Cursed by Fire (18 page)

“Oh, Mem, my head,” she said, closing her eyes again.

“Come, look at me.” Selinda did, taking in the visage of a strong, beautiful woman, about Hanit’s age, with a straight tail of hair falling down from where it had been
pulled up to the top of her head, and it was every color of brown in the spectrum. It shone and was among the most beautiful hair in their world, Selinda thought, matched by her equally beautiful brown eyes. They would have been pure gold, only they had just enough brown in them to keep them from being so. She was wearing her priestess’s shawl over her shoulders, the corners knotted together just above her breasts. Selinda knew that on the back of the shawl was the symbol of Hella, a circle with three stars in its center: one for fate, one for fortune, and one for healing. A very powerful sign and very much deserved by the goddess of fate.

“My lady, what can I do for you?” the mem asked quietly.

“My head hurts. I can barely open my eyes.” Selinda knew the mems of Hella were healers, some astoundingly so. But she had never met this mem before. She hoped the woman was of significant enough talent. She must have been, in order to be sent to care for the grandina. “Are you new …?” she said, trailing off.

“I have only just arrived … just before the Redoe set in. My name is Josepha.”

“Why would you come here, to our little city with all its troubles?” Selinda asked curiously.

The mem laughed at that, a warm, enriched sound. “I did not know what troubles the city had when I came. But I am certain if I had known I would have come all the faster. I must go where I am needed, not where I wish to. Hella guided me here. Maybe she guided me to you and you to me, and that is our fate. Although those who are faithful seem to be faithful to Xaxis in this city. If not for our healing, there would not even be a temple to Hella here, I think.”

“No one really worships the gods anymore. There is little faith.”

“And yet you have faith in us?” the mem asked with amusement touching her lips.

“I have faith in your ability to heal,” Selinda said, returning the other woman’s smile.

“This is very true. I am a great healer … and portender. Perhaps, once we give you relief, I might read your runes?”

“I do not think I will need you to do that,” Selinda said with a sigh. “I already know my future.”

“No future is truly known, Grandina. Not by us. All we can know is what we should do in order to shape that future.”

“I never know how to shape my future,” Selinda said with a frown. “It just seems to … happen to me.”

“Well, we shall have to fix that,” the mem said with another smile. “But first, your headache.” The mem sat forward and enclosed Selinda’s head in her hands. She hushed a soothing sound, her sweetly scented breath spilling over Selinda’s face.

“Now, tell me why you think you have this headache.”

“I have … There is much stress in my life,” she said vaguely. She certainly wasn’t about to trust a stranger with details. True, the mem was new to the city and probably had not slid into Grannish’s grasp as yet, but once he knew the mem had visited Selinda, that would all change. And he would know. He always knew.

A studied, almost pained look crossed the mem’s lovely face, and then she closed her eyes. “I do not think this is from what you think it is from,” she said quietly, the concentration on her face deepening. “There is something inside you … something building up that needs release. If you do not release it, the pressure becomes too much and the headache comes.”

“Something? Like what?”

“I wish I could tell you,” she said, opening her eyes
and sitting back. “I’m not certain I can help you,” she said, biting a full lower lip. “Perhaps if I read your runes I will get a clearer picture. Do you mind?” she asked, jiggling the bag of runes hanging from a pretty braided belt low on her hips.

“Go ahead,” Selinda said with a pained sigh. “For whatever good it will do.”

“Now, my lady.” The woman tsked like a scolding mother. “You must not be that way. You need to open your soul to the runes or they will not work.”

“All right,” Selinda agreed. Her headache seemed to be lifting just by the mem’s presence, and at the very least the runes would distract her from the mangling pain.

“Now, lie back completely. No pillow. There now. Perfect.” She opened the bag and dumped all the runes out on Selinda’s belly. “Now, do not look at them, but one by one pick up a rune when I ask for it. Start with the first one.”

The mem called for a rune and then took it from Selinda’s fingers. In the end, there were six runes. The first she laid on Selinda’s forehead. “The mind,” she said. Then her chest. “The heart.” Then her solar plexus. “The soul,” she said. Then one on each wrist. “The past and the present.” And the last she placed just above Selinda’s pubic bone, above her womb. “The future,” she said. Then she scooped up the remaining runes, put them back into her bag, and with a concentrated frown began to study the six runes.

“You are a victim. To your life,” she said. “But you are not to blame, so do not think that you are. You have made every effort to shape the future to the better. In fact, recently you have taken a great step toward the future. Very recently.”

“Is it … is it the right choice, this step?”

“Hmm. Perhaps it is. Or perhaps it is not about right
or wrong. It is about better or worse. You will not have made anything worse,” she said.

“Encouraging,” Selinda said wryly. She would have rolled her eyes if she weren’t afraid of it hurting her head.

The mem chuckled. “Now, now. Sometimes that is the best kind of future. One that does not get worse.”

She had a point. Right now Selinda would settle for things not getting any worse. After Grannish’s threats today, things could very easily get worse.

“What else do you see?”

“Well, it is the soul and mind and heart runes that have me most intrigued. This heart rune, it is the symbol for fire and light. And the mind rune is a very powerful rune. But the soul rune is blocked. It is as though … as though what you really are is being kept inside. Yes! I have seen this combination before! It was in a young man who used to have these terrible chest pains … like your head pains … and it turned out that he was a latent mage! He needed to tap into his power and release it. Once he did, he never had pain again. Does magery run in your family?” she asked quickly, seeming to grow very excited.

“No! And everyone knows you have to have a mage bloodline in order to be a mage!” Selinda sat up, shoving the runes off her body. “What trickery is this?” she demanded to know. “Did Grannish send you? Is this his idea of a joke?”

“No! Your ladyship, no! I promise you this is no joke,” she said imploringly, holding out a calming hand. “I would not joke about something so serious. A magess who does not use her gifts is a waste of an important talent, but it is also highly dangerous to her. Please … I beg you to listen to me. If you do not believe me, then at least try to do something … try to use your magery on something.”

“Like what?” Selinda asked suspiciously.

“Well … here!” Mem Josepha hurried to the table nearby and poured water from the pitcher into a crystal glass. “Water. It is as pure an element as you can find, and in some way every mage has the ability to bend water to their will. Take the glass in your hands and focus on it. Concentrate all the pain in your head into this glass of water.”

Feeling foolish, Selinda did as the mem said. Of course she didn’t believe she was a magess for even a second, but she would entertain the mem.

As expected, nothing happened. The glass of still water just remained a glass of still water.

“Well done,” the mem said with satisfaction.

“Well done?” Selinda asked incredulously. “I didn’t do anything!”

“Nothing?” the mem asked archly.

“No! Nothing! And this isn’t funny anymore.”

“How does your head feel?” the mem asked persistently.

“It feels …” Better. Significantly so, Selinda realized with surprise.

“You see? You were able to release some of your power after all!”

“But the water didn’t do anything,” Selinda said with confusion.

“And you expected to go from nothing to casting fire or ice in the blink of an eye?” Mem Josepha chuckled. “Dearest, you did not walk without crawling first and you did not crawl until you learned to roll over.”

“Do not be so familiar with me,” Selinda snapped. She didn’t believe this. Not any of it. And she certainly had more important things to worry about. It was already coming around to the evening meal, and soon it would be juquil’s hour and she would be required to go
to her new lover’s bed. “Thank you for your services. You are dismissed. Hanit, see her out,” she said shortly.

“Very well, my lady,” the mem said graciously, gathering her runes back into her bag and giving Selinda a respectful bow. “If you need me further, you may call on me any time, day or night, and I will come to you. And my lady?”

“Yes?” Selinda sighed in a cross between irritation and exasperation.

“I am yours,” she said. “I am true to only one other person above you and that is my goddess. You need never fear my loyalty. Serving you serves my goddess and that means everything to me.”

The statement of devotion did much to soften Selinda’s irritation toward the other woman. She wasn’t sure she believed her, but just hearing the statement made her feel better.

“Very well. Good night to you, Mem. Hanit will see you paid.”

“Thank you, your ladyship.”

With another bow, the priestess slipped out of Selinda’s rooms.

The difference in how Selinda felt by the time she went down to join the others at table was remarkable. Especially considering she ought to be more concerned about the impending encounter come juquil’s hour. But that was some time away and she allowed herself the luxury of not thinking about it.

There was nothing relaxing about their meal. She felt the ominous presence of Grannish seated next to her—he had since switched seats with Dethan, seeing him settled across the table and down a few seats, as was befitting his station. But she felt it was more to make a point. Grannish held all the power in that household and he was making sure she knew it.

Still, she found herself looking over toward Dethan often. He looked haler and heartier than she had remembered from earlier. Had he grown even more muscular? Was such a thing even possible? She could see the massive width of his shoulders under his shirt and, she noticed, the vest he had been wearing earlier was gone, only to have appeared on a page now seated at the servants’ table, which was set aside from the masters’ table. The body servants, personal pages and pagettes, were allowed to dine at the same time as their
masters because it made them readily available at all times. The household servants were another matter entirely. Like their masters’ table, the servants’ table was arranged by rank. Hanit sat close to the head of the table and Selinda could see that her pagette’s interest strayed often to the new page. Almost as often as Selinda’s attention drifted to his master.

Was it her mistaking or did he look almost completely free of his burns and scarring? She remembered them being more prominent that morning. They had been nearly bone deep the night previous. None of it should be possible, and yet it was. She wondered if anyone else had taken note of the difference between day and night. Then again, by morning he had appeared mostly healed … though the differences might not be noticed unless one was obsessing over his appearance as she was.

It was still light out, sunset an hour away. The main dining room was dark and shadowed for the most part. It was lit brightly by lamps, but lamps cast shadows and played tricks on the eyes. Perhaps she was seeing it all wrong to begin with.

But she didn’t think so.

Once again Dethan did not make it entirely through the evening meal before he was hastily excusing himself. His page, after some urging by Hanit, immediately followed.
Strange. What kind of page needed to be told how to behave?

Dethan had procured horses for himself and his page earlier that day from the stables, but it was only his horse he had made certain was saddled and ready to go half an hour before dusk, giving him thirty minutes to make the ten minute ride to the cavern, which allowed plenty of time for potential holdups or trouble.

He had no intention of telling Tonkin what was about to happen. He had come prepared this time with a cloak, intending that the darkness and the folds of the
garment would hide the worst of his punishment’s results from any curious eyes.

“No, Tonkin. Go finish your meal and find your bed in your room adjacent to mine. I will not need you anymore tonight.”

“Are you certain, my lord?”

“Most certain. Good eve and good night.”

He urged his horse onward and headed out of the bailey at a gallop.

Juquil’s hour came too soon, to Selinda’s thinking. She had Hanit clasp a cloak about her shoulders and she pulled the hood up to conceal her face. She had worn dark clothing, one of Hanit’s gowns cinched tighter than the slightly rounder woman wore them. The fineness of her own gowns would be easily recognizable. This way she would pass for any pagette.