"A woman named Median devised a way to extract Magic from the tree," Fayree said. "The intention-or so she said-was to give us a chance to speak to Magic. To give Magic a voice. She took a young man named Brasen and tattooed him with wards in the finest gold."
Winslow could remember those wards. He'd seen Magic up close the day the Dellidus attacked. Even in the horror of the moment, the man-god had been beautiful, shimmering golden light as power was drained from him.
"When Brasen touched the Host tree, Magic poured into its new corporeal form. We were all of us amazed," she continued, as they resumed hiking. "We'd lived for centuries with Magic, but never had the opportunity to speak with it. In the months that followed, we all took our turn with Magic, learning how best to harness our Talent. But the longer Magic stayed in Brasen, the darker the Host tree became.
"Our Talent started to change. Instead of being able to work our craftsmanship, we began to . . . shift. At first we couldn't predict it. One moment we would be ourselves and the next . . ."
"An animal," Winslow said, realization hitting him. Fayree really was a great cat.
She nodded at him and smiled sadly.
"I've never seen you as an animal," Mirabella said suddenly.
Fayree brushed curly hair away from her daughter's face. "I've had a lot of practice learning how to control it."
Mirabella seemed to accept this answer and continued walking. He watched her for a moment, thinking of Fayree's description of the timeless world outside the Pillars. He wouldn't want to raise a child that couldn't grow. That would be heartbreaking to the extreme.
"Mirabella . . ." he started to say but Fayree must have anticipated his question.
"My daughter was born in Magnellum. She isn't like the rest of us."
"Ah," Winslow said. "So . . . what has time got to do with this?"
Fayree sighed and shook her head. "We demanded that Median put Magic back."
"And . . . she refused?"
"No, she tried." Fayree frowned, her whole face pinching in concern. "But when Brasen touched the Host tree again, something else happened. Some say Median was standing too close. Others say she misplaced a ward on Brasen. The theories vary, but whatever it was that went wrong, it cursed Median. And through her, we are cursed."
"I don't understand. What kind of curse?"
"Median is stuck. She is constantly pushed through Past, Present and Future. You know her as Fate."
Winslow stopped walking again, this time out of shock.
"Mother, Maiden and Crone," he said reflexively.
"Her body shifts because it cannot stop. She is constantly in flux, you see?" Fayree said.
"Let me get this straight," Winslow said. "Fate, the Deity that all of Magnellum worships, is really a cursed Tre`ow named Median who may or may not have intentionally stolen Magic from a tree in the Wild?"
"The Host tree is not merely a tree, sir. Please do not take it lightly," Fayree said stiffly. "For thousands of years it protected us and brought us prosperity. Without Magic it has continued to decay, slowly dying right in front of us. And believe me when I tell you that any Tre`ow would gladly give their life to heal it."
"Is that why you're here? To find Magic?"
Her expression suddenly closed. "No, Lord Agoston. I already told you. I am a fugitive from my own people."
A hollow hooting belched into the air and Winslow glanced down the tracks. Another train was coming.
Though it had taken them a disgracefully long time to send it, the depot in Three Points had finally come to see about their missing passenger train. Winslow could feel the rumble of it through the tracks and hobbled for the side, quickly ushering Mirabella and Fayree out of the way. The hurried movement jostled his injuries, but he was too pleased at the prospect of rescue to grumble about it.
He didn't know what he was going to say about his sudden lack of magic and he really didn't care. The other Tre`ow was still tracking them and he wanted Mirabella safely away. He looked from the girl to her mother and then at the approaching train. Fayree had taken a big risk by saving his life and exposing herself. Damned if he knew all the consequences to it, but he could smell the fear in her.
"Your secret is safe, but if you have any hope of survival you will go to Lady Elsie Delgora." He had to raise his voice against the roar of the locomotive. "At the very least, she can buy you a little more time."
Cringing, Winslow hobbled down the short steps and onto the platform. For various safety reasons, not the least of which was a concern to keep Fayree's secret, he'd been forced to scrape off the verue goo. He'd done this in the privacy of his cabin, insisting that the Untalented physicians were unnecessary in spite of the gaping wound. He'd expected the pain to double without the numbing agents of the plant, but Winslow had grossly underestimated the damage to his shoulder.
Now that he could feel it, the entire arm was only barely attached. His bones shifted every time he moved; like they were floating in a viscid sea of torn muscle and cartilage. Giddiness made the world swirl in his vision as his feet settled onto the wooden deck and for a horrified second he thought he might faint.
"Winslow!" a familiar voice shouted above the throng of people.
Winslow hadn't really noticed the crowd at first, he'd been too damned focused on not vomiting all over himself. The unpleasant prickle of fever made his skin damp and his vision fuzzy, and he suddenly wished they hadn't been rescued. The verue plant was far better than dealing with the unnatural tide of heat, the nausea threatening him, or the confusion of bodies just below the platform.
"Winslow!" The voice came again and he tried to concentrate.
He was holding up the line of people behind him who wanted to disembark the train, but if he wasn't careful he thought he really would pass out. So he used the unidentified caller as an excuse and scanned the crowd. His vision blurred at the edges, smearing people together and making them indistinguishable from storefronts and streets and grungy market tents. Blinking hard, he finally located the voice in his memory.
An instant later, Bartholomew Feverrette-Kelemen broke free of the crowd. He was intercepted by a Warder, who was obviously trying to quell the fascination of the crowd. It had been twenty years since the last train accident, making this an unprecedented debacle. There were a scant few, however, whose anxious faces gave away the hope of finding a loved one among the survivors. Winslow wondered which one was Fayree's husband.
"Sir." Bart's voice cut through the clamor with cold authority. "I am Lord Feverrette, Consort of House Witch Caresse Feverrette, and you
will
stand aside."
The Warder looked conflicted for a moment, but conceded. Tugging once on his suit jacket, Bartholomew strode forward, clearly angry but too gracious to complain. Winslow found himself smiling, though he knew it must look weak to his friend. Bart reached his side, took in his battered state, and then grabbed his elbow.
"Fates alive, Winifred, if you tell me you've strained yourself out of Talent, I will kill you where you stand."
The reprimand was quite serious but for the use of Winslow's teasing name. He couldn't remember exactly when he'd earned the title "Winifred"-sometime during his University years-but he was fairly certain Dorian was the instigator. The rest of their little group had taken to the nickname shortly after.
"Oh, you know me, Barty," Winslow mumbled as Bart began to lead him out of the way.
"Curse you, Winslow Agoston. When I heard about the accident, my heart nearly failed." Bart took a slow pace away from the train, toward the private stairs that would take him into the depot. "You could try to have more consideration for my nerves, you arrogant, thoughtless man."
Winslow was too ill to argue. In fact, given the last few days, he was honestly pleased to hear his friend's voice again, irate as it might be. He found weird comfort in Bartholomew's tirade. Winslow didn't catch it all, just the familiar rumble of his friend's voice as they proceeded into the station's formal offices designated for nobility.
The building around him was a dizzy swirl of wood and brass fixtures, but he caught the privacy of the room they stopped in. Bart helped him settle into an overstuffed sofa that seemed utterly out of place. They were in an office, not a lounge. The fraying, brown catastrophe that he sunk into belonged someplace else. The overwhelming scent of stale smoke wafted from the thing, and he had to take a moment to fight his nausea down.
Winslow decided instantly that the sofa needed to be burned and put out of its misery.
"Now then," Bart said, returning from closing the door and reaching for Winslow's shoulder, "let me have a look."
He knew his friend meant to heal him, and for some reason he became alarmed. He jerked to the right, and his shoulder snapped to life with sudden, acute pain. He lost control and wretched all over the couch. Bart swore, which was funny because he never swore, but Winslow was too busy being sick to laugh.
"Fates alive, Winslow! Just let me fix it!"
But all Winslow could think of was Mirabella, proud as a shiny whistle, declaring that he had a little Wild in him. He wouldn't risk hurting Bartholomew, not even if it meant the end of his misery.
"D-don't," he wheezed.
"What?" Bart hesitated. "Why ever not?"
"Just . . . don't."
"To hell with you, Winslow Fagen Agoston. I'm not watching you bleed to death. Now quit whining and let me help . . ."
"Crone's teeth, Bart! Leave me be!"
Obviously shocked by the outburst, Bart stepped back.
There was cursing
, Winslow thought wryly,
and then there was 'cursing'
. "Fates preserve us", "Fates alive", even the unsavory "Mother, Maiden and Crone" could almost be construed as a prayer or a plea. But "Crone's teeth" was something you only heard muttered in a black alley somewhere with murder in the air. Given what he knew now about the Fate's origins, Winslow couldn't work up the superstition to apologize, either.
Someone knocked on the door but Bart didn't move, he just kept staring at Winslow.
"You really have lost your magic, haven't you?" Bart said quietly. "I thought maybe you'd just been resting it after helping the other survivors, but . . ."
The knock came again.
Winslow met his friend's light blue eyes and held them. He trusted Bartholomew with all his might, but he couldn't part with Fayree's secret.
Not here
, he thought. If someone else heard him, he'd have more to worry about than his silent Talent. He could be branded a heretic for revealing Fate as no more than a cursed Wild woman. Now that he thought of it, Winslow had no idea how to tell his friends-especially Elsie-what he had learned. They would have to know, and soon, if anything was going to be done about it.
But Fates help him, he wasn't certain they would believe him.
Just before the door opened, Winslow nodded to his friend. He consoled himself with the fact that it was only partially a lie. At present, he really was Talentless. He wasn't certain how he was going to explain to Bart why he didn't want to be healed, but he hoped he would think of something soon. Bartholomew's expression turned pained and he closed his eyes, ignoring the fact that their privacy had been intruded.
"My Lord Feverrette," a professional needle of a man said from the doorway, "are we to assume that the gentleman is indeed Lord Winslow Agoston?"
"He is," Bart said quietly, opening his eyes.
"Excellent. We have arranged lodging at the Pinnacle and Pyre." The man glanced at the soiled sofa, but his face never faltered from its polite, careful expression. "We will, of course, want to hear His Lordship's version of events so that we can discover what happened."
"I'm certain that can wait for a day," Bart said.
"Yes, of course."
"Wait." Winslow fought another bout of nausea before he could finish his sentence. "Mirabella and Fayree . . ."
"Mrs. Cornelius was met by her husband. They are filling out some forms for us and are free to go."
"Give them my room number at the Pyre," Winslow said. "I . . . wish to see them again. Before they go."
The man looked puzzled at this but nodded acceptance. A moment later the door was closed, presumably so that Bart could heal him in privacy. It was sometimes funny, the things society took for granted.
"They're going to notice if you won't let me heal you," Bart seemed to read his mind.
"I know."
"You're not the first Witch-Born to strain himself out of Talent," Bart continued. "From all appearances, you did it to save those two females. That's as noble a reason as any to lose your magic."
"Barty," Winslow struggled to his feet. He swayed until Bart steadied him with a hand on his good elbow. "Stop trying to cheer me up."
"I'm not trying to cheer you up, I'm trying to make you see reason." Winslow heard annoyance in Bart's voice now. "Just let me heal you."
"Bartholomew," Winslow grabbed his friend's shoulder, shook off another wave of dizziness, and met his eyes again. "Swear to me that you won't try. No matter what happens, don't do it."
"What the hell, Winslow? This is insane. What do you mean 'try'? You know perfectly well that I can do this." Bart stopped suddenly, a new flicker of understanding in his eyes. "By Fates! What has happened to you?"
"I can't explain right now, Bart. I just . . ." Glancing at the door, he lowered his voice. "It could be dangerous for you."
Bartholomew's mouth tightened into a grim line. "Fine," he said. "But when I'm castigated from one end of Magnellum to the other for not doing my compassionate duty, I want you to remember this moment."
***
"We've been dragging the water up here in buckets," Forvant grumbled and pointed at the southern slope beside the ark. "It's a pain, but at least the greenhouses inside are healthy. There'll be herbs and food, just like you wanted.
"Master Walter is interviewing an engineer for the water pumps tomorrow," Elsie said with a frown. "Hopefully we can solve the issue of water soon."