Chapter 13 Wagon
Wagon
Eloise
For the first time in months, I wake from a deep sleep, warm and cozy in a soft bed.
Not too hot, not too cold. I spent the night dreaming about painting in my mother’s studio in Harcourt Manor.
In the morning light, I miss my hobby. It’s been months since I held a paintbrush against a blank canvas.
Will I ever have the sort of peace and space I need to create again the way I used to?
So much has changed. My physical composition, my magic, my world. But inside, I’m the same.
No, that’s not true.
I am not the same. When I left Tony, I was a child, barely brave enough to drag myself to the safety of my grandmother’s home in order to escape an abusive marriage.
I was a desperate woman willing to trade her own blood for someone to protect me.
Today, I am powerful. I am brave. I am the protector.
And, importantly, I am loved. Damien’s love is a constant, a foundation to the tower of my confidence and self-esteem.
I am worthy because I am loved. I am able to love because I was already worthy.
And still, my inner child cries out for a paintbrush.
A knock on my door startles me, and I make sure my disguise is in place before opening it.
A teenage boy hands me a copper vessel that feels hot to the touch and a lidded basket that I hook on my elbow.
“Your morning provisions, ma’am. The caravan will set off in one hour.
I’m supposed to ask you if you’re comfortable driving or if we need to supply someone. ”
“You want me to drive the wagon in the caravan?”
“If you’re capable. We usually have to hook this one up to the next as it is normally unoccupied, but it would be easier on the rabble beasts if you were able to share the load.”
I nod. “I’ll drive.”
“Excellent. I will retrieve your rabble beast.”
I furrow my brow. “How will you know which one is mine?”
He laughs. “We know.” He waves a hand and disappears.
I open the lid of the basket. Inside is a small basin with a sponge, soap that smells of rose petals, and a towel quilted from scraps of soft, plush material.
A metal canister contains a meal of something like oatmeal but with nuts, fruit, and small pieces of sausage.
On top of it all is a packet of tea that wafts a scent I can only compare to chai—cardamon and cinnamon and other spices completely foreign to me.
The copper vessel contains hot water—much more than I need to bathe.
Clever Rivertoads. I’m meant to eat and drink first and then use the remainder of the water to wash.
A marvelously efficient system from a people I’m swiftly coming to respect for their pragmatic approach to things.
I’m finishing my morning routine when I feel the wagon rock as the boy who visited before attaches the yoke to Romulus.
I have just enough time to use the latrines the caravan erects in the woods before everything is deconstructed, filled in, and packed away.
The boy helps me into the driver’s seat of my wagon, a leather-upholstered bench built on springs, and shoves the reins into my hands.
He’s much too busy to answer any of my questions, which is just as well because, truthfully, there’s nothing to know.
When the caravan moves, Romulus seems to know what to do.
Like a great, winding serpent, we set off to the east, before the moon has reached its apex.
We’ve been traveling about an hour when a column of shadow funnels into the seat next to me, and Damien’s smoke and spice scent perfumes the air.
He forms, still in his disguise. “Good morning, Marquis. What brings my cousin to my wagon?” I ask through a smile.
Maintaining our ruse, even now when the caravan is in motion, seems a wise idea in a group that remembered which rabble beast was mine among a herd of hundreds of animals.
“Are you well, cousin?” The corners of his eyes wrinkle in a way that is pure Damien and weird to see on a pale, blond-headed face. “Feeling fatigued? Any reason we should abandon this route?”
It doesn’t take our bond for me to understand what he’s actually asking. He’s checking to make sure I can hold the disguises we’re wearing.
“I’m fine,” I whisper. “All of this is hardly a burden. I could do it for days.”
“I doubt that will be necessary, but for now, Valerian and I agree we should continue our mission, earn their trust, and propose an alliance.”
I nod. “Have you noticed we’re heading toward Aendor? If nothing else, we’ve found a safer way to make the journey.”
“Safer?” His eyes shift right then left. “I don’t think so. I think these people would sell us to the highest bidder if they thought we were worth anything. Trust no one. The only thing keeping us safe right now is our coin purse, and you’d best believe I slept with it under my pillow last night.”
I frown. “Everyone here has been kind to me. They’ve given us no reason not to trust them.”
He scoffs. “Yet.”
“I think you should keep an open mind.”
“Maybe,” he says more softly. In silence, we ride together until the caravan begins to slow.
“I think they’re stopping.”
“Probably a scheduled break. I’ll see you in Maggie’s tent tonight.” We say our goodbyes, and he shadows out from beside me.
It turns out that it is a scheduled break.
The caravan stops every three hours. Young Rivertoads help the elderly with their needs, and someone comes by to check Romulus for signs of distress, including the place where the yoke rubs his shoulders and his feet.
They offer the rabble beasts water and bring me a sandwich made from red wheat and a type of blood sausage. It’s simple but delicious.
The moon is low in the sky when we halt beside a river, and this time, the boy comes back and removes Romulus’s harness. “Are we stopping for the night?” I ask him.
He nods. “You’ll find everyone down by the river until the tent is set up.”
“Should I help?”
The boy chuckles. “Maggie has a team and is very…exacting. She’d only shoo you out of the way.”
“Understood.” I give a soft laugh, easily picturing Maggie shouting orders at a small crew. I follow the crowd down to the river and join the people gathered there. Everyone is talking and laughing. Most have removed their shoes and are walking along the shore barefoot.
“Well, Velis, what did you think of your first day on the road?” Jaqual appears beside me, his smile as bright as the moon.
I answer truthfully. “Peaceful,” I say. “I understand why you love it.”
“Ooh? Pray tell, why do you think I love it?” He brushes a string of beads that dangles from his headband behind his shoulders.
Jaqual is the first and only person who has had any real conversation with me here.
If I want him to open up to me and trust me with information about the Rivertoads, I need to authentically answer his question.
So I think about what I experienced today and try to answer specifically.
“The colors,” I say. “All the brightly colored wagons carving their way through the green and the red of the countryside are like the first brush of paint on a canvas. I bet you love that, and I bet you love the community, how everyone helps one another and knows their role during the breaks. And I bet you enjoy how the scenery is never the same from hour to hour. A person could never be bored living among you.”
When he doesn’t say anything, I look over at him, and his amethyst eyes are sparkling. “I believe you may secretly have the soul of a Rivertoad.”
I laugh. “Why are you called that anyway? Rivertoad?”
“It doesn’t seem to fit, does it? Once you know what we’re really like.”
“My thoughts exactly.”
“In our culture, toads represent adaptability because they are born in the water and then grow to thrive on the land, and the river is a symbol of the infinite flow of time. My people have been traveling these roads for thousands of years, longer than Stygarde has ruled and since before the dark elves of Willowgulch crawled out of the rocks they once lived under and organized a government. We are a creation of the goddess and are natives of Tenebris, as close to the land as any. We are Rivertoads, and although you might hear the name used in a derogatory way, it is who we are.”
“Fascinating.” I wasn’t expecting to learn that Rivertoads were the indigenous people of Tenebris, or that they considered themselves the preservers of an ancient culture. The way Damien talked about them, they were thieves and hired guns. It’s hard to reconcile the two views of their culture.
He pauses. “You mentioned the colors of the wagons reminding you of paint on canvas. Has anyone introduced you to the artist’s conclave?”
I shake my head.
“I’ll show you.” A few minutes’ walk downriver and Jaqual slides a paintbrush into my hand and positions me in front of a used canvas painted white. I’m in a circle of easels, a group of five Rivertoads painting riverside, three of them old and one young.
“Enjoy, Velis. Maggie’s should be open in an hour.” Jaqual waves his goodbye and disappears toward the wagons as I fight back tears at the joy of painting again. I dip the tip of my brush into the paint and get started.
“It’s lovely,” Terilla says, her gray braids the only sign of her advanced age. Since she’s a shade, I suppose she doesn’t have to show her age at all, but she seems proud of her advanced years and grins at my painting of a wagon.
“Do you think? I’m out of practice.” I painted my wagon blue to represent the river and filled the windows with stars to show how an entire universe could fit inside, a universe of culture anyway.
Terilla nods and tugs on my arm. “It’s perfect, my dear. But you should come now. You don’t want to miss dinner.” I look up for the first time in I don’t know how long and realize that we are the only ones left beside the river. “Oh no! My…cousin is going to be livid.”
She pats my shoulder. “Go. It’s my turn to clean up.”