CHAPTER SIXTEEN THE CHILD WHO SAW
G eorgie knew three things.
Her mama was alive.
Euan was bleeding.
And Sheriff Duncan Bell was lying.
She knew the last one best because he always smiled too much when he lied. Not a happy smile either. Not like Tavish when she had bitten him and he pretended not to be impressed. Duncan’s smile looked like a door closing quietly.
Georgie did not like doors closing quietly.
She clutched Lorna’s hand tighter as the silver fog crept over the snow toward them. The Grove was awful. Worse than the stories. Worse than any nightmare she had made up in the castle while everyone whispered and cried and thought she was too small to hear.
She heard plenty.
Grown people always forgot children had ears.
The trees were black and bent, and wolves moved through smoke like shadows with teeth. Men shouted. A white fire burned against a root and hissed when snow touched it. Somewhere in all of that, her mama stood with silver in her hair and light in her hands, looking not dead at all.
Georgie had known she was not dead.
Well, she had hoped very hard, which was nearly the same if one had enough stubbornness.
Euan was harder to see through the smoke, but she caught glimpses of him. Tall. Bloody. Terrifying. Alive. That was important. He had tried to go away and be dead, which was rude and foolish and very like him when he got that tragic look on his face.
Mama would shout at him later.
Good.
Someone should.
“Stay behind me,” Lorna said, pulling Georgie back so abruptly that Georgie nearly stepped on her own hem.
“I cannot see.”
“You do not need to see.”
“That is what people say when they are about to lie.”
Lorna looked down at her, startled despite the battle. “You sound like your mother.”
“Thank you.”
“That was not entirely praise.”
“It should be.”
Lorna opened her mouth, then shut it again as a Crown soldier stumbled out of the smoke ahead of them. His face was covered with a leather mask, and he held a silver tipped blade that glowed meanly in the white morning. Lorna shoved Georgie behind her and lifted a short knife.
The soldier took one step.
Tavish came from nowhere with a snarl and hit him so hard they both disappeared into the fog.
Georgie tried to run toward them.
Lorna caught her around the waist. “No.”
“But Tavish.”
“Tavish is doing his job.”
“He is not very good at listening.”
“Neither are you.”
That was unfair, mostly because it was true.
Georgie twisted in Lorna’s hold, trying to find her mama again. The fog moved between them in dirty silver waves. It smelled bad. Like old pennies, burned hair and the time a village man had brought Mama a wolf trap to clean and she had thrown it out the door.
Georgie coughed.
Lorna pulled her cloak up over Georgie’s nose. “Breathe through this.”
“It tastes like sheep.”
“It is wool.”
“That explains it.”
A hand closed around Georgie’s shoulder.
At first she thought it was Lorna moving her again, but the fingers were wrong. Too tight. Too careful in a way that hurt more.
“Come here, child.”
Georgie went cold.
Lorna spun, but two Crown soldiers surged from the smoke and drove her back. One caught her knife arm. She kicked him hard in the shin, which Georgie thought was excellent, but the other man shoved the butt of his spear into Lorna’s stomach. She folded with a gasp.
“Lorna!”
“Do not fuss,” Duncan said, his hand sliding from Georgie’s shoulder to her upper arm. His fingers dug in. “Your mother has made enough of a spectacle.”
Georgie tried to pull away.
He held fast.
He looked down at her with that same old smile. His hair was damp. There was ash on his coat and a scrape along one cheek. He smelled of smoke, sweat and something sharp that made her nose sting.
“Let go,” Georgie said.
“I am taking you somewhere safe.”
“No you are not.”
His smile thinned. “You are frightened. That is understandable.”
“I am not frightened.”
“You are trembling.”
“I am angry.”
That made his eyes change.
Just a little.
He crouched lower, bringing his face closer to hers. Georgie hated that. Adults always thought being close made them kinder. Sometimes it only made their breath worse.
“Georgina,” he said.
“My name is Georgie.”
“Your name is what your family calls you.”
“You are not my family.”
His hand tightened so sharply she gasped.
Across the Grove, a wolf howled. Georgie looked wildly for her mother, but the smoke had swallowed everything. She saw flashes only. Light. Fur. Euan’s dark shape striking down a soldier. Mama turning suddenly as if she had heard something.
Maybe she had.
Georgie sucked in a breath.
“Mama!”
Duncan’s other hand clamped over her mouth.
“Enough,” he hissed.
The pleasant mask had gone now. Without it, his face looked older and meaner. Georgie bit his glove.
He cursed and snatched his hand back.
“You little savage.”
“I learned from wolves,” she snapped.
That was not entirely true, but it seemed to bother him enough.
He hauled her closer, half dragging her toward the trees where a black wagon waited behind the smoke. It had iron wheels and a covered back. She did not like it. She had never seen it before, but she knew she did not like it. Bad things waited inside covered wagons during battles.
“Stop,” she said, digging her heels into the snow.
“You will come with me.”
“No.”
“Your mother is no longer fit to care for you.”
Georgie stared at him. For one second she forgot to struggle.
“What?”
His mouth curved again, gentler this time. That was the worst one. “Look at her, child. Look at what that beast has turned her into. She is not the woman who made your soup and tucked you into bed. She is dangerous now.”
Georgie looked toward the smoke where silver light burst up for a moment, bright and fierce. A wolf screamed, then breathed again. Her mama’s voice came through the chaos, snapping at someone to stay still or she would sit on them.
Georgie’s chest hurt.
“That is my mama,” she said.
Duncan’s jaw tightened. “That thing is not your mother.”
Georgie kicked him.
Hard.
Her boot connected with his shin. Not as well as she wanted, but enough to make him grunt.
“Do not call her a thing.”
“You need discipline.”
“I need you to let go.”
He shook her once, not terribly hard, but hard enough that her teeth clicked. “Listen to me. The Crown will place you under proper guardianship. You will have schooling, protection, a respectable home. You will not grow up among animals and witchcraft.”
“I like animals.”
“This is not a game.”
“No,” Georgie said, and her voice shook now, which she hated. “It is you being horrible.”
Something flickered behind his eyes.
Anger.
Real anger this time. Not the neat sort he kept folded behind law. This one came hot and ugly. His fingers bit into her arm.
“You are her daughter,” he said. “Same mouth. Same ingratitude. I tried to save her from this.”
“No you didn’t.”
“What would you know of it?”
“I know Mama hides her face when you come to the cottage.”
His grip loosened for one shocked second.
Georgie should have run.
She should have screamed again.
Instead, because she was angry and small and perhaps not sensible, she kept talking.
“I know she locks the door twice after you leave. I know she tells me not to answer if you knock. I know Euan scares bad men, but you scare women when no one is watching.”
Duncan’s face went pale, then red.
“Be quiet.”
“No.”
He lifted his hand.
Not high. Not enough that someone from far away might see and understand. But Georgie saw. She knew what it meant before he did it.
And something inside her went very still.
It was strange. The battle sound faded. The smoke slowed. Duncan’s fingers around her arm felt far away. Under her skin, something warm opened like a coal breathed on by wind.
Not fire.
Light.
Gold light.
Mama’s light.
Georgie looked down.
Her hand was glowing.
Duncan saw it too.
His eyes widened.
“What are you?”
Georgie did not know.
She only knew he was hurting her and had said Mama was not Mama and Euan was bleeding somewhere and grown men were forever trying to carry people off when no one asked them to.
So she shoved her glowing hand against his wrist.
Duncan screamed.
He released her so fast she fell backward into the snow.
For a moment Georgie just sat there, staring.
His glove smoked.
Not burned like fire. More like light had gone under the leather and found something rotten there. He ripped the glove off and stared at his reddened wrist with horror.
Georgie stared too.
Her hand had stopped glowing.
Mostly.
A faint gold shimmer still clung to her fingers.
“Oh,” she whispered.
That was not very helpful, but it was all she had.
Lorna crawled through the snow and grabbed Georgie from behind, yanking her back. “Move, child.”
“I burned him.”
“Yes, well done. Move.”
Duncan looked at Georgie with such hatred that the small proud feeling in her chest vanished.
“You little curse.”
A snarl tore through the Grove.
Not from Euan.
From Mama.
The smoke split for half a breath, and Georgie saw her mother across the clearing. Marion stood with light blazing in both hands, golden eyes fixed on Duncan. For one moment she did not look like a woman or a wolf.
She looked like every warning ever given to foolish men.
“Georgie!” Marion shouted.
“I am fine!” Georgie shouted back, which was not exactly true but seemed important.
Euan was beside Mama then, blood on his shoulder and murder in his face. He started forward.
A canister burst between them.
Silver smoke rushed up in a wall, cutting Marion and Euan from view.
“No!” Georgie scrambled to her feet.
Lorna caught her again. “Stay down.”
Tavish reappeared from the fog, limping, with blood down one side of his face. “Georgie!”
“I burned him,” she told him, because it still seemed like news.
“Excellent,” he said, then shoved her behind him as Duncan reached for the fallen silver blade at his feet.
His hand was shaking.
Not from fear now.
Rage.
“You will come with me,” Duncan said, voice low and ugly. “Both of you if need be.”
Tavish lifted his sword, but two soldiers moved out of the smoke behind Duncan. One had a crossbow. The other carried a canister with silver wire wrapped around black glass.
Tavish went still.
Georgie’s little spark fluttered again, weakly.
Not enough.
Not yet.
Duncan saw it and smiled.
There was nothing pleasant left in it.
“Do that again,” he said softly, “and I will make certain your mother watches what happens next.”
Georgie’s throat closed.
From somewhere beyond the wall of silver smoke, Marion screamed her name.
Duncan stepped toward her again, blade in hand.