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“We’re drawing away,” he said. “Keep on this course?”
“For now,” said Karrilke. “Unless the wind shifts, which it shouldn’t.”
“We do anything for the girl?” shouted Tolther toward his mother, the wind blowing his words back into his face.
“Healing spell wouldn’t take,” Karrilke said. “Best leave the wound for now. If the wind doesn’t turn too much at dusk, we’ll be home by dawn. Let’s hope Astilaran can do something, save that foot.”
Ferin heard nothing of this, and did not feel the nor’easter that blew the fishing boat south. She was lost inside her own fevered mind, caught in a bubble of time from years ago. A very small part of her knew it was a dream, a memory, but that corner of her mind could gain no leverage to break her free and bring her to a conscious present.
She was in her own tent, made, like her clothes, of red-stitched goatskin. The dye for the red thread came from a scale insect in the oaks that grew on the lower slopes; the yarn was made from goat hair. Ferin neither spun nor dyed herself, nor did she look after goats, as would be normal for the children of the Athask people. All her time was spent in training and learning, readying her mind and body for its eventual occupation by the Witch With No Face.
In this fever dream, Ferin was having the Talk with the elder who had most to do with her, a woman named Jithelal, Jith for short. She thought of it as “the Talk” because it was a common subject, often returned to, particularly before the few festivals when Ferin was required to join the clan. At such a time she could almost feel she was another daughter, another sister, one of the Athask without difference.
“You are the Offering,” said Jith. “That means you are the best of us, or you will be. Strongest, fastest, most cunning.”
Ferin bent her head. She did not speak during the Talk.
“You live apart from us, not because you are not one of the Athask. You live apart because what you do is for all the people, not for one family. We are all your fathers and mothers, we are all your brothers and sisters, we are all the children you will not bear.”
Ferin bent her head again.
“You must be the best, for if we were to give less to the Witch With No Face, she would be displeased. In her anger, she would kill and despoil, perhaps slaying many of the Athask people. You, Offering, stand against her in the same way the strongest of a war party must turn against overwhelming pursuit, selling their life dearly so the others may escape. You are our hope, our shield.”
Ferin nodded again.
The dream blurred and changed, and all of a sudden Ferin was in the Offering’s Chair, which was really only a cushion set into the hollow in the middle of the great round stone that sat above the Athask people’s lower camp, where they wintered.
A huge bonfire burned on the flat before the stone, sparks flying up to the clear, cold sky and the full moon above, a ring of ice around its luminous disc. The dancing had finished, and now all the clan were engaged in the traditional act of gratitude to the Offering. The line had begun with the oldest, each person passing the Offering and taking her hands, just for a moment, to whisper their thanks for what she must do. Then the adults in their prime, the hunters, the warriors, the goat-herders, the spinners and dyers, the gatherers and others. Last came the children, those nearly full grown aloof and self-conscious; the middling ones tired and grumpy, and then the toddlers, last to come, for the babies were too small.
The very little ones, though they could walk, could not reach Ferin’s hands, and she was not allowed to bend down to them, for the Offering must bow to no one on this night. So they touched her feet and mumbled the words and toddled away to waiting embraces and straight to bed.
All save the last, who did not touch Ferin’s feet. Ferin looked down wonderingly, for this child did not look like the others. She felt a flash of fear as he . . . no, it . . . looked up, for instead of a face it had a mask of dull bronze, a half mask that did not cover its mouth, a mouth full of sharp teeth that it lowered upon her ankle and began to gnaw at Ferin’s flesh with horrible grunting noises, like a boar ripping with its tusks. Pain shot through Ferin and she choked trying not to scream, and then she kicked, trying to throw off this horrible thing that she knew was no child, but somehow the Witch With No Face herself, chewing on her leg—
Ferin woke up, still choking. For a moment she thought she was in another dream, for the night sky above was strangely slanted, and she smelled a scent she did not immediately know, until it came to her that it was salt, the salt of the sea, mixed with the reek of fish. She was on a boat, a fishing boat, and her ankle was not being chewed upon, but had been hit by a crossbow bolt.
“Drink again, if you can,” said someone, and a face came into view, a blurry face that sharpened as Ferin blinked, once, twice, three times.
“Tolther,” said the young man. “Remember? Feeling better? Your fever’s broke. That’s a good . . . good-ish sign.”
Ferin raised her head and tried to raise her injured leg at the same time. A stab of pain struck her in the head and she flopped back, gasping.
“No, best not move it,” said Tolther. He tucked the blanket back around her, careful not to touch her close. “You stay rested. We’ll be home safe at Yellowsands soon enough, get the healer to look at you . . .”
Something in his voice, some uncertainty or doubt she could hear, made Ferin turn her head toward him.
“There is trouble?” she asked.
“A raider follows us,” said Tolther. “Has been since before sunset. And they have a witch or shaman aboard, a wind-eater who keeps taking the breeze away from us, so they’re catching up.”
“A raider? Another boat?” asked Ferin. She struggled to sit up, Tolther helping her after a momentary hesitation. Her bow and arrow case were by her side, she noted, but it wasn’t light enough to see much else, save the dim outline of sails and rigging above.
“From one of the clans,” said Tolther. “Sky Horse. But that’s not what they call themselves. They come from the parts of the steppe nearest the shore north of here.”
“Ah,” said Ferin. “I know the clan. Sky Horse people . . . what they call themselves is Yrus, as we are Athask, though others call us Mountain Cat. I didn’t know the Yrus go to sea . . .”
“They don’t in spring, at least not normally,” said Tolther. “Only late in summer, into the autumn, and never in winter. At least I guess so; we lay up in winter as well, so maybe they’re out . . . but the storms are so bad I doubt it.”
“I feel the breeze now,” said Ferin. She could feel it on her face, cool and strong. “This wind-eater is not so strong, perhaps?”
Almost as she said the words, the breeze died away. Tolther grimaced.
“When the wind shifts, even by only a few points, we get it for a while, then whoever it is eats it up again.”
“Will they catch us?” asked Ferin.
“Not if I can help it,” said Karrilke, suddenly appearing next to her son. “Tolther, stand ready on the foresail sheet; trim it for any gust we can catch.”
“How close are they?” asked Ferin. She struggled to sit up higher, but found she couldn’t move her leg without suffering intense pain, which lessened if she kept still. Looking down, she saw it was greatly swollen around and above her ankle. Slowly, she looked away again, as if there was nothing of importance there, and instead picked up her bow. “Are they within bowshot?”
Karrilke looked down at her odd nomad passenger.
“Maybe for you,” she said. “From the stern. But I came to ask if you know how they can still be rowing at full pace. It’s been nine hours, more or less. The wind-eating, I’ve seen that before. Not often, but it’s known. But this rowing . . . any normal folk would have collapsed a long time since.”
“I know nothing of the sea,” said Ferin. “If you help me to the . . . the stern? I will look, and perhaps even kill the witch or shaman who steals our breeze.”
“You shouldn’t be moved,” said Karrilke. She he
sitated, then said, “As it is, the healer might have to take off your foot.”
Ferin shrugged.
“My foot, as my entire body, is nothing,” she said. “I must get the message I carry where it needs to go, and that means this boat must get to shore. Help me up.”
“It is easy to be brave when you are young,” said Karrilke. “And have little knowledge of pain. But you are right. Better to lose a foot than a life.”
The broad-shouldered woman bent down and lifted Ferin up under the arms. As her ankle dragged across the deck and her leg jerked and hung down when she was upright, Ferin blacked out from the sudden, intense pain. Only for a few seconds, but when she came back, the pain was still there, and she gasped several times as she tried to steady her breath. Her hand had also opened, and her bow had fallen.
