As gently as her mother would, Tornac pulled back the cuff of her sleeve. Essie turned her head away. She didn’t need to see the scar again—didn’t need to look to know how it crawled up her forearm all the way to her elbow.
She hoped no one else in the common room would notice.
After a moment, she felt Tornac pull her sleeve back down, and he said, “That…is a very impressive scar. You should be proud of it.”
Confused, she looked back at him. “Why? It’s ugly, and I hate it.”
A faint smile played around the corners of his lips. “Because a scar means you survived. It means you’re tough and hard to kill. It means you lived. A scar is something to admire.”
“You’re wrong,” said Essie. She pointed at the pot with the painted bluebells on the mantel—the one Auntie Helna had given them last winter, the one Essie had knocked onto the floor a few moons back. A long crack ran from the lip of the pot to the base. “It just means you’re broken.”
“Ah,” said Tornac in a soft voice. “But sometimes, if you work very hard, you can mend a break so that it’s stronger than before.”
Essie wasn’t liking their conversation as much as she had earlier. She crossed her arms, tucking her left hand into her armpit. “Hjordis and the others always make fun of me for it,” she mumbled. “They say my arm is as red as a snapper, and that I’ll never get a husband because of it.”
“And what do your parents say?”
Essie made a face. “That it doesn’t matter. But that’s not true, is it?”
Tornac inclined his head. “No. I suppose it isn’t. Your parents are doing their best to protect you, though.”
“Well, they can’t,” she said, and huffed. She glanced at him; the darkness had returned to his face, but it didn’t seem to be directed at her. “Do you have any scars?” she asked.
A humorless laugh escaped him. “Oh yes.” He pointed at a small white mark on his chin. “This one is only a few months old. A friend of mine gave it to me by accident while we were playing around, the big oaf.” A hint of affection lightened Tornac’s expression. Then he said, “What happened to your arm?”
It took Essie a while to answer. All she could see in her head was the inn’s kitchen that morning three years ago, and all she could hear were Mama’s frantic cries….“It was an accident,” she mumbled. “A pot with hot water fell onto my arm.”
Tornac’s eyes narrowed. “It just fell on you?”
Essie nodded. She didn’t want to mention that it had been Papa who bumped her. But it hadn’t been his fault! She’d been running around the kitchen, and he hadn’t seen her, and Essie knew he felt terrible about what had happened.
“Mmm.” Tornac was staring at the fire, the sparks and embers reflecting in his eyes.
Essie looked at him, curious. “Where are you from?” she asked.
“A long, long way from here.”
“In the south?”
“Yes, in the south.”
She kicked her feet against the chair. “What’s it like there?” If she was going to run away, she ought to know what to expect.
Tornac inhaled slowly and tilted his head back so he was gazing at the ceiling. “It depends where you go. There are hot places and cold places, and places where the wind never stops blowing. Forests seemingly without end. Caves that burrow into the deepest parts of the earth, and plains full of vast herds of red deer.”
“Are there monsters?” she asked.
“Of course,” he said, returning his gaze to her. “There are always monsters. Some of them even look like humans….I ran away from home myself, you know.”
“You did?”
He nodded. “I was older than you, but yes. I ran, but I didn’t escape what I was running from….Listen to me, Essie. I know you think leaving will make everything better, but—”
“There you are, Tornac of the Road,” said a sly, slithering voice that made the hair on the back of Essie’s neck prickle. A man stepped forward between the tables. He was thin and stooped, with a patched cloak draped over his shoulders and ragged clothes underneath. Rings glittered on his fingers.
Essie took an instant dislike to the man. He smelled of wet fur, and something about the way he moved and looked gave her a warning feeling in her gut.
“Sarros,” said Tornac, a flicker of distaste on his face. “I’ve been waiting for you.”
“The reaches are dangerous these days,” said Sarros. He picked up an empty chair and placed it between Essie and Tornac, and then sat facing both of them.
Essie noticed several more men had entered the common room from the street. Six of them. They were rough-looking, but not like the fishermen; they wore furs and leathers and had a wild appearance similar to the trappers who came in during spring. Papa often had to throw them out because they made too much trouble.
Over by the bar, Papa watched the newcomers, wary. He pulled out his leather-wrapped truncheon and laid it next to his washcloth as a silent warning. The sight comforted Essie; she had seen him settle even the meanest drunks with a few well-placed blows.
Sarros pointed at her with one long, grimy forefinger. “We have business to discuss. Send the youngling away.”
“I have nothing to hide,” said Tornac smoothly. “She can stay.” He glanced at her. “If you’re interested. You might learn something useful of the world by it.”
Essie shrank back in her seat, but she didn’t leave. Tornac’s words tickled her curiosity. Also, for some reason, she couldn’t help but remember the bad omens from earlier, and she felt that if she did leave, something horrible would happen to Tornac.
A long hiss sounded between Sarros’s teeth as he shook his head. “Foolish, Wanderer. Do as you wish, then. I’ll not argue, even if you put your foot crosswise.”
A glint of steel appeared in Tornac’s gaze. “No, you won’t. Tell me, then, what have you found? It’s been three months, and—”
Sarros waved a hand. “Yes, yes. Three months. I told you; the reaches are dangerous. But I found word of what you seek. Better than word, I found this—” From the leather wallet on his belt, he produced a fist-sized chunk of black something that he thumped down on the table.
Essie leaned forward, as did Tornac.
The something was a piece of rock, but there was a deep shine to it unlike any rock Essie had seen, as if a smoldering coal were buried in the center. She sniffed and then wrinkled her nose. Yuck! It smelled as bad as a rotten egg.
Tornac looked at the rock as if he wasn’t sure he believed it existed. “What exactly is that?”
Sarros lifted his shoulders, shrugging like the herons along the docks. “Suspicions of shadows are all I have, but you sought the unusual, the out-of-place, and that there doesn’t fit in the normal frame.”
“Were there more, or…?”
Sarros nodded. “I am told. A whole field scattered with stones.”
“Black and burnt?”
“As if seared by fire, but with no sign of flame or smoke.”
Essie said, “Where is it from?”
Sarros smiled unpleasantly. His teeth, she noticed, had been sharpened to points. The sight disgusted her more than it frightened her. “Well now, that there is the nub of it, youngling. Yes indeed.”
Tornac reached for the rock, and Sarros dropped a hand over the shiny chunk, caging it behind his fingers. “No,” he said. “Coin first, Wanderer.”
Tornac pressed his lips together and then produced a small leather pouch from under his heavy cloak. The clink of metal sounded as he put it on the table.
Sarros’s smile widened. He tugged loose the pouch’s drawstring, and Essie glimpsed a yellow gleam inside. She took a sharp breath. Gold! She’d never even seen a whole crown before.
“Half now,” said Tornac. “And the rest when you tell me where you found that.” He p
oked the rock with the tip of a finger.
A strange choking sound came from Sarros. It took Essie a second to realize that the man was laughing. Then he said, “Oh no, Wanderer. No indeed. I think instead you should give us the rest of your coin, and perhaps then we’ll let you keep your head.”
Across the common room, the fur-clad men slipped hands under their cloaks, and Essie saw the hilts of swords, half hidden beneath.
She stiffened and, panicked, looked to her father. A guest had distracted him: one of the laborers from the docks stood leaning against the bar, chattering away. She opened her mouth and was about to cry out a warning when Sarros drew a thin-bladed knife and pressed it against her throat.
“Ah-ah,” he said. “Not a peep from you, youngling, or I’ll open your throat from stem to stern.”
Fear froze Essie in place. She could barely breathe, she was so scared of the razor edge touching her skin, cold and deadly. Suddenly all of her previous worries didn’t seem important in the slightest. Papa could save her—she felt sure he could—but only if he knew she was in trouble. She kept glancing toward the bar, hoping Papa would somehow sense her thoughts.
The hardness in Tornac’s eyes grew even more flinty, but otherwise he remained as calm as ever. “Why the turn of face, Sarros? I’m paying you good money.”
“Yesss. That’s the point.” Sarros leaned in closer, lips pulled wide. His breath stank of rotting meat. “If you are willing to pay thiswise-much for hints and rumors, then you must have more coin than sense. Much more coin.”
Essie considered kicking him in the shin, but she was too scared of the knife to try.
A frown formed on Tornac’s brow, and she heard him mutter a bad word under his breath. Then he said, “This isn’t a fight you want. Tell me the location, take the gold you’re owed, and no one has to get hurt.”
“What fight?” said Sarros, and cackled. “You have no sword on you. We are six, and you are one. The coin is ours whether you wish it or not.” Essie stiffened as the steel bit into her neck, a bright little slice of pain. “See?” said Sarros. “I make the choice easy for you, Wanderer. Hand over the rest of your gold, or the youngling here will pay with blood.”
Essie held her breath as she watched Tornac. Part of her expected him to pull out a hidden dagger and do something dangerous and heroic. He seemed like that kind of person. Part of her hoped he would rescue her.
Instead, all Tornac did was utter a sentence of strange words.
The air in front of him seemed to shiver, but nothing else happened. Essie didn’t know what he was trying to do, but it wasn’t helping.
Sarros chuckled again. “Foolish. Very foolish.” With his free hand, he pulled out a bird-skull amulet from under his jerkin. “Do you see this, Wanderer? The witch-woman Bachel charmed a necklace for each of us. Your weirding ways won’t help you now. We’re protected against all evilness.”
“Is that so?” said Tornac. And then he spoke a Word, and such a word it was. It rang like a bell, and in the sound, Essie thought she heard all possible meanings, and yet when she tried to recall the Word itself, no memory of it remained.
A dull silence followed. Everyone in the common room looked at Tornac, many of the guests with a dazed expression, as if they’d just woken from a dream.
Magic! Essie stared wide-eyed, so amazed she nearly forgot her fear. No one was supposed to use magic these days, not unless they had the approval of the queen’s spellcasters, the Du Vrangr Gata. But Essie had always wanted to see the sort of magic the old stories talked about.
Despite the ringing Word, Sarros appeared unharmed, and for the first time, Tornac seemed perturbed.
“Essie!” said Papa. He grabbed his truncheon and sprang over the bar. “You let her go now!” Before he could take more than a step, two of the fur-clad men charged him and knocked him to the floor. A dull thunk sounded as one of them struck Papa on the head with the pommel of a sword.
He moaned and dropped the truncheon.
No one else dared move.
“Papa!” Essie cried. If not for the knife at her throat, she would have rushed to his side. She’d never seen her father lose a fight before, and the sight of him on the floor removed any last sense of safety.
Again, Sarros chuckled, louder than before. “Your tricks will not help you, Wanderer. No enchantments are as strong as Bachel’s. No magic is deeper.”
“Perhaps you’re right,” said Tornac. He seemed calm again, which Essie couldn’t understand. He picked up the fork and began to fiddle with it. “Well then. It appears I have no choice in the matter.”
“None whatsoever,” said Sarros, smug.
Mama appeared in the doorway to the kitchen, wiping her hands on her apron. “What is all this—” she started to say, and then saw Sarros holding the knife and Papa lying on the floor, and her face went pale.
“Don’t cause no trouble, or your man gets stuck,” said one of the fur-clad ruffians, pointing his blade at Papa.
While everyone else was distracted by Mama, Essie saw Tornac’s lips twitch as he spoke without voice, and a flame-like ripple ran the length of the fork.
If she’d blinked, she would have missed it.
Sarros slapped the table. “Enough with the yapping. Your coin, now.”
Tornac tipped his head and—with his left hand—again reached under his cloak. One moment he was sitting, seemingly relaxed. Then he moved faster than Essie could follow. His cloak swung through the air, sending a rush of wind into her face, and his fork flashed across the table, and she heard a ting! as it knocked the knife free of Sarros’s grip and sent the weapon flying into the log wall.
Tornac sat with his arm extended, holding the tines of the fork against the underside of Sarros’s chin, tickling him with the points. The sharp-toothed man swallowed. A sheen of sweat had broken out on his face.
Essie still didn’t dare move; Sarros’s hand was next to her neck, fingers spread wide as if to tear out her throat.
“Then again,” said Tornac, “there’s nothing in your charm to stop me from using magic on something else. Like this fork, for example.” A feral gleam appeared in his eyes as he pressed the tines deeper into Sarros’s flesh. “Do you really think I need a sword to defeat you, you tumorous sack of filth?”
Sarros hissed. Then he shoved Essie into Tornac’s lap and sprang backward, knocking his chair over.
Essie fell to the floor. Terrified, she scrambled on hands and feet between the tables until she reached Mama’s side. Around her, the common room erupted into a commotion, with shouts and crashes and breaking mugs.
Her mother didn’t say anything, just pulled Essie behind her skirts and grabbed a chair, which she held out in front of them, like a weapon or a shield.
The room had become a sea of thrashing bodies as the guests struggled to escape. The six fur-clad men had drawn their blades and were attempting to box in Tornac by the fireplace, but Tornac was having none of that. He had thrown off his cloak and was moving about the room, like a prowling cat. Sarros had retreated to a corner and was shouting, “Slice him crosswise! Kill him! Cut open his belly and spill his guts.”
The nearest swordsman charged Tornac, swinging his blade. Tornac knocked the blow aside with his fork, and then he darted forward and buried the fork in the man’s chest.
Essie had seen plenty end-of-harvest brawls, but this was nothing like a drunken fight between laborers. It was far worse: sober men trying to kill each other in open combat, and it frightened her many times more because of it.
She looked for her father and spotted him crawling toward the cover of the bar, blood dripping from a cut on his temple. “Papa!” she cried, but he didn’t hear.
Three more of Sarros’s men attacked Tornac. All three jabbed and slashed with their swords, not waiting for the others to take their turn.
Torna
c grabbed a chair and, one-handed, smashed it over the man to his left. At the same time, he used the fork to parry the attacks from the other two brutes. He matched each of their blows, fencing with amazing skill as they tried to get past his guard. The men had the advantage of reach with their swords, but Tornac sidestepped their blades and slipped into striking range. His hand was a blur as he stabbed with the fork: one, two, three, four hard impacts that dropped the men to the floor, where they lay groaning.
Across the room, Papa reached the bar and pulled himself to his feet. He still held the truncheon in his hand, but the leather-wrapped stick seemed useless compared to the flashing swords.
“Essie,” said Mama, her voice tight. “Olfa is in the kitchen. I want you to go—”
Before she could finish, one of Sarros’s guards ran up to them. In his off hand, he held a mace, which he swung at the chair Mama was holding.
The impact knocked the chair out of Mama’s hands, breaking it.
Essie had never felt so small or helpless as she did in that moment. Papa was too far away to help, and there was nothing Mama could do to stop the fur-clad man as he drew back the sword in his other hand—
Thud.
The man’s eyes rolled until they showed white, and then he collapsed, and Essie saw the fork sticking out from the back of his head.
Tornac had thrown it from across the common room.
Sarros and his last remaining companion attempted to flank the now-weaponless Tornac. Before they could get close, Tornac kicked a table into the swordsman’s stomach and—when he stumbled—jumped on him and knocked his head against the floor.
Sarros cursed and fled toward the door. As he turned, he threw a handful of glittering crystals at Tornac.
Again, Tornac spoke a Word, and at his command, the crystals swerved in midair and flew into the flames of the fire. A series of loud pops! sounded, and a fountain of embers sprayed the stone hearth.
Before Sarros could reach the door, Tornac caught up with him. He grabbed the back of Sarros’s jerkin and—in a stunning display of strength—lifted Sarros off the floor and over his head, and then slammed him back down onto the wooden boards.
The Fork, the Witch, and the Worm Page 3