by Mark Anthony
The three reached the edge of the circle of wagons. Now that they were close, Lirith could see the vehicles were more than a little roadworn: wood cracked, gilt peeled, and dust flecked sun-faded paint. Yet somehow this only added to their patina of mystery.
Although they had wandered for time out of mind, it was said the Mournish came from the south. And indeed the appearance of their wagons had been a more frequent—if far from regular—sight in Lirith’s childhood home in southern Toloria. Still, she had not seen the Mournish up close since her girlhood. The scent of spices, candles, and roasted meat reached her nose, and memories flooded her.
“Listen!” Aryn said, coming to a halt. Lilting music drifted on the air, blowing back and forth with the breeze. The young woman shut her eyes and swayed like a slender tree. “It’s so beautiful.”
Lirith drew in a breath, letting fresh air clear the memories from her mind. “Well, are you feeling wild yet, Sir Durge?”
He seemed to consider her words, then gave a solemn nod. “Perhaps just a bit, now that you mention it.”
Lirith gaped at the stone-faced knight. Had the Embarran made a joke, or was it merely a happy accident? Either way, she laughed. Perhaps Aryn’s impulses had proved beneficial once again—perhaps visiting the Mournish was not such a bad idea after all.
“All right,” she said, engaging Aryn’s good left arm and Durge’s iron-hard right, “I believe there are some spice pies with our names on them.”
It did not take them long to find the pies. They paid a copper coin apiece to a toothless woman clad in orange and yellow, then sat in leafy shade. There they bit into bubbled crusts to release warm juices that dribbled down their chins. When the spice pies were gone, Aryn and Lirith laughed as Durge diligently licked each of his fingers.
After that, the three wandered from wagon to wagon, and at each one a new and enticing aroma drew them on. There were plates of sugared nuts, sizzling bits of meat on sticks, and small cups fashioned ingeniously of leaves, filled with honeyed wine as gold as the sun, but cool against the tongue as evening dew.
And not all of the wagons contained food. Many were open to reveal black cloths piled with silver rings, bright scarves that fluttered on the air like butterflies, knives of blue steel, polished stones, rugs woven with swirling colors, tin whistles, and boxes of wood carved like the Mournish wagons themselves into the forms of animals and birds.
At one wagon—this one shaped like a crouching rat—an old man beckoned them closer with a bony finger. They peered into the gloom within the wagon, and only as their eyes adjusted did they make out the glass jars that lined wooden shelves. The jars were filled with yellowish fluid, and things floated inside them. At first Lirith couldn’t tell what they were, then a jolt of horror surged through her. One jar was filled with eyeballs, another with snakes, and one with the half-formed fetus of a pig, its clearly visible spine ending not in one head but two.
Displaying a rotten grin, the old man reached out and brushed Aryn’s left arm with something dark, dry, and shriveled: a monkey’s paw. The baroness screamed and darted from the wagon, bumping into a rickety wooden stage where a monkey—this one quite alive—danced in time to a drum. The stage tilted, and the spindly creature leaped for Aryn, eliciting another shriek. She heaved the monkey back at its owner, who caught it as he shouted at her in a hot and musical tongue.
Lirith and Durge grasped the baroness’s shoulders and quickly steered her away. As they walked, Aryn collapsed against them in breathless, trembling laughter, tears streaming from her eyes. Lirith couldn’t help joining in, and even Durge’s craggy cheek seemed to twitch. At last the three of them came to a halt beside a tree, away from the circle of wagons. Heavy light infused the air, and the leaves whispered soft, green secrets above; the day was waning. Aryn’s laughter dwindled, and she let out a breath as she leaned against the smooth bark of the tree.
“I feel sticky,” she said.
Lirith nodded in agreement. Durge said nothing, but his mustaches stuck out at odd angles.
“It’s nearly sunset,” Lirith said. “We should get back to the castle. The queen will notice if we’re not at supper.”
Durge held a hand to his stomach and winced. “Please, my lady. May I beg that you do not mention the word ‘supper’ again this evening?”
Lirith gave the knight a wry smile. “I told you not to go back for another spice pie.”
“And no doubt I shall pay for my folly, my lady. Do I need the lash of your tongue to punish me as well?”
Lirith smiled sweetly.
Aryn stepped away from the tree. “Can we walk slowly back to the castle? It’s been such a fine day.”
The two women started back across the green arm in arm as Durge lumbered none too swiftly behind them.
“Now here is a sight,” said a voice as deep and rich as a bronze bell. “There walks the moon and the sun arm in arm. And look—a gloomy cloud follows behind them.”
The three came to a halt, searching. It took Lirith a moment to see the hulking shape nestled in the deepening shade between two trees. Then she made out the ridged spine, the sinuous neck, the folded bat wings. Aryn gasped beside her, and out of the corner of her eye she saw Durge grope in vain for the greatsword that was not strapped to his back.
For a heartbeat, Lirith was transported to the high, windswept bowl of stone where they had encountered the dragon Sfithrisir.
And here are two Daughters of Sia, both doomed to betray their sisters and their mistress.…
But how could such a terrible and ancient creature be here, in a well-tended grove beneath the queen’s castle of Ar-tolor?
A shadow moved between the trees: the shape of man. “Good sisters? Good brother? Is something amiss?”
It was the thrumming voice again—the warm voice of a man, not the dry hiss of a dragon. Realization drained through Lirith, leaving her trembling. How could she have been so foolish? It was not a real dragon before them, but rather a Mournish wagon carved in the shape of one. Now that she peered closer, she could see the craft’s spoked wheels, its circular windows, and the peeling, painted scales of the dragon’s neck. Yet they had not seen this wagon before. Why was it set apart from all the others?
The man stepped closer, still awaiting an answer.
Lirith swallowed. “It was nothing, sir. A shadow of the past, that is all, and soon gone.”
The man paused, and it seemed he stiffened. Then he said softly, “I have found in my travels it is usually best not to dismiss what one glimpses in shadows.”
Before Lirith could speak again, a cracked voice drifted through the wagon’s window.
“Sareth, who is it out there? I cannot see them, blast my failing eyes. I should give them to Mirgeth and his jars for all the good they do me.”
“It is … two beautiful ladies and a stern knight, al-Mama.”
“Well, bring them here where I can look at them. I will see their fates for them.”
“This way,” the man said, gesturing to the wagon.
“Al-Mama does not like to be kept waiting. She says at her age there is no time for patience.”
He turned and started toward the wagon. Lirith glanced at Aryn and Durge, but they only shrugged. It seemed there was nothing else to do save follow.
3.
The Mournish man walked swiftly—although there was a peculiar cadence to his gait—and in moments they reached the wagon. Smoke and the scent of lemons rose on the purple air. Bits of copper hung from the eaves of the wagon, filling the grove with chiming music.
The man turned toward them.
“What did you mean?” Lirith said before he could speak. “Back there, when you said, ‘there goes the sun and the moon’?”
The man smiled, his teeth white in the premature gloom beneath the trees. “It is simple enough, beshala. You are as brilliant as the sun and your sister as luminous as the moon.”
Durge cleared his throat. “And what was this speech about clouds?”
The man clapped the knight’s shoulder. “It is no insult I meant you, good brother. For the cloud grants the sun and moon a chance to rest when he lies over them.”
Even in the dimness, Durge’s blush was plain to see. “I have not … that is, I do not lie over … I mean to say …”
The man laughed—a sound as joyous as the chimes, but octaves lower, thrumming in Lirith’s chest. Curious for a reason she could not name, she studied him.
The Mournish man’s skin was the color of burnt sugar, and his eyes were as dark as old copper coins. Short as it was, his black hair was thick and curling, and his pointed beard was glossy with oil. He wore only a pair of blue, billowing pants in the style of the Mournish, and a red vest open to expose a flat chest. A dozen short, thin scars marked each of his forearms. The scars were precisely lined in parallel, which made Lirith suppose they had some ritual meaning. He smelled of sweat and strong spices. It was not an unpleasant scent.
The man’s laughter faded, and his eyes narrowed, as if he noticed Lirith’s attention. She quickly looked away.
“Where are they, Sareth?” came the cracked voice from inside the wagon. “It is almost time for my tea.”
Sareth grinned again. “My al-Mama will see you now.”
He pulled a handle near the dragon’s tail, and a door swung open. Beyond was smoke and dim, golden light. Sareth unfolded a set of wooden steps, then climbed into the wagon. It was only as he did this that Lirith finally noticed his leg.
Sareth’s loose pants ended just below his knees. On the right, his bare calf and foot were well shaped. However, on the left, there was no leg beneath the knee, but instead an ornately carved shaft of wood ending in a bronze cap. The peg leg drummed against the wooden steps as Sareth climbed inside.
“Come,” he said to the three below.
Lifting the hem of her gown, Lirith started up the steps, followed by Aryn and Durge. She couldn’t imagine there would be room for them all inside the wagon. But there was—barely. Light emanated from a single oil lamp, but Lirith couldn’t see the walls or ceiling, for everywhere hung jars, pots, bundles, and bunches of dried herbs. Sareth gestured for them to sit on three small stools while he stood near the door, blocking the waning daylight.
“A silver coin each it will cost you,” came the same cracked voice they had heard before, louder now.
Only then did Lirith realize that what she had taken for a bundle of rags against the far wall was in fact a woman.
She was ancient. Her body was lost in the tangled mass of rugs and blankets that covered the bench, but the arm she stretched forth was as thin and withered as a stick. Her head bobbed on a long, crooked neck, and her scalp bore only wisps of gray hair. However, amid the countless wrinkles of her face, her eyes were bright and warm as harvest moons. Bracelets clattered around her bony wrist, and large rings hung from her ears.
Before Lirith could respond, Durge held out three silver coins. The old woman snatched them from his hand and bit each coin with what appeared to be her only tooth. Then she grunted, spirited the coins to someplace deep within the mass of rags, and turned her large eyes on the visitors.
“You are marked with power,” the old woman rasped, thrusting a long finger toward Aryn.
Aryn started. “What … what do you mean?”
“Your arm,” the woman said.
Aryn lifted her hand to clutch her withered right arm, but the appendage rested as always in a linen sling, hidden beneath a fold of her gown.
“Always the balance seeks something in return when a great gift is given,” the crone said in her harsh voice. “Beautiful I was, until I discovered my shes’thar.”
Durge frowned at Sareth. “Her shes’thar?”
“She means her magic.”
Now Durge cast his somber gaze on Aryn, but what he thought he did not say.
“My cards, Sareth,” the old woman barked.
“They are next to you, al-Mama,” he said gently.
“Well of course they are.” The old woman snatched up a deck of cards from a small shelf. Another birdlike hand appeared from the rags, and she shuffled the cards with deft motions. “Each of you must draw a card from the T’hot deck.”
She fanned the cards out before her. The backs of the cards were faded, their corners worn, but silver symbols still gleamed against midnight-blue ink. Lirith exchanged looks with Aryn and Durge, then reached. Her fingertips seemed to tingle as she brushed one of the cards; she drew it. The others followed suit.
“You,” the old woman said with a nod to Durge. “Show me what you have drawn.”
Durge turned over his card, revealing a drawing that was at once dusky and radiant. It depicted a man with dark hair and eyes, standing by a pool of water that reflected the moon hanging in the slate-blue sky.
No, not just a man, Lirith. Look at the sword in his hand, and his armor. He’s a knight—a knight with a moon emblazoned on his shield.
The old woman took the card, running a yellowed fingernail over its surface. “The Knight of Moons. A man of war you are—trustworthy and strong. Yet you are ruled by the heart. And so full of sorrow! You believe you fight alone, but that is not so. For see? She smiles upon you always, although you know it not.”
The crone pointed to the drawing of the moon. Painted in the circle was the face of a woman, her lips curved in a soft smile.
“But who is she?” the old woman muttered. “Someone gone, or someone yet to come? My magic cannot say.”
Durge grunted. “I do not believe in magic, madam.”
The crone looked up. “And yet magic shall be the death of you,” she said flatly, burying the card back in the deck.
“Al-Mama!” Sareth said in a chiding voice.
The old woman shrugged. “I do not make their fates, Sareth. I but speak them. Now you.” She pointed to Aryn.
Trembling slightly, Aryn held out her card.
“Hah!” the old woman said, as if something she guessed had now been confirmed. “The Eight of Blades.”
On the card, a beautiful but solemn woman in a blue dress rode on a white horse across sun-dappled fields, a sword in her left hand. In the distance behind her rose a castle with seven towers, each crowned by a sword.
Aryn gasped. “But I’ve seen this before!”
Lirith glanced at the baroness. What did she mean?
The old woman nodded as she took the card. “As I said before, you have great power. See how the woman rides so proudly? All love her beauty even as they fear her sword. Yet there is always a price to wielding power. For see? She does not notice the poor man in the grass who is trampled beneath the hooves of her horse.”
Lirith stiffened. There—she could just make out the face in the long grass beneath the horse, eyes shut as if sleeping.
Aryn shook her head. “I don’t understand.”
“You have forgotten about one who bore pain for you.”
“But who is it?”
The old woman slipped the card back into the deck. “That is for you to remember, child.”
Even before the crone gazed at her, Lirith knew it was her turn. After Durge’s and Aryn’s tellings, she was not so certain she wanted to see the card she had drawn, but she didn’t have a choice. She turned it over.
Lightning slashed across a black sky behind a barren landscape as gray as ash. White shapes stained red scattered the ground. Perched on a twisted tree was a dark form, its eyes like hard beads.
A hiss escaped the old woman. “The Raven …”
“What does it foretell?” Lirith said, surprised at the calmness in her voice.
“The raven scavenges on the fields of the dead.” The old woman’s hand shook as she took the card. “Fields poisoned with spilled blood, where nothing will ever grow again.”
The dimness closed around Lirith, and the stifling air pressed against her so that she could not breathe. She blinked, and it seemed the images on the T’hot card moved. Sinuous lightning slithered across the black-ink sky. The bird opened the
cruel hook of its mouth as if laughing.
Lirith swayed on her stool, but a strong hand gripped her shoulder. She blinked, and the images on the card were motionless again. She looked up to thank Durge for steadying her—
—and froze. It wasn’t Durge who stood above her, but Sareth.
“Are you well, beshala?”
She licked her lips. “It’s nothing. I just need some air.”
“I will help you outside.”
Aryn and Durge looked concerned as the Mournish man helped her stand.
“You flee your fate,” came the old woman’s voice behind her. “Yet you cannot escape it, for it lies within you.”
Lirith stiffened, then stepped from the wagon into the gray-green air of the grove. She turned toward Sareth. His eyes were filled with such a strange softness that she almost gasped aloud. Why should he act this way for a stranger?
“I must apologize for my al-Mama,” he said, his deep voice husky.
Lirith forced her chin up, meeting his eyes. “Why? Are her tellings not true?”
His cheeks darkened, but he did not reply.
“Your leg,” Lirith murmured before she could stop herself. “Was that the price you paid for your shes’thar?”
His smile returned, but it was fiercer now, sharper. “No, beshala. That was the price I paid for my pride.”
Lirith opened her mouth, but before she could answer Durge and Aryn stepped from the wagon. Aryn’s face was pale, and Lirith did not fail to notice the way Durge hovered close to her.
“We should get back to the castle,” he said.
Aryn lifted her hand to her chest. “I don’t feel well.”
Lirith took the woman’s hand. “Do not fear, sister. You have only eaten too many sweets, that’s all. The feeling will soon pass.”
She led Aryn from the grove as Durge followed three paces behind. Only after a moment did she remember to look over her shoulder, to bid Sareth farewell. But the grove was empty, save for the now-shut wagon and the soft music of chimes.