Out of nowhere Eiland felt his eyes prick with tears. He swallowed hard and pressed the bedroll flat against the ground. The fire was nothing but glowing embers now, and darkness pressed in on all sides. Charon lay still and silent.
Sucking in a shaky breath, Eiland lay down flat on his back and pulled his thin blanket up to his chin. It was a clear night, no clouds to hide the stars or hold in the heat of the day. He shivered and scooted closer to the remains of their fire.
If Charon felt cold, he did not betray it. A full two feet of ground stretched between them and stayed there all night.
Chapter Four
After seeing Charon’s paltry meal that night under the ridge, Eiland had been somewhat concerned that he might actually starve in the wilderness. This proved to be unfounded: Charon was an expert with snares.
“I lived with a trapper for a year,” he explained as he looped a thin piece of wire.
“You lived with him? For a whole year?” One night of Charon visiting his parents’ home had been frightening enough for Eiland; he couldn’t imagine a whole year of his mother keeping her eyes on the floor and his father giving up his seat at the table.
Charon pursed his lips, his eyes on his work. “Yes. Navarro was good to me. He taught me how to catch all sorts of game. There are bigger kinds of traps, for bears and deer, but I can’t exactly drag a deer carcass around with me, so I never bothered to learn.”
Eiland frowned. “Where is he? The trapper, I mean. Why didn’t you stay with him?”
Charon paused in his work for a long moment, and then lifted the hand that was missing the ends of two fingers. “This was from the wolf that killed him. When Navarro went to get it out of the trap it bit his throat. I tried to pry it off and it bit my fingers, too.”
Eiland gaped at him. That answered the question of whether wolves would attack the Cursed. Catching his expression, Charon smirked. “Don’t worry. There aren’t any wolves around here.”
Charon showed him how to set the traps far enough away from their campsite so as not to frighten off game but close enough that they could easily gather their catch the next morning. Eiland had some trouble with the latter part of that equation, so every night he hurried to set the traps. In the morning he would find fuel or fill their skeins so that he didn’t have to gather up the little dead bodies or watch Charon skin and clean them.
“You don’t seem to mind it now,” Charon pointed out, watching Eiland devour the leg of what might have been a squirrel.
“Shh,” Eiland mumbled. “This squirrel died of old age. It had a long and full life and the trap killed it instantly.”
Charon snorted.
After that dark night under the ridge, Charon had adopted an oddly businesslike attitude. He questioned Eiland often about his father’s salve, asking where to find the best gyman roots and what other supplies they would need. As if in exchange, he taught Eiland to set traps, put his fine flint and tinder to use, and made sure he didn’t starve.
He’d said nothing further about the orchard, or made any attempt to touch Eiland the way he had before. Eiland knew he should be relieved and he was, truly; he just couldn’t help feeling a little put out that Charon had set his attraction aside so easily.
Charon had left off winding around quite so much, but he still wouldn’t tell Eiland exactly where they were going. Whenever Eiland lifted his gaze he saw the mountains ahead of them. He hoped they wouldn’t be traveling that far. His shoes were really not fit for snow.
Charon walked at his slow but steady pace. For the first few days Eiland trudged obediently behind him, but eventually he grew brave enough to wander. He weaved across the fields, crouching beside riverbanks to investigate the weeds that grew there, and shimmying up tree trunks to steal bird eggs from their nests.
He started an herb satchel almost out of habit: fireweed for the stomach; hesfast flowers to cleanse the blood; a whole piter plant that he ripped out of the ground and stuffed, dirt clods and all, into his bag. There were new plants, too, that Eiland had never seen before. In particular he loved a pale blue grass that grew along the river and was so soft to the touch that Eiland longed to bed down on its stalks.
He collected nuts and berries to share with Charon, who seemed surprised at the offerings. Eiland thought it only fair, really, after Charon had shared the meat from his traps. Charon didn’t comment on his wanderings, and Eiland was always careful to stay within sight and earshot. Eiland could almost pretend that he was walking with his mother back when she’d been teaching him the names of every flower and where to find the best ginger root.
That all changed when they come to the first village.
They encountered the cow fields first, and the animals lifted their heads to watch Charon and Eiland pass, chewing their cud all the while. The town was not big enough to have horses, but Eiland did spot a few donkeys, and goats. Eiland loved goats; he baa-ed at them as they passed, and several raced over, following them along the fence. Eiland clapped his hands, laughing.
Charon did not laugh. He walked with his eyes forward, glancing neither left nor right.
Voices filtered through the afternoon air. Eiland craned his head, apprehensive and excited. He’d never been to another village. The thatched rooftops were familiar, but the walls looked strange and earthen, as if they’d chosen to make their homes from mud instead of wood. At the moment the streets looked dry, but Eiland could imagine that they turned into a swamp in the wetter months.
At the very outskirts of town, Charon stopped. The main thoroughfare lay ahead. People and carts moved back and forth at a leisurely rate; the settlement was far removed from the trading lanes, and only a few local merchants bartered in the streets.
Charon’s gaze roamed over the people and buildings. “Tell me again what we need to get,” he said to Eiland without turning his head.
“Um.” Eiland pondered. “A second cooking pot. A strainer. A couple of water-tight jars, a hand shovel, oh, and I could use another bag.”
Charon listened in silence. When Eiland had finished he took a deep breath. “All right,” he murmured and seemed to gather himself, his back straightening.
He strode into the village with his shoulders thrown back and his face set. Eiland trailed at his shoulder, unsettled at the sudden shift.
They quickly drew notice among the villagers. An older girl stopped dead in her tracks then swooped up her two younger siblings. Several other children paused to stare at Charon as he passed; they’d clearly never seen a Cursed one before and didn’t know what to make of the shocked, frightened reactions of everyone else around them.
Eiland thought of his nieces and nephews and ached a little. He smiled at them, but that only seemed to make things worse. Some of the adults clearly took his notice as a threat and rushed the children away, as though Eiland was Cursed as well.
Biting his lip, Eiland hurried after Charon.
An old man with a cart nervously straightened as they approached. He looked so frightened that Eiland quickened his pace, stepping in front of Charon and speaking first.
“Hello! Hello, I’m Eiland of Summerton.” He put out his hand. The old man shrank backward.
Behind Eiland, Charon snorted. Eiland licked his lips and dropped his hand, pasting on his best smile. “We’re looking for the apothecary, we need to buy some supplies. Could you point the way, please?”
The old man did so with a shaking finger. As they left him, Charon said low and vicious, “You shouldn’t have said we were going to buy anything.”
“What? Why not? That’s what we’re here—”
Charon rounded on him, folding his arms across his chest. His eyes were dead cold. “Do you have any gold, Eiland? Because I don’t. So how are you going to buy anything?”
Realization broke like an egg over Eiland’s skull, trickling down through the rest of his body and raising the little hairs on his skin.
Charon laughed shortly, an ugly sound, and nodded. “Right. Stick close.”
The apothecary’s house was a humble building, undoubtedly doubling as the family home. Fortunately only the healer seemed to be in; he was a short, round-faced man whose eyes widened and jowls trembled when he saw them. He flitted nervously around the single-room house, gathering what supplies Charon demanded of him.
Eiland stood by the door, shifting nervously from foot to foot and wishing to be anywhere else. The smell of ground numeria leaves filled the shop, too familiar for comfort.
A flicker of movement drew his attention. A little boy, no more than five summers old, peeked out from underneath the healer’s work table. With his round face and dark hair, he must be the man’s son. The boy stared up at them with wide eyes, and Eiland couldn’t stay silent.
Stepping forward he said to the healer, “We have furs. To trade, I mean. It’s not gold but—we can trade, can’t we?”
In the corner of his eye Charon stilled but said nothing. For a moment the healer looked taken aback but then he nodded quickly. “Yes, yes, of course. I should be delighted. Very kind, very kind of you, sir.”
Eiland dragged out the furs that they’d collected from the animals in Charon’s snares. Eiland had been planning to make a blanket with them, or a cloak. It was not close to a fair bargain, and the knowledge of that needled Eiland even as the healer pretended to admire them.
As they walked out of town Charon said shortly, “You shouldn’t have done that.”
Anger welled up in Eiland, dangerous but too strong to bite back. He had as much—if not more—to fear from Charon as the villagers, but all he could see in his mind was that little boy in the apothecary. “What, I shouldn’t have given them a fair trade? You can’t just take things from people, Charon. It’s wrong!”
They’d reached the edge of the forest now, and Charon drew up short. Eiland flinched on instinct but then planted his feet, putting his chin up. He wasn’t going to apologize for treating people well, no matter what Charon did to him.
Charon wasn’t even looking at him, though. He’d turned his head back towards the village.
“And besides,” Eiland hazarded to continue, “we’d have had a hard time carrying the furs, too, with everything else we got. It can’t hurt to be nice to people—maybe if you were more often they’d—”
“Gods, you’re a dunce,” Charon said between his teeth. “Now hush, look.”
Eiland followed his gaze in time to see the back door of the apothecary open and the healer come hurrying out. In his arms he carried all the furs Eiland had given him. He did not see Eiland and Charon watching him from a distance.
Cutting diagonally between his lot and a goat paddock, the shopkeeper reached the low stone wall that marked the boundary of town. He heaved the furs over the wall into the wild bushes.
Once the shopkeeper had gone back inside and shut his door, Charon turned to Eiland, one eyebrow raised as if to say, There, you see?
Eiland’s voice seemed to have curled up in the base of his throat, and after a moment Charon rolled his eyes and moved away through the trees. “If you’re quite done trying to make friends, let’s go find this root of yours.”
Eiland bit his lip and followed.
They left the village behind, heading back into the deep woods with their new possessions. Once Charon was satisfied that they’d put enough distance behind them they shucked their packs, tucking them at the base of a towering maple.
They hunted in near silence with their eyes on the ground. It was slow going. While Summerton had been surrounded by thick firs, all the trees here were soft and leafy and the change in environment made gyman root scarce. Somehow Eiland doubted that Charon would take kindly to a suggestion that they head back toward Summerton.
They walked a fair distance apart from one another. Eiland felt grateful for that; his thoughts were all a jumble, and he needed time to sort them out. Anger curdled between his ribs but he didn’t know who to turn it on: Charon for being so cruel, the village healer for rejecting even the attempt of kindness, or the villagers for treating Eiland as if he were Cursed as well.
Admittedly he had been a stranger, but Eiland didn’t understand why they had shrunk away without even asking his name or wondering how he had come to be in the company of one of the Cursed. Surely some of them would have heard rumors of innocent villagers being taken, yet they had offered no help or even a kindly smile.
A telltale patch of diamond-shaped leaves poked out of the ground, interrupting his thoughts. Eiland kneeled and plunged his fingers into the dirt, digging out the gnarled, misshapen tubers.
“Eiland,” Charon called.
“Over here. I’ve found some gyman.” He rose, carefully tucking the roots in his bag before making his way back to Charon, who stood with one hand raised to his brow, his eyes closed.
“Are you all right?” Eiland asked.
“Fine.” Charon dropped his hand and used his foot to poke at a small plant on the ground in front of him. “Is this it?”
“No, that’s miller’s weed. The leaves do look alike.” Eiland dug one of the roots out of his bag and spread the little leaves with his fingertips. “Here, see how these are more pointed? That’s how—”
Charon interrupted him by leaning over and retching all over the miller’s weed, clutching his belly with both hands.
“Crickets!” Eiland exclaimed.
Charon shook his head, straightening and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. He shook all over, a fine tremor that filled every limb. “We…we need to go back.”
“What, to the village? Oh, no, to the packs. Are you sick? Do you—”
Eiland cut off, his eyes widening. Because yes, of course Charon was sick. “Oh. Oh.”
Charon’s mouth screwed up tight. He turned and started back the way they had come, his stride only a little unsteady.
Eiland walked alongside him, a safe distance away. His mind raced. He’d never seen someone go through an Agony before. That misbegotten six months he’d spent training as an acolyte came back to him of a sudden, and he remembered how the priests had called the Agony a mark of the gods, their will made flesh.
Eiland didn’t know if he was ready to be in the presence of the gods’ will.
They reached the small clearing where they’d left their packs, and Charon immediately crossed to his. Eiland looked down at the gyman roots clenched tight in his hands. Their skins were dirty.
“I could start work on these, I suppose. A proper salve will take days but these alone could help with the pain. They need to be boiled—the juice is too strong, otherwise, it would burn your skin. If I boil them, though, then just take from the top of the pot then I could—what?”
Charon had straightened up from his pack. A short length of rope rested in his hands.
He said, “Come here.”
Eiland looked at the rope then at Charon. “What’s that for?”
“Just, put those down and come here,” Charon snapped. His face was gray and his breathing labored.
Eiland swallowed then placed the roots carefully on the ground and walked over.
“Give me your hand.” Eiland obeyed and Charon tied one end of the rope around his wrist. It was thin and coarse; Eiland winced as Charon tied it off with a double knot.
“All right,” Charon murmured, half to himself. He looked around them then strode over to a small birch tree. The rope tugged Eiland along like a dog on a leash.
“Turn around.” Charon pushed roughly at Eiland’s shoulder until Eiland, confused, put his back to the tree. Charon immediately disappeared around the side of the trunk and it wasn’t until he grabbed Eiland’s other wrist that Eiland realized—
“Are you tying me to a tree?”
“Yes. Hold still.”
“No! Why are you tying me to a tree?” Eiland struggled but Charon’s grip tightened. Eiland could feel him binding both wrists together, securing Eiland to the narrow trunk.
“There,” Charon said, tying off the knots. He circled back around to stand in front of
Eiland. “You can’t get free, can you?”
Eiland stared at him a moment then drew back one foot and kicked Charon as hard as he could in the shins. Charon yelped and hopped out of range. He fixed Eiland with a furious look but Eiland’s anger far outweighed his fear and he glared right back.
“Why am I tied to a tree?”
“So that you don’t go anywhere.” Charon turned away and moved back to his pack—hobbling a little, Eiland noted with bitter satisfaction. “Stop whining, it won’t be but a few hours.”
“A few hours? Charon!” Eiland twisted his hands, wincing as the rope burned him. “What if a bear comes along? Or a wolf? Or—”
“We haven’t seen anything bigger than a squirrel all day, Eiland.” Charon dug through his pack, apparently unfazed by Eiland’s very real concerns that he might die here.
“What if I get thirsty? Or hungry? What if I have to pee?” Charon just rolled his eyes. “And—and you! What if you need help?”
“I’m pretty sure I’ll manage,” Charon retorted, setting out his bedroll. He took a long draught from one of the water skeins. “I’ve been managing just fine.”
“By tying people to trees?”
“Stop bleating. You’ll definitely attract something if you keep—”
Charon cut off midsentence, dropping the water skein to the ground. His hands flew up to clutch at his belly again. His shoulders bent inward, his back curving. His legs seemed to fold underneath him, bringing him to his knees.
For a confused moment Eiland thought he’d been struck by an invisible arrow—and then Charon threw his head back and screamed.
Eiland flinched against the tree, his eyes wide. Charon collapsed onto his back on the forest floor, his knees bent. An expression of terrible pain twisted his face. His chest heaved. His hands clawed at the air, at his clothes, his skin.
Another spasm made him arch and he screamed again, the sound echoing between the trees. His limbs began to jerk uncontrollably.
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