Rol seated Jazz at the head of the table. The giant put me on one side of her, and he sat on the other side, across from me. In moments, a short guy appeared with a big tray holding platters of roasted chicken, prime rib, potatoes, puddings, and all sorts of things I couldn’t identify. My stomach growled as soon as the delicious smells hit my nose, and I ate like it was my last meal. For all I knew, it could be, if I didn’t figure out where I was and how I was going to get away.
When I devoured the last apple tart, I pushed my chair away from the table and stood. “Thanks for the shirt and dinner,” I said to Rol.
Jazz raised an eyebrow, and Rol stopped in mid-chew.
To Jazz I said, “Maybe I’ll see you around.”
Before they could reply, I turned and headed out the door.
***
Chapter Six
“Do you plan to act?” Rol asked. “I am not certain the streets of Shallym are ready for the likes of him.”
I swallowed my last bite of rice pudding, ignoring the flutter of my heart. “Let Bren make his own errors. If he dies by his folly, better sooner than later, so we don’t waste time training him.”
“You seem too interested in this one to take such a casual attitude.” Rol emphasized “interested,” and I thought about pasting him to Shadowbridge’s stone walls. A simple sticky spell would have done it, even for a man as large as him. And Rol would make a fine piece of art—like the time I turned him into a green coat of arms and hung him on Father’s wall. Of course, I had been banished to my room for a week for that little prank. And Rol had me run endless laps around Shadowbridge. To build my stamina, he told Father. Father had only laughed and agreed, saying I would vex my husband sorely one day.
Husband. As if any witch on the Path would give me a second look. With my knowledge and power, I was as attractive to a potential husband as the two-hearted slithers dwelling in the forest—scales, fangs, fiery breath, and all.
My scowl must have deepened, because the training master glared at me, gripping the table’s edge as if to resist anything I tried. Though I was too old to run laps, I was disinclined to try Rol’s patience. After all, it was Bren I truly wanted to paste to a wall.
The heavy front door swung open, then closed.
I sighed.
Bren was no doubt making his way into Shallym. Other than my castle grounds and the forbidding woods nearby, there was nowhere else for him to go in this Sanctuary.
I drew a breath and tried to maintain my air of unconcern, but with each passing second, the flutters in my chest increased.
Rol’s eyes narrowed as he studied me. Waiting.
Don’t be ridiculous, I told myself.
Bren was the one. The Shadowalker. And the Shadowalker was quite capable of caring for himself.
But Bren was untrained, and brimming with a wild, wild energy. And that mouth. What if Bren angered a hag? Woke a slither? Or, fates forbid, caught the eye of a klatchKeeper?
The peace between the oldeFolke—the witches converted from ancient races such as faeries, dwarves, and creatures with no names understandable to human ears—and the rest of us was tenuous at best. This peace was a requirement of the Path, and not something born of the oldeFolke’s free will.
It would serve Bren right to learn of the oldeFolke in some rude fashion. “Maybe I’ll see you around,” indeed.
“The pup cannot help his confusion,” Rol muttered. “Why would you punish him for being himself, for trying to restore the life he has always known? After all, you wish him to restore ours.”
“Silence,” I snapped, careful to keep my hands on the table. Rol flinched nonetheless. Shame warmed my cheeks, adding fuel to my swelling anger.
Rol pushed his food around his plate, his fork clinking against the stoneware. In the kitchen, Acaw the elfling spoke with his crow-brother, so softly that not even my keen hearing could make out his words. From the stables came the piercing whinny of Rol’s stallion, and in the distance, an eagle screamed in triumph as it captured its prey.
After several long minutes, I said, “I’m not punishing Bren for being confused or for making efforts to return to his life.”
“For what, then?” Rol grimaced. “Wounding your pride? I would have preferred the first explanation. The second sounds too much like—”
“If you compare me to my father, I shall turn you into a snake and skin you,” I warned. “Alive.”
“Hmph.” Rol seized his tankard of ale. “I was going to say your mother.”
A strange panic seized me, and I could no longer abide the training master’s cool regard. Before he could speak again, I jumped to my feet and fled the dining room.
She was tense and unforgiving. So deliberately cold.
And I’m not my father, either. I have intelligence and foresight. I wasn’t so innocent and blind, trusting fate or circumstance or all the wrong people. I wouldn’t go blindly to my death and leave my family to fight my battles.
Even if Rol was the only “family” I had, and even if he thought I was awful.
My growing dread drove me harder than Rol’s well-placed barbs. How could I have allowed Bren to leave? Alderon, yes—to be sure, it would have been a pleasure to watch him suffer—but Bren?
What was wrong with me?
Weakness springs from two sources, Jasmina. The mind and the blood. Thanks to your father, you have a liberal amount of both to overcome…
Sweet fates, but I wished there was some spell to rip my mother’s voice from my mind! Perhaps she was Nire. After all, Mother seemed intent on taking my sanity before she was captured.
If she had been captured.
She could have been killed, her spirit thrown into the Shadows. I had no way to know for sure.
Shadowbridge seemed to resist my efforts to reach the door. Here a rug snagged my foot. There a chair sat just forward enough to trip me. Somehow I lurched to the entrance without falling and yanked on the metal ring handle.
The door swung open. A roar of anger reached my ears immediately—far away, from down the hill. By the Goddess! Bren had made it to the village. And he was already in trouble.
I could have cast a ceasing spell, halting everything within a few miles of me, but I had done that once already, only a short time ago. The oldeFolke would be so enraged, being spelled twice in one day, they would no doubt take some hideous revenge. Not an option. This problem I had to handle more directly.
“Wind!” I screamed, holding out my palms.
A crack announced my gift from the trees, torn loose and speeding on its way. The live oak branch landed in my hands with a rustle and thump. Its rough bark felt strong and sure, and its gnarled contours welcomed my legs as I straddled it.
One push of my feet sent me skyward, and I shot down Shadowbridge Hill toward Shallym.
It took only a moment for my sensitive vision to find the crowd—and Bren. He was a mile ahead, no more, sprawled across a merchant’s cart on Main Square. Apples lay everywhere, and Bren had covered his head with his arms.
Wagons had stopped. Children clapped hands over their mouths. Even the horses were staring.
Wind rushed through my hair as I hurtled toward the village. At least twenty witches pelted Bren with fruit, curses, and stones. Some were regular witches, human by birth, as I was. But most were of the oldeFolke—creatures with magic so ancient and powerful it could scarcely be contained, even by me. They looked none too pleased to find an unconverted human in a witch’s refuge on the Path of Shadows. Especially in Shallym, the oldest Sanctuary of all. I could tell the oldeFolke were regretting their vow of peace, just by the tension simmering brightly in the air.
“You owe me!” the cart-man bellowed at Bren. “My apples! My beautiful apples!”
“He isn’t even a witch yet!” screamed the nearest hag to her cronies. Her warty face twisted with rage, and her truly dark hag-spirit hovered nearby, ready to strike like a snake on her command.
Mother always said hags were descended from the uni
on of faeries with cobras and asps. Looking at the hideous woman and her hateful familiar, I had no cause to doubt that lineage.
Don’t move, Bren, I pleaded in my mind as I flew toward the marketplace. Not a twitch. Not a quiver.
Six hypnotically beautiful girls danced as one near Bren’s feet. Bren was still conscious and not trying to crawl toward them, so I knew the girls must be a very young klatchKoven. Not yet at full strength or power. Manageable, at least.
No klatchKeeper in sight, thank the Goddess.
Otherwise, Bren might have been swearing his eternal love for the klatchKoven—the result of faerie dalliances with Greek Sirens—and I didn’t want to think of what surely would happen next. Of all the oldeFolke, klatch witches disliked humans the most, perhaps because human males found them irresistible and refused to leave them alone. The klatch certainly found means to avenge themselves for that particular human weakness, however.
Oh, dear. If that cart-man finished his mutterings before my arrival, I might find myself searching for a mouse or lizard instead of a stubborn, insolent boy.
At the moment, though, Bren looked helpless, cowering in the muck. I landed like a meteor, live oak branch flaming from the speed of the ride.
The crowd gasped as one and fell silent—and more importantly, they fell away, leaving Bren and me in the center of a large, quiet circle. Even the hag-spirits dared no movement. They hovered, scowling at me like the Shadowmaster’s minions.
Perhaps they were, I reminded myself. Even with the vow, was evil not still evil? After all, it was Father who allowed hags to defect from their dark origins and enter the Path of Shadows, and Father’s judgment was questionable, at best. More heart than mind, sometimes.
Like my own.
“Get up, Bren,” I said.
Bren didn’t move. He crouched on the ground near my legs, and I could feel anger rising from him like spell-driven steam. Mud obscured his hair and face, blending brown to brown, giving him the appearance of a puppy fresh from frolicking in a puddle.
Hags drooled and the klatchKoven clasped their hands. I knew they were waiting for me to spell the boy into oblivion. If I tried to use magic to set him on his feet and failed—if Bren threw off my magic in front of them like he had when we first came to Shallym—no.
Too great a risk.
I gave him a gentle kick. “Get up, or die. I assure you that if I leave, the villagers will kill you.”
Bren scrambled to his feet, all thumbs and stumbles, barely missing a hag as he staggered in the mud. “This is sooo not happening,” he said to himself, but everyone heard. We were all witches, with hearing keener than owls.
The hag that Bren nearly bumped curled her fingers and hissed, but I raised my hands.
Everyone cowered.
“He offered you no insult.” My voice echoed through the silent marketplace. “And he means you no harm. Any aggression toward him will be a breach of your vows and cause for expulsion from the Path. You’ll all do well to know that this boy is under my protection until his conversion, and even afterward.”
Before the cart-man could argue that his property damage was enough to warrant vengeance spells, I restored his wares with a wide sweep of my fingers. Down to the last shiny apple. He grunted and backed away, keeping a wary eye on my hands.
Hags—I counted seven in all—swore and threatened under their breaths, but their hag-spirits sulked close to their elbows as they raised cloaks and vanished. The klatchKoven shrank back, clawing the air like frightened cats. From a few streets over, I heard a reedy whistle.
A Keeper.
The klatch witches scattered, running for their mistress. I shivered, not desiring to encounter a klatchKeeper on this tiresome day. The remainder of the crowd seemed to agree. They stomped away, both merchant and customer, grumbling and shooting wicked glances in Bren’s direction.
The Keeper sang out as her charges joined her, and for a moment, their eerie and beautiful chorus filled the air.
Bren glared at me with a mixture of hate and fear on his dirty face, and then his head turned. He began to drift toward the enticing music of the klatchKoven. In seconds, he almost tripped over the apple cart.
Too much to hope that he could resist a Keeper’s song with no training. No, Bren was definitely not ready to meet a Keeper, and strangely, I wasn’t ready to share Bren’s attention with any woman who appeared to be that beautiful.
Not that he felt the same, I was certain.
“Quiet,” I said, letting my hands make a circle above my head. The spell affected only the air around Bren and me, so the oldeFolke would not be offended.
Silence settled over the two of us like a pall, and Bren shook his muddy head. His normally bright eyes were still glazed from the Keeper’s music. I took the spare moment to point at the dirt all over him, banishing it, clump by smear, back to the earth. When I finished, he sparkled. But he had sparkled before, even filthy.
“What did you do?” he asked, glancing around. His eyes lingered on the owner of the applecart, who glared back ferociously. “Why did everything get so quiet?”
“Come,” I said, ignoring his question. “We’re safest at Shadowbridge until you know enough not to be hexed into twenty pieces or entranced by the klatchKoven—and then, well, your fate wouldn’t be pleasant.”
“Go to h—” he began, but bit off his own sentence. Silver energy surged from his clenched fists, startling me.
What was that power?
I still hadn’t figured out the source of his strength, but at least he couldn’t see it yet. Soon, though, he would. Very soon. I didn’t have much time left to understand this boy. Raising my hand to dismiss the thought, I shouted, “Wind!” The crack of wood startled Bren into raising his fists as though to strike what might come his way.
“You don’t have to wish me to hell,” I told him in a voice that sounded all too much like my mother’s. “I’ve already been, and yet remain. Trapped, just as you are.” One-handed, I caught the live oak branch as I added, “Now, come and ride with me. I won’t save you from your own foolishness again.”
***
Chapter Seven
“Save me from my foolishness?” I was so furious with Jazz that my arms shook. “You brought me to this creeped-out place. I am so sick of your high-and-mighty, better-than-everyone attitude. If you weren’t a girl, I would—I would—” I clenched my fist and slammed it into the closest thing to me—which happened to be the apple cart.
Wood splintered and crunched as my knuckles went straight through it. I yanked my hand back, expecting to feel pain, or at least numbness, but I felt…nothing. Nothing at all. The hole was at least a foot in diameter, the wooden planks an inch thick. Yet I didn’t get a single scratch or cut.
Apples tumbled through the hole, one after another. But the noise of apples hitting cobblestones faded. For a minute, I forgot about the village. Forgot about Jazz. I clenched and unclenched my hand and stared at it. The really weird thing was that I thought I saw a glow on my arms. Like the glow I’d seen on Jazz, but silver instead of gold. And even more bizarre was this total power rush that went through me like an electrical charge.
My brother, Todd, would have freaked. He’d be so jealous he’d turn silver. Dad wouldn’t believe it, of course. And Mom—who knows? She might have made an offering to the forces of the universe.
I lifted my head and looked from my hand to Jazz. Her dark lips were parted and her eyes wide. I felt a tickle in my chest, almost like fingers pushing into my skin. Was Jazz trying to read my mind again? Or something else—like touching my feelings? My essence?
My essence? Where did that come from?
A sick feeling settled in my gut. I shook my head, making sure to will Jazz—and anyone else for that matter—totally out of me.
Jazz blinked and stepped back, holding that tree branch she’d pulled out of the sky close to her body. She raised her chin and attempted to put on her better-than-anyone act, but I could see right through her. I ha
d surprised her. Made her leave my brain.
How about that, Dad? Using my head enough for ya?
“You have some explaining to do,” I said to Jazz, my voice low, but dead serious. “And you’d better start now.”
“Yes. Well.” She glanced around the street that was now almost empty. The only others around were the merchants and a couple of older-looking women who glared at me a lot.
She cocked her head as if she was listening for something. “It isn’t safe for you here.” Her eyes met mine. “Whether it pleases you or not, you have no choice but to trust me. We must go to Shadowbridge at once.”
A snapping sound jerked her attention to the skies, and mine, too.
For a minute, I thought I saw a dark shadow pass above us. Not really in the sky, more like…behind it. I glanced at Jazz, and felt a new wave of cold wash down my back. She looked very, very scared.
“What’s going on?” I muttered, keeping my eyes pinned to hers.
“We need to leave now, Bren,” she said, and the concern in her voice shut down all my arguments. I nodded. “Okay, but as soon as we get back to your creepy castle, you’re going to answer my questions.”
Jazz waved her fingers, repairing the applecart again and sending every spilled apple back to the piles on its shelves. Then, she straddled the branch and motioned for me to get on. I hesitated a second, but I got on behind her. If I hadn’t seen her fly in on her flaming broomstick, I would have thought she was totally nuts. But instead I just thought I had gone nuts.
“Hold on to me,” she said.
I put my hands at Jazz’s waist, barely touching her.
She glanced over her shoulder. “You’ll need to hold tightly, or you’ll fall. Perhaps to your death.”
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” I muttered as I wrapped my arms around her and squeezed so hard she gasped.
“Not quite so tightly,” she wheezed.
Grinning in spite of myself, I eased up. She smelled good—that peaches and cinnamon scent. And she felt soft and warm in my arms, and it surprised me how much I liked holding her.
L.O.S.T. Trilogy Box Set Page 4
