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Authors: Laurel Wanrow

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BOOK: The Twisting
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chapter three

Annmar woke to
hands touching her head.
Who?
She froze, her mind clear enough to be afraid. Within seconds, she realized the touch was gentle, a survey of a sore spot.

Where Paet hit me.
Oh, Lord.

The horrible night tumbled back. Annmar’s stomach heaved.

“You’re awake,” a female voice said. She cupped Annmar’s chin with one hand. “Can you open your eyes?”

Annmar blinked. The face above her blurred, then resolved into the sharp features of the healer. Her eyesight—it worked. Relief flooded Annmar, turning her limbs a bit limp. “Miriam,” she whispered.

Miriam’s gray eyes were soft and worried, and unlike other times Annmar had seen the older woman, loose wisps of her brown hair formed a halo around the crown of her head.

“Yes.” Miriam’s smile crumpled, and she wiped one eye. “Your eyes are focusing?” She held up her fingers. “How many?”

“Two.”

“Follow this one. Without moving your head.”

Annmar did, tracking the finger side to side and up and down.

“Any pain?”

“No.”

“Thank the Creator,” Miriam said with a release of breath. “That’s enough for now. Rest your eyes.”

Annmar sank into her pillows and shut her eyelids, though a few tears leaked out.

Miriam wrapped her hand around Annmar’s. “I am so very sorry I missed the seriousness of your head injury.”

“But I sat and drew when I wasn’t supposed to. I mean—” Annmar pressed her lips together. She should never have brought that up. Mary Clare and Rivley had worked hard to keep her healing Knack a secret. And Daeryn. She remembered Daeryn standing up to Miriam, saying she didn’t need to explain her wild gift, one different than other Basin dwellers’. Her head started throbbing.

Fingers lightly rubbed her forehead. “Learn and let live,” Miriam said. “You’re hurting yourself. Nothing matters but you healing. Which you are.”

She was healing. Thank the Lord—Creator—whomever. More tears ran down her cheeks. She wanted to lie still as Miriam instructed, but her muscles ached from being in bed too long… “How many days have I been asleep?”

“Four.” Miriam wiped her face with a warm cloth and got up from her chair. Rustles sounded at the table. The clinking of silverware against crockery and the familiar whir of a tea warmer.

Annmar’s eyes flashed open. If her eyesight worked, would her Knack sight? She focused, like she had when finding her gift while drawing, going deep within herself and willing the luminated threads to appear. Then, careful of her head, she eased over.

Miriam blocked the table. Annmar wanted to rise up or crane her neck—already feeling a bit warm from activating her Knack—but she didn’t dare. Pushing herself might hurt her head. But she had to know. Then Miriam moved.

A flicker of cerulean blue lit the gears of the tea warmer.

A sigh escaped her. Annmar closed her eyes in case Miriam turned. That was enough.

She was healing. She could focus her eyes. She had her Knack. The thought of being able to draw, to work, sent a flurry of plans to her clearing head. She could continue drawing Mistress Gere’s labels and at the same time start the search for her father. Once she wasn’t so tired, Annmar would figure out how many days until the next Market Day. In the town square, she could approach Old Terry to ask what the woman knew about the doodems—the figures that were part of the Basin Creator worship—and the sparkling tunnels that had upset Rivley. Yet these plans left her uneasy. Just like the rough Paet, wild people such as Old Terry held unfamiliar risks. Maybe she should leave Blighted Basin.

If Annmar returned to Derby now, she wouldn’t have the money to lease a shop. She’d be forced to take any job, including one Mr. Shearing might offer. Would offer.

One accompanied by improper advances.

She was loath to accept anything from the oppressive man, which left…

She had to believe what Mary Clare believed: No one would attack her again, not at Wellspring. Mistress Gere would protect her. And the Collective guards would protect her, too. Not just Daeryn, but many of them had fought for her. Mary Clare had said Annmar had been able to heal them, but she must give them a proper thanks when she was allowed up. Then she would seek her new friends’ advice on how to approach Old Terry safely.

Having made the decision, Annmar felt better. It was a good choice, and her choice. She wasn’t being scared off. She opened her eyes and looked around her room, pain-free. She could see the wrinkles in Miriam’s country gown, and when the other woman turned with a mug, Annmar noticed the dark smudges under her eyes. “You’ve slept poorly.”

“Again, nothing we will discuss now. You mustn’t be thinking about anything except yourself.” Miriam carried the tea to the bedside.

The minty smell wafted to her. Annmar couldn’t stop a frown from forming. “More medicine? I’m feeling much better. Much.”

“And we shall keep you that way.” Miriam lifted the mug, and a smile etched itself across her tired face. “You’re a strong-willed woman. Just like your mother.”

Annmar’s eyes widened. “Mother? You knew my mother?” Without realizing it, she lifted up, only to wince at the beat of pain between her ears.

Miriam pressed her shoulder. “Lie back. Or not another word will cross my lips.”

Annmar fell against her pillows, but she gripped Miriam’s long fingers. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Miriam laughed. “You’ve been here eight days, the last four bed-ridden with a head injury I missed. When did we have time to discuss a delicate subject?”

“Now?” Annmar squeezed Miriam’s hand. “Please?”

“Take the remedy, and I’ll tell you what I know of Anna Mary.”

Now that Annmar’s head wasn’t so blurry, drinking down the nasty herbs was difficult. When she finished, Miriam set aside the mug.

The healer folded her hands on her lap. “I met your mother during my last year apprenticing to a healer in Chapel Hollow. I’d come to town to get experience with a greater variety of peoples than we had in my local practice. But because I’d been exposed to country traditions, Anna Mary Masterson requested to see me. I was more like the healers back home, she said.”

Annmar drew a quick breath. “Where was back home?”

“Bramble Corner. I knew she thought I wouldn’t have heard of the village, but I had. My traveling family collected wildland herbs to peddle at the chapel Market Days.” The lines on Miriam’s forehead smoothed, and her voice softened with the unwinding tale. “We went through Bramble Corner yearly. A richly diverse area of plants lies nearby, most of which is off-limits to all but a few Bramble folk. My father knew the boundary edges and stuck to them. Plus, the area residents very much appreciated our herbs, because of their frequent clashes between the species.”

Mary Clare had told her the species fought, but Annmar could learn the details of the battles in Mother’s village later. Now her chest was tight with more important questions. “Why did Mother come to see you?”

“Pregnant. But you figured that out.” Annmar nodded. “So did she. At seventeen. She loved the young man.”

Oh, thank the heavens.
Not until she heard the answer did Annmar realize she’d always wondered if she’d been the result of an attack…like Paet might have planned. Her birth might have been a mistake, but Annmar preferred knowing Mother loved him.

“He’d moved with her to Chapel Hollow,” Miriam said. “They’d been here a month or so. He hired out as a grower, and she sold her drawings at Market Day.”

“What was his name?”

“They said it was Michael, but sometimes she pronounced it differently. I can’t remember how.” Miriam shrugged. “Me-coal or Mi-coal? My-cal? Masterson was his family name, I gathered.”

Perhaps. Since they had used the name before Mother left the Basin, maybe it wasn’t made up, as she’d claimed. Annmar closed her eyes.
Michael
. Her father’s name was Michael. They were from Bramble Corner. She could learn more with this information.

“Do you think—were they married?”

“They wore matching woven wristbands, a pledge symbol of the Creator Path Unity in some enclaves, but in others it simply means intended or betrothed. Because the use is inconsistent, people tend not to ask, like so many other details of Basin life.”

Then they had planned a future together, and Annmar had two possible names to look for: Master Brightwell’s guess that Mother’s family name was Shaw, and now her father’s name. Michael Masterson. “What was he? I mean, planta or ’cambire?”

“I have no idea. I saw him around town the few months they lived here. Tall, pale and skinny. Long, blond hair he kept tied back. The attempt at a goatee on his chin. Right before he left your mother, I saw him professionally. In the middle of the night.”

Mother had said she left him. Annmar kept still, but her insides fell apart. “He must not have wanted a baby.”

“Anna Mary half-carried him to my mentor’s house and rapped on my window. Michael had been badly beaten. I tended the cuts and bruises in the kitchen and got the barest scrapings of the story. It was someone he knew, threatening him with worse. If he didn’t do what the man wanted, Michael was afraid Anna Mary would be hurt. And the baby. He wanted me to confirm there was a baby. I couldn’t. Not without her permission. But before they left that night, I pulled her aside and told her to tell him. That he wanted to know.” Miriam sighed and reached out to loosen Annmar’s hands from where they clenched the covers.

“Why did he leave, if he knew?”

“I thought about that a lot. Either he was forced to, or he left to protect your mother. And you. He told me he’d pay, and sure enough, the next day a basket of mushrooms appeared on the bench outside the door. Rare ones. Some I recognized, and others I’d only seen in my pa’s drawings and descriptions of species he hoped to find on our hunts. The note said the mushrooms were to pay for any medical care Anna Mary or the baby might need.”

“So they did talk about…me?” Annmar’s voice broke, and tears rolled down her cheeks.

“Oh, my dear,” Miriam said softly. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

Mother had never allowed a conversation about this, despite Annmar’s desperate longing for one. But the next best thing was talking to people who had known her mother. “I want to hear about them. Please? Mother would never say anything about her life here.”

A shadow of sadness crossed Miriam’s tired face. “I don’t believe they talked about her pregnancy, because a few days later she dropped off these.” The healer picked up a basket from the floor and handed Annmar a stack of thick rectangular papers. “Her payment for treating him.”

Watercolor paintings. The lines, the delicate coloring…even without the signature, they were clearly Mother’s. And knowing Mother’s work, Annmar could see in an instant the strokes were generous, the colors bright and gay. Mother had been happy when she made them.

Again, Annmar’s eyes welled with tears, and Miriam put a hand over the paintings. “We don’t need to view these now if it’s too sad. I can bring them again on another day.”

Annmar shook her head, and winced. She had to close her eyes and steady her breathing for a minute against the dull throb. “It’s not. I have wished for this since Mr. Fetcher told me he traced Mother through her paintings. Please, let me look.”

Miriam released her hand. “Constance came to me the evening you asked her. I felt I had to know you better before I could tell you what little I know of their story.”

Several paintings showed plants, others the rolling Basin hills with the mountains behind, the local chapel with its square tower. A few others depicted stone pavilions…other chapels? The last painting was of Miriam. The willowy woman looked relaxed, her long hair loose and blowing in the wind, caught up with flowers, leaves and other bits of plants. And in the centers of her eyes, tiny silhouettes of people were visible.

Annmar lifted her gaze to the older woman. “She captured you perfectly. And you’ve only grown more connected to plants and people.”

Miriam flashed a quick smile. “You see that, too? Your mother’s insight amazed people. She would have been very successful. If she’d stayed.” She tapped a painting of stone buildings peeking from between towering trees, then another of a rocky hill. “I thought she’d gone back home. These are Bramble Corner.”

They were? Annmar set them side-by-side and studied the layers of green in the lush images, trying to glean from them what Mother’s home must have been like. But the myriad lines blurred. Her eyes were too tired and growing heavier with each yawn. She didn’t dare consider pushing things by using her Knack. “But she didn’t,” she whispered.

“Anna Mary Masterson had made a name for herself rendering portraits in town, and her landscapes were gaining popularity. I could have sold the paintings to any number of people. But I love them, and am glad I never had to. Instead, I dried the mushrooms and traded them as I needed things.”

Annmar shuffled through the paintings again, but she couldn’t properly focus on their details. The medicine was taking effect. She handed the stack to Miriam and slumped into her pillow, eyelids drooping. “What happened next?”

“I wanted to return one payment, so looked for her at Market Day. She was gone.”

BOOK: The Twisting
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ads

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