"Hurry, my love," Mother said. "You know if we don't salt it in time, Papa will bellyache about the flavor."
"Papa always bellyaches about the flavor," she replied. "It's too salty, it's not salty enough, the skin is too crunchy, the skin isn't crunchy enough."
He always found something wrong with the duck, but it was more of a rolling humor than a serious complaint.
Eryn stretched out one last time, sighing with the effort, but falling just short. The tips of her fingers touched the edge of the bag, and then she felt herself losing her balance and was forced to shift her weight back. "By Amman," she said under her breath. Papa would have scolded her if he'd heard her speak so.
She turned her head and looked back at the daylight rising through the small opening to the attic, feeling her heart begin to beat faster. She knew she could get the bag of salt. She knew how to retrieve it even though it was beyond her grasp.
She also knew she was forbidden.
***
Eryn had been twelve when she and her family had first discovered that she was Cursed. It had been a total accident, as the discovery usually was. She had just been fortunate that only her family had witnessed it, or she would have been locked up within the hour, and they would have been summoned to their small village. His soldiers, the frightening men who patrolled every corner of every province in search of the Cursed, to take them away from their families, never to be seen again. It had seemed unfair to her, but he was the Emporer, and all were his subjects. They had no choice, and no say.
They had been having a picnic, way out in the Whistling Woods on a beautiful spring day. Papa had loaded his cart with food and drink for once, instead of ingot and hammer and wood. He had guided them through the lighter part of the brush to a wide, shallow stream that divided a gigantic field of grass and wild flowers. They had eaten and drank, played games like hide and find, and Papa had even shown her how to draw a bow and loose an arrow. It had been the perfect day.
It had been the perfect day, until they had loaded up the cart and started making their way back home. What was a bright, cool, sunny spring day turned dark as heavy clouds moved in, and before long the wind had picked up and a steady rain began to fall, soaking them all to the bone. They didn't really mind being wet, in fact she and Roddin had enjoyed jumping in the newly created puddles that were born in the cratered earth of the woods. If that had been the end of it, their lives could have continued as before.
It had been a flash of lightning, and a tremendous clap of thunder that had startled their horse, Maxin. He had snorted and reared back, then launched forward like one of the arrows they had been loosing earlier. It would have been easy enough to let him race his way back home, except she and Roddin had been out in front of the old stallion, jumping in the puddles and playing tag. It was Roddin who'd found himself in the frightened horse's path.
She could still see it clearly in her mind. Papa's booming voice roaring out her brother's name in warning. Mother's shrill cry of alarm at seeing her child in harm's way. Eryn herself saw the horse before Roddin did, and out of nothing more than instinct she had wished her brother would move from here to there.
It had felt strange then. A tingling sensation that had started behind her ears and ran down her back and chest to her arms. Of their own volition they shot out straight towards Roddin, and the air in front of him began to wiggle and squirm. She saw Roddin's hair get blown to the side as though he were caught in a mighty wind, and then his whole body had been lifted up and thrown aside, only moments before Maxin rushed by with the cart.
They had run to him then, Mother and Papa, with Mother leaning down and wrapping her arms around her older child. Eryn had been too stunned to move, and she stood as still as she could while her arms dropped to her sides and the tingling sensation faded. She realized then that she was crying, and she brought up one of her arms to wipe away the rain and the tears. When she pulled her it away, she saw that it was streaked with blood.
***
Papa had seen it too, she remembered, and he had rushed over to her and held her tight and cried. She didn't know why he was crying, not at first. She had been too young to pay much attention to the stories about the Cursed. In time, they had told her that she must never tell anyone what had happened that night, and that she must never let her ears tingle like that again.
It had been an easy promise to make at the time, but a much harder one to keep in the two years that had followed. After all, how could it be a Curse when she had used it to save her brother's life? How could it be bad when it was so useful? She had gone out to the edge of the Whistling Woods on her own when nobody expected her to be anywhere in particular. She had tried again and again to make her ears tingle, and to feel the energy rushing through her body. It had taken weeks of trying, but eventually she made it happen once, and then again. It was never as strong as when she had pushed Roddin out of Maxin's path, but it was enough to do little things.
Like move a bag of salt just a tiny bit closer.
Chapter 3
Silas Morningstar lifted the mug of ale to his chin, and then tilted his head to peer down into it's depths.
"Almost gone," he mumbled to himself, shaking the mug so the dark amber liquid inside would shift and swirl.
Silas watched every rise and fall of the remainder of his drink, considering the movement of swirling ale, and the patterns of the resulting waves. "To a fair lady lost at sea," he said, a little louder than intended.
"Hey Silas, I didn't know you had a fair lady?"
Wenley Hollow was the proprietor of the Sleepy Hollow, a small inn and tavern in the town of Root. He was a small man with a large appetite, and a burgeoning belly to match it. He laughed at his own sense of humor while he dried a fresh mug with a less than fresh cloth.
"Only a fool would know," Silas mumbled. His head felt heavy. His eyes felt heavy. He kept staring into the ale. "Is there any sense in cups?" he asked nobody. He brought the mug to his mouth, and took his final swallow. "I'll have another," he called out to Wenley.
"A copper a cup," Wenley replied.
Silas grumbled and got to his feet. His somewhat unsteady feet. He reached into his pants, feeling around for the hidden pocket where he kept his coin.
"Where is it?" he whispered to himself. He felt a little sick. "It has to be here, I haven't changed my pants in..." He tried to remember. He only had one pair of pants. When had he last brought them down to the river to soak? When had he last brought himself down to the river to soak?
He squirmed and twisted while he searched the inner lining for the pocket. "To Heden with it," he cursed.
"No coin, no courtesy," Wenley said, walking over to him. "If you can't pay for another round, you're going to have to leave."
Silas took a deep breath, sucking the air in through a congested nose. "I can pay you in a fortnight," he said. "Or I can pay with a song."
Wenley shook his head. "I took you up on the song once, remember, Silas? I should have known you had the singing voice of an ogre, and lyrics that made as much sense as their howls." He reached out to take Silas by the arm. "You're lucky I even let you come in here, as bad as you smell."
Silas looked around. It was barely mid-morning. He and Wenley were the only two in the tavern.
"You've been a good friend to me," Silas said, his voice rough and raw. "A good friend."
Wenley reached out and put his hand under Silas' shoulder. "I'm not your friend, Silas," Wenley replied. "I'm running a business. I let you in because I'm here to clean and get the place ready, and it's harmless enough to watch you sit there and mutter to yourself. When you have coin. Which you don't. So now you need to leave."
"I can pay you in a fortnight," Silas said again. "Or I can pay you with a song."
Wenley gripped Silas' arm a little tighter, and pulled on him. It wasn't as simple a task as it could have been, because Silas was almost two heads taller. "Come on, old man. Go find a hole to fall into to sleep it off. Or better yet, go
down to the Baden and throw yourself in it."
Silas didn't resist Wenley's tug. He let the man drag him out from behind his chair. "I can wash dishes," he suggested, losing his balance. Wenley's grip was the only thing that kept him from falling to the floor.
"I've never seen you right enough to handle dishes," he said, "and you've been coming around for almost two years."
"On a morning bright, in lighter days. Or is it, on a morning light in brighter days?" Silas looked up at the beams of wood supporting the three floors of rooms above them, and then down at the smooth planked floor. The motion made him dizzy, and the dizziness made his stomach churn. He felt bubbling in his throat, and heard the sounds of his body rejecting the ale.
"Out. Out right now," Wenley urged. He knew what those sounds meant, and he tugged harder on the older man.
Silas shook off the man's arm and rushed himself outside. The streets were quiet at this time of day, and there was a light fog that the sun had yet to burn off. It worked out to his advantage. Nobody else saw him duck around the side of the Sleepy Hollow, to a narrow alley between the tavern and a seamstress' shop. He vomited on the seamstress' wall.
"That was disgusting," he announced to nobody in a deep sing-song voice. He supported himself by resting his head against the wall, and he gazed down into the muck of his regurgitated drink. He stared at it, looking for patterns in the foam.
"To a fair lady lost at sea," he said again.
Silas pushed himself away from the wall and headed back towards the street. His legs still felt like rubber beneath him, and his head was throbbing, but he'd decided he would follow his friend's advice and head down to the river. He stepped back out onto the empty street, turning left and crossing over towards the town square.
The center of town was known to the locals as the Root Bazaar. It was a massive open space that was cut in half by the Baden river, over which two wood and iron bridges arched. Both sides of the space were used for an assortment of purposes like celebrations, games, and tournaments, though the west bank was often called the Red Bank, because that was were they held the executions.
Each side of the square was closed in by tightly spaced storefronts and taverns, with a few dirt roads that crossed them, and a single cobblestone road on the Red Bank that led from the north gate to the south gate. It was early yet, but there was already a collection of traveling merchants randomly spotted on the grass on both sides of the river, unpacking their wares and putting them up on display.
Being the largest town between the cities of Killorn and Elling, and a hub from the villages surrounding the Baden and its tributaries, Root spent nearly every day each year hosting traders, performers, and nobles on their way to and from the seat of the province's Overlord. Such transient wealth also meant there was a strong presence of less than honorable professions. Silas wasn't always an honest man, but he also wasn't the type to belong to any of those guilds.
Even so, the merchants kept a close eye on Silas as he walked by. Whenever he came too close to one, they would move to stand in front of their wares, and wrinkle their noses at the smell of him. It wasn't that they didn't trust him in particular, but there was something suspicious about a haggard man who couldn't walk in a straight line, wandering past them at this time of day.
Silas reached the cobblestone road and turned north. Using the river from inside of the city walls was forbidden and punishable by death, as most offenses were under his rule. Root itself had a clay pipeline that led from a diverted basin to various sections of the town, where the inhabitants could go and pay for access to water from which to bathe and drink. As he had no way to pay, he had no choice but to walk.
He sobered up somewhat as he traveled, staying to the outer reaches of the main thoroughfare where it split around the Constable's Office. The office was the seat of Root's governor, Constable Penticott. It was a large, ornately columned, two-story building that sat in an area roughly half the size of the square, and was surrounded by an incredible botanical garden, which itself was surrounded by a tall iron fence. The garden was there to prevent any from being able to view his soldiers, out training in the yard, as the office was home not only to the Constable, but also two hundred of his soldiers and the Root dungeons. There was another barracks on the south side of the Baden's east bank, which housed another two hundred.
"So many soldiers," Silas said to himself as he walked past, trying to avoid being noticed by the guards positioned around the gate. "Who are they fighting against?" As far as he knew, there had been no war and no uprisings in at least forty years. It was true that some of the soldiers were needed to keep the peace within the city walls, but a solider for every ten inhabitants seemed excessive to him. Even if Silas added the travelers passing through the town, it still appeared too many.
It took him nearly two hours of walking to reach a secluded spot on the Baden, giving him more than enough time to shake the effects of the ale. His head began to throb, and his eyes were blurry from lack of sleep. Silas tried to remember the last time he had been completely sober.
"It was probably the last time I bathed," he said to himself with a chuckle.
He made his way down to the edge of the Baden, and then lifted his stained white shirt over his head and brought it to his face, sniffing under the arms and drawing back in disgust. He took hold of his pants and removed them as well, though he declined to check on their cleanliness. Last, he bent down and removed the simple leather sandals that cradled his feet.
"A fine day," Silas announced, stretching out his naked body and letting it catch as much of the cool morning air as it could. The sun was rising in the sky, and by afternoon it would be blasting Root with it's intensity, so he needed to enjoy the crispness while it lasted. He shifted his neck from one side to the other, satisfied with the resulting crunch, and then bent over and reached his hands to his toes. More cracks ran along his entire back, his elbows and his knees. Finally, he leaned over and looked down into the calm flow of the Baden.
He was confused by what he saw. White hair grown long, a thick white mustache and beard attached to a long, narrow, chiseled face. His body was equally long and thin, though he had managed to maintain some definition in his muscles, even after the years.
"When did that happen?" he asked himself.
He ran his hand along his torso, where a jagged scar cut its way from his right pectoral to his left hip. Try as he might, he couldn't recall ever being so grievously wounded. Had the drink made him forget? Or did he drink to forget? Or had he forgotten long before he started drinking?
He didn't know, and when he thought more about it, he realized he didn't care. He decided that he would clean himself up a little, and with any luck be in right enough shape to convince Wenley to let him wash dishes. Failing that, he would see if he could find some purses to lighten. The penalty for stealing was hard labor in the ore mines, not death, and anyway he was an exceptional thief. If only he could remember where he had learned the skill.
"Am I not in right shape?" he asked himself, staring down at his reflection.
"You haven't been in right shape in years," his reflection answered back. Or maybe it hadn't. Maybe it was all in his head. He wasn't sure. All he did know was that he needed a drink.
"Now or never," he said. He gathered his clothes into a ball in his arms, took a few steps back, and then ran forward and leaped into the river. He shouted at the shock of the cold water greeting him, and then began to laugh. He had forgotten how much he liked to swim.
He cavorted in the water for a while, holding his clothes in each hand as he dove under, swam on his back, and paddled upstream and downstream. He was hopeful that the motion would help pull some of the stink out of the cloth, his hair, and his body.
As it was, the play led him to distraction of his own, and before he realized it he was much further downstream than he had intended. Silas planted his feet in the soft mud of a shallow spot in the river and stood up, the water climbing up to his chest. He spun arou
nd in a circle, trying to figure out where he was, but not recognizing the location. He had gone way too far.
"Momma, what's going to happen to me?"
He heard the voice of a boy, and turned his head to find it.
"Nothing, dear. Nothing is going to happen to you." A woman's voice. His mother, Silas assumed. He still wasn't sure where it was coming from.
"I'm scared," the boy said.
Silas saw movement through trees on the west side of the river. The boy and his mother were in a small copse of trees, near the furthest edge of the farmlands surrounding Root. He had definitely gone way, way too far.
"I'm scared too."
Silas creased his brow, wondering what they were talking about. He decided he wanted to know, so he swam over to the shore and carefully pulled himself out of the water. He left his clothes on the banks and slithered his way across the ground like a snake, getting himself covered in dirt and grass with the effort. Finally, he reached the trees.
"You aren't going to tell them?" the boy asked.
"I could never do that to you," came the reply. "I love you too much to let him take you."
Silas' ears perked up even more at his mention. He pushed himself to his feet, and snuck across to the trunk of a wide oak tree. He peeked his head around the corner, able to see the two people who were talking now. He was shocked to find that he recognized them. He was even more shocked when he saw the boy's face. He had tried to wipe it away, but there was still a smudge of red right below his right eye. He was Cursed.
"Are you going to tell Da?" Calum asked.
Bound (The Divine, Book Four) Page 31
