Oakhaven

I woke to the smell of woodsmoke and frying salt-pork.

My body felt peculiar. Hollow, as if someone had scooped out my marrow and filled the cavity with lead. Not exhausted, precisely, but thin. One night's rest hadn't been enough to shake off whatever the Obsidian Needle had taken from me. I could function well enough, and I suspected I'd feel more like myself by afternoon, but the thought of running, heavy labor, or another attempt at using the Silk made my temples throb in anticipation.

Another good night's sleep might do it.

Breakfast consisted of thick oat porridge with a dollop of last autumn's honey, the salt-pork Mother had fried, and small beer to wash it down. Simple, filling, and familiar. The sort of meal I'd eaten almost every morning of my life.

Alaric was already at the clinic window, grinding something pungent with his mortar and pestle. He looked up as I entered and gave me a long, evaluating stare. A healer's assessment, even when the patient happened to be his own son.

"You look pale."

"Good morning to you too."

He ignored that. "Take the small basket and gather fresh yarrow from the north field. The dry stock is running low, and Mistress Caelwyn's boy sliced his palm open yesterday. We’ll need a fresh supply. Move yourself. No dawdling."

I nodded.

He paused, the pestle still in his hand. "You're not going to argue?"

"Should I?"

He blinked, then frowned. "No. Just get it done."

I hid a smile behind my porridge.

Mother set another piece of salt-pork on my plate. "Perhaps he's finally discovered the satisfaction of doing something useful."

"Let's not get carried away," I said.

Alaric gave me another suspicious look before returning to his grinding. The Magistrate's visit had left him with plenty to think about, but whatever tension he'd carried yesterday seemed to have settled into the ordinary business of the clinic. He had patients to treat, supplies to replenish, and apparently a son to keep occupied.

Yarrow. A legitimate errand, a few hours of plausible absence, and the freedom of the morning sun. Bram would likely be at the mill, Mirena at her loom, Tomas somewhere near the burying ground. The village stretched before me like a map of opportunity.

The morning sun was already turning the dirt road golden as I slung the gathering basket over my shoulder. Mother watched from the doorway, her hands flour-dusted from preparing the morning bread.

"Take your waterskin," she called, tossing it underhand. "And perhaps some sense with you. The north field's been left fallow since the blight. Mind where you step."

I caught the leather flask with a reflex that might have impressed my father, had he bothered to look up from his mortar.

The weight of the Obsidian Needle against my thigh was barely perceptible. It seemed little more than a dead sliver this morning, nothing like the strange sensation I'd felt when it first awakened in my hand. I wondered whether it was simply resting, or whether I was the one who needed to recover.

Either way, I had no intention of testing it today.

The road to the north field carried me past the edge of village life. I nodded to Old Willem, who was bent over a wagon wheel, muttering at a stubborn wooden peg. Mistress Caelwyn was hanging bloodied bandages over a line outside her cottage, her injured son sitting nearby with his hand wrapped in linen. He waved with his good one.

Their lives continued in the familiar ruts they'd worn over decades, unremarkable as the weather. I used to find that comforting. Now it looked a little different. People went about their business, unaware of how much could be changed by the smallest nudge.

The thought lingered longer than I liked.

The yarrow grew thickest where the blight had spared a rocky outcropping, its white flowers bobbing in the warm breeze. I set to work with surprising diligence, my fingers remembering my father's lessons despite my resistance to them. Cut the stems cleanly. Leave enough growth for next season. Avoid the plants growing too close to the damp ground.

The bitter, clean scent of the crushed stalks filled the basket. There was something soothing about the work. No mysteries, no strange sensations, no questions about what I might be capable of. Just a plant, a knife, and a simple task that needed doing.

By the time I'd gathered enough, the sun had climbed past midmorning. The mill's great wheel was audible from the field, a constant groaning heartbeat that marked the center of Oakhaven's industry. Bram would be there, shoveling grain or napping in the loft, depending on whether his father had found him yet.

I cut across the barley field, the stalks whispering against my breeches. The mill loomed ahead, its timber frame dark with decades of flour dust. Voices drifted from inside: Bram's booming laugh, followed by his father's curt reprimand.

I circled around to the side door, the one leading to the grain stores where the cool air made it a favorite place for anyone looking to avoid honest work.

The interior was cathedral-dark, motes of flour dancing in shafts of light from the high windows. Bram was indeed there, sitting on an overturned barrel and whittling something crude from a stick. He looked up with a gap-toothed grin that split his flour-whitened face.

"There he is! The ghost of labor itself, condescending to walk among us mere mortals." He gestured grandly with his knife. "I had a wager with myself you'd be in your orchard by now, perfecting the art of horizontal meditation."

I slid onto a neighboring barrel and set the yarrow basket aside. The flour dust made my nose itch, but the cool darkness was a welcome relief from the strengthening sun.

"Father's got me on a short leash after yesterday's service to the gentry," I said, rolling my shoulders. "Apparently, I'm to prove I can complete one task without causing a diplomatic incident."

Bram stopped whittling. "What did you do?"

"Nothing."

"That usually means something."

I told him about the Magistrate's visit.

Bram's eyes went wide as dinner plates, his whittling forgotten in his lap. I'd always had a gift for storytelling, usually employed to excuse my absences, but now I had something far more interesting to work with.

"The looks her Ladyship was giving me..." I began, stretching my legs across the barrel. "There I was, bringing her the tonic, and she simply wouldn't let go of my hand. Clinging to me like a woman drowning, Bram. Her fingers were cold, but her eyes—"

I paused for effect.

"Her eyes were burning. Hot enough to shame the hearth. And the Magistrate? Five feet away, bellowing about his own headache, completely blind to the way his wife was looking at the healer's apprentice."

"You're a lying bastard," Bram breathed, though his voice carried more awe than accusation.

"On my mother's grave," I said smoothly, which was technically accurate since my mother yet lived. "She spilled the tonic herself. Couldn't keep her hands steady. And when I bent to clean it? Her fingers brushed my neck. Brief as a breath, but purposeful, Bram. I swear it by the old gods."

Bram's laugh was half-choked with envy and delight. "You absolute devil. The Magistrate's wife! He'd have you gelded and mounted on his gate if he knew."

"He doesn't know. Nobody knows." I tapped my nose with conspiratorial significance. "And nobody will, unless some loud-mouthed miller starts gossiping."

"Your secret's safe with me, you magnificent fraud." Bram clapped me on the shoulder, releasing a small cloud of flour. "Even if it's only half-true, it's the best tale this village has heard since Widow Sera claimed the blacksmith's pony was possessed by her late husband."

We laughed together, the sound echoing through the grain stores. Two young men in the dark, sharing fantasies of power and desire.

For Bram, it was pure vicarious thrill. For me, it was practice. I watched his expressions as I spoke, noticed where he leaned forward and where he laughed, and filed away the difference between a detail that entertained and one that strained belief.

It was easy to make a story better than the truth. Easier still when the truth was already interesting.

"Mirena's been asking after you, by the way," Bram said. "At the well this morning. Very casual-like. 'Has anyone seen our fallen hero?'"

Something in my chest tightened. Not the Needle. Just the memory of Mirena at the well, sleeves rolled to the elbow, her sharp tongue masking the curiosity I knew too well.

"And what did our mutual friend reply?"

"That you were likely deceased from overexertion, and she should begin mourning immediately." Bram grinned. "She hit me with her bucket. I consider that a sign of affection, in her case."

"She always did have a tender heart."

"Like a blacksmith's hammer."

I let the banter wash over me, something almost normal in a morning that still felt tilted, unreal. Bram chattered about the miller's new contract, about a traveler passing through on the road to the capital, and about the usual village business. The mill had been promised a larger grain shipment before winter, which meant more work for Bram and less opportunity to escape his father's notice. He complained about both with equal enthusiasm.

I nodded at the appropriate intervals, my thumb tracing the outline of the Needle through my pocket.

The hollow feeling persisted. Not quite exhaustion, but a lingering thinness, as though some part of me hadn't caught up with the rest. I wondered how much of it had been taken by the Needle and how long it would take to return.

More importantly, I wondered what the Needle could actually do.

So far, its power had seemed to flow through me almost of its own accord. I'd felt the Silk, seen the threads, and somehow known how to reach for them. The coachman had been different. I'd wanted him to rest, and I'd deliberately tried to encourage that feeling. But had I really controlled what happened? Or had I simply given a push to something that was already there?

Could I tell how much strength the Needle had? Could I make it do something specific? Could I use it without feeling as though I'd spent the next day hauling stones?

I turned the questions over in my mind. There was a temptation to try again, just to see what would happen. But the thought of another bout of dizziness and that hollow ache was enough to dampen my enthusiasm.

There were other ways to learn about people. Bram, for instance, was already offering information without realizing it. Mirena had been asking after me. A little conversation could be useful, and it didn't leave me feeling as though my bones had been emptied.

"—listening?"

I blinked. Bram was waving his whittling stick in front of my face.

"Absolutely. The capital. Travelers. Very important."

"Bloody liar." But he was grinning. "I said Tomas was looking for you too. Something about something interesting in the old burying ground. You know how he gets. Probably found a ring-worm and thinks it's a curse."

The burying ground. The abandoned chapel, the loose earth, the whispered secrets of the dead. Tomas and his morbid fascinations had led us to strange places before.

I glanced at the yarrow basket. I'd gathered enough for Father, and there was no particular reason to hurry back. Besides, if Tomas had found something interesting, I was curious to see what it was.

"Did he say what he'd found?"

"Only that it was worth seeing. You know Tomas. He'd make a mystery out of a broken shovel."

I stood, brushing flour from my trousers and lifting the basket.

"Well, I suppose I'd better go see what the dead have been up to."

Bram laughed. "Give them my regards."