Knowing she wouldn’t sleep again, Vhalla dressed. A loose linen split-skirt was held in place by a belt around the waist. Overtop, she buttoned a long jacket made of the same breathable fabric. Her last adornment was a wide scarf looped around her head and neck.
Everything she’d ever read about Western fashions held true. Keeping the sun off bare skin was the most sensible way to survive the oppressive summer heat, and the fabric readily breathed in the constant winds. Cutting her hair again would also keep her cooler and would trim away the last of the faded dye that lingered around her frayed ends. But Vhalla was intent on growing it long once more and had yet to allow someone to take sheers to it.
In the corner of her tiny room, Vhalla pulled open a trapdoor. She put her feet to the rungs of a narrow ladder before taking a breath. Clenching her fists, Vhalla opened her magic Channel. Gripping the opening, she slowly pulled her feet from the rungs so she was only hanging by her hands. And then let go.
Rather than falling quickly, Vhalla eased down like a feather. Her hands hovered, ready to catch herself should the descent go awry, but that precaution proved unnecessary. Today was slower than yesterday, three times slower than a week ago. Her magic was becoming stronger—or Vhalla was better at managing it. Keeping the same pockets of air around her feet like boots made of wind, she padded across the small living space, not allowing any footfalls.
She relaxed her magic when she had descended most of the way down a side stairway into the dim bookshop below. Vhalla ran her fingers along the spines in the narrow bookshelf walkways. Some of the books were tall, some short, some old, and some new, but every book carried its own story, and she’d already devoured most of what the small shop had to impart.
Throwing back the shutters allowed the dim morning’s light to filter into the narrow space. After her first two weeks in the shop, her duties had become engrained. Now at nearly six weeks, she went about the shop-keeping with little thought. First came pushing back the shutters, then wedging the door open so the store didn’t become an oven. The wind wasn’t optional to surviving the day. But it carried in sand that settled on the books, horrifying Vhalla, and she set to dusting first thing every morning.
Her hands rested on one of the manuscripts on the end of the tallest shelf in the back corner, and her dust rag was quickly forgotten. Sliding it out, she ran her fingertips over the embossed cover, Kishn’si Coth. It was written entirely in the old language of Mhashan, and Vhalla had overlooked it for weeks as a result. It wasn’t until she’d devoured most of the books in Southern Common that she turned to language study, which finally allowed her to translate the title of this particular work.
“That one again?” a portly woman asked with a yawn, standing in the stairway.
Vhalla nearly jumped off her stool. Gianna wasn’t a Windwalker, but she knew her home and shop well enough not to make a sound coming down the stairs.
“I think I can almost read it.” Vhalla tried to shrug nonchalantly, slipping it back into its place on the bookshelf.
“Yae, tokshi,” the woman chuckled.
Vhalla wasn’t about to take “not yet” as an answer. “Vah da.”
Her careful pronunciation put a wide smile on the woman’s features. “What is your obsession with The Knights’ Code? I can’t even pay someone to take it off my hands.”
“Curiosity.” It was the truth, in part. A small part.
She’d come west, to the Crossroads, to escape everything—to go to a place where she could be no one and nothing. But when she came across mention of the Knights of Jadar in a manuscript on Western history, she’d set out to devour as much information about the group as possible.
Vhalla had only known the broad facts about them before, that they were a mysterious and unquestioned force founded by King Jadar in old Mhashan during the genocide of Windwalkers—the Burning Times—with the purpose of executing the king’s will. She hadn’t given the Knights much thought before the war against Shaldan, when she’d learned the Western zealots had been working with the Northerners against the Empire. Thanks to her reading, she was finally filling in more of the blanks, which was yielding some answers about why the group seemed to be bent on hunting her down.
“Breakfast?” the woman asked.
“Not hungry,” Vhalla replied, true to form. After the first week together, Gianna had given up trying to make her eat. Vhalla never felt hungry first thing in the morning. There was too much to think about, too many things to get started for the day.
Vhalla already held a wet quill when Gianna left the room. With diligent accuracy, the sorcerer recounted the dream she’d had the night prior. Perhaps with too much accuracy, Vhalla furiously scratched out the portion of writing about Aldrik’s hair, the gauntness of his face, and pallor of his skin.