If he thought there was even a possibility I had magic, he’d sacrifice me as willingly as he had killed the snake. Would he drink my blood?
“Is there a problem?” Sir Raleigh’s cool northern lilt snuck up on us. He rode his horse beside the wagon, slowing to match Dorn’s pace.
Xavier calmed, but didn’t let go. He sat taller and put on a pleasing expression. “No. No problem. Maggie forgot something back at the tavern, but I told her there was no turning back now.” Xavier patted my shoulder.
Fuming, I bit my lip to keep quiet.
“’Fraid not.” Raleigh tossed me an apple, then kicked his horse, trotting ahead.
“Thank you,” I called after him, oddly hoping he wouldn’t go far.
Xavier leaned over and whispered, “We’re not finished.”
I shifted, trying to keep my voice low. “I do not know what happened last night any more than you do. Maybe all the baubles you have finally aligned in exactly the right way. Did you ever think of that?” It sounded good to my ears.
His glare lessened, his face contorted, mulling over the possibility. “No. I hadn’t. But I suppose that would mean . . .” His anger flipped. His eyes grew wide with excitement, then narrowed with worry. “But how am I to do it again? If I don’t know exactly how I did it? And I must, Maggie. We are going to the Walled City. We are to perform for the king!”
“Practice. We have three nights before the performance. We can sneak off after they set up camp.”
That quieted him. He released my shoulder. I rubbed the place where his fingers had dug into my skin, leaving bruises that would stay for some time.
Within an hour of leaving the seaside village, we passed the tall stone marking the border for the South. Typically, with fall came rain, but not this year. We traversed through a river that only a year prior would have reached Dorn’s neck, but she was barely inconvenienced, sloshing through it as if it were a puddle. There was no sweet smell from harvested wheat to greet us in the fields. Only dried beds and cracked ground. The drought had hit the South hard.
At the sight of the first farmhouse, Sir Raleigh jerked his chin. His men dismounted horse and wagon and stormed up to the home.
“Why have we stopped?” I asked, pulling Dorn’s reins.
“King’s business,” Sir Raleigh said, twirling a grass stem that he had chewed on since the creek. “Collecting taxes.”
“Taxes? But the fields are devastated. Does the king not know of the drought that struck this summer? There’s been little water for months. This family likely can’t even feed their own!”
Xavier shushed me. “Sir Raleigh, please forgive her impudence.”
Raleigh walked his horse around the wagon until he was beside me.
“The East and West have already paid a heavy share this year. It is only fair the South give their part.” He stared at me as if he were trying to teach me a lesson, like an old man passing out indisputable worldly wisdom.
“I’m sure if you asked those in the East and West, they would forgo fairness this season so these southerners do not need to starve.”
Raleigh gave an amused smirk. “You are clearly too young to understand the way of things.”
“And you’re clearly too old to hear the truth!”
Raleigh reeled back. A crease formed between his brows. He spat the grass blade, then kicked his horse to a trot to move away from us.
Xavier whacked me on the back of the head. “I should’ve left you at the tavern working for Porchie. You’ll be the death of both of us. Now hold your tongue before they lop it off at my request!”
I rubbed the spot, more for show than anything else. It didn’t really hurt.
Raleigh’s men returned with a small basket of seed grain, probably all the family had to plant for next season.
“We passed through here a year ago. They took us in and fed us. The old man who was missing an eye, and his daughter? Have you forgotten?” I whispered harshly to Xavier.
“Yes, I have. Today I forget everything. We are the king’s guests on this journey and we must act as such.” He tore the reins from me. “Not another word.”
The next farm had nothing to show in produce from their fields, only two pigs in their pen. Sir Raleigh ordered both taken. When the old woman begged to keep one, a soldier struck her with an axe handle on the back of the head, leaving her unconscious and bleeding.
Xavier kept hold of my wrist, keeping me from jumping out of the wagon to help her. I wasn’t surprised by the king’s men. This was what they did. But Xavier’s ability to turn his back shocked me to my core. I’d always thought of him as compassionate. After all, he had taken me in—an urchin with nothing.
There were days when I was young I wished he were my father.
Now all I could think was that I was glad he wasn’t.
As the scene repeated many times over, I felt sicker with each farm we passed. I had seen soldiers pillage their way through the Hinterlands every harvest. Last year, in the East, I hid with other children in the woods, along with half their livestock, to ensure the winter shelves had enough to get through to spring. Xavier was there with me, and them.
But this was different. By all appearances I was with the soldiers. The burden of guilt weighed heavy on my chest, making it difficult to breathe. I moved into the rear of the wagon, putting my back to the seat so I wouldn’t have to look at Xavier, and stared at the sky, searching for the moon. I found it too. Strange. I never noticed before how visible it was, in the day or night. A new moon, when it was invisible to the eye, yes, it would then be impossible to find, but now it was there, a thin strip, smiling down on me. A tingling on the back of my neck, my palm prickled too. A reminder of what had transpired in the tavern. A comfort too. I fisted my hand, wanting to keep that feeling forever.
Meanwhile Xavier conversed with the soldiers as if he was their newfound best friend, asking about the Walled City and after the king and the prince.
Three soldiers dismounted at the last farm before the road inclined. The sun was setting. We were told we would make camp after this, which was good because I couldn’t stop shivering. The moon rose higher. A radiating warmth shot through me, relieving the chill.
I smiled. I hadn’t seen Xavier glance back at me.
“What?” Xavier snapped.
“Nothing.” I scooted lower in the wagon.
The farm looked deserted.
Soldiers kicked open the barn and returned empty-handed. “No horses. Only old hay in the stalls. Rats everywhere.”
“I’ll check the house,” the largest of them called. Yellow haired, with shoulders so square he had to turn sideways to go through the door.
Yet another returned, heaving a sigh. “Stys are empty too, Sir Raleigh. Shall we go?”
“There’s nothing, I swear!” a frantic woman cried from inside the house. “No. Not that. Please . . . !”
Square Shoulders returned with a loaf of bread. “I wouldn’t call this nothing.” He tossed it to another, who put it underneath the cover of one of their five bursting wagons.
A small boy came out of the house. His stomach protruding from starvation, he was so thin a strong wind would blow him over. “Give it back! The king won’t want it! It’s stale! Please!”
“Colin, come back!” His mother stood in the doorway, crying, too afraid to come out. Her skin was so thin her bones threatened to break through if she lost another ounce of weight. She needed to eat. And yet these soldiers were stealing their only food and I was sitting in the back of our wagon, letting them.