Page 78 of Shadow Wings

“Dyter,” I said. “Can you tell me about her? About how youmet?”

Dyter wouldn’t normally hesitate to tell me, but I held my breath, remembering Tyrrik. Despite my easy relationship with the old man, he wasn’t one to spill his guts, and he was the king ofsecrets.

Sure enough, Dyter stiffened. He flung a quick look at the Drae then met my gaze, and his eyes steeled. No one was more surprised than I when he startedtalking.

Dyter trusted Tyrrik? But my memory niggled at the back of my mind that this wasn’t the first time Dyter had made this decision in front ofme.

I shook my head and focused on what he wassaying.

“My sister, Dyrell met her first,” Dyter spoke. “Your mother was searching the bins behind The Raven’s Hollow in Harvest ZoneEight.”

I grimaced. Amateur. Dumpsters were always picked clean. Not that I’d had occasion to pick through them like many others, but growing up in starving Verald, rubbish bin-dipping had been common among the poor in the Penny Wheel. Still, life had probably been a bit easier back then, or at least more food was available if my mother’s stories weretrue.

“My sister took one look at the baby swaddled on your mother’s back and invited her in for a meal, but your mother refused to go inside. Dyrell thought it odd but put it from her mind; even then, people were just scraping by, and Dyrell was busy. A week later, five of the emperor’s men came through the zone asking after a young woman and a child. Dyrell denied it, having forgotten all about your mum; there were too many going hungry to remember any one in particular. But, a few days later, Dyrell saw your mum again and put things together after that. Enough to realize your mother was introuble.”

My mother had told me she’d run from my abusive father to start a new life. Talk about the understatement of thecentury.

“When Dyrell asked if Ryhl was in trouble and offered to help, your mum ran off,” Dyter broke off. “But four weeks later, your mother knocked on the back door of my sister’s tavern and asked for food. She was starving, and her milk had dried up. She could no longer feed herchild.

“Your mum worked for Dyrell for a month, for room and board, and then the king’s men stumbled into Dyrell’s tavern with several Druman. Your mother hid again, this time returning a few days later. Dyrell wrestled the truth from her. Zone Eight had more money than Seven, so there were more patrols, and your mother insisted she leave. So, my sister and your mother fabricated a story between them, and my sister sent the pair of you to me. We told everyone your mum had recently been widowed and decided to start afresh in a different Harvest Zone. My sister acted like your mother’s dear friend, giving plausibility to the story and fooling everyone in our Zone. We got her a house, and she kept quiet for a good long time, and after several months, it was as though she’d always lived in our part of therealm.”

“Didn’t guards notice someonenew?”

Dyter nodded. “Theydid.”

“And they didn’t think a new woman and child in a Zone that suddenly had more food a bitsuspicious?”

“What would you do if you were hungry and you found a patch of carrots hidden in the middle ofnowhere?”

Easy. “I wouldn’t tell anyone aboutthem.”

“Exactly,” Dyter said. “And Ryhl was our patch of carrots. She could grow things. Not only that, she helped a lot of others grow things. I’m not sure you realize how many people revered your mother, Rynnie. In such hard times, many people of Verald would’ve gone to significant lengths to ensure her safety, not merelymyself.”

“So no one told the king or the emperor?” I asked. As my mentor shook his head, I felt a swift and fierce pride for the people ofVerald.

“Though it took me a long time to understand why, Ryhl’s house was always dark at night,” Dyter said. “One day, it clicked that your mother wasn’t actually sleeping there. Back then, she didn’t rely on anyone to keep her secrets. I don’t know where she slept those first few years, but she always turned up during the day. I hadn’t bought the tavern off the prior owner at that point, and I had to walk past your house to get to my own back then.” Dyter tipped his head back to look at the blue sky. “It took three years for me to see a candle lit in your house atnight.”

Three years?“She didn’t trust anyone for threeyears?”

Dyter turned to me. “I told you I was honored to be a confidant of your mother’s, and I meant that. I can count the people she trusted on one hand. I never asked where she came from or what she ran from, but it didn’t take a genius to see your mother had been taught trust was aweakness.”

I breathed through the tightness in my chest. Hadn’t I learned that lesson myself? I knew anyone could snap under the right pressure. You couldn’t really trust another, not unless they were willing to die foryou.

“Her life sounds so isolated and forlorn,” I said hoarsely. “I never saw her as a lonely, frightened person.” But to live life in the company of such fear, always running, never trusting, constantly expecting to be captured. I’d always believed my mother to be a happy person, firm and unafraid, loving and kind to those around her. From Dyter’s description, she was someone who had few friends, and she’d never learned to trustagain.

Was that my fate? To be unable to trust? Unable to live a peacefullife?

“She eased up as the years went on, Rynnie. She began sleeping in the house, remember? It took your mother time, but she began to live life in time, and much of that was thanks to you. You brought so much happiness to herlife—”

Dyter broke off, and a burning sensation built behind myeyes.

I whispered, “Is that true, Dyter? Was Mumhappy?”

Dyter’s shoulders shook, and at least a full minute passed before he replied, “She was truly happy, Rynnie. For the time she spent in Verald, in Harvest Zone Seven, I can say that with certainty. She found love and joy again throughyou.”

A tear slipped down my cheek, and despite my struggle to keep my emotions in check, I knew my choked breathing wasn’t missed by the Drae behind me. There was warmth at my back as he approached, and I stiffened, conflicted. I hoped Tyrrik would touch me, I longed for it,andI worried about what it may mean to give into thatlonging.

He fell back once more and spoke in my mind instead.There’s another branchahead.

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