by M K Hutchins
It smelled amazing. If I were marrying Sorrel and moving to Westbank, I could cook like this every day. My throat knotted. The engagement had been so perfect.
“Dami?”
I blinked. “She’s... not here.”
“That’s your name now.” Father tasted again, then put the lid on and let it simmer. “How old are you?”
“Sevente—” No. I dropped my eyes to the floor. “Fifteen.”
“That’s my Dami.”
Dami ran away from home and in doing so, she’d erased me.
“What’s your birthgift?” Father asked.
I froze. Perceptive-of-taste-and-smell. That edge allowed me to become a cook. But now I was Dami. Strong-of-arm. That’s what the census records and Dami’s application stated.
No one in the palace would trust me to cook. I’d have to pretend to know nothing about food.
I hadn’t cried before, but I did now. Fat, sticky tears that made me feel no older than three. I tried to wipe them away, but of course Father saw.
He hugged me. “Oh, Plum.”
Would that be the last time I heard anyone speak my name?
I composed myself. “I’m fine. Simply... tired.”
And I’d be lucky to be simply tired by the time I left the palace. For two years, I’d be hauling water or doing laundry while pretending my birthgift made it easy. My back would be as bad as Mother’s.
“Tired,” Father echoed in a tone that told me he knew better. He banked the coals around the little crock, then tidied the counter. I loved this room. I loved the fire-stained brick hearth, the glowing wood walls, the row of obsidian knives and the shelf of carefully cleaned crocks.
Father’s eyebrows pinched together. “I’ve always tried to do good. Always tried to increase my skills. I think we have the healthiest village in Rowak.”
I nodded, the words washing over me.
“Even if some calamity left you orphaned, I knew the village would care for you. In so many ways, taking care of these people mattered to me more than storing up amber. I should have realized that amber mattered, too.”
Was he apologizing? “Father, this isn’t your fault.”
It was Dami’s. A coal of anger burned in my stomach. How could she do this to herself, to us? Throughout our lives, the sages teach, we are cared for and we take care of others. Grandparents care for infants. Parents work to support children and grandparents. Then the child becomes the parent, the parent the grandparent. The living feed and honor their Ancestors. And our Ancestors watch over all of us. Interdependence. That is how the world works.
Did Dami think she didn’t belong to this world, to this family?
Father sighed. “If I’d been more careful with my salary, if I’d saved, then—”
“Stop!”
Father blinked at me. I never raised my voice.
I swallowed the knots in my throat and spoke calmly. “I won’t let you blame yourself for Dami’s actions.”
“But I’ll always regret that I couldn’t protect you from them.” Father wiped his eyes and hastily turned back to the crock. He fussed over it some minutes more, then poured the beautiful clams into a bowl. After a final taste-test, he topped it with fresh herbs and brought the steaming delight to me. “And I deserve plenty of guilt. You know if the Royal House discovers your deception, they’ll execute you for your lies. I’m risking one daughter’s life to preserve the other’s.”
Oh, I knew my plan meant lying to the Royal House, but I’d thought only of Sorrel’s library and greenhouses, of my ruined future. But of course. Lying to the Royal House, in wartime or not, was punishable by death.
Vertigo washed over me, despite Father’s excellent meal. I thanked him, then staggered into our shrine, the centermost room of our home.
The small shrine held a lacquered table, just big enough for the daily supper offering. Shelves filled the wall above it, decorated with redwood boughs and white ribbons. The preserved heads of my Ancestors, going back three generations, rested on the lowest shelves, with plaques standing in for Ancestors on the higher shelves. Those older heads lived with Father’s relatives in Lillywhite. When we could, we made a pilgrimage to pay our respects.
I knelt. It seemed like only last week that we carried Nana’s body to the sages in Meadowind. Mother, Father, Dami, and I prayed outside while they worked. The sages shaved her head to preserve her hair, then detached her head from her body and boiled it over and over until only a whitened skull remained. Then the sages layered special clay over the bone, shaping Nana’s face. Dami and I each found a brown river stone for her eyes. We burned her body and scattered the ashes in a circle of redwood trees near our home.
I felt Nana so close when I said her name here, even though her head looked wrong. The skilled sages created a life-like face, but it wasn’t hers. The clay wore a smooth, young smile with an elaborately braided cap of gray hair. Nana had sun-broiled skin with deep wrinkles, like old pine bark. Maybe after a few decades, her new clay skin would develop fine lines like wrinkles, as my great-great grandparents had.
“Nana.” I’d never personally known anyone else on those shelves. I didn’t know how to plead with them. Nana would hear me and relate everything to my other Ancestors. “I’m scared. I’m scared for you, for me, for my parents, for Dami. But you’ll take care of us, right? Everyone is interdependent.”
I felt no reassurance, just the familiar ache—that ache for Nana’s honey-scented hand on my cheek.
“I suppose it’s my turn to take care of you, now. I won’t let you starve. I won’t leave you to roam the world as a Hungry Ghost. You loved me too much, Nana, for me to let that happen to you.”
Father packed me a bag with buckwheat branches, my spare dress, and a few amber chips and beads for the rest of the journey. I’d walk through Meadowind to Sandhead—a two day’s journey. In Sandhead, I could buy a quick, two-day ride to the capital at a carter station. I might have to wait in Sandhead a day for the next west-bound cart, but I’d make it to the palace on time. And no one that far west should recognize me.
Father tucked Dami’s royal summons into the inside pocket of his best mantle, then draped it over my shoulders.
“I can’t take this,” I protested as he belted the mantle around me.
“It’s yours,” he said. “If nothing else, you’ll be warm.”
Mother cried and covered my face with kisses. “You come back safe. You promise to come back safe.”
“I promise.” The words tasted like raw flour. I couldn’t promise anything.
Mother held me and stroked my hair, like I was little again. But I didn’t mind. This might be the last time I saw her. “Two years. Two years and you can honorably step down from service. I’ll see you then.”
Father hugged me, nearly crushing my ribs. Mother kept crying. Father’s face grew more and more pinched with guilt. My feet felt stuck to the floor, like sauce burnt onto a crock.
But delaying the journey would only make my parents hurt longer. They’d start to heal once I left.
I turned and headed down the path.
The forest was Dami’s domain, not mine. I picked wild herbs and mushrooms here, but neat, cultivated rows of turnips and strawberries were my delight. The redwoods reached almost higher than I could see. Ferns, moss, and pine needles blanketed the floor under them, dark and glossy in the trees’ perpetual twilight shadows.
I ached to turn around. Instead, I munched on one of the branches Father had packed for me. The buckwheat itself was merely filling, but the sweet compote of parsnips, carrots, and rutabaga he’d piped into the hollow center of the branch gave my limbs and torso a touch of extra endurance.
And I needed that. One step in front of the other. Home behind. The Redwood Palace ahead. By now, Father had probably walked into the village. Given a courier the letter refusing my engagement to Sorrel.
That thought kept me walking forward. No wedding waited for me at home now. No Sorrel of Westbank. No greenhouse with st
rawberries. No library of recipes. No former Master Chef Yarrow for my father-in-law.
I couldn’t mourn losing Sorrel, either. I was Dami. I’d never been engaged. I was strong-of-arm. I cared nothing for cooking now.
By midday I reached Meadowind. I should have kept going. Or I should have rested someplace else. But I sat on a hill, close to the training grounds. A few others lounged nearby—mostly girls giggling and pointing at the army recruits as they drilled.
I didn’t laugh. I scanned the men. Each wore loose pants and a belted rectangular shirt that fell to the knee. Each wore an armband with some insignia on it. And each held a staff. An officer—distinguished by his bright armband—shouted instructions. The recruits clumsily tried to follow. Block. Swing. Block. Behind the shouting, arrows hissed and thunked, but I couldn’t see the archery range.
A young man about my age grinned and plunked down next to me on the grass. He smelled like pine-needle soap. “Come to enjoy the view?”
“Just stopping a moment to eat.”
“You look like you’ve been traveling. From out east?” His voice had a warmth to it, like smoked salt. He leaned back on his hands, flirting with the two-foot gap of space propriety demanded between young men and young women. His sleeves draped halfway to his elbows. Yellow-ranked, like me.
“I look exhausted, or I look strange?”
He laughed—an infectious sound. “Neither. I have to come here to keep an eye on my sister.” He nodded at a clump of girls down the hill. “But I haven’t seen you before. And usually girls gawk in bunches. You’re interesting.”
From his mouth, all of that sounded like a compliment. I stared down at my half-eaten branch and wished my traitor cheeks weren’t burning.
“I’m Fir, by the way.”
I swallowed my real name. “Dami.”
“Dami.” He grinned with those dazzling teeth. “That’s a beautiful name. Here.” Fir pulled out a thinwood box from the bag he carried. “Mother packed these for us, but since my sister’s hardly paying attention, I’ll share them with you.”
He slid the lid off. Inside, dumplings sat on clean leaves.
“They’re smoked salmon. Go ahead. Take one.”
After a morning of walking, I didn’t protest. The balance wasn’t perfect—too much hotradish, ginger, and salt—but it was good for a home cook. Especially the light texture of the dough.
Fir ate one, then gave me another. I was turning it in my mouth, letting everything mix together, when the soldiers set down their staffs and rotated. New trainees replaced them.
I spotted Dami at once. At least that meant she hadn’t been caught yet. A bruise darkened her cheekbone. From a fight? A training accident? She held her staff as well as any other trainee, eyes focused on the instructor.
I tightened my fists in my skirt. I wanted to yell at her. Wanted to make her understand what she’d done to the rest of us and what could happen to her. Her face showed no regret, only concentration as she drilled. She never glanced my way.
“You look intense. Those aren’t settling with you?”
I’d forgotten all about Fir. “No, they’re lovely. I...”
And I didn’t have an explanation, so I flashed him a smile and took another dumpling. Fir took the last. Then he glanced at the clump of girls. “Drat. My sister wants to talk to me. It was a pleasure, Dami.”
He winked and strolled away.
I watched him go. Would Sorrel have been like him? Easy to smile, eager to share? I’d never know.
I couldn’t stay here and watch Dami train. I’d need two backpacks of soul-calming sweets for me to endure that. So I left Meadowind and tried not to think of the people I’d lost. Sorrel gone forever. My parents for at least two years. And Dami—would she survive? Would she come home if she did?
By dusk, I made it as far as Bobcat Run, the town between Meadowind and Sandhead. The sole wayhouse wasn’t hard to locate. The aroma of broiled fish and pease porridge permeated the smoky, dim common room. My stomach rumbled. Those salmon dumplings seemed an eternity ago.
A double-chinned woman gave me a flat look. “You want a room, dinner, or both?”
“Both, please.” I opened my bag. Where had that purse gone? I shoved my spare dress to the side.
The woman raised an impatient eyebrow.
“It’s in here somewhere,” I muttered, pulse pounding. I couldn’t have lost the amber. I had to hire a ride tomorrow in Sandhead.
At last, I found the pouch under what remained of my branches. But my stomach sunk as I lifted it out. The weight and shape felt all wrong.
I opened it. The amber was gone. In its place rested a single dumpling wrapped in a clean leaf.
“Trying to slip in a night for free?” The woman sneered, chins waggling.
My words stuck in my throat like uncooked dough. A few of the other patrons pointed and laughed, glossy bits of glazed carrots and broiled fish on their plates. I swallowed. “I... I was robbed.”
Saying it out loud didn’t make it less jarring. Fir was nothing but a polished thief. And I’d fallen for it.
“I don’t care why you’re out of amber. If you can’t pay, you can’t stay.” She said the last line in a nasty sing-song—like she’d said it a hundred times before.
“But...” I stammered, mind reeling. “My father will reimburse you. Or maybe the palace. I’m headed to a post...”
Her glare silenced me. “Unless you’re King Alder himself, I don’t care. Fancy yellow-ranked people, always thinking they’re so much better than everyone else!” She placed her hands on her hips as if to emphasize that her dress just covered her shoulders—orange-ranked.
“I’ve been robbed!” This had nothing to do with rank or trying to flaunt it.
“Do you have payment now? No? Then you don’t get food or a room now, either. Shoo!” She reached for a broom.
I hurried out, hugging my bag to my chest. No amber. No hot food. No room. No fast, comfortable ride purchased at the carter station tomorrow.
If I returned to Clamsriver, Father might have a few more beads around, but going back would add at least two days to my travels. If I had to wait for a cart in Sandhead for a single day, I’d be late.
Would the palace dismiss me and fine Father for three years of unpaid taxes? I didn’t know. I couldn’t risk it. Walking was slower than riding, but surely not slower than two days’ wasted time.
I ate Fir’s salmon dumpling. Even if he left it to mock me, it was food.
I slept poorly against the damp wood wall of the inn and woke covered in frigid spring dew. After downing my last buckwheat branch for breakfast, I shook out my skirt and walked. At least the road sloped gently downhill as I headed away from the mountains. Sometimes it cut through the dense redwood forest, sometimes through meadows or fields.
By late afternoon, I noticed more and more jays—scavengers that enjoyed scraps left by people. Sure enough, I soon crossed into a small town. My mouth watered at the aroma of early spring greens and salted fish. I navigated my way through the children playing in the green around the well and filled my water skin. A pair of men chatted next to one of the houses. Maybe I could ask them for a meal.
A girl my age with a jug on her hip came toward the well. Even better.
“Excuse me, but is there... is there anywhere here to stay?” I fumbled. I made a horrible beggar. “I’ve lost most of my things, but I’d be willing to work for a meal and a night’s shelter. I’m good at... at scrubbing pots and such,” I finished lamely. I couldn’t go around proclaiming to be a decent cook; someone might take note of me.
Her expression soured. “Not tonight, I’m afraid.”
My empty stomach twisted, trying to pull my innards into my sandals. “Oh.”
“Usually we’re a hotpot of hospitality,” she apologized, “but there are some returning veterans coming this way. We’re supposed to house them tonight.”
What was one more? “Surely there’s plenty of extra work, then.”
; “Have you heard much news about the war?”
I paused. They didn’t send women as camp cooks, so I’d never paid much attention.
The girl filled her jug as she talked. “Not too long ago, some soldiers heading down to the front stopped at Hidet. A traveler like you showed up, just staying the night. She slit their commander’s throat before running off. Now, you don’t look like one of those Bloodmarrows to me, but if I were you, I wouldn’t want to be sharing a bowl with a soldier if you’re a stranger here.”
“I don’t even know what a Bloodmarrow is.” It sounded familiar, but I couldn’t place it.
“People say they’re Vengeful Ghosts controlled by the Shoreed for their evil ends. Wherever they go, folks die and disappear.” She eyed me suspiciously.
The Shoreed didn’t have an army of ghosts at their disposal. A well-trained spy had killed the poor commander. I fumbled for my papers. “Would this be enough to prove myself?”
“Serving at the palace. That’s pretty. Maybe with that, you’ll find someone in town willing to risk feeding you.” She walked away.
Apparently, she wasn’t willing.
A little boy ran up to me, hands all grubby from play. He handed me a pair of dried, tart yellow plums. “Here! You’re hungry, right?”
“Yes. Thank you.”
He beamed at me, front two teeth missing. “Mother always tries to get me to eat those. Better you than me.”
He scurried off as fast as he’d come.
I munched gratefully on my namesake as I walked. Plums target the muscles. The simple snack gave me a moment of pain-free limbs before my aches settled back in.
A commander killed in his sleep. Did his family already have word that he was returning alive and whole? Did he have children waiting, eager to hug their father? The redwoods blocked out the sun above me, chilling the air. I tied Father’s mantle shut, wishing it hung down further than my knees.