And in the dream, it seemed he missed her, too, calling her name from the other side of a courtyard she did and didn’t know:Fie. Fie. Where are you?
The sun-warmed tiles stuck to her bare soles as she padded across the courtyard.Here, she tried to say, but no sound came out.
Fie.
She caught at his elbow and he shook her off, gaze skipping over her like a stone on water.It’s me, she shouted noiselessly.I’m right here.
Fie!He walked away, scanning the arching corridors about the yard, the latticed gallery above.
She followed—and caught her own reflection in a pane of Peacock-green glass.
Red stained her plain linen shift, pouring from a gash across her throat.
Her face belonged to the Peacock girl she’d killed not five days ago.
Fie!
It’s me, she tried to say, choking on blood.It’s me—
“FIE!”
She jolted awake with a sucking gasp.
Wretch’s and Lakima’s faces swam above her. Lakima sat back and let out a long breath, eyes closing. “Thank the Mender.”
“You were out cold.” Wretch helped Fie sit up. The camp tilted and blurred, all much brighter than it ought to be. “Thought you slept through pack-up on account of burning all those teeth last night, then none of us could wake you.”
“It’s a healer’s sleep,” Lakima said. “We put patients in them for serious wounds, but… I’m the only other witch here.”
“Could Rhusana have obtained one of your hairs?” Khoda asked, rubbing his chin. All a Swan-caste witch needed was a strand of someone’s hair in order to twist their desires to terrible ends.
Fie shook her head. “I’d already be dead.” She peered about the camp, which seemed curiously empty.
And that was when the answer, horrid and gutting, came to her.
Lakima wasn’t the only witch who could use the Birthright of blood.
She twisted about, staring at the sleeping mat, and saw naught. Her throat closed. Her voice came out as a squeak. “Was I moved at all?”
“No,” Wretch answered.
“When did Drudge and his band leave?”
“Before dawn.”
Fie pushed herself to her feet, heart beginning to pound. “Which way did they go?”
“What’s wrong, Fie?” Wretch asked.
Fie’s breath came faster and faster. She scanned the grass about her sleeping mat—naught. The ground where Lakima and Wretch knelt—naught.
“What’s wrong?”
The head of her sleeping mat—naught.
“He took my teeth,” Fie answered, hollow. “The bag. They’re all gone.”
Quiet gasps swept through the camp.
