The Spell of Rosette

by Kim Falconer

  He shook his head, as she had expected.

  ‘Where, then?’

  ‘Beyond Corsanon.’

  Rosette had no idea what was beyond Corsanon. ‘Where?’

  ‘To the east.’

  She frowned. ‘Is it a secret?’

  ‘You’d know.’

  ‘Pardon me, Master?’ Rosette stared into his eyes.

  ‘I think you know what I mean.’

  ‘I’m sure I do not.’

  ‘Eat up. We have much to talk about.’ He placed two other bowls near the hearth and looked up at the rafters. ‘Scylla, bring your new friend down,’ he said aloud. ‘I’ve saved some raw meat and bones.’

  The temple cats were on the floor, pacing towards him before he’d finished his sentence.

  They toasted, dining in silence. It was not a tension waiting to break, but a curious expectation. Rosette closed her eyes with every bite and exhaled slowly. The food was divine.

  ‘More?’ he offered, as her wooden spoon scraped the bottom of the bowl.

  ‘A touch,’ she smiled. ‘Please.’

  ‘A touch it is,’ he said returning to the kitchen.

  Is he flirting with me?

  His voice altered when he sat down, direct, stern. ‘Rosette, you’ve been moved into my school for a reason.’

  Definitely not flirting.

  ‘A reason?’ she asked, slipping another spoonful into her mouth. She didn’t close her eyes this time. She fixed them on him. Could this be it? The apprenticeship?

  ‘We have something very specific in mind.’

  Her face fell. ‘We?’

  ‘The High Priestess and I. We’ve selected you to perform a certain task. We thought there’d be more time to prepare, but it turns out there isn’t.’

  Rosette stopped eating and put down her spoon. ‘What kind of task?’

  ‘I can’t say yet, only that it involves crossing Los Loma undetected.’

  ‘This time of year?’

  ‘It’ll be chilly.’

  ‘Chilly? Are you insane? It’s solid ice and blizzards up there.’

  ‘I won’t pretend there are no risks in the travel, let alone the rest of the assignment.’

  ‘What rest?’

  ‘An exchange, if things go to plan.’

  ‘And if they don’t go to plan?’

  ‘There’ll be fighting.’

  He reached for the flagon of wine and re-filled their glasses. She lifted hers, but did not take a sip. ‘I’m hardly ready for such an assignment.’

  ‘I know.’

  Rosette glared at him before taking a long swig. ‘Then why do you want me?’ she asked, placing her empty glass down on the table.

  ‘Partly because of your ability to shield your thoughts and use your magic undetected, and partly because you’re not without other inherent skills, though I still can’t work out why, unless it’s in your blood. Is your mother a witch?’

  ‘No,’ she lied.

  ‘What about your father or grandparents?’

  Rosette laughed at the thought. ‘Hardly.’

  ‘Curious. But either way, by the next moon, your sword skills will be tenfold.’

  She had a pretty good idea how many hours, days, months and years it would take to make that true.

  ‘You’re saying I’ve only a matter of weeks to prepare for this adventure?’

  ‘A little less.’

  Rosette turned to stare out the front window. All she could see was his reflection, watching her like a bird of prey, golden in the fire’s glow.

  Sounds exciting, Drayco chimed in.

  ‘Drayco’s coming.’ It wasn’t a query.

  I’ll be there. He’s not an idiot.

  ‘Of course your familiar will accompany you.’

  ‘And?’ She raised both eyebrows. ‘Who else?

  He looked away.

  ‘You aren’t telling me that’s it, are you? Me, Drayco and the mountain of Los Loma? Midwinter?’

  An’ Lawrence took a long drink before answering. ‘You’ll be travelling with me.’

  And Scylla, Drayco added. It was a smug, happy cat sound he made in her head.

  She glanced up to the rafters and saw Drayco licking his lips. Scylla hissed, then chortled, then hissed again.

  Terrific! ‘Sounds real fun,’ she said under her breath. She lowered her eyes and stared at her bowl. There wasn’t much left, but she suddenly felt full. ‘How long will we be away?’

  ‘I can’t say.’

  ‘Will we be on foot or horseback?’

  ‘Haven’t decided.’

  ‘Why are we…’

  The Sword Master cut her off with a wave of his hand. ‘I can’t tell you anything else about the journey, Rosette de Santo. Stop asking.’

  ‘What can you tell me?’

  ‘Nothing, except that it will involve stealth and deception, and you’ll need to be fit. Very fit. How do you go in the cold?’

  ‘I hate it.’

  ‘We’ll get you a new sheepskin coat.’

  ‘Thanks.’ She was silent for a moment. ‘Can I just ask one other thing?’

  He crossed his arms in front of his chest and ripples of fear ran down her spine.

  ‘My apologies, Sword Master.’ She bowed her head. ‘No more questions.’

  Well, no more aloud, anyway. He couldn’t control what bounced around in her mind. What could he possibly be up to? Los Loma offered no easy crossing, and though she had never been near the summit, she had some knowledge of what might be found on the other side: the greater mountains of Prieta. One didn’t go there without a good reason. Kreshkali had a stronghold underground, or so she’d heard.

  ‘Just the four of us?’ she asked, her voice seeming thin and high to her own ears. She didn’t want to anger him further, but if she was going to risk her life, she had a right to know.

  Shaking his head with a half grin, An’ Lawrence replied, ‘That’s all for tonight, Rosette. Go and rest. We’ll begin training at dawn. I want you fighting fit in two weeks.’

  ‘I thought I had three?’

  ‘Two. We need the final week for something else.’

  She pushed back from the table. Summoning her courage, she spoke again: ‘Please tell me this means I’m in line for apprenticeship?’

  He looked her up and down. ‘It’s being considered.’

  She nodded. ‘Getting ready in two weeks—that’s going to take some magic.’

  ‘Yes, it is.’

  ‘I thought that was taboo, especially for an unassigned initiate,’ she probed, emphasising the last two words as she cleared her place.

  ‘I plan on using what’s necessary, and so will you. Go get some rest, and take your familiar with you.’

  Rosette looked up to the rafters. Scylla had her companion backed into a corner, though she was purring like a waterfall.

  She likes me, Drayco sent.

  ‘Are you sure?’ Rosette asked, smiling.

  It’s unnerving. How peculiar does this feel? I don’t know what she’s up to.

  ‘It’s like that, Dray—it’s like that.’

  ‘What’s like that?’ the Sword Master queried.

  She shook her head and nodded towards the ceiling. ‘Just something between them.’

  Drayco jumped lightly to the stone floor and stretched before the Sword Master. Rosette was surprised. She didn’t remember him showing such respect to anyone else besides Nell, no matter what their standing in the human order of things.

  An’ Lawrence seemed momentarily stunned. Then he smiled and Rosette suspected he’d gotten a message from Scylla, who still hovered amongst the rafters overhead, watching.

  The Sword Master roughed Drayco’s neck. ‘Some of us will get along, it seems,’ he said, and showed them to the door.

  Nell communicated with the Watcher whenever she felt the need. She used whichever portal was nearest, and today it was in the ruins of Temple Dumarka, half a day’s walk from her cottage, less as the crow flies. All she had t
o do to link with the Watcher was to touch the field of energy, an undulating electromagnetic pulse that was obvious to any witch of her calibre. She could go there physically—in her body—or simply through the astral space in meditation. Either way, the Watcher’s voice bypassed her empirical senses, communicating on a sub-cellular level. That is, when it chose to communicate at all.

  She called it the Sphinx, a being, or composite of beings, who answered her questions with a complexity of riddles, more cryptic than clear. Still she would ask, when the need drove her, though she was never certain of the information or how to interpret it. This time, her mind was reeling from the paradoxes. The Watcher, on the other hand, seemed to think it a game. It snorted at her request.

  You find this humorous, Great Sphinx?

  You must appreciate the audacity of your request, Nell.

  Is it audacious to want to preserve life in the many-worlds?

  By the means that you suggest, it is. I can’t have you playing with time. Too messy.

  She frowned. What was the Sphinx on about? If time was an illusion, what was so tricky about manipulating it to her ends? She tried again. I realise time’s not what one normally tampers with, but under the circumstances I don’t know what else to do.

  The Sphinx didn’t respond—usually a sign that she’d missed something obvious in a previous statement. She searched her mind, coming up blank.

  You aren’t going to help? she asked after a prolonged silence, suspecting the Sphinx had gone. The strength of the reply startled her.

  I’m not going to alter time to suit your needs. Think of something else, Nellion Paree.

  I’ve tried. There isn’t anything else.

  The Sphinx laughed, a deep belly laugh that rippled through her skin. Are you sure?

  Nell clenched her jaw. No, I’m not sure. That’s why I am here, asking for your help.

  More chuckling.

  Nell crossed her arms, resisting the temptation to tap her foot.

  The chuckling stopped and the Sphinx made a sound much like throat clearing. Have you thought of the future? The communication was soft, seductive.

  Of course I’ve thought about the future. That’s all I’m thinking about, day and night.

  Not like that, Nell…

  What do you mean?

  Have you thought about how the future can change the past, without worrying time at all?

  She let her arms drop to her sides. You’ve lost me, Sphinx.

  Think of it this way: if you go back to the past, it becomes your future, does it not?

  She considered for a moment. I suppose. She looked up. Are you talking about reversed causation?

  The Sphinx clicked, an impatient sound. What is it about being in a physical body that keeps you holding to the notion that causation has direction – either forward or back?

  Nell curled her lip. Perhaps it has to do with ageing. Have you heard of it? The process of being born, growing up and dying? Sequential timelines, sunrise, sunset and the predictable path of the planets are also a hint. Everything else we learn from nature… She let her voice trail off, realising suddenly that she sounded like a narrow-minded cleric. Nell took a breath. Time’s not directional? Is that what you’re telling me?

  Warmer.

  Not forward or backward?

  Correct. Consider the shape of a spiral.

  Nell let that sink in, though her mind remained murky. I don’t get it.

  Consider this metaphor, Nellion. Causation is like dropping a stone into a pool.

  You mean ripples?

  Yes, waves and ripples, if you must think in such horizontal dimensions.

  Ripples, Nell repeated. I still don’t understand.

  She felt a flick, like the closing of a book, before the ground dropped out from under her feet. In a split second, she was standing on a wooden bridge. It arched over a flowing river, the water below blue. Everglades spread out into the distance as far as she could see, and waterlilies and willows hugged the shore on either side.

  ‘Look down,’ said the Watcher.

  He stood next to her, a man of medium height with sandy hair and dark eyes. He wore muslin fisherman’s pants and a pale orange cotton shirt, the tails wafting in the breeze. Prayer beads hung around his neck. His hands were folded in front of him.

  ‘Sphinx?’

  The man raised his eyebrows.

  ‘What are you doing?’ She looked him up and down.

  ‘I like to try on different things, don’t you?’

  She shrugged.

  ‘Look down,’ he said again.

  Nell stepped closer to the rail and leaned over. She gazed at the ripples of water under the bridge. They were like little waves that constantly branched off, interfering with each other to form yet another wave and another.

  ‘Now look out there.’ The Watcher lifted his arm, opening it out towards the everglades.

  Nell followed the ripples as they multiplied for as far as the eye could see. The Watcher smiled and touched her shoulder, guiding her to the other side of the bridge. There she saw the same thing—endless ripples of waves, and arched bridges—all heading out into the distance, leading to and from the waterlilies and willows, path after path after path.

  ‘Where would you like to stand?’

  She looked at the Sphinx. ‘I can choose?’

  ‘You choose every time you draw in a breath, every time you exhale.’

  He took a stone from his pocket and dropped it over the edge. When it hit the surface, waves flowed out from the impact point. They expanded towards each shore, upstream and downstream, an ever-increasing circumference, interfering with the ripples of the currents, creating more and more little waves.

  ‘Sphinx, are you saying there is something I can do in the future that will alter what has happened in the past? If I do something on one shore, it will change another?’

  ‘You could construct it in those terms, but I’m suggesting you stop thinking of past and future as if they were two different things. It’s all one river, one shore, one mind, one spiral, when you focus on it.’

  ‘And when I don’t focus on it?’

  ‘Then it is infinite ripples of possibility, each with a potential destiny of its own.’ Again he opened his arm out towards the flow of water until it blurred into the horizon.

  ‘But what if…’ She felt the tactile sensation of his departure.

  ‘I’ll leave you to contemplate.’ His voice trailed off, and he was gone.

  ‘That’s it? That’s all you have to say?’ Nell looked down at the water. She thought for a second it was laughing at her. ‘Enigmatic Watchers,’ she mumbled. ‘Just what I don’t need—another metaphysical puzzle.’

  She wandered over the bridges for the rest of the day, dropping stones into the water and watching the ripples flow. Just before she dropped a particularly lovely greenstone over the edge, she straightened, slipping it into her pocket instead.

  Bingo.

  She shape-shifted into a red-tailed kite and caught a thermal. With one last look below, the ripples still clear with her raptor vision, she shot off towards the horizon, hoping that her cottage in Dumarka wasn’t far off.

  The Three Sisters had been restless all day, scolding and flapping and cawing. They’d be quiet for a moment, composing themselves in a stately row, then suddenly the commotion would start all over again—flap, squawk, raucous. When the slanting light angled through the garden, turning red roses golden, they flew to the highest pine, watching all directions like weather-vanes.

  ‘When will you settle?’ she asked.

  Someone comes! Someone tall, long legs.

  ‘Are you talking about a heron or a person?’

  They squawked and flapped but didn’t answer.

  She tapped the windowpane. ‘If someone’s approaching, why not fly out to meet them instead of sitting here all day and driving me nuts! I honestly don’t detect a threat!’

  The middle raven tilted her head to stare into the cottage
then took flight, followed by the other two.

  Finally, some peace.

  Person, Nellion. Long legs person.

  How far off?

  Long legs has a long walk.

  She squared her shoulders and put the kettle on.

  Nell sipped her tea and studied the chart before her. The eclipse would be on Saturn in less than three days. She never felt comfortable in the shadow of an eclipse and this one seemed particularly potent. It could coincide with a realisation, a disclosure and a choice to make. With Mars at a ninety-degree square to the lunar nodes in the cardinal sign of the Ram, things would happen fast. Quite likely, there would be an uninvited guest.

  ‘Nothing my ravens didn’t tell me.’ She looked up at Mozzie draped over the rafters. ‘Be mindful, my beauty. Someone’s coming but I can’t say who.’

  The snake flicked his tongue in her direction, uncoiling to meet her eye to eye. Ally?

  ‘I hope so, Moz. Could use one about now.’

  The fire had burned low when she heard the Three Sisters return and the gate latch click. Booted feet stepped confidently up the path, a purposeful walk, a man’s walk—long legs, indeed.

  Mozzie coiled about the rafter in front of the door, tongue scenting. Nell washed her cup in the sink and set it carefully on the rack. She picked up her staff that leaned against the wall. Mozzie followed, but Nell held out a hand to stop him.

  Let’s see who it is first, shall we?

  The knock startled them, though they knew it was coming.

  ‘Nellion Paree?’ A young man’s voice called out. ‘Rosette?’

  ‘Who’s there?’ Nell asked. She ran her thumb over the carvings etched into her staff.

  ‘It’s Jarrod.’

  The hairs on the back of her neck rose. ‘Say again?’

  ‘Jarrod Cossica; I’m a friend of Rosette’s. I’ve come from Lividica. I have news.’

  Nell opened the door to a tall man with broad shoulders and a wry smile. He swept off his hat, revealing a mass of dark curls, and bowed—his eyes never leaving hers, his grin beaming.

  ‘Jarrod Cossica, ready to serve.’

  After a moment his gaze shot past her and into the cottage, searching.