Witchsign

by Den Patrick

  ‘I was just surprised to see Kristofine is all,’ he replied and looked away.

  ‘How are you, Kjell?’ asked Kristofine. ‘Been to Håkon’s? Make sure you wash that meat. You never know where his hands have been.’

  Steiner pulled a face. ‘I think I’ve just lost my appetite. Possibly for the whole week.’

  ‘The man is a pig,’ said Kjellrunn, ‘A dirty great pig. Imagine a pig running a butcher’s, how absurd.’

  Steiner and Kristofine frowned at her observation, but the stranger smiled and held out her hand.

  ‘I’m Romola. I like the way your mind works. Like a poet or a madman.’

  ‘Uh, thanks,’ replied Kjellrunn. ‘I’m not sure I’m so keen on being mad.’

  Romola pouted. ‘In a world this strange, madness seems like a good option, right?’

  Kjellrunn wasn’t sure what the woman meant, but drank in every detail of her. ‘Are you a pirate?’ she asked.

  ‘Kjell!’ Steiner stared at his sister and glanced at Romola. ‘Forgive my sister, she, uh, well …’

  ‘Some days,’ replied Romola.

  ‘Some days what?’ said Steiner.

  ‘Some days I’m a pirate.’ Romola turned a smile on Kristofine. ‘But not today and not recently.’

  I was right, mouthed Kjellrunn to Steiner, and smiled.

  Steiner began to laugh and stifled it with a cough behind his hand.

  ‘Why don’t you two come to the tavern,’ said Kristofine. ‘I was going to show Romola around and we could have something to eat.’

  Kjellrunn caught the way Kristofine looked her brother and felt some unknown feeling course through her, swirling dangerously.

  ‘I should get back,’ said Kjellrunn. ‘Father will be waiting.’ These last words were pointed at Steiner, but he was too busy smiling at Kristofine to notice.

  ‘It was nice to meet you,’ said Romola. ‘You take care of yourself now.’

  Kjellrunn nodded and stalked away, angry with Kristofine but unsure why.

  ‘Tell Father I’ll be home in a while,’ Steiner called after her, but Kjellrunn pretended not to hear and bowed her head.

  ‘Not sure I care for a half-wit brother who abandons me halfway through a trip to town,’ she muttered to herself. ‘And I’m not sure I care for being called mad by an ex-pirate.’ A passerby on the street glanced at her and crossed to the other side. ‘And I certainly don’t care for the way Kristofine stares at my brother. What is going on between those two?’

  Steiner didn’t reappear for the rest of the afternoon and if Marek minded he didn’t show it. Kjellrunn stayed up after dinner and fussed with this and that in the kitchen. Finally the latch rattled on the kitchen door and Steiner shouldered his way into the room, a little unsteady on his feet.

  ‘Did you see a ghost on the walk home?’ Kjellrunn was sitting at the table in her nightshirt, hands clasped around a mug of hot milk.

  ‘Not a ghost, but it turns out Romola is a storyweaver as a well as a pirate. She told a story that was unsettling.’

  ‘Which story?’

  ‘Bittervinge and the Mama Qara.’

  ‘That’s not a scary story. Not really.’

  ‘It depends who’s telling it, I suppose,’ said Steiner quietly.

  ‘What else did she say?’ Kjellrunn’s eyes were bright with curiosity.

  ‘No stories, only that Imperial soldiers are in town, and there’ll be an Invigilation tomorrow.’

  Kjellrunn sat up straighter in her chair, then set her eyes on her mug.

  ‘I hate it,’ was all she said.

  ‘So did I,’ replied Steiner.

  She remembered being inspected by the Synod, how her palms had sweated and her stomach knotted like old rope, wondering if she would be taken away for bearing the taint of dragons.

  ‘But this is the last time you have to do it,’ said Steiner. ‘You’ll be fine, Kjell.’

  She struggled not to tremble and said nothing.

  ‘There’s been no witchsign in Cinderfell for twenty years,’ said Steiner. ‘And you’ve always passed without a problem before. This year won’t be any different.’

  ‘I hope you’re right,’ she said, her mouth a bitter curve of worry.

  ‘Kjell, is there anything, any reason … Do you doubt you’ll pass this year? If there’s anything you wanted to tell me …’

  ‘Of course not!’ She stood up and marched past him, climbing the stairs without a backward glance.

  ‘Good night then,’ he called after her, but there was little good about it.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Steiner

  Though many Imperial scholars argue there is no proof linking the emergence of the arcane with our former draconic masters, the Holy Synod takes it as a matter of faith. Ours is a double poisoning; ash and smoke have tainted the sky just as young children manifest unearthly powers. How else to explain the unexplainable?

  – From the field notes of Hierarch Khigir, Vigilant of the Imperial Synod.

  Steiner looked up into the skies from the porch and watched the grey snow drifting down, obscuring roof and road. It lay along lintels and windowsills, a hushed drabness for the gloomy town. The chill wind, so often a feature in Cinderfell, was absent that day.

  ‘The snow will cover everything if it keeps up like this,’ whispered Kjellrunn, joining him in the porch, a shawl wrapped about her shoulders. Her breath misted on the air and for a moment Steiner’s mind wandered to Romola’s tale of dragons from the previous night. ‘Perhaps the Vigilants will forget we’re here,’ added Kjellrunn.

  ‘Small chance of that.’ Steiner forced a smile at his sister. ‘Still, they might catch a cold and go home.’ He knew exactly how she felt; he had stood for six Invigilations and was glad he’d not have to do so again. Each time he’d wondered if some glimmer of the arcane would see him taken by the Synod.

  ‘Last night, you said you hoped you’d pass the Invigilation. You haven’t …’ Steiner struggled for the words.

  ‘Started casting spells that summon the winds and make people burst into flames?’ said Kjellrunn.

  ‘I think I would have noticed that,’ replied Steiner with a smile, but Kjellrunn didn’t return it, looking away to the falling snow. ‘You and Father are all I have. I don’t know what I’d do if they took you, Kjell. I don’t know what Father would do.’

  ‘No one is going take me,’ replied Kjell, but Steiner couldn’t miss the way she looked off to the horizon as she said it, not meeting his eyes.

  ‘You’ll walk your sister to school today?’ said Marek from the kitchen, as if Steiner would refuse.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘And wait until she can come home.’ Steiner couldn’t miss the guarded tone in his father’s voice. There would be no lessons today. There would be no teachers. It was impossible to spare a thought for anything else at times like these.

  ‘We’d best get to it,’ said Steiner, slipping an arm around Kjellrunn’s shoulders.

  ‘Wait now.’ Their father’s voice was soft, softer than the snow falling outside. Marek pulled a brooch from a pocket. He took a step towards Kjellrunn with a sad smile on his lips. ‘This was your mother’s. You should have it.’

  Kjellrunn blinked, then her expression fell as she saw the brooch, styled in the shape of a sledgehammer. It had been cast in black iron; hardly the jewellery a young woman yearned for.

  ‘Wear it today.’ Marek pulled open her shawl and reached for the tunic beneath, pinning the brooch in place. ‘If you get scared at the Invigilation, remember your mother.’

  ‘But … but I don’t remember my mother,’ said Kjellrunn in a whisper. ‘I don’t remember her at all.’ The pain of that absence was written across her slender face in that moment, as tears blossomed at the corners of her eyes. Steiner did not share her pain, only nursed a resentment that the woman who’d birthed him had fled to gods knew where.

  ‘She loved you,’ said their father. ‘Be brave.’ Marek waved them off and closed t
he door, leaving Kjellrunn and Steiner with the long walk ahead, surrounded by drifting grey motes of snow.

  ‘Do you have one?’ asked Kjellrunn, when they were a few streets away. Steiner was glad of the question, for the distraction. Anything was preferable to the endless din of anxiety in his mind, like a smithy consumed with work.

  ‘No,’ he replied, glancing at the hammer brooch. ‘But I’d rather have the real thing anyway. I couldn’t do much in the smithy with a hammer that small.’ He nudged her with an elbow and was rewarded with a smile which faded as they drew closer to the bay. The menace of the red ship was not lessened by the cheerless weather. Three soldiers idled on the pier, waiting for a smaller boat that ferried indistinct figures across the water.

  ‘That’s the ship.’ Kjellrunn’s voice was a whisper. ‘That’s the ship that will take all those poor children away for cleansing.’

  Every year the Synod arrived in Cinderfell with around two score of children, gathered up from across Vinterkveld. Every year those children were piled on a ship and never seen again. Cinderfell was the last stop on their unholy tour of the continent.

  ‘Perhaps they take them to Khlystburg?’ said Kjellrunn. It was an age-old pastime, wondering where the ships took children tainted with witchsign.

  ‘Khlystburg.’ Capital of the Solmindre Empire and final destination of dissenters and traitors. ‘No, they’re not taken to Khlystburg,’ said Steiner.

  ‘Then where?’ She eyed him and frowned. ‘Do you know?’

  Steiner’s eyes strayed to the sea even as his thoughts turned to Vladibogdan, the mysterious island Verner had mentioned. The waters were a flat green expanse that swallowed each snowflake and Steiner reached for Kjellrunn’s hand and held it tight. Together they watched parents walking their children to the Invigilation with heavy hearts. The chill in their bones had nothing to do with the weather.

  ‘I wish Mother was here,’ said Kjellrunn, her grip tightening on his hand as the words slipped free. ‘I’d like to see her just once in my life.’

  ‘Your life isn’t over, Kjell. They’ll not take you today. Look them in the eye when they come close, don’t let them see you’re afraid.’

  ‘That’s easier said than done,’ grumbled Kjell.

  ‘Don’t look down at your boots, it makes them think you have something to hide. And don’t sing, even to comfort yourself. Don’t breathe a word about the old gods either.’

  ‘Goddesses. And I’m not a fool. You really think I’d bring up Frøya and Frejna on a day like this?’

  Steiner didn’t answer, but watched Kjellrunn’s expression darken.

  ‘Of course not,’ he replied after they’d trudged on a dozen feet. ‘I’m just worried is all. There’s been no witchsign in Cinderfell for decades and I don’t want that to change today.’

  ‘Nor will it,’ said Kjellrunn, her hand straying to the hammer brooch Marek had given her.

  Steiner considered another truth, one the fishermen spoke of when they were in dark moods and well into their cups. Was it possible that the Vigilants had darker motives for taking the children away? Kjellrunn marched beside him, all tangled hair, built like a sparrow with a watchful cast to her eye. She was more urchin than woman, and Steiner hoped it would provide some measure of protection.

  Kjellrunn scowled over her shoulder at the blood-red ship. The clouds overhead had darkened and a cold breeze carried the scent of fresh snow. ‘What if I refused to go? I doubt the Vigilant will notice the absence of one child. We could go home right now.’

  They’d played this game before, two children teasing at ‘what if’ and ‘if only’. The outcome was always the same: bleak as the Cinderfell weather.

  ‘It’s their job to notice,’ replied Steiner. ‘They’re called Vigilants and they have the school register. If you don’t attend then they’ll come to the house for you.’

  ‘I’ll hide in the woods all day,’ she replied, daring to look pleased with herself.

  ‘And then they’ll search the whole town and the soldiers won’t be gentle or shy about letting people know how much they dislike being defied.’

  ‘I won’t go!’ She stopped walking and folded her arms, a scowl on her face. All traces of the Kjellrunn fascinated by Spriggani and rusalka had disappeared, only a stony-eyed blonde girl remained. Steiner looked down the slope to where the track met the coastal road. The three soldiers he’d seen on the pier were headed for the school, coming closer with every heartbeat.

  ‘Come on,’ he whispered, but Kjellrunn shook her head. ‘Come on, Kjell. I never wanted to go either but …’

  ‘Maybe our mother didn’t leave at all,’ hissed Kjellrunn. ‘Maybe she was taken, taken by the same soldiers who are here today.’

  ‘Kjell, you’re just telling stories now. Come on, please.’ The soldiers were coming closer, less than a stone’s throw from where they argued.

  ‘You’d hand me over to the same Empire that took our mother?’

  ‘Kjell, you don’t know that’s true, Father never mentioned anything like this—’

  ‘He’s barely mentioned her at all.’ Kjellrunn turned and walked into the chest of the nearest soldier with a grunt. They were all taller than her by a head and a half at least, mail gleaming in the gaps between their black enamelled armour. Their matching helms bore the red star of the Solmindre Empire while the narrow eye slots revealed nothing of the men inside. The same red star was embossed on each arm and heavy maces hung from loops at their leather belts. Their cloaks, boots and gloves were as black as tar. Steiner held his breath; he’d seen soldiers before but never this close.

  ‘You’d best be moving on,’ said the nearest soldier in heavily accented Nordspråk. ‘You wouldn’t want to be late now, would you?’

  Steiner watched as Kjell’s anger was eclipsed by the sheer size of the three men. Her head bowed, shoulders slumped with resignation.

  ‘N-no,’ was all she managed.

  Cinderfell’s only school had started as a lone classroom, a log cabin with a stone chimney and a thatched roof that had gone green with moss. Some said the chimney had stood since before the uprising against the dragons. Other classrooms had been added, and one had famously burned down, though not from dragon fire despite many a tall tale. The cabins were arranged around two wide squares, rebuilt in stone as the decades passed. New storeys had been added, a bell tower and then a cloister. Columns supported covered walkways inside each square, keeping the students dry from grimy rain during the wet months and free from the dirty snow during the cold ones. A fine layer of soot settled on everything during summer, adding to the misery. The lawns of the school were kept neat and a lone spruce pointed towards the overcast skies.

  The children filed into the square, swapping fearful gazes as if eye contact alone might save them. Row by row they formed an anxious mass, boots crunching in the gritty slush. Steiner took up a spot by the archway, reluctant to head into the school. The snow had stopped but an unrelenting chill persisted.

  ‘Steiner, I’m scared,’ said Kjellrunn in a harsh whisper.

  He nodded. ‘Everyone is,’ he said softly. ‘Go and stand with the others. It will be over quick enough.’

  Kjellrunn picked her way through the rows and found a space to stand with her classmates. None spoke to her, none offered so much as a look. She was a strangeling among the townsfolk, a curious girl with a head full of old gods and things that were no longer fashionable to speak of in Nordvlast. Soon all talk of Frøya and Frejna would be forbidden, just as it was in the Empire, and in Drakefjord, so it was said.

  The soldiers entered first, their spiked maces clasped in gloved fists. The armoured men took up positions at each corner of the cloister, figures of deeper darkness on an overcast day. Steiner felt a terrible dread settle upon him, a compulsion to look over his shoulder. Not one but two members of the Synod approached. They wore padded cream jackets that reached their knees with long sleeveless leather coats over the top. The leather was embossed with the geometric
designs of the Holy Synod and dyed the colour of dried blood. Only their masks were different. The first wore a mask of polished silver with a gentle smile whereas the second had opted for an almost featureless mask, save for the frowning brow above the eye holes. Crafted from pitted bronze, the mask made the Vigilant appear like some ancient horror. The first announced himself in a voice so loud that several children flinched.

  ‘I am Hierarch Shirinov of the Holy Synod of the Solmindre Empire, and my colleague is Hierarch Khigir.’ The heavy Solska accent made each word more severe. Shirinov had the stoop of an old man and his steps were aided by a stout walking stick, yet his frailty did not extend to his voice.

  ‘Fear not, children of Cinderfell,’ said Khigir, in a deep and mournful tone. ‘The pitiful Scorched Republics only produce witchsign but rarely.’

  Steiner frowned. Vigilants operated in groups of three, known as Troika, when they were about the Emperor’s business. That two Vigilants should visit Cinderfell was most unusual and Steiner feared some deeper problem.

  ‘Know that I will spirit away the unclean souls bearing the taint of witchsign,’ said Shirinov. ‘Think of me not as a persecutor, but a cure for the sickness of draconic sorcery.’ The Vigilant stopped before Kjellrunn, the smiling silver mask so close their noses almost touched.

  ‘And what is your name, girl?’

  ‘Kjellrunn Vartiainen,’ she replied. Steiner’s hands became slick with sweat. Surely it could be no accident that the Hierarch had gone straight to her? Wouldn’t a brother know if his own sister had been corrupted by the taint of dragons? Rumours spoke of bodies rebelling against the strangeness: discolouring, twisting, wasting away, yet Kjellrunn remained whole. Other tales mentioned strange dreams, or being able to able to pluck thoughts from people’s minds. Nothing of the sort had befallen Kjellrunn, and yet in that moment Steiner was sure she would be shipped away to Vladibogdan, never to be seen again. Steiner promised himself he’d be a better brother if Hierarch Shirinov turned away, promised himself he’d look after his sister until the end of days if she walked free from the Invigilation.