Page 79 of Soulgazer

Brona scoffs to my right. “Drop him dead, more like. You’d have to dilute the venom with meadowsweet an’ honey to get only a paralysis.” I strain to see the fang in question, but my boot catches for the hundredth time in an hour. Faolan wraps a steadying arm about my waist.

The market was half-formed by the time we made it to shore, but now rows of stalls and blankets piled high with wares cover every inch of the narrow land. Anything the Ring of Stars has banned or limited is laid out here, waiting for a buyer. There are flora and fauna like I’ve never seen, tinctures and instruments—and weapons.

So many weapons.

My gaze drifts aimlessly over blades forged from a volcano’s heart, iron-studded shields, daggers crafted of ice, and colorful bows so finely wrought, I have to wonder if they’re decorative. I’m running my fingers along the iridescent feathers of an arrow, watching how they turn the light, when I see it.

A sling.

It’s been treated like an afterthought, looped over a sword’s handle at the edge of a table. Five silver-threaded cords of leather are braided into two strands that taper at the ends into delicateloops, each woven piece roughly the length of my arm. At the place where they join, four bronze discs secure the straps to a central pocket large enough to fit a palm-sized stone.

I remember the ache it used to leave in my shoulder. The delicious rush in my chest whenever I found a perfectly round pebble to add to my brother’s pouch. Secret lessons spent hitting targets on the beach.

And Aidan’s grin when after months of nothing, my rock finally hit its mark.

Keep at it, Saoirse! Don’t you dare give up.

My fingers flex in Faolan’s as the memory passes through—bittersweet and far away. Yet as though he’s felt the shift in my body, the break in my heart, Faolan tracks my gaze to the sling and raises a single dark brow.

“They call that a poor man’s weapon. The humble shepherd’s sling.”

The wordsI knowrest on the tip of my tongue; that was always my father’s reason to dismiss it. He refused to allow Conal, his heir, to learn, but Aidan never much cared for Da’s rules—and Da never cared enough about Aidan to stop him. And when my brother picked it up from a fisherman’s son, he took his rebellion one step further and passed the knowledge on to me.

I tug on Faolan’s hand. “Let’s leave it, then.”

He refuses to budge, eyes narrowed and mouth tugged to one side. “No, I don’t think I will.”

“Why? A sling is useless on a ship.”

“Oh, you’d be surprised. Besides,” Faolan says as he raises my hand to his lips, kissing each knuckle, “anything that makes your eyes shine like that is well worth the coin.”

Before I can blink, Faolan’s approached the merchant and has begun to haggle a price. I ought to protest—deny my interest orput up a proper fight. Instead, I linger near the table’s edge and then force myself to move on. It’s his fortune. He can spend it however he wishes.

Even if this one act sends my insides into an uproar.

My fingers trail over blankets spun of the finest wool I’ve ever touched as I find a new path through the market, but I jerk them back when a seller demonstrates what they’re capable of on a fellow traveler. The moment her slight body is wrapped in it, she tips over and curls up in a deep sleep on the ground. Wool from the sheep of Painted Claw’s highest hills, forbidden from use a decade ago.

Perhaps in another life with fewer enemies, I could use such a thing for a peaceful night’s sleep. I haven’t managed more than a few hours each night since the evening we were attacked.

I’m nearly past a new stall boasting honey that instantly seals any wound once applied—for a pretty price, naturally—when I notice the humming.

It stops me in my tracks.

My feet grind against loose stones, but for once, my body isn’t taken over by panic. There is no pain or ice between my shoulder blades, no tug of the magic at my gut. I strain to listen—to seek and find. To my right, coin passes between two hands as a third swipes a bag of ice from the Dromlach Cliffs while the vendor is distracted. And to the left, so low to the ground my eyes nearly pass over her, is a woman sitting on a woven mat, her body bent with age.

It’s not the humming of magic I hear. It’s her.

She sings under her breath as her fingers work incredible knots through thread that gleams with every color I’ve ever seen, and quite a few I haven’t. Together, they weave cloth charms in the shape of living creatures—a swan, bear, otter, and sheep.

“Would you like to know what they’re for, lass?”

Kind brown eyes slanted as deep as Tavin’s meet mine, though where his are framed by a curtain of dark hair, her hair is short and touched with silver. The woman smiles and pats the mat beside her, setting the half-formed animal down in her lap. I glance over my shoulder, but Faolan’s still busy with the merchant. Careful not to sweep her creations into the dirt with my skirts, I lower myself to the mat’s edge.

“These are my aisling de na sióga.”

A laugh escapes me. Dream faeries. Clever little creatures that, once spun and sung into existence, can live for years like the animal they represent, curling up to your cheek at night to stave off bad dreams. I scoop the bear into my palm and smile as he comes to life, ambling across the network of lines to sniff around my fingers.

“Stars. I’ve only ever seen one in person, during the celebration of the autumn equinox.” It was before the prayers and scoldings, before the proper magic began, when I was hardly big enough to matter. Rí Callen—only a child themself then—had a tiny cloth-woven dragon that would fly from their finger and circle our heads before returning on swift wings. When I’d asked Aidan for one later, he’d laughed and told me I’d have a better chance at taking flight myself than convincing Da to pay for one.

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