Chapter One Lettle #2
She looked up when Lettle called her name, her violet eyes wide and imploring. ‘You’re right, the obeah are humans.’
‘Of course you would side with her,’ Furi muttered, but Yeeran didn’t rise to the bait.
She spoke to Lettle alone. ‘While you were gone Alder spoke in his sleep again.’
Alder gave a tired wave.
Yeeran continued, ‘And Pila understood him.’
‘What?’
‘What?’
Both Rayan and Furi exclaimed in tandem, but Lettle was not surprised.
‘What did he say?’
It was Alder who answered, his voice deep and distant. ‘The time for the curse to end is fast approaching.’
Silence. But the silence wasn’t empty. It was full of questions. They bristled along Lettle’s skin, leaving the hairs raised.
She knew that the faebound were conversing with their obeah. But she also understood from Yeeran that the creatures knew very little about who and what they were.
Finally, when she could stand it no longer, she asked, ‘Well, what now?’
‘We tell no one,’ Furi said. ‘Mosima is too unstable, we cannot afford to shake its very foundations with this knowledge.’
This elicited a strong reaction from Yeeran, who was tired of lies. Rayan was of the mind to support Yeeran, which didn’t surprise Lettle–she had been his colonel, after all–but that only aggravated Furi further.
They argued for an hour before Lettle grew frustrated enough to interject.
‘You are all talking about what this means to the fae, and not what it means to the obeah. Do they not deserve to know who and what they are?’
Pila looked at Lettle then, in her unnerving way, with eyes like clouds before rain.
‘Yes,’ Furi said quietly. ‘They do, but we can’t answer that, not truly. There is so much we don’t know.’
‘Then we find it out,’ Alder said.
Lettle met his gaze and nodded encouragingly.
‘We need to learn everything we can about your past. About you.’
‘I don’t remember anything,’ he said miserably. Golan squeezed his shoulder and Alder gave him a weak smile.
‘Nothing? Nothing at all?’ Furi stepped towards Alder as she spoke and Lettle saw him flinch from the intensity of the queen’s tone.
‘What was your first memory?’ Lettle said more gently.
Alder shrugged. ‘Being with the Nomads.’
The disappointment his words brought was palpable. But Lettle didn’t want to succumb to despair.
‘Where? When?’
‘Somewhere near Caperly, ten years ago.’
‘You must have been barely out of childhood,’ Yeeran remarked, but Alder shook his head.
‘No, I am just youthful in looks.’
It was true, he had told Lettle he was thirty-five based on what the Nomads had estimated. But he looked no older than twenty even now.
‘One of the elders, Osei, found me outside one of the caves. He brought me to the village. I could speak no language, I knew of no home, but I don’t remember that.’
‘This Osei, where is he?’ Furi asked.
Alder grimaced. ‘He passed. Two winters ago.’
Furi began to laugh but Lettle pressed on. ‘Was there anyone else who was there when you were found? Who might know more?’
Alder bit his lip. ‘Dart might. He is Osei’s son and though he wasn’t there, his father might have told him.’
‘And Dart is?’
‘On his way to Caperly. But the Nomads won’t speak to me. I refuted their ways. Even if I stand in front of them, they won’t hear me, they won’t see me—’
‘We have to go to Caperly,’ Lettle cut in. There was no one in this world who could ignore her for long.
‘The journey will take four months,’ Golan said quietly.
‘It has to be done,’ Lettle said. ‘We have no other leads, and you heard what the Fates said–the obeah are related to the curse.’
‘We have the grimoire. We can get our best thinkers on it—’ Golan protested.
‘And what, share this knowledge before we even know what it is?’ Furi said. ‘The foundation of our society is already cracking; this knowledge will break it down entirely. I wish to know what to do with the pieces when that moment comes.’
Rayan nodded, relenting to her logic.
‘I will go with Alder,’ Golan said.
Lettle shook her head. ‘No, you need to stay here, Golan. You have to run the Free the Light Initiative.’
‘You can do it without me.’
She gave him a sad smile. ‘Sadly, I cannot. You are Lightless, you are the beacon of the initiative. It could incite another rebellion if you disappear without cause. It has to be me.’
Rayan’s gaze snapped to hers. ‘You will go? Leave Mosima for four months? More, including the return journey?’
‘There is no one else,’ Lettle said softly, avoiding his stare. ‘I can speak to the Fates and guide our path. This is my journey as well as Alder’s.’
‘You’ll have to leave before we are under siege from the elven army,’ Furi said. This drew incredulous expressions until she explained what she had seen that evening.
‘They’re close, a few days away, maybe less.’
Lettle looked to the window, even though there was no sky in Mosima, no moon, no horizon. She imagined the army pouring through the cavern ceiling like ants and shivered.
‘We’ll go tonight. There’s no reason to wait.’ No reason to stay.
Rayan stiffened as though he’d heard her thoughts.
‘What of my nightmares? Without an obeah you won’t be able to translate my sleepwalking,’ Alder said.
‘I’ll go with them.’ It was like Yeeran had been waiting for the right moment to be the hero. Lettle tried not to roll her eyes.
‘No, you know the elven armies far more intimately than anyone here. You will be needed for diplomacy. ‘Furi said the word like a slur.
So it was decided that another fae would accompany them. Someone not important enough to miss, nor capable enough to be needed should they go to war.
Farhan had been both a burden and a source of amusement for Alder and Lettle.
He was beyond useless as a navigator or hunter, which was fine as they both excelled in one and the other.
But he had a fantastic baritone and a plethora of tavern songs that he would belt out every evening.
They’d had little entertainment over the last few months so his performances had brought a smile to their faces after a long day on the trail.