys in muddy cast-off coats, wrestling her packs from Shep’s back. She kicked and flailed as one of them lunged into the stall for her mother’s garments, aided by the dim glow of a magic crystal another boy held lashed to a stick overhead. Screaming, Skye got in several swift kicks before they seized her wrists and feet. In the fray, Chuffer reared and pulled his stake, whinnying to Shep, who neighed back. Evading grasping hands, Chuffer charged past the boys and flew along the riverbank, followed by Shep, his lead rope trailing.
“Chuffer,” Skye called, but to no avail. “Shep!” The ponies galloped toward the river bend. She turned to her captors and spit, “You stupid, stupid fossick boys!”
“Trader!” cried the boy holding her feet, “There goes our ride!”
“Your ride!” Skye yelled, kicking free. “Your ride! Those are my ponies.”
“We’ll get them,” the one called Trader said. Slight and sinewy, Skye could see he was their leader. He looked about her own age.
“You have put them in danger,” Skye said angrily. “What if they drown?”
Trader pointed to two of the bigger boys. “Ross, you and Clayton run after them. They’re too fat to get far.”
“You idiot.” Skye pulled first one wrist and then her other arm from the grimy hands of the red-haired boy called Clayton, who had not, after all, gone after the ponies. She rubbed her right hand, which had gone numb in his grip. “You don’t run after ponies!”
“No, you don’t,” a familiar voice agreed. “You let them run after you.”
Skye gasped in surprise as a familiar red sweater came into view within the light of the crystal. “Let her up, mates. That’s my sister.” Although Garth’s face was peaked and drawn, he was smiling at her.
“You look like a drowned rat,” Skye scolded, hugging him. Tears stung her eyes as she took in his soiled clothing, and the wet hair plastered to his face. “What happened to you?” She demanded. “What are you doing with this stinking lot of juvenile bandits?”
“Stinking lot?” Ross said. “Did you hear that, Trader? She called us a stinking lot.” He sniffed at his coat sleeve.
“You do smell,” Clayton said.
“Aye, and juvenile bandits,” Trader jeered, his dark eyes smoldering. “Just how old are you, little miss?”
“Old enough to know a thieving fossicker when I see one,” Skye retorted. She grabbed her mother’s bundle from a rail-thin boy who was trying to examine the contents. “Give me back my clothes.”
The boy turned to his leader for direction.
“Micah, hand it over for now.” Trader gave Skye a veiled look before he nodded toward Garth. “Seeing as she’s his sister and all.”
“Garth, let’s get out of here,” Skye said, tying up the rucksack. “But these fossickers saved my life. Or at least Trader did.”
Hugging her bundle, Skye glared at Trader. “I’ll bet they did.”
“We brought you your brother,” Trader said. His eyes shifted toward the rucksack. “Now we are here to collect our profit.”
Ignoring him, Skye turned to Garth. “What happened?”
“When the Teardrop spilled,” Garth began, “I was down at the farmhouse. Father had taken the goats up to the Sleep Out. He said he was coming back with the dogs to get the alpacas, so I went down to the barn and WHOOSH!” He pantomimed with his arms. “There was no warning at all. The dam didn’t spill like it usually does. No, the sluice board broke and the whole thing let go. Water started coming over the fields in waves.”
“What about Father?”
Garth avoided her eyes. “I climbed up on the chicken house and searched for Father, but I couldn’t see him anywhere. The water swirled around and around, and then it pulled the roof clear off the chicken house and there I was on this raft, but it wasn’t a raft, really, just the roof of the chicken house. It was going down this river that used to be our track beside the Lavender Rill, and then turned into a big muddy river, full of branches and fence posts,” he lowered his voice, “and boards from our house. . . .”
“Our farm?”
Garth’s eyes grew glassy. “Parts of it anyway. The wood parts. They flew by me, and I was holding on, holding on . . .” Struggling to keep from whimpering, trying to be older than he really was, Garth paused to catch his breath. “It was so scary,” he said quietly, hugging her hard. When he let go, two huge tears trailed down his face. He wiped them away swiftly with the back of his hand.
“I imagine it was scary,” Skye agreed, recalling her own brush with the Northland soldiers at the Middlemarch bridge and how inconsequential it seemed now that her mother was gone and their farm had washed away. She decided not to mention Sierra’s capture to Garth until later.
“Oh, it was scary, a little,” Garth nodded, his bravado returning as he noticed the other boys had stopped talking among themselves to listen. “But the worst part was next. I came around a turn where the road was all washed out and the water dropped to rocks below and . . .”
“A waterfall?” Skye asked. “Where was this?”
“Just above the Mill on the Rill,” Garth said. “I knew I was not going to make it over that thing, not on a chicken-coop roof.” He sighed with a shrug and a small smile. “
Then I saw the fossickers along the river bank. Trader caught me with a snag, and him and Clayton and Micah pulled me up beside them, and I never want to go down the rill on a raft again.” He gave her a solemn look. “They saved me, Skye. I would be drowned dead.”
“Dead or not, they still would have dragged you out of the river, looking for loot,” Skye said, scanning the circle of ragged boys. They looked tired, she thought, and hungry—certainly not the predators her father had made them out to be. “They’re scavengers, Garth. They did not come looking to save you.”
“At least we came looking,” Micah said.
“We like to look,” Ross chimed in. “Got anything to eat in one of them baskets?”
“Carrion birds, the lot of you,” Skye muttered, digging out her sack of dried apples and tossing it to the little boy. “Garth, they knew the Teardrop would spill so they came to the rill for spoils.” She watched the boys share the apples. “They almost robbed me.”
“And may yet,” Trader said, scuffing one small, booted foot in the dirt.
“I dare say you’ve stolen enough for one day,” Skye argued, “Especially if you think you’ve convinced my brother to join your dirty little band.”
“Skye, it isn’t like that,” Garth said. “I want to be a fossicker.”
“You’ll do no such thing,” Skye declared.
“He owes us,” Ross said, stubbornly, chewing the last apple. “Don’t he, Trader?”
Skye whirled on her brother. “You owe them nothing. Come help me catch the ponies.”
Without looking back, she started toward the bend in the river. Grumbling, Garth followed, trotting to catch up. As the other boys fell in line, Trader held up a hand. “They’ll not try to leave without their packs,” he told them, motioning to Skye’s twig baskets and Sierra’s bundle.
As soon as she was sure they were out of earshot, Skye grabbed Garth’s arm roughly. “What really happened to Father?”
Garth pulled a sodden lump from his pocket. “Trader found this.” Taking the wet wool from Garth’s hands, Skye gasped. It was the Potluck hat Sierra had knit for Kendrick. “In the river?”
Garth nodded. “Caught on a branch.”
Skye’s eyes began to water. “Do you think he drowned?”
Garth shrugged. “I think he’s just gone, and not coming back, just like our farm.” He shook his head and leveled his eyes at his sister. “I hated that place. The never-ending chores and the loneliness and Father’s disappointment that I wasn’t who he wanted me to be.”
“I know,” Skye said, ruffling his hair.
“No, you don’t,” Garth shot back. “Do you know what he made Warren do? Do you know what I had to do?”
“I can guess. You didn’t go moose hunting those last few times, did you?” Skye asked quietly as they approached the ponies, who were cropping green shoots of new grass next to the river.
“No,” Garth said. “We broke trail so filthy Lowlanders could pass through the Notch unnoticed. We built a sled track that was a secret route to the Northland Glacier, called the Blind Side Loop. Then the Guard came and took Warren. They knew something, apparently.”
“Our brother is missing now. Some say he’s a deserter,” Skye said. “At least that was the rumor I heard from soldiers at the fair.”
“Warren would desert no one, willingly,” Garth disagreed. “Whatever happened, I’ll bet it had to do with Lowlanders or Father.” Garth bowed his head. “I won’t go back to the farm,” he said. Then he cocked his eyes at Skye. “Don’t make me go back.”
Skye squeezed his shoulder. “It doesn’t sound like there’s much to go back to,” she said. “Chuffer,” she called in a singsong voice. “Shep!” Both ponies raised their sturdy necks and glanced over, chewing idly. Skye looked at Garth. “Are you ready?”
He nodded, and quickly they turned and sprinted away from the ponies, slowing to let the ponies overtake them as they rounded the bend toward the group of boys, who hooted at the edge of the track. Soon they grasped both lead ropes and rejoined the fossickers.
“That was quite a trick,” Trader grinned.
“Mountain ponies love to chase,” Skye said, letting Ross and Clayton pat Chuffer. “You don’t know much about horses, do you?”
“Nope,” Trader said. “Do they always come in pairs?”
“No,” Skye laughed. “These were hitched to our wagon.”
Garth gave her a sick look. “The wagon,” he realized. “Skye . . .?”
She turned to her brother. “I guess you’re finally wondering what I am doing here alone with the ponies, without Mother or the wagon.”
“Now that you mention it,” he replied in a small voice. “Aren’t you supposed to be in Middlemarch, tending our booth at the fair with Mother?”
“See?” Micah shot Trader a sulky look. “Some folk get to go to the fair.”
“Trader wouldn’t let us go,” Ross complained. “Because we’re boys.”
“Trader was right,” Clayton argued. His eyes flickered over Skye’s tall figure. “Look at her, she’s nothing but a girl! She’d not have the Northland Guard trying to round her up in a rolling cage.”
“Oh, the Guard came after me, all right,” she said. “The soldiers captured my mother and took her away. If I hadn’t hidden under a table, they’d have found me, too. Here I am, sworn to find her, except I don’t know where to go.”
“This day can get no stranger.” Garth shook his head. “The Northland Guard arrested Mother? What for? Making the wrong change? When were you going to tell me?”
“When you asked,” Skye replied. “They tried to detain me, too, but a sledder friend of Warren’s helped me escape with the ponies.”
“You got away from soldiers?” Clayton asked, with admiration. “Trader, this girl outran the Guard.”
“I heard.”
“And she has a wagon,” small Ross added. He plucked Skye’s sleeve. “Where is that wagon?”
“Back at the fairgrounds.” Skye watched Trader, who said nothing. “A long ways off.”
“Too bad,” Ross grumbled. “We all could’ve ridden in it.”
“You’ll not get far on this main track with ponies,” Trader said, looking from Garth to Skye. “Neither of you. The Northland soldiers patrol it day and night.” He lifted his chin toward Skye. “They would throw your brother into a rolling cage and confiscate your ponies to pull it, or another one like it.”
“Do you think that is where our mother is, in a prison wagon?” Skye asked.
Trader shook his head. “No, they only use those for rounding up the likes of us.”
“Speaking of which,” Micah warned, scanning the road both ways. “It’s time to scramble.”
Clayton nodded. “We need to scatter.”
“One moment,” Trader raised his hand. His black eyes snapped at Skye. “Do you know why the soldiers took your mother?”
Skye looked at him and felt her face grow hot with a good lie, but instead found herself telling the truth. “They believe she misuses magic. They think she was one of the original Potluck Twelve.”
“A knitting witch?” Micah asked.
“Can’t be,” Ross grumbled. “No such thing.”
“Hush,” Clayton knocked him on the head.
“Oww,” Ross protested.
“The Guard is arresting all of the witches,” Clayton told Skye. “That’s the rumor up and down this road.”
Trader raised his brows. “If the Guard thinks your mother is a Potluck witch, that means they believe that she’s committed a crime against the Northland. In that case, they would smuggle her up the military track. It’s faster, less traveled, and you can avoid the walls of
Bordertown altogether. They’ll probably try to take her to the jails of the Burnt Holes.”
“No one ever comes back from the Burnt Holes,” Ross whispered. “That’s what they say.”
Micah gave him a little shove. “No, that’s what you say.”
Trader held up his hand again, silencing them. “Clayton’s right. All of a sudden, there’s lots of talk of the Twelve up and down this track. None of it good. If you want to avoid the Guard today, come with us.” He motioned Clayton and Micah to help Skye pack her belongings onto Shep’s back.
“Why should I trust you?” Skye asked. “We need to find our family.”
“We’re all of us without family,” Trader shot back, not unkindly. “What you need to do now is avoid getting caught. Look about, boys. It’s full day now and we’re easy pickings for the Guard.”
“Time for us to scatter,” Clayton said. “Want to meet at the fossick camp under the big rocks upriver?”
“No,” Trader shook his head. “Not with a girl and ponies.”
“In the dell?” Micah suggested. “There’s green grass in the dell.”
“I’ll take the girl to the dell, and you take the boys to the rocks,” Trader decided, waving Clayton away as he took Skye’s arm. “Eat up and pack the gear, plus all we can fossick for trade,” he said. “We’ll meet at dusk under the bridge. Now go.”
“Scramble,” Clayton said, as he and Micah and Ross melted into the tall grass on the other side of the track.
“Scatter!” Ross turned back to grin at Garth, who stood alone in the road, holding Shep’s halter. “That means you. Come on!”
Once within the safety of the tree line, Trader let go of Skye’s arm. “Keep close in the Copse,” he warned.
“Copse?” Skye snorted, leading both ponies. “It’s just woods.” Trader pulled out a walking stick with what looked to Skye like a dull bit of purple glass lashed to its top. He tapped it on the ground and the glass glowed, lighting their path. Their way was lined with overgrown firs whose branches blocked out the daylight.
“Right,” he grinned at her surprise. “And that’s just a cloak you’re wearing.”
The Broken Circle: Yarns of the Knitting Witches Page 7
