The Warded Man

“I want you out the door when the dawn bell rings,” Elona said. “And I’ll not hear a murmur about you being tired! I won’t have our family seen lagging to help.”

Leesha knew her mother well enough to know that “seen” was the operative word. Elona didn’t care about helping anyone but herself.

Leesha’s father, Erny, was waiting by the door under Elona’s stern gaze. He was not a large man, and to call him wiry would have implied a strength that wasn’t there. He was no stronger of will than of body, a timid man whose voice never rose. Erny was Elona’s elder by a dozen years; his thin brown hair had deserted the top of his head, and he wore thin-rimmed glasses he had bought from a Messenger years ago, the only man in town with the like.

He was, in short, not the man Elona wanted him to be, but there was great demand in the Free Cities for the fine paper he made, and she liked his money well enough.

Unlike her mother, Leesha really wanted to help her neighbors. She was out and running toward the fire the moment the corelings fled, even before the bell.

“Leesha! Stay with us!” Elona cried, but Leesha ignored her. The smoke was thick and choking, but she raised her apron to cover her mouth, and did not slow.

A few townsfolk were already gathered by the time she reached the source. Three houses had burned to the ground, and two more still blazed, threatening to set their neighbors alight. Leesha shrieked when she saw that one of the houses was Gared’s.

Smitt, who owned the inn and general store in town, was on the scene, barking orders. Smitt had been town Speaker as long as Leesha could remember. He was never eager to give orders, preferring to let people solve their own problems, but everyone agreed he was good at it.

“… never pull water from the well fast enough,” Smitt was saying as Leesha approached. “We’ll have to form a bucket line to the stream and wet the other houses, or the whole village will be ashes by nightfall!”

Gared and Steave came running up just then, harried and sooty, but otherwise healthy. Gared, just fifteen, was bigger than most grown men in the village. Steave, his father, was a giant, towering over everyone. Leesha felt a knot in her stomach unclench at the sight of them.

But before she could run to Gared, Smitt pointed to him. “Gared, pull the bucket cart to the stream!” He looked over the others. “Leesha!” he said. “Follow him and start filling!”

Leesha ran for all she was worth, but even pulling the heavy cart, Gared beat her to the small stream flowing from the River Angiers, miles to the north. The moment he pulled up short, she fell into his arms. She had thought seeing him alive would dispel the horrible images in her head, but it only intensified them. She didn’t know what she would do if she lost Gared.

“I feared you dead,” she moaned, sobbing into his chest.

“I’m safe,” he whispered, hugging her tightly. “I’m safe.”

Quickly, the two began unloading the cart, filling buckets to start the line as others arrived. Soon, more than a hundred villagers were in a neat row stretching from the stream to the blaze, passing up full buckets and handing back empty ones. Gared was called back to the fire with the cart, his strong arms needed to throw water.

It wasn’t long before the cart returned, this time pulled by Tender Michel and laden with wounded. The sight brought mixed feelings. Seeing fellow villagers, friends all, burned and savaged cut her deeply, but a breach that left survivors was rare, and each one was a gift she thanked the Creator for.

The Holy Man and his acolyte, Child Jona, laid the injured out by the stream. Michel left the young man to comfort them while he brought the cart back for more.

Leesha turned from the sight, focusing on filling buckets. Her feet went numb in the cold water and her arms grew leaden, but she lost herself in the work until a whisper got her attention.

“Hag Bruna is coming,” someone said, and Leesha’s head snapped up. Sure enough, the ancient Herb Gatherer was coming down the path, led by her apprentice, Darsy.

No one knew for sure how old Bruna was. It was said she was old when the village elders were young. She had delivered most of them herself. She had outlived her husband, children, and grandchildren, and had no family left in the world.

Now she was little more than a wrinkle of translucent skin stretched over sharp bone. Half blind, she could walk only at a slow shuffle, but Bruna could still shout to be heard from the far end of the village, and she swung her gnarled walking stick with surprising strength and accuracy when her ire was roused.

Leesha, like most everyone in the village, was terrified of her.

Bruna’s apprentice was a homely woman of twenty summers, thick of limb and wide of face. After Bruna outlived her last apprentice, a number of young girls had been sent to her for training. After a constant stream of abuse from the old woman, all but Darsy had been driven off.

“She’s ugly as a bull and just as strong,” Elona once said of Darsy, cackling. “What does she have to fear from that sour hag? It’s not as if Bruna will drive the suitors from her door.”

Bruna knelt beside the injured, inspecting them with firm hands as Darsy unrolled a heavy cloth covered in pockets, each marked with symbols and holding a tool, vial, or pouch. Injured villagers moaned or cried out as she worked, but Bruna paid them no mind, pinching wounds and sniffing her fingers, working as much from touch and smell as sight. Without looking, Bruna’s hands darted to the pockets of the cloth, mixing herbs with a mortar and pestle.

Darsy began laying a small fire, and looked up to where Leesha stood staring from the stream. “Leesha! Bring water, and be quick about it!” she barked.

As Leesha hurried to comply, Bruna pulled up, sniffing the herbs she was grinding.

“Idiot girl!” Bruna shrieked. Leesha jumped, thinking she meant her, but Bruna hurled the mortar and pestle at Darsy, hitting her hard in the shoulder and covering her in ground herbs.

Bruna fumbled through her cloth, snatching the contents of each pocket and sniffing at them like an animal.

“You put stinkweed where the hogroot should be, and mixed all the skyflower with tampweed!” The old crone lifted her gnarled staff and struck Darsy across the shoulders. “Are you trying to kill these people, or are you still too stupid to read?”

Leesha had seen her mother in such a state before, and if Elona was as frightening as a coreling, Hag Bruna was the mother of all demons. She began to edge away from the two, fearing to draw attention to herself.

“I won’t take this abuse forever, you evil old hag!” Darsy screamed.

“Be off, then!” Bruna said. “I’d sooner mar every ward in this town than leave you my herb pouch when I pass! The people would be no worse off!”

Darsy laughed. “Be off?” she asked. “Who’ll carry your bottles and tripods, old woman? Who’ll lay your fire, fix your meals, and wipe the spit from your face when the cough takes you? Who’ll cart your old bones around when chill and damp sap your strength? You need me more than I need you!”

Bruna swung her staff, and Darsy wisely scurried out of the way, tripping over Leesha, who had been doing her best to remain invisible. Both of them tumbled to the ground.

Bruna used the opportunity to swing her staff again. Leesha rolled through the dirt to avoid the blows, but Bruna’s aim was true. Darsy cried out in pain, covering her head with her arms.