Page 43 of The BoneKeeper's Daughter

We exchange a long look; this is how we’ve always communicated. We’d learned over time that actual conversations weren’t safe, so our strange friendship grew in laden words and heavy glances. I remember the moment we realized we were on one side of history together, with the rest of the Council on the other. The BoneKeeper was sick and unable to speak for the bones, so the Council voted in her stead. It was an unusual reoccurrence after years of her falling ill; since the moment she clothed herself in bone she hadn’t missed the monthly naming for Reaping and Render. Nor has she missed one since. On this occasion, though, while she was unwell, Nickolas and Raek, plus a few of their cohorts, pushed to call for a certain child. And while we all abide by the First Lesson, something about the Council naming the girl felt…deliberate.

I wasn’t there yet, too young to have been called to the Council, so I wasn’t part of the decision. A girl from a miller’s family, still with milk-teeth, was chosen, and Ceridwen, barely well enough to Guide, sobbed through the length of the Offering. Even at 15, I noted the looks of satisfaction on Raek and Nickolas’ faces; it was clearly personal in some way, and the Offerings should never be personal. Since that time, that last child, none have been called by bone, a thing which has never before happened in the entire history of our Rendings and Reapings. It makes certain members of the Council furious, though their only explanation for their anger is that it seems like theKeeper is purposefully going against the First Lesson, somehow circumventing the will of the Gods —I is for Infant, after all. It makes them suspicious of her, and they sow that suspicion like seeds for summer wheat. There is too much fertile ground for doubt in our village these days; desperation seeks a cause, a place to lay blame when everything is crumbling around you. And it is always easier to look atonethanmany, to have the comfort of thought that, if only a single thing were different, everything would be different. It’s much harder to face the reality that there are no easy paths to the mountain peak, that it will be struggle after struggle, the work of many hands over many seasons, not a sole, sharp cut in a solitary, swift movement.

The day the miller’s daughter was thrown to the Reaping Pit, Silas caught my anger; I was young and hadn’t learned to cloak my emotion yet. He remembered it though, kept it tucked away, and six years later, when the bones by way of Ceridwen commanded me to the Council, he reached out to me cautiously. I was more than happy to join him in his plans to burn the poison from this village, but hadn’t anticipated how deep the roots of corruption and abuse went.

Silas, however, had watched for years as the flesh of our leaders grew gangrenous, helpless to do anything. He had been called to be Father too young, and it gave the sitting Council unheard of strength, dangling him like a puppet in front of the people. They overplayed their hand when Silas was 20, though. His closest friend, someone he considered a brother, was named Offering by the Council at only 18 — a strange choice, as Protectors, Renders, and Reapers were almost never chosen. The moment sparked something in Silas that forced him from child to adult. From what Silas has said, he argued vehemently against it, but was still fighting to claim his position as Father, and was outvoted. Lorcan’s loss was devastating to him, and set fire to a long dormant flame inside him. He vowed at Lorcan’s Guiding to correct the course of our village, and to put nothing before it; no friendship or love, no family or feeling would supplant that single, driving goal he had sworn in blood over the empty body of his only friend. He was clear with me from the start — if for some reason it saved our people, he would slice my throat himself, friendship bedamned. I would die for our village, but Silas would let himself be consumed by the Everfire.

We’ve been plotting and planning ever since, taking careful, cautious steps on ground that constantly shifts beneath our feet. There have been few things that are consistent, little we’ve been able to depend on. Staring at the girl curled on the ground before us, skin almost grey and glistening with cold sweat, it’s unnerving to realize even those things we thought would never alter have started changing.

“How–” Silas speaks, then stops, studying Ceridwen’s still face with a furious dawning realization. “When she has been sick in the past, how has it presented?”

Shaking my head, I shrug. “She bars her door, and is unreachable for two or three days. Then is weak, but in her right mind. There are rumors of it being a falling sickness, or fainting spells.”

“Rumors,” he scoffs. “Of course. Started by whom? I don’t even have to wager a guess. Always when an Offering is to be named?”

Nodding slowly, I inhale, long and low. “As far as I know, initially yes. Though not for years, at least for an Offering. Not since the miller’s daughter. Not since –”

“Not since she was able to bar her doors and windows, hmmm?” He grimaces. That had been a battle between the Council and the Keeper — the right to personal privacy, and I try to remember the last time she’d been sick.

“Yeees…” I reply, thinking back. “She was allowed to start locking her home at, what, 12 or 13? And the last Offering named by the Council was just after…She’s taken ill since — just rarely. But never for a Rending or Reaping. You can’t think….”

“Poison,” he whispers to himself, surging to his feet and leaning over her face, inhaling deeply through his nose. “I can only smell herbs.”

“She prefers her water scented — it’s a common enough practice. Most of the village, if they have time and stores enough, lace it with sweet grass or rosemary, or chamomile. Something to help mask the taste from the cisterns.”

“Something that would mask henbane, or nightshade.”

I nod.

“Who gave her water tonight?”

“I don’t know. Not me, or you. Or Raek or Nickolas. She would never accept it from their hands.”

Sighing, he rubs a tired hand over his face. “But having her incapacitated during these discussions of the Blood Tree, of her actions, of her claims….Gods. It doesn’t looks good. She accuses them of feeding the Ender–” His words are cut off by a sudden rattle from far down the tunnel and we exchange panicked looks. “I’m sorry,” he whispers. “I wasn’t thinking.”

Nodding, I quickly light all the torches in the small room, and the sound subsides. “What happened after I left?”

“A lot of arguing, a lot of placating. I’m sending Raek out with the Hunters past the southwestern wall for a week.”

I can’t help letting a bitter bark of laughter escape. “How hard did he fight leaving his comfort and privilege?” It’s rhetorical, but Silas answers anyway, face darkly satisfied.

“Hard. Until I made him expedition leader. Which he wore for several minutes with a puffed chest before realizing I wouldn’t let his brother go with him. I’m sending a few of ours as well. And a second party to the southeast.”

“Nickolas?”

“No. Just a few of their supporters. We’ll have Nickolas in the village, and five others. So six of the Council here for when the Traders come. Plus you and I. As long as they stay on course, Raek and his crew shouldn’t be back until they are already welcomed into the village.”

“Silas.” I don’t even know what to say, but he hears the question anyway.

“I don’t know. I don’t understand it, Rann. We leave on hunt, the silos are full and dry. Full enough that we’ll make it through the winter, in any case. We return and half is gone, lost ‘to mold and rot’? How?How?” He stands, pacing, and for a second I’m reminded of how young he really is, how long he’s been shouldering this burden, howmuch he hates the weight of being the Father to these people. “And they would turn away the Traders, too, if they could. After the last visit…” We exchange looks again. Yes. After the last visit, and the Council’s rash decisions to block the path. With our stores barely enough to keep half the village alive through the winter months, this trade could mean the difference between life and silence for thousands.Thousands.

Raek was on the Council when the trail was blocked, when the avalanche was loosed to prevent anyone from outside the Upper Kingdom from entering. A secret none but those on the Council know.

“We need this, Rann.” He is certain and desperate all at once.

The Keeper moans quietly, and we turn as one towards her. Her jaw is locked tight, eyes fluttering beneath her thin lids, and Silas presses his lips together. “I don’t like this. Something is bothering her. Her breathing is too shallow. Did it get worse when you came down here?”

I take a second to think, then nod. “Yes. And ever since.”

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