The Girl of Fire and Thorns Complete Collection (120 page)

“Thunderstorm. There may be hail. We need to find shelter.” The drops are falling faster now, in a symphony of varying drum taps as they land on leaf and dirt and rock. A horse whinnies.

“The cottonwood,” Mara says. “I sheltered my sheep under a cottonwood when storms came up too quickly to lead them home.”

“I’ll see to the horses,” Belén says. “Get under the tree. Spread out the bedrolls in the branches above you.”

The bedrolls won’t keep out the rain, not the way it’s coming down now. But maybe they’ll help protect us from falling ice.

We scramble to follow Belén’s suggestion, bumping into one another in the dark. The branches of the tree are low, and we are able—through much swearing and scraping of knuckles against branches—to get the bedrolls spread out above our heads. Belén guides the horses to the other side of the tree and ties them down. No bedrolls for them, but it will have to be enough.

“Times like this,” Storm grumbles, “it would be useful for one of us to be able to call fire with a Godstone.”

“Nothing would light anyway,” I say. “Not in this deluge.”

But I can’t stop thinking about his words. We shiver together as the rain slaps our bedroll canopy. I pray hard for wisdom and warmth, and as the Godstone sends tendrils of heat through my body, I wonder about calling fire, about what I would have to do.

The animagi almost always use blood to wake the
zafira
and pull it from the ground. And the animagi send fire from stones that are caged in amulets or embedded into staffs. Neither is an option for me. How am I supposed to shoot fire from my belly? Would my clothes burn? What about my skin?

One of the greatest frustrations about being the only chosen one in four generations is that there is no one to tell me what to do. I’ve only centuries-old scripture to guide me, pored over by learned priests and eager revolutionaries who decide what those scriptures mean based on their own desperate hopes. None of them have felt God’s own power rippling through their bodies; none of them really
know
.

It seems to me that when God decided he wanted to communicate with humankind, he could have come up with a much better plan.

The sound of the rain changes from drum taps to shattering glass; the hail has come.

Our bedrolls sag with the weight of water. It drips from my nose, soaks my cloak, and I feel I’ll never be dry again. Hail bounces and cracks all around us. One huge chunk rolls up to the toe of my boot, and I pick it up. It’s solid ice, half the size of my fist, crusted in dirt.

A horse screams, and I lurch up, hitting my head on a branch.

“Nothing we can do for it now,” Belén shouts above the noise.

I bring my knees to my chest and huddle against the tree trunk, pressed in on either side by the shoulders of my friends.
I pray in a furious bid for warmth and comfort.
God, we can
’
t afford to lose a mount. Please keep our horses safe. Keep Hector safe. Make this storm pass soon. Is it your will that I learn to use the stone
’
s destructive power? If so, I could use some guidance. Storm could use your help too. I don
’
t know if you answer the prayers of Inviernos. Actually, I
’
m not sure you answer mine either, but if you do
. . .

Eventually my head drops onto Mara’s shoulder, and I fall asleep praying.

I wake to sunshine flashing on puddled water, to dirty clumps of hail melting in the shadowed lees of boulders, to rock wrens singing like it’s the best day of their lives.

Aside from the crick in my neck, I feel refreshed and restored. I’m suddenly grateful for that horrid storm. It forced a rest that I didn’t have the wisdom or patience to allow.

Mara’s mare has a bloody gash on her neck, but she seems fine. Mara cleans the gash and smothers it with salve—the same salve she uses every day on her burn scars. The mare accepts these ministrations like an attention-starved puppy.

Until recently, I believed all horses were alike. They’ve been giant, four-footed animals with ugly dispositions and alarmingly large teeth for so long that it’s a bit startling to notice how different their personalities are. Mara’s mare, for instance, is a blood bay, except for a wide white blaze down her nose that suits her perpetually excited demeanor. My huge, plodding mare has a dark-brown coat that seems black at night, with the most unruly mane I’ve ever seen. Her shaggy forelock covers her right eye and reaches almost to her mouth. Maybe
the reason she moves so slowly is that she can hardly see where to go.

Mara’s mare head-butts my lady-in-waiting in the chest. Grinning, Mara plants a kiss between her wide, dumb eyes, then murmurs something.

“Have you named her?” I ask.

“Yes! Her name is Jasmine.”

I grimace. “But jasmine is such a sweet, pretty flower.”

Mara laughs. “Have you named yours?”

“Her name is Horse.”

She rolls her eyes. “If you want to get along with your mount, you have to learn each other’s language. That means starting with a good name.”

“All right.” I pretend to consider. “What about Imbecile? Or Poops A Lot?”

Mara shakes her head.

We lay out our bedrolls in the sun while we down a quick breakfast of pine nuts, jerky, and flatbread. The bedrolls are still wet when we roll them up and attach them to our packs. I should call an early halt and give them time to air out again. Or maybe we’ll just sleep directly on the ground tonight. It can’t be worse than sleeping hunched beneath a cottonwood during a thunder burst.

Belén shows me how to saddle Horse, and I promise to try it on my own next time. We mount up, Belén leads the way, and moments later we’re back on the trail.

The ground turns rocky as we enter a series of steep switchbacks. Our horses’ legs are so spindly and fragile, and I fear
they will snap like kindling on the jagged outcroppings that mar our path. But the horses clomp along unbothered, and after a while I forget to worry.

We pause for lunch in a small green valley, divided down the middle by a crystal creek. Trout dart under the grassy bank as we approach, and Mara squeals. “We could have fish for lunch!” she says. “I can show you how to catch them with your hands. Trout are the easiest to clean and spit, and then—”

I picture Hector being driven through these mountains, weeks ahead of us. I would bet my Godstone crown he’s planning his escape, trying to delay their progress. God, I hope he’s being treated well. What if he’s injured? Or starving? “We water the horses, and then we move on. We’ll rest when we’ve made camp for the night.”

Mara looks away. “All right.”

Guilt stabs my chest. I’m pushing too hard again. I don’t know what else to do.

As we ride, Storm tells us this trail is usually well traveled, for it’s one of only two main trading routes between Joya d’Arena and the free villages that hug the alpine slopes. But in the days since the highwaymen attacked us, we’ve seen no one.

“It’s the coming war,” Mara says. “No one will leave the shelter of the mountains to trade. They fear conscription into the conde’s army.”

“It doesn’t surprise me that he would extend his draft into territory that doesn’t belong to him,” I say. Eduardo comes from a long line of ambitious condes, and over the centuries, several attempts have been made to annex the free villages into
the countship of Montamayor. But they are a wily, reclusive, and independent people, and far more trouble to govern than they are worth.

“We should stock up on supplies in the free villages,” Storm calls at my back. “Now that we have horses, we can carry more.”

Storm has proven adept at assuring his own comfort. I glance back over my shoulder at him and say, “I may send Mara to pick up a few things, but I’m not sure it’s safe.”

“It’s definitely not safe,” he says. “But no one there will recognize you. Even
I
can walk through the free villages. It’s the one place where your people and mine exist in relative peace.”

I rein in Horse and twist in the saddle to face him. “Truly?”

“I always speak truly.”

I frown. “My old tutor, Master Geraldo, taught me all about the free villages. He never once mentioned peace with Invierne.”

He shrugs. “I wouldn’t call it peace with Invierne. I’m sure Invierne would love to annex and control the area just as much as your wayward conde.”

I turn back around and spur Horse onward to catch up to Mara and Belén. She takes a few quick steps, then slows to her usual plodding, but I’m thinking too hard to mind.

Master Geraldo said the free villages were a dangerous place, a magnet for black market merchants and army defectors and wanted felons. It makes sense that it would attract the same type of people from Invierne. But it’s strange that he never mentioned an Invierno presence.

Or maybe not so strange. Only recently have I realized how
much Master Geraldo kept from me, especially anything pertaining to the Godstone I bear. My old tutor wasn’t the only one. My sister, Alodia. My nurse, Ximena. Even my brief and well-meaning husband, Alejandro. All of them conspired to keep the chosen one—me—ignorant. Unsullied by damning knowledge. They believed God had ordained my obliviousness, based on an alternate translation of one of the
Scriptura Sancta
’s more obscure passages.

They were wrong.

Suddenly I want to see the free villages more than anything. I want to see my people and Storm’s living side by side. I want to know what a place without king or council looks like, how a society can exist without fealty.

Mostly, though, I want to see it because during the last year I have learned, through much heartbreak, that the things people work hardest to keep me ignorant of are the things most worth pursuing.

8

W
E
find ourselves on the bald face of a giant granite outcropping. The trail disappears, marked only by piles of stone left by previous travelers to guide the way across the bare mountainside. Without the cover of pine forest, the wind is as loud and steady as a rushing river, the sun bright and fierce.

We take a moment to gaze westward toward the desert and see how far we’ve come. Below, the foothills spread wide, forested nearby but becoming sparser and sparser until they disappear into a hazy yellow horizon. Looking down at the vast landscape makes me feel strong, like I’ve accomplished something magnificent.

I imagine the Invierno soldiers who traveled this unforgiving path. There must have been an endless stream over many years to have amassed the enormous army that eventually attacked and nearly destroyed my capital city. I am filled with a sense of grudging admiration for the determination and stubbornness such a venture would take.

We cross the outcropping and drop into a grassy valley.
Storm says the first free village is just ahead, past a copse of spruce. Though no one here is likely to recognize us, Belén has warned us to be alert at all times. I clutch my reins so tight they dig into my palms, because at last we’ve come to a place where we can ask openly about travelers who have passed through before us.

I momentarily forget all this when I catch first sight of it. Massive stone walls jut from rolling grass, rising four or five times the height of a man before ending in jagged ruins, as if a giant cleaver has lopped off their tops. Chunks of quarry stone lie scattered throughout the meadow, half buried in sod.

I’ve seen this before—huge granite blocks so tightly fitted that the mortar is either invisible or absent, vegetation scaling the sides, corners rounded and worn smooth from centuries of wind and rain.

It’s just like the hidden valley Storm and I discovered on our way to the
zafira
—the valley I destroyed. Perhaps the towers in this mountain village were also built by the ancestors of the Inviernos, long before God brought my own people to this world.

The village has grown up around these ruins, incorporating ancient walls and cornerstones into its own odd architecture. We pass a small cottage that uses one of the towers for its rear wall. Its roof is steep and pointed—never have I seen such a steep roof—and smoke curls lazily from a fat chimney. A stout woman dressed in doeskin leans over a porch railing, beating dust from a large pelt with a club. She studies us as we pass, but seems unconcerned.

Farther in, we encounter a large plaza of paver stone. Market stalls ring the area, and merchants cry their wares to everyone passing through. It’s a busier, louder place than the commandeered village where we stole our horses. Looking around, listening to the rhythm of haggling, I could almost forget that a war is coming.

We toss a few coins to a stable boy who promises to feed and rub down our mounts, then Storm leads us toward the inn—a larger building with two gable windows. The setting sun reflects against the panes, and I can’t shake the feeling that they’re fiery eyes, glaring at us.

We’re stepping onto the wood-plank porch when something flashes bright blue in my peripheral vision. I turn, puzzled.

Beside the inn is one of the many merchants’ stalls, and it’s obvious why this one faces west. In the setting sun, its wares are as bright as candle flames, for the stall is filled with glass. Glass of every color, sculpted into goblets and jewelry and candlestick holders, even blown into delicate sculptures of animals and people.