The Toll (49 page)

“
Don’t hide it, Phedaenya.”
His fingers brushed my cheeks warmly, brushing my hands away,
platonic and unfamiliar, yet still filling me with comfort. “Don’t
you know they’re beautiful?
You’re
beautiful.”

“
Pfft. They’re cursed, not
beautiful—anything but. You must be bli...” My guts clenched and my
chest squeezed. Still facing the crowd, I murmured on a stammer,
“B-bb-bavol?”

“
Yes, little one?” His
voice was a low, kittenish purr, right behind my ear.

My skin pricked and my breath
stilled.

“
H-how did you...” When I
went to turn, he gripped my shoulders firmly but gently, nudging me
forward.

“
Don’t be rude, Phedaenya,”
he whispered, voice gone breezy and light, “meet your new
friends.”

“
But... I... but you... I
never told you my-”

The revelers next to me froze when I
stumbled into view, not a one dressed like Bavol—they all looked
seemingly normal—and I fidgeted nervously.

As they just stood there and stared,
my stunned gaze staring back, I grew increasingly
uncomfortable.

“
What?” I called softly
when the two closest to me glanced to each other, then back at me,
eyes widening like saucers. “What are you staring at?” Turning to
Bavol for reassurance, I found myself alone, his spot right behind
me empty. He was gone. It was as if he’d vanished into thin
air—here one minute, gone the next—leaving me to fend for myself in
a camp full of strangers.

“
Move!” A high pitched,
booming voice called above the rest. “Let an old woman through! Do
you know who I am, child?! Hah! Do they teach the youth nothing?!
Move! Move for Magda!” As the sea of people, all stopping to stare
curiously now, reluctantly parted, a small, plump woman with a
crumpled but flowing dress, and long, thick black hair streaked
with grey braided down her back, partially covered by a wide swath
of fabric, stopped a few feet from me. Bracelets jingling in her
wake and flowing up her wrists, they clanked to a stop when she
came to a jerky halt.

Eyeing me as she came to a jarring
stop, she let out a very unladylike sniff, running her thumb along
the side of her nose, finishing off her display with a disgruntled
harrumph and a stomp of her walking stick.

“
Beginning to think you
wouldn’t show.” Lifting a hand carved, thick wooden cane with a
strange, glittery stone embedded in it high up in the air, she
gestured me forward. “This way, this way. Vidi has the food on.”
Glancing over her shoulder, she eyed me again, deep jade eyes
alight. “Didn’t know your state. Saved some, just in
case.”

Still looking around for Bavol, I
finally asked, “The man, the one I was with when I came here, did
you see where he went?” I was ready to run in whichever direction
she pointed in search of him, as fast as my thick legs could carry
me.

“
What man?” the old woman
called. “Weren’t a one here but you, girl.”

Frowning, I gestured towards the spot
just off behind me, gob smacked. “No. I was with the tall man, he
was just here a moment ago, but I seem to have, uh,” a nervous
laugh escaped me, “misplaced him.” Glancing to the couple still
gaping at me, I thrust a finger out, right in their direction. They
all flinched, the boy thrusting the girl behind him protectively.
“You know, you saw him, didn’t you?”

Flinching again like my finger was a
dagger or a witch’s wand as I waggled it at them, they both shook
their heads hard in response, and I quickly dropped it.

“
This is ridiculous,” I
muttered under my breath. “Someone must have seen him?” Blank looks
all around.

How could they not
have?
I wondered.
He was right there! A goofy, crimson haired, babbling,
jittering beacon. You couldn’t miss him.

“
Thin, tall, bright red
hair... a sword, a gun, scarf tied around his waist... dressed like
a flamboyant pir-” At the odd looks I was receiving, increasing by
the second, my trap clapped shut. Obviously, no one had seen him,
and are all now possibly questioning my sanity.
Lovely. Just lovely. Why did I leave the dilapidated hut,
again? Or even bother waking up?

Oh, that’s right, no more
magic for me
. Yet, here I am, once more,
surrounded by it. I can
feel
it
.

About to follow after the old woman
and get this all over with, maybe get some answers, and hopefully a
place to bed down, if just for the night, my steps faltered and I
squeezed my eyes shut tight, feeling like I’d just been hit by a
ton of bricks.

Thinking of sleeping reminded me of
all those weird dreams/visions, flashing through me, so fast I felt
it like the flash of a whip, yet there it all was, crystal clear.
Which, in turn, as I thought of all that I’d lost, gained, then
lost anew, as well as what was taken from me, I felt my eyes
pricking again, harsh breaths growing sharp and shallow.

At the reminder of the nightmare I was
forced into in the field, before all of this utter madness—the long
sleep, the trauma that had facilitated it all—I shuddered. Body
clammy, hands sweaty, it felt as if the large caravan of people
gathered around had somehow grown smaller, like walls closing in on
me, and it was growing difficult to breath.

What’s happening to
me?
I thought in a panic.
What is this?

I’m dying, this is it. This
is whatever Troll was going to do to me! It’s happening!
As I stumbled back a little, a hand shot out and
steadied me. Eyes still shut tight as I tried not to lash out, I
allowed it.

“
There’s only so much a
body can take before it cracks.”

I knew someone was talking to me, I’d
heard their voice, but the thudding in my ears, matching my
thundering heart, was growing deafening. If I thought on it too
long, I could almost feel Trystan’s hands pawing at me again, a
ghost of a bad memory, feel his heavy breaths along my nape, his
unwanted, desperate kisses, thick body pressing on top of mine as I
fought, panic clawing at me, and then... Shaking my head sharply as
a small whimper slipped out, I bit my lip hard enough to make it
bleed, willing my thoughts to still.

No. I won’t think on
it.
I refused to. I relived it for days in
those dark dreams, over and over again, brought on by the poison
slipped down my parched throat, torturing my soul as it locked me
in a never ending loop
. I’d thought I’d
gone mad, and maybe I have. He won’t win, though. I won’t let
him.
Strengthening my resolve, I released
my swelling lip, taking a few deep breaths before slowly
straightening my shoulders, forcing myself to meet everyone’s eyes,
staring every single one of them down until they all looked
away.

That hand was still there, tethering
me to the present, grounding me, but I hadn’t bothered to see who
it belonged to yet, too busy staring down the last of the gawkers
to care.

“
It’s your eyes,” the quiet
voice whispered, “they’re glowing.”

“
Oi! Girl! They don’t mean
no harm, just nosy. Pay them no mind. Too watered down to harness
anything, they’re no better than garden sprites! Been a long time
since we’ve seen one like you. A long time.”

“
Like me?” My brows nearly
kissed my hairline and my face flushed as the older woman toddled
off.
They know?

She made it a short distance away
before she realized she was still unaccompanied. “Come
along!”

“
Powerful,” the quiet voice
supplied, her hand slipping away as she stood just off to my
side.

“
Can’t miss those eyes when
you’re emotional, tell more than a mouth ever could. Windows to the
soul.” Turning back around to find I hadn’t moved an inch, the old
gypsy woman rolled her eyes and huffed, “Walk with me, bright eyes.
Don’t you pay them any mind! Now, right this way. Step lively!”
When some wouldn’t move fast enough for her liking as she hustled
through the waning crowd, she wacked the back of their legs with
her intricately carved stick, hissing at them to scat as she
bustled by, ignoring all the pained yelps and muttered curses. She
may have even let out a muted cackle a time or two.

“
She gets like this near
the full moon.”

Turning my head to glance at the
speaker, the low voice that had pulled me back to the present, my
solid blues met with a set of glittering, deep emerald orbs.
Serious yet light somehow, dancing with mirth and brimming with
intelligence, there was a warmth about her that was downright
disarming.

“
Lavidia,” the young woman
murmured quietly, and with a nod, motioned that I should follow the
cane whacking menace swathing a path through the poor, unsuspecting
gathered about, brandishing her cane like a sword as she twirled it
around expertly over her head, shouting this way and that. “But
Granmamma calls me Vidi.”

“
She’s your... You mean...
You’re related to her?” I sputtered, studying this Vidi person
intently. This stranger next to me, possibly a few years my junior,
if not more, was quite tall and sturdily built, with long limbs and
wide hips, all softness surrounded by sharp edges.

Something about her had the back of my
head tingling, a small trickling tickle, but not in alarm. No, her
mere presence soothed in a way I couldn’t explain. I felt rather
short and frumpy standing next to her, though—lackluster—glancing
up at her long enough to take her in without being accused of
staring.

Solid but still feminine, she had
long, thick, snow white blonde hair, trickling down her back in
spiraled, streaming waves, streaking with bits of dark brown. A
heart shaped face with small, thin lips, framing wide, almond
shaped eyes, surrounded her startling green eyes with a thick
fringe of black lashes, finishing off her look.

Holding out an olive toned, deeply
tanned hand in a quick wave, she shrugged. “Better get going now or
she might start swinging that silly stick at us.”

“
Vidi!” her granmamma
bellowed.

Offering me a quick smile over her
shoulder before she trotted off, she turned, and at another bellow,
whipped back around, long, green hued skirts swishing around her
ankles and bare feet as she spun and sprinted to catch up.
“Coming!”

Bare feet? It’s the middle
of a-
I noticed, belatedly, that there
was, indeed, no snow around us, or anywhere on the ground within
the campsite. Squinting into the darkness beyond that, I thought I
could make out the faint outline of snow softly flurrying all
around.

How interesting.
More magic at work.

“
Bright eyes!”

Jerking, startled, I bit
back a yelp with a grunt. I was beginning to loathe those two
words, dander up as she continued to call after me. About to shout
out that I had a name, I held back.
I
don’t know this woman, magic greetings and safe feelings be
damned.

Pausing to let my senses do their
thing, no pangs alerting me of any imminent danger, or so I’d
hoped, I resigned myself to follow.

Reluctantly trailing after, I sighed
heavily, and as is custom lately, my thoughts immediately drifted
back to Troll.

You should be happy,
I told myself unconvincingly.
He left. Isn’t this what you’d wanted, once upon a time, to
be rid of him? For it all to just... go away?
He gave me exactly that.
So why am I
not happy, and why does it feel like someone died?

Dread filled me again, and a wave of
nausea hit me square in the middle. “Gersthart, you stupid male,
what have you done?” I whispered. He won’t be coming back—he
won’t—and we’ll both suffer the fall out.

‘
Heed the warning, claiming
Ornthren.

Distance weakens, minds do
forth rend.’

I felt as if the Fates had fashioned
that piece just for me. Minds do forth rend—we’ll go
mad.

Hah. No. I’m already
mad.
I’ll lose my ever-loving
altogether.

“
Vidi! Bright
eyes!”

As a large wagon came into view, this
one made of wood, unlike some of the smaller ones I’d wandered
past, whose tops were made of canvas and other similar materials, a
thick, oak looking door slammed wide open.

Illuminating the dark night, a deep
orange glow emanating from the inside, Madga’s head popped out and
darted around. The action made me think of a chicken, ready to peck
at its first sight of corn.

Fingers slowly creeping up my throat
to tap at my lips, I had to stifle a small snicker into my
hand.

Jade eyes met mine, flashing briefly
with what looked like a hint of silver before it
disappeared.

Magic.
Other, definitely, but what? I still knew so
little.

“
Don’t keep old Madga
waiting, girl. Already been up more than half the night. I wish to
sleep at some point before the morn.”

As my feet landed on the first step
and my hand reached out to grasp the aged oak door, levering myself
up, my skin prickled, tingling as my senses went
berserk.