Bones of Faerie (21 page)

Had my father ever held me like that? I couldn't remember.

Beside him Caleb said slowly, “We thought you were dead. When we saw the rockslide and the light and the scraps that were all we could find of your backpacks.” Unlike Samuel, Caleb's face and voice held no expression. “We thought you were dead, and we thought your town should know.”

I stood and met his gaze, not caring what he saw. “My mother is dying.” My throat tightened around the words. “Can you save her?”

Caleb looked past me, and his face grew more impassive yet, like stone. He strode across the room to where Mom lay. I knelt by his side.

He ran his hands along her body, a series of short feather touches, none lingering too long.

“I couldn't heal her,” Allie said in a small voice. Samuel still held her. “I tried, but I couldn't—I mean not without…”
Caleb turned to her. “You did well,” he said, and for an instant his expression softened. “I am glad you did not attempt more.”

“But
you
can heal her, can't you?” Allie asked. I didn't dare speak, for fear of his answer.

“By the powers that be I'm going to try.”

“Right, then.” Allie squared her shoulders, pulled away from her father, and moved to Caleb's side.

Caleb shook his head. “Not this time, Allison. This I have to do alone.”

“You'll go too far if I'm not here. You know you will.”

Caleb set his hands gently on Allie's shoulders. “You are as gifted a healer as any faerie-born I had the honor to teach Before,” he said. “But as your teacher I tell you that you are not ready for this.”

“At least let me be your watcher.”

Caleb cast an unreadable look my way. “Liza will watch.”

“But why—”

“Trust me, Allison.”

Allie drew a breath. “You'll make him be careful, won't you, Liza? You'll make sure he doesn't go too far?”

“I promise,” I said, but my thoughts were with Mom,
hoping, not daring to hope, there was something Caleb could do.

“I'll stay, too,” Matthew said.

Caleb shook his head. “Only Liza.” There was something in his voice—I still didn't trust him, not completely. But whatever the risk, I would take it.

Matthew reached for my hand again. His grip felt cool in mine. “Call if you need me. I'll be right outside.” He squeezed my hand, then left. Kate and Samuel and Allie followed him, leaving me alone with Caleb and Mom.

Caleb brushed the hair back from Mom's forehead and gently traced the plated quia leaf she wore. Some thing slipped in his face, letting grief through. “You were right, Tara. I never should have forced you to leave. The mistake was mine. I know that now.”

Caleb turned to me, and his face hardened again, reminding me of the man who'd held me to a mirror. I didn't look away from him, though.

“Two things,” he said, his voice hard as his gaze. “First: an apology. I had no right to force visions on you, or to enter your thoughts to see where the visions led. There were other ways, and I should have remembered them. I ask that you forgive me.”
I said nothing. What was done was done. Like the War—it remained there behind us, whatever words we spoke or didn't speak. After a long moment, Caleb went on. “Second: once I start this healing, you are not to stop me. No matter what happens. Do you understand?”

I understood far too well. I thought how I'd promised Allie, and shame burned my cheeks, but I remained silent.

Caleb nodded, taking my silence for the answer it was. “At least the fever's gone. That's a help.” He placed his hands on Mom's chest. For a moment, two moments, his expression remained calm. Then his face tightened as if in pain. Mom bolted upright, screaming.

My heart pounded so hard I thought it'd burst from my chest. Caleb forced Mom back to the pillows, light flowing like water from his hands. Light flowed over Mom's chest and abdomen, her arms and legs. Her screams gave way to whimpers as she fought Caleb. Her eyes opened wide, but whatever she saw, it wasn't us. She struggled on. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't look away. Caleb's fingers dug into Mom's shoulders. She lurched up again and heaved violently, spewing blood and vomit on her clothes and his. When she fell back to the pillows, I rolled her to her side, even as Caleb fell beside her.
He pulled himself up with visible effort and put his hands to either side of her face. “Tara,” he whispered, and I couldn't tell whether the name was a call or a prayer.

Mom opened her eyes, and tears spilled down her cheeks. Caleb traced a track through them with one finger, then sighed and sank to the floor, his lips twisting into a smile.

Mom sat up and looked at me, her eyes clear and focused, seeing me at last. “Liza,” she whispered, as if in pain still. “Lizzy, my baby, my girl.” She pulled me into a fierce hug.

I thought of all she'd hidden, of all she hadn't trusted me to know. I thought of how I'd found her and how she hadn't wanted to be found. But I hugged her back, drawing shuddering breaths, clinging like a child.

It took me several heartbeats to realize how silent Caleb was, several more to draw away from Mom. I put a hand to his neck. The skin was warm but I felt no pulse.

“Caleb,” I called. No answer. I turned the word to a command.
“Caleb. Kaylen.”
Still nothing.

My throat went dry.
I promised Allie,
I thought again.

Mom reached out as if to shake him, then drew away, pain settling more deeply over her features. I'd been willing to accept what Caleb asked, but what about Mom? What about Allie?

Caleb's silver eyes were still open. I looked into them, seeing again how like mirrors they really were.

How far was too far? How long until you had no choice but to let someone go?

Caleb's eyes grew brighter, bright as metal, bright as moonlight. I didn't look away. I stared into those eyes, and as I stared I saw—

Caleb kneeling beneath a gray sky, sifting dark soil through his hands. Around him blackened trees rose like bones from the dead land.

I stood in that same land, saw those same trees. “Caleb,” I called. He didn't hear. I walked toward him, and my legs were lead, almost too heavy to lift. Cinders crunched beneath my feet. Above a pale sun shone, giving no heat.

My skin was pale, too. My clothes were washed of all color. I knew I was here in mind only, that back in Kate's house my body slumped motionless as Caleb's. I called his name again. I tried to walk faster but I couldn't. I could only take one step, and the next, and the
next. I reached out to touch Caleb's shoulder. He looked up, and there was no surprise, no grief, no curiosity in his gaze.

“It is finished,” he said.

“Not yet.” I reached for his hand and pulled him to his feet. He neither helped nor hindered me. His weight was like a sack of grain. But when I turned and started walking again, he didn't ask me to let him go. He walked with me.

Our steps were slow, though, too slow. I felt the land dragging at my feet. I wanted to stop, to gather my strength, just for a moment or two. Dust blew through the air, blurring my sight. My legs were lead, heavier than lead. Without realizing it I fell to my knees. Caleb's hand slipped from my own. I stared down at the blackened earth, knowing I needed to stand but not remembering how. Amid the cinders I saw dark maple seeds, gray mulberries, black acorns. I clutched a small dark nut in one hand—perfectly round, it belonged to no species I knew.
Dead,
I thought.
Dead and gone.
I was the one who had gone too far, beyond any place where things grew.

Yet the seed was cool in my hand. I felt the green deep within the nut calling me, begging to be called. Seeds weren't like people. Even when they seemed to sleep for
years and years, something living remained in them, awaiting the call of sun and rain. Father had warned me often enough of the dangers seeds held.

But Father was gone. And the green in the nut kept calling me, begging to be called.

I remembered the green vines that had twined around Karin's hands. I remembered the weeds around our house and how they fought me year after year. I remembered how corn and squash fought me, fought my town and all its harvesting.

I clutched the nut tighter. I remembered how my town fought the corn and squash in turn, because we knew they would keep us alive. I remembered Matthew struggling to breathe as Caleb healed him. I remembered how tightly Allie had clutched the rope above her as she crossed the river.

I remembered how I'd called for Karin's help when the trees had attacked us. I remembered how I'd reached for Matthew's hand out of a dark river, because I knew without thought, without reason, that I, too, wanted to live.

I remembered Rebecca's cries. I remembered how my sister had come back at my call, clinging to shadow when
nothing else remained. Most things wanted to grow, given a chance. I found the strength to stand and reached for Caleb's hand once more. The seed in my other hand shivered, green struggling to break free. Around us the gray land turned to silver, shimmering bright. Silver surrounded us, veined everywhere with green—

I blinked in the brightness, and all at once I was looking down at Caleb, and he was looking up at me, while Mom watched us both, tears drying on her cheeks. Caleb opened his mouth as if to speak, but no words came out. “I'm sorry,” I said. My voice was stiff, as if not used to speech. “I know I should have asked. Allie says you should always ask before calling someone back. Only I can see well enough Mom needs you here, and Allie, too, so I couldn't just let you go. And, well, you didn't seem to mind, not like Tallow.”

Caleb drew a long, uneven breath, then another, more steady. He sat up and solemnly lifted my chin. “Do not apologize, Liza. It was well done.”

I cried then. Not for Mom, not for Caleb, not even for myself. For the memory of a seed, shivering in my hand, not understanding it was in a place without life or color or hope.

I realized I held something. I looked down, unfolding my fingers as I did.

A small red-brown nut lay cupped in my palm, perfectly round, save for a small crack in its shell, thin as good nylon thread from Before.

Chapter 18

I
had a sister once. She was a beautiful baby, long-limbed and graceful, eyes dark as shadows through mulberry trees.

A month after her birth I crept out before dawn. I followed the road, carrying an oil lamp in one hand. My breath frosted in front of me. Maples and sycamores whispered among themselves, but I didn't fear them. I listened, as Father had taught me always to listen. I knew I had magic enough to keep the trees at bay.

The hillside where Rebecca had died was a patchwork of blackberry and sumac.
“Go away,”
I whispered, and the bushes gently parted, letting me through.

I searched for a long time, but no bones remained, no
sign that anything but brown roots had ever troubled the earth. Finally light touched the horizon, and I blew the lantern out. The sky was gray as old embers.

I opened my other hand and stared at the nut that lay in my palm. The crack in its shell remained small, but I felt the green within yearning, like the shadows of the dead had yearned, to be called.

I dug a hole in the dirt with my fingers and buried the nut there.
“Grow,”
I whispered to it.
“Seek sun, seek water, seek air. ”

I waited, but nothing happened. Sometimes what we want or don't want doesn't matter in the end. Sometimes magic doesn't listen after all. I patted the dirt down and returned to the road. I heard Allie's footsteps even before I turned. “You should know better by now than to leave us behind,” she said. Her hand rested on a wolf's back; he'd been sniffing the ground as they walked. Allie drew her hand away, and the wolf sat, regarding me. I regarded him back, knowing his gray eyes. I would always know him, whatever form he took.

“I wasn't leaving,” I said.

Allie tugged on her braid. Samuel had patiently worked all the tangles out. “That's what Matthew thought, too,
but I wasn't so sure. So Matthew said he'd go with me, and Dad agreed. Boys aren't always silly, you know.”