Page 91 of Silver in the Bone

“And ... you weren’t at school that day?” I asked her carefully.

She shook her head. “I didn’t wanna go. It was dull and the others were better at everything. So I came to the tower to watch ’em set up for the harvest festival. And then ...”

Flea trailed off, rubbing at her runny nose. “And then there was no harvest. Me mam and papa were there in the sacred grove and now nothing’s left of ’em. And that’s the whole of it.”

The force of her words pressed down on my body until it felt too heavy to move. As bad as my childhood had been, it hadn’t been ... this. The tattered remains of a life that Flea could only cling to as the last vestiges of her world crumbled around her.

“That’s not the whole whole of it,” I said gently. “I’m sorry about your parents and your friends. It must be hard, missing them.”

Flea frowned. “’S fine. I’ve got me sisters. I’m not alone now. None of us are.”

“I’m glad about that,” I said, looking back at where Arianwen was nocking another arrow on her bow. “And their families ... ?”

“Gone,” Flea confirmed. “One by one. The dark was so thick it could strangle ye, but Cait got us through it. The others are always jokin’ about how, with her hair that peculiar shade, she wasn’t born, but made in the forge, but I know she once had a mam and papa too.”

I nodded.

“Mari’s got her auntie and uncle here. Old Aled and Dilwyn,” Flea said. “But the rest of us, we’ve got each other to care for, and it only hurts sometimes, when it’s quiet enough to be thinkin’ of it.”

I nodded, working my jaw, trying to think of what to say to that. I was too scared of my words coming out as bitter and sharp as they always did.

“And ye have yer brother, even if he turns into a beastie?” she said, looking up at me with a surprisingly solemn expression. “I’m sorry ’bout your own papa.”

It didn’t make sense why that—out of everything that had happened—brought an unwelcome sting to my eyes. I needed to change the subject.

“When were you called to be a priestess?” I asked.

Flea sniffed. “Just before our High Priestess got herself clawed a few days after the orchard and schools. ’Twas just there—”

She pointed to the area beside the kitchen.

“The Children actually got into the fortress?” I asked, horrified.

Flea nodded. “She was old as stone and died quick-and-bloody protecting Mari and the others ’cause only a few guards knew how to fight—Avalon being peaceful and the like. Gave Mari a bad fright and she was never the same—or so says Olwen, but she knows these things.”

I wanted to say something comforting, but I’d never been good at this sort of thing. All the words I had for it felt wrong.

You don’t owe them anything, that same voice whispered in my mind, even kindness.

“That’s why Caitriona and the others learned how to fight?” I asked. And why Bedivere helped them, once he’d come to seek refuge at the tower. “They didn’t train like this before?”

“Oh no,” Flea said. “They all flounced about in gowns, blessing the grounds for the Goddess, having the festivals, singing daft songs, and making them wee flower crowns. But it’s not so strange, I suppose. There was the Lady of the Lake, ’course.”

“I thought the Lady of the Lake was just another name for the Goddess,” I said. “It was someone else?”

“’Twas the title given to all the priestesses over the ages chosen to defend the isle with sword and magic,” Flea said dreamily, “when it was still part of yer world, and there was need of it. Excalibur was the sword each Lady of the Lake used, until they gave it to Arthur to be Avalon’s protector while he ruled. That’s why he had to give it back when he got skewered.”

“Really?” I could understand how I’d misinterpreted the title Lady of the Lake in the texts I’d read, but this version of Excalibur’s origins was utterly new to me.

“There hasn’t been a Lady of the Lake since the isle became its own realm. The last one stayed behind in the mortal world with her love, who was a smithy of some sort, says Mari. A bunch of tosh if ye ask me.” Flea’s nose wrinkled. “Cait says we’ve got to show the others there’s still hope, so we fight. It’s why they should be teaching me how to use a blade, but they say I’m too little, and they think I’m stupid. Rhona and Seren agree.”

I hadn’t met Rhona and Seren, but I’d seen the two priestesses walking arm in arm between chores. Rhona with hair as dark as a raven’s wing, and Seren’s like spun sunlight.

“Actually, your sisters seem to think you’re too clever for your own good,” I told her.

Flea beamed at that. “I just have to come into my magic, is all. Then I’ll be full clever.”

“You were called, but you can’t use magic yet?” I clarified.

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