Grief welled within Sidra as she returned her attention to the city thoroughfare. She came to Sloane twice a week, to make a round of visits to her patients there. Her first appointment was with Una Carlow, and Sidra followed the song of a hammer striking an anvil.
She arrived at Una’s forge and stood in the sun for a moment, watching the blacksmith work in her shop. The air was thick with the tang of hot metal, the sparks flying as Una hammered a long blade of steel. Sidra could feel every strike in her teeth until Una finally quenched the blade in a tub of water, the steam rising with a hiss.
Una withdrew the sword and handed it off to her apprentice, who was red faced and perspiring from pumping the bellows. Sidra thought of how the fire always burned at the forge, how its embers never fell cold and docile. If anyone was intimate with Cadence fire, knowing its temperament and power and secrets, it was Una.
As such, Una was one of the only blacksmiths in the east who wasn’t afraid to hammer enchantments into her steel. She could take a secret and an ingot, melt them together over a blistering fire, and shape them as one on her anvil. Once an enchanted blade was complete, she always fell ill with a fever and was sometimes unable to leave her bed for days.
“Sidra,” the blacksmith said in greeting, removing her thick leather gloves. “How are you and Maisie?”
“We’re well,” Sidra replied, but she felt the true meaning of Una’s question. “She’s with Graeme for now. I’m thankful that he’s able to watch her while I’m away on visits.”
“Good,” Una said, joining her at the edge of the forge.
“And how are your two children?” Sidra reached into her basket to find the tonic she had made for Una’s vitality. “It’s been a while since I’ve seen them.”
“Growing up too fast,” Una replied with a smile. “But they’re content. When they’re not at school they’re either here with me or spending time with Ailsa at the stables, keen to learn all of my wife’s horse secrets.”
Sidra nodded, wholly understanding the caution, even though Una and Ailsa’s son and daughter were adolescents now. Old enough to heed the strict rules parents were suddenly doling out with the disappearances.
As she set the tonic jar on Una’s outstretched palm, the blacksmith surprised her by saying, “Do you ever wonder if we are unknowing participants in a spirit’s game? If they move us like pawns on a board and glean pleasure from provoking our heartaches?”
Sidra hesitated. She looked deep within herself and knew the answer was yes. She had thought as much. But her devout nature had instantly stamped out those dangerous wonderings; she worried that the earth would sense that disbelief in her when she worked the kail yard, when she crushed the herbs to make healing salves.
“It’s a troubling thought,” Sidra said. “To think they gain pleasure from tormenting us.”
“Sometimes, when I watch the fire burn in the forge,” Una continued, “I imagine what it would be like to be immortal, to hold no fear of death. To dance and burn for an endless era. And I think how dull such an existence would be. That one would do anything to feel the sharp edge of life again.”
“Yes,” Sidra whispered. She was too paranoid to say anything more, and the blacksmith sensed it.
“Don’t let me keep you,” Una said. “Thank you for the tonic. I’ve been commissioned to make an enchanted blade tomorrow, so this will help me bear the effects.”
Sidra bid Una farewell and continued on her route. The day unfurled just as she had expected until a cold burst of northern wind blew through the city. She paused, watching it twine with smoke, overturn baskets in the market, rattle shutters and doors.
Sidra’s black hair tangled across her face as she stood in the center of the street.
And that was when she heard the faint whisper, like a rush of wings.
The wind brought news.
Jack waited for Adaira at the castle. It was noontide, just as she had requested for their meeting, and a servant had brought him to the music turret, telling him the heiress would be with him directly. Impatient, Jack passed the time by walking the length of the bookshelves, selecting a few volumes to sift through. He found a book brimming with music that he swiftly recognized. These were the ballads of the clan. The songs Lorna once sang on feast nights.
Jack smiled as he read the notes. He fondly remembered these songs; they had shaped his childhood, those wild days roaming the heather and exploring the sea caves. And he was pleased to discover that even years later, this music still roused a warm nostalgia within him. It drew him back to those moments in the hall, when he had savored listening to these songs. Long before he ever dreamt of becoming a bard or dared to imagine that he would one day learn the secrets of instruments.
He eventually shut the music book and set it back on the shelf. It was riddled with dust. Realizing he must have been the first person to touch the volume in years, he suddenly felt sad, thinking of how quiet the east had become without Lorna.
He walked to the harp in the center of the room, but refrained from playing. He noticed the table was cleared; all of the papers and books that had been piled upon it yesterday were gone save for a sealed letter.
Curious, Jack took a closer look at the parchment. The letter was addressed to Adaira, and it bore the crest of two swords in a ring of juniper. The Breccans’ sigil.
He recoiled from it, alarmed. Why would the western clan write to her?
He paced the room, trying to cast his thoughts about the letter aside, but his worries lingered. What could the Breccans want from her? It was strange that the first thing that crossed his mind was that they wanted to marry her.
Jack came to a stop before the balcony doors, disconcerted when he remembered the legend of Joan Tamerlaine, dying entwined with Fingal Breccan. Did the Breccans dream of peace again after so many years of strife?
He wondered if the isle could be made whole again, but thought it impossible.
An hour had passed on the sun dial. Where was Adaira?
The view overlooked the thoroughfare of Sloane, and as Jack’s gaze skimmed the street he realized there was some sort of commotion happening below. People were gathering together in the market. A few men started running, and vendors began to close their stalls early. It looked like school was even released spontaneously; young girls and boys were being escorted home.
Jack looked for Frae amongst the dispersing students, but there was no sign of her bright russet hair. She’s with Mirin today, he recalled, the tension in his shoulders easing. She’s safe, at home.
He continued to watch the activity in the streets. He decided to leave—after all, Adaira had stood him up—and he hurried through the courtyard to the market.
“What’s happening?” he asked one of the women who was closing her bakery.
“You didn’t hear the news?” she replied. “Another lass has gone missing.”
“Who?” Jack demanded.
“I’m not sure yet. Several names have been mentioned, but we’re waiting for it to be confirmed by Captain Torin.”
At once, Jack’s stomach dropped, his blood ran cold, and his thoughts scattered like broken glass. On the mainland, he had been afraid of nothing but failure. Failing a class, failing to graduate, failing to please his lover. His fears had only pertained to himself and his own performance. Now he realized how self-absorbed he had been all those years. He was swiftly learning ever since he had returned home that he couldn’t live on music alone, that he cared about and needed other things, even if their appearance in his life came as an utter shock, like bulbs blooming after a long winter. He felt his greatest fear come to life within him, a fear that had been born only days before.