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“Nobody. Look, we’re in some dull little fishing village. When can you be here? I’d planned to leave later tonight, to sea or into the wild.”

“What?” Oraik asked. I shook my head and pointed at my ear, where I heard Kalcedon’s voice. Oraik only shook his head back at me, eyes narrowed in confusion.

“Don’t. Just stay there. I can reach Montay by first light tomorrow.” Kalcedon sounded irritated, each word clipped and sharp.

“See you soon, then, Kalcedon.”

Oraik’s mouth parted in a silent oh. He turned and walked back to his portion of the river. He neglected to cover his plump rear with the trousers.

“Still there?” I asked the other witch, but there was no answer. No flicker of magic just out of sight. I sighed and dunked my head beneath the surface of the river.

Chapter 26

When one of the men asked Oraik to help split firewood, he cheerfully agreed… and then volunteered me to help with the cooking. An hour later I was still sitting at one of the tables, glumly spooning a dark marinade over a batch of the scaled, gutted laghek fish.

“So, you and Oraik?” Cliantha asked beside me. She had a needle in hand to repair a string of decorative flags that had apparently been torn in last night’s celebration. “You really are just friends?”

“Absolutely,” I said. “Look at him.”

Handsome Oraik was with one of the town’s old women, gesturing emphatically before moving a flowerpot five inches to the right and then back again. Nikko’s clothes turned out to be a little too wide on him, but the loose, clean shirt still did him more favors than the bloody one. He’d tied back his damp hair, and I couldn’t help but notice that two gold earrings had mysteriously made their way back into his ear from who-knew-where. Probably his shoe again.

“He’s sweet,” Cliantha said with a shrug. Her lips twitched watching him. We couldn’t hear what was being said across the square, but we both watched as Oraik leaned backward with a laugh and clapped a hand over his mouth.

“I guess,” I told her. “But so’s mad honey, and that still makes you see things.” Cliantha laughed.

“We just don’t get many newcomers. Every man I know, I’ve known since I was a child, and if I haven’t been sweethearts with him, one of my friends has. That, or he’s a relative twice my age.” She pierced the needle through the flag’s fabric. “But I guess you wouldn’t know anything about that, being from Rovileis.”

“I’m not. And if you don’t like it here, just leave.”

She shrugged. “I don’t think I could. It’s home.”

“I grew up somewhere like here. You’re the only one stopping yourself.”

“Well, maybe,” she said quietly. “I don’t know. I couldn’t do that to my parents.”

“They’d get over it,” I snapped, but I don’t think she was trying to insult me or call me a bad daughter. Anyways, it probably was harder for someone like Cliantha to leave. Why would she? She wasn’t a witch, or an artisan. She was just a normal person. She was sitting silently beside me now, looking very fixedly at the flags in her lap. I chewed my lip. “Sorry. I don’t mean to be rude.”

“You miss it,” she guessed quietly.

I missed the life I’d had, with Eudoria and Kalcedon, perhaps. I didn’t miss Missaniech or Zebitun, the village my parents lived by, though at some point I really did owe them a visit. I didn’t miss any of it the way Cliantha was suggesting, but it was as good an excuse as any for my casual spite, so I nodded.

“Sometimes,” I lied, and set down the spoon I was holding.

“It must be exciting. Traveling all over the isles. Going wherever the wind takes you.”

I didn’t mind that she was painting me as some far-flung traveler when I hadn’t been gone from home long at all. It sounded exciting, the life she described. It made me sound exciting.

“It has its moments,” I admitted. She seemed to be waiting for me to say more. “But for every place I’d like to go, there’s a half-dozen I’d rather avoid.”

“Like where?”

“I wouldn’t have come here,” I said, before I even realized I was saying it. I winced, and avoided looking Cliantha in the eye. “No offense. I’ve just had enough of tired little towns for a lifetime. And does a fish really need its own holiday?”

“Well, maybe not,” she said quietly. “I’m sure it all seems silly, from the outside.” I could see her hands out of the corner of my vision, plucking at the string without actually sewing.

“No, ignore me.” I sighed. “I’m just… missing home. Like you said. I think these are done. What now?”

“I’ll skewer those, if you want to walk around,” she offered.