Page 76 of The BoneKeeper's Daughter

The meaning hits me, wrapping around me like a snake. It takes several moments for me to be able to respond without tearing this boy’s larynx from his throat.

“I wasn’t aware the BoneKeeper had invited to you to…trade.”

“Are you normally aware of Wren’s choices?” he asks, and I want to slice the smirk from his face as painfully as possible.

“I was long before you arrived here, and will be long after you leave. So yes. I am.”

We lock eyes, neither willing to look away, and though there are no clear stakes on the table, the taste of violence grows between us, metallic on my tongue. Who knows how long we would have stayed there, or how quickly blades would have been drawn, had two anxious women not approached hesitantly, clearly not wanting to interrupt, but having their footsteps forced forward by need.

“Village Father?” Hands wringing, pulling at their skirts in nervousness, they approach together, lending each other strength.

“Yes?” I know I’m too short, too clipped in my response, and see them shaking, but I can’t force peace into my voice, no matter how deeply I breathe.

“We…we went to call on the Keeper at first light….she was meant to join us at the women’s pool…house a wreck…what looks like blood…” Their words tumble over each other, making it hard to separate them.

“You…I’m sorry.Wrenwas going to the women’s pools with you?” Rannoch sounds astonished, as if the Earth and Sky Gods themselves were in front of us.

“Wren?” The women turn to each other, having a silent conversation, and then back to us, eyes narrowed in twin expressions of carefully crafted nonchalance. “Yes. Wren. She was to come with us today. We promised her last night. Something has happened.”

“Well, Village Father.Imay not be your people, but these women are.” The Trader is smug, and steps behind the women, offering them space to move forward. “Surely you owe them some sort of answer about where their…BoneKeeper?...is.”

“She is…indisposed.”

A shout and a groan from the square reverberate through the emptiness of the plaza. From the far side, Raek is calling to us, arm wrapped around a stumbling Nickolas, face pale and bloodied in the early morning. The women gasp in shock, hands going to their mouths, eyes darting between me and the brothers, who make a pathetic show of their progress.

“Village Father!” Raek manages to be both respectful and outraged, and my hands clench to fists at my side, visions of smashing his skull to pieces flashing through my brain before I can stop them. Rannoch steps up beside me, silent and anxious. Raek and his Hunters weren’t meant to return for another four days at the least, when the trade would have been completed, and he would have no room to undo what had been done. They must have gotten in this morning, though why so early I have no idea. “My brother! My brother has been attacked!” The distress in his voice is real, but not for the reasons those watching would think.

Raek is a favorite, though, having charmed most of the village since before I became the Father, and the two women run toward him,clucking like distressed chickens, helping him sit Nickolas on the steps.

“Whathappened?” One asks in horror, seeing the deep gouge and vibrant purple-red bruising on the side of his face. I have to bite back a vicious grin; whatever Wren did to him laid him out. The side of his eye looks almost crushed in, the bone caving oddly at the curve above his cheek, and I find myself muttering a silent prayer to the Gods that it’s broken, that it gets infected and creeps to his brain, killing him so I don’t have to. I wouldn’t mind his blood on my hands — I’d make it last, collect it drop by drop from his veins so he would feel every second of his life leaving, but it would destroy everything Rannoch and I are working to rebuild here. I can’t makeanymistakes, not if we want this village and its people to survive. So I grit my teeth and simply say, “Explain.”

Whatever Raek hears in my voice isn’t to his liking, because he narrows his eyes assessingly before widening them again in borrowed distress, playing to his real audience. “I got back this morning, just with a small group, ahead of the rest of the Hunters. To…bring you a report, Father.” Here he stutters briefly, and I exchange a quick glance with Rannoch. There is a fox in the henhouse. Clearly someone sent him word, somehow, that the Traders were here. Our circle of those we can trust has narrowed again, and I see Rannoch making mental notes about who we have lost from our already small band of allies. “I was coming straight to the Council House, of course, and I stumbled across his body on the path.” He takes a deep breath, lets his voice shake on the words, and the women bow toward him in sympathy. “I thought him dead.”

I wish him dead.But I can’t say the words, just nod.

“Thank the Gods he was breathing. I was able to rouse him. Barely. Just barely.” That part I believe. Nickolas looks green, as though he can only just focus his eyes. “He was able to tell me the barest outline of what happened — that he was returning to the Council House after the dancing, that he passed the BoneKeeper’s house and heard screaming.” The women gasp, and Kaden, who has been noticeably quiet, inhalessharply, his jaw clenching. Raek risks a quick glance toward the Trader, and I’m caught by the brief flicker of satisfaction in his eyes. Something is at hand that I’m not seeing. “He ran in to help her. The cottage was pitch-black — he could see nothing, just two figures in a struggle. Rushing over, he managed to pull the larger one…a man, he said…off the Keeper, and he thinks she was able to escape. In the chaos, the attacker smashed Nickolas, though, and knocked him out cold.”

“Who wouldassaultthe BoneKeeper?” This from one of the women, who sounds like she’s about to be ill. “TheBoneKeeper?”

“No one in this village, that much is certain,” Raek replies as if on cue, and it suddenly and sickeningly plays out before me, unraveling too quickly for me to stop it.

“Never, never,” the women agree in shocked murmurs, dabbing at Nickolas’ face with small clothes and clucking meaningless words of appreciation for his bravery.

“Nickolas was concerned, though, that in the fear of the moment, in the darkness and the shock of the event, especially because he thinks she had been hit, her memory of the event might be…shaky. That our BoneKeeper may be so distressed by the evening that she may think Nickolas did this, or misremember the path of the night. We wanted to check on her, to make sure she is comforted by the presence of those who wish to see her safe and secure.”

“Oh, she would never believe that a Councilman would attack her,” the women rush to say. “Never. Unthinkable.”

And it is. Unthinkable, that is. That a Councilor would ever attack the BoneKeeper. But we live in unthinkable times, where unspeakable things happen on a daily basis.

Kaden, who has been silent beside me the entire time, leans forward — infinitesimally, but enough to draw attention. When he speaks, his voice is surprisingly commanding, enough that Raek straightens slightly, despite himself.

“And who doyouthink attacked your Keeper, Councilman?” The question is dark, and loaded, and though he tries to fight it, Raek’s lips twitch in a minute break before he is able to stop them. “Because yourstatement that no one from thevillagewould seem…dangerously close to an accusation.”

Raek tilts his head, lips still pressed flat against amusement, and raises a single brow. “What? Absolutely not,Trader.” There is strange emphasis on the last word, a dripping sort of hatred that even the women catch, both falling silent, glancing back and forth between the two men. “I would not think to accuse anyone, especially when I have been back in the village for less than an hour, and so much has happened in my absence. I was simply stating a fact. For all of our history, we have never had a BoneKeeper attacked or assaulted. Then I leave, and in the meantime, Traders have arrived for the first time in twenty-four years after an unexplained absence, and our precious Keeper has been bloodied and beaten. That one happened at the same time as the other is not a direct correlation.”

“Hmm.” Kaden responds only with a sound, nothing more; Raek’s mouth twists into a sneering satisfaction.

“I’m sorry, I can’t stay longer at the moment. I’d like to get Nickolas to bed. He has been through enough. Ladies, thank you for your help. I know from experience that you were most likely on your way to the pools — please, don’t let us keep you. Your kindness in this moment has been so appreciated. I’d like to gift each of you a measure of water from Nickolas and myself, in gratitude you know.”

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