The Storm Weaver & the Sand (Books of the Change)

by Sean Williams

  “Right,” said Fairney, undeterred, “then we’ll move to Shilly. Take my hand and show me the purification charm I asked you to memorise last night.”

  It might have been Skender’s imagination, but from then on Fairney worked the three of them much harder than the others in the class. If so, it was probably to keep their minds from wandering off on tangents, but he could have been punishing them for being too inquisitive.

  Who, Skender wondered then, did Fairney work for? The Weavers wouldn’t trust Sal and Shilly with any old tutor. Perhaps he, like Radi Mierlo and Shom Behenna, was waiting for word to come from hidden masters with equally hidden motives. Perhaps nothing Fairney told them could be trusted. Just because he said that the Weavers or the Golden Tower were legends, that didn’t automatically make Skender believe him.

  Skender chided himself for being paranoid. It was only much later, after their lesson had finished and they had had their evening meal, that Skender realised that Fairney hadn’t said that the Weavers didn’t exist. He had, in fact, said that the Golden Tower was like the Weavers. If one existed, then the other might too.

  Skender didn’t notice that he’d fallen asleep in the middle of the homework session until Kemp shocked him awake by grabbing his hair and rattling him. He jerked out of a dream in which he had found the Golden Tower, but it was nothing but a giant hollowed-out carrot in which the Weavers lived, dressed in green robes woven from the enormous vegetable’s leafy top.

  “Now,” leered the bully into his face, “where were we, Tom?”

  Skender cursed his tiredness as Kemp moved away. If only he hadn’t stayed out so late the night before, he might have been able to think straight now—and keep himself out of trouble into the bargain. That wasn’t part of the deal at all.

  He rubbed at his eyes to wake them up. There was no point wailing at what he couldn’t change, as his mother used to say. He would catch up on his sleep as soon as he got the chance. And the night was far from over yet.

  Shilly had the tattooing gear laid out on her bed when Sal and Skender descended through the hole in her ceiling. For a moment, she felt as though they were back on the road again, the three of them pretty much free to do whatever they wanted as long as they didn’t leave the caravan. Visiting Belilanca Brokate had been like seeing a long-lost friend. Although pleasant, it had also reminded her of just how constricting their present circumstances were.

  More or less…

  “You really went all the way to the library?” Sal was querying the younger boy in disbelief. “On your own?”

  “Sure.” Skender perched beside Shilly on the bed, less dusty than he had been last time. “It’s not that hard, as long as you keep your head. Everything connects, and no one suspects anything. I mean, it’s not as if anyone’s tried to invade the Haunted City before, have they? Everyone who comes here is pretty much vetted beforehand.”

  “Or put under control,” said Sal, raising his bound wrist.

  “Exactly.” Shilly grabbed his hand and pulled him closer. “Time to do something about this, I think.”

  Sal looked nervous. “Skender explained some of it. You’re giving me a tattoo to break the bracelet?”

  “Not break,” said Skender, “bend. If that seems strange, remember that they’re both charms. All they do is channel the Change in particular ways. The bracelet keeps you within certain bounds—and the fact that you’re here, now, rather than in your bedroom—demonstrates that those bounds are flexible. The charm I found last night will help flex those bounds even further. I think,” he added.

  “You’re not sure?” For the first time, Shilly felt doubt. She had assumed that Skender knew completely what he was doing.

  “Well, you know, it’s not an exact science, and I’m not what you’d call an expert.” He held out his hands palm up and exhibited a crooked grin. “Hey, I’m just a kid.”

  “No ordinary kid,” Shilly admitted. A good memory made up for lots of shortcomings.

  “So how are we going to do this?” Sal seemed more nervous about the procedure than the theory behind it. His gaze kept sticking on the needles lying on the leather binding before her.

  “You’ve never seen a tattoo applied before?” Skender asked him. “I thought you knew, and that was why you looked so nervous.”

  “They’re not common in the Strand,” said Sal weakly. “There are tattoo houses in the borderlands, but I’ve never been in one.”

  “Well, they don’t paint them on,” Skender sat up to examine the implements, “and I guess this means I’m going to be the one to do it. I don’t have a tattoo myself, but I’ve seen it done. Seeing it once is enough; I know the principles. The needle pushes the ink down under the skin, where it will stay forever. Everything else is just window-dressing.”

  Shilly couldn’t help but notice that, although Skender sounded confident, his hands were shaking.

  “I should do it,” she said, “I’m the best at drawing here.”

  “This isn’t the same thing as charcoal, Shilly—” Sal began.

  “No, but the pattern has to be exactly right or it won’t work. You don’t want us to have to do it twice, do you?”

  “No.” He shook his head quickly. “That is, I doubt I will.”

  “And you can probably do it smaller,” said Skender, nodding enthusiastically. “That’ll take less time, and be, um, less painful.”

  “Great.” Sal was beginning to look giddy. Shilly decided the time for talk was over, before he backed out.

  She pulled the pattern from under her pillow. It consisted of three flattened circles intersecting at a common point. “Where are we going to do it?”

  “Somewhere it can’t be seen.” Skender helped Sal take off his top. “Here. On his back, under the shoulder blade. That’s not too close to bone.”

  Shilly sketched the tattoo in place with an ordinary nib pen. Skender declared himself satisfied. Next she took a needle and rubbed it against a smooth, orange crystal Belilanca Brokate had given her. She had seen Lodo performing the same action once, after she had cut her foot, and she knew what the crystal did. The touch of the metal needle made the crystal heat up, sterilising it.

  Skender showed her how to apply the ink—a rich, deep black—to the tip of the needle. She held the image of the charm in her mind as she bent over to press the needle into Sal’s skin at a point just to the left of his spine. There was a thick ridge of muscle at that point, developed by weeks of helping Brokate’s drivers with their gear.

  Just like a drawing, she told herself, to distract her from the fact that she was drawing on skin, not on paper. One dot at a time…

  The instant the hot needle went in, Sal jumped halfway across the room with a strangled, “Ouch!”

  “What?” Shilly spread her hands innocently. “You knew it was coming.”

  “I did, yes, but…” He rubbed his back with one hand. “It hurt!”

  “I think that’s the idea,” said Skender, swallowing a grin. “Come back here. Shilly can’t work with you hopping around the room like a mad roo.”

  Reluctantly Sal obeyed. He lay face down on the bed, and Skender sat on his legs. Shilly was able to work much more easily from that position; her leg was less twisted, and his back was better lit.

  “Okay,” she said as she sterilised the needle again. “This time, no acrobatics.”

  Sal clutched the sheets as the needle went in, but apart from stiffening he didn’t move.

  Shilly felt only a slight resistance as the needle went smoothly in and out. She dipped it in the ink and repeated the movement slightly to the right. The tiny puncture wound produced a drop of blood that mixed with the black ink and got in her way for the third try. She wiped it away, and stared at the spot in puzzlement.

  “Hang on.”

  “Now what?” asked Skender.

  “It’s not working. See? The in
k’s not staying in.”

  “What?” asked Sal, twisting to see but not able to turn far enough.

  Skender came up to stare at the spot. “That can’t be. We’re doing it right. There must be—” He stopped and slapped his forehead. “Your ward, Sal! It’s protecting you. You’re going to have to take it out before the ink will take.”

  Sal did as he was told, tugging the silver ring from his ear and putting it on the pillow beside him. “You’re not deliberately torturing me, are you?” he asked. “The sooner we get this over with, the better.”

  “Believe me,” said Skender, sitting back on his legs to stop him twitching, “I agree.”

  Shilly went to work. Third time lucky, the ink went in and stayed in. A tiny, thin line gradually formed under her fingertips in Sal’s skin. Encouraged, she bent all her energies to the task. She soon acquired the rhythm of inking the needle then applying it, pausing every ten times or so to wipe away the blood with an alcohol-soaked rag. Her mind adopted that rhythm like a meditation, and soon she noticed nothing else. She forgot about the ghosts, about Lodo, about Kemp, and about her leg. There was just the ink and the smooth skin of Sal’s back; nothing else.

  Slowly, the shape of the charm began to emerge.

  Midway through, she sat up to wipe her hair out of her eyes. Her spine was stiff, and her eyes ached from staring at something so close for too long. She didn’t know the exact time, but she guessed that an hour had passed.

  Skender had fallen asleep, draped across Sal’s legs like an exhausted puppy. Sal was wide awake, although he appeared not to have moved even slightly since she had started. His hands still clenched the sheets as a defence against the pain. Shilly noticed, though, that the muscles in his arms were quivering, and there was a strange wildness in his eyes that she’d never seen before.

  “Are you okay?” she asked, lying down beside him.

  He blinked and focused on her. “It hurts.”

  “It’s just a needle. Hey, try breaking your leg in half. Then you’ll know what pain is.”

  “I know. It shouldn’t be this bad. But it just keeps going…”

  His left hand was shaking more than his right. She glanced at it and saw the tender skin around the bracelet burning bright red. She realised only then that he didn’t mean the needle when he said that it hurt, but the charm Shom Behenna had placed on him. It knew what they were doing, and it was punishing him for it.

  Sal’s eyes had lost focus again. His hair was damp with sweat, and she guessed the sheets beneath him were the same. She could see muscles twitching, not just in his arms, but also in his jaw and down his neck. She wished there was something she could do to ease the pain. Engenius Lutz, the surgeon from Yor who had betrayed them at the Lookout, had given her a vial of powerful painkillers to help her get through their journey with a broken leg, but she had used them up long ago. If she’d had just one left, she would have happily given it to him. Anything to make it easier.

  She wasn’t used to seeing boys express pain. The boys at School in Fundelry had revelled in their cuts and bruises and gone out of their way to show them off to anyone who would look. Around other girls, they would risk new injuries as though keen to prove their valour. It was the same with men, she gathered. She’d overheard stories of husbands straining backs from carrying heavy loads, tearing muscles by digging too deep, breaking limbs by climbing too high. It was almost as though pursuing pain was a way of proving their worthiness as mates. Or perhaps it was the other way around, she thought: the presence of a potential mate was so distracting that the pain simply didn’t seem so bad.

  Either way, Sal’s pain was bad, and she felt terrible for being the one to inflict it on him.

  Before she could examine the logic, if any, behind the impulse, she leaned across the gap between them and kissed him on the lips.

  It was awkward, and it was brief, but it had all the effect she hoped for. Sal was so startled at first that he almost pulled away. Then he realised what was going on and he responded with surprising force. Then his mind caught up, and he really did pull away, flushing furiously. Her own face felt just as hot. There was a terrified excitement bubbling away in her gut.

  “What are you doing?” he asked, his voice creeping back up into the higher register it had had before breaking weeks earlier.

  “Taking your mind off the needle. Did it work?”

  “I—but—” The feverish fragility in his eyes was gone. His attention was firmly on her. He moved hesitantly to kiss her again, as though to make sure he hadn’t imagined it, and she met him in the middle, suddenly feeling self-conscious and awkward. The element of surprise had given her the upper hand the first time. Now she was more vulnerable.

  She could taste salt on his lips. His breath was slightly sour, but no more than hers, she suspected. Her breathing sounded like air roaring in a blowhole and she was acutely aware of Skender at the foot of the bed, still sprawled unknowing across Sal’s legs.

  Bending over him was awkward. She went to put her hand on his arm, but thought better of it. His skin had gone from being a blank canvas to something far more potent in just a matter of minutes.

  She sat up, away from him. “We’d better get back to it.”

  “I guess.” He cleared his throat and moved uncomfortably on her bed. “The sooner we’re finished, the better. I can’t feel my feet any more.”

  They both glanced at Skender, and exchanged a quick smile. Then she turned to pick up where she had left off. It was harder to concentrate, this time, and she still felt him go rigid with the pain at the first pinprick, but the tension was a different one.

  Destined? she thought to herself. Bugger that.

  But it was difficult to maintain her usual scepticism at Lodo’s prediction for the two of them, and eventually she stopped trying. Next time the smile returned, it stayed right where it was, and she didn’t mind.

  Chapter 6. Among Family

  The following day began on a decidedly positive note. Sal woke feeling different, as though his life had changed overnight. The red welt around the bracelet was down, and the memory of Shilly’s kiss was still bright in his mind. He got out of bed to check her handiwork in the glowing mirror, standing on a chair to see his back clearly.

  It was then that the day took a turn to strangeness.

  He twisted to peer over his shoulder. Under a crusty cotton bandage was a bloody scab about the size of a large coin where the multiple needle wounds had bled. The tissue around it was inflamed, but not looking infected. He could see a slight bruise where the heel of Shilly’s drawing hand had pressed into his muscle.

  There was, however, no sign of the tattoo.

  Frowning, he lifted his shirt higher and peered more closely. Maybe it was a trick of the light. He brushed at the scab and winced as dried blood peeled away. There were no lines beneath. The tattoo appeared to have vanished.

  That didn’t make sense at all. Shilly had worked hard applying the pattern to his skin, yet the evidence of his senses couldn’t be denied: the morning after, it wasn’t there. It had disappeared—unless he had dreamed the whole thing, of course, in which case where had the scab come from? And what about the kiss? Had that not happened either?

  He sat down on the bed to think, disappointment and disbelief warring for control of his mind. He couldn’t have dreamt it. The tattoo had taken three hours to apply, in all. At the end, he had felt utterly drained yet filled with a strange exhilaration. Every muscle had been quivering as Shilly wiped away the blood one last time and applied the bandage to the wound.

  “What’s happening?” Skender had moaned as Sal had rolled over, waking from his deep sleep at the foot of the bed and sitting up, rubbing his eyes.

  “We’ve finished,” Shilly said, folding away the implements in the leather pouch.

  “About time.” The boy stood up. “Come on, Sal. I’ll show you back to your
room.”

  “It’s okay. I can find my own way back.”

  “What are you talking about? You’ve seen it up there. You’ll get lost in a second without me to show you the way.” Skender had grabbed his hand and tugged him to where Shilly’s cupboard stood below the vent. “I’m tired and don’t feel like sitting around here all night.”

  Shilly and Sal had exchanged glances. Sal had a perfectly good reason to want to stay longer. He hadn’t told her about the golem’s comment the previous night for fear of disturbing her concentration. They also hadn’t decided what to do about finding the Golden Tower. Mainly, though, he wanted to know if her kissing him had just been a way of keeping his mind off the tattoo—in which case it had worked perfectly—or if it was something she wanted to repeat.

  Skender was insistent, and it was hard to read what Shilly was thinking.

  “Okay,” he conceded with reluctance, “there’s always tomorrow.”

  “Avoid sleeping on the wound,” Shilly said as she helped him up onto the cupboard.

  “I’ll try.” Skender guided him through the vent, and would have crawled off into the dusty darkness without a word of goodnight, had Sal not lingered.

  He turned to peer back down at Shilly. She was standing in the middle of her room, leaning her weight on the cupboard, as though she had known he would look back. She was smiling.

  “Git.” She winked. Then Skender had pulled him away with a muffled complaint and taken him back to his room, where sleep had been difficult to achieve and his dreams had been even more bizarre than usual.

  And now this. If he had dreamt it, there was no way he was going through it all again.

  Sal looked yet again, daring his eyes to repeat what they had already told him. The tattoo definitely wasn’t there. The second morning bell went, reminding him that his time was limited. He couldn’t stand around all day, waiting for the answer to come to him. He had lectures to go to, or else he would be in trouble. Claiming to be locked in wasn’t an option, as the attendants had explained to him that the door was charmed to unlock itself at the second bell.