Child of Flame (Crown of Stars 4)

The words chilled Adica. “I will come.”

Alain had the intent look on his face that meant he was working hard to understand words. At once, she realized how long it would be until she saw him again. This the looms demanded: you could never predict how many days or even months each crossing would take. The loom’s burden had never seemed as harsh as it did at this moment. How could she make him understand how bitterly it hurt her to leave him?

He spoke first. “I come with you to keep you safe.” He turned at once, not waiting for her answer, and sent Kel off to fetch his staff, dagger, and cloak.

Relief left Adica speechless.

Mother Weiwara came forward. “Winter departs late in the north country where the Akka dwell.” She sent villagers for water and travel bread, winter clothing, hide leggings and shirts, fur cloaks fastened with precious copper pins, and a complicated binding of grass and leather to protect feet from bitter cold.

Alain beckoned Beor over. “Put more adults on the night watch. Let all adults walk armed to the fields. If there is danger, if the Cursed Ones are planning an attack, then you must be ready.”

Beor turned to Adica. “Give me the bronze sword, the one you hid away. If the Cursed Ones attack us and you are not here to protect against them with your magic, then it will go worse for us. It isn’t right that we might have had a weapon in our hands to fight them off.”

The memory of her vision flashed in her mind, of the bronze sword in Beor’s hand as he wreaked havoc. It was a terrible choice, and perhaps an unfair one, but because she had no time, because the river had caught her in its grasp and swept her forward, she gave in. “Very well. Come with us to the loom. I will give you the sword.”

sunderstood her. “No child lives here yet.” His fingers tapped her skin caressingly. “We can make a child, yes?”

She sighed, not wanting to have to make him understand. “No child, beloved.”

“I will never let you or a child come to any harm.” Suddenly passionate, almost angry, he leaned away from her, still grasping her elbows, so that he could look into her face. “You think I cannot protect you, just like I could not protect—”

Both dogs growled and stood.

“That’s the loom! Someone is working the loom.” She leaped up and ran to the gate. Alain and the dogs caught up with her there. He had brought a torch but not lit it.

“Do you hear the stones?” She waited for the night watch to open the narrow portal and squeezed through, Alain following after. Crossing the bridge, she turned her face toward the hill. Threads woven out of the loom of the sky, drawn down by magic’s shuttle, traced so faint a pattern against the night sky and the glare of the full moon that only an eye trained to magic could discern them. The stones lay out of her sight at the height of the hill.

“Look!” said Alain as both dogs barked. A torch bobbed high up on the ramparts.

Who had come? Was it the Cursed Ones again?

The night watch blew two short calls to alert the village. Alain pulled her back through the portal, barring it behind them. Safe behind the palisade, she climbed the ladder that led to the gate tower. There, she waited as the torchlight approached and as adults of the village gathered outside the common house, ready with weapons.

A woman she had never seen before approached the gate, torch held high to light her path. In her other hand, she held a spear tipped with a flint point. Her hair, braided with bone and shell beads, gleamed under the torchlight, and her skin was mottled with strange markings, perhaps a scabrous disease.

But her voice was clear and strong. “Let there be peace among allies.”

“Let those who suffer join hands,” called Adica in reply. She signaled to the night watch. As he unbarred the portal, she climbed down from the parapet so that if the messenger brought evil spirits in with her, she would be the only one to take harm from them. The crowd gathered at the common house murmured at her appearance, but none called out. They, too, waited.

The woman had no disease: she bore the tattoos common to Spits-last’s people, who called themselves “Akka,” the Old Woman’s people. She spoke the language of the Deer people with so heavy an accent that it was hard for Adica to understand her.

“I am a Walking One of the Akka people. This message I bring for the sorcerer of the Deer people from the one who falls down when the spirit rides him.”

“I am Hallowed One of the White Deer people. Do you bring me a message from Falling-down?”

“This message I bring from the sorcerer who falls down when the spirit rides him: ‘Walk with the messenger who brings you this message. Danger time this day and tomorrow. Knife of Cursed Ones cuts our threads. They know who we are. Come to the land of the Akka people, of the north country. Come quick quick. There I wait.’”

The words chilled Adica. “I will come.”

Alain had the intent look on his face that meant he was working hard to understand words. At once, she realized how long it would be until she saw him again. This the looms demanded: you could never predict how many days or even months each crossing would take. The loom’s burden had never seemed as harsh as it did at this moment. How could she make him understand how bitterly it hurt her to leave him?

He spoke first. “I come with you to keep you safe.” He turned at once, not waiting for her answer, and sent Kel off to fetch his staff, dagger, and cloak.

Relief left Adica speechless.

Mother Weiwara came forward. “Winter departs late in the north country where the Akka dwell.” She sent villagers for water and travel bread, winter clothing, hide leggings and shirts, fur cloaks fastened with precious copper pins, and a complicated binding of grass and leather to protect feet from bitter cold.

Alain beckoned Beor over. “Put more adults on the night watch. Let all adults walk armed to the fields. If there is danger, if the Cursed Ones are planning an attack, then you must be ready.”