full bloom
FULL BLOOM
I. SNOWMELT
The snow takes on a new texture as spring draws near, as the weakened sun regains its strength and the days get just a touch warmer--enough that the powder melts a little and freezes again and develops an icy crust to match the growing icicles that, when you have lived in the mountains long enough, are portents of the coming spring. The ice is treacherous, and has a jagged edge to it that scrapes at the skin if you are unwary enough to slip and fall on it. So many children learn that lesson the hard way: one of my earliest memories is of running out to play in the icy late winter snow, and sliding, and staring at all the tiny little cuts on my hands, most not even deep enough to bleed, but enough to sting for weeks after.
That's not why I started wearing gloves, though.
There were four of us living at the little inn our family maintained. There was our mother, who worked herself ragged at the cider presses and the orchards and barely had the energy left to manage the inn, as well, especially with her failing health. There was our father, who took the cider our mother made, sold it in the market town, and gambled away most of the earnings, then came home with a pittance and said the markets were difficult this year; I did not understand why everyone pretended to believe him when he said he was a traveling merchant. There was my sister, who took it on herself to raise me since our mother did not have the energy and our father did not have the time. And, of course, there was me, odd, quiet girl that I was.
I was easy enough to ignore; I shadowed after my sister, and seldom spoke to anyone but her. We were a common sight in the village, running errands for our mother who had neither the time nor the energy. People would smile at me and sometimes give me some crumbly cheese or a wrinkled apple or some bruised cherries as a treat, because they liked silent children and because my sister was always very polite and very insistent on being treated as a grown-up. If sometimes I seemed to stare at things that weren't there, or disappear into my own mind, or fidget with whatever objects were lying around, no one thought anything of it; what are children, after all, but people who have not yet learned how not to be strange? As I grew older and showed no signs of becoming less strange, people instead politely ignored me.
They couldn't see the echoes, as my sister called them. I didn't even know it was unusual: of course, I thought, if someone has a strong memory associated with an object and a place, those feelings will linger, and others will be able to see them, just as you can experience your own memories given the appropriate reminder. For me, for the most part, the echoes happened whenever I touched something with a memory associated with it, in the place where it happened; it was not until I casually revealed this ability to our mother that I realized that not everyone shares this gift, and that people find it unsettling. "You mustn't tell anyone about this," she told me, her voice trembling; I could not tell you if she was angry or afraid. "Promise me you will never speak of these visions to anyone else." And of course I promised; I loved my mother more than anything.
From then on I spent what time I could alone in the ruins just outside of town. No one else went there--they feared what might live in those old ruins--but I found them comforting. I could lose myself in the echoes of the scholars who once lived there, with their books and their quiet rituals. It was a quiet, peaceful life, and the things I learned there were from a civilization a hundred years dead; I would never be tempted to reveal these secrets to anyone in the first place, and no one would recognize them even if I did.
Though springtime is associated with budding leaves and brilliant flowers--ah, for the brilliant pinks and whites of the apples and the cherries in the orchards--the season in the village was marked by snowmelt. Once all the powder had turned to ice, and once the sun had gathered up enough strength, it all began to melt, and everything would be a torrent of slushy water: muddy icy puddles in the streets, a constant drip from the rooftops. And one year--I was thirteen, still just as strange and quiet--my father was eager to take his cart to the market town and sell his wares, for, he said, "It's been a hard winter, and we've not enough money to get by." Spring started early in the lowlands, after all, and it was too early for travelers. He had, in fact, skimmed a portion of the money the inn had earned during the harvest and stashed it in the attic; every time he added a few coins he would calculate how much we had left, and decide that it would be enough. Of course he intended to gamble it away, though he truly did believe this time he'd found a way to cheat the system. That this time he would redeem himself.
And I could see the pain in my mother's face; she did not want to suspect her husband of stealing from her, did not want to believe that he was the reason that we could barely get by from year to year, but she knew the numbers didn't add up. And my sister . . . well, what I knew, she knew. She tried her best to hide her scowl. And I, with all the irritable confidence of youth, said, "You think you've found a way to beat them at their own game," I said, "but you haven't. It's already rigged."
A silence fell, broken only by the steady dripping of melting snow from the roof. My father, his eyes narrow, his voice deathly quiet, said, "What did you say to me?"
"You have a purse of coins hidden in the attic," I told him. "You keep trying to convince yourself it's not much, just enough to make sure that you don't come home a failure, but really it's enough to get us through several months, and you know it. You've told yourself this is the last time a dozen times now. You're so convinced--"
"That's enough," he said, his voice still soft.
"--so convinced you're helping you can't see that you're killing us. We would be thriving if it weren't for you."
"I said that's enough!" He didn't raise his voice, but there was a shift in his tone that carried a terrible threat. He was glaring at our mother, now, who had closed her eyes and furrowed her brow in deep concern; then he turned to look at my sister. "You both knew," he said. "You both knew she was a demon child." It wasn't a question. Finally, he fixed that cold glare on me. "And you. Living under my roof, eating my food, acting like my child? How dare you? How dare you?"
Fear and anger, I have often found, are balanced on a razor's edge. Between the urge to stand up and fight and the urge to turn and flee, I was paralyzed, unable to move, or think; all I could see was the calm fury in his eyes, the certainty that my life was over.
"People will ask questions," said my mother, in a placatory tone. "She likely doesn't even know. And besides, if you're leaving for town early this year, I'll need the extra hands, and as you said, we can't afford to hire extra help. Maybe we can buy an amulet with the money you earn us. Something that will bring our daughter back."
He clenched his hands into fists and took a deep breath, then relaxed. "So how does it work, demon?"
I tried to come up with a lie, and then my sister, who still looked terrified, said, "She has to touch something. Then she can see an echo."
Without a word, my father rose to his feet and left the room. He came back with a pair of leather gloves, which he threw at me and said, "You wear these. You touch nothing, you talk to no one outside of this family, and you work to earn your keep. And when I sell this year's batch, I'm finding an alchemist who knows how to make you my daughter again."
I put the gloves on, and tried my best not to cry, or to fall into an echo spiral as I remembered this conversation over and over again: from my father's perspective, from my mother's, from my sister's. I was able to succeed at the first part, at least. I fled to the bedroom I shared with my sister and curled up there and closed my eyes and lay still and tried very hard not to think about anything at all. My sister came and sat next to me in silence for a while, then placed a stuffed toy cat we had both once played with against the exposed skin of my face. "I'm sorry," she said. "I was so afraid."
I said nothing, but hugged the cat close, and tried to lose myself in more pleasant memories. It was harder, but it was at least something to focus on, pretending I was someone else, someone who wasn't cursed, someone whose father still loved her.
He left the following day, his stashed purse in his pocket, a cart full of cider that he would sell at the market for less than it's worth. I did not leave my room for weeks.
II. RAINFALL
The arrival of spring storms marks the end of the snowmelt, as sudden downpours melt the last of the snow and cause the river to flood its banks; at some point, though the roads are still all muddy and the rivulets and puddles still carry winter's chill, so one wrong step will leave you soaked and shivering and miserable if the rain didn't already get you there, the beauty of spring starts to show its face. Some new leaves here, some budding flowers there. And the warmth and the cleared roads means there is work to be done; the old imperial highway over the mountains passes through here, and we're the last village before the mountain pass. Soon there will be travelers, and travelers need food and lodgings.
Our father did not find any alchemists on that expedition; he did not come home with any money at all. He avoided talking to me or looking at me, but his fury at having a demon-touched daughter seemed to have subsided. He did once catch me not wearing gloves that summer, and locked me in the attic for a week as punishment; it was the most he had paid attention to me in months. He tried to skim some more of the inn's money, but my sister and my mother were more vigilant now that his secret was out in the open. He soon gave up, and no longer tried to come up with an excuse for spending most of the year in town.
At harvest that year he disappeared, and only returned with the first storm of the following spring, in shabby boots and tattered coat, and he looked at me when he returned with a strange look in his eye and said, "I know why you are the way you are, now." I froze in panic, but he held up his hands, as if trying to calm a wild animal. "No, no, it's good. You can see people's secrets, right?"
I tilted my head, uncertain how to respond.
"You were right," he said. "The . . . games I play in town. They're cheating. But you, you can help. They have all that gold. And you're going to help me get it."
"I don't think--"
He pulled close and grabbed me by the wrist. I had expected the smell of stale cider on his breath, but there was nothing; somehow that made it worse. "I gave you those nice gloves, didn't I? Helped you, you know, not have to live like that." He had not, in fact, gotten me these gloves; my sister had bought them for me, something supple and well-fitting and durable. Not the cheap ill-fitting work gloves he'd given me. "You owe me one. And this'll make it all worth it."
"I can't control it," I said. "Not every memory is useful. And I have to get to the place, and--"
"Give it a shot, eh?" He gave me a smile that, in the echo of this conversation I remembered years later, I remember him thinking was friendly. It was such an odd recollection: at the time he seemed manic and desperate; in his memory, he was offering me kindness. "You'll be doing us all a favor."
There was no resisting. I accompanied him into town, down the rain-soaked imperial highway, and the whole way he chattered at me about his travels. It was an arduous journey, and we found ourselves on several occasions knee-deep in muddy water pushing the cart out of the rut it had gotten stuck in. So we were drenched and miserable when we reached town. With the cart and the road conditions, it took us two days to make the journey.
Our village was a small place--a few hundred people, some farms and orchards, an inn and a general store for travelers--and though I have since seen the ruins of cities that would dwarf this place, this was the first time I had seen so many people together in one place. No one paid attention to us, and no one raised an eyebrow when my father paid a few coppers for space on the floor of the common room of an inn that, according to him, was "Not the best in town, but it's cheap and they don't ask questions."
I couldn't sleep that night, even when I tried to focus on the familiar sound of the spring storms; the sounds of a dozen people trying to sleep, the constant sense of other people's presence . . . and, of course, there were the echoes of an unfamiliar place. Even just my face pressed against the cheap bedding that had been laid out on the floor was enough--they were faint, dozens of people who had slept on this same strange bedding and had half-remembered conversations, but . . . I became convinced that if I weren't careful I would lose myself in the echoes entirely, that so many people in one place would leave so many echoes behind that if I weren't careful I'd get lost and forget who I was. (It doesn't work like that, but I was a kid. I didn't know. There are so many other ways to lose myself.)
He woke early the next morning, and in the dull grey light of predawn led me to a dingy house by the riverside that I would have taken for disused. But he rapped out a strange knock on the door, and a sullen-looking young woman opened the door and ushered us inside without so much as a word. She led us into a back room and threw some tattered cushions on the floor for us to sit on, then disappeared back to wherever she came from. We were alone for a few minutes when a woman about my father's age appeared. "This the girl?" she said.
"This is . . . yes," said my father.
The woman sat down opposite me and looked at me appraisingly; I got the unsettling feeling she would size up a new horse in the same way. "Doesn't look like much. But demon-touched, huh? Show me what you can do, kid."
My father looked down at me with a fond expression. "I told them about you," he said. "They've agreed to cancel my debts and even give us some gold--real gold, imagine!--if you'll go work for them. Help them run their . . . games."
He was selling me. I tried to keep my expression carefully neutral, but I must have given away my horror at the prospect. The woman laughed, even as my father tried to convince me. "It's only for a few years," he said. "And it's enough money for, for . . . it'll help. We can look after your mother properly, and maybe even find an alchemist who can, you know . . . cure you."
Did I want to be cured? I tried to calm myself by listening to the rain but of course the rain had stopped. So I took a deep breath, and looked at my father and his hopeful eyes, then at the woman and her single raised eyebrow.
"I'm not actually demon-touched," I said. "It's just a lie he tells people to make himself sound dangerous. What did he tell you? That I can read your secrets?" The woman folded her arms, but said nothing. "I'm just quiet, so people don't really pay attention to me. But it makes him feel powerful to be able to say that his demon-touched daughter will steal your secrets instead of just 'my weird daughter will eavesdrop on you later'." The lie came easily--some lost echo of someone else who knew how to bluff her way out of situations, perhaps; I wondered what my life would have been like if I'd been able to lie so easily when I revealed my power to my father.
I glanced over at him, aiming for insouciance. His face fell. I was expecting anger, but instead he just looked . . . hurt. Betrayed. And for a moment I wondered if maybe he believed me, too. That I wasn't cursed. Then he said, "Don't tell me you believe her. She's just trying to get out of it."
"It's only for a few years," she said, a perfect mockery of his tone. "Deal's a deal, friend. I don't want her, and you promised me three years. I've got plenty of things a merchant could be doing for me while he pays off his debt." She paused, as if a thought had just occurred to her. "Or you could give me that inn of yours. Give me that, and we're square."
I have often thought of this moment in the years since it happened. He did not hesitate, did not pause to consider. "No, no. We had a deal. Three years. I'll do it."
She smiled. "Good. Now, get your daughter out of here. We have business to discuss."
For a moment he seemed like he would argue, but then he finally mustered some anger for me. He dragged me to my feet and pushed me towards the exit. "You had your chance to help the family," he hissed. "Now find your own way home."
Under ideal conditions it was the better part of a day's walk up the old imperial highway back to the village. The rain fell fitfully the whole way: a downpour one minute, a sad drizzle the next, and I hadn't slept, and had no provisions. I stumbled, exhausted, into the inn well past midnight, and collapsed, still in my rain-soaked traveling clothes, in my bed.
I don't remember my sister waking up, but she shook me awake and told me she had drawn me a bath; hot water had never felt so good before. She waited until the bath had melted some of the chill from my bones and I had stopped devouring the cheese and bread and apples she had brought me to eat before asking what happened.
She listened silently to the story, and even when I'd finished, said nothing for a long while. We were used to each others' silences, by now; but this time I worried that she would tell me I should have stayed, should have let our father sell me into servitude. Instead she said, "I'm glad you're home."
"I almost stayed," I told her. "Maybe I should have. You'd all--"
"No." She actually put her hand over my mouth, gently, but the physical contact--and, yes, echoes of her and me in this room, playing and laughing and planning and living--startled me into silence. "This is your home. You belong here. I would not trade you for all the comfort and riches in the world."
Home is such a strange concept. You live your life in one place, filling it with echoes of all of your tragedies and triumphs, and somehow people don't become trapped by it, don't find it overwhelming. It's hard for me to fathom. Even if I were just myself, alone, with only my own memories . . . it's too much. I understood our father, just then: he felt it, too. For him, being away so much of the time--and he hadn't always gambled it all away, not at first--had been a way to make sure that home would always feel like home, that it was not a prison of memories and familiarity.
And I knew I would never be able to stay still. But in that moment, at least, it was good to be home.
III. SUNBREAK
Every now and then, between fits of hail and rain, the sun breaks through the clouds and the entire village is too dazzling to look at, every waterlogged surface shining as bright as the sun. But it is momentarily glorious, the blue of the sky, the dramatic clouds, the sudden warmth; and in those moments, when not everything is bleak and grey, that you can begin to truly feel the promise of spring. The memories of winter begin to melt away, and it is easy to forget that it is not yet gone.
I sneaked away that spring several times to enjoy the quiet of the ruins. No one in town ever visited them, though they were visible from the old highway; there was a sense, I think, that if there were anything worth keeping around from before the collapse, someone would have taken the time to preserve it. I would often take naps in the spring sun, and dream that I was the river, in a time before the old highway. No one lived here, but some mountain nomads would visit occasionally and leave me offerings: sweet apples, white cheese, and cider and beer and bread in the springtime. I woke feeling a sense of loss I couldn't quite understand, but also feeling profoundly grateful to have had the chance to see those dreams. I told my sister about them and she told me, distracted, that she thought I should probably be careful, that there was probably a reason that the ruins had been abandoned.
Rumors spread quickly in a small village, especially as things begin to clear up and people spend less and less time sheltering at home. Everyone seemed to know that our father's gambling debts had earned him three years of indentured servitude to a woman that everyone seemed to recognize but no one was willing to talk about, not to me. Everyone also seemed to know that I was, as my father put it, demon-touched. They refused to make eye contact with me, and shooed me off like a stray cat if my sister was not there to chaperon. I tried my best not to wonder who had told them, or why.
But despite that, I felt as if a weight had been lifted. That year we worked hard, and one of the neighbors offered to take our goods to market since our father was no longer able to; by the time winter's first storm snowed us in, we'd tidied away enough that we could hire on some additional help come springtime, enough that our mother could rest and that my sister and I could go into town in our father's stead. By snowmelt we were both almost too excited to bear, and we set out with the first rains, with our brand new cart and some much sturdier traveling clothes than I'd had the year before. It was strange to be traveling without a sense of dread, to imagine the old highway and the market square becoming familiar. I still wore the gloves, but I was even beginning to anticipate the echoes I could find in a new town, without the spectre of our father looming overhead. And though we were frustrated that some people did not take us seriously, even though my sister was old enough now to run the inn in name as well as in deed, still we enjoyed haggling with the people who came to visit us at our cart, planning what we could do with the money we were bringing in. That first spring storm passed quickly, leaving blue skies and unseasonably warm days in its wake.
Neither of us had considered that our father would still be in town; or rather, I had thought that he would be too busy to care about us. He always had been before.
It was a sleepy afternoon, and my sister was telling a story I wasn't quite paying attention to--I was distracted living through another day in the market, seeing the town through the eyes of a trader who had come all the way from the coast, and who kept thinking of the ruins of the old empire he had encountered on his travels. He wondered if there was money to be made in exploring those old ruins, or if scavengers had already picked them clean, or if that even mattered--he could be proud of himself as an explorer, couldn't he? And I was so lost in his thoughts that when someone said, "That's her, that's the demon girl," I frowned and looked around for who they could be talking to. Then I felt my sister's hand in my hand and I returned to myself, and saw them: the beginnings of a mob. Our father was nowhere to be seen, but this was surely his doing; now several locals were gathering. They weren't shouting yet, but they were angry and talking loudly, and attention was being drawn. And--I glanced, moved by the same impulse that had saved me from my father--our escape routes had been cut off. There was no running, here.
"Probably cheating honest folk out of their coin," said one. "I'll wager every last dram of that cider she's selling is poison."
"I heard she tricked her father into selling himself into servitude," said another.
My sister stood between them and me--always protecting me, always afraid for me, always acting where I could only lose myself in thoughts and memories--and seemed about to say something, and how desperately I wanted her to say nothing, because what could she say that wouldn't make things worse?--when a white-clad figure pushed her way through the crowd with a forceful cry of "Enough!" Though I had never seen one in person before, I recognized that cocked hat, the dramatically flared coat, the sword and pistol at her hip--this was a Seeker of the Order. The townsfolk must have recognized her, too--the white was distinctive, if nothing else--because their attention immediately shifted. They were still angry, but her presence seemed to constrain their action.
"I am conscripting these two into the Order," announced the Seeker.
"But the demon--"
"Will serve the Creator, as do we all," said the Seeker. "Now leave us be. I need to prepare my conscripts for their new lives."
Few institutions survived the collapse of the old empire. That mattered little out here, where we relied on our local militias to keep the peace, and kept ourselves safe by making friends and trading with our neighbors, but one of the few institutions that survived was the Order of the Keepers. The fact that just one woman with a white coat was able to even temporarily quiet a mob may have been a token to the fact that they still carried some respect, but I suspect they merely felt that conscription was simply another form of punishment.
The crowd parted, though not without grumbling and glares; most were aimed at my sister and me, but a few furtive glares were cast at the Seeker, and the Seeker, in turn, approached us with a dark look on her face. "Gods-damned provincials," she muttered, then looked us up and down. "Oh, don't give me those terrified looks. The Order will look after you. Come on, on your feet, the road is long."
My sister rallied herself and tried to protest. "We need to--"
"You think the mob will wait nicely for you to go back to the inn and pack up all your things and sell off the rest of your inventory?" she said. "If we leave town now, we might be able to leave it behind. Don't make me reconsider whether saving you is worth my time." A long pause, and then she lowered her voice. "Which way's home?"
My sister seemed determined to be defiant, but there was something odd in her tone that made me want to answer. "East," I said, just as quietly, ignoring my sister's accusing glare. "Towards the mountain pass."
The Seeker did not respond to this information immediately; she marched us through the main streets of town, barking orders at us, heading towards the west gate. I began to suspect she was hoping that our departure would be marked, and could only hope she had our best interests in mind when she did. She certainly quieted down once we started down the old imperial highway, the mountains behind us, squinting into the setting sun. We had been walking for what seemed like hours (but, given that the sun had only just started setting, couldn't have been that long) when she finally stopped. Her expression had softened somewhat, but it was still far from friendly. "Right. We're leaving the road. If we cut south, we should be able to go around town, rejoin the highway east of town. That should lose them if they're following."
We had reached the end of the cultivated areas around town; here the trees were encroaching on the road, and there were plenty of places to hide. It would be rough going, but we had very loudly set out heading east. Understanding dawned. "You aren't really conscripting us," I said.
"Last thing I need is a couple of kids following me around," she said. "Come on. We can talk later. Mobs can move fast when they want to."
We picked our way through the forest; I was completely lost, but the Seeker seemed confident in her wayfinding, with her compass and her map. The white coat had disappeared--one moment she had been all dressed in white, as flashy as you please, and the next it was dull greys that would not stand out against the rocks and trees. And though she did wait for us to keep up with her, she seemed irritated at having to do so, so we both stumbled as quickly as we could through the unfamiliar woods. And all the while the light was fading and I worried we'd be navigating in the dark.
Finally we came to a secluded clearing overlooking the river, and we made camp. There was no fire, and the Seeker did not have enough kit for three people, but she let me and my sister share her bedroll and the stale trail rations she had packed for her long journey from--I assumed, from her accent, and the light tone of her skin--the coast.
"Thank you," said my sister, as we settled in for the evening, "for saving us."
The Seeker took a long time before replying. "They knew I couldn't just let two innocent girls get strung up," she said, and sounded annoyed at herself for it. "Doesn't matter, you don't need to worry about it." She reached into a pocket and produced a small purse, which she tossed at my sister. "This will cover your losses. They'll forget about you eventually, but I'd stay clear of town for a while."
"They won't forget about us," I said.
The Seeker turned to look at me, her face unreadable by the fading light of evening. "You really are spirit-touched?" she said. There was surprise in her voice--most victims of these mobs were innocent of the crimes of which they were accused. "Look. I'm not . . . it's not safe for you out here. Even if it's not here . . . if your hometown finds out, if anyone finds out, they will turn on you. One bad harvest, one unusual storm. That's all it takes. You have to stay with me. I can keep you safe."
My sister caught my eye. "Please," she said. "You know mother and I will always look after you. We need you at home." Her expression, too, was obscured by shadow, but I could imagine the sad, earnest look in her eyes. She knew the Seeker was right, knew I would want to leave, knew that I couldn't, not so long as she kept asking.
"Listen, kid. I'm not doing this because I want you around, but I can't . . . you know what it's like out here. You have to come with me, or there might not be anyone there to save you, or your family, next time."
"You could conscript me for real," I said. "Then I wouldn't have a choice."
I thought I could feel it, then, the moment both their hearts broke. Maybe I could--an echo of the present, a time they would both remember for a long time. Here in this clearing, our voices obscured by the sound of the river, the rough uneven ground beneath us, the light almost entirely vanished behind the western horizon, and here I was, telling them to please make the choice for me. I should have fought harder to stay with my family; I should have fought harder for myself. I failed them both, in that moment.
"I don't kidnap children," said the Seeker.
"It's different in the village," said my sister. "Everyone knows each other. Out here we're just strangers, but they wouldn't do this to their neighbors. They've known us both for years." And I thought of how no one would meet my eye anymore, how they shooed me away if I did not have my sister or my mother there to accompany me. I wasn't sure who she was trying to convince. "And besides," and here I knew she was looking at me, "you know Mother needs you."
I wished I could read the Seeker's face, then, wished she could see mine, how desperate I was for an excuse, to be able to tell my sister "I can't, I'm sorry." But there was no way for me to communicate that, not as I was. So I said, feeling miserable, "You're right, of course."
The Seeker said, "If that's what you want," her voice dark. "Get some rest. I'll get you back on the road tomorrow."
We woke with the dawn, and made our way to the old imperial highway in a sullen silence. Clouds were already gathering on the horizon, vast and ominous, promising a stormy voyage home. And the Seeker made one final attempt, here in the light of day. "You're sure this is what you want?"
"What I want doesn't matter," I said, and hated myself for saying it, and hated the look on her face when I did. "But thank you. Without you--"
"None of that." She scowled, and, with a moment's hesitation, removed a single, worn coin on a leather string from around her neck. "Here." She pressed it into my gloved hand, as I stood staring. "A keepsake. So you'll remember that the Order will welcome you, when the rest of the world won't."
This, I learned much later, was a tradition from the old imperial heartland, before the collapse. It went like this: you would carry around a little trinket, something you were fond of, but ideally nothing particularly valuable, such as an old coin; then, you would gift that keepsake to someone who, for whatever reason, you hoped would remember your meeting, even if you did not expect to encounter them again. I still wonder whether that tradition originated with someone who had my gift--imagine how much of yourself that trinket would absorb. Every hardship, every joy, everything in between, that keepsake would be with you for all of them, be a part of them all.
I accepted the coin, and put it around my neck; as the metal, still warm, touched my skin, I could feel every time she touched that coin for good luck, or focused on it to meditate. And I saw myself through her eyes, in that moment: how sad I looked, how lost; and how frustrating I was, how childish. And I felt her frustration at something else: her quarry now out of reach, because she had chosen to help us, and now that I had chosen not to join her, that sense of helplessness and uncertainty.
She was gone when I returned to myself; she had a mission, after all, and how could she have known that I knew the woman she was looking for? My father had tried to sell me to her. But I had made my choice, or rather, failed to make it. My sister and I began the long walk home. It began raining soon after, a driving rain with a howling wind that, if either of us had been in the mood to talk, would have swallowed the sounds of our voices and made it difficult. I focused on the coin now pressed against my collarbone, and thought about the Seeker's words, and wondered how long it would be before the village turned on me, just as she said it would.
IV. FULL BLOOM
There is a moment, every spring, where you know, deep in your bones, that winter is dead and gone. All the flowers are in bloom, and the trees and the grass and the hedges are a vibrant shade of green. If there is rain, it's a warm rain; if there is wind, it is wind that fills the air with fallen petals; and if there is sun, it is so warm and clear that spring is here. It is a fleeting moment, of course; soon the blossoms will fall and fade, and the brilliant greens of spring will fade into the richer, subtler greens of summer, and the warmth of the sun, once a relief, will eventually intensify into the oppressive heat of summer.
All the more reason to celebrate. Every year the village holds a festival for that ephemeral moment when the mountain is in full bloom; they had already begun preparations for the festival when my sister and I returned. The anticipatory mood slowed the spread of rumors of what had happened to us, and even though my sister was reluctant to lie, everyone believed her when she said that bandits had taken the cart and horse on our way home. They were a recent problem, everyone agreed, but a pervasive one. Oh, there were whispers that our mother shouldn't have sent the two of us on our own, but it had always been safe before, and who else could she have sent? We told our mother the truth, of course.
No one paid any mind to the traveler from the market town who said he was here for the festival. I should have been on my guard, but I had convinced myself I could worry about the future after the festival; it's not as if anyone would pay any attention to me for the duration. So I was surprised to overhear him talking to my mother, "I was sorry to hear about your daughters."
I should not have panicked, but I froze where I was, my heart pounding. No one from outside of town should have known anything, known who she was, should have--but my mother, seeing my reaction, simply said, "Thank you. I'd prefer not to talk about it."
"Of course, of course. But I know how you need them to run this place, now that your husband is gone." He lowered his voice. "I confess I came because I had an offer for you. My employer is interested in buying your inn. For a fair price, of course--she'll bring on staff, let you finally get come rest. I know how hard you work."
"I shall need some time to think about it."
"Of course. But please don't wait too long; my employer has many plans for this village, and it would be a shame if she could no longer afford such a generous offer by the time you make your decision." He rose to depart. "I'll visit again soon; we'll talk then."
Once he was gone, my mother caught my eye and waved me over, and then my sister. In a private room she explained the conversation, and said, "I'm thinking of selling."
"Mother, you know he was threatening you," said my sister. Her voice took on a bitter, mocking tone. "'Sell now or we'll steal it later.'"
"I know. But I don't have much fight left in me."
"You can't just--you have to say no! We can get the village together, or . . ."
My sister looked to me for support; I maintained eye contact as I said, "I don't think either of us will be safe here if we keep the inn. We should take his offer and find a new home, somewhere over the mountains. Somewhere Father and his new boss can't find us. Somewhere nobody thinks either of us are demon-touched fugitives from the Order."
"This is our home! We can't just leave!"
The two of them continued the conversation far into the night. It went nowhere; our mother still seemed inclined to sell, and my sister still seemed upset that we were even considering it. And I did understand how she felt; before everything had fallen apart I would have felt the same way. But the village had not been home to me for so long that it frustrated me that she could not see it.
"We would hardly be the first people who'd been forced out of their homes," I said. "We'll survive."
"You're giving up without even trying," she said. "You could at least try to put up a fight. You owe me that much." She stormed off before I could respond; or perhaps she left while I stared, silently, trying to find words that weren't just bitter. What did she expect me to do? I was just her demon little sister, always needing to be taken care of. Hiding and leaving were all I was good for.
Change came rapidly to the village that year. The elder approved the construction of a new barracks on the village greens; the good people of the market town had generously offered to lend us some militiamen and mercenaries to protect against the growing scourge of bandits. Some new enterprising merchants purchased the general store and the blacksmith; and a lumbermill was opened, and brought with it an influx of new workers to operate it. A wall was built, and lodging for the workers. Of course some were skeptical of the changes, but there could be no doubt the village was flourishing, at least for now. Certainly everyone who had been replaced was more than adequately paid.
In the end, my mother compromised, and sold the inn but decided to remain in the village; we kept the orchard and the cider press, and moved into the little cabin on the orchard. Neither my sister nor I were satisfied with this, but at least no one paid us any mind out here. My sister was able to convince the inn's new management to hire her on, and from there she was able to report the gossip and pretend that life was continuing as normal. And at night I would sneak in and see what sort of secrets I could uncover.
So far it was an incomplete picture of "the boss," as they all seemed to call her, consolidating power. The new militiamen were hers, as was the lumbermill; the inn and the general store and the blacksmith all reported to her. The only question was why: surely she did not simply decide to claim this remote mountain village as her own? Surely she had something better to do than become the petty queen of nowhere?
Another winter came with no answer to those questions. It was a hard winter with so many more mouths to feed, made harder by the fact that some of the new residents were unused to such long isolation, and went a little stir crazy. Tempers ran high, fights broke out, and one or two of the new militiamen were caught stealing. The militia captain assured us they were appropriately disciplined, but it left a sour taste in everyone's mouths. But spring came, as it always does; the snow melted, the rains came, and then, finally, there was the mountain in full bloom. The orchards were bright with white and pink petals, and for a moment the joy of spring made it possible to forget the constant sense of dread.
I spent most of my days that spring at the ruins outside of town; they were so beautiful, all covered in the pale blue wildflowers that I had never seen growing anywhere else, and there was little enough for me to do now that our mother had hired on additional help. I still thought of the ruins as a safe place; but then, I had no way of anticipating that one day the so-called boss would arrive there.
It was early evening, and she didn't notice me as I lounged against a ruined wall, my bare hand pressed to the stone as I relived some of the memories of one of its old caretakers. She was dressed for an expedition, and moving furtively; the ruins were visible from the road but she approached from a strange angle, like she was worried she might be followed.
I hid myself as well as I could, and watched. She said nothing, only explored the ruins, taking notes, sketching details, and occasionally consulting a round amber-colored stone she wore around her neck, holding it up to various objects or simply aloft, clasping a hand around it. The stone I recognized as a waystone--the keepers of this place had worn one much like that--but I had no idea what she was doing with it. Then the coin I wore around my neck shifted, brushed against my collarbone, and I disappeared into the Seeker's memory. Of course she had been here before. Of course they both had. There was a time when the boss wore the white robes of the Order, before she had begun amassing wealth in a little market town far removed from anything.
She is so beautiful, standing in these old ruins, the stark white of her robes bright against the green of the grass and the grey of the stones. I am having difficulty focusing, because it has been a long journey, because there is never anything to be found in these ruins, and, yes, because the curves of my colleague's body are present in a way that these desolate places never quite can be. She is animated, driven, and ambitious in a way which has been troubling me for a while now, a raw sense of unease that has been growing into something that I have only begun to be able to name.
There's an odd expression on her face when she leaves her surveys and approaches me. "This is it," she says. The emphasis is all wrong: we're supposed to be charting the ruins of the old empire, learning what we can about their geomancy, to better help us understand why the empire collapsed, and how that collapse is still affecting us. It was a marvel of geomantic infrastructure, continent-spanning, and so much of it is corrupted or broken in ways which affect the whole network. And this node is not nearly important enough to merit the excitement and enthusiasm that my colleague is showing me now.
"What do you mean?" I ask, trying not to dread her answer.
"This place," she says. "The spirit here is still here, still sleeping. I don't know how they did it. It's completely intact, completely isolated. But dormant. Someone saw the calamity approaching and saved themselves."
"We should report that," I say. "The Order could--"
She scoffs. "The Order could go fuck themselves. They sent us out here because they don't care about us. You're too smart for that. Think about what we could do with an intact waystation, just the two of us. No more long roads, no more fighting off bandits, no more Order." She is standing so close to me now, her hand on my cheek. "We can rebuild what was lost. You know the Order won't do that."
I try to focus on the feel of the coin around my neck, cool against my skin, and ignore the heat of her, the frisson that her touch sends down my spine. "There's still so much we don't know," I say. "We don't even have this station's Waystone."
Her face is close to mine, and I force myself to hold eye contact as she searches them; I can see the moment she makes a decision. "You're right," she says. I know her too well: I can hear the bitterness there, the hurt. She wanted me on her side, and she could see in my eyes the resolution to never let her see this through. "It's a nice thought, though, isn't it?"
"It is a nice thought," I agree as the memory dissolves back into reality.
I realized, far too late, I had spoken that last line aloud; as I returned to myself, I found the boss staring directly at me, startled, frightened, and, most worryingly, intrigued. "You're the spirit-touched girl," she said. "I should have known you were from here, though I'd thought the Seeker had taken you off west." She held out her hands to show they were empty, then sat down on a section of ruined wall. "I've no quarrel with you, child. I should be asking why you're spying on me, but I think I know." She patted the wall next to her. "Come, sit."
I sat down next to her, not quite trusting myself to speak.
"A long time ago, this was a Waystation," she said, "and it is still functioning, even after the collapse. That means that if a trained Sage," she gestured at herself, though she no longer wore the white robes that marked her as a bearer of that title, "has the correct Waystone," she indicated the amber-colored stone, "she can make sure that the crops in this area never fail, that the weather is always temperate, that plagues never take root . . . she can even dissuade bandits and attackers. It can create a golden age."
I tilted my head.
"It sounds incredible, but before the collapse, there were waystations like this all across the continent. Most of them are broken now, even the ones which the Order still operates. But this one . . ."
"Why are you telling me this?" I asked.
"I suppose I felt I owed you an apology. I needed the Seeker out of my hair, and you were . . . convenient. I'm glad that you seem to have returned home unscathed, though--because I think the spirit that has given you your gift is the spirit of this ruin," she said. "You've always felt the draw of this place, I assume?" I nodded. "It's calling out to you in its long slumber. I think you could help me understand this place. If this is to be my great work, you could shave decades from it. That golden age could belong to your children, instead of to your grandchildren."
I closed my eyes, tried to focus. So much depended on my answer here, more, I think, than she realized. I did not trust her, and perhaps some part of the Seeker's resolve to stop her still lingered in my own consciousness. I said, my voice carefully neutral, "Can I see the waystone? I've never actually held one before, and I've always been curious."
She shrugged and handed it to me. "They're lovely, aren't they?"
"Is it true the spirit of the ruin is bound in here?"
"Not exactly, but you have the right idea," she said. She seemed to enjoy teaching; I imagined it must have been ages since she'd had the opportunity, running a gambling ring and amassing the wealth and power she had over the past decades. "The stone represents a promise; it binds the spirit, and keeps them in a deep slumber, and allows the stone's keeper to channel the spirit's power through the geomancy of the waystation and create the golden age I told you about. So, the spirit is not bound in the stone, but--"
I walked over to a small pedestal and set it down there. "I think it goes here. You were looking for this, weren't you?"
"Oh, you beautiful child," she said. And because I had turned my back to her, she did not notice that in my hands I now held a large stone from the ruins, which I lifted over my head, and brought down on the waystone. The beautiful amber color shattered, and went grey, and then, for a period of time that could have been a few seconds or a hundred years, the world . . . changed.
I am spring on the mountainside. I am vibrant flowers spreading like fire. I am the river flooding its banks, the fields growing ripe. I am the village in full bloom. Somewhere, one of the tiny beautiful flickering creatures that used to leave me gifts before they tricked me into a dream falls into a waking nightmare, and walks and walks until I can no longer see her. Somewhere else, one of them wakes up feeling rested and full of energy for the first time in what, to her, feels like countless ages of this world, and to me is barely a heartbeat. And one of them dreams she has a sister who has been trapped, and who needs, at last, to be free of the place that bound her.
Overnight, thick tangles of wildflowers filled the town. Walking through the streets, I am told, was as difficult as walking through the undergrowth along the riverbanks in the forest: many people in the village spent the next few days cutting paths with knives and axes. But the orchards and the fields were untouched, and indeed seemed to be healthier than ever. I awoke, or returned to myself, as the sun rose, the sensation of spreading across the mountain fading like dreams do. The boss was gone, and my sister was standing above me. There were tears in her eyes.
"I suppose you know I'm leaving, then," I said. It felt odd to use my voice; I wanted to communicate with flowers and wild berries, with the roaring of a river, with wind and rain and glorious sun. How much easier that would have been.
"I . . . had a dream," she said. "And when I woke up, I was here. I guess that was you?"
"She likes when you leave her gifts," I said. "Cider and cheese and fresh apples."
"So you did awaken a spirit. I wasn't sure if that was a dream, or . . . " She trailed off, shook her head. "Will I see you again?"
"I hope so." Tentatively, she held out her arms for an embrace. I removed my gloves and held her tight. "I will miss you," I said, or she said, or both of us said. One last moment where the two of us were one, where I was her strange shadow and she my brash protector, discrete but inseparable. And then, when the moment had finally passed, I handed her the gloves. "A keepsake," I said. "So you'll remember the road we walked together for so long."
She took them solemnly. "Safe travels, then," she said, and turned back towards the village. For myself, I started east. The old imperial highway was thick with pale blue flowers, but I paid them no heed and they gave me no trouble. Years later I would see the echo of this moment, as my sister hid herself behind a tree and watched me leave, trying her hardest not to cry, watching me walk into the rising sun until it swallowed my silhouette.