Brightly Woven(71)

“Excuse me,” I called.

The dark-haired woman walked over to me. “Is there something I may help you with?”

“How…how can I get down to the channel?” I whispered. She didn’t look like any devil—if anything, she looked like my mother.

“Oh,” she said, surprised. “It’s a bit of a walk. If you plan on going somewhere, you’ll have to ask about a boat in the center of town. I’m headed that way, if you’d like some company.”

“It’s all right,” I began weakly.

“It’s no trouble at all,” she said, folding my arm under her own. After a moment she lowered her voice and said, “Are you in some kind of peril, dear? What happened to your shoes?”

“I prefer to go without them,” I said, my mouth dry. I reached up to pull the hood farther over my face.

“You and my son both,” she said, and led me down the steps of the palace. “Don’t worry, my dear. Whatever the trouble is, you’ll be perfectly safe with me.”

We entered the small village through the shaded marketplace. I kept my eyes on the knotted lengths of silk that covered the stands of flowers, vegetables, and fruit. The tiered, round roofs of the buildings were visible through small patches where no silk had been tied. Instead of the uneven stone surfaces of Palmarta’s cities, stones that were covered with years of moss and dirt, the buildings were smooth, clean, and soft to the touch. Even the stone path beneath our feet was whitewashed. If I hadn’t been in the world of my enemies, if I hadn’t passed a statue of Salvala the sword bearer, I might have thought it beautiful. Now all I felt was the creeping of unease across my skin. I reached for the necklace that wasn’t there.

The woman, Elema, waved to several of the vendors and bent to stop an apple from rolling away from a cart. She threw it back, smiling at the man who caught it.

“I’m going to introduce you to my brother-in-law,” she said. “He has a fishing boat and is one of the few who has obtained permission to sail in the channel during the war preparations.”

I shook my head. “You’ve already done enough for me.”

“Nonsense,” she said. “You know the Word as well as I do—life in the service of others. We’re all here to help one another.”

I knew those as Astraea’s words, not the violent, bloodthirsty Salvala’s.

“I don’t have any money to pay for passage,” I said as she brought us down another road, wide enough for us to slip past two horse-drawn carts. Elema greeted both drivers.

“That’s perfectly fine,” she said. “We don’t have much use for money in these parts. If you can trade something or some kind of service, you should be just fine.”

I felt my face relax into a smile. With all the sordid history of wars between our countries, I hadn’t expected the peace of that village to soothe me into something that resembled calm.

“Here we are,” Elema said when we reached a long line of doors in the white walls. She opened the closest door and pulled me inside.

The stew over the hearth smelled sweet, like apples, and I found myself taking a step toward it, even as I noticed the man standing beside it.

“Evening, Elema,” he said. “Sallie’s gone out for a bit. Can’t believe she actually trusted me to watch dinner.”

“I can’t believe it, either, after the stew fiasco of last week,” Elema said, embracing him. “I’ve brought a guest with me. I hope you don’t mind.”

“Course not,” he said, and bowed in my direction. “My name is Ben Crom.”

“I’m Sydelle,” I said. Maybe I shouldn’t have been that honest—Elema gave a little start when I said my name.

“That’s a beautiful name,” she said. “One we don’t often hear around here. Are you from Palmarta?”

I looked back and forth between their faces.

“My father was from Fairwell. He had a sister with that name,” Elema said. “I thought you looked awfully nervous! Is that why you still have your hood up?”

“I’m sorry,” I said, taking a step back toward the door. “I’m sorry, I’ll go—”

“None of that,” Ben said. “No one in this town would harm you. Many have come from Palmarta, and many have left for it. Is that why you’ve come to see me?”

I nodded, keeping my eyes on my bare toes. “I was brought here against my will.”

“And without your shoes, it seems,” Ben said with a small laugh. “Elema, Sallie should have an extra pair for Sydelle to use.”

The other woman smiled and disappeared up the small stairway.

“Come here,” Ben said, motioning me closer to the hearth. “That’s better—a bit warmer, eh? Am I to understand that you’re trying to return to Palmarta?”

“If possible,” I said. “I don’t have much to offer—I can sew and weave, even mix elixirs…but they’re wizard elixirs.”

“Probably won’t need those, then,” he said, inclining his head toward Salvala’s symbol on the wall. “I have to tell you that it might be a few days before I can take you anywhere. We have very limited opportunities to go out into the channel. The only reason I’m allowed is to bring food to the soldiers stationed on the boats out there.”