Fire Arrow (19 page)

Brie was just about to avert her eyes when, with a flash, one sumog near her burst into pinpoints of light, and then there was nothing left except tiny phosphorescent specks floating in the water.

Hypnotized by the sight, Brie watched as one by one the sumog exploded, like so many iridescent soap bubbles. Then the sumog were gone, and the water around the boat sparkled with thousands of tiny motes of light.

Brie wheeled around to look at Sago, suddenly, irrationally afraid he, too, was going to burst. But the light was already fading from his body, and he gave her a smile.

Then he crossed to her. His arm was glowing only faintly as he took her injured hand. Wiping the blood off her hand with 3 cloth, he looked closely at the jagged cut across the backs of her fingers. Abruptly he lifted them to his mouth and sucked. Brie winced.

Then he spat into the twinkling water. For a moment he looked almost otherworldly, his pale face still radiant, with the red of Brie's blood around his lips. At last he wiped his mouth with the cloth.

"There is poison in the sumog tongue. I got most of it, but you may be sick for a day or two."

Brie stared at him in a daze. Then she sagged onto the bench, suddenly exhausted. Sago raised the sail and, as he took the tiller, Brie's eyelids closed. She slept all the way back to Ardara.

 

For the next few days, Brie was feverish and her head ached. When she tried to stand, everything had an annoying tendency to spin, so she stayed close to her pallet. Lom brought her books of Dungalan lore, which she read until her head pounded, then she slept again. When Sago had left her at the door of Jacan's hut that night, he had asked Brie not to tell the villagers of the sumog hunting expedition. "Life is more peaceful for an old Sea Dyak sorcerer if the people come only for fishing advice." So Brie told Lom and Jacan she must have caught a chill.

Sago did not visit during her sickness, but Lom reported that mysterious flickering lights had been spotted out on the water each night, and Brie knew what occupied the sorcerer.

When the sumog sickness had mostly passed, she went to see Sago at his mote. She found him a little paler than usual, but otherwise unchanged. He sang her a nonsense song about taten-pisc and custard, showed off a highly prized parrot fish he had caught that day, and said offhandedly that the fishing should be better now in Ardara. And it was.

The Ardarans credited their good fortune to a change in the current and wind direction. Later, when Brie heard the innkeeper and his cronies deride Sago as a useless, witless old man, she wanted to tell them of the radiant sorcerer who had turned a monstrosity into innumerable, beautiful specks of light.

But she did not.

***

The days grew shorter until the sun was winking below the horizon only a few hours after the midday meal. Brie was unused to the shortness of winter days in the north, and the perpetual darkness began to weigh on her like a full basket of dead fish, except that there were no full baskets; there was little fishing at all. During the dark months, Dungalans turned to storytelling and music to pass the time, and Brie could now see why Travelers were so highly valued.

When no Traveler came to Ardara, homegrown storytellers presided over the long nights, along with fiddlers and singers. There was also dancing, though Brie continued to demur when asked. At first she told herself she was weak from the sumog poison; for a long time after the sumog hunt, just the thought of moving in any direction resembling a circle made her head spin. But after the sickness had finally worn off, Brie still remained on the side of the room, watching. It became a standing joke between Brie and Lom; he swore that by spring he would have her up and twirling on a dance floor. And she swore, equally adamant, that he would not.

Although Brie had become part of the weave of life in Ardara, she was yet held at a distance by many of the townspeople. She was most comfortable with the fishermen, who had come to respect and accept her.

Brie wasn't quite sure how it happened but word had gotten around of her skill with bow and arrow. And one day a young village boy named Dil appeared at the door to her hut and shyly asked if she would teach him. He was a slight fellow, though tall for his age, with a head of unruly coppery yellow hair.

Though it was a windy day with the threat of rain, Brie took Dil to a sandy bay north of the harbor and immediately began his lessons. They started by fashioning a bow out of a piece of driftwood. Then Brie loaned him an arrow and a piece of bowstring, saying that arrow-and string-making would be part of their next lesson. Dil nodded eagerly.

As she guided his hands and directed him how to aim the arrow, Brie remembered herself long ago with her father. "Open your stance, Brie. Back straight, head upright. I said up, not down!" And "What are you trying to do, strangle the bow?! Don't grip so hard, relax your fingers."

At the end of the lesson Dil's eyes shone, and Brie found herself promising to meet him again the next day.

That night there was a gathering at Farmer Garmon's barn to hear the tales of the latest Traveler who had come to the village. The Traveler had an unpleasant face, long with a small oval of a mouth and red lips, which he licked often. But his stories were captivating, if a little frightening. Several of the children had to be taken, crying, from the barn by their mothers.

After readying herself for sleep that night, Brie took out the fire arrow. She had begun doing this in the past week, at the end of the day. At first she told herself it was because the arrow really ought to have a daily cleaning and polishing, but she was coming to believe that, for some reason, the arrow wanted her to hold it in her hands. At any rate she found it comforting, in a peculiar way, to feel the arrow humming under her fingers. After a while it was almost as if she needed to touch it. As the wyll Aelwyn needed her cup of cyffroi in the morning, Brie needed to feel the arrow humming against her skin before she went to sleep. And as this became a nightly ritual, she noticed that her dreaming changed, became more vivid, more acute.

Brie had not dreamed of Collun since that night when she had realized it was too late to cross the Blue Stacks, but several days before the winter solstice she did. It was a brief, terrifying dream; Cuillean's dun was deserted, and the soldier Renin lay dead in the forecourt. Brie woke, shaking and wild-eyed. She had been right; Collun did need her. Once again she tried to think of some way to get to Eirren. The sea was her first thought, as before, but she knew now, firsthand, that the winter sea was as dangerous to navigate as the Blue Stacks, if not more so. She felt useless, frustrated, and promised herself that she would begin her journey back to Eirren, to Collun, the day after Hyslin's wedding.

The next day, as Brie helped Lom on his boat, she was preoccupied and accidentally splintered a trunnel while hammering it into place. Then she broke off the handle of Lom's broadax and, later, hammered her thumb instead of a nail. She let out a howl of pain, and Lom wound his handkerchief around her thumb, muttering that she was more hindrance than help to him today. "If I am to finish by Hyslin's wedding day I can't be losing precious time carving new trunnels and mending tools."

"I'm sorry," Brie said, contrite. "I'll do better."

"Perhaps you would do better to take the rest of the day off."

"It's the darkness. It wears on me."

"Aye. But after winter solstice the days will start to get longer. And before you know it, it will be spring and time for Hyslin's binding ceremony."

Brie looked unconvinced.

"And if I don't finish this boat in time, I won't be able to dance you across her deck," he teased. "So get off with you. Take a walk or go help Hyslin."

As Brie made her way to Jacan's house, Fara loping along at her side, she thought of the promise she had made herself that morning.

***

Winter solstice was a time for celebration in Dungal. Spring was still distant, but the solstice marked the turning of the sun and the lengthening of the days.

Three Travelers had arrived in Ardara for the sun-return festivities; Hanna was one, as was the severe-looking man with the red lips and an elderly man with a crystalline voice and a pure white beard.

Brie was glad to see Hanna. They spent a peaceful afternoon walking the coastline with Fara and the two dogs, who frisked together like old friends.

That evening they gathered, along with most of the townspeople, in Farmer Garmon's large barn. There the storyspinning, dancing, eating, and singing would continue until dawn on this, the longest night of the year. At sundown the families arrived, each bringing with them the greatest delicacy left from their rapidly dwindling stores. They ate at long tables amid much chatter and high spirits, and afterward the tables were moved away and everyone settled onto blankets or hay to listen to the storytellers.

During a break between stories, Brie and Lom got into a friendly quarrel about Lom's boat.

"Truth is, you wouldn't know a hawsepiece from a deck beam if it wasn't for me," Lom said with a rather superior air.

"Oh, and who was it measured the sternpost three inches too short?"

They continued to trade jibes, then finally dissolved into laughter at the absurdity of the quarrel. As Brie laughed, she happened to glance over at Lom's mother, Lotte. The innkeeper of the Speckled Trout was speaking softly in her ear. Lotte's eyes grew uncertain and darted to Lorn and Brie. Brie averted her own gaze just in time. When she looked back at Lotte, the innkeeper had moved away and the older woman was clutching her husband's arm, talking urgently. Farmer Garmon listened, then shook his head with a quick definite motion and returned to the chocolate tart he was eating. But Brie could see the uncertainty still in Lotte's face.

***

Several days later, on a dark, cool afternoon, Brie and Lom were working together on the hewing of the mast, a fine fir Lom had carefully selected for its clear, straight grain.

Abruptly Brie turned to Lom and asked him if he knew of any gossip that the innkeeper might be spreading. Lom frowned and his nose twitched slightly as though at a bad smell.

"It doesn't bear repeating," he replied tersely, hewing downward with the rasel, using long sure strokes.

"Tell me," Brie said.

"The innkeeper is a sour old miser."

"Tell me, Lom."

Lom set the rasel down and brushed wood shavings from his arms. "He has been calling you a leannan-shee."

"What is that?"

"'Tis an evil creature, female always, who attaches itself to a man and sucks the life out of him."

Brie was so astonished she nearly laughed, but because of the anger in Lom's face she did not.

"And is it your life I am supposed to be doing this to?" she asked.

He nodded, a hint of color in his cheeks. "And the boy Dil, who you're giving the bow lessons to, and some of the lads in the village as well, ever since you wore that yellow dress on harvest day..." He trailed off.

Brie had forgotten about the uncomfortable yellow dress. "Well, I am a busy little leannan-whatever it is, aren't I?"

Lom's face relaxed into a smile.

"You don't think I am, do you, Lom?" Brie demanded.

He laughed. "No proper leannan-shee would go around stinking of fish and arguing with a fellow about how to lay a keel."

"I do not stink!" Brie rejoined, laughing along with him. "And even you have to admit that keel was the slightest bit off center..."

***

The days and weeks following the winter solstice were hard ones. Spring was still a long way off, and there was little to break the desolation of dwindling food supplies, howling wind, and bitter cold. Other than working on Lom's boat and continuing Dil's bow lessons, the only thing that provided Brie a diversion was preparations for Hyslin's wedding ceremony. Brie learned that there was almost always a marriage ceremony at the end of winter as a way to celebrate the end of the dark season.

Hyslin had taught Brie how to use a weaving loom, and Brie was working on a piece of cloth. She had not decided what it would be when she was done, but she enjoyed the weaving of it. Hyslin, with her deft, experienced fingers, was making a luminous, pearl-colored cloth for her wedding cyrtel, the traditional flowing gown used for the binding ceremony.

For weeks the Storm Petrel did not leave the harbor. And constant driving rain or, more often, sleet meant no boatbuilding or archery lessons. Brie could hardly contain her restlessness. When she was not weaving or preparing food, she took long walks on coastal paths, occasionally pausing to stare up at the Blue Stacks, willing the snow to melt.

She began to experience a growing sense of unease, of something left undone. Every night as she lay in her pallet, after stowing the fire arrow safely in her quiver, she would go over the day's activities in her mind, few as they were. She tried to think of something she might have overlooked—mending a tear in one of Jacan's nets, some ingredient she might have left out of the lemongrass-and-rose wine she was helping Hyslin make, a missed thread in the cloth she was weaving—but she always came up blank.

Her dreams grew more vivid. She began to have the nightmare of the yellow bird again—the rapacious beak, the large, suffocating wings, the pulsing black sky. She dreaded going to her pallet at night and stayed up reading until she could keep her eyes open no longer.

There were other dreams as well, but two in particular that kept repeating. In the first she was approaching a lake, very still and gleaming like a mirror. From the center of the lake rose a bell tower. Coming toward her was a goat-man, dragging something behind him. When he drew close, she could see that the goat-man was dragging Collun, his head bloodied and raw. Then Collun's face blurred and changed, and became the face of Brie's father, streaked with blood and still contorted from his death struggle.

In the second dream she was watching the fire arrow flying through the sky, away from her. But where her eyes should have been, there were flames. The pain was terrible, a white-hot burning into her skull. She would awaken with a scream, hands clawing at her eyes, and later, when she looked in the mirror, there were scratches on her face from her fingernails.