Burnt (Blood and Fire Book 1)

by Michelle Wheet & Lyn Lowe

fairy?”

  The girl’s laugh came out half snort. It was strange. “He also says you might die if you sit still too long. That you are always moving in one direction or another. Moving, planning, moving. Never ever still.”

  Kaie shrugged. “I get bored. Your brother is still enough for both of us, with all that meditation.”

  “You know what I think is strange?”

  He was answering before he could think any better of it. “I’m afraid to ask. It must be damn disturbing.”

  She laughed again, snort and all, and punched him in the shoulder. Not lightly, the way girls hit to play. It was a real hit that left his skin stinging. “There’s a boy. He is so powerful people think he might be fay. He must be terribly compelling, because even a cautious and fearful person starts trusting this boy without a second thought. He inspires his friend to sacrifice love and future for him. He thinks so highly of himself that he believes his gods will return just to absolve him of some very appropriate misgivings.

  “There are a good number of directions he can move in, and some of them could even bring him a measure of peace and happiness. But, of all those directions, he chooses to walk backward, when he already knows everything that waits there will hollow out the greatness in him and leave only guilt and self-hatred. Isn’t that odd?”

  She stood up, a process that was every bit as treacherous as sitting down. This time, Kaie actually did catch an elbow in his shoulder. The same one she hit. He wasn’t sure it was accidental, either. “I need to go fetch your Amorette. You are an interesting person to speak with, Bruhani.”

  “Wait!”

  She kept moving toward the path he followed from the houses with no sign of slowing. But she did glance back.

  “What’s your name?”

  She rolled her eyes once more before flipping her hair back into place and covering up her angled face. “You haven’t earned it yet. And don’t you ask my brother! That’s cheating.”

  Twenty-One

  The next week passed much like the ones before it. Amorette did speak to him. Sort of. It was, of course, what he wanted. Except the only times she said anything was when she tried to convince him to sleep with her. Not every night but most. He managed to scrape together enough self-control to say no, but it was always a near thing. And it got harder each time, especially when she started crying herself to sleep after he refused her.

  He missed Amorette. She was right there, across from him every night. But, even if she was willing to talk to him, Kaie found it increasingly difficult to find something to say. Each morning slipping out to avoid her grew a little easier. He wanted her so bad he ached with it. All he ever needed to do was say that one word. But saying anything else seemed impossible. And that was what he missed: their conversations. He resented her for taking that from him sometimes. More than sometimes, when he was being honest with himself.

  No matter how difficult the mornings were, Kaie always returned before the girl came to get Amorette. Her arrival was the best part of every one of his days. His puzzle. She would watch him, those big blue eyes half hidden underneath her mass of white-blonde hair. Some days she would talk to him, some she wouldn’t. She refused to give him any hint about how he might earn her name, but she was quite good at giving him enough encouragement to try the next morning. He told her jokes, shared his favorite stories and asked her all manner of caring and considerate questions. But she did not budge. It was wonderfully frustrating.

  Vaughan came every other day. Always just after the sun reached its highest point. The boy was more regular than bowel movements, and Kaie found he appreciated that more than he expected. He was surprised to discover how much he looked forward to those visits. They were almost as important as the time spent with the boy’s sister.

  So when the blanket over the front of the house lifted, Kaie expected it to be Vaughan. He looked up from a design he was making in the dirt in front of him, anticipating another enlightening conversation about the sister. But it wasn’t Vaughan. It was the woman who put the brand in his shoulder.

  Kaie was scrambled backward, his hand seeking anything that might serve as a weapon, before he consciously processed this new development. His fingers wrapped around one of the bowls his neighbors gave them. Knowing it for perhaps the most absurd defense ever attempted, he swung it in the space between them as warning. The woman’s nose wrinkled in what could just as easily be scorn as laughter. She made as though to step across the threshold, the hand not holding back the blanket clenched in a fist.

  “Thank you, Josephina. That will be all.”

  The voice came from outside, well beyond his scope of vision. It was soft and unassuming; he barely heard it over the pumping of blood in his ears. But it snapped the woman straight in an instant. She tilted her head to the unseen speaker and then dropped the blanket back into place, obscuring Kaie’s view completely.

  He crept forward, not at all certain he wanted to find out what was going on, clutching the bowl like a lifeline. Just as he reached the halfway point the blanket was jerked open again.

  Kaie found himself staring at what was once a beautiful woman.

  She was around the same age as his mother, he supposed. Older, probably, but not much. Her long brown hair was pulled back from her slender face in a style that managed to look both ornate and simple at the same time. Her rich brown eyes were framed by wrinkles, as were her full lips. Despite her age, she was far from ugly. Age was coming on her gracefully. She was, his father would say, quite handsome. And despite the fact that her beauty was clearly fading, she didn’t make any attempts to hide it with garish makeup or flashy clothing the way some older women of his tribe were known to. Her dress was obviously of fine make but it was not bedecked with beads or feathers, or anything else intended to distract from the one wearing it.

  She didn’t belong in his new world.

  She seemed oblivious to the inappropriateness of her presence as she stepped into his house with a dainty grace he imagined must take years of practice. He gawked as she surveyed the room without a trace of disdain or disapproval. When she was done, she fixed her gaze to him once again. “I imagine you are wondering who I am.”

  It was the same soft voice from before. The clues snapped into place. He set the bowl down cautiously and climbed back to his feet. It wouldn’t do to cower before this woman. “You’re the Lady Autumnsong.”

  He thought he caught a slight lift to her right eyebrow, but it was gone before he could be sure.

  “Yes. Do you know why I am here?”

  “No.” He bit back everything else he wanted to say, not quite ready to see how far he could push the one responsible for his enslavement. There would be time for that later.

  She gestured to the doorway. “I am going for a walk. You will accompany me.”

  He wanted very much to argue. Compliance would mean he accepted her ownership of him, and that was most certainly not true. But he was curious. And a little bored. And, honestly, he wasn’t sure he was ready to make an enemy of this woman. He didn’t know enough. Not yet.

  She did not glance back to see if he was following. Kaie struggled to swallow his irritation at her arrogance as he trotted along like a dutiful dog.

  “This area is very quiet now, isn’t it?”

  It took him a second to decide if she was asking him or simply making an observation. “Uh, I guess. Are other places different?”

  She shot him a backward glance informing that she, in fact, was not speaking to him before. The expression wasn’t angry. Not exactly. But it did make him feel distinctly uncomfortable. “Yes. I make it a habit to visit my holdings regularly. Most of them are quite vibrant. I do what I can to make them bearable and the residents make them home. This place though…”

  They were at the well. She stopped and turned around, crossing her arms over her chest and looked through him. Kaie got the feeling she was caught up in some unpleasant memory. “You met my niece, Luna. She is a brilliant girl. Anything she sets her
mind to, she accomplishes with a flourish.

  “Unfortunately, last month that was stirring up trouble here in East Field. By the time I realized what she was doing, the people were rioting. Two overseers were killed before I could accept that there was no peaceful solution. Half the people – twenty-one men, twelve women and four children – were put down before the instigators surrendered. At least one person from every family. And, to ensure that things did not get out of control again, I’ve cut rations in half for East Field. No personal effects are allowed. No gatherings of any sorts. Everyone is escorted to and from their duties.

  “It is a terrible burden on everyone living here. Especially, I imagine, the new arrivals like yourself. You are being punished for things you did not even know about. But if I lift the punishment too early, I will seem weak. It will invite more disturbances. From Luna and the residents both. I must continue this punishment for another six months, I expect, before she stops paying attention.”

  “Oh.” What was he supposed to say to that? Did she expect him to apologize that she was forced to make his life so miserable?

  “My niece is a difficult girl to live with. A fact I expect you do not find hard to believe. She grows bored and then I find myself entrenched in one of her games. Losing would be disastrous for me and my household, but also for her. I’m not sure if she