I felt Shun tighten her grip on me. “Could you run?” she breathed by my ear, and I knew what she was thinking.
So did Dwalia. She did not whisper but spoke in a normal voice. “If you leapt from the sleigh and ran to any of those houses, the soldiers with us would kill everyone you spoke to. The rest we would bind to forgetfulness. Then we would burn the house down around the bodies, and on you would go with us. Much simpler for all if you simply stay where you are and enjoy this picturesque little town.” She gave a sideways glance, and Reppin and Soula both shifted to sit between us and the edge of the sleigh.
Shun did not loosen her grip on me, but I felt the spirit go out of her. We drove right past a team and waiting wagon outside an inn. The horses whickered a greeting to us, but on we went. We passed through the town as if we were the wind, and we continued past the outlying farmsteads and up another hill and back into woodlands again. We left the road and followed a dimpled cart-trail into the forest. And on until dawn.
That morning, I could eat a little food on my own, and follow Shun when she went aside from the others to piss. I remembered what she had told me, and mimed standing to piss as if I were a boy before crouching to relieve myself. When we went back in the tent, the luriks whispered to one another behind their hands. “I told you he would live, if he was meant to live. And we knew he was. That was why we did not interfere.” Dwalia spoke those words to her underlings, and once more she held a kindly smile on her face whenever she looked at me. She was pleased that I hadn’t died, but even more pleased, I thought, that she hadn’t helped me to stay alive.
We camped well off the road that dawn. The fog boy stumbled when he clambered down from the sleigh. Then he held on to the side of the sleigh and stood there with his head bent. Dwalia frowned but as soon as she realized I’d seen her expression, she changed it to a look of motherly concern. “Come, Vindeliar. It was not that hard, was it? And we have spared you that work as much as we can. But traveling cross-country is taking far too much time. You must be strong and determined. We need to return to the ship as swiftly as we can, lest the work you did there begin to weaken and fade. Come. I will see if we cannot get a bit of meat for you tonight.”
He nodded, his head a heavy stone on a reed neck. She held out her arm with a sigh, and he took it. She escorted him to a place where others were building the fire and commanded that a fur be folded for him to sit upon. That dawn he did no chores but only sat by the fire and went early to his bed.
Shun and I slept more closely together than ever we had that day. I was too weak still to stay awake for long, but I could tell that she had not eaten enough of the brown soup to make her sleep. She feigned sleep with one arm flung over me, as if she feared they might take me from her.
I woke toward nightfall, itching everywhere. I scratched myself but it brought only slight relief. When the others stirred and we went out by the fires, Shun flinched back at the sight of me. “What is wrong with you?” she demanded. I had been scratching my cheek. I lowered my hand, startled, and saw tendrils and flaps of dry white skin clinging to my fingers.
“I don’t know!” I exclaimed and, still weak from being ill so long, I began to weep. Shun sighed over my uselessness. But Dwalia came quickly to my side.
“Silly,” said Dwalia. “You shed your old skin. That is all. You’ve taken a step forward in your path. Let me look at you!” She seized me by the sleeve and pulled me closer to the fire. She pushed back the cuff of the fur coat, and then my shirt. Her nails were rounded and clean. She matter-of-factly scratched at my arm, and then shook the threads of dangling skin from her fingertips. She leaned in to look closer at my new skin.
“That is not right!” she exclaimed, and then clapped a hand over her own mouth.
“What isn’t right?” I asked anxiously.
“I didn’t hear you, dear? Does something worry you?” Her voice was warm with concern for me.
“You said something wasn’t right. What’s wrong?”
Her brows drew together and her voice radiated warmth. “Why, dear, I said nothing. Do you think something’s wrong?”
I looked at the patch of skin her nails had cleared. “I’m turning white. Like a dead person.” I had nearly said like the messenger. I shut my lips tightly and tried not to sob. I’d said too many words. I wasn’t good at this pretending to be younger and stupider than I was.
“Did he dream in his change time?” a thin-faced lurik lad asked, and Dwalia shot him a look far sharper than a slap. He hung his head and I saw him take a quick, anxious breath. Alaria had been sitting next to him. She hitched herself away from him.
