Dreaming, her mind replied mockingly. He was in a trance, some kind of trance, like Annie Fowler gets sometimes when they ask her to tell tomorrow’s weather.
But Annie would merely close her eyes for a moment before predicting the weather, usually correctly. What happened to Jonathan had been something else entirely. It was almost like—
“Is practice over?” Jonathan asked.
“Yes.” She straightened, then offered him a hand. She would pull him to his feet, and that would be the end of it. She had fulfilled her neighborly requirement for today. She would get out of here, go down to the sheep farm, dye some yarn, and forget about this entire creepy scene.
Instead, she felt her mouth open and say, “What did you see?”
His expression drew inward. “What do you mean?”
She pulled him up. “Your father goes into trances. Mum’s told me about them. You were in one too. What did you see?”
“You can’t tell anyone about this.”
“Why not? It’s not my fault you decided to do it right in the middle of practice.”
He grabbed her shoulders and Katie tensed, suddenly realizing that he was nearly a foot taller than she was. She reached for her knife, but before she could pull it free, Jonathan released her and backed away.
“I’m sorry,” he said stiffly. “But I don’t want anyone to know.”
“Why not?” Katie asked, bewildered. “I would love to have the sight. I didn’t get any gifts from the Crossing.”
Jonathan gave her a measuring look. “All my life, people have been watching me, waiting for me to become my father in miniature. And that’s fine; I understand why they do it. But dynasties are dangerous. Whoever they elect to lead this town next, it shouldn’t be simply because he’s someone’s son. They’ll make a better decision if they think I’m like everyone else.”
“Isn’t it a little hard to hide?”
“Not really. I spend most of my time alone.”
Katie looked down, embarrassed. She had always assumed that Jonathan’s isolation was merely a function of social awkwardness; it had never occurred to her that it might be self-imposed. Thinking of the snide comments that she and Row had traded back and forth about him, she felt ashamed.
“Don’t,” Jonathan said, making Katie jump. “It’s the impression you were meant to get.”
Katie retreated, frightened again. Had he heard what she was thinking? Several teenagers in town had a little bit of that talent; Katie had overheard Mum and Aunt Maddy talking about it once. Mum said that William Tear had ordered them not to talk about these things, not to make the Crossing children feel singled out. Row could do extraordinary things with fire; it was his gift, just as Ellie Bennett could find water and Matt van Wye could make things vanish. Row did not showcase his ability either; only Katie—and perhaps Row’s mother—knew that this skill was what made Row such a fine metalworker. Katie, who had been born nearly two years after the Landing, had no such gifts, and had often envied them. But she sensed that the Crossing children, with their little magics salted around the Town like hidden eggs at the spring festival, were very different from Jonathan. Power seemed to surround him. Katie looked down and found that the hair on her arms was standing on end. She kept her hand on her knife.
“I’m no danger to you,” Jonathan told her.
Maybe not, but there was danger in him, all the same, and Katie struggled to analyze it. Hadn’t she just been thinking that the Town was a place where everyone was equally valuable, where all of their gifts came together to make a tapestry?
Equally valuable? What about William Tear?
Katie blinked. She wondered what Row would say if he knew what she had discovered here, and the answer came back instantly.
We don’t need another William Tear.
Yes, that was Row’s voice, but Row hadn’t been there that night, hadn’t sat on the bench and felt Tear’s greatness, the majesty of him. Tear had arranged with all of their mentors to shield this time, to pretend that they were all working at their apprenticeships when they were not, and so far the story seemed to be holding. But secrecy from Row was a different story entirely; he knew that Katie wasn’t being entirely truthful, and it had created a tiny divide between them. Katie hated this divide, but could do nothing about it. Although she still chafed occasionally at the strictures of the Town, its innate hypocrisy, she knew that she could never go against William Tear. Tear didn’t want to be worshipped as a god, or even a king; there was danger there, something innately hostile to the democracy he prized. But Katie worshipped him, all the same. And now here was Tear’s son, the odd duck of Katie’s school, a boy she had always dismissed as utterly unimportant, standing here with William Tear’s power flowing off him in waves. A new thought occurred to Katie, one she had never considered: what would happen to the Town when William Tear was gone?
“Will you take your hand off your knife?” Jonathan asked.