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Willow sat in Leo’s kitchen, idly tracing a scar on the worn table and watching the elderly man assemble the ingredients for supper. Leo had a brace of some kind of bird, which he planned to stuff with breadcrumbs and castanya nuts, one of Willow’s favorite winter treats, although at home they usually were pureed and sweetened as a filling for pastries.
Leo’s sure touch would sweeten the food, if not the atmosphere created by those partaking of it.
She rarely saw Gauvain apart from meals and lessons. Not surprising, given that she suspected he was avoiding her as much as she avoided him. Unresolved tension underlay life in the tower. Willow stuck to her room and the kitchen, and longed to venture out into the town, but Leo informed her that the market had shrunk to only a handful of stalls, the merchants bunkered against the cold in unwelcoming hovels of stores.
“I do wish I could find the formula to cheer you, Miss,” Leo commented, his eyes never leaving his chopping. “It grieves me to see you so desolate.”
“Sometimes you make the right decision, but to the wrong effect.”
“True. But when the decision is correct, in the long term all will be well.”
“I wish he weren’t so angry, though. He’s... I don’t want his mood to overflow onto you.”
Leo chuckled. “I’ve known Gauvain since he was a lad, and we on his staff are used to his moods. The unusual thing was his cheerful demeanor until now. This is much more typical.”
“Nevertheless...”
Leo set his knife on the table and leaned toward her. “Take your tisane and a pastry and go up to your room, Miss. You haven’t been sleeping well. Give yourself an afternoon off. If your schedule is free, accompany me to the butcher’s tomorrow. There are one or two shops nearby you might enjoy.”
“Thank you.” Willow stood. “As for free, though, Gauvain acts as if the break at Solstice destroyed all the work from the autumn. He drives the apprentices as if he wielded a whip.”
“A hard taskmaster. Go now. Things may look better in the morning.”
Maybe, she thought as she climbed the curved stairs. But not likely to be. Gauvain had been frigid since their aborted liaison, refusing to hear or acknowledge her explanation. Proof enough that she hadn’t handled it well. In the past, she had given her body, just as she gave her affections, where she chose, and it never occurred to her that this time would be any different. Joss had changed her unexpectedly, and deeply.
But now, faced with this new awareness, she’d done the only thing possible. The fulfillment of love far outweighed the magic of sex, and she was no longer willing to exchange the one for the other.
She grimaced as she passed through her door and settled into her chair, wondering what Joss himself would say about all this.
The tisane finished, she stood to stare out the window. The bare limbs of a solitary tree, only just visible behind a bank of buildings, tossed in the chill wind driving gray, scudding clouds. Stalks of weeds thrashed against the base of the tower. A cover of snow softened the distant view, but she knew it to be a thin layer, insufficient to provide moisture come spring.
The high hills must be waist deep in snow by now; like it or not, she was trapped in this place until after the melt.
Another season before she could go home.
Willow nodded to herself and began preparations for a leisurely bath. Hot water on demand still thrilled her.
Given no other options, she’d accept Gauvain’s teachings, assessing each weave’s potential for Healing work. Other lessons, the esoteric stuff dealing more with probing the mysteries of esoteric templates, twisting them to a person’s bidding, she might carry home for Quinn and the other Scribes.
Borgonne offered nothing Bryar would value. Borgonnian music differed little from music in the Midland, and Willow had heard no stories or legends at all. A pragmatic culture, Borgonnnians showed no interest in history or fantasy.
Before Solstice, as her powers strengthened, she had approached Gauvain about setting up a clinic in Orlan, renewing her Healing skills by helping the populace. He had flatly denied her, and even Leo had explained that such a move would undermine the resident healers and create resentment toward the inhabitants of the tower.
No Healing, then. But the ability lay dormant, waiting. Relaxing in the warm water, she practiced a few weaves, just enough to experience the joy of working with templates again.
Warm and dry, again at her window, she reached out with her mind to the land. She received only a trickle of sensation in response, nothing like the rich connection of the Midland. The Aura might be stronger in Borgonne, but it seemed to require a harsher, more demanding touch to awaken it. Gauvain’s, perhaps. She wondered if, had she opened a clinic, her Healing templates would even have worked here. The energy felt different, as if the earth itself bowed to the will of the people living here, a colder, less welcoming society.
In the hours before Leo rang the supper bell, as she watched the bleak landscape and revisited all she was learning – or, more often, reviewing – in the apprentice class, she was led to one inexorable conclusion. She did not belong here. As soon as the snow receded, she would replace Gauvain’s fine silks and satins with her old tunic and boots, and strike out for home.