The Other Side of Magic

by Ester Manzini

  It was the last straw. Leo got up, but her father stopped her with a wave of his hand.

  “No, now you must listen to me. I’m your family, and it pains me to hold you back.”

  Leo sighed and sat back at the table. Good, now she felt horrible.

  “I didn’t mean that. You’re not a burden.”

  Her father lifted his shoulder and cocked an eyebrow.

  “If you say so… still, you could use some fresh air. We’re almost out of salt and flour, and it’s still early. Why don’t you go to the market? You could sleep there and be back in the morning.”

  Leo laughed softly, even if her throat felt tight with anxiety.

  “And leave you on your own?”

  “It’s just for one night, I can take care of myself. Don’t fret!” He coughed in the crook of his elbow, and Leo tried not to stare. She didn’t want to know if there was blood in his saliva.

  She got up and circled his shoulders with her arm, gently patting his back until he’d calmed.

  She couldn’t tell him he needed more efficient medicines for his illness, but she couldn’t avoid the truth any longer.

  Eventually, her father caressed her hand and took a shivering breath.

  “You grew up so much and so fast… your mom would be very proud of you,” he wheezed. Then, as his voice steadied, he smirked. “Maybe not so much about your hair…”

  The worst had passed, and Leo chuckled and playfully swatted his hand away.

  It was a good idea, after all. She did need some time off, and since it was Da’s thinking, she was absolved of her perceived guilt.

  An hour later she was making her way on food. Toad, the village’s only horse, was lame and she didn’t want to stress him further.

  Leaving the Mill made her heart lighter. She counted four hours to get to Tarini, the nearest marketplace, and at least as many to shop for the bare necessities. With some luck, she could skip sleeping on the road and be back home a little before dawn. The thought didn’t worry her too much.

  When she reached the road, she blinked in astonishment. She’d grown unused to the sight of people, but the crowd making their way on the grey cobbles seemed too sparse even for her standards.

  She adjusted the empty bag on her shoulders and frowned. Maybe it was just a matter of time: two months ago, on her last trip to the market, it had been morning. The afternoon clearly wasn’t the best moment for shoppers and merchants.

  She shook the concern away and walked down the road. It was weird not to be surrounded by trees and vegetation; the fields were turning golden, but there were too many patches of weeds infesting them--more farm hands had left for Zafiria under the Asares’ command, and it showed. She wallowed some more on the injustice of that system while the sun burned the back of her neck and drenched her shirt in sweat.

  Eventually, Tarini appeared on the horizon. To Leo, it looked intimidating, with too many houses stacked one above the other, and its narrow streets running in the shadow of too many buildings. Half were abandoned, with shattered windows and holes in their roof, and she never felt their charm.

  She was content to just visit the stands on the outskirts of town, and the most peripheral ones, too. There, the goods were cheaper and there weren’t as many customers bumping and shrieking.

  Still, it was overwhelming.

  Leo clutched her bag as she walked through the stalls. Plump chickens cooed from their cages, and blocks of meat covered in flies buzzed as she passed by. She easily ignored the vendors of sweets and jewelry, cheap as it was, and dodged a fat man who pushed a live baby goat in her face.

  What she couldn’t resist was the cart selling mince pies near a crossroads. She bought three to take home, and one more for her supper; it was still warm, with a mouthwatering scent of cloves and roast mutton, its pastry yellow with butter. She licked her lips in anticipation and tucked it in her bag, and then added some strips of dried meat to boost. Cheap and long lasting, they were a good addition to her pantry, together with some of the earliest apples, small and pink.

  It took her long enough to spot an herbalist who didn’t look too much like a charlatan. The first one tried to sell her river monkey hands to enhance her magic; they were clearly coypu paws, and she doubted they served any purpose at all. Two more insisted on offering her raspberry leaves for period cramps (no, thank you very much, she was fine) or grappa infused with vipers. She didn’t even want to know why one would put a snake in his booze.

  Eventually, she stumbled upon a tiny, messy stall in a shadowy corner. The yellow haired seller caressed his mustache as Leo told him about Da’s illness, and without a word he nodded and handed her a bottle of dark green liquid.

  * * *

  “Three drops twice a day. Five if it snows. Start after the equinox and go on until spring,” he said in a heavy accent. Two talers were a lot, but Leo hoped they were worth the effort.

  Nobody pushed her around, and while it was pleasant to avoid the tight-packed crowd she remembered, it was somewhat weird.

  It was late in the afternoon when she resolved to get the heavy part of her shopping list. Her purse was lighter, but there was still enough coin for a bag of salt and a sack of flour--a small one, but she would make do with some acorns from the woods.

  To her surprise, the miller’s stall was more crowded than the rest of the market. Leo stood in line, grunting with every push of her neighbors and glaring at the woman who tried to cut in front of her. Everyone was talking at once, and she tried her best to ignore the chaos around her. The sun was starting to set when she found herself pushed against the lateral pole of the stall.

  “... see, told you,” said a bald man to his friend, in front of her. “Gonna be a real mess til they found her.”

  “Hush, you. Might be some guard here, and you don’t want ’em to come question us!”

  “As if I knew anything…”

  “As if they care!”

  Leo squinted when the couple moved on. Someone had nailed a sheet of parchment to the pole; a silver wax seal with a ribbon embroidered in white butterflies hung from the footer. Black words, bold and tightly packed, filled the yellowish surface.

  “T-T-The R-Roal… no, Roayal… no, no. R-o-y-a-l. Royal H-House of…”

  She hadn’t meant to read it out loud, but it was easier that way, and she did it absentmindedly. Still, the two guys ahead of her heard it.

  “What?”

  Leo’s cheeks flushes and she looked down to her boots.

  * * *

  “Nothing,” she mumbled.

  “Can’t read, girl?” asked the bald one, but his friend, stocky with a thick mustache, silenced him with a grunt.

  “You can’t even read your own name, don’t be rude!”

  “I can read!” Leo said, louder than she’d intended. “It’s just… I’m a little short sighted, and it gets hard to see with such little light.” A lie she’d practiced for twelve years at least.

  “Oh! Sorry, then,” the first guy said. “Here, let me… there’s plenty of those around, and I heard the seneschal read it out loud. It says that the Royal House of Zafiria and Epidalio--alright I’ll spare you the titles and such--anyway, they lost princess Gaiane, and they offer good coin to whoever comes with some info about her whereabouts, and a real treasure--they say fifty thousand talers!-- for anyone who finds her and brings her back unharmed. And to be careful when approaching her because she’s a mage and all that stuff. As if that was the only thing that mattered,” he grumbled, rubbing his forehead. His black circle was so faded that it looked like an old scar.

  “Bah!” Mustache Man snapped. “It fails to mention that if you don’t give any info at all because, you know, you don’t have any they’ll beat the shit out of you, burn your house or poison your wells?”

  Shiny Head Man stared at the parchment and shook his head.

  “No, I can’t remember it said anything…”

  “It was sarcasm, you fool. Anyway, I know of at least a couple of farmer
s who got their cattle beaten and barns burned because they knew nothing about any sodded princess. And just in the last three days!”

  Leo blinked.

  “I had no idea,” she said. “I came all the way from Elertha’s Mill and saw nothing.”

  “It’s ‘cause you’re on the right side of the issue,” said Mustache Man. “They’re moving this way, those patrols, and there’s many people avoiding the market already.”

  “Blame it on the fares. I swear it, the barley’s twice as expensive this year!”

  “You’re just seeing double, you drunkard…”

  “They lost their princess, by the way?” Leo interrupted them.

  “Gone, they say. Kidnapped, probably…”

  Shiny Head rolled his eyes.

  “Nobody talks ‘bout kidnapping!”

  “Of course not, you ass. It’s just that at court they have no clue what happened, and they’re panicking, and they’re sending soldiers all around the land looking for a missing girl because they don’t know where to start…”

  “And they burn down places to smoke her out like a mouse?”

  “Well, they’re panicking, as I said…”

  Leo drifted off. She stared at the manifesto and past the wall of text, until she saw the miniature of a portrait. A girl with black hair and a heart-shaped, pale face. She instantly didn’t like her.

  “Dark times ahead, my pal. Dark times,” said Mustache Man before stepping in front of the stall to place his order.

  Dark times indeed, Leo thought. The blank stare of the princess was mesmerizing to the point some other customers cut in front of her.

  This useless doll sneaks out for a walk, and us poor souls have to face the wrath of her nightmarish mother and guards. Justice is a lie.

  More people rushed in front of her, but she couldn’t move.

  Soldiers roamed the land. They burned down houses, threatened innocent people, showed no remorse to find the lost princess.

  A chill ran up her back.

  The patrols were marching to the Mill.

  “I need to go home,” she whispered.

  It was probably nothing--the Mill was too far out of the main roads to be of any interest, and not many people stumbled that way. But Da was alone, and he was frail. He needed her more than they needed salt or flour.

  Suddenly, the marketplace seemed unreal. The people pressing against her too vivid and distant at the same time, the shadows too deep and the light too bright.

  I need to go home, she repeated to herself. Her back to the pole, she slithered down the queue, stepping on some feet and causing some grumbled protest.

  She didn’t care.

  “Sorry--I’m sorry, I must… if you’ll excuse me,” she said under her breath, wiggling to snatch her bag free from the pressure of the mob. By the time she reached the back of the mass, she was drenched in sweat and shaking.

  She jumped free and staggered among the sparser people.

  Only now did she notice more manifests all around--hanging from the outer city walls, by the entrance doors, and she even glimpsed a pair of soldiers glistening in steel under the twilight sun.

  Her mouth was dry, her stomach lined in lead.

  She had to hurry. For nothing, probably, but she couldn’t stand wasting more time here, far from home.

  The way back home was a long chain of fear and self-reassurances linked together by her swift steps. She nearly ran her way back to the Mill, ignoring the burn in her calves and the darkness closing around the dancing flame of the torch she’d brought along.

  It’s fine, of course. I will scare Da the moment he sees me run through the door in the middle of the night, and he’ll scold me for doing the trip in the dark when he’d said I was to come back home in the morning. And then he’ll ask where the salt and flour are, and I’ll hug him and everything will be the same as always.

  The refrain bounced in her head with every beat of her heart. In any other situation she’d have spared a thought for the black shadows looming over her once she left the main road, and maybe even felt a hint of fear, only to banish it out of stubbornness. Now, though, she marched through the ferns and bush thorns, indifferent to the burn of scratches on her shins and the cold sweat making her hair stick to her brow.

  She was two miles from home when the wind rose. The warm caress on her heated cheeks stopped her into place.

  Smoke.

  Leo gasped in the darkness and almost dropped her torch.

  Maybe it’s something else. An accident. It’s not necessarily that bad.

  But she couldn’t stop her hands from shaking.

  She ran in the woods, vaguely aware of how the path looked wider and more trampled than ever. Her throat burned, and any time she slowed down to give her lungs and legs some rest she fought back tears.

  Thick layers of mist welcomed her to the outskirts of the Mill--only it was not mist. She wasn’t supposed to see the buildings from here, but through the bitter smell that made her eyes water and her nose prickle she glimpsed flashes of gold and red.

  And at this point, reassurance was a waste of time. As was self-care.

  Leo sprinted through the last of the bushes dividing her from her home, her bag bouncing heavy against her side and twin streams of tears running down her cheeks. The torch fell from her hand, dying in the moist ground. Still, she could see--embers painting the foundations, low flames dying against the wet reeds.

  She held her left side, stinging with fatigue, and reached the outer border of the village.

  She slowed down to a limp and sniffed. Cinder and ashes filled her throat, and she pulled her collar to her nose.

  Her shed was gone. It hadn’t been much more than four wooden walls and some straw for a roof, of course the fire had claimed it first. But it was empty, and it didn’t matter--don’t look, it’s just a building, it was empty and you must not care about it. Think of the people!

  But as she zig-zagged through the path, now muddy from the footprints of half a dozen horses, she realized the Mill’s people was nowhere to be seen.

  She pointed straight to the left, hoping against all hope she was wrong, and peeked through the smoke.

  An invisible hand clenched her chest and emptied it of all air.

  Clio’s house was an empty shell. The roof was collapsed for good, the door and shutters hung loose from the hinges. All the ferns and flowers crowding the walkway were stomped in the mud, and in the shadows the hut looked void and dead.

  Leo stopped and covered her mouth with her hand.

  No. No, this can’t be. We’re peaceful people. We’ve suffered enough. Why this?

  She took one hesitant step toward the smoking house. Under the crackling of the fire, it was too silent.

  Leo sunk her teeth in her lower lip until she tasted blood.

  Clio was dead, wasn’t she? And she couldn’t help her. But her father--maybe he still stood a chance.

  She backed away from the ruins, guilt layering her stomach and weighing down her bones.

  Da. I must find Da. He needs me.

  Before she realized it, she was running again, despite her aching throat and burning eyes.

  Her skin crawled with countless invisible bugs. Leo dropped her hands and stared at her home. What was left of it.

  The embers glimmered indifferent through the cracks in the walls. Gone were her quick fixes, the second-hand shutters closing the hole in the roof. Gone was her room, burned to the ground to a pile of ashes. Her toys, her creations. Her book.

  “No,” she rasped.

  True.

  It was true, and yet so distant and unreal. The embers were red strokes in the night, the air thick and heavy.

  The wind rose and ruffled her hair, dispersing some of the smoke.

  Leo’s legs barely obeyed her when she took a step forward--she couldn’t fall, no matter how weak her knees felt. She needed to see.

  The gaping void of the door opened on a motionless picture of death. A toppled cauldron. A scrap
of green flax. A shoe.

  Heath rippled the air, and Leo’s heart leapt at the illusion of movement it created.

  “D-Da?”

  Her voice, so small and hoarse. The voice of a young girl who’d lost what little was left of her family.

  “Da?” she called again in a sob.

  Only the sizzle of the dying flames answered her.

  The whole world wiggled and bent in front of her, it folded around her and crushed her.

  “No, no it can’t be. Not again, not…”

  The rush of blood in her ears was deafening. She swayed and held her hand out to the chaos of broken items on the threshold. Fragments of a life twice lost.

  A mournful neigh echoed under the cacophony of her pain.

  She was going mad. Of course she was, because her father was dead and her heart was breaking. Toad was gone, too, and she was losing her mind.

  But then the sound returned, and a soft buzz with it.

  Leo rubbed her eyes and turned around in the smoke.

  “Leo! Spirits’ sake, get away from there!”

  Clio’s voice was heavy with tears and hoarse with anger. But it was undoubtedly Clio, even if Leo couldn’t see anyone in the smoke.

  “No, Folco, you stay back, it’s…”

  “It’s my daughter!”

  Da. Shocked, loud as he hadn’t been in ages.

  Leo gasped and emerged from her shock.

  “I’m here!” she rasped, but a fit of cough interrupted her. She stumbled toward the source of the voices, and before the smoke could clear, her eyes veiled with tears.

  In a matter of seconds, she found herself wrapped in a shaking embrace.

  She couldn’t believe it. Stunned eyed, with tears streaming down her cheeks, she stared at her father’s skinny shoulder.

  Real. Alive. He was holding her, sobbing and shaking.

  Her nerves broke. She let out a muffled cry and crumpled in his arms, her knees giving way under her.

  “It’s alright, Leo. I’m fine. I’m fine, and you’re here--oh, sweet Mother, I was so scared you… you’d never…”

  His breath faltered and he swayed. Leo roused and managed to steady him, frantically caressing his face.