Chapter Twenty-Four Vina
Chapter Twenty-Four
Vina
Be careful. He’s coming.
Source: Letter from Vaughan David to Hari Patel
On the edge of ancient woods, misty and timeless, lay a small town.
The town was progressive, a marvel of modern invention.
Their mayor proudly enthused, at any given opportunity, about their clock tower, a stout brick tower with a marvelous stained glass clock face.
It had been a bell tower until only recently—two decades ago, at the most. The bell at its zenith—now long gone—used to be rung to warn the townsfolk that something was emerging from the ancient, primordial forest that bordered the town.
But one night the tower transformed, blooming stained glass and machinery.
By some stroke of luck, no creatures from the forest had haunted the town since.
There was a girl who lived in the town. She was more a woman than a girl now—twenty, restless, hungry for something she had no words for.
She’d left home before, at sixteen, but she’d returned in a year.
What she needed did not lie in the green fields and woodlands of the Isle, the stone villages with sparkling brooks, the deep hills full of caverns and topped with snow.
It did not lie in the brick buildings of her hometown either; but home, at least, was free.
No rent, no debts. Her fathers told her, again and again, that she was always welcome.
She helped, sometimes, at the blacksmith.
She liked being close to iron, and basked in the heat of the forge.
She liked, too, feeling her own body grow stronger—her arms more muscular, her shoulders broader.
She liked to leave exhausted, her mind quiet, her body aching.
For a little while, it eased the restless disquiet in her heart.
The sun was setting, the sky bloody gold. The woman went to the clock tower and lockpicked the door—a hilariously easy thing to do. She’d been doing it since she was eight, when her father had taught her.
The clock tower smelled of oil and dust. Motes of light glowed through the stained glass.
But the woman was more interested in opening a door, and climbing the external ladder, and settling herself on the clock tower’s zenith, where she could see the ancient forest to her right, and green rolling valleys to her left, cut through by a broad brick road.
When the skies were clear, and no mist clouded the horizon, sometimes you could see the giants lumbering between distant mountains.
Once, she had seen a dragon on the wing—its body swooping with the same joyous poetry as a swallow.
Now she was not looking for beasts. She was looking for a man.
She leaned precariously forward, staring at churning dust rising in the distance on the road, roiling to meet the falling sun.
And there he was. The incarnate who’d returned only weeks ago and sent a ripple through the Isle, the Prince with his gleaming sword, his white horse, his destiny.
The woman had woken covered in sweat, a new tale stuck straight in her skull, fully fleshed.
Everyone had been gossiping about it excitedly at the inn on the edge of town, and in the tea house, and outside the smithy.
Glorious, they said. He’s going to be glorious, a blood-spiller, a terror yes—but aren’t you oddly thrilled?
Isn’t awe one part joy and two parts fear?
The Eternal Prince has awakened. He’s come to take his throne.
And there he was. Perched on the clock tower, she could see his approach: his knights, gray gasps of ink on the horizon.
And his white horse, and his silver sword.
She watched, and felt a keen strangeness in her chest. Perhaps it was normal for your heart to stir and your emotions to lift at the sight of an incarnate from a powerful and Isle-changing tale, one so deep and old you knew it by feel alone.
But this didn’t feel like an emotional upswell; it felt a little like she was going to be sick.
Here it is, she thought. This is what I’ve been waiting for.
She’d thought finding that elusive something would feel good. Well, that had been foolish of her.
She climbed back into the clock tower. She left, nudging the door shut, and walked back home. It felt like she was walking through sludge.
Her parents lived in a cottage near the edge of the woods.
Four tawny rabbits were sleeping in a huddle inside the fence, next to a wall of swaying lavender.
The family cat was awake on top of their hutch, grooming her paws.
She gave the woman a baleful blink when the gate swung open, then returned to her ablutions.
Inside, the house was lit by warm lamps. She toed off her shoes.
“Want some dinner?” her papa called from the kitchen. She could see him through the half-open door, sleeves rolled up, peeling potatoes.
“I ate at Amir’s,” she said. Amir was the apprentice blacksmith but was much better at cooking than blacksmithing. “Where’s Father?”
“He’ll be home by morning,” said her papa, which was a typical kind of answer.
Her father was always vanishing somewhere, sometimes for days at a time.
It had taken her years to realize how unusual that was.
It did not bother her, though. Her parents were her parents.
She loved them, but she wasn’t curious about them.
In her room was a grandfather clock that ticked through its steady, pendulous rhythm.
Her childhood books and more recent reads were haphazardly scattered on her desk and heaving from her shelves.
She went to her desk to pick up her newest read—a vintage copy of Incarnate Tales for Children, bought from a traveling salesman last month—and raised her head, and met her own eyes in her bedroom mirror.
And she—
—remembered.
She woke on the floor, breathing ragged. Scattered papers all around her.
Her papa was in the room, leaning over her, shaking her shoulders.
She stared at him, his face swaying before her eyes. For a moment he had two faces: the one she knew, with the lines around the eyes, and the lick of silver in his hair; and another, younger, seen only briefly in a room of bronze mirrors before she’d—before—
“Ah,” her papa said. His face crumpled, a little, as it had when her dadi had passed away. He released her. “You remember.”
Her vision distorted.
“Hari,” she said. Then, “Papa. I. Shit. I need a moment.”
He left and returned with a glass of water. He set it carefully on the ground next to her. She grabbed it blindly, vision still uneven—drank. The water was cold.
“Where’s Father?” she asked.
“On his way home,” Hari said quietly. “I sent Mal to collect him.”
Maleficium, the family cat—and Papa’s familiar spirit, bound to him by dint of witchcraft. Had Hari been a witch when she’d first met him? No, no. She was almost sure. She clutched her head and tried not to panic.
“How did I end up here?”
“You collapsed. I heard your fall.”
“Here in this house, I mean,” Vina said, voice cracking a little. “In—in this decent childhood, with both of you. I can’t. I don’t understand.”
“Breathe,” Hari said soothingly. “I’ll… I’ll give you a minute. I’ll make tea. Come to the kitchen when you’re ready.”
Despite his words, he didn’t leave immediately. He hesitated, looking down at her, mouth parted as if he wanted to say something and didn’t know how. Then finally, he left, closing the door softly behind him.
After a moment Vina struggled to standing. She looked at her own face in the mirror, shaky with the knowledge of two lives in her skull.
She looked a little different, to her own eyes.
Her hair was slightly longer, curling to the nape of her neck—long enough that sometimes she could even tie it back.
Her hand calluses were different, her scars fewer, and in different shapes.
But the ink Simran had spilled had preserved her, like a cursed creature from a tale.
She was not a new girl in a new time; she was Vina still.
It was as if she’d slept, and dreamt a good dream—of being raised with love and care in a place too small for her.
She thought of Tristesse—a skull-splitting memory. Tristesse, and all the other fae, those born from the ink of the Isle. Was that what she was now too? Isle-wrought, and Isle-made?
She couldn’t feel Tristram under her skin, or any of the other knights. Her last memory was of her last life: of Simran, snowy light spangled in her hair, a sword of ink in the shared clasp of their hands.
The kitchen door was wide, the lights blazing. Maleficium was perched on the bottom step of the stairs. There were two shadows in the kitchen.
There was Hari. And looming in the corner, mud still on his boots and the forest’s strange green leaves brushed on his shoulders, stood the man she’d called her father.
“Vina,” said Galath, voice low. She couldn’t read his face—he was looking at her, unreadable, arms crossed. “Sit.”
You only used to call me knight, before, she thought.
Her mind was full of her whole childhood—her father’s gentleness, his patience; the way he’d been the one to teach her to read, and to spell, and shown her how to use her first weapon.
He’d never been the one to hug her or comfort her, except when she was sick.
More nights than she could count, he’d nursed her through childhood fevers, and held her as she’d restlessly slept, small and safe in his arms.
She remembered his axe, raised to kill her.
She sat.
“Tea’s always best in a crisis,” said Hari. He’d boiled the tea the way her grandparents had always made it: stewed in the old iron pot with spices and milk, until it simmered into a rich, fragrant drink. He took up a ladle and poured it into a cup, then set it down in front of her.
She stared down at the tea, watching it swirl and settle. She felt vaguely nauseated.
“You didn’t even change my name,” said Vina.