“Yes. And if no one’s doing anything, as you say, I’ll call you in and you can knock over some snatchers for me. Put your pattern and flow to good use.”
Niya laughs. “You’d never send for me. Just . . . if you really plan to learn about the snatchers, be careful, all right?”
I reach out to touch her arm. There is one truth, one future we have always promised each other: when Bean is married and leaves, and our parents are grown old, we will still always be there for each other. Niya because she can never dare to marry, given her secret, and me because I will never find anyone.
“Always,” I promise. “You’re not getting rid of me that easily.”
Chapter
6
I bring up my decision to my parents the following morning after breakfast. “I don’t know that Melly really needs my company,” I admit. Far more likely, she’s happy to have an excuse to finally make me visit her. “But it would be nice to see her. And . . . I intend to ask her what’s being done about the snatchers, if something more can’t be done.”
Mama considers my words. “There’s no harm in that. Just be careful about who you speak to. And Rae, bear in mind that if it were easy, it would already be done.”
“I know.” I don’t expect it to be easy. But Niya’s counting on me to do what she can’t, and, like Ani, I can’t give up. I know I won’t find Seri in Tarinon, but this is still part of fighting for her.
“Is there anything else?” Mama asks as I continue to sit there.
Of course there is. If I go, I’ll be leaving my whole life behind. And that means my sisters as well. “I’m worried about Bean and Niya,” I confess. “About not being here for them. If anything should happen.” Unspoken but not unheard are the last of my fears: that if the snatchers should return, I might lose a sister while away at court. Or that Niya might be found out and taken from us, my parents punished for hiding her.
“Suppose I promise to watch them?” Mama says lightly.
I laugh.
“I could bar Bean from accompanying me to Spring Fair in your place,” Baba says doubtfully. “But she may never forgive you.”
“She wouldn’t,” I agree. “And you’re both right: they don’t need me as long as they have you. But I still worry.”
“I’m glad you do,” Mama says. “That makes you a good sister. But they should be all right through the summer, and they will want to hear all your stories when you return.”
“Excellent,” Baba says, as if it were settled. “You’ll be ready to leave next week, then?”
“Next week?”
“Our own Veria Sanlyn is traveling to Tarinon for the wedding,” Baba says, naming a local noblewoman. “Her head hostler came by to see if he could cajole me into selling her a brace of horses for her carriage—as if we breed carriage horses! At any rate, I mentioned you might be traveling there. The hostler informed the housekeeper, who spoke with the lady herself, and she sent an invitation for you to ride along with her.” Baba smiles, well pleased with himself. And even I have to admit it is rather perfect.
I frown. “I suppose Sanlyn will be expecting to see those horses, then.”
“Oh, no,” Baba says. “I’ve been very clear that we have a lovely riding horse that might suit her perfectly instead. I was thinking of Lemon, really—their dispositions are of a kind.”
“Baba!” I say, amused despite myself. Mama just shakes her head.
I spend the day with the horses, glad to return to the steadying routine of cleaning, training, and—to be honest—visiting with the horses. As with the day before, I take some time in the afternoon to ride into town to check in on Ani, who is pleased to hear that I do in fact have a day of departure to report.
In the evening, as we settle on cushions in the sitting room, Niya brings out her work basket. Mama and Baba are lingering in the kitchen, voices lowered, though Mama’s muffled laugh tells me that, whatever their conversation, it isn’t a grim one. Bean sprawls on a cushion, utterly uninterested in the horse blanket she’s supposed to mend.
“I’ve been working on something for you,” Niya says. “For your birthday, but I think I can get it done for you before you leave. Shall I show you?”
“Oh yes,” I say.
She removes the topmost items in her mending basket and delves into the bottom to lift out a new sash. It is tradition to wear an embroidered sash about one’s waist, and Niya has embroidered more than a few designs for us over the years, but this is something different altogether.
“It’s a story sash,” Bean gasps, delighted. “What story did you do? Oh! Will you make me one too?”
Niya laughs. “Of course, but first I have to finish Rae’s.” She offers it to me, and I carefully unfold it. The fabric itself is a simple cream, but the sash almost shimmers with Niya’s multihued embroidery, so elaborate it takes my breath away. Story sashes contain the symbols and colors of a story so that it can be carried with you and passed down to those you love. They are rare nowadays, with paper being available and the embroidery itself so time-intensive. Which makes it all that much more special a gift.
The first few bands of embroidery are purely decoration, but then the story begins—a twist of blue around a black center: There was and there was not.
“A princess!” Bean says, happily jumping ahead to the stylized image of a girl with long braids.
Niya laughs. “Not yet. You see how the leaves wrap around her? She’s a girl who lives in the forest.”
“Yes, but there”—Bean points to the other end of the sash—“she’s getting married and that yellow twist around them is a crown.”
“That’s how most stories end,” I agree, amused. “It’s Riha of the Woods, isn’t it?”
“Mama said that was your favorite tale growing up. You always used to tell it to us too,” Niya says.
“I still love it. Thank you, Niya.”
“You should stitch in something useful too,” Bean reproves her. “Stories are all very well and good, but suppose she needs something?”
One of Niya’s favorite magical skills involves hiding things in her stitches, things which can only be regained when the stitches are undone. She learned this, as she has learned much of her magic, the hard way: in this case, by accidentally stitching Baba’s prize nanny goat into a whorl of embroidery. At a harvest fair livestock competition. Right behind the judges’ backs.
Niya nods. “I was planning to hide some coins, in case you ever lose your purse.”
“Could you stitch up my bone knife too?” I ask. A gift from that same faerie visitor who suggested pattern magic to Niya a year ago, it looks like an old chipped kitchen knife to most. I am the only one who can see its shining ivory blade and onyx-and-mother-of-pearl handle. But more than that, it’s sharp and useful, and while I hope I won’t need it, it can’t hurt to have it handy.
“Of course,” Niya says. “I’ve put a backing on to protect the knots, see?” She turns the sash over, and sure enough the other side is plain cream, only the ends, where they would hang free, embroidered on both sides. “Anything I add for you, I’ll bring the knots through the backing so you can easily break them and release what I’ve hidden.”