The Pillars of Creation

  Sebastian straightened and pulled a coin from his pocket, then slid it across the counter toward the woman. After taking the coin, she traded it for a key from a box behind her. Sebastian scooped the key off the counter worn smooth by countless mugs and hands. He picked up his own mug, and bid the woman a good day.

  When he reached the end of the counter, he leaned close to Jennsen so she could hear him and gestured with his mug. “You sure you wouldn’t like a drink?”

  Jennsen shook her head.

  He kept an eye on the roomful of people. They were all once again engaged in their own business. “It was a good thing you pushed your hood back. Until the woman of the house saw that red hair of yours, she was playing dumb. After that, her tongue loosened.”

  “The woman knows her? She is still living here in Gretton, as my mother said? The innkeeper is sure?”

  Sebastian took a long drink, watching a roll of dice bring a cheer for the winner. “She gave me directions.”

  “And you got us rooms?”

  “Only one room.” As he took another swig, he saw her reaction. “Better to be together in case of trouble. I thought it would be safer with us both in one room.”

  “I’d rather sleep with Betty.” Realizing how that must have sounded, she looked away in embarrassment and added, “Than in an inn, I mean. I’d rather be by myself than where there are so many people so close all around. I’d feel safer in the woods than closed in a room, here. I didn’t mean—”

  “I know what you meant.” Sebastian’s blue eyes took up his smile. “It will do you good to sleep inside—it’s going to be a bitter night. And Betty will be better sheltered at the stable.”

  The man who ran the stable had been a bit surprised to be asked to stable a goat for the night, but horses enjoyed the company of goats, so he was accommodating.

  That first night, Betty had probably saved their lives. Sebastian, with his fever, might not have survived had Jennsen not found a dry place under a jut of ledge. The back of the small cleft beneath the overhang narrowed to a point, but it was big enough for the two of them. Jennsen had cut balsam and fir limbs to line the depression, lest the cold rock sap their bodies of heat. She and Sebastian then wedged themselves into the back. With Jennsen’s urging and with the aid of the rope, Betty knelt behind the pine boughs positioned over the opening and then lay down close before them. With Betty’s body against them, blocking the cold and providing her warmth, they had a dry, warm bed.

  Jennsen quietly wept the long miserable night away. She was at least relieved that Sebastian, feverish, was able to sleep. By morning, his fever had broken. Morning had been the first day of Jennsen’s bleak new life without her mother.

  Leaving her mother’s body there at the house, all alone, constantly haunted Jennsen. The memory of the horrifying bloody sight gave her nightmares. That her mother was gone brought limitless tears and crushed Jennsen with heartache. Life seemed desolate and meaningless.

  But Sebastian and Jennsen had escaped. They had survived. That instinct to survive, and knowing all that her mother had done to give Jennsen life, kept her going. At times she wished she were not such a coward and could simply face the end and be done with it. At other times the terror of being pursued kept her putting one foot in front of the other. At yet other moments she felt a sense of fierce commitment to life, to not allowing all her mother’s sacrifices to be in vain.

  “We should have some supper,” Sebastian said. “They have lamb stew. Then maybe you should get a good night’s sleep in a warm bed before we go see this old acquaintance of yours. I’ll stand watch while you sleep.”

  Jennsen shook her head. “No. Let’s go see her now. We can sleep later.” She had seen people eating thick stew from wooden bowls. The thought of food held no appeal for her.

  Sebastian studied the look on her face and saw that he wasn’t going to talk her out of it. He drained the mug and set it on the counter. “It’s not far. We’re on the right side of town.”

  Outside in the gathering dusk, she asked, “Why did you want to stay here, at this inn? There were other places much nicer, where the people didn’t look so…rough.”

  His blue-eyed gaze swept the buildings, the dark doorways, the alleys, as his fingers touched his cloak, seeking the reassurance of the hilt of his sword. “A rough crowd asks fewer questions, especially the kind of questions we don’t want to answer.”

  He seemed to her a man who was used to avoiding having questions asked of him.

  She stepped along the narrow furrow of a frozen rut, following it down the road toward the woman’s house, a woman Jennsen only dimly remembered. She held on tightly to the hope that the woman might be able to help. Her mother must have had some reason for not going to this woman again, but Jennsen could think of nothing else to try but to seek her aid.

  Without her mother, Jennsen needed help. The other three members of the quad were surely hunting her. Five men dead told her that there were at least two quads, That would mean at least three of those killers were still after her. It was entirely possible there were more. It was probable that even if there were not more, there soon would be.

  They had escaped by using the hidden trail away from her house—the men probably wouldn’t have been expecting that—so she and Sebastian had gained the temporary safety of distance. The rain would have done a good job of covering any tracks. It was possible that the two of them had gotten away cleanly and were for the time being safe. But since her pursuer was the Lord Rahl himself, it was also possible that the killers were, by some dark and mysterious means, moment by moment, closing in on her.

  After the horrifying encounter with the huge soldiers at her house, the terror of that possibility always loomed in Jennsen’s fears.

  At a deserted corner, Sebastian pointed to the right. “Down this street.”

  They walked past dark buildings, square and windowless, that suggested to her that maybe they were only used for storage. No one seemed to live down the street. Before long, they’d left the buildings behind. Trees, naked before the bitter wind, huddled in clumps. When they came to a narrow road, Sebastian pointed.

  “By the directions, it’s the house down this road, down at the end, in that stand of trees.”

  The road looked to be little used. Weak light from a distant window stole through bare branches of oak and alder. The light, rather than warm invitation, shone more like a glowing warning to stay away.

  “Why don’t you wait here,” she said. “It might be better if I went alone.”

  She was providing him with an excuse. Most people didn’t want anything to do with a sorceress. Jennsen, herself, wished she had some other choice.

  “I’ll go with you.”

  He had shown a distinct distrust of anything to do with magic. The way his eyes watched the dark place off through the branches and brush to the sides, he might have been trying to sound more brave than he was.

  Jennsen admonished herself for even thinking such thoughts. He had fought D’Haran soldiers who not only had been much bigger than he, but had outnumbered him. He could have simply stayed out in the cave and not risked his life. He could have left the scene of such carnage and gone on with his life. Fearing magic only proved him of sound mind. She, of all people, could understand fearing magic.

  Snow crunched under their boots as the two of them, after reaching the end of the road, made their way along the narrow path through the trees. Sebastian watched off to the sides while her attention was mostly fixed on the house. Behind the small place, the woods marched off up foothills. Jennsen imagined that only those with a strong need dared walk the path toward this door.

  Jennsen reasoned that if the sorceress lived this near in to town, then she must be someone who helped people, someone whom people trusted. It was entirely possible that the woman was a valued and respected member of the community—a healer, devoted to helping others. Not someone to fear.

  As the wind moaned through the trees looming around her, Jennsen rap
ped on the door. Sebastian’s gaze studied the woods to each side. Off behind them the lights from homes and businesses would at least provide light enough for them to find their way back.

  As she waited, Jennsen’s gaze, too, was drawn to the gloom all around. She imagined eyes in the darkness watching her. The hairs at the back of her neck lifted.

  The door finally drew in, but only as wide as the face of the woman peering out at them. “Yes?”

  Jennsen couldn’t clearly make out the shadowed features of the face, but by the light coming out through the partly opened door, the woman could see Jennsen plainly enough.

  “Are you Lathea?” she asked. “Lathea, the…sorceress?”

  “Why?”

  “We were told that Lathea the sorceress lives here. If that’s you, may we come in?”

  Still the door didn’t open any wider. Jennsen pulled her cloak tighter against the cold night air, as well as the chilly reception. The woman’s steady look took in Sebastian, then Jennsen’s form hidden within a heavy cloak.

  “I’m not a midwife. If you want to get yourself out of the trouble you two are in, I can’t help with that. Go see a midwife.”

  Jennsen was mortified. “That’s not why we’re here!”

  The woman peered out for a moment, considering the two strangers at her door. “What sort of medicine do you need, then?”

  “No medicine. A…spell. I’ve met you before, once. I need a spell like you once cast for me—when I was little.”

  The face in the shadows frowned. “When? Where?”

  Jennsen cleared her throat. “Back at the People’s Palace. When I lived there. You helped me when I was little.”

  “Helped you what? Speak up, girl.”

  “Helped…hide me. With some kind of spell, I believe. I was little at the time, so I don’t recall exactly.”

  “Hide you?”

  “From Lord Rahl.”

  There was an awful silence from the house.

  “Do you remember? My name is Jennsen. I was very little at the time.” Jennsen pushed her hood back so the woman could see her ringlets of red hair lit in the wedge of light coming through the door.

  “Jennsen. Don’t recall the name, but the hair I remember. It’s not often one sees hair like yours.”

  Jennsen’s spirits buoyed with relief. “It has been a while. I’m so glad to hear that—”

  “I don’t deal in your kind,” the woman said. “Never have. I cast no spell for you.”

  Jennsen was stunned speechless. She didn’t know what to say. She was sure the woman had once cast a spell to help her.

  “Now, be gone. The both of you.” The door started to close.

  “Wait! Please—I can pay.”

  Jennsen reached into a pocket and hurriedly brought out a coin. Only after she passed it through the door did she see that it had been gold.

  The woman inspected the gold mark for a time, perhaps considering if it was worth becoming involved again in what was sure to be a high crime, even for what amounted to a small fortune.

  “Now do you remember?” Sebastian asked.

  The woman’s eyes turned to him. “And who are you?”

  “Just a friend.”

  “Lathea, I need your help again. My mother…” Jennsen couldn’t bring herself to say it, and started over in a different direction. “I remember my mother telling me about you, and how you helped us, once. I was very little at the time, but I remember having the spell cast over me. It wore off years ago. I need that help again.”

  “Well, you have the wrong person.”

  Jennsen’s fists tightened on her wool cloak. She had no other ideas. This was the only thing she could think of.

  “Lathea, please, I’m at my wits’ end. I need help.”

  “She’s given you a goodly sum,” Sebastian put in. “If you say that we have the wrong person, and you don’t want to help, then I guess we should save the gold for the right person.”

  Lathea gave him a sly smile. “Oh, I said she had the wrong person, but I didn’t say I couldn’t earn the payment tendered.”

  “I don’t understand,” Jennsen said, holding her cloak closed at her throat as she shivered with cold.

  Lathea gazed out at her for a moment, as if waiting to be sure they were paying close attention. “You are looking for my sister, Althea. I am La-thea. She is Al-thea. She is the one who helped you, not I. Your mother probably got our names mixed up, or you recalled it wrong. It used to be a common mistake, back when we were together. Althea and I have different talents with the gift. It was she who helped you and your mother, not I.”

  Jennsen was dumbfounded and disappointed, but at least not defeated. There was still a thread of hope. “Please, Lathea, could you help me this time? In your sister’s place?”

  “No. I can do nothing for you. I am blind to your kind. Only Althea can see the holes in the world. I cannot.”

  Jennsen didn’t know what that meant—holes in the world. “Blind…to my kind?”

  “Yes. I have told you what I can. Now, go away.”

  The woman started pulling back from the door.

  “Wait! Please! Can you at least tell me where your sister lives, then?”

  She looked back at Jennsen’s expectant face. “This is dangerous business—”

  “It’s business,” Sebastian said, his voice as cold as the night. “A gold mark’s worth. For that price we should at the least have the place where we can find your sister.”

  Lathea considered his words, then in a voice as cold as his had been said to Jennsen, “I don’t want nothing to do with your kind. Understand? Nothing. If Althea does, that’s her business. Inquire at the People’s Palace.”

  Jennsen seemed to remember traveling to a woman not terribly far from the palace. She had thought it was Lathea, but it must have been her sister, Althea. “But can’t you tell me more than that? Where she lives, how I can find her?”

  “Last time I saw her she lived near there with her husband. You can inquire there for the sorceress Althea. People will know her—if she still lives.”

  Sebastian put his hand against the door before the woman could shut it. “That’s a pretty thin bit of information. We should have more than that for the price offered.”

  “For what I have told you the price is paltry. I gave you the information you need. If my sister wants to tempt her doom, that’s up to her. What I don’t need, for any price, is trouble.”

  “We mean no trouble,” Jennsen said. “We only need the help of a spell. If you can’t help with that, then we thank you for your sister’s name. We will seek her out. But there are some important things I need to know. If you could tell me—”

  “If you had any decency, you’d leave Althea alone. Your kind will only bring us harm. Now go from my door before I set a nightmare upon you.”

  Jennsen stared at the face in the shadows.

  “Someone already has,” she said as she turned away.

  Chapter 9

  Oba, feeling fashionable in his cap and brown wool jacket, walked down the sides of the narrow streets, humming a tune he had heard played on a pipe at an inn he’d passed. He had to wait for a rider to go by before he turned down Lathea’s road. The horse’s ears swiveled toward him as it passed. Oba had had a horse, once, and liked to ride, but his mother had decided that they couldn’t afford to keep a horse. Oxen were more useful and did more work, but they weren’t as companionable.

  As he walked down the dark road, his boots crunching on the crust of snow, a couple came past from the opposite direction, from the direction of Lathea’s place. He wondered if they had gone to the sorceress for a cure. The woman cast a wary look his way. On a dark road, such a reaction was not undue, and, too, Oba knew that his size frightened some women. She sidestepped clear of him. The man with her met Oba’s gaze—many men didn’t.

  The way they stared reminded Oba of the rat. He grinned at that memory, at learning new things. Both the man and the woman thought he was grinning
at them. Oba tipped his cap to the lady. She returned a weak smile. It was the kind of empty smile Oba had often seen from women. It made him feel a buffoon. The couple melted into the dark streets.

  Oba stuffed his hands in his jacket pockets and turned back toward Lathea’s place. He hated going there in the dark. The sorceress was fearsome enough without the walk down her dark path. He let out a troubled sigh into the brisk winter air.

  He wasn’t afraid to confront the strength of men, but he knew he was helpless against the mysteries of magic. He knew how much misery her potions inflicted upon him. They burned him going in and coming out. They not only hurt, they made him lose control of himself, making him seem like he was just an animal. It was humiliating.

  He had heard tell of others, though, who had angered the sorceress and suffered worse fates—fevers, blindness, a slow lingering death. One man had gone mad and run off naked into a swamp. People said he must have crossed the sorceress, somehow. They found him snakebit and dead, all puffed up and purple, floating among the slimy weed. Oba couldn’t imagine what the man had done to earn such a fate from the sorceress. He should have known better and been more cautious with the old shrew.

  Sometimes, Oba had nightmares about what she might do to him with her magic. He imagined Lathea’s powers could lance him with a thousand cuts, or even strip the flesh from his bones. Boil his eyes in his head. Or make his tongue swell until he gagged and choked in a slow, agonizing death.

  He hurried along the path. The sooner started, the sooner finished. Oba had learned that.

  When he reached the house he knocked. “It’s Oba Schalk. My mother sent me for her medicine.”