Page 9 of The Arrow and the Alder

T he snow turned back into rain as Seph made her way home. She was slipping within the shadows, her mind lost in thought over the hooded stranger, the coat, and all Lord Massie had said, when a door opened and a familiar face popped out.

Milly, maker of mead and any threads of joy left in this saintsforsaken place. “D’ya have a minute, Sephie?” Milly asked. Her voice and expression were frantic.

Seph glanced about, nodded, then ducked beneath the small awning and stepped inside, out of the rain. Milly closed the door behind her.

“The baron asked me to deliver four barrels, and I just?—”

“ Four barrels ?” Seph stammered. Milly’s husband had started their mead business, but the war had taken him too, so Milly kept it limping along as best she could.

“Mm.”

Seph eyed Milly. “And is he paying for them?”

Milly smiled, all lip.

“ Mills …”

“What was I to say? No?” Milly defended. “And anyway, I get a little sum, which should help, and maybe even more if the high lord likes it.”

Seph cocked a brow at her.

“I just need help getting them onto the cart,” Milly continued, batting her hand as if to slap away the truth of it. “Bors is out helping to repair the roof over the baron’s guest lodgings, and he says it’s urgent?—”

“Milly.” Seph grabbed the woman’s frenzied hand. “I’ll help.”

Milly sighed in relief and her shoulders relaxed. Seph released her hand as she glanced around the storage closet. These shelves used to be stuffed with barrels, though they were mostly stuffed with dust now. Seph noted the three wooden figurines upon the little shelf above the lintel. The first was featureless except for lips, the second except for eyes, and the last possessed only ears. They represented the kith goddesses of Fate, though many mortals worshipped them too, hoping to increase prosperity by paying alms to both mortal and kith gods. Seph’s grandfather had always worshipped the Fates, and while Seph believed they existed, she did not love the idea of worshipping gods who’d done nothing but torment mortal kind. For Seph’s part, she stuck to Ava and her saints, just like her nani had done.

“Which barrels?” Seph asked.

“Just through there. Under the bench. They’ll be the red oak with the black rings.” Milly nodded toward the doorway to the main entry, where she used to serve dozens of Harran’s weary.

Now, all of Harran was weary, but no one could afford to drown it in ale. No one but the baron.

It took Seph and Milly nearly an hour to complete the task, and they were both soaked to the bone by the end of it. Once they finished, Milly grabbed a small ampoule off of a high shelf and pushed it at Seph.

Seph shook her head. “You don’t need to?—”

“ Take it ,” Milly insisted, forcing Seph’s frigid fingers around it. “Put it in some broth for Nora. It’ll soothe that cough of hers.”

Seph hesitated, but Milly wouldn’t yield, so Seph slipped the bottle inside of her coat. She was just leaving when Milly added, “I had a dream a few weeks past.”

Seph stopped.

Milly was the only person in Harran, aside from Seph’s own family, who knew about Seph’s ability. That she was saints-touched. It was Levi who’d let it slip after Seph interpreted one of his dreams and ended up saving Rys’s life. In his enthusiasm, Levi had accidentally told the tavern keeper.

Thankfully, Milly was a vault, and she’d never once let on that she knew—not even to Seph. It was Levi who’d confessed.

This was the first time Milly ever confirmed it.

Seph glanced over her shoulder.

Milly dug the tip of a boot in the floor, wringing her apron between her hands. “I’ve had it three times, and I wasn’t sure if I should say—I don’t want you feeling obliged, that is—but I can’t shake it, and I can’t help but feeling like it’s something that I should tell you.”

Seph swallowed and faced the woman. She hadn’t seen Milly this rattled since her husband passed. “It’s all right, Mills…go on.”

“Well.” Milly’s gaze jumped to the door behind Seph, like she was making sure it was closed and no one was listening. “How much should I say?”

“Every detail that you can remember.”

Milly nodded, her brow furrowing. “It starts with me walking Harran’s streets. The streets are empty, and there’s a dusting of snow over everything. I turn the corner by Jondus’s old pasture, you know…” She paused to see that Seph was tracking, and Seph nodded encouragingly, so Milly continued, “There are cows in the field, like there were before the war.”

“How many cows?”

Milly didn’t hesitate. “Three, all grazing peacefully, but as I watch, the mist creeps in. It’s so thick I can hardly see the cows now, and then the cows… change .” Milly paused, and her features scrunched in disgust and horror. “Their skin rots away and depraved hatch from them like their bodies are cocoons. One depraved screams and flies at me…and that’s when I wake.”

Seph stood quiet for a very long time.

Milly worried her bottom lip. “Does it mean anything? Or is it just an empty nightmare?”

Seph inhaled slowly, wishing with every fiber of her being that Milly’s dream were the latter. Glancing at the empty shelves and the cobwebs that had taken residence within, Seph said, “The three cows represent three months of normal life. The snow means that those three months begin at the first snowfall.”

“That’s…” Today , Milly never finished.

“At the end of those three months, the kith’s curse will have finally consumed the kithlands and seep through the veil and into our lands, and…Harran will fall.”

Milly stared at Seph. “Are you certain?”

“You had the dream three times, which means Ava has heard it from each of Demas’s three Fates.” According to Nani’s teachings on dreams.

Milly paled. “Blazing stars in heaven…What do we do?”

“I don’t know,” Seph answered at last. “Let me think on it.” Her last word were empty, just an attempt to minimize Milly’s fear, because Seph wasn’t sure anything could be done.

Snow whirled like ghosts in the night as Seph hurried home. The streets were stark, empty, and though the light from a few struggling lanterns helped illuminate her path, Seph ignored it all, too wrapped up in Milly’s dream and the timing of High Lord Massie’s arrival.

And the hooded stranger. She still couldn’t believe she’d lost him!

Was it all connected? What was the coat really for? How did it all fit together––

Seph froze on her doorstep. Male voices echoed within, and one of them unmistakably belonged to the baron.

The coat .

She threw open the door and strode inside, bringing the snowstorm with her, and all conversation ceased. Seph soon realized that it was not just the baron who’d paid them a visit. Lord Bracey was there too, as well as Harbrook—Harran’s lead elder—two boned-faced kith, and High Lord Massie himself.

And Massie was holding her grandfather’s beautiful coat, appraising it hungrily.

“That doesn’t belong to you, kith ,” Seph said before she could think better of it. But Milly’s dream was too near, Seph’s despair too loud, and she was so weary of sacrificing everything to these people.

And Seph had never been good at controlling her temper.

Her words were met with a silence so complete she could hear bits of ice strike the window.

Mama’s eyes grew large and round, and Linnea shot a helpless look at her savior–– Bracey , who blinked as though he couldn’t possibly have heard Seph correctly . Harbrook, on the other hand, had heard Seph and was seconds away from spewing fire, while the two kith stiffened and took a step forward, as if they intended to teach her a hard and unforgettable lesson.

Which was when Seph noticed the veiled woman. Seph hadn’t spotted her initially because she’d been shielded behind the two larger kith. She still wore her mask, but fathomless black eyes glinted through the slats.

High Lord Massie was unmoved, his ice-blue eyes expressionless, but it was the baron who broke the silence. There was no plastered smile on his face now. “You forget your place, you insolent girl! Apologize to High Lord Massie at once.”

He was right, of course. Seph knew better. She’d spoken out of turn, and such disrespect was grounds for death. Reason demanded she drop to her knees and beg for forgiveness, but her body would not bend and the words would not fall. Instead, she remembered the day Papa left, then Rys and Levi too. The fear straining their features, though they tried so hard to be strong. She thought of Elias, and his parents, and Henrik and Bailey, and so many others in Harran who had sacrificed those they loved most so that this baron could stand there with his jeweled fingers and greasy hair and a dozen smoking chimneys—and four damned barrels of mead.

The silence stretched and strained.

Lord Massie’s eyes narrowed, but only a hint.

Indignation splotched the baron’s shiny cheeks, and he took a threatening step toward Seph. “If you do not get on your knees and apologize this instant, I will personally take the?—”

Lord Massie raised a hand, and the baron’s jaw flapped shut like a fish. Master and puppet.

The kith high lord appraised Seph, his gaze like ice to her heart, piercing through flesh and bone, straight into her soul. If Seph had ever held any doubts that the kith were not human, they vanished in that instant. There was something unnatural about Massie, the way he did not blink, and the way he saw but didn’t see, as though he were gazing into another plane of existence. His features were too sharp, too hard and unforgiving. His scar caught the light in a strange way, as if he himself were the veil between worlds, the Rift the tear in his skin, and all the demons dwelled within him.

And for perhaps the second time in Seph’s life, she felt truly afraid.

The first was when she’d said goodbye to her papa and brothers.

Without turning his gaze from Seph, the high lord handed the coat to the masked woman, who folded it neatly and tucked it away, out of sight.

“You have a quarrel with me, mortal?” Lord Massie asked in that burning port voice.

From the bedchamber, Nora coughed, sobering Seph at once. Her gaze fell, and she dropped to one knee, head bowed so low her white hair brushed the floor. She hated every second of it.

Hated her own helplessness.

She forced the apology from her lips. “Forgive me, my lord. I have spoken out of turn. That coat is very special to me; it’s the only token of a grandfather who isn’t long for this world. It was grief that gripped my heart and persuaded me to speak thus, though I swear it will not happen again.”

She didn’t lift her head, but she could feel their stares. Not even her massive mane of hair could shield her from them.

Finally, footsteps approached, step after slow and agonizing step, until Lord Massie’s shining black boots were immediately before her.

Seph’s heart pounded hard and fast, and she prayed that Ava might have mercy upon her, for Nora’s sake. She waited for the kith high lord to speak or for his sword to fall, but something trailed Seph’s jaw instead. An arrowhead, she realized, still attached to its shaft.

Her arrowhead.

Seph’s blood ran cold. He’d known it was her all along! Seph had misjudged him. He was the sort to play with his food before ripping it apart.

Never trust a kith .

Lord Massie stopped the arrowhead beneath Seph’s chin and lifted, forcing her to look up, right into his glacial blue eyes. “And what, pray, has persuaded you to this ?” He removed the arrowhead and turned it over before Seph. “Grief?”

Seph swallowed, knees trembling. “Hunger, my lord.”

“See! What did I tell you?” the baron interjected, waggling a finger. He looked eagerly at Seph now, like a weasel scampering off with a carcass. “You thought I wouldn’t discover your little secret, ah, but thankfully your sister has better sense.”

Seph looked to Linnea, but her sister’s gaze dropped to the floor and her cheeks turned the color of spilt wine. Not that it mattered. The kith high lord had discovered Seph in the woods, and that part was Seph’s fault, at least.

“Here is what we are going to do,” Massie said in that still-smooth voice, while his icy gaze nearly froze Seph’s heart. “You are going to gift me the coat, and I am going to let you live.”

Seph clenched fury between her teeth. She knew from her grandfather’s stories that a gift freely given was far more powerful than one stolen, but she had no idea what consequences awaited her should she gift this coat to the kith high lord. Would it help Milly’s vision come to fruition, or was it possible that handing Lord Massie the coat could prevent it?

“Perhaps I’m not being clear…” Massie’s words trailed off as the woman veiled in black moved forward. Small, pale feet peeked out from beneath a hem embroidered in silvery enchantments, and all watched in silence as she stopped behind Massie and touched his arm.

Massie’s spine straightened. The woman whispered into his ear as she curled long fingers possessively over his shoulder, revealing the enchantments inked all over her skin. A chill ran over Seph, head to toe.

Who was this woman that commanded the attention of a kith high lord?

The woman slid her hand from Massie, faced Seph, and exhaled, as though she were snuffing out a candle. Ice cold air breathed over Seph’s skin, and a thin tendril of mist streamed from the woman’s lips, slithering through the air like a serpent.

What in the world ?—

It slid right past Seph to Linnea, where it coiled around Linnea’s neck and squeezed.

Linnea choked, clawing desperately at the mist, but her hands only passed through.

“No…” Seph said as fear for her sister obliterated every other thought. “Stop it! Leave her alone!”

“Linnie!” Mama screamed, reaching for Linnea, but one of the larger kith grabbed hold of Mama’s arm and yanked her back.

Linnea collapsed to her knees, convulsing and gagging for breath, and now her lips were turning blue.

“Stop… please !” Seph begged the woman. “Take the coat! Do whatever you want with it, just please let her go!”

The woman’s mask turned toward Seph, those empty black eyes unblinking. Finally, after what felt like an eternity, the woman curled two fingers.

The mist dissipated. Linnea dropped to her hands, wheezing and gasping, while Lord Massie bent closer to Seph. His cool breath whispered across her skin like a winter breeze, and he held the arrowhead to the soft skin beneath her chin. Seph had never hated anyone more. “Say these words: This coat I freely give…”

Seph’s eyes burned. “This coat I freely give.” She could hardly speak.

“Of my own volition…” Lord Massie continued.

“Of my own volition.”

“And I sever all claim to its power.”

Seph trembled.

“ Say it .” Lord Massie’s port tone burned, and the arrowhead dug into Seph’s skin.

Seph winced. “And I…sever all claim…to its…” She swallowed. “Power.”

Lord Massie inhaled deeply, as if he might breathe Seph’s words into his very being. His eyes shuttered closed, but only for a moment before they snapped open and focused on Seph again.

Fire writhed behind the ice, and Seph wondered what she had just done. Whether or not she had just singlehandedly set Milly’s vision in motion.

Lord Massie looked back to the masked woman, who nodded almost imperceptibly, and he held the arrowhead before Seph like a boon. Seph stared at that little piece of collateral—evidence that had damned them all—and she took it from the high lord’s long, pale fingers. Lord Massie regarded Seph a second more and gestured at his kith, who promptly strode to the door and opened it. A cold draft tore into the room, mixed with flakes of snow. The fire fought to stay alive.

Lord Massie gave Seph one last shrewd and condescending glance, and a wicked smile touched his lips. “Give my regards to your grandfather.” His gaze flickered to Grandpa Jake, and then he, the masked woman, and his kith were gone.

Seph couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe. She was still trapped in the moment she’d given the coat to Lord Massie against the backdrop of Linnea’s slow suffocation.

“We are not done here, girl,” the baron stammered, cutting through her haze of bitter regret as he hurried through the door like a dog after his master. Harbrook and a reluctant Lord Bracey followed, closing the door after them.

Mama whirled on Seph. “Saints, for once in your life, Josephine!”

But Seph only had eyes for Linnea, who now sat upon the floor with her eyes closed, breathing slowly. “ Why , Linnie ? ” Seph’s words fell in despair. She still had not risen from her knees; she didn’t have the strength.

Linnea’s shoulders expanded with a breath, but she did not open her eyes. “You know why.”

Seph shook her head. “I will never know why, and if you can’t admit what they are after they just…” Seph couldn’t even finish the sentence, and her hands curled into fists upon the floor. “ Every day I risk my life in those woods…for you!” It wasn’t that Seph needed to be commended for what she did for their family—she would do it regardless. But to work so tirelessly only to be betrayed by the very ones she did it all for…“I keep the woodpile, I mend the roof, our clothes, and whatever else needs repairing until my hands bleed, and I?—”

“And it is not enough!” Linnea yelled. She opened her eyes, and tears flowed down her cheeks. “I’ve seen our stores, Sephie, same as you. I am not trying to diminish what you do for us—I swear, I am not. You think I don’t see you, but I do. I always have, better than you know. You are the strong one, and I… I am not . I try, but I am not you ! So if I must give my hand to a man I don’t love to help alleviate your burden, then I will do it, because at least then I’ve done something.”

There were words Seph had been about to say. Words that had been building inside of her for two years, but at Linnea’s last confession, they all lodged in her chest, burned to ash, and floated away like chaff in the wind.

Seph stared at her sister, hardly aware of Mama, who watched them, bewildered into silence. “Why didn’t you tell me?” Seph whispered at last, every word shattered.

Linnea’s shoulders sank as if succumbing to the weight of a burden she’d been holding for too long. She closed her eyes. “Because…you were already carrying enough.”

Seph glanced down, a single tear splashing to the floor.

Linnea crossed the room and pushed through the door that led to Nora’s bedchamber. A second later, the ladder to the loft groaned and creaked. Seph caught her mama’s gaze, but she only shook her head and followed Linnea, closing the door behind her.

Seph dropped her head in her hands.

You are the strong one …

Linnea’s words were like stinging nettle upon her skin.

Strength. Seph wasn’t sure what strength was anymore. She thought she’d known. She’d thought strength was muscle and grit, something loud and defiant—a force that could not be contained by the edicts of man—and Seph had prided herself in that defiance. She’d worn it like armor, skillfully hiding all of the loneliness and despair buried within. Yet the only fruit that armor had yielded was attention from those with the power to crush her entire family.

And the baron would crush her for this offense.

No, Seph wasn’t strong. She was selfish. And rash and foolish and proud. Linnea had quietly denied herself, for their family’s sake, never once showing signs of her own misery. That was strength. But not even Linnea’s ties to Lord Bracey could save Seph from the baron’s inevitable wrath. Saints above, they’d be fortunate if Seph was the only one he punished. She wished her grandfather was awake. He always knew what to do and what to say, and…

Seph remembered the coat.

She lifted her head and looked to her grandfather, who still sat unconscious and slumped in his chair. Wiping her eyes, she stood and made her way to him, kneeling at his feet as she grabbed his hands and searched his face. He was so familiar to her, every crease and every plane, and yet…

She suddenly felt as though she did not know him at all.

“What in Ava’s name were you doing with an enchanted coat?” Seph whispered.

Of course, he didn’t answer.

Seph found it odd that for all the stories he’d told, he’d never shared any about a coat.

Give my regards to your grandfather.

The high lord’s parting words set her nerves on edge. As if he’d known Seph’s grandfather once, as if he delighted in some irony of the moment, but they couldn’t possibly know one another.

Only…did they?

She really had no idea who her grandfather could have known in his youth. He never spoke of it. He’d always smiled and said his life began with Nani.

Seph’s gaze moved over her grandfather as if the answers to these questions were hidden in the lines of his face, and, after some time, when the answers did not come, she sighed and stood instead, bending over to kiss his forehead. “I love you,” she said, and just as she was letting go of his hand, he squeezed hers.

Seph startled as she looked back at him. His eyes were still closed, but his grip remained firm. “Grandpa…?”

He moaned something indecipherable, and his grip became desperate, as if he were fighting to cling to this sudden thread of consciousness he’d been granted.

Seph leaned in and grabbed his other hand too. “Grandpa, it’s me…Sephie. I’m here.”

His head turned to the side, his features strained as he moaned again, only this time she caught a word: pile .

“Pile…?” She studied him intently. “What pile?”

His head turned to the other side, as though he were in pain. “Back…p-pile…”

“Back pile? Grandpa…what are you talking about?”

He murmured a word that sounded strongly like time , and then his grip went slack, his head drooped, and he fell unconscious again.

Seph stared at him, bewildered, and then there was a sharp knock on the door.