Page 156 of Silver in the Bone

Caitriona suddenly looked like a fox caught by the tail. “No, truly, I can ...”

Her words trailed off as Neve gently turned her wrist up and began to work the leather laces as if she had done it a thousand times before.

With her head bent over her work, Neve was too focused to notice the way the other girl had stilled, or the way the hardness of her expression had eased. For a moment, it didn’t seem like she was even breathing—as if Neve were a feather that might drift away with even the smallest stirring of the air.

Olwen’s finger prodded the stitches in my arm, sharply drawing my attention back to where she knelt in front of me.

“Ow!”

“Dear me,” she said with a pointed look. “A thousand apologies for my rough handling.”

I raised my brows. She raised hers back.

Emrys leaned over my shoulder, watching as she dabbed oil on the wound—oregano, by the pungent smell of it—and then a waxy ointment that she warmed between her fingers before gently massaging it into my skin.

“This is a deep wound,” Olwen began, a small tremor in her voice. “It must have been terribly painful when she ... when the revenant cut you.” She drew a breath and looked up. “Viviane never would have done this if she were—if she were still herself. I’m so very sorry.”

“I know, and there’s nothing to apologize for.” I caught Emrys’s eye. He gave me a small, reassuring smile, and I knew I couldn’t keep withholding the other important piece of information I’d learned at the barrow. “There’s something else you should know. About me.”

The others listened with varying degrees of horror as I spoke. Once or twice, Olwen seemed on the verge of bursting with some thought or question, but managed to hold it in—until she couldn’t.

“Your bone was silver? It wasn’t merely a vision?” she asked, eyeing the stitches.

I tensed. “As shiny as a polished coin. Just rotten to the core, I guess.”

Emrys gripped my shoulder, but Neve cut in before he could speak.

“It doesn’t mean what you clearly think it does,” she said sternly as she came toward us. “So stop feeling sorry for yourself about it.”

My lips parted in indignation.

“Yes, you are, and it’s understandable, but it doesn’t make all of your worst thoughts true,” Neve continued. “And here I was thinking that finding a mystical fire sword would have cheered you up.”

I sighed. “Well ... there’s something else I have to tell you about that, too.”

Olwen nodded as I explained about the dreams, absorbing the information with the same imperviousness I’d come to expect from her. Caitriona hung back, an odd expression on her face I couldn’t quite read.

“Why didn’t you say something about this before?” Emrys asked, troubled.

“I don’t know, I just ... didn’t know what it meant or if it meant anything at all.” I looked at Olwen. “You don’t think it’s related to the silver, do you?”

“I think it has a far simpler explanation,” Olwen said, exchanging another knowing look with Caitriona. “The Goddess uses the mist to speak to us in different ways. Song, dreams, even visions. Perhaps she, in all her great wisdom, has need for you to listen, and is speaking to you the only way she knows you will hear her.”

“By sending me visions of unicorns?” I asked, pained. “She needs to work on her communication skills.”

“Perhaps that is merely how she chose to appear to you,” Olwen said.

“I have to admit, some part of me was afraid I was dreaming these things into existence,” I said hoarsely.

Olwen glanced over to the door, where Emrys had leaned the sword I pulled from the lake. “A fascinating thought. Objects may be born from the mist in rare cases, but I believe that sword has been in existence far longer than you’ve been in Avalon.”

“Do you recognize it?” Neve asked.

“It reminds me of a story Mari told us once, though I cannot quite recall it all now,” Olwen said.

“You must ask her when you return to the tower,” Caitriona said. “Such a treasure will delight her.”

“I do have a suspicion about the silver, if you’d like to hear it,” Olwen offered, reaching into her bag for a rolled bandage.

---