The Omen of Stones

by Casey L. Bond

  “Go…to river,” she managed to say.

  “You want me to find you there?”

  She gave a nod before vanishing, the darkness enveloping her once again.

  Illana wanted me to find her bones and hold one in my hand, to learn of her death the best way I could. Omen’s mother wanted me to know what it was like for her to die. There was only one way to do that. For the first time I could remember, I wanted to clamp onto a bone and let it bleed its story.

  “River?” Omen’s voice shook. She sounded far away, muffled. “Come back to us, please.”

  I blinked a few times and color slowly re-saturated the world. Omen hovered over me, her fuchsia lips trembling.

  I slowly sat up from where I’d slumped into the corner of the couch. “I’m fine, Omen.”

  Her eyes raked over me, as if trying to reassure herself that what I said was true. I wondered what she saw. Was I as pale as she’d been when Sky opened her door?

  “You found her, didn’t you? I could tell the moment you reached her, but I was worried you had gone too far.”

  I gently took her hand. “I wouldn’t go too far. Not with you waiting for me here.”

  Omen’s lips parted.

  Sky cleared her throat. “So…did you learn anything?”

  “She wants me to see her death.”

  “You mean feel it,” Omen amended.

  I nodded. “She wants me to experience it for myself. I have to read her bones.”

  Lyric looked distraught. How are you going to do that? she wrote.

  Omen answered, “We think we know where she’s buried. She led us there before she told River to go to North Village, then to West. It’s near a river that’s been flooded for days. Hopefully, the water has receded.” She looked at me apologetically. “We have to know. If there was any other way, River…”

  “I want to help you,” I promised.

  This moment. This witch and her daughters – this was why Fate made me a spirit tongue. As many bones as I’d read, I knew my own by heart, and they were screaming that helping these women was my purpose. My fortune and fate. My destiny. I’d never been more at peace with my abilities or felt more grateful for what I was.

  As early dawn’s pink hue shone through the sheer curtains covering Lyric’s window, painting the floor, the walls, and the four of us in its rosy shade, we made our plan. Sky and Lyric agreed to slip into East Village with us where Omen would speak to Lindey before we made our way to the river, hopefully unseen. Though they’d each received the shock of their lives on this night, they banded together and I with them.

  We were all Fate-Kissed.

  We knew what magic he’d gifted each of us, but I couldn’t help but wonder what price we would pay for it. Mom said there was always something that had to be relinquished in order to receive Fate’s blessing. I couldn’t help but feel she was right, and that Fate would demand repayment soon.

  Sable

  The wards around the town suddenly weakened and we entered the wood at night, walking until we came upon a sleepy town full of farmland and modest houses clustered together in the middle of town. While stars sparkled overhead, I drew on the energy from the moon, bright and full. I called to Fate and begged him for help. For him to keep River safe until we could find him. For him to lead us to our son.

  Arron, Tauren, and I spread out and checked every barn stall, and as the townspeople slept, we slipped into their homes. In every room, in every shed and every nook and cranny, even the cellars, there was no trace of River anywhere. His scent was nowhere. River wasn’t here. My heart plummeted. I had such hope that someone here had been holding him, but the witch who made the wards wasn’t in the town. I would’ve been able to sense her.

  “I found the witch’s house,” Tauren revealed, the black silken hand-fasting ribbon shining on his wrist as he raked his hand through his hair.

  “You could’ve been killed!” Arron whispered angrily. “You should’ve come and gotten one of us.”

  “For one, she could detect your magic in an instant. For another, I’m not helpless, Son of Night,” Tauren fumed. “And I’ve told you both before – I will find my son. If it means turning over every rock or climbing every mountain in The Wilds, I’ll find him.” A muscle ticked in his jaw. Tauren’s smooth, reassuring façade was cracking more every moment River was missing.

  Arron apologized. “I was concerned for your safety, but you’re right. You aren’t helpless. And you can do things that Sable and I cannot.”

  “Was the house empty?” I asked, trying to refocus their energy. We couldn’t lose that if we wanted to find our son.

  “No one else was inside.”

  Tauren had wandered into a powerful witch’s house, only to find the witch not at home. It couldn’t have been the woman sleeping in the back room. If anyone trespassed in a witch’s space, she would know it. Like an alarm, her magic would wake her.

  Arron stared at the mountains looming over us.

  “What is it?” I asked, squinting to see as he did. With his serpentine eyes, he always seemed to see more.

  “There’s magic nearby – different from the wards around this town. And there are slivers of smoke rising from the mountain.”

  “Could be fog,” Tauren suggested.

  “It doesn’t behave as fog. Watch it.”

  It was nearly imperceptible, but as we watched, small plumes became visible. At night, if you wanted to see stars, the trick was to avoid focusing on them. This smoky area, so high on the mountain, was no different.

  A blood-red dawn seeped across the sky, filling me with fear.

  Fate? Is this your warning? Please, lead me to him. Don’t let anything hurt him.

  Tauren ignored the omen and focused on the smoke, barely visible in the blossoming daylight. “Let’s check there,” he suggested.

  I wondered who would’ve taken River so far up into the mountains, but couldn’t fathom who would be brave or foolish enough to kidnap our son in the first place. If there was an encampment or town on the mountain, we’d be remiss in skipping over it. Like Tauren said, we needed to turn over every rock. According to dawn’s sleepy arrival, we needed to hurry.

  Spiriting to the spot where we saw the smoke rising, we found more wards; not constructed with stone, but fashioned of a thick mist that swallowed us and erased our view of the rising smoke. The magic was strong, but not as strong as the warded trees surrounding the town below. The warded fog gave us pause but didn’t stop us.

  Arron had his own dark clouds that he could call forth when he pleased. The fog, though dense, wasn’t difficult for him to see through. Tauren and I had more difficulty. We trudged after Arron toward an area where more smoke mingled as it rose from a nook in the mountain. The houses spewing the acrid slivers had been obscured by the mist the morning sunlight was beginning to burn away.

  A question tore at my insides. Is a witch responsible for luring my son away? Is that why we are hitting ward after ward? Or is there more than one witch?

  Layers of magic tangled together here, unlike any I’d never felt. Magic like none I’d ever seen.

  Our son was a spirit tongue, a rare power cautiously named in an ancient tome, a power warned against but never described. What other witches lay outside our history and knowledge beyond the Kingdom’s boundary?

  Along the trail we met a wizened shepherd, whose skin was dark from the sun and cracked with age, walking the paths with his flock. He was kind enough to tell us where we were. “This is North Village,” he provided warily. “No one ever stumbles upon this place, and we usually notice anyone coming. Where are you from, and what are the three of you doing here?”

  “We’re from Nautilus and we are looking for our son. He’s gone missing,” Tauren explained.

  The man pursed his lips and scratched the ring of hair sticking out from the base of his
hat. “Haven’t noticed any newcomers lately. But your son, even if he wandered his whole life, wouldn’t have found North Village. Best you check East and West Village at the mountain’s base, instead. If anyone was lost, they’d find those places, not this one,” he supplied. “This is harsh country.”

  We thanked the shepherd for his suggestion, but as soon as he walked out of sight, Tauren was the first to say, “We should check North anyway, since we’re already here.”

  Arron nodded and, in a blink, spirited up the mountain. I clasped Tauren’s hand and followed. Dawn was waking the small town and the people were startled to see strangers. The blacksmith left his forge and approached. “Can I help you?” His tone was brusque as he straightened to his full height.

  “We’re looking for our son who has gone missing,” Tauren explained.

  “You’re the first outsiders to enter North Village for at least a year.”

  “A witch lives here,” Arron began. “Where is her home?”

  The blacksmith’s thick dark brows furrowed. He was so solid, it looked like the mountain itself had sired him. “Why are you looking for her?”

  Was he defending her?

  “We were hoping she might help us with a location spell,” I told him, giving a hopeful smile. “Please, I need to find my son.”

  The mountain of a man softened. “A mother’s love would move mountains if it had to, I suppose.”

  I nodded, tears clogging my throat. “Yes, it would.”

  He pointed to a small cabin surrounded by a dozen others. “She lives in the middle of us.”

  “Thank you,” I replied, taking off in the direction of the witch’s cabin. I knocked several times, waking some of her neighbors in the process, but she never answered. I whispered a spell and the locked door opened. Pushing it aside, we stepped into the cozy cabin where a fire still roared in the hearth. Rocking chairs were situated around the fire and a quaint kitchen was visible past the living area. It wasn’t unlike the cabin I grew up in, truthfully. She’d made efficient use of the space, tacking her pans and utensils to the wall.

  “Hello!” I called out. But no one responded.

  Arron strode past me and checked a small back bedroom. “It’s empty.”

  My heart sank. Where was she?

  Tauren put his arm around my shoulders and tugged me against his side. “The blacksmith was being truthful. No one new has been here, Sable. I’m glad we checked, though. Just in case.”

  I nodded.

  Arron suggested we spirit to the mountain’s base again. We’d checked two villages, but according to the shepherd, there was another. I whispered to Fate again for help. “Help us find him. Please.”

  Appearing at the base of the mountain from where we’d left, I could feel the stones in the trees pulsing as we drew near the base. The wards would not allow us back inside them again. They repelled us, pushing us away.

  I looked at Arron, just about to ask him what he felt about the re-strengthened ward magic when he pointed to the sky.

  “What do you make of that?” Arron asked. It was clear, save for a wispy, barely visible, white cloud swirling directly overhead. A distant song was carried on the wind that ruffled our cloaks and hair.

  “I have no idea,” I answered.

  Tauren studied the sky. “Something happened while we were on the mountain in North Village. I know we’ve already looked in East Village, but I think we should go back into this town and check again before we head to West.” He shook his head, pinching his lips together tight. “I know it’s crazy, but my gut tells me he’s in there. Maybe the witch knows we’re closing in and is moving him around.”

  Tauren could go through her wards, but I couldn’t. I wasn’t sure if it was Fate guiding me from afar and keeping me from danger, or something else. A spell, perhaps. The witch who conjured the wards had raised them again. I wasn’t sure why she’d lowered them or if she’d left and returned home, but she was inside the magic. It swirled around this place, just like the cloud above us. Maybe that was her doing, too.

  The acrid tang of magic stung the back of my throat. The longer I stood near the ward stones, the hotter the soles of my feet became, until it felt like I was walking on embers.

  “I can’t go back in there,” I exhaled.

  “Neither can I,” Arron agreed. He shifted his weight. Did his feet burn, too?

  The more I burned, the more I wanted inside those wards.

  Tauren wasn’t on fire. As a human, he could walk in, but I didn’t want him to go alone. He was my everything. Our King. And if something happened to him in that village, if I couldn’t bring myself to go with him, I would never forgive myself.

  “I don’t want you to go without us,” I told him.

  “If our son is in there, I will find him,” he vowed.

  Arron spoke up. “Maybe the wards act as a lock?”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “We walked around the village and entered from the other side before. What if we have to do the same thing to release the ward magic?”

  Tauren wanted to storm inside and scour the village; I could see it in his face. “I can enter this way, and the two of you can approach from the other side. We can meet near the large house in the center of town.”

  I shook my head. “What if it won’t let us in? Then we’re in the same situation. Being separated is a bad idea. We could lose one another as well.”

  Suddenly, Mira and Brecan appeared with Knox in tow. Knox, Tauren’s brother and leader of the Guard was panting. “There’s a situation,” he puffed out. He looked at Tauren. “I need you.”

  “Can’t it wait?” Tauren growled.

  “I wouldn’t have come here if it could,” Knox assured him.

  Mira vowed to take them back to Nautilus. Her eyes roiled agitatedly.

  “What is it? What’s happening?” I asked. But they disappeared before she or Knox could answer.

  Brecan pinched his lips before answering. “A group in Twelve attacked a witch who was trying to purchase some fabric from one of their stores. Every witch in The Gallows is preparing to retaliate against the attackers and teach a lesson to anyone who might think to do such a thing again.”

  I knew it would come to this. I should have quenched the fire when it was first kindled.

  “Stop,” he said. “I know what you’re thinking, Sable, but you aren’t responsible for the actions of anyone but yourself.”

  “What did Knox do?” I asked Brecan.

  “He hunted down those who were involved, and now he’s holding them for Tauren to decide their punishment.”

  The tables had turned. I used to obey Fate. I took lives for him. Changed lives for him.

  Now, Tauren had to make a decision that would tip the scales irrevocably one way or the other. Too far, and the delicate balance we’d somehow managed to cling to would disintegrate like moth-eaten fabric.

  I knew what I would choose, but wasn’t sure what he would. Tauren was good and fair. He loved every citizen of Nautilus, but he had been too lenient and unwaveringly merciful for far too long. He needed to show the Purists his teeth. He needed to show them that if his word was not heeded, he would shred them.

  “Whoever made those is incredibly powerful,” Brecan marveled, staring at the stone wards hanging in the crooks of the trees. “Do you know who it is?”

  I shook my head. “Can you penetrate them?”

  Brecan was Priest of the House of Air, able to command wind and air like no other witch alive. He sent a powerful gust, but the stones did not fall from their twine. He tried harder, sending them horizontal, but they did not break. Their power did not falter.

  Brecan stared at the spot between the trunk and branch where the ward stones swung in his turbulence. “I have a book about ward magic. Let me consult it.”

  Before I could ask
any more questions, he disappeared.

  Exasperated, I thought about conjuring a spell to prevent people from doing that when I still had questions to ask them.

  20

  Omen

  We spirited as close to the outskirts of East Village as my wards would allow. Dawn had erupted in a brilliant red sky, a harbinger of a terrible storm, according to Sky. My sisters were shocked that I hadn’t learned to spirit myself anywhere, though Sky called it breezing and Lyric called it travelling. The only way I could travel was on foot, which caused them both to groan when I revealed it to them.

  We walked to the tree line where Sky stopped, her stormy eyes searching for stones on the ground. Surprise flitted over her expression when she found them in the trees.

  Lyric printed a challenge. You broke through our wards, Omen. Let’s see if I can break yours.

  Lyric made a strange humming noise. The stones hanging in the trees trembled from her tone, but they did not fall or break.

  “Why don’t you speak?” Sky blurted, watching Lyric for her response.

  She pressed her lips together and erased her slate, writing, My magic lies in my voice. I was forbidden to use it, except to protect the village with ward magic.

  “The Founder told you not to speak?”

  She nodded and wrote, He forbade it, lest I use my voice against anyone.

  “Have you ever done that?” Sky asked.

  Lyric’s eyes darkened. She looked angry that Sky had asked. Her question clearly struck a nerve.

  “Lyric,” I said gently. “We are also witches. Your magic, your voice, won’t bother us. You can use it around us if you’d like. If you’re comfortable doing so,” I added.

  Lyric lowered her slate and tucked her chalk into the pocket of her dress. She cleared her throat. “I can’t penetrate them,” Lyric announced, “and I can’t get any closer.”

  Her tone was hypnotic. Beautiful was too small a word.

  Lyric looked at Sky for help. “You try to break through,” she dared.

  Sky accepted the challenge and held her palm out, blowing a gust directly at one of the ward wreaths. They barely teetered, despite the fact that the rest of the tree’s limbs blew sideways, fresh leaves tearing away. It was like her wind was prevented from reaching them. She put her hand down and the gust stopped.