Page 1 of Thorn Season
1
Of all the treasonous acts I’d ever committed, this shouldn’t have been the one to get me caught.
Red water streamed between my fingers with each frantic sponge-drag, but even my frothing assault of soap and vinegar wouldn’t erase the Hunters’ Mark on Marge’s door. I was only spreading the paint around, making a mess of the rose pattern Marge had drawn above the door knocker last summer.
So much for preserving her memory.
Footsteps clopped behind me and I spun, heart racing. The air was still fuzzed and dewy as a morning peach, the jewel-toned houses barely flushed with color; I had to squint to see the figures through the haze.
I exhaled in a sharp blast. Not the guards. Just some children racing across the mosaic-encrusted road, too caught up in their laughter to notice me. They rounded the corner, and the street returned to its sleepy silence, the silver penny blossom trees rustling like sequins in the wind.
But a few streets away, the market was yawning awake and exhaling the stench of roses. Soon, the festivity of Rose Season would drag locals from their beds.
I was running out of time.
I dunked the sponge into the bucket and slapped it across the door once more, scrubbing until vinegar fumes stung my eyes. Marge had loved the first day of Rose Season. Last year, she’d gorged on so many syrup-steeped confections that we’d had to cancel our Double Decks game, and I’d brought her mint tea instead. I’d risen in the early hours of this morning and, remembering her sweet, grateful face, had known I couldn’t leave the Hunters’ Mark on her door one more day.
The tenth Hunters’ Mark to appear in the kingdom of Daradon within the last two months.
The Hunters had never struck so frequently within such a short period, and the sudden, inexplicable increase had left me with a permanent chest-fluttering feeling.
It had made the locals nervous, too.
Another Wielder living among us all this time!I’d heard them whisper.I once let her watch the children!As if Marge hadn’t also volunteered at the clinic, or salted the ice off her neighbors’ doorsteps, or distributed lemon baskets when her potted trees had overflowed. As if her existence had been a scandal and her slaughter an inconvenience.
I clenched the sponge, water veining my olive-brown skin. Marge should’ve let them break their bones on the ice. I would.
Footsteps pounded again, and this time I recognized those long strides. I whirled as my best friend braced her hands on her knees, her black braid snapping around her hip.
“The guards,” Tari said, panting. “They’re coming this way.”
I swore, hurling the sponge into the bucket. Our hands scrabbled to clean the evidence. Water slopped and wood clacked, and robins scattered at the noise.
“There!” Tari pointed across the street.
Three guards ambled up the pavement, their silver-stitched uniforms gleaming.
I dropped to the doorstep and mopped the water, red streaking under my sponge like a bloodstain. “How did they get here so fast? You were meant to be watching!”
She winced, bending to help me. “I got distracted.” A green gem swung from her neck like a pendulum, flashing rainbows over her rich copper skin.
My eyes snapped up. “You left your post forthat?”
“It was on sale!”
“It’s fake!”
Tari faltered, then plucked up the gem. “Really?”
I stood, trousers soaked. “Do you understand what a lookout does?”
“Do you understand what acleanerdoes?” She gestured at the mark, now bleeding down the door. “Gracious gods, it looks worse than when you started!”
“If my father finds out about this—”
The guards’ voices halted me, now audible over our bickering. Father was the least of my worries.
I hefted the bucket, tipping water down my blouse. Murkier water ribboned downhill across the mosaic tiles; the guards would follow that trail to the perpetrators. Tari could outrun them, but I couldn’t.
