Truthwitch

by Susan Dennard

  Finally, she risked flicking her gaze upward—and found Merik’s eyes roving across her face. To her lips. To her neck.

  The door flew wide. Safi and Merik jerked apart.

  Evrane strode in … then instantly reared back. “Am I … am I interrupting something?”

  “No,” Safi and Merik intoned, stepping apart two paces. Then a third, for good measure.

  Iseult tottered into the room behind Evrane, her face pale and the Carawen hood pulled back. She looked like she might vomit or pass out—or both.

  Safi lurched for Iseult and grabbed her arm, guiding her to a stool. Then Safi unfastened the Carawen cloak from Iseult’s neck and shoved it toward Evrane. “You’re sweating too much. Are you sick?”

  “I just need rest,” Iseult answered. Then, she nodded gratefully as Merik handed her a glass of water. “Thank you.”

  “She needs more than rest,” Evrane insisted. “She needs healing.”

  Cold terror caught Safi’s breath. “Firewitch healing?”

  “Not Firewitch healing,” Evrane rushed to assure her, “but more than I can offer right now. I am drained from days of tapping into my power…” She trailed off, her gaze moving to Merik. “If we could go to the Well, then I could help her.”

  Merik stiffened, the triangle on his brow deepening. “The Well hasn’t healed anyone for centuries.”

  “It might augment my witchery, though,” Evrane countered. “At the very least, we can wash Iseult’s wound there, where the water is completely pure.”

  “It ain’t far,” said a new voice. Yoris. He stepped over the knee-high threshold and mopped his sleeve on his brow. “There’s a path along the river. Shouldn’t take more than ten minutes to reach.”

  “What about your men,” Merik asked, brow still folded. “Do they patrol that area?”

  “Of course. All the way to the edge of the Nihar lands.”

  A pause. Then Merik nodded, and his expression melted into something almost calm. “Aunt,” he said, twisting toward Evrane, “you can take Iseult to the Well. Heal her, if you’re able, and I’ll come for you at the next chime.”

  Evrane’s breath sighed out. “Thank you, Merik.” She slid a hand behind Iseult’s back. “Come. We’ll go slowly.” Iseult rose, and Safi moved to follow … but then paused.

  She turned to Merik, who stared at her. “I would like to join,” she said. “But I won’t go if you think it’s a risk to the contract.”

  He straightened slightly, as if startled she’d considered the contract. Considered him. “The contract should be fine. Although…” He stepped in close, and with aching slowness, he reached out to slide his fingers around Safi’s left wrist. When she didn’t resist, he lifted her hand, palm up.

  “If you run, Domna,” his voice was a low thrum that shivered into Safi’s chest, “I will hunt you down.”

  “Oh?” She arched an eyebrow, pretending Merik wasn’t touching her. That his voice wasn’t making her abdomen gutter and spark. “Is that a promise, Prince?”

  He laughed softly, and his fingers slipped behind her wrist. His thumb trailed fire over her palm … Then he dropped her hand, leaving no indication of why he’d picked it up in the first place.

  “It’s a promise, Domna Safiya.”

  “Safi,” she said, pleased to note her voice was steady—and that Merik was actually smiling now. “You can call me Safi.”

  Then she bowed her head once and left the room to follow Iseult and Evrane to the Origin Well of Nubrevna.

  * * *

  The path to the Water Well was no easy walk, and Iseult was bone-tired before Noden’s Gift was even out of sight. In fact, she wasn’t even convinced that Evrane followed a real path. It was steep, overgrown by stinging nettle (that Safi stepped in and proceeded to howl over), and the insects and birds chattered so loudly, Iseult thought her ribs might shatter from the vibration of it all.

  The hardest part, though, was the steep climb to the double-ridged peak on which the Origin Well stood. With Safi’s and Evrane’s help, though, Iseult finally reached the top of the black-rocked hill, and promptly gasped.

  For she was at an Origin Well. The Water Well of the Witchlands. There had been an illustration of it in her Carawen book, yet this, the reality …

  It was so much more in person. No painting could ever capture all the angles and shades and movement of the place.

  The narrow basin, with its six cypress trees (albeit skeletal and leafless) spaced evenly around the sides, held water clear enough to reval a sharp, rocky bottom. The flagstone path circling the Well had always looked gray in the book, but now Iseult saw it was actually a million shades of ancient white. Beyond the Well’s ridge of stone was the Jadansi, blue and endless—yet strangely calm. Only the lightest salty breeze swirled up to ripple tenderly at the Well’s surface.

  “It looks nothing like the Earth Well,” Safi said, her expression and Threads as reverent as Iseult knew hers must be.

  Evrane hummed an acknowledgment. “Each Well is different. The one at the Carawen Monastery is on a high peak in the Sirmayans and covered permanently in snow. We have pine trees, not dead cypresses.” She raised questioning eyebrows at Safi. “What did the Earth Well look like?”

  “It was beneath an overhang.” Safi’s gaze turned distant as she rummaged through her past. “There were six beech trees, and there was a waterfall that fed into the Well. But it only flowed when it rained.”

  Evrane nodded knowingly. “The same happens here.” She pointed to a stone dam splitting the eastern ridge in half. “That used to feed into the river, but now it only flows during a storm.”

  “Can we look?” Iseult asked, curious as to what the canyon looked like. There’d been no mention of that in the book.

  “Don’t you want to rest first?” Safi asked, brow furrowing and Threads concerned. “Or try to heal?”

  “Yes,” Evrane chimed. She swooped an arm behind Iseult and led her to a ramp descending beneath the water. “Let’s get you undressed and into the Well.”

  “Undressed?” Iseult felt the heat drain from her face. She braced her heels against the flagstones.

  “You need to clean more than just your wound,” Evrane insisted, heaving Iseult onward. “Plus, if there is any magic to be had in this Well, you need as much skin exposed as possible.” Then, almost as an afterthought, she added, “You can keep on your underclothes, if that will help.”

  “I’ll strip with you,” Safi offered, grabbing for her shirttails. “If anyone shows up”—the shirt slid over her face, muffled her words—“I’ll dance around and distract them.”

  Iseult forced a shrill chuckle. “Fine. You win—as always.”

  By the time Safi had flung her shirt to the flagstones, Iseult started undoing her own buttons. Soon, both girls were stripped to their small clothes, their Threadstones glittering at their necks. As Safi helped Iseult sit on the ramp—oh, it was shockingly cold water—Evrane also undressed.

  The monk glided into the Well, barely a wave around her chill-bumped skin. “Give me your arm, Iseult. I will dull your pain so you can swim.”

  “Swim?” Safi squeaked. “Why does Iseult need to swim?”

  “The healing properties are strongest at the center of the Well. If she can touch the spring’s source, it could heal her completely.”

  Safi took Iseult’s left hand. “I’ll help you reach the bottom. I didn’t fight sea foxes just to have a simple swim stop me.”

  Even though Iseult wasn’t particularly excited at the prospect of swimming, she offered her arm to Evrane. Soon, the familiar warmth rushed through Iseult’s biceps, shoulders, fingers, and she felt the lines of her face smooth away. Felt her lungs inhale fuller than they had in hours.

  Iseult rolled her shoulder. Straightened her arm. Then she heaved an overly forlorn sigh. “If only they made stones that could dull pain this easily.”

  Evrane’s forehead puckered. “They do. You used one on the … oh. Oh. That was a joke.”

>   Iseult’s lips tugged up—Evrane was starting to understand her humor—and Safi laughed. Then she shoved out into the well, lugging Iseult with her.

  Together, they awkwardly frog-legged toward the center, spraying up a storm. “Just hold on,” Safi called, “and I’ll pull you down to the bottom.”

  “I can manage alone.”

  “And I don’t care. Just because you don’t feel pain doesn’t mean it isn’t there. Now hold your breath.”

  Iseult sucked in, chest expanding …

  Safi ducked under, hauling Iseult in a roar of exhaled bubbles. Iseult’s eyes snapped open. Then she heaved a clumsy kick and aimed down.

  Iseult wasn’t sure how she or Safi knew where the spring’s source was. The world of the Well was rock, rock, and more rock. Yet something stirred inside her. A string winding tighter and tighter—but only as long as she swam in this one, true direction.

  Pressure built in Iseult’s ears, pounded behind her eyes. Each stroke brushed colder and colder water against her flesh, making it harder to hold fast to Safi. Before they were halfway down, Iseult’s lungs started to burn.

  Then they were to the bottom, and Safi was reaching for the rocks. Iseult reached too …

  Her fingers hit something. Something she couldn’t see but that sent power—static—rushing over her body.

  A red light flashed. Then flashed again—brighter. Safi’s and Iseult’s Threadstones were blinking.

  That was when it happened. A boom! that slammed into Iseult. It yanked her sideways, wringing the air from her lungs. But she didn’t release Safi, and Safi didn’t release her as they churned toward the surface, pushed by water. By the charging roar that still quaked around them.

  They broke the surface. Waves kicked and swept toward shore. Iseult sputtered and spun, completely disoriented by the Well’s roughness. By the power shivering through her.

  Suddenly a gray head splashed up beside her. “Come on!” Evrane hooked her arm in Iseult’s and towed her toward the ramp.

  “What’s happening?” Safi shouted, straggling behind.

  “Earthquake,” Evrane called, her strokes sure. Then Iseult’s feet scraped stone, and she shoved to her feet. Evrane and Safi did the same, and all around them, the Well’s waters kept reaching and spraying, twirling and trembling.

  “I should have warned you,” Evrane panted, “we have tremors from time to time.” Already, the water was calming, the earth stilling once more. But Iseult barely noticed, her gaze caught on Evrane’s Threads. They were the wrong color for fear of an earthquake or even for concern over the girls’ safety.

  Evrane’s Threads burned with a blinding sunset-pink awe.

  And now that Iseult was staggering from the water beside the monk, she thought she saw tears falling from Evrane’s dark eyes.

  “Are you all right?” Safi asked, clutching Iseult’s shoulder and distracting her from Evrane.

  “Oh. Um…” Iseult stretched her arm and honed in on the feel of the muscle, the roll of her joints. “Yes. It does feel better.” Her whole body felt better, in fact. Like she could run for miles or endure the worst of Habim’s drills.

  And now that she was focused on it, she found a strange, boundless joy rushing through her—almost in time to the waves against her calves. The wind gusting over the Well. The twirling happiness in Evrane’s Threads.

  “I think,” Iseult said, meeting Safi’s bright eyes and grinning, “it’s all better now.”

  THIRTY-TWO

  “She has gone to shore,” Aeduan said. He stood at the door to Leopold’s cabin—which was, surprisingly, no larger than his own. It was made smaller, though, by the prince’s trunks against the walls and by the dozens of colorfully bound epics strewn everywhere.

  Sunlight beamed over a single cot, on which Leopold groggily propped himself up. “Who has done what, Monk?”

  “The girl called Safiya has gone to shore, and now your ship sails too far east—”

  Leopold burst out of bed, blankets flying. “Why are you telling me this? Tell the captain! No … I’ll tell the captain.” Leopold stopped, gaze dropping to his night robe. “Actually, I shall dress and then tell the captain.”

  “I’ll tell him,” Aeduan snarled. Why the prince was sleeping at midmorning Aeduan couldn’t fathom anyway. Much less why the man had bothered to don special attire for it.

  Soon, Aeduan found himself at the tiller, speaking in broken Cartorran while sailors backed away, fingers flying into the sign against evil. Aeduan ignored them all. The domna’s scent had moved due north, and due north meant land.

  Land meant that time was running out.

  “You want me to go ashore where?” the bearded captain asked, his voice rising in volume as if Aeduan were deaf. He held a spyglass to his eye and scanned the craggy shore. “There is nowhere to moor here.”

  “Ahead.” Aeduan pointed at a single sharp rock rising up from the waves. “The Nubrevnans went behind that, so we must follow.”

  “Impossible.” The captain frowned. “We’ll be smashed and sunk in moments.”

  Aeduan snatched the spyglass from the captain, then honed in on the lone rock surrounded by wild waves. Their Cartorran cutter was hauling past and would soon leave this spot entirely. Yet the captain seemed correct that landing here was impossible.

  Except … that it wasn’t.

  Now that the ship was lurching by, Aeduan could see behind the single rock. There was a gap in the cliffside. An inlet.

  Aeduan shoved the spyglass back to the captain—who didn’t take it. The brass fell to the deck. The captain swore.

  Aeduan ignored the stupid man and tipped up his nose. Breathed in until his chest bowed out and his magic had hooked onto the snow-swept truth of Safiya’s blood.

  She had gone in that inlet and then set foot on land—moved east. Yet she was not far. Her scent was strong ahead.

  Excitement roiled through Aeduan. Sparked in his blood, his lungs. If he moved fast enough, he could catch the Truthwitch today.

  And the Nomatsi girl too.

  “I need a Windwitch,” Aeduan said, turning to the captain—and making sure to keep his witchery alight. He wanted red in his eyes as he made his demands. “A Windwitch or several of them. However many it takes to fly me to the cliffs along with my things.” Along with my money.

  The captain stiffened, eyes dropping. But then a voice rose from behind.

  “Do as the monk orders, Captain. We will be going to shore immediately.”

  Ever so slowly, he turned to face Prince Leopold, who was now dressed in a thoroughly impractical tan suit.

  “We?” Aeduan asked. “I cannot accommodate eight Hell-Bards—”

  “No Hell-Bards, Monk.” Leopold ran his hands through his hair and stared at the Nubrevnan hills. “Safiya is my uncle’s betrothed, so I will join you. Alone.”

  Aeduan’s neck stiffened with frustration. “You will only slow me,” he said at last, no longer bothering with formalities.

  But Leopold simply glanced at him with a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “Or perhaps, Monk Aeduan, I will surprise you.”

  * * *

  Aeduan lost several hours of precious time because of the prince. To start, Leopold took forever to pack a single satchel and to strap on his useless rapier. Next, Leopold and the Hell-Bard Commander slunk off to speak in hushed, emphatic voices about only the Wells knew what.

  All the while, Aeduan stood on the quarterdeck, stretching his wrists and fingers, fuming at the prince’s slowness.

  Once the Windwitches finally blasted everyone off the cutter, Aeduan thought surely the pace would pick up. It didn’t. As soon as they touched down on the nearest cliff, Leopold wasted even more time by informing the Windwitches of all the same orders he had just given the captain. Something about a Wordwitched scroll that would alert the Hell-Bards to when and where Leopold and his uncle’s bride would need retrieval.

  So, Aeduan abandoned the prince for several minutes and set off into a world
of bleached pine trunks. The weight of the silver talers and its iron case was too much for Aeduan to carry at maximum speed, so he might as well use this wasted time to hide the lockbox.

  There were no smells or sounds here. It was like being at sea, alone, with only salt to fill the nose and a breeze to tickle the ears. There were scents, as if humans had passed, but no one was near right now.

  The emptiness made Aeduan … uncomfortable. Exposed, like a man on the chopping block. Even at the Monastery, high atop its mountain, there were still birds dotting the skies. Still signs of life.

  Unbidden, a story from Aeduan’s old mentor rose to the surface. A story of poison and magic and war. This was not the image Aeduan had conjured, though. He’d imagined a crispy wasteland, like the ones of his childhood. The ones left by Marstoki flames.

  Somehow this silent desert was worse than smoldering homes. At least with charred earth and village ruins, there was a sign of man’s hand at work. Nubrevna, however, looked liked the gods had simply given up. Decided the land wasn’t worth their time and abandoned it.

  At least in a godless world, though, there was no one to see Aeduan hide his talers.

  He found a hollowed tree stump and laid his iron box inside. Unless someone happened to pass close enough to peer within the trunk, the lock box was invisible.

  Flicking his knife against his wrist, Aeduan sliced open his left hand. Blood welled, dripped down his palm, and finally splattered to the iron.

  Now the money was marked. Now Aeduan could find it, even if he forgot where he’d hidden it. Or worse, even if someone tried to take it.

  Wind exploded. The Windwitches shot above the trees.

  “Monk Aeduan?” Leopold shouted over the gusting air. “Where are you?”

  For half a breath, a chaotic rage swept up from Aeduan’s toes. Burned in his veins. It was Leopold’s empire that had desolated this place. Who had ended the lives of not just the people but the earth itself. And now the prince stomped around with no respect, no remorse.

  Aeduan reached the prince in seconds, teeth grinding. “Silence,” he hissed. “No speaking for the rest of our journey.”