Mire

by Vivien Leanne Saunders

  “Go?” I parroted. She scowled and leaned forward to pinch my ear.

  “Yes, you fool! I’ve let you play with your feathers for far too long. Come on, we’re leaving tonight.”

  “No.” I dug my fingers into the blanket. Petra was just reaching out to grab me when a hand fell onto her shoulder.

  “I swear I heard you telling your friends that you were never coming near us again.” Landen said pointedly. The woman smiled, but the expression was strained. She had clearly wanted to snatch me away while the man’s back was turned.

  “I’m here to take the girl back.”

  “She doesn’t belong to you.”

  “Really? Who took her home from the river? Who fed her, and gave her medicine?” Petra’s voice was acidic, and she couldn’t stop her lying tongue, “She made sure we paid for my kindness, didn’t she?”

  “Didn’t you try to sacrifice her?” Landen’s fingers sank into her shoulder. They trembled with restraint, “I wouldn’t call that kind.”

  She drew back, hissing like a snake, and her eyes fixed on me.

  “How dare you lie about me!” she slapped me hard across the face, “You lying bitch!”

  “River isn’t the one who told me.” Landen stood quite still, not moving to defend me, and Petra moved back. Her eyes flicked between us for a moment, and then her sour-milk smile came back.

  “My sister is going to the dam, too. How far do you think you’ll get once every lawman knows why you like to keep little children close by?”

  The man paled. I saw his hand trembling, and reached out to hold it still. He flinched and shook me off. He looked down at me and his face was fixed with such anger that I wailed.

  “Fine.” he spat at Petra. “Take her. Let the world see what you do to innocent children. You’ll be just as damned as me, but your sins won’t be lies. I’ll make sure everyone knows about the witch who tortured an innocent child because she was scared of the rain.”

  Petra smirked, caught my wrist and pulled. I expected Landen to snatch me back, for he had spoken in hasty anger, but he didn’t move. We stumbled over the uneven ground and out into the sunlight. I gasped and covered my eyes. The time I had spent in the cave had made me forget how bright daylight was. The air tasted sweet. I drew a deep breath and coughed fitfully.

  “Don’t do that.” Petra snapped, and then stopped in her tracks to look at me. Her lips pursed. A claw-like hand reached out and yanked at my hair. When it wouldn’t lie flat she scooped a handful of water out of a puddle and smeared it into my dirty curls until they were tamed. I felt the gritty liquid trickling down my neck and shivered. Petra pulled me between the rotting tree trunks through mud and grit, until we finally reached a paved trail. I had not realized that the village was so close to a road. It felt like the edge of the world.

  A carriage was waiting for us. The door opened as we approached and a woman stepped out. She was the most wonderful thing I had ever seen. Her eyes were bright green, with dark lashes standing out brilliantly around them. Her skin was as pale as the moon. Her travelling dress was made of soft, embroidered wool. Her hands were covered in kid gloves, and she walked as though she was dancing. She had a long scar which followed her right cheekbone to her jaw. Nothing could have made that woman ugly, but the mark made her difficult to look at. Your eyes were drawn to it. I looked at my feet, blushing.

  “This is the brat.” Petra called out in her harsh frog-voice. “Give me the money you promised and get the little bitch away from me.”

  “Good morning!” The beauty replied in a light voice. I stared at her, and she flashed me a secretive smile before she turned and frowned daintily at the other woman. “Yes, I got your letter. So nice of you to write! You told me there was a girl here with magic. If you’re just trying to sell a worthless piggery brat to the Siren then I promise you, you will not get a single coin.”

  “Oh, she’s a witch.” Petra spilled out the whole story. It was twisted around so much that even I wondered if my sullen hatred had caused the flood. Petra did not even mention a storm. In her version I had summoned a curse on Singen, and danced and laughed in the rain until a righteous villager lashed me to a rock and tied a rag around my mouth. If they hadn’t, Petra insisted, the rain would still be falling, and even the mountain would have been washed away.

  The women listened with a small smile on her face. She hadn’t so much as glanced at me during the whole tirade, but had kept her luminous eyes set on Petra’s until the old bat stumbled to a halt. It was wonderful to see Petra being cowed for once. I smirked.

  “She does smile, then.” The beautiful woman murmured, and touched my cheek with a gentle finger. “These are the kind of dimples you cannot outgrow, and her eyes are pleasant enough. Her skin is as rough as a hog’s, and you have hacked at her hair like a butcher.” her voice grew suddenly cool, “I wouldn’t pay money for this girl if you begged me. You’ve ruined any beauty she might have had.”

  Petra choked and her hands clutched at the air, “It doesn’t matter what she looks like! I told you, she’s a witch!”

  “There are many types of witches in the world.” The woman said with a serene smile. “I am only beholden to the Siren. If you want to profit from this brat then you’d do better pretending she’s a troll.”

  “There are no trolls. How could I sell her to them?” Petra demanded, missing the point by a huge margin. “The girl made our river flood. She can’t stay here.”

  I looked up. The beautiful woman was toying with the sleeve of her dress. The thread shone like metal, and against the russet fabric it looked like sunlight. Her voice was low and sweet,

  “If you wish to be rid of her, then I will take her away. The Siren have enough power to control an infant. But I will not pay for a half-starved, surly little brat who thinks she can summon the rain.”

  “Not the rain,” I spoke up, the first words I had uttered since Petra had ordered me to hold my tongue. The hag glared at me, but the beautiful woman smiled. “I can only call the rivers.”

  “Can you?” the woman’s eyebrows rose. She knelt down to listen to me, heedless of the way her skirts dragged through the mud. I wondered if she was a witch – a real witch. There was a depth of knowledge in her eyes that made it seem like all of my wild fantasies were simple facts to her. I reddened but refused to look away.

  “They say I can.”

  “They say! Do you think it’s true?”

  “No!” I shook my head scornfully. “But every time the river floods they say it’s my fault. They hate me for it. If I wasn’t calling the rivers then why would they hate me?”

  “It’s best not to ask.” she murmured, and then straightened up.

  Petra had watched our exchange impatiently. The beautiful woman took her pique and crafted it into something pliable and pathetic. If I had believed half of the threats the stranger made about my magic then I would have been afraid of my own shadow, but I knew that she was lying. Petra fell into the woman’s trap and paid dearly for the privilege. She had hoped to make enough money to buy her way into a handsome new life. As it was, she wouldn’t starve, but that was all. I still wished I could snatch the money out of her hand and throw it into the mud.

  I was bundled into the carriage. It rattled away so quickly that I did not even have time to look back. The beautiful lady sank into the seat beside me, and as the horses slowed to a more sedate canter her perfect face softened.

  “I’m sorry for the haste. I did not want to give her a chance to think things through.”

  “She doesn’t know how to think.” I replied in my sulkiest voice. I was just starting to realise that I would never see Landen again, and that Jonas would never find out where I had gone. My lip stuck out as I tried not to cry. I would have been humiliated if she thought I was crying over Petra!

  The beauty knocked on the carriage roof. The jolting changed into a gentle sway and she looped her arm around my shoulders. She told me that her name was Emma, and that I shouldn’t be frightene
d. We would spend the night in Emma’s home before she took me to the Siren. I had no idea what the Siren were, or why I should be scared. Petra had obviously thought they were more terrifying than a witch.

  As long as Singen was behind me, I didn’t care what lay ahead.

  Emma asked me for my name.

  “Clay.”

  “Is that your real name?” she looked horrified. I pointed back towards the village.

  “They called me Clay after they pulled me out of the river.”

  “And before that? What did your mother call you?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t remember. I died, and the river carried me to Singen. If an evil spirit sent me there then it was stupid. No-one would want to go to a place like that, not even a demon.”

  I closed my mouth with a snap. I had already told this woman that I had no magic. Hadn’t she just bought me because I was a witch? If she realized I was just a brat then she would take me right back to Petra.

  The woman patted my arm, and asked me more questions about my life. She kept asking about my family. If I had been stolen, Emma told me, she would take me back home. She could only take me to the Siren if I belonged to myself, and no-one else.

  “They threw me into the river.” I repeated, and finally began to cry. “I don’t even know my own name! How could I remember my mama?”

  Emma pursed her lips, but finally believed me.

  CHAPTER 6

  That night I slept on a sofa filled with goose down. I bit through the stitches and pulled out the downy feathers until I was sure that they weren’t pricking me on purpose. I slept badly. The wind did not howl here, and the air was not full of sharp-tasting smoke. The moonlight burned through my eyelids.

  The beautiful lady woke me before dawn, and we tiptoed back into the carriage. A house that large must have had servants, but the only person who saw me was the coachman. The mansion had been a silhouette at sunset when we arrived and a shadow at dawn when we left. I had not been given any food, only water, and no clean clothes to sleep in. It was as if I had not been there at all. Emma was very nervous, and her tense shoulders only relaxed when the mansion was miles behind us.

  Everything was so exciting that I did not ask Emma about the need for secrecy. All I wanted to know was where we were going next! Our coachman stopped to water the horses, and he brought us pies from the coach house. I took a huge bite and burned my tongue on the steaming meat. Emma picked at the food with her fingers.

  It was the only time I saw her without her gloves on. A second scar ran along the top of her right hand. She saw me looking and her face took on an odd expression. I could not read her at all. Was she angry at me, or had she burned her mouth, too? Perhaps she was happy, or tired, or amused. Her face was so blank that she could have been feeling all of those things, or something else altogether.

  “What happened to your hand?” I asked.

  “Don’t speak with your mouth full.” She returned, and that was it. When the coachman returned we threw the wax cloths out of the windows and sat in silence for the rest of the day.

  The air began to smell odd. I pulled the window shutter down a little to look out. I could not see anything unusual, but the scent was so peculiar that I was sure there must be something there. Emma smiled at me for the first time all day, and pointed towards the horizon. I squinted, and I realized that the fields stopped long before they ought. It was as if the sky was suddenly much closer, and the horizon was near enough to touch. I gasped and stretched my hand out. An odd moistness crossed my palm.

  “It’s the sea.” Emma explained, “We’re at the top of a cliff. When we get to the bottom you’ll see it properly. It’s a big lake full of salt.” she closed her eyes, “I’ve missed that smell.”

  The ‘big lake’ was a vivid blue-green. It swarmed with birds which screamed mockingly at each other. One of them dropped out of the sky like a stone and fell into the water. I gasped and gripped the window sill until the creature surfaced. It bobbed smugly on the waves. I sat back, feeling foolish. The birds were obviously just big ducks. I said that I could not see the horizon, but it was not true – the flat, shimmering water was broken by hundreds of tiny islands. Beyond them the sea grew deeper, as grey as storm-clouds, and twice as treacherous.

  It just kept going! My jaw dropped. The carriage rattled into a village and stopped right next to the water. There was a sheer drop from the road to the water. I flattened my back against the carriage and tried not to look down. One of the men who was loitering on the dock laughed in a voice that was as rough as his weathered face.

  “Clay.” Emma took my hand and coaxed me away from the road. We walked onto a long wooden platform. It rested on posts which held it out above the sea. For a dizzying moment I thought that it just kept going, and that we would walk over to one of the distant rocks. We stopped, and the woman spoke in a low voice to one of the salt-faced men. He scooped me up and carried me down a steep ladder to a boat.

  Emma had to stop me from leaning over the edge. I did not weigh enough to capsize us, but I was so fascinated by the breathing water that I was in danger of falling in. She sat me on her lap and told me about the dangers of the sea and about the people who died on their way from the Mainland to the island. For the rest of the journey I sat bolt-upright on my seat and shivered whenever the swell grew too high. Instead of looking at the deadly sea, I stared back at the disappearing shore. The mountains looked like jagged teeth, piercing through the writhing water into the sky. I felt dizzy when I looked at them. The immense peaks and deep valleys we had spent two days travelling through looked like anthills.

  The continent of Rhelet was shaped like a sliver of the moon. The country we had just left was called the Mainland. It shared Rhelet with the sprawling regency of Altissi. In between us was a wall of frozen mountains that not even the Altissi were stupid enough to cross. They weren’t even guarded. We defended ourselves from our enemies with strong ships and glaciers.

  Our oarsman took hours carefully navigating through submerged rocks that could have sliced through our hull like butter. The spikes grew sharper as a huge island drew closer. I expected it to be the same as the soft, sandy banks in the river. Perhaps there would be a few trees in the middle. I was wrong, of course. The island was enormous. A dormant volcano sat in the middle of endless fertile fields, forests and golden beaches. A sprawling village was hidden amongst the trees that faced the Mainland. I could make out distant specks moving about between the buildings. It looked like Singen: plain, practical buildings, with people beating their laundry out in the sun.

  I felt sick with disappointment. I had no idea what I expected, but after Emma’s beautiful mansion I had thought that I would never pick weevils out of a bran tub again. The village looked as if it needed as many skivvies as it could get.

  The boat circled around the shore. The far side of the island shone in the late afternoon light. The ugly stone buildings were nowhere to be seen! There were brightly painted temples and shining white tiles. Instead of trees there were flowers, and they were so brightly coloured that I had to rub my eyes before I looked again. The treacherous waterway circled around to a pier. It was nowhere near as large as the one we had just left, but it was far more beautiful. Everything had been scrubbed until it shone. Flowers and carvings decorated every marble strut, and pennants of silk drifted on the breeze. The flowers spilled their rich perfume into the air. The saltwater made it tart and exotic. I breathed in and closed my eyes in bliss.

  There were people on the pier – bright butterflies whose laughter sang out over the waves. There were larger shadows that lay back on soft cushions and dozed in the sun. The oarsman stopped rowing and guided the boat into the lee of a rock.

  “We have to wait.” Emma explained. “The men will go inside soon, and then we can use the pier.”

  I did not know what she meant, but I smiled and nodded. We were hidden from the party. One of them started to sing. I sat in the warm sunshine and listened with a smile on my f
ace. I was as far from the cold misery of Singen as it was possible to be.

  We disembarked when the sun set. The oarsman barely gave us time to climb ashore before he rowed off again. He must have been able to see the rocks in the moonlight, or else he knew the route so well that he could have done it blindfolded. Emma led me past a large, beautiful stone building whose tapering pillars were engraved with birds and snakes. I could hear the sounds of cutlery chiming against plates, and my stomach growled at the smell of roasted meat. I made myself look as starving and pathetic as I could, but the woman pulled me away from the door.

  The manicured lawns and flowers slowly gave way to orchards of fruit trees and finally wild thickets of oak and chestnuts. The paving stones there had not been tended or replaced, and after another mile we were walking on dust. I stumbled over tree roots so often that Emma complained that her arm was aching from pulling me back upright. We were both breathless by the time we reached the village.

  The haven by the docks had looked like a temple; the building we arrived at was more like a crypt. The dark windows looked like empty, leering eyes. I shivered and hung back, but the woman pulled me onwards.

  “You’re forbidden to go back to the pier.” she said, “Do you understand? If anyone sees you there you’ll be beaten.”

  I had seen Jonas bruised and smiling too often to be scared of a beating. I shrugged. The woman ran her finger along the scar on her face. It stood out in a lurid purple line. “Mistress Sweetwater gave me this when I told her I was leaving. She was being kind. She cut my hands when I tried to come back.”

  I ran my fingers over my own soft cheek and shuddered at the thought of a blade piercing my skin. Doubtless my mumbled promise was very convincing, after that. Emma kissed my forehead and said that she believed me.

  The building we walked into was, as I found out later, a school. It was two stories high – a wonder to me. I had never seen anything taller than a cottage. The first floor was made of large, empty classrooms. The apprentices slept upstairs. Their tiny rooms were barely large enough for their flimsy pallet beds, let alone a growing girl. The girls were crammed together in a warren of hastily constructed cubbies. Cheap furniture stood side by side with solid stone and oak. The school had been designed to hold fifty children, but when I arrived more than two hundred girls lived, ate and studied in the same building.