16. Emi
Ipulled the treacle pie from the oven with a hiss of pain as heat burned through the tattered oven mitt. I’d have to find a new pair to gift to my host, Julie, for her hospitality.
When I refused to return to Anterra with Locke, he’d finally agreed to take me to a friend of his who happened to also be Anterran but now lived in Zocere. Unfortunately, my ex-patriated new friend was downright unhappy with Locke’s request at first, and indeed with the man himself. I got the impression something major had gone wrong between them recently, but there was enough history there that she agreed to let me stay for a short time. I was already working on ways to extend it.
In the days since arriving, I’d been winning her over by cooking and cleaning around her house and shop. Julie Smyth had carved out a place for herself in LaMont as a respected blacksmith. As I understood it, the original smith had once taken Locke in, and Locke had brought Julie to him when she needed somewhere to go. Smyth certainly wasn’t an Anterran surname, so I deduced she had taken on the old blacksmith’s moniker to continue his trade. Well, if she could decide to stay, then so could I.
I wanted to earn my keep, though, and I couldn”t venture out too much without exposing Locke and the unconventional way he’d brought me here. I’d been firmly instructed to “lie low.” It turned out Grandma’s trader was actually more of a smuggler, and the gate we’d come through was unmarked, unguarded, and highly illegal. I’d never done anything criminal before, but I didn’t want to turn Locke in or cause him trouble after he’d helped me.
“I don’t think this place has ever smelled so good,” Julie moaned appreciatively as she came through the door from her day of duties up at the Chateau Mont. “What is that?”
“I made you a treat from home. You work so hard, you deserve one.”
“It wouldn’t be so bad if I didn’t have to clean up after a bunch of crowned incompetents.” She clapped a hand over her mouth and turned a horrified gaze on me. “Do not repeat that.”
“Never.” I laughed. “I take it you’re not a fan of aristocracy.”
Julie prevaricated. “Even as a child in Anterra, we loathed the Mont’Royales of Zocere.”
We sat down to the meal I’d prepared of roast boar and baked potato along with pastry cups full of richly aromatic gravy. I set out a dish of sweet and tangy dressing of diced apple, redcurrant, and mint. Julie’s stomach rumbled.
“Mmm, sweet sunbeams,” she moaned. “I haven’t had food like this in forever.”
I chuckled. “I’m glad you like it.”
“You’re okay, Emi from Baines. I’m glad I agreed to let you stay.” She was joking, but there was a wistfulness to her tone.
“Do you ever want to go back to Anterra?” I asked, hiding how my own thoughts wrestled with that dilemma.
She chewed another bite of roast dripping with gravy before answering. “I have, but…It’s complicated.”
Images of my sister and father played in my mind, but those were soon joined by Wolf which, to my great displeasure, sent a pang of longing through me. Complicated, indeed.
“I heard something recently.” I’d avoided the topics of Wolf and witches thus far. I wasn”t sure I wanted to ask, and I scooped some dressing with a bite of potato into my mouth and chewed slowly to delay. “There are people who think the Mist is a curse that was cast deliberately by a gemstone witch.”
Julie raised an eyebrow at me. “You just heard that now? That”s what people have always said.”
“Really?”
“It”s hardly a natural weather phenomenon.”
“No, of course. It’s not that I thought it was just strange weather, but…I guess it didn”t really occur to me to wonder what caused it. It just seemed like something we had to live with.” Like so many other unpleasant things. Like my mother leaving. Like Jade and my father always ignoring me. Like the nasty rumors and rude looks people always gave me.
Was it possible that I was so absorbed in my own daily misery that I never stopped to care about what others were going through? I knew, of course, that the Mist had changed lives. It had driven people out of the towns closest to Aglonbriar. But I’d always been able to walk through the forest, unaffected by Mist and heedless of the stories others told, so it never directly impacted me.
Had Grandma Ruby’s assurances blinded me to reality? With no one to talk to, no friends to share things with, had I missed the truth this whole time? I never thought I was so self-absorbed until that instant. The thought that I could be more like Jade than I knew soured my appetite.
Julie gave my troubled expression a long, cold look. Then she uncrossed her arms and sighed heavily. ”Let me tell you about the one and only time I ever went into the Mist. Locke saved my life, too, once.”
She told me how the Mist had burned and she’d felt like she was losing herself in it. I recalled Wolf’s description of pain with horror. He’d told me how it was impossible to flee from the Mist’s bonds, describing a pain unlike any I’d ever experienced. Which was exactly why I struggled to believe him, because I’d never felt it, so it didn’t seem real. But did my experience mean I knew what it was like for others? Or could we be in the same boat yet sailing through different storms?
Julie had tried to flee, only to be hunted by some of the beasts. Then Locke had appeared, killed a fenriswulf that was about to make Julie its next meal, and then brought her here. It was almost uncanny, the similarities to my own plight and rescue. Without Wolf, I could have been victim to another fenriswulf. I wondered if the one Locke had killed was the twin brother Wolf had mentioned.
Now that I had Julie’s word to add to his, Wolf’s version rang truer. Was everything I believed wrong? What if my truth was the lie?
“It’s really that bad?” My voice was a whisper.
Julie’s eyes were pitying. “It wasn”t just as bad as everyone says. It was indescribably worse.”
My foundation cracked. The ground I’d stood firm on for years was shifting, and I didn’t know what to do about it.
Worrying at my bottom lip with my teeth, I dreaded how much more Wolf had told me might be true. “Julie, have you heard of the Ruby Witch?”
“So you do know about the curse. Everyone knows the Ruby Witch’s name. She doomed our whole world.”
The food in my stomach turned to stone. I didn”t want to believe it, but why would Julie lie to me? Grandma was a witch.
“Why do you look like you just swallowed a fly?” she asked.
“I…I need you to tell me everything you know about gemstone witches.”
“What? Why?”
“Just...please?”
The woman was too smart to avoid reaching the obvious conclusion. ”Emi. Are you a witch?”
“No, I”m not, I swear. I have no magic, and…” I swallowed hard. “And even if I did, I would never hurt you.” It was as close as I’d come to admitting the possibility.
Her gaze was shrewd. Eventually, she nodded.
It turned out Julie knew a lot about gemstone witches. “For reasons I don’t want to get into, I spent a long time after my mother’s death researching magic and witches.”
As the lantern over the table sent flickering light dancing up the walls, she spoke of how witches are named for gemstones based on an affinity determined at birth, and how that stone will be their best magic conduit later. Julie explained how witches awaken their magic with a wish; the first wish they ever make determines what magic they will have.
I finally understood what Wolf had meant about wishing him dead.
There! That was proof I couldn’t be a witch. Surely I’d made wishes before. Not that I could think of any just then, but no one could have reached my age without wishing for…something.
“The Ruby Witch is infamous because her magic is curse magic, and powerful,” Julie explained.
While she finished, I racked my memories for a wish I’d made. It must have happened. I’d been sad about not feeling love from my father and not being interesting enough for Jade, but I’d always just pushed those sorrows down. There was no point wishing for something that wouldn’t change, so I hadn’t. Feeling sorry for myself wasn’t the same as wishing things were different. What would have been the point in that? That would have been like wishing my mother hadn’t left us, or that the townspeople would magically like me the way they did Jade. It seemed absurd to think anything so simple as a wish could change anything, so I’d never tried.
Something small, then. Surely I’d made an accidental wish somewhere along the way. Hadn’t I?