Page 72 of Magick and Lead
“The rest of you… didn’t see it?” she asked.
One of the little boys shook his head. “Didn’t see anything,” he grumbled.
Rohree hesitated, glancing at Clua, who was looking back at her with concern.
“It was… nothing…” Rohree said quietly.
“We always share what we saw,” Mik said. “The wisdom of the void is for all to share. I saw something. I saw a bad crop. Plants withering in the fields. See? That’s good knowledge. We can start planning now. Forging for berries and roots to preserve for winter.”
“I saw a dog with a hurt leg,” the smaller boy volunteered.
“I didn’t see anything,” the other boy grumbled again. “I never see anything!”
“I saw a baby,” Ayal said, and her hand went to her belly. “I don’t know if it was mine or someone else’s, but I know I loved it.”
Mik smiled and put an arm around her. His eyes went back to Rohree, expectant.
“I saw nothing,” she said again.
“Come,” Mik said. “You must’ve seen something to make a sound like that.” His tone was casual, but there was steel behind it.
“I saw nothing, either,” Clua said quickly. “Except black water. Now, forgive us, but we’ve been walking all day. We’re very tired.”
Ayal kicked the boys out of the loft where they usually slept and made their straw beds up with fresh blankets for Rohree and Clua. Then, she bid them goodnight.
Rohree and Clua lay there, listening to the crackling of the fire and the slow breathing of the two boys who slept down near the hearth. Rohree longed for sleep. Every fiber of her body seemed stretched to the point of unraveling, and she ached to let all the tension drop out of her, to replace her dread and anxiety with sweet nothingness for just a little while. And yet, the events of the day kept replaying themselves before her eyes. Those black pennants flying over the village. The words of this couple praising that traitor, Kortoi. And then that strange and terrifying vision of Essa…
The specter of the witch loomed behind her, a trauma she’d never forget. And what lay ahead? Issastar, her beloved city, destroyed. The Skrathan, decimated and scattered. Essa deposed. The kingdom fallen.
Even falling asleep was frightening, for sleep sat adjacent to the realm of the void. And that was where monsters like the one responsible for her scrying vision waited.
She felt a tear slip down her face.
Gods, it was all too much…
Then a hand was on her face, a finger wiping the tear away. Clua came up onto one elbow, looking at her.
“You’re crying,” she said softly. “Is it the vision?”
Rohree took a steadying breath, trying to gather herself, then shook her head. It wasn’t the vision that had bothered her most. She didn’t even know what the vision was, or what it meant. It may have been nonsense, for all she knew. No. What bothered her most…
“It’s just… these people…” she glanced down to where the family slept. “I can tell they’re good people. But they hate Essa. They’d hate us if they knew where our loyalties lay. Kortoi and his Brothers have completely warped their minds.”
Clua nodded gravely. “I know,” she said. “And how many others throughout the kingdom have they brainwashed? Howmany others blame Essa for the golenae? How many are ready to rise up and rebel against her, ready to fight for traitors who would betray them all…?”
She shook her head bitterly.
“It’s all backwards,” Rohree said. “It’s as if the world’s gone mad.”
Clua nodded, her fingertips still resting on Rohree’s cheek.
“We must get back as fast as we can. We must warn Essa,” Rohree said. “And get her these.”
Her hand drifted to the satchel full of scrolls, the correspondence they’d stolen from the witch. In the haste of their escape, they still hadn’t even cracked a wax seal to read one, and she was too exhausted to do so now.
“We’ll get back to Essa,” Clua assured her, laying her head back down. “But for now, we must get some sleep.”
Rohree rolled onto her side, shifting into a more comfortable sleeping position. Lying like this, she could see Clua’s face in the firelight, could study her. The long lashes on her closed eyelids. Her chin-length dark hair. Her blunt, dwarfish features. The scar on her cheek.
