by Jenna Rhodes
She pinched the toe. “I’m all squinched up.”
He nodded, looking at her shoe. The weather still held warm days, but the nights had started going cold. She needed shoes on her feet. Evar got off the cot and padded into the kitchen, looking for a sharp knife. It took a lot of tries before he found part of a broken-off scissor, a single blade with handle. He sawed the end of her shoe off, his face knotted in concentration, his breathing harsh until he muscled the leather off. Then he did the same with her other shoe and when he was done, Evar secreted the blade away under his straw mattress, in case he needed it later. His own shoes would be ready to be cut open in a day or two, he reckoned. It was the meadow filling them up and now, spilling over.
The side of a fist thundered against the little wooden door, shaking the entire bunkhouse. “Git your scrawny little butts out here, NOW.”
Evar shoved himself into his clothes and took Merri by the elbow, hauling her along with him while she hopped on one foot, getting her shoe on the other. Her little pink toes stuck out, but she’d stopped crying and turned her face on him, aglow with a smile. She bustled out the wooden door and grabbed her bucket by its rusty bail and stood at attention, waiting for the frowning face to give her chores until breakfast.
Evar took his place beside her, and he could hear the tiny rumble of her stomach, soon to be echoed by his own. They’d be lucky if they had breakfast. Frowning face didn’t always like to make porridge, and there were days when he went off hunting for himself, coming back empty-handed but smelling of wood smoke and grilled meat. He’d been told to keep them alive, but he’d once hauled Evar up by the shirt collar and lifting him up off the ground till their noses nearly met, told Evar he didn’t have to keep them plump.
“Scour the groves. I want tinder and kindling, the small, dry stuff from you two. I’ll haul the bigger branches. Rain is in the wind, and it’ll be a wet night. Wet season is nearly here. Best to get wood ready for the next few days, or we’ll all be freezing our asses off. Got it?”
Merri nodded rapidly, hair bouncing.
Evar lifted a shoulder, looking up. “We need a breakfast, later.”
“Mebbe. Mebbe not.” Frowning face ran his fingernails through his stubbly beard. “If you git your jobs done quick. Bring back your buckets a coupla times and we’ll see.”
Merri took off running. Evar let her go and stared at frowning face. “We get breakfast.”
The man shrugged. “A’right, a’right. Now on with you, shit for blood.”
Evar went after Merri, not wanting to let her get too far ahead. The woods hereabouts seemed devoid of large prey, but that could change as autumn weather bore down on them, and the big predators got hungrier as the cold dropped its curtain. These things he’d heard from Tolby and Dayne and Hosmer when he was still small, but he remembered. She could protect herself, he thought, if she could gather her scattered thoughts. He could feel the frowning man staring at his back as he ran.
The bails dug into their hands as the buckets gained weight, so Merri stopped gathering long enough to braid soft rushes to wrap about them. He wandered off as he heard a buzzing, and when he found the hive in a fallen tree trunk, he plundered as big a piece of honeycomb as he could manage without too many stings, and wrapped it in his handkerchief, and stuffed it in his trousers. Merri had to heal him of his stings before they started filling their buckets again. All the preparations slowed them down and by the time dawn had stretched to midmorning, her stomach growling had grown louder and louder. They had gathered three buckets each to the frowning man’s one wheelbarrow load of wood as he sat on the front stoop, drinking from a tin cup and enjoying the sun’s rays while he could, as the promised clouds curled at the sky’s edge. Merri sat down as Evar filled the sheltered trough with the last of their kindling and dropped the buckets.
“Breakfast.”
“Think you earned it, do ya?”
Evar grabbed his sister’s hand and showed him the blisters and streaks of blood, despite the reed covers she’d made. “We did what you said.”
“Aye and took her fair time, dincha? Go on, there’s a pot on the fire.” He jabbed a thumb in the air, pointing behind him.
Merri bolted to her feet and led the way, but she stood over the pot with a disgusted look on her face. “It’s all dried up. Burned on the bottom.” She pulled a wooden spoon out, holding up a clump of what was meant to be porridge and now clung, solid and chunky, to the spoon.
“Don’t worry.” He patted his pocket. “We got that honeycomb we found earlier. We’ll just paint the honey over the bad parts and dream of Mama’s cookies.”
And they did, eating the chunky, dried-out yet still warm cereal with honey drizzled all over its nooks and crannies and it was almost good. He wrapped his honeycomb back in his handkerchief and stowed it away with the scissor blade, thinking that he was growing a treasure. He did not like to think what else he might have to use the blade on, but he felt a little better for having it. They washed up and set the pot to soaking after they had scraped it as clean as they could. Then he had to help Merri wash her face (how did she get honey stuck in her eyebrows??) before going out to see what other chores the frowning man had for them.
He’d fallen asleep in the sun, hands clasped over a belly that showed under his thin shirt. The frown had almost slipped away, leaving heavily tanned skin that showed few lines. He had an underlying copper tone to his Vaelinar complexion as a few did, but Evar was fascinated by the change in the frowning man. He looked almost . . . nice. If he looked nice in his sleep, in his dreams, then it was something dreadful that turned him nasty when awake. Evar couldn’t think of anything he and Merri had done to earn such hatred. It just simply seemed to be.
He turned away before the man could wake and before he said anything, but as they slipped past, Merri stubbed her bare toes on the rough-hewn steps and cried out. He came awake abruptly, eyes clear and forehead immediately sinking into deep lines, hand going to his belt where he kept his weapon sheathed, a wicked and curved short sword. It wouldn’t be much good for stabbing, but it would be a devastating slicer, Evar figured. That much he knew from the many toy soldiers he’d once had and the times he and Dayne had spent skirmishing with them. He rubbed his forehead. So many more thoughts got in now than used to. The valley kept filling them up every day, and he wondered if his head would begin spilling over like a too full pot set to boiling.
The frowning man waved over to the pastures. “We got fences to fix.”
Merri stood on one foot with her hand about her other one, in midair. “I don’t know how.” She worried at getting the other shoe on and finally achieved it.
“Oh, don’t ya worry, little shit-blooded bastige. I’ll be teaching ya. Follow me.” He glanced at Merri’s feet. “What th’ cold hell did ya do that for?”
“My shoes won’t go on my feet.” Her face wrinkled up, eyes brimming. “So my toes have to stick out.”
“Doncha be crying over that.” He cast his knotted-up gaze on Evarton. “What about ya feet?”
“Shoes are tight. Sir.”
“Weeds. Filthy choking weeds ye are.” He spat off into the dirt. The frowning man made a noise deep in his throat. “We’ll see about thet. Now, on with ya. Plenty of daylight left for work.”
By the time the sun hung directly over the horse pastures, Evar had learned what he could of fence building and most of that was that neither he nor Merri were big or strong enough to do it successfully. The frowning man didn’t seem to care if they did it right, only if they struggled hard while doing it. Merri’s hair grew damp with sweat, and her face which already carried their mother Nutmeg’s natural apple-blushed cheeks grew vibrantly pink. Post splinters filled their hands, and dirt buried itself deep under their nails. The bales of braided wire sprung on them more than once, flinging one or the other halfway across the fallow meadows, much to the amusement of the frowning man.
<
br /> Evar heard his sister’s cry behind him as the wire snapped into its coil once more, this time imprisoning her inside and he rushed to free her, the sound of harsh laughter at his heels. He burned at the sound of it, punctuating Merri’s plea for help. He grasped her trembling hand. “I’ll get you out.”
Sweat or maybe it was tears slicked her face. “It hurts. All over.”
He could see the purple bruising on her arms and ankles and where her shirt had pulled away from her stomach. She chewed on her lower lip. He knew what she prepared to do, and she couldn’t, not here, not now, not with the frowning man watching. He leaned close.
“Don’t make it better.”
“But it hurts, Evar.”
“No! We can’t show him what we do. Remember what Auntie said.” He took his mouth away from her ear and concentrated on pulling the wire rounder open so he could tug her free. He could feel the silver energy from the valley coiling up inside him. If he wanted, he could make wire fences all along the pastures, so many they would never need a fence again. He could do it. It swelled inside of him, up his throat, until the words and power shoved to break free.
But he did not dare. Merri couldn’t, and he couldn’t. This was terrible, but something worse waited for them if they did. He didn’t know what, but it had scared Grampa Tolby and Grandma Lily and Mama and Dayne and Auntie Corrie. They were broken somehow, inside, and if they showed it, the frowning man might hurt them dreadfully. This beautiful valley, lonely and stretching in front of them, held a deadly trap waiting to chomp them up. He knew it.
“Pull,” he told her, swallowing his power and his fear. “I’ll get you out.”
They grasped their hands tightly, small hands compared to those of the frowning man, but Evar could feel the strength and magic running through them. He knotted his fingers about it tightly and slowly, determinedly, pulled his sister free. She lay on the grass at his feet for a moment, curled up in pain and gasping a bit, and he said nothing but stared at the frowning man. Stared hard enough to burn holes. The man turned his face away from them.
When Merri uncurled, he set her on her feet. The two of them brushed her off and about, making sure she hadn’t broken a bone or was bleeding anywhere. She hissed between her teeth at nearly every touch but made no attempt to heal herself although she trembled with the effort not to. He pressed her shoulder gently. “I know it hurts.”
Her eyes looked up at him hopefully. “Tonight?”
He nodded.
Balling her hands into fists, she wailed, “I can’t wait.”
“You have to.”
“It hurts me all over.”
“Merri, you can’t.”
She put the knuckles of her right hand to his cheekbone where the wire had whipped up against him. It’d hurt sharply then, but he’d nearly forgotten it. He winced now as she touched him. “It’ll make a mark.” She opened her hand and laid her palm to his face; he felt a brief, warm glow. “There. Better.”
And when she dropped her hand, she balled it up again, her knuckles white. “I won’t do anymore,” she told him. “Till tonight.”
Over the top of her head, he could see the frowning man watching them intently again. Evar hugged Merri carefully as the man called out gruffly, “Back to work or there’ll be no dinner.”
Evar stooped to the braided wire and loosed just enough of his power to make it more supple and easier to handle. The metal warmed under his fingers in answer, telling him it was ready and eager to do whatever he asked of it, but he bit the inside of his cheek instead, a warning to himself that they were being watched most carefully.
He pulled the wire bale open, instructed Merri to stand on it while he unrolled the rest of the length, and then the two of them struggled to cut the length and hold it while the frowning man nailed it firmly into place. They set new posts the rest of the day until Merri fell to her knees with a little whimper. Then the frowning man glanced at the sun low in the sky.
“That’ll do,” he told him. “Get back and clean up. I’ll check the traps for dinner.”
And while it wasn’t cooked long enough to be truly tender, the long-ear stew they had tasted really good. Long after the sun had set and a sliver of the moon appeared, the frowning man finally fell asleep, and Merri could tend to their wounds. She did so, shaking with tiredness. Evar could feel the power flickering in her like the fretful flame of a candle with wind flowing over it, but they were mostly better before they fell into their cots.
Evar didn’t know why the frowning man hated them, but he knew that he hated the man back. He also felt sure that he would grow to hate him even more over the coming days and nights.
Chapter
Forty-Seven
THE APPROACHING NIGHT shivered over him. Bregan sat hunched with his arms folded over his head, enjoying the silence of the evening, the silence that had settled about him like a mantle for weeks now. Blessed quiet. He couldn’t train in the quiet and knew that, but he didn’t mind it for his ears still felt raw from listening. The Gods did not speak in patient or gentle tones. No, they railed at him. Shrieked and hammered. Whined until they hit a high note that sliced through him. There was one voice, soft and low, but what it said was so appalling, so disgusting and gruesome, that he would rather the voice disappear in a cacophony of noise like the others than to be audible. Sibilant, it cut through the other voices easily, but it was the voice he wished to hear the least of all of them. It made his head throb and his stomach knot, and it dripped like rancid grease down the back of his throat. When that voice had left him a day or so ago, he rejoiced although he knew it was only a matter of time until it returned. He had eaten and slept better than he had in too many seasons to recall, and he wished he could count better than that, but memory eluded him now more often than not.
No, he embraced the silence he found now, not knowing how he’d achieved it but infinitely grateful it had come to him. Bregan put his arms down at his sides and rolled his shoulders to ease the tense muscles there a bit. Today, he felt almost like himself again: Bregan Oxfort, a Master Trader, son of Willard Oxfort, head of the Hawthorne Guild of Traders.
He dipped a hand in his pocket, finding nothing more than a loose thread or two and some lint. Should he not have a few gems and some gold pieces in various denominations, and perhaps even a crinkled paper bill or two? It seemed he eschewed wealth as well as his former status.
He peeled his shirt away from his rib cage, scarcely more than a rag, and wondered at his wearing of it. The tattered trousers that covered his lower limbs accomplished the job only a bit better, and his elvish brace gleamed from ankle to mid-thigh over the one pants leg, giving it a chance at fewer tears and holes than the left. He peered at his feet, hardened and brown, shoved into old sandals though it was obvious he often went barefoot. Had he fallen, or had he simply degraded into this state? Bregan tilted his head to one side, remembering rich clothes and jewelry as befit a Kernan of Master Trader status.
That was, of course, before he’d lost his mind as well as his purse. He knotted his fingers in his trouser leg and, not surprisingly, the fabric gave way to a gaping hole. He’d have to beg for more clothes. A chilly tug in the wind told him of the changing seasons with winter near. He’d have to do his begging soon, or the cold would accomplish what the voices had not. He rubbed his hand over his arm. The skin, brown and freckled and weathered, reminded him of the arms of caravan drivers, free-striding and living men that Bregan had never thought he would, or wanted to, resemble although he had escorted his father and his own caravans many a time. He had, however, worn shirts with billowing sleeves to protect his arms, as well as long, soft pants to cover his legs, boots as soft as a baby’s skin, and a wide-brimmed hat to keep the sun from his eyes and face. He must have shed all those long ago.
The wind came about again, a tiny puff against the side of his face, a tease. He flicked it off, like an annoying insect. The wav
e of his hand left an arc of color in its wake about his head, and he stared at it for long moments until the colors faded away completely. The ground underneath him trembled slightly, as if a very heavy footfall nearby sounded, although he knew of no one large enough to make the very earth shake. The earth shook when volcanoes stirred to life—only one or two on this vast continent—but it was said the island continent to the south held a number of active volcanoes which could rumble to life. And there were those times when whatever God who wore the world on its back simply tired of the burden and shifted, often carelessly and without heed for whatever destruction might be caused. The world was full of structures laid low, all with little or no warning.
Bregan lifted his chin a bit. In past days, the old war hammer Rakka had shaken city walls and even mountains from their foundations when struck by its wielder. Diort built his empire from those struck down by the hammer when they would not yield to him, but he had given warning, in all fairness. In those past days, a God of Kerith had been laid inside the war hammer while it was being made, and a bargain had been struck between the maker—Quendius and his hound Narskap—and Abayan Diort. His guardian had not kept that bargain, ultimately, and the demon fled when the hammer fell at Ashenbrook, helping to save the day for Bistel and Lariel’s forces, fell for good rather than the total domination Quendius had intended. But those were the last times Bregan could remember anything making the earth rattle beneath him, quite as it did now. Memories moved him now.
He spread his hands out, palms up, as if he could reflect the dusk from them, reluctant to give up the day to night, savoring his quietude. He so rarely knew who and when and where he was these days. The power of the Mageborn burned through him like a hot knife through sweet churned butter and left him behind in a puddle, more often than not. He had no more control of his powers than a newborn did of its body, and despite Diort’s patient guardianship, the situation did not seem to be improving. Unless one could count these days of silence as an improvement, which gave him hope that there might be more facing him.
