“No, you didn’t.”
Katie didn’t much like being told what she did or didn’t intend on doing. She floated closer and kept a close eye on the woman before her.
“So, tell me what you wish to know.” The silver balls, like tiny snowdrops, danced in her hair.
Katie wet her lips and let the words spill out of their own accord. “I was wondering if you can see if my grandfather and his friend are still alive. If they’re dead, I’d rather know now.”
Christina arched an eyebrow. “Would you? Or would you still wonder if I was right or wrong? Don’t ask me of this, child. You wouldn’t believe what I say in either case.”
Katie couldn’t deny that. She never had much faith in what so-called mystics claimed. They so often proved to be wrong and always came up with intricate explanations as to how they were right all along.
But couldn’t that be said of everything?
There were good football players and then there were the truly great. There were the smart and then the exceptionally smart. There could be a bunch of fake mystics but wasn’t there at least the chance there could be real ones out there? And why couldn’t one of those that were genuine be the woman she was staring at right now? There was no reason, so far as she could tell.
Christina’s smile was small and curious. “But I can see your mind is at least a little ajar for such things. Very well. Sit. I shall tell you, and you shall go on to question whether or not what I said was true. Before you sit, hand me those teacups.”
Katie took the handsome cup and saucers off the shelf and handed them over. “You’re going to read my tea leaves?”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I have a long night ahead of me and I need the caffeine.”
Steam poured from the kettle’s spout and she used a tea towel to heft the heavy kettle over to the table and poured hot water into the teacups. She returned the kettle and let the cups sit to one side. She took a seat at a small table. “Sit, child.”
Katie did. The legs did not match in height and were wobbly. Or perhaps it was the flagstones beneath them that were not level.
“Give me something you have that has a strong connection to the men you miss. Something they possess but you now hold.”
“I don’t have anything that belongs to them.”
“We all carry items given to us as gifts, child. We merely forget where they came from and they become a part of us.”
Katie thought for a moment, her mind drifting from one item of clothing she carried to another. Finally, she stopped and reached into her pocket. She took the necklace out and hesitated before handing it over to the older woman.
Christina ran it over in her fingers without looking at it and held it up to her ear. “It’s very nice. An heirloom, unless I’m very much mistaken.”
“He gave it to me to keep until he got back,” Katie said. “But I guess you already knew that.”
Christina screwed up her lips. “Then it’s no good.”
She handed the necklace back.
“I was only kidding. Please try.”
“It is not the kidding that is no good. It is the necklace.”
Katie frowned at the necklace. The big green jewel sparkled beneath the soft candlelight. “What’s wrong with it? I promise it’s his.”
“It’s not his, child. It is yours. He gave it to you, to keep always. It is no longer his possession.”
“No. He said I would give it back when he returned.”
“If you believed every word every man ever told you, you wouldn’t survive a minute out in the world, and you look a great deal stronger than that to me. Smarter too.”
Katie ran her fingers over the necklace and tucked it back in her pocket. “Then there’s nothing else I can give you that belongs to either of them.”
“Yes, there is.”
Christina snapped out and took Katie by the hand. She turned her palm over and made small circular patterns with the tip of her index finger. Being touched by someone like that, especially by someone she didn’t know, sent shivers from her tips to her toes.
Maybe she was focusing on the blood she shared with her grandfather? Or because she recently spent time with them and there was still a lingering trace on her? She knew it would be some nonsense like that.
Christina shut her eyes and sat in silence for a moment. The grip on her hand remained consistent and didn’t grow hard nor soft. Not until the last moment, right before she opened her eyes, did she look Katie over and smile.
“They are alive, child,” she said. “They are alive and well.”
Katie’s breath caught in her throat and she felt the stinging onset of tears and her free hand went to her mouth. “Are you sure?”
“Oh yes, child. Quite sure. They are dirty, tired, and in need of a good meal, but they are alive and well.”
Katie grinned. She cheered the hot wad at the back of her throat. “Where are they? Are they far?”
“I… do not know. They are in a wooded place somewhere. Deep in the forest, I think. They’re wary, cautious as if they think someone, or something, is drawing near.”
“Will they be okay?”
“They’ve been okay so far. I don’t suppose it’s much to assume they won’t be okay until they get here.”
Katie’s ears pricked up. “They’ll get here?”
“The chances are good but I cannot be certain. The universe is generous sometimes and gives me crystal clear images. Other times, it is murky and stingy and it is hard to see. But they look strong and I think they will return.”
Katie didn’t think she would put much stock in what the gypsy would tell her. She hedged her beliefs against the possibility that the news would be bad, that she wouldn’t like what she had to say. The truth was, she would only believe what the woman had to say if it was good. And now that she had heard what she wanted to hear, she was willing to swallow every positive word the woman said.
Hope, she thought, could blind us all.
Katie withdrew her hand and wiped the tears from her eyes. “Thank you,” she said. “It’s comforting to hear that. Whether the words are true or not.”
“Oh, they’re true, my child. As true as anything else I see. But remember, I only interpret them. I do not create them or have any influence over them. Unlike you. It’s late and you should go to bed, child.”
Katie was still relieved. She got to her feet and felt a new bounce in her heart, a buoyancy that she hadn’t enjoyed for a long, long time. But something niggled at her, and that was usually reason enough to leave it well alone.
She stopped at the door and turned. “How did you know all that without the thing he possesses that I carry?”
Christina was bent over the oven, checking the food inside was cooking well. “Because there is something he possesses that you carry with you, always.”
Katie looked down at herself and ran through every item of clothing she could think of. Besides the necklace, there was nothing. “I give up. What is it?”
Christina turned her smile on her. “Your heart, dear.”
41
Katie shut the door behind her and pressed her back to it. She’d run up every step to get to her bedroom. She found her way a lot easier than getting to the kitchen. She shut her eyes and wished she never went downstairs in the first place.
“Katie?” Ella sat up in bed and rubbed her eyes with her palms. “Is everything okay?”
Katie breathed a sigh of relief. “Yes, little one.” She hadn’t noticed the little girl was in her bed. “Everything’s fine. What are you and Stinky doing in my bed?”
‘Stinky’ was her new nickname for Scallywag. Whenever he ate food too rich for him, it tended to evacuate his body via his bowels and then into a poisonous, noxious gas.
“I couldn’t sleep. I hope you don’t mind I came here.”
Katie smiled and shook her head. “What’s mine is yours. You know that.”
She climbed into bed with her most favourite person in the whole world. The
y snuggled up close. As they drifted to sleep, Katie realized how thankful she was that the little girl needed her just as much as she needed her in return.
They slipped into a deep sleep and didn’t wake until late morning.
42
The things Christina told her niggled Katie all day. Each time the older woman came into the dining room, she focused on the plate before her, unable to meet those deep, penetrating eyes and keep her wits about her at the same time.
The woman was somehow wrong. No, not wrong. Unnatural. Yes, that was a much better word. The witch was unnatural. She didn’t know what she was saying. She couldn’t have. She was making things up as she went along.
A bell rang.
High in the belfry. The same that chimed when Katie and the others turned up at the castle.
Someone was coming. Could it be them?
Katie ran to the window and peered outside. She saw only green lawn and the hedge that wrapped around the property. A pair of guards exchanged pleasantries as they crossed paths, each heading in a different direction.
She was facing the wrong way.
She pushed off the wall and ran down the red carpet that lined the floor like a monster’s tongue. She bolted down the hall and nearly clashed with a woman carrying fresh blankets. She yelped and hopped aside as Katie bolted down another corridor.
“Sorry!” she yelled.
She didn’t slow down.
Katie skidded to a halt. The carpet slid beneath her feet but she kept her balance. She darted to another window, this one facing the right direction. She panted as she looked upon those being welcomed to the castle by the tolling bell.
A group of newcomers. None she recognized.
They were not grandfather and Aaron but a bunch of wanderers. They smiled uncertainly as they were welcomed with warm hugs from Geronimo and his wife.
The excitement in her chest stalled and she suddenly felt empty. Was Christina right with her prediction? Or was she only trying to give a girl hope when there was none to be had?
She pushed off the wall and meandered down the hall.
43
The only quiet AREA Katie could find in the whole stinking place was the wall facing the back entrance. It was also as far from the main entrance as she could get, which was a bonus. The house was constantly alive with maids and cleaners and soldiers and–
Urgh!
Every time Katie turned around that woman was there.
Christina.
She tugged a handful of grass out by the root and threw it with aggression. The blades fluttered to the ground.
Katie pretended it was the old woman she was trying to avoid, but really it was something else.
Thoughts of Aaron.
She knew she liked him but did she think she might love him? Love was something that belonged in fairy tales and boring stories parents told their kids.
She shook her head and plucked the head off a snowdrop. Love wasn’t meant to be something you pursued while you were struggling to survive in a world stripped of power. Love was something people did when they were happy and everything was steady.
Why did it bother her so much?
“Room for one more?”
The figure standing over her blocked the sunlight. She couldn’t see his face, but she didn’t need to. His voice was identification enough.
“Go nuts,” Katie said.
Geronimo took a seat beside her, groaning as if it was the most painful thing he’d ever done. He pressed his back against the wall and bent his legs so his knees pointed at the sky.
“You know what they say about people plucking petals off flowers?” he said.
“What do they say about plucking heads off flowers?”
Geronimo angled for a better view and saw that she was right. He frowned. “Tell me, what does it mean?”
“It doesn’t mean anything. Just like plucking petals off flowers doesn’t mean anything either.” Katie tossed the headless stems into a pile. “Maybe nothing means anything. Maybe we’re all here, floating around and no one knows a single thing.” She pressed her mouth to her forearm and braced her knees.
“What a terrible world that would be. Don’t you prefer it if the things we do had some meaningful impact on our lives and others around us?”
“No.” Katie heard her own voice. It sounded like a petulant kid, a whiny voice that Ella never assumed. She sighed. “I’m sorry. I just… don’t know what I’m doing with myself here.”
“You should find something to do. Something to keep your mind and body busy. It’s easy to go crazy when you have nothing to do but think. Thinking is not a good thing.”
“Thanks for the suggestion but I doubt we’ll be here for much longer.”
“You may be right, and you may not. Your friends have already begun keeping themselves active and getting involved with the community. Perhaps you would benefit from doing so too.”
Katie was surprised to learn that. She hadn’t seen the others much since she arrived at this place. “What are they doing?”
“The twins have taken to the axe, hurling it and splitting the wood unlike any human being I’ve seen before. And the little girl, Ella, she begins school this very day.”
“She did?”
Ella had never struck Katie as particularly sociable before but then, she never had many children her own age to play with before either.
“What about Scallywag?” she said. There was no way Ella would leave the dog behind, unprotected.
“He’s a little afraid of the other dogs. He is a house dog, the others hunters. He will not fit in well with them. So, he goes to school with your Ella.”
Katie chuckled at the thought of the two of them in school together. She’d be the most popular kid in school – after Scallywag, of course.
“What about my brother?” she said. “And Hannah and Jodie?”
“Camden is with them at all times. He takes care of the girl, this Hannah? While she takes care of Jodie. Something bad happened to Jodie, Geronimo thinks, for it to have such an effect on her. Nurse Hollis says physically, she’s fine. But maybe she has always been like this?”
“No,” Katie said. “It happened to her recently.”
“Geronimo is sorry to hear this.” He genuinely did look sorry too. It made Katie a little angry.
“Why are you sorry? You didn’t know her. She’s nothing to you.”
“All God’s creatures are something to Geronimo. They ought to be something to us all.”
Katie swore she would never understand the way this man thought. He was too light, too happy, too pure. He could not survive if he was always this way. And yet, look at the community he had managed to build. It was far greater than anything she’d seen so far.
Once more, her thoughts drifted to Aaron and her grandfather. She blocked the emotions that attempted to burst through her defences at the thought of the younger man.
“Have you heard anything?” she said.
Geronimo shook his head sadly. “Not yet.”
“You expect they’ll make it through?”
“It’s foolish to make predictions about such things. Geronimo is a man who has earned a great deal betting on the winning side, but even he would not make a bet on something as serious as this.”
Katie lowered her head.
“Geronimo is sorry. He is too honest for his own good sometimes. My wife, she tells me this. You were looking for something to bolster your spirits, and instead, Geronimo has given you nothing but strife.”
“It’s all right. It’s better to hear the truth that to hear lies.”
“But it is not truth. It is only opinion. What do I know? Half the advice Geronimo gave to his subscribers is good, the other half, not so good. He does his best but the real trick is knowing which half is good, which half bad. That takes skill, and it takes a great deal of luck. But if Geronimo were forced to make a bet, it would be that your grandfather and his friend are okay.”
After his earlier admissi
on on the odds, Katie couldn’t say she put much stock in Geronimo’s sudden change of heart.
Geronimo read her expression. “You think Geronimo gives you false confidence? He does not. A man like your grandfather does not go down easily, even when he really ought to. He’s just about the bravest man I’ve ever met.”
Katie shook her head. Another man to tell her how little she knew about her own grandfather.
“There wasn’t a man alive who didn’t know of your grandfather’s bravery. It’s the kind of thing they taught you at the academy back in the day. Symbols and ideas of what it means to be a member of the military.”
Now that was a surprise to her. “You were in the same unit?”
Geronimo nodded. “He was our captain. So you see, child, your grandfather is not a man to be crossed lightly. Not on the battlefield. Not on the street. Not anywhere.”
Geronimo nodded to the blades of grass Katie weaved absentmindedly. “You did a fine job with that. We’re always on the lookout for fine weavers.”
44
Katie interweaved the three strands of wicker to their very tips. The activity kept her fingers busy but did nothing to stop her mind from wandering to the same old subjects.
The woman in charge of making the wicker baskets took the long strand from her and handed it to someone in charge of turning them into full baskets.
“You’re doing a great job there, Katie,” the woman said with a kindly smile. “If you want, I can show you some other weaves so you can make a whole basket by yourself.”
Katie smiled but didn’t answer. Under different circumstances, she might have taken her up on the offer and enjoyed learning something new but it just wasn’t in her. The community had a training program where they moved each person from one section to another to see if she had any particular talent. It was largely a waste of time because the moment Aaron and Bill returned, she would leave.
Bong. Bong. Bong.
The bell tolled, and this time, she didn’t run to see who arrived. Over the past two days, she allowed herself to grow overexcited and always met with disappointment. She was beginning to think their two remaining members were lost to them.
Cut Off (Book 2): Cut Throat Page 14
