by Jordan Rivet
Esteban edged over to the pair, tugging his scrawny mare behind him. “Would you like me to accompany you in case this is a mage’s work?” The offer sounded reluctant but genuine.
“We’ve already passed the point where it’s safe to use your powers,” Archer said. “Anyone watching will know where we’re going if they detect you near New Chester.”
“Very well.” Esteban turned to Briar, his thin shoulders hunching. “Take care of yourself in the village.”
“I will,” Briar said. “And thank you.”
Esteban’s mouth twitched in a crusty attempt at a smile before he wandered off. Remarkable. It seemed old Esteban had finally warmed to Briar. If only Jemma could do the same.
Their preparations complete, Archer and Briar set off into the trees on foot. The slanting green rays of evening light gave the forest an eerie quality, all the stranger with so few birds about. Archer didn’t hear a single chirp or spot so much as a flurry of feathers as they walked through the woods. The air smelled odd, too, almost dead, and it seemed to grow heavier the farther they walked. The forest hadn’t felt that way the last time he was there. He didn’t like it.
The peculiar atmosphere doused Archer’s hopes of a romantic rendezvous like a bucket of ice water. He stayed close to Briar, half to protect her and half for the comfort of her presence. Whatever was wrong in those woods didn’t feel like something he could shoot with an arrow or punch in the nose. Briar seemed equally aware of the change in the air. She had a paintbrush in one hand and a jar of red paint half-open in the other.
So much for stealing away for a kiss.
“What’s your theory about what Lew saw?” Archer asked to break the uncanny silence. “Could it really be a curse?”
“It’s possible to curse an entire village with a powerful enough painting,” Briar said. “It uses the Law of Wholes, if you do it right. Some mages use multiple images to anchor the curse when they’re working on a large space, so we’ll want to check the boundaries too.”
“Why would someone want to hurt the whole village?”
“I was hoping you could tell me,” Briar said. “What do you know about New Chester?”
“I’ve been there a few times,” Archer said slowly. “There isn’t a whole lot to it. A few farms in a clearing, an inn, a tannery. Most people make their living hunting and trapping in the woods. Their primary export is animal pelts.”
“There doesn’t seem to be much game around.”
“I noticed that too.”
The woods ended abruptly, the trees giving way to a grassy clearing. The village sat in the center, composed of a few rows of lumpy thatched houses and a large inn, also with a thatched roof. The tannery on the opposite side of the village was missing its usual smoky haze and pungent odor. It didn’t smell much like the New Chester Archer remembered.
“That looks like a livestock paddock, doesn’t it?” Briar pointed to a fenced pasture near them. “No animals there either.”
“I don’t like this.”
“I can sense something in the air, or maybe a lack of something.” Briar inhaled deeply. “It’s getting stronger the closer we get to the buildings.”
A queasy feeling swirled through Archer’s stomach. “Maybe we should just forget it,” he said. “There’s no one left to give us the information, and we—”
“Wait!” Briar grabbed his arm to stop him. “Hear that?”
“What—”
“Shh! Someone’s talking.”
Archer held his breath, listening. Briar was concentrating too hard to notice she still held his arm, but a thrill went through him at her touch all the same. She felt warm and strong and—focus, Archer.
Gradually he became aware of a low murmur, as if someone were having an animated conversation at the bottom of a well.
“I think they’re just on the other side,” Briar whispered.
“Other side of what?”
She didn’t answer, still scanning the clearing intently. Then she took a tentative step forward, as if testing the temperature of a swimming hole. She gasped and pulled back.
“What is it?”
“A cloaking curse. Come on. This will feel a little strange.” Her hand slipped down to clasp his.
Archer marveled at the way their hands fit perfectly together. She tugged him forward one more step. He shivered at a sudden coldness. It was like pushing through a cloud or the spray from a waterfall. Then, just as abruptly, they were on the other side of it. The town of New Chester was still there, now bustling with people and chatter and birdsong. It looked just as it had on Archer’s last visit. A cow lowed nearby, serenading the setting sun.
The animated conversation rang loud and clear. A young boy was arguing with his mother over his failure to milk the cow properly. The cow stood beside them, shifting its weight and swatting flies with its tail. The woman, boy, and cow paid no attention to Archer and Briar as they walked past, still holding hands.
“They were just hidden?” Archer asked quietly. “But why?”
“I’m not sure yet,” Briar said. “I don’t think this curse uses boundary paintings. Let’s try to find the anchor.”
They strode between the nearest houses and entered the village proper. New Chester looked just as Archer remembered, all thatched-roof houses and cozy leaded-glass windows, but something felt off. It still didn’t smell right. The people went about their early-evening business, coming in from hunting or hurrying home from the market, but they didn’t look at Archer or Briar at all. He rolled his shoulders uneasily. It was a small enough town that two strangers ought to have attracted a few curious glances.
“They can’t see us,” Briar said, as if reading his thoughts. “We’re cloaked to them by the same curse that cloaked them from outside.”
“Why can we see them now?”
“The curse painter must have targeted the villagers specifically when they placed the spell. We’ll know more as soon as we find it.”
Archer suppressed a shiver and scanned the surrounding houses, which were built of weathered pinewood with carvings on the shutters and doors to add variety. “So, we’re looking for a painting? Will it be at the dead center?”
“Possibly. It’s more likely we’ll find it on an important building or meeting place, somewhere that affects the whole village on a daily basis.”
“The tannery?”
“That or the most popular tavern.”
“I see where you’re going with this.” Archer nodded at the slice of the main street visible between the next row of houses. “The common room of the inn is everyone’s favorite watering hole here.” He tightened his grip on her hand, pleased she still hadn’t pulled away. “Shall we?”
The inn, called the Sleepy Fox, was the only two-story structure in New Chester. Archer had spent a number of evenings enjoying a pint there—compliments of his friend the innkeeper. The building had a thatched roof, half a dozen guest rooms, and a spacious common room, which doubled as the village tavern. Someone was lighting candles in the windows when they reached it, the last dregs of daylight fading from the sky.
As Archer and Briar paused to study the Sleepy Fox, a man with a bushy beard stomped up the road and nearly knocked into them. His unseeing gaze passed right over them as he entered the inn. A murmur of voices drifted out the door around him.
“Sounds busy,” Briar said.
“The villagers love this place,” Archer said. “It’s always full.”
“Then this is probably where the curse is,” Briar said. “We’re looking for a large and intricate painting for it to have this much power.”
“Understood.”
They circled the outside of the building together, looking for anything unusual. Splitting up to search would have been more efficient, but something about the way the people looked straight through them made them want to stay close to each other. Archer checked the highest planes of the building carefully, remembering how Briar had hidden her curse under the eaves of Winton�
�s house. Nothing marked the chipped whitewash as far as he could tell, though it was growing darker by the minute.
“I didn’t see anything,” Archer said when they reached the front again. “Do we need to climb onto the roof? Maybe find an accommodating maple tree?”
Briar gave him a faint smile. “Curses don’t take well to thatch.”
“Inside, then?”
“Yes, but try not to touch anyone. I’m not sure whether or not they’ll feel it.”
They waited on the stoop until a red-faced woman burst out the front door and stomped down the short flight of steps. Archer released Briar’s hand to catch the door as it swung shut. He was a little surprised to feel the rough grain against his palm. New Chester felt like a ghost town, and it wouldn’t have shocked him if his hand had passed right through the wood.
The tavern was busy, the sturdy wooden tables filled with local trappers who’d paused for a pint of ale on their way home. One man had brought the day’s catch inside with him—a rather stringy hare—and the innkeeper was shouting at him about the blood dripping on her polished floor. She was a beautiful woman with finer clothes and a more elegant posture than one would expect in a place like New Chester.
“That’s my contact, Miss Oleander,” Archer whispered to Briar. Her hair tickled his mouth as he leaned close to her ear, and he found himself momentarily distracted by the smell of roses and linseed oil.
“How do you know her?”
“She used to work for my fa—friend.” He had almost said father. He had to be more careful. He was in danger of losing his wits completely around this girl. “We’d better look for that curse, eh?”
“Already found it.” Briar pointed across the common room at a massive painting hanging above the stone fireplace.
“Huh. I didn’t expect it to be out in the open like that.”
Briar hardly seemed to be listening. All the color had drained from her face, and her voice was a little unsteady. “Let’s look closer.”
They edged around Miss Oleander, who was still shouting at the trapper, and crossed the common room, taking care not to bump into anyone. Fortunately, the seats in front of the fireplace were empty, allowing them to examine the strange painting without alarming any of the patrons.
Bordered by a carved wooden frame, the painting depicted the village in impressive detail, from the smoky tannery to the surrounding pastures to the charming pinewood houses. It was like looking through a window from a distance except that the painting showed New Chester in the wintertime with a fine layer of snow coating everything.
Archer leaned closer to study the tiny white brushstrokes. “So all someone had to do was hang that up there and poof! All the people in the village are invisible?”
“They didn’t hang it,” Briar said. “It’s painted directly onto the wall of the inn, making it part of the building. That would satisfy the Law of Wholes. The frame is hiding the edges.”
“I see.” The slats of finely carved wood framing the picture were nailed directly to the wall. Archer reached out to touch one of the nails.
“Don’t!” Briar snatched his hand away. “There might be defensive spells. Experienced curse painters will go to great lengths to keep their work safe, especially if they intend it to last a long time.”
“But why would they do this?” Archer looked back at Miss Oleander, who still hadn’t so much as glanced their way. It was sobering to see his old friend caught by whatever strange force made him and Briar invisible to the villagers. “Are they trying to protect information by making it so the villagers can’t talk to anyone? Any visitors would know something strange is going on.”
“It could be a punishment.” Briar studied the painting intently, tapping her finger on her bottom lip. “Maybe the villagers committed some offense, and now they’re trapped here, unable to interact with the outside world.”
“So they can’t leave?”
“Most likely,” Briar said. “And no one comes to this village anymore, as far as they know. They could spend years wondering why the world forgot all about them and have no way to ask for help. They could be driven mad worrying that it’s just them, wondering why no one’s coming to save them, despairing because things never change. Look.”
She nodded toward the men sitting at their cups. Their expressions were bleak, as if they were trapped in an unhappy life—and they had no idea how to fix it. Many had multiple empty tankards beside them, working their way through far more ale than the hour warranted. Though the inn was full, the murmur of voices had a strained quality, not at all like the happy buzz Archer remembered from his last visit. He shuddered. He was starting to get the idea.
“Can we help them?”
Briar hesitated. “We’d have to break the curse.”
“Would destroying the painting do it?”
“Yes, but like I said, there are probably protections.” She twisted the strap of her canvas satchel nervously. “We could call the curse’s creator here, but that’s exactly the kind of attention we want to avoid. We should get out of here.”
Archer grimaced. His innkeeper friend had stopped shouting at the trapper, who hadn’t bothered to move the hare carcass despite her harangue. Miss Oleander gave up and trudged back toward the bar, her steps heavy, as if she wasn’t sure why she bothered anymore. Archer had known her as a lively woman who would never shout at someone or walk all slumped over like that. The curse had taken a toll, all the more insidious because it was subtle.
Archer clenched his fists, a familiar old anger beginning to seethe. “We can’t leave them like this.”
“There’s nothing we can do,” Briar said, her voice heavy with regret.
“I can light that damn thing on fire.”
He moved to pluck a burning log from the fireplace, but Briar seized his arm.
“Wait. You don’t know what you’re dealing with.”
“Some curse painter might be upset with me for messing up their precious picture? Bring it on.” He tried to shrug her off, reckless anger burning in his blood, getting hotter with every glance at the melancholy villagers and his entrapped friend. They didn’t deserve that life.
“Archer, listen to me,” Briar said urgently, still holding onto his arm. “I … I think I know who created this curse. Trust me when I say you do not want to touch their work.”
Archer braced himself as she tried to pull him away from the curse painting. “Who are they, then?”
Briar bit her lip. “I can’t tell you.”
“Then, I guess they’ll just have to introduce themselves.” He twisted out of her grasp and grabbed a branch from the fire, sending sparks flying.
“Stop!”
Archer ignored her. More signs of bleakness came into focus around him—unkempt bodies, mud left to dry where it fell, despairing stares, all those empty tankards and drink-slackened faces. No one deserved such a nightmarish curse. “I’m not leaving these people to slowly go mad.”
“You’re going to ruin everything,” Briar said.
Archer advanced on the painting with the burning branch.
“I said stop!” Briar reached for him again.
Archer saw something in her hand, a flash of blue, then the world went black.
Chapter 15
Darkness had fallen by the time Briar managed to drag Archer out of the village. He was more solidly built than his long limbs suggested, and she soon regretted not using an ambulatory curse. She’d been worried that getting out her paints so close to that elaborate curse would trigger its defenses.
It was difficult to keep the blue curse stone in contact with Archer’s skin while hauling him along the rough ground by his boots, and she eventually forced it into his mouth, hoping he wouldn’t swallow it. She could make him vomit out the stone, but she would already have enough explaining to do when he woke. She saw no need to make it worse.
The night was tranquil beyond the boundaries of the cloaking curse. Briar dropped Archer’s feet at the tree line and knelt b
eside him. His blond hair glowed in the moonlight, and his sleep looked peaceful—though artificially induced. She watched him for a moment, his chest rising and falling in his indigo coat.
Briar hadn’t wanted to believe it when she’d seen the painting of the snowy village in the inn. Only a few mages could create a curse strong enough to affect an entire town, so she’d had her suspicions, but the sight of that signature style had still been a shock. Instantly, she had been transported back to a studio near the sea, an owl-eyed man concentrating on a canvas bedecked in whites and blues, lead white for invisibility, azurite for anxiety, ultramarine for illusions, carbon black to bind it all.
A psychological curse, her father’s specialty. Donovan Dryden had left his mark on New Chester. She had thought she could escape him so far from High Lure, but he had come to the outer counties in the flesh to paint that image. Maybe he was still there. Fear squeezed at her innards, making her nauseous.
Briar had panicked when Archer moved to destroy the painting. All would be lost if they drew her father’s attention. She’d had no choice but to curse Archer to sleep. She had likely killed whatever had begun to develop between them in the process. Feelings of attraction aside, their trust in each other had been a fragile thing, like the first shoots in a spring garden. She had crushed it into the dirt in a matter of seconds.
Maybe it was for the best. She couldn’t escape what she was no matter how far she ran. Archer would never understand.
With a sigh, she fished the blue-smalt stone out of his mouth to awaken him. His eyes snapped open at once. He looked up at her leaning over him, her hair falling around their faces. A smile tugged at his lips, and a sort of painful breathlessness clutched at her chest. Then Archer’s smile faded, and she knew he was remembering where they’d been as he closed his eyes.
He sat up, reaching for his belt knife. “You cursed me.”
