‘Not on your life am I sleeping in there. On the floor. In rags.’
‘Let me past, then.’ Noon pushed past him, heading into the gloom of the den. She poked around until she found a free blanket and then dropped to the floor. In a moment she had her head tucked under her arm and her hat pulled down over her face. She seemed utterly unconcerned by all the warm bodies around her.
‘Vintage, really. What is this place?’
‘It’s someone’s home, like any other, so keep a civil tongue in your head. These are the Keshin people. There are little pockets of them all through these forests. They live and hunt out here, and occasionally trade. Their main source of meat and fur are a particular type of nocturnal hare. They keep this room for the hunters who have been out all night and want to grab a nap.’ She lowered her voice. ‘Look, Tormalin, my darling, we need a rest, do we not? And we need it under cover.’ She glanced up at the circle of sky, now the colour of a spring bird’s egg. ‘I don’t want another visit from that fiery bitch.’
‘Vintage,’ said Tor, glancing at Noon’s indistinct form, and lowering his voice, ‘by all the roots, why didn’t you just hand her in? We all make mistakes, and, as usual, yours has come from a place of kindness, but this waif is not worth getting us killed for.’
Vintage lifted her chin, her face stony. ‘That waif saved our lives back in the Shroom Flats.’
‘That’s debatable.’
‘And can you truly imagine me just handing her back to the filth that is the Winnowry?’ Vintage sniffed. ‘Tor, my dear, do you know me at all?’
Tor snorted in disgust. ‘Well, at least if that fiery lunatic does find us, this place will go up like kindling, and it’ll all be over swiftly enough.’
Vintage turned away from him in disgust. ‘I’m going to bed. I suggest you do the same, if you can fit your lanky arse in here.’
She found her own space, whispering apologies to the sleeping men and women she stepped over, before disappearing into the shadows. Tor stood for a moment, at a loss. A quick glance around the so-called Keshin village was enough to tell him there wouldn’t be anywhere to get a decent drink, so with little other choice, he crouched down and shuffled into the darkened chamber. It was warm inside, and filled with the unmistakeable odour of human bodies. Tor grimaced, looking around for an empty spot away from everyone else, but the only free section was next to Noon. He stepped over her – she was already asleep somehow, her breathing slow and deep – and settled himself between her and the twisted mat of twigs and branches that was the wall. From here, the entrance was a dull moon of yellow light, until someone pulled a gauze curtain over it. The whole place smelled strongly of rabbit.
‘Just marvellous,’ he murmured to himself. ‘Absolutely marvellous.’
Someone from somewhere in the dark shushed him, so he lay back and closed his eyes. To cheer himself up he pictured Serena and Ainsel. They would be back in Mushenska now, going about their daily lives with no idea that their beloved Tormalin was currently sleeping in squalor. Serena and her skin that smelled of summer fruit, Ainsel and the smooth column of her neck. He pictured evenings they had spent together, lazy afternoons, and on the tail of that, he thought about the taste of their blood. Sex and blood: the two were always mingled, like a smell that brought back how it felt to be a child, or a song that holds the last memory of someone dear. The taste of their blood, the strength that it brought, and the touch of a willing hand. He was never quite sure which he craved the most – except that wasn’t entirely true.
A small noise from beside him brought him back from his recollections. Noon had shifted in her sleep, her face turned up to the ceiling. In the dim light he could see that her eyes were squeezed shut, her mouth turned down at the corners, as though she were tasting something bitter. A cold hand walked down Tormalin’s spine: she was having a nightmare. He thought of their conversation in the woods – could she be having the same dream again, the same one as Ainsel? If she was, that had to mean something. He had to know for certain.
Sitting up, he moved closer to the sleeping witch. He felt an odd pang of guilt, half expecting Vintage to appear and chastise him, and then he closed his eyes and slipped into the netherdark. Dreaming minds were pressed in closely all around him, but Noon’s was impossible to miss – she was the closest, and now that he knew her, it was almost familiar. He pushed away a brief memory of her warm hand on his neck and slipped through into her sleeping mind.
She was dreaming of a bright, sunlit day. White clouds daubed the horizon, and in all directions, there was grass as high as his waist; a tired, dusty green. There were large tents behind him, shaped like cones and draped with various animal skins and woven blankets and painted silks. There were horses here, and men and women with the horses. They were plains people, and they were going about their lives peaceably enough. He saw young men and women; warriors with horsehair vests and deer-skin trousers, with short, curving swords at their waists. He saw riders leading their horses to hunt, and a man turning a great side of meat over a fire. There was an old woman sitting amongst a crowd of children, and she was dancing a pair of puppets for them, telling them some story about the stars and the storm winds. It was a peaceful picture, full of the detail and warmth that told him it was a true memory, something cherished even. And then he remembered the distress on the fell-witch’s face. He had not mistaken that.
Sensing a shape next to him, he looked down to see a child. She was around ten years old. Her black hair was tied back into a short, stubby tail and she carried a wooden sword in her hand. At once, all sense of peace and warmth vanished. Instead, Tor felt a wave of terror move through him, as sudden and as cold as a riptide. Threat was all around them, he realised, he just hadn’t seen it before. Surely the Jure’lia would now arrive, coming from a blameless sky to kill them all.
‘It’s all connected.’
The girl’s voice was soft, and she did not look at Tor when she spoke. Instead, she continued to stare keenly at the scene around her.
Tor waited, but there was nothing more. He stood for a while with the child, making himself a shadow on the grass so that she would not notice him, but nothing came; no corpse moon, no wave of hungry black beetles, and she did not speak again. There were just the people, caught in this moment of living their lives, and this strange, serious girl, standing just beyond their circle, watching them. And the sense of a terrible calamity looming never lessened.
Quietly, a whisper on the breeze, Tor left. Whatever it was the girl faced, she would face it alone.
24