Luce swiveled around to meet her stare. Both of them startled when a white crow dropped from the branches above. It swooped over Crony’s head then into the rooms, large wings stirring gusts that disturbed the fire and caught strands of Luce’s hair. The creature landed on the cedar chest, taking up half of the lid. It was beastly, its one eye as bright pink as the sky after the flash of twilight when the sun returned.
Luce leapt to his feet, dropped his jacket, and lunged at their grotesque guest. Stain yanked his jacket over, fishing out her necklace. She stuffed it, along with the tin of ointment and bandages, into her vest.
Caw-caw! the crow screeched, escaping Luce’s clutch.
Only it wasn’t a screech or a caw . . . it was a shrill, wordless lamentation—like wails sung by the dead and dying. Stain slapped her palms across her ears. White feathers fluttered down in a dreamy sequence as Luce chased the bird, and in the muffled silence, Stain wondered if that’s what snow looked like upon falling. Had she known at one time? Had that memory been taken from her along with the others?
A dog barked in the distance and prompted Stain to stand on her tender feet just as Crony crossed the threshold. Stain’s eyes held her guardian’s muddy gaze, and like the first time she awoke to the witch’s blindfolded, slumbering face, she couldn’t see the goodness and affection for the murkiness there.
You lied. It wasn’t . . . amnesia. Stain’s hands moved in such a spasmodic manner her accusations came out disjointed. My memories. You took them. Sold . . . or hid? Where? Why?
Her cheeks prickled with heat as she awaited an answer.
Crony averted her gaze and tipped her skull staff toward the crow, the flames in the fire pit glimmering off her black horns. “Thana, be ye gone, old bird! Tell yer mistress I’m minding me own, so she should do the same!”
Luce, who’d managed to catch the crow by its tail feathers, released it. It soared up, up, up, into the trees with thudding flaps until the canopy swallowed its hideous cries.
Luce watched with a strained expression. Stain wasn’t sure if the reaction was one of envy, or of remorse for all the secrets. The loose feathers still drifted, as if carried by an invisible force. Stain reached up and caught two, her eyes burning—a cruel tease to empty sockets.
Her life was a lie. She’d known that already. But she never realized Crony’s and Luce’s lives were lies, too. For they’d both been lying to her. She could have no revenge, because in every way, they’d been her family. They’d made her trust them. They’d made her love them.
She crushed the feathers in her hand and tossed the clump toward Luce, feeling as lost as his wings. Catching up her boots, she leapt across the threshold before either of her shouting guardians could stop her. Unless he transformed to fox form, Luce would never catch her. And if he tried, she would take to the trees.
She heard the dog of earlier barking once more, but it was distant. Just to be safe, she altered her route and stopped to slide into her boots. Forcing the leather over her damaged feet intensified the stabbing jabs of each puncture mark. Still, she pressed forward at a full sprint. The air stung the welts on her skin where thorns had left their mark. She’d learned long ago how to shut out discomfort, how to function in spite of it—on that day she met the one soul who had never lied to her: the beast of sky and wind and feathers and flame, who cared only that she ran alongside him—evenly matched.
The tin of ointment rattled next to the knife in her vest. She would see that Scorch would heal and fly again. Then she would avenge his wounds, as she could never avenge her own.
16
The Lachrymosity of Reminiscing
Somewhere in the distance, a dog barked and a crow keened in answer, loud and earsplitting—a discordant symphony of the natural and unnatural. Crony hoped wherever Dyadia’s nettlesome bird was flying, it would lead the prince to Stain. But Dyadia didn’t yet know the truth of the girl’s identity, which meant the prince didn’t know, either. And without him, how would the princess ever find her way to Eldoria’s castle to claim her fate? Wasn’t he supposed to be the lure to lead her there?
Crony had never wanted to return a set of memories to their rightful owner more than now. But if she did, the world would forever remain split in half. She couldn’t stop seeing Stain’s wounded expression, and it scored her innards as if she’d been running through the brambles herself, turned wrong side out. Crony and Luce had agreed neither of them should take chase . . . that it would only make her run farther, harder. The girl needed time with her Pegasus. If anyone could comfort her, the horse could. They had a strong kinship, those two. Crony had attempted to offer the child such a foundation herself, but a house built on mislaid bricks is destined to crumble.
None of this would have happened if Luce had kept his muzzle shut.
The witch stared at her sylphin companion across the short expanse of their skeletal kitchen, frowning. “What was ye thinkin’, dandy dog?” She was tempted to wrap him in filaments from her horns and string him up in the branches like all the stolen memories . . . those Stain assumed were her own. “Ye and yer blabbering tongue. Did the fleas wriggle themselves into yer brain and suck out all yer common senses?”
“That’s hardly fair. You know as well as I that parasites are lazy. It’s too far a climb from my tail to my head.” Luce’s smug frown looked every bit as fierce as her own must.
Her lips twitched. If she wasn’t so furious, she could try a smile. See if that might bring him some humility.
The tea kettle whistled, breaking Crony’s and Luce’s unblinking stares.
“You know I’ll have to go after her soon.” Luce made his way to lift the kettle from its hook. “The cessation course starts in a couple of hours. She doesn’t need to be out there in such a state.”
“May-let she does.” Crony found two teacups, cracked at the rims but suitable enough to hold water. She crumpled a handful of tea leaves and dried mint into each. “May-let her prince will find her now.”
“She already found him.”
Crony’s body tensed. “Where . . . when?”
“She was with him in the labyrinth when I saw them.”
“And . . . be he worthy of her? All that we hoped?”
Luce shrugged. “Not sure yet. They were fighting on the ground. Considering the man could easily have bested her in size, there’s something to be said for his gentleness. He was dressed as a Night Ravager; I only recognized him by his dark eyes. But there was no communicating between them. Instead of bargaining for the moths, Stain had nothing but shadows and crickets in jars, and bloody good they did.”
Crony thought back to the day when she’d shared the memory with Luce . . . the one where Stain was still Lyra—princess in the castle. The child had used moths to tell her aunt she would never be her mother. The first time Crony viewed it, she felt a warm flash of pride, even though she barely knew their young ward then. After Luce watched it, he suggested they arm Stain with moths so she might speak to the prince through the insects. He even arranged for Stain to get them herself by bargaining, thus keeping Crony and Luce from technically interfering. A shame that had fallen through.
“Where be the shadows and crickets now? May-let she can use them somehow, to intrigue him with their fealty to her.”
“She left them behind when she ran—after spending all morning haggling for them. You can blame her pesky horsefly for everything. He had the prince trapped and on the defensive. I’ve known biting midges with better self-control than that half-wit donkey.”
Crony snorted. “Have ye e’er considered that it’s her frolics with said donkey that made her wily enough to wrestle a trained prince and match his skills?”
“Ha! Her fighting skills were honed by watching drunken brawls between our upstanding citizens here. No need to credit the Pegasus with that.”
“Not so. She would ne’er have seen such skirmishes had ye been her only companion. Yer too protective. But Scorch led her into the thick of it all. Now, she be that prince’s equal, just as the prophecy said. I’m guessing that fact is turnin’ in our royal man’s head . . . that it be makin’ him think. Makin’ him wonder. I’m guessing he be searching for our ‘boy’ as we speak. That Pegasus may be an impulsive beast, but her walk with him has served a purpose.” Crony held up the two teacups so Luce could fill them. “In fact, best hope she’s walkin’ with him now. That ye didn’t send her hiding so deep none of us can find her.”
“I didn’t send her anywhere,” Luce snarled, hesitating on pouring the hot water. “Stain’s always had a mind of her own. In spite that we stole half of it. If you had been honest with me from the beginning, just once shared the reason why you made your damned vow . . . why it’s so unbreakable, I wouldn’t have been so tempted to tell her some snippet of truth.”