Touch of Power

by Maria V. Snyder

  “Ha. Ha. Not funny,” Flea said.

  “Is there such a thing as a good poison?” Loren asked.

  “Actually, there is,” I said. “The fulip plant is poisonous, but if you dry it, crush it and mix it with ginger water, it becomes a remedy for an upset stomach.”

  “You seem to know what you’re doing. Why didn’t you graduate?”

  “The plague came before I finished my apprenticeship.”

  The humorous mood faded in an instant. The plague had ruined all our futures. I served the rest of the soup, but noticed everyone but Belen waited until I swallowed a few mouthfuls before they ate. Joking aside, they still didn’t trust me.

  “Stop overthinking it. Your head is getting in the way of your feet,” Kerrick said.

  “That makes no sense,” I said, stifling my frustration.

  I had been walking through the woods all morning and getting nowhere. Back and forth outside the cave, I tried to copy Kerrick’s silent movements.

  “It’s all in how you step and how you distribute your weight.”

  He watched while I made another pass.

  “Use your hips more.”

  “Like this?” My hips swayed with each step. I felt ridiculous.

  “No. Not like that.” He came up behind me. “Let me show you.”

  When Kerrick grasped my hips, his magic flowed over me, igniting a tingling warmth in places it shouldn’t.

  “Why are you pulling power?” I asked.

  “Am I?” He sounded surprised.

  “Yes.”

  “Habit, I guess. Keeping my connection with the forest just in case. Ignore it.”

  Easy for him to say. He didn’t have someone leaning against his back sending him distracting vibrations.

  “Walk like you did the last time,” he said.

  As I stepped, he corrected my gait. We did a couple passes. I understood what he had been trying to explain, but when he released me, I wasn’t so sure.

  “That’s better. Try again.”

  I did. Again and again and again. All afternoon, which normally would have been unpleasant, but there was a big difference in personalities between Kerrick the teacher and Kerrick the leader.

  “That’s it,” he said. “You got the technique. Now you need to—”

  “Practice.” My words to Flea had come back to haunt me.

  “Right. I’ll give you two days.”

  “And if I don’t improve?”

  “I’ll go with Flea to the market. But if you do improve, you’ll graduate.” Humor lit his gray eyes—they had changed color to match the winter forest.

  “As long as graduating doesn’t involve swearing an oath.”

  “Oh, no, wouldn’t want to do that. Besides, you’ve been true to your word. That’s all I need.”

  I spent the next two days practicing in the woods on my own. It was refreshing to be by myself for a few hours. And without the pressure of someone watching me, I could focus all my energy into listening to the forest’s song. Once I knew what sounds to listen for, I wondered how I had missed them before.

  After my two days of practice, Kerrick announced we’d all play a game of hide-and-seek. “If she can find everyone, she wins.”

  “Sweet,” Flea said.

  “The rules are…” Kerrick waited for everyone’s attention. “You can’t stay in one hiding place too long. You have to switch spots to give her a chance to hear you.” He paused dramatically for a moment. “Ready. Set. Go!”

  Chapter 10

  The game of hide-and-seek was on. The men scattered into the woods. I turned my back to the forest, facing the outer rock wall of the cave.

  “And no cheating,” Quain called. “Make sure you count to a hundred before seeking.”

  “Don’t forget to shout out the ‘Ready or not’ at the end,” Loren said.

  Half of me felt foolish, the other half reverted to my childhood days—when no other worries sullied the pure thrill of the hunt. I embraced my childish side, pushing away the dull adult sensibilities. I counted faster. Long-forgotten strategies surfaced in my mind. Too bad all the…boys—couldn’t call them men when playing this game—wore gray, black or dark brown clothing. It made sense for blending in with the winter landscape, but it gave them an advantage for now.

  “Ready or not, here I come.” I spun around, hoping to catch a flash of movement as one of the boys dashed to a hiding spot. Nothing. Not even a branch swayed. I listened to the forest for a moment. Off to my right, an unnatural off-note sounded.

  Despite the cold air, I removed my cloak. I wore my black clothes, but I had taken the time to smear gray clay I had found at the bottom of a shallow pool in the caves over sections of my shirt and pants, equalizing the playing field.

  Instead of going right, I walked with the special—what to call it?—gait straight for a while before veering right, hoping to come in behind the unnatural spot. I stopped often to make sure my quarry hadn’t moved. As I drew closer, I noted a dense little thicket that would be perfect to hide behind. I stood nearby and waited. Sure enough, Flea slipped out, searching for another spot. I followed.

  Once Flea found a place to hide, I crept up on him and pounced. His yell of surprise echoed throughout the forest.

  Sputtering with indignation, he said, “You didn’t have to scare me!”

  I feigned innocence. “I thought you heard me.”

  “Yeah, right. You have that evil gleam in your eyes. Have you’ve been pretending to be noisy all this time?”

  “No. But you don’t know everything about me. Like the fact that when I was younger, no one could hide from me. I was Queen Seeker.” I had grown up in a small city, but a few of the strategies for seeking someone in an urban environment worked out here, as well.

  Flea grumbled, but I shooed him back to the cave. “Hurry up so I can find the rest.”

  “You won’t find Kerrick,” he said.

  I waited until the forest settled, then honed in on another off-key area. This time I caught Quain.

  “At least I’m not the first one,” he said. He wore a gray wool cap over his bald head. “You’re a fast learner, but you won’t find Kerrick.”

  If Quain and Flea had been trying to discourage me, they failed. I continued to stop and listen. But when I encountered the perfect hiding spot—a dried creek bed hidden under the branches of a fallen tree, I knew one of the boys wouldn’t be able to resist this place. I squirmed below the thickest part of the branches and pressed against the bank. My years on the run hadn’t been a total waste. A couple of the skills I had learned aided me today. The biggest one was patience.

  After twenty or thirty minutes, Loren slid under the tree.

  “Ah, hell,” he said. “I should have known this spot was too good to be true.”

  Three down, two to go. I made half-circle sweeps farther and farther from the cave and, on my tenth pass, I sensed a strangeness. Boulders jutted from the ground. A few were in mounds while others stood alone. As my gaze traveled over the area, something seemed wrong. Not the color, not the size, but one shape kept snagging my attention. One large boulder had soft lines and a symmetry to it.

  When I touched the boulder, it chuckled. Belen peeked out from under his cloak.

  “With my size, I didn’t have a lot of choices,” he said.

  “You blended in,” I said. “But one thing I did learn as a healer’s apprentice was to be observant. A rash could be just an ordinary rash, but if it had blurry edges, it was a sign of a more serious illness.”

  “I knew you were smart, so I’m not surprised you found the four of us. But—”

  “I won’t find Kerrick. Everyone seems to delight in telling me that.”

  “Don’t
take it the wrong way,” Belen, ever the peacemaker, said. “His ability to disappear in the forest is impressive. We’re just proud of him.”

  As Belen returned to the cave, I wondered if they’d still be proud of him if they knew about his magic.

  I considered the problem. Kerrick wouldn’t make any noise, and the forest wouldn’t give him away with out-of-tune notes. He would be camouflaged, but not by magic. That wouldn’t be fair unless he used it unconsciously, keeping contact with the forest just in case. I might be able to feel it and follow it to him.

  Except I only felt it when we touched. Skin to skin. I searched my memories. Something Kerrick had done…when he knew about the mercs… An image formed in my mind of him crouched down, touching the ground with his hand.

  I pressed my palm to the earth. A slight tingle rolled along my fingers. Was it going in any certain direction? Concentrating, I thought it might be coming from my left. Which didn’t help since I couldn’t crawl because he’d hear me. I needed to stay on my feet. Of course!

  Sitting down, I pulled my boots and socks off. I stood, cringing as my soles touched the cold ground. After my skin adapted to the temperature, I felt that tingle pointing to the left. I’d have to find him before my feet froze and lost all sensation.

  The vibrations intensified as I walked. I covered a good bit of ground before the tingle stopped. Which probably meant Kerrick had seen me with bare feet, figured out what I was doing and ceased using magic, or my feet were numb.

  Kerrick must be close. I turned in a circle, scanning the forest before remembering he wouldn’t stand out. Frustration swelled, but I shoved it down. What were my options? I couldn’t use sight, touch or sound. What’s left? Taste and smell.

  Not about to taste the dirt, I sniffed the air. The cold damp scent of earth with a slight rotten taint filled my nose. With no other options, I returned to the cave and did sweeps again, but instead of listening, I drew in deep lungfuls of air. Ten, twelve, fifteen, twenty, twenty-three sweeps later, I caught a hint of spring sunshine. Like a hunting dog, I followed it, sucking in so much air I was dizzy.

  The scent increased and I focused all my energy into staying with it. It led me to a huge briar full of thorns. I remembered when Kerrick had rolled me right through the underbrush. But then he had used his magic. Of course, he could have pulled power to get inside, then stopped. Except his scent wasn’t coming from the patch, but seemed to surround me. Odd.

  I circled the briar a few times, puzzling over the inconsistency. No brilliant solution came to mind. I’d lost him. That one word—lost—jolted me. Yegor the bull had lost his horns. I scanned the trees above my head.

  Kerrick lounged on a limb. His amused half smile grew into a full-blown grin. “What took you so long?”

  “Well, I napped a couple hours this afternoon so the boys would believe they were hard to find.”

  “Ah, yes, the fragile male ego. Always good to keep it intact.” Kerrick swung down from the limb and landed beside me without making a sound. “So what gave me away? My magic?”

  “At first, but you stopped using it.”

  “Once I realized I’d connected to the forest, I had to stop. Otherwise, it wouldn’t have been fair.”

  “Uh-huh. Keep repeating that, and maybe one of us will eventually believe you.” Now that the game had ended, I relaxed and woke to other sensations. The cold air assaulted my exposed skin. My hands and feet were numb. I retraced my steps to where I’d left my boots.

  Kerrick followed but kept quiet as I pulled on my wool socks. I shivered. My cloak was back at the cave. Of course Kerrick had gone the farthest.

  We headed back “home.”

  After a few minutes, he said, “You didn’t answer my question. How did you find me?”

  I feigned confusion. “I didn’t answer? Odd. Doesn’t sound like me.”

  “You’re not going to tell me, are you?”

  “Why would I do that?”

  “Because if you tell me, I might change something and you won’t be able to find me next time.”

  And I was too embarrassed to tell him I sniffed him out. I shouldn’t know he smelled of spring sunshine, shouldn’t care and shouldn’t tell him a damn thing. But, knowing him, he would pester me for an answer.

  I asked, “Remember when Belen was injured by the mercs?”

  “Hard to forget.”

  “You distracted them while Flea and the monkeys positioned themselves up on the rocks. It was a good strategy. People don’t usually look up. When I lost your trail, I remembered it.”

  “Interesting.” He didn’t say anything else for the rest of the trip.

  The others waited for us outside the cave. Their expressions remained uncertain as they looked from me to Kerrick and back, searching for some hint of what had happened. They hoped I’d failed. After all, they had boasted about Kerrick’s superior forest skills.

  Finally, Quain asked, “Well?”

  “You were right,” I said before Kerrick could open his mouth. “I couldn’t find him.”

  I endured a few “told you so’s” from the monkeys and Flea. They whooped and were obnoxious. Belen, though, gave me a shrewd look. I met his gaze without flinching or glancing down. I’d learned to lie while on the run. My life had depended on it. Funny, my mother didn’t even have to see my face to know when I’d been lying.

  Once the boys were done crowing, they returned to the cave for a special surprise. I grabbed my cloak and moved to follow, but Kerrick clasped my shoulder, stopping me.

  “Explain,” he ordered.

  “I couldn’t disappoint them.”

  “That makes no sense. I let them down. Not you. Besides, it’s just a silly game. And they won’t let you forget it. You did boast you were Queen Seeker.”

  “It may have been a silly game to you, but not to them. You’re their leader. They have complete confidence in you, which they should. Any doubt, no matter how small or silly, can be detrimental to their trust. You’ll be ordering them to risk their lives, not the Queen Seeker.”

  Kerrick stared at me so long I grew uncomfortable and wondered what he was thinking about. I almost swayed in relief when he glanced away.

  He swept a hand out, gesturing to the entrance to the cave. “After you, your majesty.” He bowed.

  I punched his arm. “Don’t start. I’ll take the ribbing from the boys, but not from you.”

  “Who said I was teasing?”

  Now it was my turn to stare at him.

  “Hey, what’s taking you so long?” Quain called. “Can’t Avry find the entrance?”

  Laughter erupted from inside the cave.

  “I warned you,” Kerrick said.

  “I grew up with two brothers. I can handle harmless teasing. Besides, laughter heals the soul. You should try it sometime.” I walked into the cave without looking back.

  Cheers and a few good-natured taunts greeted me. The men stood in a line with their hands hidden behind their backs, fidgeting like kids who had been caught stealing sweets. Their attention focused on Kerrick, who had followed me inside. He nodded.

  “Okay, boys. What’s going on?” I asked.

  Belen stepped forward. “We decided that even though you didn’t find Kerrick, you did catch the rest of us and should graduate. Congratulations!” They hooted and hollered.

  “Thanks. Now stop blocking the heat, I’m frozen solid.”

  “Not so fast,” Belen said. “We still need to give you our graduation gifts.”

  “But—”

  Belen approached and brought his hands forward. With a dramatic flourish, he opened them, revealing a pair of black gloves. “I noticed you didn’t have a pair.”

  “Where—?”

  “They were mine, but they h
ad holes in the fingertips. I just cut them down for you and sewed them.” He gave them to me. “Try them on.”

  They fit, but all I could say was, “You sew?”

  “After two years on the road, someone has to. Do you like them?”

  “Yes. They’re lovely…thanks.”

  Quain and Loren presented me with a piece of leather rolled up and tied with twine.

  “Untie it,” Loren said.

  I had to take off my gloves to loosen the knot. Unrolling the leather, I exposed the inner side. Pockets lined the material. I puzzled over it.

  “It’s for your plants and herbs,” Quain said. “You can store them in separate pockets and, when you roll it up, you can carry it in your knapsack.”

  “That’s…” Unbelievable. Unexpected. “Perfect. Thanks.”

  Flea came up next. With a shy smile he flourished three rocks and proceeded to juggle them. He performed a whole routine, with high throws and low throws, ending the show with one rock going up to the ceiling while he spun around in a circle before catching it behind his back.

  The others cheered and clapped. I couldn’t speak for a long moment. When the cave grew quiet, I said, “You’ve been practicing.”

  “A little,” he said.

  “Wow, that was…amazing. Thank you.”

  Kerrick handed me a piece of paper. I squinted at the words with suspicion. Was this an oath? But it was a list of supplies.

  “Things to buy at the market,” he said. Then he dropped a pouch full of coins in my hands. “You and Flea can go tomorrow. I suggest you wear your green skirt and tunic to match the market crowd.”

  “And clay-caked clothes are so last year,” Quain said.

  Lying in my bedroll that night, I couldn’t sleep. The unexpected gifts from the guys had shocked me. They didn’t think of me as just a healer for Ryne like Kerrick. They cared about me. All those years I had avoided forming close relationships because I knew they would make it difficult for me to keep moving on. Eventually, I would have to leave the guys and that would cut deep. Damn. I hated being right.