Sisters of the Fire Read online

  Ash finished her task and packed away her needle and thread. The weather had been unforgiving, but had cleared to a calm warm day. She chose to leave the chapel and picked her way down over steep rocks and slippery gravel to the shore. Her cloak now rattled softly, all the little bony, spiny gifts rubbing against one another. The tide was halfway out, and the grey sand and rocks crunched under her feet. Long veins of rock, smooth and hollowed out, had been revealed by the sea’s retreat. Ash pulled off her shoes and tiptoed out along one of the veins. She crouched down to study a rock pool. The sun shone into it, illuminating a miniature forest of algae. Tiny fish darted in it. Small curled shells clung to its smooth walls. A light breeze fanned across the beach, making ripples on the surface of the pool, and she watched it a long time, a sense of lazy calm spreading through her.

  At length, she stood and walked a little further, around a rock wall to a cove where she could see Unweder’s wooden bucket, his fishing net, and his cloak on the beach. Unweder himself was nowhere to be seen. Ash made her way around a mountain of orange seaweed, and went to his cloak. Had he gone swimming? The sun was warm on her back and her scalp, and she wondered if the water would be warm too.

  In the bucket was a single fish – bream by the look of it – staring dead eyed at the sky. Ash walked down to the shoreline, hitched her skirts and stood ankle-deep in the ocean for a while. It sucked and swirled around her feet, burrowing under the gravelly sand then pushing it back up. Still no sign of Unweder.

  He had caught a fish, though, and perhaps she should get about preparing it for dinner. She had her knife, so she could gut it and fillet it before he returned. Ash returned to the bucket, gave the fish a poke – no life left in it at all – and pulled it out by its tail to lay on a flat rock in the sun.

  Just as she was about to cut off its head, somebody shrieked her name far away.

  Ash turned. Unweder was shouting at her, up to his neck in the water.

  ‘Don’t touch the fish!’

  She dropped the knife, stepping back. Unweder was a shapeshifter, and the only way he could take the form of other creatures was to trap one and suspend its body on the hinge of death with magic. This wasn’t a fish for eating; this was a fish that allowed Unweder to take fish form, and explore the ocean from underneath.

  Unweder waded towards her, held back by the weight of water but fury pushing his lithe body forwards. She knew immediately what had almost happened, and felt a horrible shudder of fear and guilt. Ash had almost killed him. It hadn’t happened in the four years they’d been together, but one unguarded moment …

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, hands in the air as he came ashore. ‘I assumed you were only fishing.’

  ‘You nearly killed me,’ he roared. He took the fish and dropped it back in the bucket.

  ‘It was dangerous to leave it there. A gull might have taken it.’

  This gave him pause.

  She’d been about to cut his head off. There was no other way to think of it. If she’d severed the fish’s head, he would have never come up for air again. The spell would be broken and he would die as the fish died. Would his human body have washed ashore later, headless? Ash tried to stop her mind going down that path.

  ‘I am sorry,’ Ash said.

  Unweder, wet and shivering, shook his head. ‘You are right. I took a risk. But I thought I might find other caves in fish form. I didn’t get far.’

  ‘If you want to go out again, I’ll sit here and mind the bucket.’

  He glanced over his shoulder at the sea, then back at her. ‘Maybe tomorrow. For now, it’s best we catch something to eat tonight.’ He picked up the net and handed it to her. ‘I will go and start a fire and get dry.’

  She watched him make his way over the rocky shore, and shuddered again with the sense of having stood too close to mischance. One heedless push on that thin, invisible membrane, and catastrophe waited.

  It filled her with a sick dread. Ill things were so unexpectedly close.

  The next morning, she was woken by a faint scratching at the shutter over her bed. She sat up, bleary, listening hard. Unweder slept on across from her.

  There it was again. A soft rasping, almost as though somebody were running rough fingers over the wood. Ash stood and warily opened the shutter a crack to peer out.

  About twenty yards away was a small figure, the size of a child but slender and composed. Ash realised immediately it was an elemental, and the seaweed hair and strange scaly appearance of the skin suggested this might be the sea-spirit who had been giving her gifts.

  She opened the shutter wide; the spirit saw her and lifted a hand to beckon her.

  Ash closed the shutter quietly, pulled on her shoes and cloak, and crept out of the chapel. She looked around, saw the sea-spirit disappearing over the cliff, where the gravelly slope that took them to the shore lay. She hurried after it, then carefully down the slope. Once on the gritty beach, she saw it, bent over the same rockpool she had been bent over yesterday. The tide was significantly higher, about to swallow the rockpools. Ash slipped off her shoes and made her way out to it. Usually she saw elementals with her inner eye – maybe a flash here or a flash there in her real vision – but this one was perfectly apparent. As she drew closer she could see the uneven details of the coral necklace it wore, could see the way the early morning sun gleamed on its seaweed hair, could even see its muscles working under the strange silvery skin on its back.

  ‘Hello,’ she said as she approached.

  It beckoned, pointing at the rockpool. She knelt next to it and watched as it pulled out one of the tiny swirling shells. She stole a glance at its face, its odd flat eyes. It held the shell between long, slightly webbed fingers, and blew on it gently. A silvery mist arose from between its parted lips, wrapping around the shell and then evaporating. The sea-spirit offered the shell to her.

  ‘For me?’

  It nodded.

  ‘I will sew it into my cloak with the others. It makes a lovely sound. Comforting.’

  Another nod. A toothless smile.

  ‘Can you speak?’ she asked.

  More nods. ‘Speeeeak,’ it said in a raspy voice.

  ‘Why do you give me gifts?’

  It pointed at her. ‘Sea witch.’

  ‘I am?’

  ‘Strong sea witch.’

  ‘Well, thank you. Do you have a name?’

  It said a word, but it was impossible to pronounce. It sounded like the draw of the ocean across gravel, long and sibilant.

  ‘I am pleased to meet you.’

  It stood, touched her cloak, and began to move away.

  She followed, but it was fast, clambering over rocks and ducking in and out of the water, never looking back. They headed south a mile, then another, Ash never quite catching up. Then it rounded a rocky outcrop and disappeared.

  Ash approached the outcrop. The rock was higher than her head. She flopped her shoes onto it and began to struggle up it, using other rocks as steps. The tide was coming in, and when she finally reached the top of the rock, she couldn’t see the sea-spirit anywhere. Maybe it hadn’t intended her to follow it. Shoes in her hand, she went a little further now, around the next scatter of big rocks, and saw a cave in the distance.

  Unweder hadn’t been here yet, he had been working his way north. The mouth of the cave was ragged, dark. She wondered if the sea-spirit had gone inside it.

  Over rocks and seaweed she made her way to the opening and went inside.

  ‘Hello?’

  The sound of the water moving echoed in the cave, muffling and amplifying it all at once. There was an exit as well as an entrance, and Ash walked through to the other side, only to find the tide there was up to her ankles.

  Time to make her way home.

  But the ocean was coming in too fast. It had come in behind her, swirling between the rocks, cutting off the base of the cliff. She could go and stand out on a rock, but had no idea how high the water would come.

  She stood there, s
kirts in her hands, then ran back to the cave. A series of ledges had worn into the rock. She climbed to the first and then the second, slimy and slippery with algae, still not sure how high the tide would come. Then up to the third ledge, which seemed drier, safer. Ash hugged her knees and watched the tide come in.

  It was dark and damp, and she was cold, but none of these things troubled her so much as the realisation that she’d lost the swirly shell the sea-spirit had given her. She had been holding it in her hand the whole time, or so she thought. She felt about on the ledge beside her, but there were many unseeable bits and pieces of rock and shell around her, so she balled up her fist and gently released it, promising only to keep the light on a little while, just to find the shell.

  Something else caught the light. Ash pounced on it and held it up, her heart hammering. It glittered iridescently: pearlescent white shot with gold. As big as her thumb, hard as forged steel but so light it was almost transparent. A scale.

  A dragon’s scale.

  Six

  Willow hated the hill up from the market to Bramble Court. Not because her legs weren’t strong enough for the steep, winding ascent. Far from it. It was because Avaarni always whined. How she hated the whining; it demeaned both of them.

  ‘Mama, slow down.’ The little voice was plaintive.

  Willow never slowed down. The child was too soft. These small hardships were necessary.

  ‘Mama!’ Now Avaarni was sobbing, and Willow turned around to see the child had dropped the bag of wheat and it had split open, its contents spilling onto the road.

  An elderly woman who was making her way, crook-backed, up the hill behind them, hurried forwards to comfort Avaarni. Willow, who was several yards ahead, pulled her headscarf carefully around her face and started back down the hill.

  ‘Leave my son be,’ she called to the old woman sternly. ‘He has to learn to correct his own mistakes. The third book of Maava tells us that to make amends for our errors is godly.’

  But the woman didn’t seem to hear her. She knelt next to Avaarni and put an arm around the child’s shoulders. ‘There, little one. I have a sugar mouse in my bag. Would you like it?’

  Avaarni was instantly placated, putting out a hand to receive the treat. Willow stood over them, her shadow falling on the spill of wheat on the ground. Avaarni gobbled the sugar mouse quickly, knowing Willow would take it away.

  The woman looked up and tsked. ‘That bag was far too heavy for your boy to carry.’

  ‘He’ll never get strong if he doesn’t carry things.’

  ‘The poor little lad must only be two.’

  ‘He’s nearly four. He’s small for his age.’ Willow hauled Avaarni up by the shoulder.

  ‘And such a sweet face. Why, he almost looks like a little girl with those long, long lashes.’

  Willow’s blood flamed. ‘I’ll thank you to leave us alone,’ she said, careful to keep her face turned away. ‘Avaarni, pick up what wheat you can and put it back in the bag. Don’t disappoint me.’

  The woman struggled to her feet and went on her way. No doubt she thought she knew better than Willow how to raise a child. But Willow had long since refused to take advice from anyone but her Lord, Maava. May His name be praised.

  When they had mostly refilled the grain bag, and Avaarni was holding it flat with both arms, the tear at the top, Willow crouched low to look the child in the face. ‘You smiled at that woman too much,’ she said. ‘She thought you were a girl. Don’t smile so much.’

  Avaarni nodded solemnly, lips deliberately sucked against each other.

  ‘Come. Home now.’

  Willow slowed her steps a little, but not so much that Avaarni would know she was making the walk easier so more grain would not be spilled. The child simply had to become harder, stronger. All had been foreseen by Maava, and Willow was not about to let Him down.

  Throughout her pregnancy, the angels had told her over and over she was having a son. When the baby had been born a girl, doubt had pierced Willow all the way to her centre. But then she’d realised it was a test: would she succumb to the doubt? No. Maava’s work was not to be comprehended by somebody as inconsequential and humble as Willow. One day, Avaarni would wake up and be a boy. A miracle. Willow knew it would happen, as confidently as she knew every mossy stone step up through the gardens to Bramble Court. She opened the gate, ushered Avaarni through, and then closed it behind her. Given Avaarni’s fate, it would be wrong to raise her as a girl. And so, Willow raised her as a son.

  Once away from the public road, Willow pushed back her scarf to feel the sunlight in her pale brown hair as they crossed the garden. Gudrun’s grey-and-white cat Parsley miaowed at them from among the foxgloves, and Avaarni stopped to say hello to him.

  ‘No smiling,’ Willow said, firmly but patiently. ‘Get the supplies to the kitchen, then you can come and find the cat again.’

  Avaarni looked up at her with big grey eyes. The woman was right. Her lashes were too long. Willow wondered if it would be possible to trim them.

  ‘Work first, pleasure later,’ Willow said. ‘It’s the way of our faith. You don’t want to go to the Blacklands when you die, do you? To be tortured forever in the caverns of ice? With all the bad people and the spiders?’

  The child shook her head urgently. ‘No, Mama.’ Avaarni hated spiders.

  ‘Then hurry up and get that wheat to Cook. Go on.’

  She scurried off. Parsley had left his spot and was now chasing a grasshopper around the garden. Willow watched for a while. She’d always hated grasshoppers, ever since one got stuck in her hair as a child. More lately, they reminded her of her sister, Bluebell, long legged and hard bodied with monstrous faces. Parsley chased the grasshopper right in front of her, where it stopped. Parsley laid both front paws down and raised his backside, ready for the kill.

  Willow stomped on the grasshopper, hearing the satisfying wet crack under her shoe.

  ‘Sorry, Parsley,’ she said, wiping her shoe on the grass, and went inside.

  Willow was always happy when her knees ached from kneeling and praying in the chapel. Aching knees meant she had done enough to keep Maava happy, and He wouldn’t send His angry angels, the ones who snarled and spit ugly words at her. Her entire existence was based on this fact: enough prayer to keep away the awful voices; enough prayer to connect deep and strong with Maava and not to be afraid or confused any more.

  Nobody prayed as much as Willow, and she didn’t expect them to. However, she did expect Avaarni to join her quietly in the chapel on holy days. Even if the child could not kneel for long, she had certainly learned how to be still and quiet and pray for up to an hour at a time. Willow had been stern enough with her. No child of Avaarni’s heritage could plead an ordinary character: she had to behave better than everyone else because she was better than everyone else. She would become Maava’s chosen king on earth, to bring trimartyrs together in Thyrsland under the holy triangle. She wasn’t some snivelling brat from the market, hiding chickens under her shirt.

  Willow rose, stretching her legs. Aching knees. She turned. Avaarni lay on her side in the recess under the shutter, eyes closed.

  ‘Avaarni!’ Willow roared.

  Avaarni’s eyes flickered open. ‘Only praying, Mama. I was only praying, not sleeping.’

  Willow wasn’t sure if she believed the child, but then reminded herself that Avaarni knew well enough what happened to children who lied. Willow had told her dozens of time.

  Willow extended her hand for Avaarni to take, helping her to her feet. The child was small, even for a girl. The boys’ clothes she wore were little more than baby clothes. Willow often wondered if, on the morning she became a boy, she might also become tall and strong. The thought made her smile. Avaarni smiled back, cautiously.

  ‘Everything I do is as our Lord tells me,’ Willow said gently.

  ‘I really wasn’t asleep. I promise. I was praying that Othilaf’s dog gets better.’

  ‘You can pray for more importan
t things than animals.’ Willow opened the door of the chapel and led Avaarni across the garden to the house. The house, the chapel, all of Bramble Hill had been paid for by Willow’s father, Æthlric, the heathen king of neighbouring Ælmesse. Once he had been married to Gudrun, but put her aside in shameful circumstances, under threats from Bluebell. Æthlric’s guilt bought Gudrun a modest life on the hill outside of Winecombe. Æthlric didn’t know that Willow and Avaarni shared in that modest life. As far as Willow understood, her family had given her up for dead years ago.

  Willow was very, very far from dead.

  The door to the house was pinned open to let a breeze in. Avaarni carefully removed her shoes then skipped to the sitting room where Gudrun stood at her loom, weaving in the sunlight that fell through the open shutters. She looked around when she heard Willow and Avaarni enter.

  ‘Avaarni!’ she said, dropping her shuttle and scooping the child up in a hug.

  Avaarni covered Gudrun’s face with kisses and giggles, and Willow stood slightly outside it all as she ever did. Avaarni had no kisses and giggles for her, but that was because Willow took the business of raising the child seriously. Gudrun was weak, soft. That’s why Avaarni loved her.

  But Gudrun had treated Willow well, and she owed her a debt of gratitude. Together, they got along somehow. Willow had brought Maava more forcefully to Gudrun’s life, and watched Him heal Gudrun’s sorrow. Gudrun had helped Willow with mothercraft in the early months, tending her ravaged body – oh, the horrors of birth! She would sooner die than do that again – and showing her how to feed the child without it stinging her breasts so hard that she cried.

  Gudrun placed Avaarni on the floor, and Avaarni picked up the shuttle. ‘Can I?’ she asked.

  Gudrun shook her head. ‘Weaving and spinning are for other little girls, my darling, not for you.’

  ‘You can go and sit with Othilaf in the kitchen and do some wood carving,’ Willow suggested. ‘Or you can practise reading with Penda.’