The Bone Charmer

by Breeana Shields

  He groans and sits up. “I’m sure she’ll sleep a little longer.”

  I dip my head toward the horizon, which has obliged me by revealing a stripe of deep pink light. “She’s an early riser. Besides”—I nudge him lightly in the ribs with my elbow—“we have our whole lives, right?”

  He clears his throat. “You have a point.” But I didn’t miss the dark shadow that crossed his expression before he could sweep it away.

  No one can spot a lie like a liar.

  Saskia

  The Bone Charmer

  Bram and I sit across from Esmee in the cozy main room of her cottage. A fire blazes in the hearth and on the low table between us is a plate of half-eaten treats—spun-sugar creations that look like bits of lace—along with a kettle of tea that has long since gone cold. I’ve tried to ask Esmee several questions since we arrived, but she’s made a tut-tut sound each time. “Let’s not talk until you’ve been fed and fussed over, little lamb.” Her tone, while friendly, left no room for argument. She’s tiny, but commanding.

  Bram knows her best, so I try to follow his lead, but he’s done nothing since we got here except eat and gush over how delicious everything is. Finally I can’t stand the polite conversation anymore, and I work up the courage to broach the subject again. “So, you must have Third Sight,” I say.

  Esmee gives a bell-like laugh that makes her sound years younger than she probably is. “Oh, skies no! I have First Sight. Not officially, of course. I didn’t have a binding ceremony. Whatever would make you think I had Third?”

  I bite my lip, confused. “When we first arrived, you said you were expecting me. So I just assumed …” I trail off.

  “Ah,” she says, licking a bit of sugar from her thumb. “That’s because of the letter your mother sent for you.”

  Both Bram and I inhale sharply. “My mother sent a letter?” I say. “When? What does it say?”

  Bram’s response is more forceful. “Esmee! Why didn’t you tell us right away?”

  Esmee gives him a reproachful look and the tips of his ears turn pink.

  “I’m sorry,” Bram says, dropping his gaze to his lap. He clearly cares about her opinion—I’ve never seen him look so sheepish before.

  Esmee turns toward me. “I don’t know what it says. I’m not in the habit of reading correspondence that isn’t addressed to me. Wait here and I’ll fetch it for you.”

  She sets off toward the bedroom at the back of the cottage. Bram turns to me. “Your mother knew you’d come here,” he says. “What do you think that means?”

  “I don’t know.” I chew on my thumbnail. A tight fist of fear has settled in my stomach.

  Esmee returns with the letter a few moments later. Both she and Bram watch me expectantly as I break the wax seal and unfold the creamy paper. A necklace is tucked into the crease—a pendant with three overlapping circles carved from bone—and I set it down on the table next to me. The sight of my mother’s small, careful script makes my throat feel thick.

  Dearest Saskia,

  I hoped you would never need to receive this letter and my heart aches that you’re reading it now. During your kenning, I chose the path that I believed would bring you the greatest possible happiness. That main path branched off dozens of times, and each of those paths diverged into even more. Small changes in your future that led in different directions. Almost all of them were equally lovely. But a few of the branches led to danger—a danger that I could never fully see beginning but could always see ending in tragedy. Each time something terrible happened, the branch point was Esmee’s cottage, so I’m sending this letter to you there in hopes that it reaches you in time.

  Whatever choices you make from here forward, it is essential that you don’t return to Midwood. Not until I contact you and let you know that it’s safe. Please promise me that you’ll honor this wish? No matter how tempting it might be to come home, I need you to stay away.

  I’m enclosing a shield to protect you. Esmee can explain how it works. I believe someone is watching you, Saskia. Someone who has access to defensive magic. Maybe you know who it is by now, but I don’t yet. Be careful whom you trust.

  I love you, bluebird. Don’t ever forget that.

  —M

  The letter flutters from my fingers and lands on the floor. It’s as if all the air has been squeezed from my lungs. Did my mother see my death? She doesn’t explicitly state it, but I can’t help but read into her words. I’m especially disconcerted that she called me bluebird—a nickname usually reserved only for my father. Her heart must have been in a tender place to use it herself.

  “What did it say?” Esmee’s voice is gentle. I open my mouth and then close it again. I can’t find the words to answer. She picks up the letter. “May I?”

  I nod. As Esmee reads, a crease forms between her brows. “Oh my,” she says once she reaches the end. She scoops up the necklace from where I left it on the table. “Better put this on now, little lamb.”

  But her voice sounds like it’s coming from a tunnel. I stare at her without really seeing. I feel detached—as if I’m watching both of us from a distance. Esmee shares a look with Bram. Without speaking, he stands and takes the necklace from her. He steps behind me and gently moves my hair aside. He settles the slender cord against my collarbone and fastens the clasp. His thumb brushes the nape of my neck.

  Suddenly I’m fully present again, aware of my heartbeat. Of my breath.

  I shift so that Bram’s hands fall away. But still, it takes me a moment to find my voice.

  “What is this?” I say, lifting the pendant.

  “It’s a shield,” Esmee says. “It will prevent any Bone Charmer from seeing you while you’re wearing it.”

  “Even my mother?”

  She frowns. “Even your mother.”

  The implications make my mind spark with fresh worry. My mother is concerned enough about this that she’s willing for me to be hidden. Even from her.

  “Do you know who she means?” Esmee asks, glancing at the letter. “Who might be watching you?”

  I tell her about Latham. The story unwinds from me like a tangled ball of yarn, thick and clumsy. Esmee listens quietly, her eyes filling with sympathy and shock. Bram, too, is hanging on every word, even though he’s already heard some of the details. By the time I finish speaking, Esmee’s mouth has gone thin. “This is certainly about more than petty revenge from your mother’s training days, but I’m afraid I don’t have any more insight about what it is about than you do.”

  I swallow. “I heard you knew about dark magic.”

  Her gaze slides to Bram and then back again. The silence is thick. And then, finally: “I know something about it.”

  “Will you tell me?”

  She sighs. “A little knowledge can cause a lot of grief.”

  “Yes,” I say. “I know. A little knowledge is all Latham was willing to give me.”

  Her lips purse. She taps them with two of her fingers. “Very well, then.”

  She stands and goes to a bookshelf on the far wall. She pulls down several volumes and sets them in my lap. “See if you can find what you’re looking for in there. But remember that magic always comes at a price. And dark magic is particularly costly.”

  “I don’t want to use the magic. I just want to understand what Latham is doing.”

  Her hand drops softly to the crown of my head and I’m reminded forcefully of my mother. “I know that’s not your intention,” she says. “Just be careful.”

  I pore over the books by the light of a low-burning lamp. Bram sits beside me, his head resting on the table, snoring softly. He lasted longer than Esmee, who turned in hours ago.

  Reading through the pages fills me with a slick sense of shame. It’s as if the words are living things—shadowy and sinister, and they cling to me like the threads of a spiderweb. Despite all my studying, I can’t find anything that explains the interest Latham showed in me. He didn’t take samples of my blood or hair to put a curse on me, he
didn’t destroy my memory, or scoop the voice from my throat. I can’t figure out what he gained from tutoring me, or why he would be watching me now—if it even is him. What if my mother saw a different danger?

  A noise behind me makes me spin around.

  “I didn’t mean to startle you,” Esmee says. Her expression makes me realize that my hand is pressed to my chest. My heart races beneath my palm. I take a deep breath and try to convince my body that I’m not in danger.

  “Did I wake you?” I ask.

  Esmee pulls her shawl more tightly around her shoulders. “I’m a restless sleeper.” She goes to the cupboard and pulls out two teacups. “How about a break?”

  “Yes, please,” I say, suddenly desperate for a reprieve from curses and murder.

  Esmee puts a kettle over the heat. “So, what’s the story here?” She waggles her fingers, indicating the space between me and Bram.

  A ripple of unease goes through me. “There’s no story.” Her skeptical expression looks so much like a reprimand that heat races up my neck and into my cheeks. “We were matched at the kenning, but I don’t think …” I can’t find the words for the restless feelings that rustle inside me. My opinion of Bram has changed, but he still sees me as the girl who ruined his life. “Neither of us intends to accept it at the end of the year.”

  She pours tea into the cups. Steam curls in the air. “Are you sure about that?”

  I tug on the edge of my sleeve. “So, how do you know Bram?”

  She laughs. “You need more practice sidestepping a question, lamb. That was artless.” She sets a cup in front of me and hands me a spoon. “But I’ll indulge you. Bram was born in Grimsby. I was friends with his parents before the accident.”

  The shock that goes through me must show on my face, because Esmee stops stirring her tea. “You must be aware of Bram’s story?”

  I shake my head. “I knew he moved to Midwood when he was young. I didn’t know …” I trail off, unsure how to ask all of the questions teeming in my mind. “What accident?”

  Esmee drizzles honey into her tea. “A fire. One of the villagers got Bram out, but both of his parents died. Afterward, Bram’s magical abilities made him … hard to place, so he stayed with me until your mother helped me find a couple in Midwood willing to take him in.”

  My mouth goes dry. The story is like a familiar nightmare and it presses against me so firmly, I can scarcely breathe. How did I never realize his parents had died in that fire? All this time, I’ve been terrified of the rage I saw in Bram’s heart that day. But now it makes perfect sense. I think of my own father’s death. On the day Oskar carved father’s name into our family tree, I took a stack of fancy plates from the kitchen and threw them one by one against the side of our house just for the satisfaction of watching them shatter.

  I wanted to destroy everything around me so the whole world would be as broken as I felt.

  But my father was still alive when I saw Bram’s memories, so I didn’t realize then how much anger and grief can overlap. How they can be almost impossible to untangle once they’ve merged.

  It takes me a long time to find my voice. “Bram had magical abilities that young?”

  “All children who have bone magic show early signs,” Esmee says. “My guess is that your mother knew you’d be a Bone Charmer long ago, am I right?” I shift my weight and the chair creaks. Esmee nods as if my discomfort is answer enough. “The kenning doesn’t create truth; it only reveals it.”

  “What made him hard to place?” I ask, glancing at Bram. His breathing is deep and even. I probably shouldn’t talk about him without his knowledge, but my curiosity is stronger than my guilt.

  “He was confused and angry,” she says. “Any child would have been. But Bram was powerful. So occasionally, when he lashed out, people got hurt.”

  “Got hurt how?”

  “Broken bones mostly,” she says.

  I gasp. “But how did he have access to bones at that age? And without any training?”

  “He didn’t need prepared bones—he can pull magic from the bones inside a living body. That’s why people were afraid of him.”

  A chill goes through me. “I was afraid of him, too. I thought maybe he was violent.”

  Esmee’s eyes narrow. “Bram isn’t violent. You never threw a tantrum when you were young? You never lashed out in frustration? He was a small child. One who was grieving.”

  A tear slips down my cheek and I wipe it away with the back of my hand. “I know that now, but it’s too late. I ruined everything between us.” I tell her about the prison boat in Midwood. About seeing inside the prisoner’s mind and then inside Bram’s. I tell her about their faces blending together. About the broken cage that allowed the prisoner to escape. About the three people who died.

  “Oh, you poor dears,” she says, as if Bram were awake and we told the story together. “That must have been terrible. What did your mother say about it?”

  I shake my head. “I never told her. I was so ashamed that my vision was wrong, that people died because of me.”

  “You didn’t kill them; the prisoner did.” Her eyes cut to Bram. “I’m sure Bram felt the same.”

  “I should have asked him about the fire. But when I saw those tattoos … the same ones the prisoner had … I was a coward.”

  Her hand drops to cover mine. “You were a child,” she says, echoing how she described Bram earlier, “one who had been traumatized.”

  Suddenly a thought sparks in my mind. “The bones on the cage were intensifiers. That’s why my abilities were so magnified.” I think of the broken bone cage. Bram didn’t intend to help the prisoner escape any more than I intended to see the man’s thoughts. “And Bram’s, too.”

  Esmee stands and touches my shoulder. “You’re probably right. Maybe it’s time both of you left your old hurts in the past, where they belong.”

  She takes her teacup and walks toward the bedroom. My gaze falls to the spell book. I’ve been studying it for hours and getting nowhere. Between that and everything I just learned about Bram, I feel so defeated, I want to curl up and cry.

  “Esmee, wait.”

  She stops. Turns.

  “The First Sight Charmer at Ivory Hall said she couldn’t see Latham in my past, but what if she wasn’t telling the truth? She could have been protecting him.” Esmee tilts her head and waits for me to finish. “I can’t stop wondering if I could see my interactions with Latham again, knowing what I know now …”

  “Are you asking me to do a reading on you?”

  I swallow. “Would you?”

  Her expression softens. “I have an even better idea.”

  Esmee and I sit on her bedroom floor in front of a basin filled with bones. The faint scent of vanilla hangs in the air.

  I blow a stray lock of hair out of my eyes. “I don’t understand how this will work.”

  “It’s simple,” Esmee says. “I’ll use the bones to do a reading on you—on your past—and you will simultaneously use them to do a reading on me in the present. To see what I am seeing in your memories. If it works, it will be as if you have First Sight and are performing a reading on your own past. You can look for clues in your interactions with Latham that you might have missed when you experienced them the first time. Does that make sense?”

  “In theory?”

  She pats me on the arm. “We’ll use my blood along with yours so you can see me more clearly.” She hands me a needle. “You’ll need to take off your shield. It will block your magic.”

  I slide the pendant from my neck and set it beside me.

  “It may take some time for me to find the memories you’re looking for. Focus all of your thoughts on me and on your interactions with Latham. Not anything else, understand?”

  I press my lips together and nod. My mind has been consumed with Latham for hours. It won’t be difficult to keep him at the forefront of my thoughts.

  Esmee pricks her finger and speckles the bones with blood. Then she sets them
alight. Smoke curls from the basin. The bones crackle and snap in the heat. Finally she covers the basin with a heavy lid and extinguishes the flame. Most of my training didn’t involve flame—it’s a more advanced technique—but I’ve seen my mother perform this ritual dozens of times and it gives me a pang of homesickness.

  Esmee tips the bones onto the cloth between us. I close my eyes. The use of fire makes it unnecessary to be in contact with the bones, so I expect the reading to be more difficult, but I feel the pull of the magic right away.

  I’m plunged into a vision.

  My mother’s face comes into focus, younger than I’ve ever seen her, and so near that I can see the delicate peach fuzz on the sides of her cheeks. My small hand closes around her nose. She laughs and kisses my baby-sized palm.

  The vision changes. I can feel Esmee’s effort to drag it forward and I follow her. This time I see a fair-haired toddler, chubby fingers gripped around the edge of a low wooden table. She pulls herself into a standing position. My father sits nearby and claps as he watches. “You did it, bluebird!” She turns toward him and gives him a nearly toothless grin, save for four baby incisors—two on the top and two on the bottom.

  Another shift. A lurch that drags us ahead through time.

  Hundreds of other scenes from my childhood flash by, too quickly to catch more than passing glimpses. And then I’m sitting across from my mother at the kenning. I watch myself snatch Gran’s bone from my mother’s fingers, and I feel sick as it snaps.

  Esmee pulls the vision forward again—my journey to Ivory Hall flies by, then the binding ceremony, until we arrive at my first day of training with Master Kyra. This was the first time I met Master Latham. I inhale sharply as Esmee’s tug slows the reading. In the vision, I hear the explosion from across the hall and watch as the room fills with smoke. Master Kyra throws open the windows. Let’s take a break, she says before leaving the room. Latham should arrive any moment.

  But he doesn’t.

  I watch myself sit near the window for a bit, breathing in the fresh air. And then I stand and leave the room, alone.