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Aethren couldn’t keep their worry down as they walked across the mootplace. Natta was just leaving her house, and she stepped to Aethren’s side with a nod of greeting. Her lips were clamped in a tense line.
“Are you alright?” Natta asked as the two of them walked towards the alley between Rostfar’s home and a large storehouse. Aethren kept going, but realised that Natta had stopped. They turned back to her.
“Tired,” they said, which wasn’t a lie, but it wasn’t entirely true either.
“You can talk to me.”
Aethren bit the inside of their cheek. Natta must have known about Rostfar’s magic and helped her hide it, but Aethren felt a sharp pang of guilt at the thought of confiding in her. It wouldn’t be fair to give Natta any more secrets to hide.
“Just tired. Promise.” Aethren gave Natta a small smile and turned the corner. Natta’s boots crunched loudly, then she outpaced them and strode ahead. Aethren slowed down as she knocked.
Faren answered.
Aethren’s breath caught in their throat. Faren, thankfully, said nothing as he ushered them inside with a tilt of his head.
Aethren noticed the smell first – rot and brine, familiar enough, save for a sickly-sweet undertone that Aethren didn’t recognise. They coughed and pressed a hand to their nose.
“What is that?” Natta asked.
“That,” Faren said. “Is what you get for consorting with magic.” He pointed towards the table and a heaping pile of . . . something.
Aethren looked around the rest of the room: Hrall, Ethy, Marken, Urdven. “Where’s Laethen? She should be here.”
“The point of Yrl Aethren being on the council was to stand in for Laethen, if she needed it.” Ethy clapped Marken on the shoulder and smiled at Aethren. “I didn’t see a reason to trouble the lass, not with what she’s got to cope with right now – her children being ill and all.”
“Enough.” Natta slammed the door shut behind her as she stepped the rest of the way inside. Cold air swirled through the room, disturbing the old scarred raven on the shelf at the back. It croaked indignantly, but Natta paid it no heed. “Faren, that wasn’t an answer. What is going on?”
“Our hemlock traps have washed up, every last one,” Hrall said.
“We only sunk those a week ago.” Aethren’s stomach clenched. They swallowed queasily. “Why would anyone – do they want us to starve?”
“Nobody would do that,” Faren said, as if trying to explain a complex matter to a child. Aethren bristled. “Look, they’ve been rotted – but it’s no rot I’ve ever seen.”
Natta walked to the table and touched the topmost hemlock branch. It dissolved under her fingers like an ember gone to ash. Her voice was distant when she asked, “All of them?”
Ethy nodded. “All of them. Took a boat out myself to check.”
Aethren wondered, viciously, if Ethy had done this. The force of the thought hit them like a storm wave, but it receded just as fast. Even if Ethy would go that far to cause trouble, no human had the power to do something so vast.
But the wraiths might.
“We’ll have nothing for the K’anakh when they come, and then what? No roe to trade means we’ve little of value to offer, and that means we starve,” Ethy said.
Natta pinched the bridge of her nose. “Don’t fire the arrow before you’ve nocked it. We’ve got grains, and the potatoes make a good tender—”
Marken spoke up for the first time. “I’m afraid not.”
Everyone turned to look at him. Aethren noticed he had a burlap sack gripped in one hand.
“Most of our crop’s gone to shit.”
“Blight?” Aethren asked, desperately hoping the answer would be yes. Blight was natural, treatable. Marken shook his head.
Opening the sack, he withdrew what might have once been a potato. Its skin had shrivelled and thickened, and the pressure of his fingers released a black ooze. “This came from our back garden.”
“I’ve ordered a salvage harvest,” Faren said, leaning against Ethy’s table. Natta turned to him like an eel striking at its prey.
“You ordered?” She raised one eyebrow.
“And what did you find?” Aethren asked, eager to cut the tension before it could rise any more, even as fury at Faren’s conduct simmered beneath their skin.
“We won’t starve,” Faren said, deliberate and slow. “But we won’t have enough, either. It’ll be a bone-bare winter once all the herds are gone.”
Natta’s white-painted lips drew back from her teeth. She stepped away from the table, and Aethren noticed a muscle twitching in her jaw.
“And all of this was done without a word to me?” Natta’s tone was like black ice. Aethren expected the others to buckle – to show some shame, at the very least – but nobody so much as flinched. Ethy smiled a sympathetic smile.
“We’re worried about you,” she said. “Worried that your – involvement, with Rostfar, has put you too close to the matter.”
“Involvement?” Nat snorted. “She’s my sister. My twin! We share a soul, she and I. I’d know if she had anything to do with this.”
Faren leaned forwards. “So, you’re not denying that she could have done it?”
“Bloody skyfire!” Aethren flung up their hands. “Do any of you even know Rost-Skelda? Or have you forgotten, just so’s you can pin all your blame on her?” Aethren pinned each person present with a scalding glare. “She’s your Dannaskeld, one you cast in. Your friend, your family – Hrall, you trained her like she’s done me. And Pa—” their breath caught in their throat and they moved past him to Urdven. “Arketh loved your bees, wanted to be Beekeeper herself. You knew Rostfar, dammit.”
“She made us think we knew her,” Ethy said.
“Look at the facts.” Faren stepped forwards and put a hand on Aethren’s shoulder. They stiffened under his touch. “Rostfar fled, and then all this went wrong.”
Natta started to protest, but Aethren got there first. “Rost-Skelda didn’t flee.”
“Ah, Aethren,” Ethy said sadly. “Your loyalty does you credit, but I spoke with Rostfar before that hunt. She was a wreck – and I’m not blaming her for that, believe me – but she confessed that she wished to run away. To leave all of this pain behind. Perhaps she went to seek her own revenge, or . . .” she let the implication hang, regarding everyone else with a look of regret. As if she felt bad about her accusations.
“A fleeing person doesn’t leave half their supplies behind.” Aethren knocked Faren’s hand away and leaned towards Ethy. “She sleep-walked, or – I saw these strange lights in the fog. Perhaps she followed them.”
Hrall shifted in his seat, rapping his knuckles on the table to get everyone’s attention. His eyes were sad, but the firm line of his mouth showed no sign of mercy. He cleared his throat and said, in the firm tone that had marked Aethren’s early training, “You don’t need to lie for her, cub. I know it’s hard to hear, but Rostfar wasn’t who we thought. Whether she’s guilty—”
“I’d say she is,” Faren muttered.
“Whether she’s guilty,” Hrall said again, louder. “Isn’t important. The bones of the matter are that we’re in trouble, and with recent revelations, people don’t trust Nat-Hrenna to make the right choices.”
“Just say what you mean,” Natta hissed. Ethy, Hrall, and Faren all shared a look. Aethren’s throat constricted.
“Nobody’s saying you’re untrustworthy, but as far as anyone’s concerned, the magic’s got into your head,” Ethy said gently. “You’re too close to the matter.”
“So?” Aethren snapped, but Natta put a hand on their arm. Surprised, Aethren’s mouth clacked shut.
“You want me to step down?” Natta said, her tone flat.
Ethy almost looked gleeful, but after a second, she schooled her expression into one of sadness. “I’m sorry it’s come to this.”
“No, you’re not.” Natta shook her head. “But ta anyway.”
Aethren didn’t go home. They were bristling with anger at everyone, their pa and themself most of all.
Without thinking about what they were doing, Aethren crossed the mootplace to Rostfar’s home. The forge was in full heat, the sound of a hammer hitting metal audible from across the open space.
Isha was sweating over a candlestick holder. He didn’t hear Aethren when they first called his name, completely absorbed. They waited as he turned the rod in his hand from side to side, giving it the beautiful furling ridges that made his work so distinguished. Sweat seeped into the cloth wrapped around his forehead, and his eyes were full of a fervour that Aethren had never seen in him before.
A tap on Aethren’s shoulder made them jump. They turned around and saw Mati, who motioned for them to follow him inside. They hovered just inside the door, watching Mati pack the finished candlesticks into a wooden crate full of straw and spare wool trimmings.
“I need to talk to Isha,” Aethren said, which felt obvious once it left their mouth. With the wind stolen from underneath them, they had no choice but to stop and think.
Being angry was definitely easier.
“You may as well wait ‘til he brings in that last stick.” Mati pointed at a chair, but Aethren remained where they were. Seeing their uncertainty, Mati managed a little smile and pushed a bowl of tea across the table to them. “You won’t be able to get his attention ‘til he’s done. Trust me, he could work through the end of the world.”
“He’s already doing that,” Aethren muttered, and then flushed when they realised how it sounded. Worrying at the inside of their cheek, they sat down and wrapped clammy fingers around the steaming bowl.
Mati hesitated with his hands still in the box. “You . . . can talk to me, if you like?”
Aethren frowned into their tea. It stood to reason that Mati, like Natta, had been in on Rostfar’s secret. But worry still gnawed at the lining of their stomach.
“It’s alright,” Isha said from behind. “Mati knows everything.” Walking around the table, Isha dried his hands on a towel and pulled off his apron. Black smudges marked his forehead and one cheek, but underneath that he looked wan.
Aethren didn’t need any further invitation.
“We need to leave.”
Isha picked up Mati’s tea and took a sip, examining Aethren as if he didn’t believe them. “You’ve changed your mind?”
“Ethy and Faren have forced Natta to step down.” Aethren stood up, unable to keep still. “They’ve turned the council inside out, and Ethy’s spitting all sorts of poison about Rostfar. If there’s even the slightest chance she’s still – well, we need her. I thought I’d be more helpful here, but I’m useless, Isha. I’ll do more good out there.”
The blood drained from Isha’s face. He and Mati shared a moment of silent communication and Mati put his hand on Isha’s shoulder.
“We’ll need supplies, time to tie up loose ends . . .” Isha rubbed the top of his head and took a deep breath. “Tomorrow night?”
“Tomorrow night,” Aethren agreed.
