Page 58 of The Starling and the Hatter

Frustration reared up when I realized that what I wanted was to go back to Dressle. But that would mean traveling alone, and as much as I wanted to be brave and independent, I wasn’t actually willing to risk traveling these mountains on my own. So not only could I not go back to Dressle, I also couldn’t go straight to Lorta in search of Robert. I would just have to hope that this time, Robert would stay put long enough for me to find him. Lorta was the last stop on this festival circuit. Surely he would stay through to the end.

And in the meantime, I needed to stop being distracted and start earning my keep. I managed to gather only a few bits in my coin nest that afternoon and went to bed both lonely and feeling like a failure.

The next morning, I awoke with renewed conviction and did my best to take control of my situation. But I met the sunset still ill at ease, and the next day was more of the same. I had success enough. Not as much as usual, but enough to meet my needs, and yet I found so little satisfaction in it.

I was wandering the festival on Thursday, looking for a good spot to start singing, when a woman caught my eyes. I smiled then looked away, but when my gaze drifted back to her, she was beckoning wildly toward me. “You, dear,” she called out. “Come here.”

Her invitation made me curious and was a welcome distraction. She was obviously some sort of fortune teller or mystic, an older woman bedecked in scarves and tinkling chains with a wreath of flora on her head. As I approached, she held out her hands, reaching for me as if I could not arrive quickly enough. Her theatrics made me smile, and I was unsurprised when she seized my hands the moment I was close enough. “Oh, I’m so glad you’ve finally come!” Her eyes were bright and luminous.

“Were you expecting me?”

She nodded vigorously, the twigs and leaves that crowned her head doing a miraculous job of staying in place. “For some time now.”

I smiled a bit. “Sorry to keep you waiting.”

She waved her hand through the air, and as she turned her head, I noticed a live caterpillar nestled on the leaves of her head. I looked closer and saw several ladybugs. Did she have spiders in there as well? I certainly hoped not.

“You’re exactly on time, never you worry,” she proclaimed, and I smiled at her contradictory statements. I appreciated a good performance, and she was very engaging.

“What is your name, mystic?” I asked.

“They call me Garnet, my dear.” Ah, so this was the fortune teller who was always warning Robert that the devil was after him. “Now, tell me.” She fixed her eyes on mine and asked with heavy meaning, “Who are you?”

“You’ve been waiting for me,” I challenged. “Don’t you already know my name?” I loved to watch performers who claimed clairvoyance to see how they responded to someone who didn’t fully buy their act on the first try. I had a feeling that this old-timer would handle my small challenge with ease.

What I didn’t expect was her response.

“I might not know your name, but the first time I saw you, I thought I recognized a kindred soul. You remind me so much of myself.”

My breath caught at the way her gaze intensified even more, as though she would discover every one of my secrets just by looking into my eyes.

“But,” she said, holding up one finger, “your name is not what I asked for. I want to know who you are.”

“You already know,” I said. If she’d seen me before, then she knew my act. But did she know me as the Starling? Or the Wolfe girl?

She shook her head. “I’m not interested in your family or your origin.” Garnet tapped her fingers over her heart. “Who are you? Down in the very core of your being. Can you tell me that?”

Who was I? Well…I knew who I wanted to be. I knew who I’d been before. I knew I wanted to feel loved and wanted. But did I really know who I was at the core of my being? “I don’t know,” I admitted in a bare whisper as the truth of it washed over me.

She kept hold of my right hand and placed her other hand on my shoulder. “That’s what you’re meant to find out. You see, I saw you years ago, and even then, I recognized you as a like soul to mine. You and me, we are a special breed. We are meant to be wild and free. We are meant to run with wolves.”

I blinked, hardly believing that her mentioning wolves was a coincidence. And yet, I was intimately familiar with the story of the wolf mother, so perhaps this was just another version of that story. Maybe she didn’t truly know me and was just using folklore and good storytelling to draw me in. Yet, she claimed to have seen me before, and she spoke of wolves.

She must have seen my recognition of the term, because she asked, “You know the wolf woman?”

“She gathers bones,” I said, guessing that we spoke of the same tale.

She nodded. “And so do you.”

I shook my head. “I’m not the mother of wolves.”

She smiled kindly. “You are more than you know.”

“You spoke of the first time you saw me. When was that?” Had she seen me perform with my brothers? Did she know the wolf wagon?

“It was in Duskmoor, two years past. You sang with such spirit. I knew then what you were—a wolf woman like me.”

I shook my head harder. “I don’t gather bones. I don’t put people back together. I’m not a wolf mother.” How could I be when my own mother hadn’t been able to stay and teach me?