Chapter Eighteen Frejara #2
I knew very little about the Seers, or the Sight, or what my Mother had wanted with them.
But I remembered the faces – half-grown boys and girls, pulled from their homes in the dead of night, eyes wide and mouths shut, ushered past me in the great corridor outside her chambers.
I had watched them go with a kind of dull curiosity, never seeing them return, never asking why.
Even then, some part of me must have known they weren’t sent for service or training, that they hadn’t been chosen for greatness or reward.
They simply vanished. My Mother did not suffer reminders of the Old Gods – or the gifts or curses they left behind – especially not the kinds she herself did not wield.
The voices faded, swallowed by stone and distance, until only the scrape of wind through the ruin remained.
The bindings dug in where my shoulder had slumped, the floor pressing hard against bone.
Grit worked its way through the seams of my coat, catching on dried blood, and beneath it all, thirst swelled thick in my mouth, wanton and persistent.
Time dragged, marked only by the ache in my muscles and the bite of the bindings against my skin.
Then, between one breath and the next, footsteps began to gather – faint at first, absorbed by the stone, then clearer: two sets, steady and unhurried, weaving their way back through the narrow entrance of the ruin.
They emerged from the shadowed arch together – Mathias first, his coat dusted pale at the knees, hair dampened into unruly curls that clung to his brow.
He moved with the same careful rhythm I remembered from before, like someone still learning the dimensions of his own intent.
His steps slowed as he reached me, eyes scanning the way I’d slumped, the way the ties had twisted deeper in his absence – and behind him, a woman followed, stepping into the light without word or pause.
She came forward with a steadiness that belonged more to habit than caution, her frame wrapped in a long coat the colour of churned earth, hems stiff with old wear.
She paused just beyond Mathias, close enough that the faint scent of crushed leaves and woodsmoke reached me.
Her face was weathered but not worn down, her features drawn into a composure so practised it barely read as expression at all, and yet in the tilt of her head, in the way her gaze moved across me—not over me, but through the angles of pain, sweat, and filth—was something almost gentle.
She crouched beside me with the ease of someone returning to a familiar task.
Her coat brushed the stone, heavy at the hem, the faint scent of dried herbs clinging to its folds.
Her hands reached for the bindings first, fingers brushing the sore skin at my wrists, assessing the damage with a healer’s precision.
Then she leaned in, her eyes narrowing slightly as they tracked the curve of my spine – searching, almost reading, like something written there had begun to surface.
The heat hit as her gaze landed on the birthmark just over my shoulder blade.
It wasn’t the familiar throb that came when the weather turned or the old bruises ran too deep.
This was sharper – precise, driving deep, as if the mark had come alive beneath my skin.
It didn’t flare. It pierced – sudden and absolute, as if it had split open and something buried within was clawing its way up through muscle and memory and bone.
My breath went shallow, fractured. My shoulders locked before I could stop them.
The woman leaned in, her brow furrowing slightly as her gaze followed the line of the mark with steady, measured intent.
Her hand lifted, hovering close enough that I could feel the warmth of her skin bleeding into the space between us, though she never quite touched me.
I felt her watching the way my breath shortened, the tension drawn sharp through my shoulders, the skin around the mark still twitching beneath the ghost of pain.
Her face didn’t shift much, but her focus deepened – more precise, more certain – as if what she saw confirmed something she already knew.
She lingered a moment longer, then rose in one smooth motion, the hem of her dress catching against the floor as she turned away without a word and stepped back into the light beyond the arch.
As the woman pushed past him, Mathias stepped forward, a flask cradled in one hand, a folded blanket in the other.
He knelt beside me, placed the water within reach, and shook the blanket loose before settling it over my legs.
The fabric was thick and sea-worn, carrying the scent of smoke and salt.
He adjusted it with quick, practised movements, then stood and looked at me – not long, just enough to see that I was still watching.
“The cold settles deeper than it seems here.” He said, and then, “I’ll come back in the morning.”
He didn’t wait for me to answer, only turned and followed the woman back through the arch.
I listened until the sound of him was gone.
The blanket was indeed thick enough to keep the cold at bay – though it did little for the ache still burning beneath my skin.
I drew it closer around me all the same, curled beneath the rough wool, and stared into the dark, letting it press close on all sides while my birthmark pulsed slow and steady at the base of my neck – not flaring now, but refusing to fade.