Eight - Mina
Eight
Mina
???
An avalanche of emotions threatened to bury me. Rage and joy. Greed and despair. Everywhere I looked, I saw them flickering. Growing. Dying. Feeding off each other and smothering each other.
I pulled my hand from the node, taking a large step away from the throne that sat partially within that wellspring of power. I grabbed my father’s hand and looked up at him, but I didn’t see the crown on his head. Instead, I saw a steely aura, his determination visible, even now that I no longer touched the node.
He smiled down at me, his expression one of sympathy, though his steely focus didn’t waver. “Never forget, ruling is a burden, Charmina, not a reward. You must feel what your subjects feel. Even when you don’t have access to magic, you must read their hearts. Learn to see what people hide. Sometimes it will be secrets, but other times it will be hurts.”
I woke with a gasp, the memory of my father’s voice fading. For a moment, I thought I could see those wisps of emotion around me, but it was only a remnant of my dream. I was too far from the castle to access the magic. I was not a mage myself, but the Devaoile family had a blood tie to one of the nexus points of magical energy that crisscrossed the world. Centuries ago, one of my ancestors had locked the node to his bloodline. That node now granted his descendants the power of heart-readers, but only when we were close to the node.
When the first Devaoile became king, he had built his throne room around the node. My dream had been a memory of the first time I had accessed that empathic power. As I readied myself for the day to come, I wondered why that memory had drifted to the surface. It wasn’t the most pleasant. With no experience to guide me, I had felt like I was drowning in emotions that first time, though using the node no longer overwhelmed me.
Tucking my necklace under the neckline of my shirt, I remembered the ring in my coin purse. Pulling it out, my father’s words from the dream took on new weight. Emotions. Secrets.
Hurts.
Alan had fled from me last night, and I couldn’t blame him. I didn’t know what had caused me to call him a disappointment. What I had seen of his work proved his talents. No one in their right mind would be disappointed in his skills.
I rubbed my thumb over the ring, feeling the details he had included, imprinting them on my skin. Those first few days after I visited the forge, I had been determined to solve the mystery of the village smiths. Then I had forgotten. Or, not forgotten, but decided there was no mystery worth my interest. I had acted like everyone else, dismissing Alan’s worth without hesitation.
Something very wrong was going on here.
I shoved the ring back in my coin purse and went down to breakfast, my determination to get to the bottom of the mystery once more strong.
Though the east-facing window in my bedroom ensured I didn’t lie abed too late, I still was the last person to rise every morning. I wasn’t used to country hours. Conrad and Sam had usually eaten and left for the village hall by the time I woke up. Eliza would always join me for breakfast, but I suspected that she had changed her habits to make sure I wasn’t left to eat alone .
This morning, though, everyone was still at the table when I made it downstairs.
Conrad saw my surprise and explained without waiting for me to ask. “I have a trial in Laer today. It doesn’t start until after noon, and I’ll be gone several days for it, so I’m taking a little extra time at home this morning.”
“And since Pa can’t very well scold me for shirking when he isn’t at work either, I’m being lazy,” Sam added with a grin.
Since he was managing to prepare a mug for me, slice bread, and take a bite of his own breakfast as he said this, I wouldn’t have described Sam as lazy. If anything, he had an abundance of energy.
I accepted my tea with cream and sat. “You aren’t going to Laer with Conrad?”
Out in the countryside, most villages didn’t have their own magistrate. Conrad lived in Skorsa, but he was the highest legal authority for several villages. Sam was an arbitrator who worked as his assistant.
“No.” Sam dropped the slice of bread he had just smothered in strawberry jam on a plate and passed it to me. “When he has trials, I stay in Skorsa and do the same thing the other villages’ arbitrators do when Pa is in Skorsa.”
Of course. Arbitrators took care of plenty of legal matters that didn’t require a magistrate’s official ruling. They weren’t assistants, much as it seemed Sam was. That was simply the byproduct of him living in the same small village as a magistrate.
“Unless something unexpected happens,” Sam continued, “I’ll probably spend the day writing reports on the trifling spats the villagers have had in the past few weeks.”
“Sam.” Conrad's voice held an edge of reprimand.
Sam rolled his eyes. “Sorry, the non-critical disagreements the villagers have had.”
I smiled, knowing that whatever Sam called them, he didn’t dismiss those problems as beneath his notice. He sought them out, his intention to solve issues before they spiraled out of control. Which reminded me of the issue no one in Skorsa seemed to recognize.
“Conrad,” I asked after swallowing a bite of bread and jam. “Did you ever go speak to Alan?”
He rubbed at his chin. “Alan Smythson? Why would I need to talk to him?”
“We spoke about it a few days ago. You said you would talk to him.”
“Right. I remember. Not sure that I need to talk to the boy, though. Won’t really change anything, will it?”
“If only it could be that easy to make him suddenly gain talent,” Sam chuckled.
I blinked. He had a point. A conversation with the village magistrate wouldn’t make Alan absorb any blacksmithing skills. It was a silly suggestion.
My thoughts stuttered as I tried to remember why I had felt outraged this morning. I pressed my hand against my purse, feeling the ring mixed in with the coins. My outrage returned. Alan didn’t need to learn anything.
I looked at the Wrisons and knew that I wouldn’t find any answers—or help—here. I needed to go to the source of the problem. Though I had only finished half of my breakfast, I stood.
“Mina?” Eliza looked at me in concern.
I tried to smile. “Sorry, I just forgot about how much I have to do today. I need to get going.”
Since everyone knew that I spent most of my days drifting around the village, joining people at whatever tasks they had going on at the moment, my answer only made them more concerned.
“I promised Gemma I’d help her at the shop this morning,” I told them, which wasn’t a lie. Not that the other woman expected me so early. Which they would know. “And I forgot that I need to run an errand first.”
“What errand?” Sam asked. “Maybe I can— ”
I shook my head. He wouldn’t let me get away with a vague answer, so I needed to give him one that wouldn’t lead to me being caught in a lie. “I broke my belt knife. I need to stop by the smithy and order a new one, and I have a few specific requirements. It will be easier if I go myself.”
Sam grimaced. “You’d be better off checking the general store. Powell’s knives don’t hold an edge very well.”
My lips parted in surprise. I had been prepared for suspicion, mentioning the smithy so soon after talking about Alan, not a critique of Master Powell. This was the first anyone had ever disparaged his abilities as a smith. I had heard grumbles about his work ethic and his willingness to make certain pieces, but no one had mentioned any concerns about his actual skill. Well, Sam had ridiculed the items in that display case, too. But those were different. “Just his knives? Don’t scythes need to hold an edge, too? If he can make farm equipment that holds an edge, why not knives?”
Eliza looked at her son with narrowed eyes. “I’ve heard nothing about any tools going dull prematurely.”
Sam shrugged, not meeting anyone’s eyes. “Maybe larger tools are made differently. I bought a few knives from Powell once, and they couldn’t cut anything, even after I tried to hone the blades myself.” He stood up, grabbing his plate. “I should probably get to work.”
We watched him scurry into the kitchen and out the back door.
“Oh, dear.” Eliza turned to her husband. “He must have bought those knives recently to be that flustered.”
“Or his reason for the purchase was so ridiculous he is embarrassed even years later,” I added.
Conrad raised an eyebrow. “I can’t think of a single non-ridiculous reason for him to have bought multiple knives.”
???
Thanks to Sam’s unexpected revelation of his past purchases, Conrad and Eliza seemed to have forgotten my odd behavior from the morning. I left without facing any further questions. I followed the same path I had taken the evening before, going out beyond the houses clustered close to the village square and down to the stream.
Once I stood by the water’s edge, I hesitated. Did I really want to break my belt knife just to snoop around the forge? Whatever replacement I received—no matter the skill of the maker—wouldn’t be as good. Not because my knife was a particularly impressive piece, but because I couldn’t actually ask for a proper replacement without raising suspicions. My current knife looked like those used by any other woman in the village, but it was designed as a weapon rather than a common tool.
I was no warrior, but I had studied the basics of self-defense since I was a child. I could use a normal belt knife as a weapon if needed, but it wouldn’t have the same balance. Not that I expected to need a weapon in Skorsa. If there had been any hint of danger, I’d never have been allowed to stay in the village without a squad of guards. Actually, I wouldn’t have been allowed to come at all, even with a company of soldiers.
I had never in my life needed to defend myself from a physical threat. I didn’t need the knife.
Yet, I still hesitated. My thoughts spun, and this time I recognized the feeling. I pulled the rose ring from my purse, and my doubts faded away, my thoughts coming clearly once more. Whatever was going on sucked me into the village mindset too easily. I needed to remember that Alan was a skilled smith.
I slipped the ring onto my finger, a touchstone. A reminder that the man I had insulted the night before didn’t deserve such scorn.
Then I unsheathed my knife, stood next to the boulder I had sat on the evening before, and drove it tip first into the stone with all my strength. The shock of impact reverberated up my arm, and I heard the rewarding sound of metal snapping. I looked down to discover the strike had only broken off the tip of the blade .
Not exactly what I had hoped for, but good enough. Tucking the tip into my coin purse, I re-sheathed the rest of the blade. Time to see a smith about a replacement.
I ran my thumb over the underside of the ring as I walked, keeping my goal firmly in mind.
The sun had risen well above the horizon by the time I crossed the village square to reach the smithy. I nodded at the villagers as I went, calling out greetings, and after each one, I had to remind myself once more that there was a mystery to solve. The ring was the only thing helping me maintain my determination.
I entered the small shop attached to the forge, the bell over the door ringing. Over by the cabinet with the hideous examples of gold smithing, a man fiddled with the placement of the goblets. He looked over his shoulder at me, then turned back, closed the cabinet and locked it. Only after he slipped the key into his pocket did he face me fully.
He looked me up and down, and I recognized the inspection for what it was: a catalog of the quality of my clothes. Each item was priced and my worth summed up in a glance. I knew exactly what the man would see. Clothes a little nicer than those worn by most women in Skorsa, but not by much. My bodice was a sapphire brocade, my skirt plain gray wool. The gold chain holding my charm was nothing extraordinary on its own, and the diamond was hidden from view—not that anyone thought it more than a crystal here.
I forgot about the ring, but from afar, even it barely garnered any attention.
I matched the smith’s scrutiny. Gerald Powell was tall and long in the face, with beady, dark eyes. His beard was just starting to go gray, though otherwise his hair was all a mousy brown. He had the build of a blacksmith going south. This wasn’t a man who still swung a hammer for hours every day.
“You must be Conrad's niece, the merchant girl.” His voice was reedy and nasal .
My finger rubbed over the ring once more, but I didn’t need the reminder. I was all too ready to paint this man as the villain in whatever the story of Alan’s life was. Instead, I needed to caution myself not to leap to conclusions.
I nodded and looked at his feet rather than give into the urge to glare. I modulated my voice, trying to sound as meek as possible. “I am, sir.”
“What do you want?”
I pulled out my knife, angling it so he could clearly see the broken tip. “I need a new belt knife, Smith Powell.”
“Alan!”
I winced at the shrill shout. Out in the forge, the muffled sounds of hammer on metal stopped. A few heartbeats later, Alan poked his head through the side door.
He spotted me and... well, I wasn’t sure what his reaction was, because he froze it before it happened. There had been the slightest widening of the eyes. Then... nothing.
“The girl wants a new belt knife,” Powell told his stepson. “When can I fit her in my schedule?”
Alan stepped fully into the shop. “Let me see what she needs.”
He came closer, his eyes fixed on the knife in my hands until he had crossed far enough into the shop that Powell wouldn’t see that his gaze had shifted. The look he gave me was full of mistrust.
Suddenly, I didn’t know what I was doing here. What had I hoped to learn?
Alan gestured at the knife, but I didn’t hold it out toward him. Maybe I didn’t need to learn anything here. But I needed to talk to Alan. And apologize to him. But not with his stepfather watching. I stepped closer, until I could feel the heat of his body and smell the smoke of the fire. When I was certain his shoulders blocked my face from Powell’s view, I mouthed the words, “Stream. Tonight.”
His head jerked as he took the knife from me and stepped back as if I had burned him. I wanted to ask what the motion meant. Was it a nod? A denial? Was it even an answer at all ?
But I could see Powell once more, and the narrow-eyed look he gave me and then his stepson sent a shiver down my spine. Oh, yes, whatever was going on here, he was the villain.
Alan held up the knife, inspecting it. Then he handed it back to me and turned to Powell. “It will be done in four days.”
Powell scowled, but said nothing. Alan walked back to the forge without another word or glance in my direction.
When the door shut, the smith crossed his arms. “It’ll be eight coppers.”
Nearly a half silver. An outrageous price for a simple belt knife, but I didn’t haggle. I could afford it. Better if the smith underestimated me. Let him see nothing more than a naive girl with no money sense. If he thought he was taking advantage of my purse, then maybe he wouldn’t notice that I wasn’t overlooking how he used Alan.