Witchlanders

by Lena Coakley

  “You’re right. It’s got to stop.” Her eyes were already beginning to clear. Maiden’s woe gave Mabis a burst of frenzied vision, but the effect soon dissipated, leaving her moody and tired—until she took more and it all started again.

  Ryder picked up the fragment of black bone. Unlike the others in the set, this one had no marks scratched into it. It was a piece of vertebra most likely, but it was so worn he couldn’t tell from what animal it had come. He’d never noticed it before, had never cared enough about his mother’s bones to distinguish one from the other, though they’d sat on the high shelf above the kitchen pots all his life. His mother had always been so quick to deride them, to belittle anyone who believed they had something to reveal. “I don’t understand. Why are you giving this to me?”

  “It’s the anchor bone,” Mabis explained. “It’s very old. A casting wouldn’t work without it.” She pressed his hands around the small black knob. “You keep it for me. Without it, I won’t be tempted.”

  The meaning of his mother’s words began to dawn on him. Could it be that simple? Could hiding this little thing really keep his mother away from the maiden’s woe? He should have thought of it before. He would have tossed the whole set of bones into the river if he thought it would stop her from taking the flower.

  “And you were right about something else,” she said. “The witches in my coven, they must see the assassin too. I’ve got to speak to them about it. Ryder, we’ve got to build a firecall.”

  “What? Tonight?”

  “Please, I won’t be able to stop thinking about it. . . .”

  Ryder was about to refuse. He knew the witches wouldn’t come, wouldn’t allow themselves to be summoned by the village fortune-teller. But then, maybe being ignored by the witches was just what his mother needed to bring her back to herself. He glanced at the shuttered window for any sign of light slipping in between the cracks. As yet, dawn hadn’t reached them, but he was beginning to suspect he wouldn’t sleep again that night.

  “And if we build this call and the witches don’t come, will you promise to stop all this? Will you face the fact you can’t see any visions in the bones?”

  Mabis smiled, and Ryder could see the black stains on her teeth. “I’ll promise anything you like,” she said. She pulled herself up from the floor, brushing the dust off her dirty reds. “But the witches won’t ignore a call from me.”

  * * *

  On the other side of the border, Falpian Caraxus watched the column of greenish smoke rise up over the shoulder of the mountain. Dawn was breaking. Behind him, his father’s men hovered around cooking fires, rolling up blankets or talking softly over last cups of steaming tea, careful not to disturb his thoughts. Some had already taken their leave with a nod or a silent bow and were leading their horses down the steep path.

  Falpian stood in the dewy grass on the edge of the plateau. The mountains were a stunning sight. The zanthia trees had changed their color, turning every peak to crimson.

  “The witches are in their reds,” he said to himself. Here, so close to the border, it was easy to see how the Witchlanders could believe in Aata and Aayse, the witch prophets. Even the red trees seemed to honor their customs.

  Bron, his father’s kennel master, came up quietly beside him, his great shadow spilling over the lip of the plateau. “Firecall,” he grunted, frowning up at jagged peaks.

  Falpian hadn’t considered that. At first he’d thought the rising smoke must be a funeral pyre, but then he remembered that Witchlanders didn’t burn their dead; they buried them in the ground, or worse, preserved them in dank catacombs.

  “Black for war, green to gather, red when the coven is under attack,” Falpian recited. He turned to Bron. “Some witch calls for a gathering with that smoke. Do you think they know something?”

  Bron took a moment to answer. “What is there to know?”

  “I’m not a fool.”

  After another pause the kennel master said quietly, “It’s always best to assume the witches know every move we make. And every move we’re going to make.” He turned to Falpian now, as if to use his face to make the point. Falpian was used to the cruel scars that slashed from left to right across Bron’s features—souvenirs of war—but seeing them now made him flinch. Witchlanders were a vicious people.

  “Maybe I should just go home with you,” Falpian suggested hopefully. “These are dangerous times.”

  “Are they?”

  Behind them on the plateau, some of the others had noticed the smoke and were murmuring and pointing. They were young men mostly, too young to be veterans of the war like Bron, too young to remember when the fire-calls all burned black.

  “It’s all right!” Bron shouted, but his words were for Falpian as much as for them. “I expect a call’s a common enough thing in these parts!” In a lower voice he went on, “There’s nothing to fear. The witches won’t break the treaty.”

  “I don’t want to go back because I’m afraid,” Falpian snapped. Bron raised an eyebrow at Falpian’s tone. Although a servant of Falpian’s father, he demanded respect from someone so young. “I’m sorry, Bron. It’s just . . . I should be home. I should be training with the others.”

  “Others?”

  “Why do you pretend not to know what I’m talking about? There wasn’t a spare bed the day we left—there were even boys sleeping in the stables.”

  “Men have always sent their sons to your father to learn their battle skills.”

  “Never so many sons as this year.”

  Bron pursed his lips and stared out at the scarlet mountains as if he enjoyed the view. He must be under orders, Falpian thought. He’d tell me if he could.

  “We’ll await you in the gorge,” someone said to Bron, and the last of the men and horses began to make their way down the path.

  Falpian watched the last horse disappear and felt a weight settle over him. Soon Bron would leave as well, and Falpian would be alone, alone at Stonehouse for a hundred days with only the dog for company—and even Bo’s company couldn’t be counted on. He was off chasing rabbits now, enamored of his new freedom.

  Of course, Falpian would want for nothing during his stay. His father had sent crates of poetry, bags of flour, jars of honey, barrel after barrel of dried fish—everything he’d need and plenty of things he wouldn’t. Somehow the man could make even bounty seem like a slap in the face. In the old days he would have told his son to live by his wits, that hardship would make him strong; he would have scoffed at the idea of reading poetry and insisted Falpian study logic or military history. Now he didn’t seem to care.

  “I can’t be completely useless,” Falpian said to Bron. “Surely there’s something I can learn to do.” He pointed to the smoke over the mountain. “I hate them as much as everyone else. If there’s another attack planned. If it’s war—”

  “Shh!” Bron warned. The men were gone now, but he looked to the mountain’s crooked peak as if, from their high covens, red witches were listening. “You are in mourning, child. This is a time of grief for you—a time of meditation and prayer.”

  Falpian waved his words away. “There are a dozen retreats where I could spend my mourning season. But Father sends me as far as he can, for as long as he can. Am I being banished?” He bit his lip, remembering how cold his father had been when they parted, barely taking the time to say good-bye. “You don’t have any magic in you either, but at least my father can stand to look at you.” This was the heart of the matter, Falpian knew. His lack of magic. “All those men and boys back home, how many of them will have the gift? One or two, if any? But he doesn’t treat the others as if they’ve disappointed him just by being alive. He puts a sword in their hands and teaches them how to use it.”

  “I seem to recall your father giving you many lessons in swordcraft.”

  Falpian blushed hotly. Neither he nor his brother had ever excelled with weapons. “I thought,” he stammered, “I thought I would have other skills.” He paused, steadying his breath.
The last thing he wanted was for Bron to see him cry, and report what he had seen to his father. “I shouldn’t have assumed.”

  The kennel master set a thick hand on his shoulder. Falpian shrugged away his touch, but at least Bron wasn’t like his mother, constantly telling him that he was a late bloomer, that his magic would come. Falpian was grateful for that.

  “Perhaps your father has a reason,” Bron said, still speaking in hushed tones. “Did you think of that? A reason for sending you so close to the border, in these . . . uncertain times.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Bron’s eyes were suddenly brighter, and the torn corners of his mouth turned upward to a grin. There was a leather pack at his side, and from it he pulled a metal cylinder that glinted dully in the sunlight. Falpian recognized it as a container for a scroll.

  “I was supposed to wait until the last moment to give this to you,” Bron said, “and I suppose that time has come.”

  All at once, Falpian was reminded of a day years earlier—the day he’d been given his dog, Bo. He remembered the kennel master holding the trembling ball of fur cupped in both his hands, that same glad brightness in his eyes: It was something special, this scroll. Falpian looked again at the cylinder. He’d never seen it before, but he recognized the Caraxus family mark etched over its surface: the words DUTY, HONOR, SACRIFICE coiled together in the ancient Baen script.

  “Is it . . . from my father?” Something like hope fluttered in his chest. “But if he had a message—”

  “Not a message,” Bron interrupted. “A mission.” He smiled again. “I wish you could have heard him. Your father did not confide everything in me, but he did say your presence here was very important, that you were very important.”

  “Very important? Me?” Try as he might, Falpian couldn’t picture his father saying the words. “Important for what?”

  “For what’s to come.”

  Later, when Bron too had gone, Falpian stood at the edge of the plateau clutching the metal cylinder tightly in one hand, delaying for a moment the pleasure of opening it. He had a mission. A reason to be here. His father had not banished him after all. The red mountains had been just a pretty picture before; now they were strangely thrilling, as if his destiny were hidden somewhere amid the rocky crags.

  Nearby, a stand of zanthias shook their branches, and a cloud of seedpods floated down on him like fat red snow-flakes. Without thinking, Falpian pulled one out of the air. It was soft and feathery. He’d read somewhere that Witchlanders made wishes on them.

  “Let me do this well,” he whispered, “whatever it is. Don’t let me disappoint him again.”

  Falpian blew a soft breath over his palm, and the seed-pod floated down on a current of air, disappearing into the gorge.

  He’d rather die than disappoint his father again.

  CHAPTER 2

  THE SKIN OF THE SEA

  The song Ryder sang in the hicca fields rose and fell, inventing itself. He had always sung while he worked, not because he was happy or because he wanted to, but just because mindless labor always seemed to bring the strange, wordless melodies to his lips.

  “Ryder!” his sister shouted from the base of the planting hill. He ignored her. “I know where you are!”

  Ryder stopped singing and ducked a little lower. It was early morning, but already he’d been picking for so long that his hands were raw and his shirt was damp with sweat. All around him, rows of golden hicca swayed stiffly in the breeze.

  “Fa prayed every day at harvest time,” Skyla called. “And you haven’t done it once!”

  “Is that you, Skyla? I can’t hear you!” He turned back to his work, but he knew he couldn’t get rid of his sister that easily.

  The hicca plants were tall and straight with an earthy, fruity smell. Ryder grasped the nearest one just below the tassel and slid his hand down the plant, knocking off the hard brown berries that grew close along the stalk. On the ground, an open sack caught the berries as they fell. It was rough work—his fingers would be blistered by sundown—but a Witchlander who wore gloves in the hicca fields couldn’t show his face in town.

  “If we start right away, we’ll be finished in time for breakfast.” Skyla’s voice was closer now. He could hear her coming toward him through the rows. “We should thank the Goddess for her bounty.”

  Ryder bent down and gathered up the few berries that had missed the sack. “Bounty! We’ll be lucky if we get a fortyweight this year.”

  “Even so . . .”

  Ryder straightened up. His sister was standing behind him, panting a little from the climb. She wore a pair of Fa’s old leggings, tied in a knot at the waist to keep them up.

  “Performing Aata’s prayer will take up half the morning,” he argued. “You and I and Mabis tilled the soil, planted the berries, weeded. What did the Goddess have to do with it?”

  “Everything,” Skyla said firmly.

  Ryder snorted. “You don’t really believe that.”

  Something behind him caught her eye, and Skyla pushed past, frowning. At the top of the hill, the lucky man—a scarecrow they had made that spring—stretched out his stick arms, watching over the crops.

  “Look,” she scolded. “You’ve let him get all bent over.” She grasped the pole that formed the scarecrow’s body and began to twist it deeper into the dirt.

  Ryder threw up his hands. “Yes, the Goddess and the lucky man. They’re the ones responsible for this harvest. I might as well go back to bed.”

  Skyla shot him a glare. She’d been in a mood all morning, and Ryder knew he wasn’t helping. Normally he’d be happy to appease his sister by praying for a little while. It was Mabis he was really annoyed with. This morning she had refused flat-out to help with the picking, saying that she had to tend the firecall. It had been burning for three days now without a word from the coven. Of course the witches weren’t coming—anyone could see that—but Mabis kept adding herbs and grasses to color the smoke, kept feeding it the good logs Ryder had split for winter. He realized now that he should have put a time limit on their agreement. Mabis had promised that things would go back to normal if the witches didn’t come, but she didn’t say how long she was prepared to wait.

  Ryder followed his sister to the top of the hill and looked out over the tops of the hicca plants. From there, he could see down past the cottage, past the neighboring planting hills, past the bend in the river, all the way to the village in the valley. Theirs was the highest farm, the last of the green foothills before the mountains turned red with zanthias and began their climb into witch country.

  “We do these things for Fa,” Skyla said softly, without turning around. She was adjusting the head of the lucky man, an old helmet from the war. “He taught us to till and plant and weed. And pray. We’d be ignorant as blackhairs if it weren’t for him.”

  Ryder was still staring into the valley. “Farmer Raiken’s got his whole bottom field done.”

  Skyla gave a frustrated hiss. “A beautiful view and that’s all you see? It’s not a race—our crops are always the last to ripen up here.”

  “But it is a race, Skyla,” he said—it was maddening that he was the only one who could see it. “The chilling might come tomorrow, or the day after that. And we’ve still got to take the hicca to the miller, cut and dry the stalks for the animals, fix the cottage roof—then there’s the vegetable garden . . .”

  “Villagers wouldn’t let us starve if worst came to worst.”

  “Charity?” Ryder could hardly believe what he heard. “Fa would cry out from his grave—”

  “Maybe,” she interrupted. “Maybe we’d be better off living in the village.”

  She inclined her head slightly toward the column of greenish smoke that rose up below them from the cottage. Every once in a while, the wind would change, and Ryder would catch its bitter smell—like burnt herbs and sour milk. Skyla meant Mabis—Mabis would be better off in the village. “Or perhaps the coven would take us in,” she added softly.


  “The coven.” He laughed. “Can you imagine us living there? Anyway, Mabis is fine.”

  He put his hand to his chest and felt for the little bone his mother had given him. Day and night he kept it with him, safe in a leather pouch that he wore around his neck. He hadn’t told Mabis where it was, but she knew—he caught her looking at the pouch sometimes.

  “She hasn’t been near the flowers,” he added. “I go every morning to check the river.”

  “So do I,” said Skyla. Ryder hadn’t known that.

  “Anyway, the more we talk, the less we do.” He started off down the hill, but Skyla pulled gently at his sleeve.

  “Ryder?” Her voice was soft, almost shy, and when he turned back, her pale blue eyes were clear as glass. “Haven’t you ever . . . wanted something else?”

  “Else?”

  “You used to talk about going to sea.” The words made something tighten deep in his chest. Why was she bringing that up?

  “What I want,” he said, more sharply than he meant, “is for us not to starve. What I want is for us to get this hicca in. That’s how we honor our father’s memory, Skyla, not by bowing and bending on the prayer hill.”

  “And what do you think I want?”

  She was serious, he could see that, but he’d never thought of Skyla wanting anything more than what was right here under their feet. He was the one who wanted more—not that he’d ever get it now.

  Ryder shrugged. “What do you want?” His mind was a blank. “How should I know? To get married, I guess. To some boy. Have babies and nice dresses.”

  “By the twins, how can you be my brother and know nothing about me?”

  “Well, what do you want, then?”

  He was baffled by the tears that were suddenly glistening in her eyes. For the first time, he noticed how tall and wiry his sister had grown in the past year, how womanish she was looking, even in her too-big men’s leggings.

  “Are you angry because I wouldn’t let you buy that cloth for a new set of prayer clothes?”