Bound (Bound Trilogy) (2 page)

Winnick bared his teeth in a mad grin. “You see that?” he whispered.

He tried to back away. I didn’t let him, and his eyes widened as he understood the extent of my control over him. His knife clattered to the floor, though he tried to hold onto it. His thoughts turned to pleading, his emotions to fear and desperation as he tried to anticipate how I would hurt him.

A low moan escaped his throat, and behind him the barmaid clapped both hands over her mouth. I ignored her. She wouldn’t remember any of this once I was through with her, and neither would Winnick. Not until he had to. Not until the suggestion I planted in his mind was ready to become action.

To hell with subtlety.

I leaned closer, and whispered to him what he was going to do.

Chapter Two

Rowan

A
nother day halfway done.

Another morning working at the library, with the smells of the old paper and new ink, with adventure and romance and tragedy. A few more hours of listening to Mr. Woorswith reminiscing with his cronies about the wonders and horrors they’d seen when they traveled to Tyrea in their youth. I’d lurked in the shadows behind the historical reference shelf, wishing I could see it all for myself, just once. Not much chance of a good Darmish girl like me doing anything of the sort, but I enjoyed eavesdropping on the old men’s tall tales. They got me through long shifts and distracted me on days when the headaches tormented me. Today it hadn’t been enough, and I’d asked to leave before lunch.

I slipped out the front door of the library and reached into my bag as I descended the stone steps to the street. The book of fairy tales that I carried felt heavier than it had any right to.
No reason to feel guilty about it,
I reminded myself. True, I was technically not allowed to access materials in the restricted section, and no one—not visiting scholars, not curious magic hunters—was allowed to remove a book about magic from the building. But no one would know. They’d never caught me before.

My boots scuffed over the dirty cobblestone streets, kicking up dust that swirled in the autumn breeze and settled into a thin layer on the bottom of my skirt. A sudden gust blew my auburn hair into my eyes, and I tied it in a thick knot at the back of my head. Not fashionable, but there was no one nearby I felt like impressing. My mother would have told me to lift my face to the world, to take pride in myself, and for goodness sakes just
smile
a little. But she wasn’t there to bother me about it, and I could hardly be bothered to care on my own.

A bright ray of sunlight broke through the clouds overhead, and the dull headache that had been building all morning pressed harder at the back of my skull. The world swam in front of me, and I paused to take a few deep breaths.
You’ll be home soon,
I told myself, and closed my eyes against the light.
Just get home, make some heartleaf tea for the pain, go to bed, everything will be fine. Nineteen years of this hasn’t killed you yet.

A clattering noise interrupted my thoughts. Hoof beats on stone, faster than they should have been. I opened my eyes, but the pain made everything slow. By the time I lifted my head and struggled to understand exactly what was happening, they were almost on top of me. Four horses with uniformed riders wearing the king’s blue and gold, armed but not armored, completely out of place in the town of Lowdell.

What’s the rush, boys?
The thought passed slowly through my thick mind. One of them yelled. I tried to step out of the street, but something wasn’t working. My legs wouldn’t respond. I closed my eyes again.

Someone grabbed my arm and yanked me away, spinning me out of the road as the horses thundered past. It hurt my shoulder, but that hardly registered over the pain in my head, which screamed to life as my head snapped sideways. I pressed my hands to my face and leaned into my rescuer.

When I opened my eyes a few seconds later, my older brother Ashe stood looking down the street where the riders had disappeared. He ran his fingers through his short blond hair and frowned. “Didn’t even look back.”

“Must have been late for something.” I slumped onto one of the crates that the grocer had left stacked outside of her store.

“Too late to do any good, that’s for sure.” Ashe scratched at the arm of his blue messenger’s uniform and bent to pick up the papers he’d dropped when he pulled me out of the road. “You all right, Ro?”

“Same old thing,” I said, and tried to smile. “Just need to get home to bed.”

He frowned. “I’ll walk you.” I started to object, but he held up a hand to stop me. “I know, it’s not my fault you’re incompetent. Still, I’d feel sort of bad about it if something happened to you. I just have to post these on the way.”

I stuck my tongue out at him.

He grinned and offered a hand to help me up. “Come on.”

Three more soldiers on white horses trotted down Main Street as we waited to cross, their expressions grim and their gazes forward.

“Seems strange, doesn’t it?” I asked Ashe.

He didn’t answer.

The notice boards in the center of town kept us informed of all the important things. Posters for community events, help-wanted notices, and advertisements for matchmaking and snow-clearing services overflowed from four sides. The fifth was reserved for birth announcements, but there was rarely anything to post there, and nothing until a baby was at least six months old. On a really exciting day we might find a new reminder about the dangers of magic and the proper procedures for reporting a magical creature or plant if we saw one—or, God forbid, a person using it.

“What’s this?” I took a heavy, cream-colored page from Ashe before he hung it.

“Read it for yourself.”

Bold, scarlet letters stretched across the top of the paper. “Notice: Every able-bodied man over the age of sixteen is required to volunteer for security patrols as part of a province-wide initiative…” I glanced up at Ashe. “This is ridiculous.”

He snorted. “I know. How is it volunteering if we’re required to do it, right?”

“Not quite what I meant.” I scanned the rest of the notice. “They don’t even say why, do they?”

“Same as it’s always been. The threat’s just escalated since the Tyrean king disappeared. His son doesn’t seem willing to let us be.” Ashe took the paper from me and tacked it up high, partially covering a list of banned flora.

“It doesn’t bother you at all?”

“Nah. It’s never as bad as they make it out to be.”

I wouldn’t have taken the news so calmly if it had been my name being added to that list. Mother would have said that was typical. I’ve never liked being forced to do anything.

The pain was receding to its usual dull ache, but I leaned on Ashe’s arm when he offered it, and we started toward our parents’ house. I still had trouble thinking of it as home. My parents sent me to live with my Uncle Ches and Aunt Victoria when I was six years old. Their home, called Stone Ridge, was a half-day’s journey from Lowdell, and my parents had hoped that life far from the city would be good for my health. I’d been back in town for a few years, but I still felt like a visitor in my parents’ house and an outsider in town.

“There’s no point worrying about it,” Ashe continued, mistaking my silence for concern. “Folks have been talking about the possibility of Tyrea invading for ages, probably since our people settled here. But there have never been any large-scale attacks on any of the border towns, nor so much as a hint of their navy on our waters for as long as I can remember. Besides, even if something did happen, I doubt we would be the primary target.”

Though Lowdell seemed like a bustling city to me, it was tiny compared to other places in Darmid. Ardare, the capital city, would be far more valuable to the Tyreans than our port town.

“The Tyreans probably wouldn’t even remember to tell us if they did take over,” I said. “We’d just wake up one morning and the dragons would be back.”

Ashe made a sour face. “Don’t even joke about it. The dragons wouldn’t be the worst thing to show up, either. I’d rather deal with one of them than with a person using magic.”

We walked in silence for a few minutes. I breathed the ocean air as we left the protection of the town’s buildings and followed the road through fields of long grass that stretched down to the bay. The smell of salt water and seaweed calmed me and cleared my mind like nothing else.

I slowed as we got closer to our parents’ house. I rarely had a chance to speak to my brother alone, and our conversation brought up questions that were more pressing than my pain. Instead of saying goodbye, I leaned against the fence.

“Ashe, have you ever met a Tyrean? Or anyone else who used magic?”

“Never have, never want to,” he said, with a firm shake of his head. “You haven’t, have you?”

“No,” I said.
Not really
. During my first years with my aunt and uncle, a family of Wanderers from beyond the mountains had come by a few times, selling wares. They seemed nice enough. I’d never tell Ashe, though. Most people considered the Wanderers harmless, and they’d never seemed magical to me. Still, their visits to Stone Ridge were a well-kept secret. We were a good family, and did not associate with anyone connected to magic or Tyrea.

Remembering the Wanderers and their disappearance troubled me, and I spoke without thinking. “If you’ve never seen magic, then how do you know it’s bad?”

Ashe gave me a sharp look. “Same way you know a fish has gone bad just from the smell. You don’t need to taste it to know it’ll make you sick. You haven’t been thinking about that again, have you?”

“No,” I lied. I’d been thinking about it less in recent years, and I’d mostly accepted that real life had nothing in common with magic as I’d imagined it when I was a child. Still, I felt out of tune with the rest of the people in town, like I had too many questions that no one else seemed inclined to ask. Ashe was the only one I trusted not to shun me for them, and to answer me honestly.

“But no one will talk about it,” I continued, hating the slight whine that crept into my voice, “and the old stories—”

“Were written in a very different time and place,” Ashe finished for me.

“I don’t need a history lesson.” My uncle was a well-known historian, and he’d given me as complete an education as anyone could in our country. Hundreds of years ago, our ancestors overthrew rulers who wielded magic, who used it to enslave their countrymen. Our people rose up and killed the Sorcerers, then fled to this land at the Western edge of the mountains. Our magic hunters had been ridding the land of every trace of magic ever since—and every memory of it, including my beloved fairy tales.

Ashe planted his feet wide and crossed his arms, ready to lecture. “Magic is dangerous. You know how the people over there got theirs.” He nodded toward the mountains to the east. “They sell their souls, Ro, just like the Sorcerers in the old country. The Tyreans worship demons and a false goddess, not our God. We have to distance ourselves from that. I know Uncle Ches keeps the old story books in his library at Stone Ridge. I also know he and Aunt Victoria let you read them when you were little, and that was unfair to you. It warped your thinking. Magic isn’t wise unicorns and pretty mermaids and benevolent magicians, understand?”

“I know the stories aren’t true. I just wondered—”

“No. The real heroes are the magic hunters who keep us safe, and the soldiers who protect our borders against the Tyreans.”

Ashe obviously considered the subject finished and turned to open the gate, but I held him back. I needed my mind to be still. “How do you know that our  stories are true? I mean, there was a time when people told their children those stories. They must have thought magic was good, once.”

Ashe folded his arms across his chest. “All right. Here’s a story for you, little one, since you enjoy them so much. I said that there have been no large-scale attacks on us, and that’s true. But I delivered a report this morning saying that a magic hunter was killed yesterday, his throat cut clean to the bone. There wasn’t much left of the killer once the other soldiers caught him, but they’re almost certain it was the hunter’s own brother that did it.”

My heart skipped at the news of the magic hunter’s death. No one I knew, but still… “That’s horrible.” I pulled a lock of hair from its knot and twisted it between my fingers, a nervous habit I’d never outgrown. “But I don’t see what their family problems have to do with magic or Tyrea.”

Ashe sighed. “The ruling family over there, the Tiernals, they’re really powerful. They say Severn, the one who’s on the throne now, has even more magic in him than his old daddy did. His brothers are strong, too, and one of them, Aren, uses it to control people’s minds.” Ashe tapped a finger against his forehead, as if the point needed emphasizing. “There was a barmaid who said the killer was in her tavern the night before the murder and she thought he met with someone, but she couldn’t remember what happened, or even what this guy looked like. She was terrified, thought she was going mad. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

It seemed impossible. An exaggeration, like I’d always assumed the old men’s stories were. I shivered and pulled my jacket closer to my body.

Ashe glanced at the house and lowered his voice. “Rowan, these people aren’t like us. Severn is ruthless. From what I’ve heard he could be insane, too. I have no doubt that the mountains are the only thing holding him back from taking our lands. We know less about this other one, but we know he’s dangerous, and this isn’t the first time he’s been to Darmid. God willing, they’ll catch him this time, but he’s probably long gone.”

“How do you know all of this?”

“I keep my ears open, and you should, too. The world’s a dangerous place these days. The governor and councils don’t want people to know about attacks like this because it would cause panic. I’m telling you because I’ve seen the kind of books you sneak out of the library, and I know you’re  curious about magic. It’s all dangerous, and if you mess with it, you’re jeopardizing everything good that’s coming to you. Understand?”