“In the Cowan Clan’s lands?”
“Yes.” He tsked. “She married a flatlander, but he’s a good man and will help us.”
I looked at the ragtag group of children. Booruby was farther east than I had wanted to travel and it would be a slow trip.
Kiki nickered at me. Get wagon, she said.
The wagon was burned in the fire.
I felt her huff of impatience. Horses run off. Take wagon.
Where are they?
Stuck. Come. Kiki flicked her tail.
Marrok came with me. We mounted Kiki and she went southwest through a small wood.
What about Onyx and Topaz? I asked her.
I felt her sorrow. Can’t smell.
We reached the wagon. When the fire had erupted, the panicked horses had bolted through the woods until the cart wedged between two trees. The animals had calmed, but their raised heads and alert ears meant they felt unsafe.
The wagon had been filled with empty coffin-shaped crates, but we found a toolbox underneath the floor. Getting the wagon free was difficult and time-consuming.
While fixing the broken wheel, Marrok lost his patience and shooed me away. “You’re rushing and making it worse. Go take a walk, Yelena. This is a one-person job anyway.”
When I hesitated, he added, “Go look for him or you won’t find peace. And we won’t either.”
Being busy had been good. Walking through the quiet forest, there was nothing to distract me from my flaming thoughts. No respite from the wrenching pain deep inside me. It felt as if I had swallowed a red-hot coal.
The barn’s ashy remains drifted in the air. Only a few beams at the edge of the structure retained their shape. Everything else had been reduced to gray and white cinders. Smoke curled from a few hot spots, but otherwise a pine-scented breeze blew the acrid fumes away.
The crunch of my boots on the residue echoed a lonely and final sound in my ears. All hope disappeared when I found Valek’s knives. Blackened and misshapen, the blades were half-melted. I collapsed to my hands and knees and sobbed, turning the ash under me into slurry. Gasping, ribs aching and throat raw, I tried to expel the smoldering sadness within, only stopping when all moisture was gone from my body. I sat back on my heels and wiped my face, smearing soot and tears.
Once my breathing returned to normal, I scooped up a handful of the ash near Valek’s weapons and let the wind scatter them. Soon, love. I’ll join you soon. The knowledge of our reunion in the other world was my only comfort.
Eventually I returned to Marrok. He had fixed the wheel. After looking at my face, he squeezed my shoulder. I had washed off the dirt, but I knew my eyes were red and puffy from crying.
Marrok steered the wagon, but finding a road around the wood used up our remaining daylight.
By the time we returned to the camp, Kell had settled the children next to the fire. I wanted to wake everyone and get moving, but Kell convinced me the children would be upset by being roused and hidden in those crates at night. After recalling my own horrible experience with the boxes, I agreed.
If Valek hadn’t shot the Warper, I would have been shoved inside one of those crates. The Councilors’ families would still be hostages, but Valek and Gale would still be alive.
I stared at the sleeping children. Jenniqilla had a protective arm over Leevi and the baby curled next to him, sucking on his thumb even while asleep. In that state, they embodied innocence and peace and joy and love. Valek had known the risk when he went into the barn and he hadn’t hesitated. I would have done the same. Eleven living beings for one unselfish act. Pretty good odds.
Even with the wagon, the trip to Booruby lasted four days. Four days of worry, frustration, hunger, sleepless nights and noise. By the time we arrived, I had a new appreciation for parents, and was as glad to see Kell’s sister as she was to see us. She wrapped Kell in a tight embrace for many heartbeats. I bit my lip and turned away. My empty arms ached.
Located about two miles south of Booruby, the farmstead appeared to be isolated from its neighbors, but her husband was quick to usher us inside. The children were fed their first hot meal in weeks. Marrok and I made plans to return to the rendezvous location to join the others. I kept my mind focused on action; otherwise, I knew I would surrender to the grief consuming me from the inside out.
We would risk crossing through the western edge of the Avibian Plains. Garnet and Kiki’s gust-of-wind gait would make up for the time lost traveling to Booruby.
Before leaving, Kell asked me, “How will I know when it’s safe for the children to return home?”
I considered. “If everything works out, you will receive a message.”
“And if it doesn’t work out?”
Emotion choked his words, reminding me that his wife was one of the Councilors. If I failed, she would be among the first of many casualties.
“If you don’t hear anything after fourteen days, that means the Daviians are in charge. Send the children to their homes and hope.”
“Hope for what?”
“Hope a person in the future will be strong enough to rebel against the Daviian Vermin. And win.”
Kell looked doubtful. “We have four Master Magicians and a Soulfinder, yet they still managed to take control.”
“It has happened before. One person can bring peace to Sitia.”
I didn’t add that the man had leveled the Daviian Mountains in the process. But it did lead me to wonder if the Sandseeds’ legendary warrior had had help. My mind reviewed Moon Man’s story about the origins of the Sandseed Clan and I remembered the warrior’s name was Guyan. Guyan had imprisoned the Fire Warper, and his descendant, Gede, had freed him. A complete circle.
Marrok and I said goodbye to Kell and the children. We traveled northwest, planning to skirt Booruby on our way to the plains. My little bat hung from Kiki’s mane and didn’t appear to be bothered by the jostling motion.
Our plans changed when I spotted Opal’s family’s glass factory in the distance and I had a sudden idea.
Before I could fully explore my intentions, we stopped outside their gate. Marrok accepted our detour without concern.
“Should I wait here?” he asked.
“Yes. I won’t be long.” I left Kiki with him.
As I approached the door to their house, Opal came out of the factory. She hesitated, but drew nearer, eyeing Marrok and me with suspicion.
“Can I help you, sir?” she asked me.
I had forgotten all about my hair. At least I knew my disguise worked. I smiled for the first time in days.
She squinted at me. “Yelena?” Then she glanced around in concern. “Come inside! There’s a price on your head!” She ushered me into the house.
“Thank goodness you’re okay.” Opal squeezed me in a quick hug. “What happened to your hair?”
“It’s a long long story. Is your family around?”
“No. They went into town. Father received a shipment of sand that was full of rocks so he went to complain and Mother—”
“Opal, I need more of your glass animals.”
“Really? Did you sell the bat??
?
“No. However, I discovered I can use your animals to communicate with other magicians far away without using my own magic. I’d like to buy as many as I can.”
“Wow! I never knew.”
“How many do you have?”
“Six. They’re in the factory.”
She set a quick pace as we crossed the yard and entered the factory. The heat from the kilns sucked all the moisture from my mouth. I followed her through the thick air and roar of the fires. Lined up on a table by the back wall were half a dozen glass animals. They all glowed with an inner fire.
Opal wrapped the animals and I counted out coins. Another idea flashed in my mind when she handed me the package.
“Can you show me how you make these?” I asked.
“It takes a lot of practice to learn.”
I shook my head. “I just want to watch you make one.”
She agreed. Picking up a five-foot-long hollow steel pipe, she opened the small door to the kiln. Bright orange light and intense heat emanated from the doorway, but, undaunted, she dipped the end of the pipe into a large ceramic pot inside the kiln that was filled with molten glass. Turning the pipe, she gathered a taffylike slug and pulled it out, closing the door with her hip. The slug pulsed with a red-hot light as if alive.
“You have to keep the blowpipe spinning or the glass will sag,” Opal said over the noise. She rolled the slug over a metal table to move the glass off the end of the pipe and shaped it so the pipe looked as if it had a clear ball attached to its end.
Her motions quick, Opal then rested the pipe on the edge of the table and blew into the other end. Magic brushed my arm as her cheeks puffed. The glass on the opposite end didn’t inflate with air. Instead, a thread of magic was trapped within its core.
“It’s supposed to expand, but mine never does,” she said as she went back to the kiln and gathered another slug overtop the first. She took the pipe to a bench designed to hold it and other metal tools needed to shape the glass. Buckets of water sat within easy reach.
Opal grabbed a pair of steel tweezers and pinched and squeezed the slug with her right hand while rolling the pipe with her left hand the whole time. “You have to move quickly because it cools fast.”