Bloodwitch (5 page)

There. If anyone saw it, they would follow the trail to find me.

Feeling better about my chances, if not any warmer, I started out.

At first I sang as I walked, but then singing reminded me of Calysta, which made my throat tight and made me feel even colder, so I stopped. When I was silent, though, every noise around me made me jump. Distant crashing sounded like a monster. And was that a roar? What lived in this forest?

That roar could have belonged to a lion or a jaguar. My neck ached from trying to look all ways at once, including up, since jaguars could attack from the trees. What about wolves or bears?

Lady Brina loved to talk about savage beasts, which she found beautiful and exotic. I had never asked
where
they existed, because all that mattered to me was that they didn’t exist in
my
world.

I yelped as a figure emerged from the forest’s shadows, like a ghost stepping into my path. I raised my stick, then set it back down as I realized he was a man, not a monster, holding a small lamp that illuminated little beyond our feet.

“I thought I heard someone stumbling around.” He raised the lamp. “Aren’t you Brina’s boy?”

The light was in my eyes, but I finally recognized Malachi Obsidian, the trader who had come by the greenhouse the day before.

“My name is Vance,” I said. “You’re Malachi, right?”

“This isn’t the safest area to wander, Vance,” he replied.

“If it’s not safe, what are you doing here?” I asked defensively, one breath before I realized his words could have
been a threat instead of a warning. Though his hands were empty at the moment, he had a slender sword—really more of a long dagger—at his left hip, and a bow and quiver on his back.

The retort apparently took him aback. He frowned and said, “You’re not broken.”

“Not
what
?” I hoped he could help me find my way home, but the intensity of his stare was making me uncomfortable.

“Are you a slave?” he asked.

“No!” I said vehemently, before I remembered what Lady Brina had said about Calysta:
on loan from Taro
. Had she been a slave? “And I’m allowed to be out here. I’m just lost.”

“Are you happy?” he asked. Seeing my look, he added, “Not right now, obviously. I mean when you’re at the greenhouse. Are you happy there?”

“Yes,” I answered, grateful for an easier question. I almost added more, about the things that had just happened—the painting, Calysta, Lady Brina, and Lord Daryl’s rage—but I bit my lip. I had lived there for fourteen years, and nothing like this had ever happened before.

“Then I’ll help you find your way back. In the morning,” he added firmly. “It’s pitch-black out here. You can come to my camp for the night. I have enough dinner to share.”

My stomach chose that moment to growl, reminding
me that it had been a long time since I had eaten more than a few bites of bread. It had been easy to ignore while I wandered lost and frightened, but I wasn’t going to turn down food.

“Thank you,” I said, trying to recall all of Taro’s lessons on proper manners. “I appreciate the help.”

He snickered at my attempt to be polite and turned to lead the way. One step later he paused to look back and say, “No, leave the stick. We don’t want to encourage anyone else to find us.”

I gripped my stick more tightly despite my cold fingers. “But I
want
to be found!” I argued.

“In this forest all sorts of things could come looking for you. I’m not going to force you to follow me,” he said, “but I’m not going to let you leave a path to my camp, either. Make up your mind.”

He turned and started to walk away without giving me a chance to decide. What if Malachi Obsidian was one of those people Taro had talked about who could be a danger to me? I had no way of knowing. What I did know for certain was that starving and freezing were bad, which meant I didn’t have a choice. I dropped the stick and followed my new guide through the trees.

Rustling nearby caused him to halt, his hand moving slowly toward his bow.

I came up beside him and saw what had made the noise: a sleek-coated stag, standing like a statue, staring at our
light with its black-tipped tail raised in alarm. He could have stepped directly out of Lady Brina’s painting of Artemis, the goddess of the hunt. She had worked on that series, which she called Proud Ladies, as long as she had worked on
Tamoanchan
.

My guts twisted at the reminder. The painting. Calysta. The guards.

A small sound escaped my throat, and the stag bolted.

“We couldn’t hunt it anyway,” my guide said with a sigh. He continued walking, speaking without looking at me. “Jeshickah has some very old-world laws regarding deer on her land.”

I stumbled, so shocked by his words that I lost my footing and fell, letting out a yelp as my bare hands landed in the snow.

Malachi paused and grasped my arm to help me up. “You all right?” he asked.

Never,
never
in my life had I heard Mistress Jeshickah referred to without a title. If I had done so, or even spoken of Lady Brina that way, Taro would have slapped me. I would have deserved it. How
dare
he?

I opened my mouth to challenge him—and then shut it fast, dropping my gaze. I was at his mercy for the moment. “I’m fine,” I answered. “I tripped on … on a rock.”

He hadn’t apologized for the slip or questioned my lie about why I fell, which meant … he didn’t expect me to
care. My mind turned that thought over like a pebble, because it wasn’t quite right.

Malachi knew where I came from. He had thought I was a slave, but now he knew that I was happy with Lady Brina. He should expect me to care.

Was he testing me?

“We’re here,” Malachi announced, interrupting my train of thought.

“Where?” I asked. I saw nothing but more trees and brush, covered in the seemingly endless snow.

“Here,”
he said, putting an arm across my shoulders to usher me forward.

The camp, invisible just a moment before, was suddenly clear as daylight. A grove of birch trees ringed the small clearing, at the center of which a covered cooking pot sat on merrily glowing coals. Most of the snow within the grove had been packed down or brushed away, leaving a smooth-topped log near the fire for a seat. The tent emerged from the space beyond like something organic, half buried in the snow, with a small gap open to the warmth of the fire.

Magic
, I thought. Was Malachi a witch? All I knew about them I had learned from overheard complaints from Lord Daryl and Lady Brina. Witches were greedy, mercenary creatures. They were needed for things like the spells on the greenhouse, but they couldn’t be trusted.

“Did Brina send you away, or did you go on your own?” Malachi asked casually as he lifted the copper lid to check on his food.

Lady
Brina, I thought instinctively. A few minutes ago the guilty fear in my gut would have forced the whole story out like a confession. Now I didn’t trust this man enough to want to share the horrors of the last few hours.

I settled for a half truth. “I tried to go for a walk,” I answered. “I got lost.”

My host looked up, sea-foam eyes piercing. I braced myself, expecting to be accused of lying. Instead, he asked, “How old are you?”

Mistress Jeshickah had said I looked younger than I was. A younger child would be more likely to get lost, right? Being younger could give me an excuse for a lot of silly slipups I might make. “Eleven,” I answered.

“Hmm.” He turned back to the fire. “Were you on your way to the market?”

“I don’t—I mean, yes, I was.” That was the way I was heading, anyway, though it wasn’t my actual goal. I didn’t want to tell him I’d been looking for Taro.

Again, those eyes on me, intense … and then sparkling, as he chuckled and shook his head.

“Truce,” he said, amusement still in his voice. “I’ll share my squirrel stew and stop asking questions if you stop pretending you know how to lie.”

“I—I don’t know what—” I stammered. “I mean—” He quirked a brow, waiting for me to get my tongue untangled. Finally, I gave up on defending myself and asked, “What’s a squirrel?”

“It’s—” This time he was the one who seemed speechless. I had meant to ask something benign, not something that was apparently shocking. “A small animal with a bushy tail,” he said at last. “The next time I see one, I’ll point it out.” Were squirrels common out here? Lady Brina cared more about gods and goddesses than bushy-tailed little animals, and she had never mentioned them. “Take a seat,” he urged, gesturing toward the tree trunk. “Dinner’s ready. I even have an extra bowl in my pack.”

The pack in question was hanging from one of the tree branches. I didn’t know if it had been as invisible as the campsite was earlier, or if I just hadn’t been paying attention.

My host handed me a tin bowl of stew and a clunky spoon, then filled a second bowl, folded his legs under himself, and sat on the snow near the fire. Since the snow wasn’t falling anymore, I pushed my hood back to get it out of the way as I ate what turned out to be a surprisingly tasty meal. Whatever “squirrel” was, it made good stew.

When I asked for seconds, however, my host said, “Only if I get to ask another question.”

I could always refuse to answer, if I needed to. “Okay.”

“Are you a bloodwitch?”

I recognized the word “witch,” but I didn’t know the rest of the term he used. “Am I a what?”

“You’re a quetzal, right?” he asked. When I hesitated, he said, “I could tell you were a bird the first time I saw you, but I wasn’t paying much attention, so I figured a crow or a raven. The feathers give you away.” He gestured to the back of his neck, causing me to reach instinctively toward mine. I didn’t think about the feathers that grew at the nape of my neck often, because they didn’t get in my face like my hair did. I knew they were red and green like gemstones, though. Apparently they were visible by firelight.

Since there was obviously no hiding it, and I didn’t know why I would need to, I admitted, “Yes, I’m a quetzal. But if one of us is a witch, I think it’s you.” I remembered the way the entire camp had seemed to materialize only when he put his hand on my shoulder.

“Why does Brina have a quetzal?” he asked.

I didn’t want to answer any more questions, and he had already said he wouldn’t ask. “I don’t need thirds,” I answered dryly, which made him laugh again.

“Fine, fine,” he said. “I’ll help you home tomorrow, and accept that some secrets are in my best interests.”

He had accused me of being a bad liar, but I suspected Malachi Obsidian was probably a very good liar. Calysta had said as much. His attitude had changed when he realized
I was a quetzal. I wasn’t sure I trusted his offer to get me home anymore.

No, my best course now was to wait for him to sleep, then set out again, leaving behind this stranger with his unsettling gaze and prying questions. Maybe he was harmless, but my gut said otherwise.

Taro and the others would be looking for me by now; I was sure of it. But, they might not be able to find me in Malachi’s magically hidden campsite, which was why I needed to get away.

“Can we sleep?” I asked, pushing away the half-full bowl of stew. His questioning had ruined what appetite I had left, and I wanted an excuse for the conversation to be over. “I was in the woods a long time.”

“Of course,” he answered. “The tent will be close quarters with two of us, but that keeps it warmer. I’m going to clean up and do some scouting before bed, so if you wake up and I’m not here, don’t panic.”

I wouldn’t panic. It would give me a chance to run.

DESPITE MY RESOLUTE
intention to sneak away, I slept like a rock. My dreams were like butterflies, colorful but fleeting. I woke groggy, surprised that it was still dark.

I pulled the blanket closer and shivered at the noise the wind made as it whistled past the tent. Somewhere in the distance I heard something howl. Did I really want to go out there again?

I couldn’t stay here. I had to get past my fear and run before Malachi returned. I pulled my boots back on, cringing at the chill that came with them, then struggled into my heavy clothes and crept out of the tent.

This time it wasn’t the cold that took my breath away.

My host had built up the fire, which popped and swirled in the wind. I could see him only in silhouette as he danced as freely as those flames.

He was barefoot and bare-chested, as if the dance made him immune to the elements. His hair was loose, and it moved around him like liquid silver, full of hot sparks as it reflected the fire. He moved as if he had joints or muscles where I didn’t and was capable of controlling each one precisely.

He danced without music … or, no, that wasn’t right. His dance
was
the music, and it made the night into music. His footfalls on the ground, the crackling of the fire, the whistling of the wind, and even the distant cries of wolves all created a song that I could only hear as one piece as his movements brought it all together.

When he turned and noticed me standing there, he stopped abruptly, and I heard a small sound of protest escape my lips. I had been utterly still, just watching, for several minutes. It hadn’t occurred to me to sneak away while he wasn’t looking. I hadn’t even noticed I was cold.