When Rains Fall
Page 1
Table of Contents
www.cassidytaylor.net
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
CHAPTER THIRTY
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
CHAPTER FORTY
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
ALSO BY CASSIDY TAYLOR
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
WHEN RAINS FALL
The Lost Fields Book One
Cassidy Taylor
WHEN RAINS FALL
THE LOST FIELDS BOOK 1
Copyright © 2017 by Cassidy Taylor. All Rights Reserved.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.
Cover designed by Christian Bentulan
Map designed by Renflowergrapx
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Cassidy Taylor
Visit my website at www.cassidytaylor.net
Printed in the United States of America
First Printing: Dec 2017
For Vivian.
This is Mommy’s book.
Before the rains fell, the skies were dry.
Claim your prequel short story, free for a limited time:
https://instafreebie.com/free/4Kk5X
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
CHAPTER THIRTY
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
CHAPTER FORTY
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
ALSO BY CASSIDY TAYLOR
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
CHAPTER ONE
Sibba
A cold breeze whispered through the bare branches, plucking one of the last defiant leaves from its perch and dropping it, brown and crisp, at Sibba's feet on the forest floor. Sibba froze, her breath a white cloud hovering in front of her. The same gust of wind danced across the meadow, the rustling grass a quiet echo of the ocean waves breaking against the nearby shore. The doe looked up, ears erect, eyes wide, muscles quivering beneath her light brown fur. If she smelled Sibba now, she would bolt, and Sibba would lose their last chance at fresh meat before the first snow. Even worse, it would prove her mother right. Darcey had argued that it was dangerous to go hunting when the storm was pressing down on them, that the animals would have all taken shelter. Her mother hated storms, but Sibba hated the idea of being stuck inside for days on end. One last excursion, one last taste of freedom, was all she wanted.
When the doe ducked her head back down to the patch of dry grass, Sibba allowed herself a quiet exhale of relief and another step forward. The supple leather of her boots was made for this, broken in after years of hunting in the forests of Ey Island. High overhead, Aeris circled. The golden hawk was just a speck against the heavy, gray clouds, hunting her own meal.
A few careful yards closer and Sibba raised the bow. It had belonged to her big brother, Jary, having been carved and strung by his own hands. The yew wood limbs were a gleaming light brown, painstakingly engraved with runes for strength and stealth and accuracy. She’d stolen it just before leaving Ottar with her mother—one more way of showing him exactly how she felt about his decision to stay with their father. Consequently, the bow was too big for her, but it only made her work harder. While at first she could hardly draw the bow, now her arms were chiseled with muscles, her grip on the bow steady and firm. She drew the string back, the arrow held between her fingers, until it touched the corner of her mouth.
The doe looked up again. Steady, she thought, both to herself and the doe. She couldn't rush or she would miss, and all they would have to eat during the winter would be dried jerky and fish, and the garden preserves—months of watered down skause that made the small house smell like a stagnant pond.
A branch cracked, the sound very close. Torn between shooting the doe and protecting herself, Sibba hesitated. The doe did not; she fled, her brown haunches disappearing into the slumbering forest, there one breath and gone the next. Sibba whipped around, the bow still held aloft, searching for the source of the noise. Ey Island was small and sparse, but in the dry season, when the tide was low, it was not uncommon for animals—predators and prey alike—to cross from the mainland and then end up stranded there with Sibba and her mother when the rains returned. Just because she hadn't seen a bear or a wolf or a field cat didn't mean there wasn't one, only that it had avoided her all season.
Movement flickered between tree trunks and she stopped her frantic searching, zeroing in on the small anomaly, the darker shadow that didn't belong. Another rustle, another snapping branch. Sibba wasn't afraid. It took a lot to scare her, and right now she was in no mood to be stalked.
“Raaahh!” she bellowed into the trees—a battle cry, a challenge. Let her bring home a new bear hide; then her mother would have to admit she had been wrong about this excursion. The figure moved, slinking from behind a trunk. It was the right size to be a bear, and just before its face registe
red in Sibba's mind, she released the arrow. She twitched the bow at the very last moment, more out of surprise than instinct, and the arrow embedded itself in the wood beside a man's head.
He held both of his hands in front of him as if to ward her off, his eyes darting sideways to the shaft of the arrow still wobbling from the impact. Sibba, who hadn’t seen a man in five years, took in the sight of him. He was big, but not as big as her father, nor quite as old. He had long, dark hair and a beard to match, and wore ill-fitting clothes that had been patched one too many times. The dark hilt of a sword stuck out over his right shoulder. He was like a strange and exotic creature. Her mother traded only with the weavers from Ottar, meeting the women once a month on the mainland shore. Sibba wasn't sure how to act or what to say to him, and so she did what she had always done in the face of danger—raised the bow again, plucking an arrow from the quiver at her hip and stringing it before he could speak a word.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“I'm not a threat,” he said, not answering her question. “I'm not— I'm— Please.”
What did she look like for a man his size to be wary of her? She had shorn off her pale yellow hair earlier that year, and it just brushed her shoulders in choppy layers. Dirt covered her face for camouflage, and she wore furs as if she were more animal than girl. Add to that the straps around her legs and torso that held her weapons in place, and she supposed she could understand his wariness. She lowered the bow; as long as he maintained his distance, she could give him that.
“I'm just a traveling tradesman,” he said, still holding his hands up. There was something about the way he spoke, his accent clipped and uncertain as if he had to think about every word. She was instantly suspicious. It was rare to find an outsider in the Fields. The closest known country was across waters infested by Nokken and Kraken and plagued by swirling storms.
“Where are you going that brought you here?” she asked. Tucked away on the northwestern side of the Fields, Ey Island was not on the way to anywhere.
“To trade in Ottar,” he said, naming the largest port town in her father's territory and the place that had been her home for the first twelve years of her life. “A storm blew me off course and deposited me on your island. Do you have a place where I can rest and eat before I take my leave?”
There had been a storm off the coast several days ago. The black clouds never made landfall, but she had watched them rough up the waters that crashed against Ey's shore. “I have nothing to spare,” Sibba said.
“I don't need much,” the man said, finally lowering his hands. “Just a meal and a place beside a warm fire.”
She didn't trust him, though her mother would have pointed out that she didn’t trust anyone. Sibba would have preferred fighting a bear to bringing this man anywhere near her home. She could imagine her mother scolding her though if she were to turn this man away. No matter how much the woman had been hurt, she never failed to be kind. And this way, at least they would be able to keep an eye on him. Better to know where he was than to have him skulking about Ey Island until the tides turned and he could be on his way.
The sun, visible only barely behind the heavy clouds, was to her right. She twitched the bow in his direction. “That way.”
✽ ✽ ✽
There was no reason to be quiet anymore. The man walked as if he had rocks in his shoes, and any animal with ears would be long gone before they got anywhere near it. That explained Aeris's continued absence; the bird would have to go to the other side of the island to find an animal that hadn't been scared away. Not trusting the blade on his back, Sibba kept him in front of her and her ax in her hand, having strapped the bow on her own back.
“Do you have a name?” he asked, glancing at her over his shoulder.
“Yes,” she answered.
For a time, the only sound was the man’s heavy footfalls. Then, “Well, what is it?”
“Sibba.” She purposefully omitted her surname. He didn't need to know that he had stumbled across the chief's daughter. Her armbands—gold and silver and iron rings that snaked up her arm to show her high status—were hidden beneath her sleeves and furs. She didn’t know why she still wore them; there was no one here to see except her mother who disliked the practice anyway.
“I'm Gabel.”
She watched him walk, saw the way that he always managed to account for the sword peeking over his shoulder as they squeezed through the trees. It never knocked against trunks or brushed low-hanging branches. She had not known a lot of men, but those she had known in Ottar were warriors—sure-footed men with easy smiles and sharpened blades. For someone so careless with his feet, Gabel certainly was mindful of his weapon. “That's a fine sword for a trader,” she called up to him. He didn't turn around but raised his right hand to touch the hilt before dropping it back down to his side.
“A family heirloom,” he said, his voice strained as he jumped over a small creek. If it snowed, as the sky promised it would, the creek would be iced over in the morning. The air, too, smelled clean and cold, biting her nose and fingertips threateningly.
As he struggled up the northern bank of the creek, she gained on him. This close, she saw that he was younger than she had at first thought. The sun and the wind had aged him, but he couldn't be more than thirty. This didn't ease her mind at all. More often than not, the ignorance of youth was equally as dangerous as the confidence of old age.
“Where are you from?” she asked him. The beach was nearly in sight now, and it would be another mile east toward home. The walk would take enough time for her to decide whether or not she trusted him.
“Here and there,” he said, tilting his head from side to side. “Everywhere and nowhere.”
Slipping into the Casuin tongue that her mother had taught her as a young girl, she said, “I know you are not Fielding.”
His surprise at hearing the other language was evident in his raised brows and crooked grin. “I am a part of everywhere I have been,” he answered in the same tongue.
This still wasn't an answer, but it was one that Sibba understood. She had never left the Fields, but she would. Not to raid and plunder, like the Fieldings would, but to explore and learn and find somewhere where she belonged. Her mother spoke of her home across the Impassable Strait, of a family that was a part of Sibba even though she didn't know them. Someday, she would go there. When her mother didn't need her, when she had amassed enough wealth, when she had a boat of her own, and a crew to take her there. Usually, someday seemed like a distant dream, but with Gabel standing in front of her, a stranger who had seen many lands, it seemed at least attainable. No matter what her father said, or how he had taunted her for her curiosity.
“You and your mother are alone here?” Gabel asked.
Sibba nodded automatically, lost in her thoughts so that it took her a moment to truly hear his question. You and your mother. Had she mentioned her mother? Keeping her steps even and her face straight, she wound back through their conversation. No, she thought. She would never have put her in that kind of danger.
“Yes,” she said, but it took her too long to answer and when she did, she choked on the word. When he looked back at her, his face had changed. Gone was the easy smile; in its place were hard lines and flat, emotionless eyes. In the space of that single word, he had shed the persona of a weary traveler and become someone else. Even though Sibba didn't know him, there was something predatory in his look that she recognized. It turned her palms sweaty in spite of the cold air.
His hand reached up again, fingers brushing the hilt of the sword, this time wrapping around the smooth handle and pulling it from its sheath in one clean, practiced movement.
CHAPTER TWO
Sibba
Sibba's feet moved before her mind could catch up. It was pure instinct, like the doe that had run at the snap of a branch. Gabel’s sword sang as it sliced through the air but Sibba was already weaving through the trees, heading east without thinking, toward the home she shared wi
th her mother. She shifted to the south, longing for the cover of darkness, but the white clouds and the bare branches kept the forest bright, and even the blundering attacker would be able to follow her tracks.
He stomped behind her, confident in his pursuit. He had her trapped on an island after all. She was a sitting duck, a sure thing. She veered east again, swinging around a river birch and leaping over a swollen creek. Sibba's feet slid in the mud but she scrambled onward, digging her fingers into the dirt to propel her forward. What would her father say if he could see her now, running scared?
“Stand and fight,” he would tell her. “It is the Fielding way.” Glory in battle, death with a weapon in her hand. It was what her father and brother urged. But Sibba had never felt that violent pride in her heart. Her fighting experience was limited to childhood bouts in the mud and beating back her brother with a wooden sword. She had learned to fight, yes, but then there was her mother in her other ear, preaching obedience and unity for the greater good. Her mother, with her calming voice and gentle smile and gracious hospitality, turning Sibba away from her Fielding roots. When they had left Ottar after her father had disgraced her mother, Sibba had felt a shameful peace. She was no longer being pulled in different directions, finally free to be herself in the wilderness. It wasn’t the permanent escape she longed for, but it would do for now.
And then Gabel had come along and ripped a violent gash in the stillness. She had never killed anyone and didn’t want to fight this man or spill blood on their island, but she would, to protect her mother and her home. That was why she had come to Ey Island, wasn’t it? Not just as company for her mother, but to do things that Darcey wouldn’t do. To protect her and care for her and do what had to be done. Her only hope would be to get far enough away from her pursuer to hide and wait, and then take him by surprise with an arrow or an ax in the back. To stop him before he could stop her.
She knew this forest, though, and here in the southern part of the island, the river birches were tall and gangly, the tree version of adolescent boys. Their flimsy branches wouldn't support her, and their skinny trunks wouldn't hide her. She cursed her Fielding size—her mother was petite and dainty, while Sibba was as imposing as her father, tall and long-limbed. Sturdy, her mother called her. She didn't feel sturdy now, pitting her mortality against the edge of Gabel's blade.