“That tune,” Hal whispered, his voice filled with wonder.
I stopped humming and mumbled an apology.
“Don’t be sorry,” he said. His fingers brushed my arm, and that spark of magic jumped between us again. “Are you the one I’ve heard singing?”
I froze, and Hal came to a stop beside me.
“Vespers,” he continued. “For half a moon, every day at sundown I’ve heard the saddest, most beautiful songs.”
“But how?” A strange feeling welled up, a muddle of fear and comfort. The gods might not have heard my prayers, but Hal had. It didn’t make sense. I hadn’t reached Valenko until today, and hadn’t spent a night there when I would have sung my vespers.
“The gift of Farhearing is from my father, the wind god. It’s the one thing his children all have in common,” he explained. “Like your Sight, I have to open myself to it, but it’s always there in the background. And someone as powerful as you? I could hear you from leagues away.”
I stared at him numbly, trying to make sense of his words.
His father, the wind god.
My father.
“But . . . I can’t hear things far away,” I said, confused. If all Hal’s siblings shared his gift, and I didn’t have it . . . My thoughts raced like animals trying to take shelter before a storm. The wind god had left me with Miriel. He had to be my father, didn’t he? I knew nothing of my mother, but I’d always had the wind to cling to as the place from which I’d come.
“Why would you be able to?” Hal asked. “It’s a gift unique to children of the wind. I’ve been able to hear most of my siblings since I was small. Pretty confusing when you’re a kid surrounded by mortals and they’re convinced you have a lot of imaginary friends—never mind that your ‘friends’ always seem to know when a storm is about to blow in and helpfully give you a warning about it.”
“That must have been hard,” I said, still not quite able to process what he was telling me.
“Sometimes. But other times my siblings were there for me when no one else could be. I’m grateful for that. The wind’s children have their families with them wherever they go.”
“You’re so lucky,” I said, afraid my voice might crack. Everything around me was unraveling, even the last thing I thought was true.
“Except when I wish they’d shut up. One time, my sister Thendra spent a fortnight yelling at anyone with half an ear to the west because she was goosed off that the king of Mynaria had taken down some buildings with rooftops she relied on to get around his crown city. Never mind that there were twenty other ways to go—she just didn’t like them. Bitter old cow. Learned some of my best insults from her,” he said fondly.
“What about the wind god—your father—has he ever spoken to you?” I asked.
Hal looked at me like I was daft. “Of course not. The gods only speak to the king when he visits the Grand Temple, or to clerics who’ve sworn to a lifetime of service to them. You really must not get any information up in that mountain village of yours.”
I frowned, remembering when the gods had spoken to me through Miriel and asked me to use my gift. Apparently that had been out of the ordinary, which made me think I’d best not tell him about it. Silence drew out between us as our boots padded over the spring-soft mulch beneath them.
“Which god do you belong to?” Hal finally asked.
“I don’t know,” I admitted. I had no seed of truth from which to grow my own story. I never had. Miriel didn’t lie, which meant that the gods hadn’t told her the truth about my parentage. By proxy, they had lied to me. A surge of anger accompanied the realization, so strong it nearly felled me. I fought it down, not wanting Hal to see me fall apart. I gripped the strap of my satchel like it might hold me together. “I was told the wind god was my father. That he brought me to my mountain.”
He looked at me with pity in his expression. “No chance of it. You would have heard us ages ago, and if anyone had ever caught wind of your voice before those glorious vespers, you would have had all of us begging you to sing us to sleep every night.”
Tears stung the corners of my eyes. I stared at the ground. The worst part was that I had always longed for what he described—to know what it was like to be wanted like that.
“Hey,” Hal said. “I’m sorry. I had no idea . . .”
“It’s not your fault.” I sniffled. “Someone lied to me. I just wish I knew why.”
“Well, I don’t have any answers, but I can offer you this if you need something to hang on to.” He held up his arm.
I hesitated only a moment before taking it, and like a gentleman he walked with me toward the trees. I swiped at my tears with my free hand, choking back the rest of my emotions. At this point it barely mattered who I was or where I’d come from. I ought to wait until I stopped Ina to worry about it, but still, it nagged at me, an impossible question to ignore. How was I supposed to start over somewhere new when I didn’t even know who I was?
Miriel had seen to my childhood needs for food and education, but sometimes at night when I woke from nightmares, I had cried, wishing for someone to stroke my hair and sing me back to sleep. Was it from my mother that I’d inherited the brooding tendencies for which Miriel had frequently scolded me? Did I look like my father? Which of them had been a god? Maybe my mother had been a healer, or another cleric of the earth god like Miriel—a person who might be responsible for my gifts with herbs or the deep connection I felt to the land. Perhaps my father had given me my dark hair or hazel eyes. Either way, it was unlikely I’d ever find any answers now. The thought gutted me. I belonged to no one.
Hal tripped just as we entered the forest, startling me from my dark thoughts. I let go of him, and he stumbled a few paces away to brace himself on a large rock.
“What’s wrong?” I asked. Anxiety rose again.
“I hoped it was just the darkness, but my vision is beginning to go. I must have overextended myself compelling those guardsmen.” His words tripped over one another.
I cast nervous glances at him as we skirted the edge of the forest. I wanted to put more distance between us and Valenko before making camp. The dark color of his eyes and the dim moonlight made it hard to tell, but the deeper we got into the woods, the wider his pupils seemed to be.
Then he stopped, and gripped my arm with a shaky hand. “We’re in trouble,” he said.
“What? How?” I asked, looking around and seeing nothing but shifting branches cutting through shadows and moonbeams.
“They’re coming,” he said, leaning against a tree. “I hear them.”
Before I could ask him what he meant, he collapsed to the ground, unconscious.
CHAPTER 11
I SANK TO MY KNEES BEHIND HAL AND SPOKE HIS NAME, but he didn’t stir. Some small nocturnal creature rustled in the bushes nearby. I extended my Sight but sensed only the forest around us and the city glowing with life in the distance.
“Wake up,” I whispered fervently. I didn’t want to face whatever was coming alone. It had to be Tamers, or worse, city guards. Fighting wasn’t my area of expertise. All I had in my satchel that could be used as a weapon was my silver knife or a handful of nightshade powder.
Then I remembered—if Hal had overextended his abilities, his collapse must be the result of a severe headache. I dug through my satchel, pulling out a vial of lavender oil and another of peppermint. I dabbed the lavender on his temples and held the peppermint under his nose. His head tipped to the side and a groan escaped his lips.
“Hal? Are you awake?” I put my hand on his forehead.