Mist-Torn Witches 02:Witches in Red

by Barb Hendee

  The largest of these was also in the best condition, with a solid-looking roof and shutters over the windows. Two women were busy out front. One was hanging clothes, and the other was tending a fire. Both straightened as Céline approached.

  The one tending the fire was perhaps sixteen years old, but Céline stopped upon getting a better look at her. She was beautiful, slender and small boned, with a mane of black hair. Her skin was pale, and her eyes were as black as her hair. Her slight body tensed, and she reminded Céline of a young doe about to spring. There was something wild in her eyes.

  Céline smiled. “Hello.”

  The woman hanging laundry approached, protectively stepping up beside the girl. This one was about twenty-five, though thin lines were already etched about the corners of her eyes. Her thick hair was a shade of brown-black and pulled back into a braid. While she lacked the girl’s beauty, she was pretty, and Céline thought them alike enough to be sisters.

  “What do you want?” the older one asked, glancing at Jaromir, her tone a mix of anger and anxiety.

  Céline had to admit that he did look rather intimidating, especially in comparison with some of the soldiers stationed here.

  “We’ve been sent here to help,” Céline said quickly, turning to open the box in Jaromir’s arms. “I’m a healer from Castle Sèone, and Prince Lieven asked his son, my lord, to send you some assistance. He’s heard of your troubles and these terrible attacks.” She motioned the woman closer and pointed to various pots, jars, and bottles inside the box. “There is cough syrup, healing ointment, salve for aching joints, bandages, insect and burn salves, and, oh, this is a cleansing tonic.”

  The woman’s eyes flew over the contents of the box. Her body gave off waves of slow-burning anger, but something akin to hope passed across her face at the same time. The slip of a girl took a step or two closer, just enough to peek inside the box, still moving like a forest animal come in from the trees.

  Céline smiled again. “I am Céline, and this is my sister, Amelie. This man is Lieutenant Jaromir. He is our bodyguard, but I do assure you, we’ve been sent to help.”

  The woman’s eyes moved up to Céline’s face as if searching for something, and then, satisfied, she nodded. “I am Mercedes. This is my sister, Mariah.”

  The girl studied Amelie curiously, but she would not move closer to where Jaromir stood.

  “Do you have any injured or ill here who need attention?” Céline asked.

  Mercedes shook her head in seeming disbelief. “Do we have any . . . ? Yes. We have a number of people in need.”

  Céline motioned to the wagon. “Perhaps I could set up here, and you could tell the others?”

  Mercedes glanced back at the box.

  “Mariah,” she said finally, “bring these ladies inside and give them what help they need. I’m going to find Marcus and have him round up any wounded men. I’ll speak to the women myself.”

  The girl tilted her head to one side and waved Céline forward. Then she sprang up the back steps of the wagon and opened a door.

  Céline followed.

  * * *

  Watching Céline head up the steps, Amelie turned to Jaromir. “You’d better wait out here. We’ll be fine, and I don’t think there’s much room in there.” She looked over toward the shacks and huts. “You might even try walking around and talking to some of the men. See what you can learn that Captain Keegan didn’t tell us.”

  “I doubt any of them will talk to me.”

  “They will,” she insisted. “After only a minute or two, they’ll see that you’re here to help. You have that effect on people. All the villagers at Castle Sèone trust you.”

  He blinked several times and then nodded. “All right, but I won’t go far.”

  Turning, she hurried up the stairs to help her sister.

  Inside, the covered wagon felt even more like a house. Toward the front were two bunk beds nailed into the wall. A bench was built into one sidewall with a stationary table. Pots and pans hung from the other wall. Threadbare curtains covered the shuttered windows.

  “Mariah, would you open the shutters for some light and air?” Céline said as she took off her cloak and began setting out a collection of jars and bottles on the table.

  “That soldier won’t come in, will he?” the girl asked.

  It was the first time she’d spoken. Her voice was soft and wild, like her eyes, but she spoke with real fear—and something deeper, possibly hatred. Amelie wondered what she might have suffered at the hands of the soldiers here.

  “No,” Amelie answered firmly. “He won’t. But even if he did, he wouldn’t hurt you.”

  Sounds of footsteps came from the stairs, and Mercedes returned with Céline’s first patients, a bone-thin woman and two children, all coughing.

  “Come in,” Céline said.

  Mercedes sent the family in, but she remained outside.

  The rest of the afternoon became a blur. Mariah slipped out so there would be more room inside. Amelie stayed to help her sister, but the condition of the people here soon began to wear upon her. She had seen poverty, true poverty, in Shetâna, but this was different; a string of half-starved women and children flowed through, suffering from deep coughs, ringworm, infected insect bites, and shingles. Some of the women were pregnant. Céline did what she could for them.

  Things only got worse when the men began arriving. Mining must be a dangerous business, as the equally underfed men coming through the door bore old injuries of poorly set broken bones. Most of the men over thirty were beginning to succumb to their joints stiffening to the point of constant pain.

  There was nothing Céline could do for poorly set bones, long healed, but she’d brought along two jugs of a dense liquid she made from monkshood that worked well on aging joints, and she spent several hours just rubbing it into elbows and shoulders and knees to help relieve pain. She told some of the men that she’d come back tomorrow, and if they brought her a small empty jar or bottle, she’d send some of the monkshood home with them.

  Several times, Mercedes came up to stand in the open doorway, just watching Céline.

  In the late afternoon, a father arrived with a boy of about fifteen who was holding his left arm with his right hand. The arm had been loosely tied up with a stained rag that was not wide enough to serve as a proper sling.

  “Broke his arm three days back,” the father said. “We were among the few still willing to go back into the mines, and then one of those beasts attacked. The boy was standing in a cart and scrambled to get out. He fell.”

  Amelie was attempting to straighten up the bottles on the table. “Inside the mines? One of the . . . wolves attacked you there? Were you working at night?”

  “No, it was midday. But no one has gone back in since.”

  Amelie took a moment to get her head around that. One of the Pählen soldiers had transformed and attacked the miners at work in the middle of the day?

  “Bring the boy inside,” Céline said.

  The boy was brought in, and she sat him on the bench and removed the makeshift sling to examine his forearm. Amelie winced. The bone had been broken and had not been set at all. Although the skin wasn’t torn, from what she could see, the bone was still in two pieces. If something was not done, he’d lose use of the arm.

  Céline looked up at the father. “If it’s only been a few days, I should able to set this.” She picked up the bottle of poppy syrup. “But it will be painful enough that I’d need to put him to sleep first, and splinting the injury will take some time. Once the bone is secured, it will need to remain splinted and in a sling for at least a moon, probably longer. He’ll not be able to work for a while, but once the bone knits, he will have use of his arm again.”

  The man was clearly unaccustomed to anyone trying to help him or his family, and he wrung his hands in indecision. Although he himself had
not thought to do anything for the boy’s injury, Céline’s talk of pain and setting bones had clearly upset him. He seemed uncertain about entrusting his son to a stranger.

  The man looked to Mercedes, who was standing in the doorway.

  She wore the same quietly angry expression, but her head moved up and down once. “She’s one of my people, from the line of Fawe. If she says she can set the bone, she can set it.”

  Amelie was startled. How would Mercedes know they were Móndyalítko, from the line of Fawe? But she bit back any questions. She didn’t want the miner to begin to doubt.

  “How can I help?” the man asked.

  “Get some boards,” Céline answered, “strong, but narrow and short, so I can splint his forearm.”

  And so for the second time in two days, Amelie helped her sister drug someone senseless, set a bone, brace it with boards, and wrap it tightly. By the time they were done, Céline was pale and wiping her forehead with her sleeve. Since entering this wagon, she’d not stopped to rest for hours.

  “Now we need something to make a proper sling,” she said, looking around.

  Mercedes was still in the open doorway. “Use one of the curtains. They’re clean, and I cannot think of anything else.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “I’m sure.”

  The curtains were one of the few homey touches inside the wagon, but Céline took one down and fashioned a sling, tying the boy’s arm against his chest.

  “He should wake soon,” she said.

  Mercedes turned to call outside somewhere, “Shaldon, you can come carry him home.” Then her voice lowered, and she spoke to someone else outside. “Mariah, go and tell Marcus not to bring any more men. The healer’s done in. But tell him that I want him to come himself.”

  A few moments later, the still-sleeping boy was carried out, and Céline finally sank onto the bench.

  * * *

  Céline’s hands and arms were nearly numb as she allowed herself to sit still for a few breaths.

  Mercedes stepped inside the wagon. “You did well. I’d forgotten . . . I’ve forgotten a lot of things.”

  “How did you know she’s from the line of Fawe?” Amelie asked.

  Céline looked up, as she had been wondering that herself.

  “Her hair,” Mercedes answered. “Only the line of Fawe has hair that color. You see any Móndyalítko here with tan hair? And you’ve both got lavender eyes.”

  “But how did you know we’re Móndyalítko?” Céline asked.

  Mercedes snorted. “You think I’d let you in here, let you treat these people, if you weren’t? I know my own kind when I see one.”

  Perhaps unconsciously, Amelie reached up and touched her hair. Ironically, she’d inherited her dark hair from their father, who was not Móndyalítko.

  Then Céline felt rather than heard something in the doorway and turned her head. She froze. The man standing there was a taller, more muscular version of Mariah, though he was closer to Mercedes in age. His coal black hair hung down past his collar, and his eyes were locked on Céline. She would never have described him as handsome. He was . . . beautiful. Like Mariah, he had something almost feral about him, as if he didn’t belong inside any four walls. More important, even though she’d never seen him before, there was something familiar about him, as if she’d known him for years.

  “This is my cousin Marcus,” Mercedes said. “I want you to look at his shoulder. He’ll be the last one today. I promise.”

  “My shoulder’s fine,” Marcus answered.

  “It’s not fine,” Mariah snapped at him, “and we have a proper healer. Let her see it.” She moved to the back of the wagon, to the bunk beds, to give him room to enter.

  Slowly, still staring at Céline, he came inside.

  “Please sit,” she managed to say, and he sank onto the bench.

  Amelie went to sit with Mercedes on one of the beds.

  “Take a look at the back of his right shoulder,” Mercedes instructed.

  His shirt was dark brown, but when Céline moved to examine his back, she could see spots of blood soaking through.

  “Please take off your shirt,” she told him.

  This he did without hesitating.

  “Oh, Marcus,” she breathed, as if she’d spoken his name a thousand times before. “What happened?”

  Four deep gouges ran from the top of his shoulder halfway down his back. They were angry and swollen and looked as if they’d not even begun to close.

  “One of those soldier-wolves slashed me. I was trying to draw it off that boy you just helped.” When he spoke the word “soldier,” the hatred in his voice was unmistakable.

  “Inside the mine?” she asked.

  “Yes. We managed to kill it, but it cost us.”

  Céline didn’t ask what it had cost. Right now, she didn’t want to know. “These wounds are on the verge of infection. I need to do a deep cleaning . . . and it’s going to hurt.” She picked up the bottle of poppy syrup. “I want you to drink just a spoonful of this, not enough to put you to sleep, but enough to dull the pain.”

  He glanced at the bottle skeptically.

  “Do it,” Mercedes ordered him.

  Céline poured a wooden spoonful, and he let her feed it to him.

  “We need to wait a few moments,” she said, “and let that take effect.”

  Mariah appeared in the doorway, looking in. The resemblance between her and her male cousin was astonishing. Then it occurred to Céline that although these three were slender, they weren’t starving. Marcus’s bare shoulders and arms showed lean but developed muscles.

  “You helped the children,” Mariah said to Céline. “That was good.”

  Her words and speech were so simple that Céline wasn’t certain how to respond for a few seconds. “There wasn’t much I could do. What they need is food.”

  “They won’t find much of that here,” Marcus said, “except in the soldiers’ provisions tent.”

  “Why don’t you have any animals?” Amelie asked. “Chickens or a milk cow?”

  “Can’t afford to buy a cow,” Mercedes answered. “And we ate the last of the chickens years ago, before we even arrived.”

  “How many years have you been here?”

  “Three.”

  Listening to the exchange, even with what little she knew of her mother’s people, Céline couldn’t imagine a group of Móndyalítko remaining in this awful place for three years.

  “Where are your horses?” she asked Marcus quietly.

  “Gone.” He glanced away. “I hunt for us, and we eat whatever Captain Keegan doesn’t take.” Again, when he said Keegan’s name, the hatred in his voice was thick. “We share what we can with the others here, and Mariah does what she can for the children.”

  He looked at Mariah, in the doorway, and she looked back. Something passed between them, but Céline had no idea what.

  Picking up the jar of adder’s-tongue ointment and a clean rag, she said, “All right, this won’t be pleasant.”

  Turning her attention to his wounds, she remembered that one of the reasons she’d come here was to examine anyone injured by the afflicted soldiers. Judging by the distance between the claw marks on Marcus’s back, whatever had done this to him must have had enormous paws.

  She started at the top of his shoulder and began to work her way down. He didn’t gasp or flinch once, and she knew the poppy syrup could not be dulling all the pain. When she finished cleaning all the wounds, she put away the adder’s-tongue and switched to a mixture of ground garlic and ginger in vinegar.

  “This is going to sting, but it will ward off infection,” she said, dabbing the mixture onto a clean rag and touching it to his back.

  Again, he didn’t flinch.

  When she’d finished with that, she wrapped his shoulder as best sh
e could and helped him get his shirt back on. He let her.

  Mercedes stood up suddenly, seeming uncomfortable. “We can’t pay you anything.”

  So weary by now that she was having trouble staying on her feet, Céline leaned on the table. “We didn’t come for payment.” Then something occurred to her. “Oh . . . there is one thing, perhaps a favor you might help us with.”

  Mercedes’s entire body went rigid. “A favor?”

  “Yes, we had to pack light for the journey, and Amelie and I were only allowed one extra wool dress for day wear. We nearly ruined the ones we wore on the journey here. I have blood on mine from tending to an injured soldier. How can we get them laundered here? Could you allow us to use your washtub and clothesline?”

  Mercedes’s expression turned incredulous, and then she barked out a single laugh. “That’s your favor? Help with washing a few gowns?” She shook her head. “You bring them to me, and I’ll launder them myself. I can get blood out of wool.”

  “Thank you.”

  Still sitting on the bench, Marcus was watching Céline with his black eyes, as if trying to figure her out. She put on her cloak and gathered up the box of supplies as Amelie moved to join her.

  “We’ll be back tomorrow,” Céline said, hoping she sounded businesslike. “Marcus, don’t take off those bandages, even if the wounds itch.”

  Mariah made room in the doorway, and Céline headed out, nearly tripping on the stairs from exhaustion. The sun dipped low. Was it only that morning that she had waved good-bye to Corporal Bazin and the other soldiers from Sèone and then followed Jaromir into this encampment? It felt as if whole days had passed.

  Jaromir was waiting for them near the path up ahead, but as Amelie walked beside her, Céline whispered, “What do you think of those three back there in the wagon?”

  “I think someone in their family has a penchant for names starting with the letter M.”

  This attempt at humor was so unexpected that Céline couldn’t help the corners of her mouth turning up. Amelie could almost always make her smile.

  “In truth,” Amelie added, “I think Mercedes is angry, but she lets it out. Marcus and Mariah are holding in a lot of hatred.”