Chapter 51
Maylie
Fourteen winters old
THE SANCTUARY BELLS clanged, their rich, high peal ringing across the mountainside and rolling through the valleys.
Doors swung open as villagers poured out of the cottages and headed towards the main square.
They bustled together in clusters, chattering and laughing, voices overlapping, readying themselves for the mid-morning service.
From the doorway of her aunt’s cottage, Maylie watched them go. She saw mams carrying babies wrapped in furs on their hips and paps swinging the mittened hands of little girls and boys. She looked away.
Bending, she picked up the pack at her feet and stepped outside.
She pulled the door of the cottage shut and pressed her hand against the knobbly, crooked wood.
Despite the chill in the air, it was warm, like skin.
Closing her eyes, Maylie thought of Tadrie.
She remembered the plump, rosy woman her aunt had once been, not the wasted figure she had become before her death.
With a deep breath, Maylie forced herself to turn away. Esmelie and Ravie would be waiting for her by the west bank of the lake. They were due to disappear this afternoon while everyone was at the mid-morning service in the Sanctuary.
Maylie walked three paces down the trodden path before pausing again. Pebbles crunched beneath her boots. She turned back, not towards her aunt’s vine-covered cottage, but further – towards the forest. The trees loomed, dark and half shrouded in gloom. There, beneath the boughs, something stirred.
The creature was calling her.
It had been calling her for days now – soft at first, like a whisper on a breeze, then stronger, pulling at her consciousness, throbbing at the edges of her mind.
She clenched her jaw. She had squandered enough time already, pacing, hesitating, pretending she could ignore it.
But this was her last chance.
As the realization settled over her, she knew what she must do.
Maylie glanced over her shoulder. No one was around. With a breath half-held in her chest, she hurried up the slope, hopping over the stream that curved past her aunt’s cottage, and running on to the band of trees ahead.
When she met the fringe of the forest, she felt the air change, becoming cooler, damper.
She plunged beneath the leaves and the daylight faded, caught in the lattice of branches overhead.
Pushing through undergrowth, brittle twigs snapped beneath her palms, and her feet sank into soft, icy moss and half-rotted leaves.
It had been so long since she had entered the forest – not since the encounter with the Great Dragon – and she had forgotten how hushed it was, how completely the stillness wrapped around her.
You have finally answered my call.
The creature appeared instantly, its graceful, branch-like limbs quivering.
I have been calling you, it added. I have been waiting.
Maylie had not seen the creature in a long time, and she had forgotten how unnervingly beautiful it was. There were tiny white flowers sprouting across its forehead and thorns lining its eyes like lashes.
I am sorry, Maylie replied in that strange, ancient language. She felt her forehead squeeze with the effort. I have been … busy.
Your kin is dead.
Maylie’s chest tightened. Yes, she replied simply.
Yesterday had been Tadrie’s death ceremony, a simple affair in the Sanctuary attended by most of the villagers except Maylie’s pap, who had disappeared again. Tadrie had fought well, but in the end, she had succumbed to sickness. She was buried in the crypt next to Maylie’s mam.
The healer had magic like you, continued the creature. It runs in your blood.
Maylie shook her head. Auntie did not have a Gift.
The creature flicked a gnarled hand in a gesture of irritation. It runs in the blood of your family, it repeated.
But … my sister has no Gift.
Beauty is a sort of magic. Though it will not serve her well.
The creature seemed unusually restless. Something was wrong.
I have come to say goodbye, said Maylie, beginning to wonder if this had been a bad idea. She fiddled with the straps of her pack. I am leaving.
The creature made an angry, clicking noise that was like the clatter of branches in the wind. I have been calling you, it said. You must not go.
Fear prickled the back of Maylie’s neck. What do you mean?
Sorrow lies ahead if you leave the mountains. A great tragedy.
Near by a twig snapped. It could have been a deer or a rabbit. Or it could have been something else.
What do you mean? Maylie stumbled backwards, her skirts catching on a patch of brambles.
You must not go.
Maylie’s fear turned to anger. She should not have come to the forest. This creature did not wish her well.
Her aunt had been right; the Hidden People were dangerous and they could not be trusted.
At least if she left Silicia, she would never have to see the creature again.
There was one good thing to come of this.
I am leaving, she repeated. And I am never coming back!
She turned and fled, running towards the sunlight and emerging into the safety of a stark, familiar winter afternoon.
But not before she heard the creature’s answer: You are wrong.