Page 18 of Sonnets and Serpents
She blinked. Her mind took a moment to sort through the words and meaning before she asked breathlessly, “Buy magic, you mean? Can a Casttranslatefor me?”
He gave an enthusiastic nod. “The market can buy stone and water and animal. Every magic.”
Even in Loegria, Casts could be purchased from certain Casters, as long as they were registered and branded. After her experience with curses, Eliza never would have steered herself toward magic, but now it was the only path before her, and with the storm rising at her back, she plunged forward rather than face it.
If this was her one way to find Henry, so be it.
Eliza ran from the library, barely remembering to throw a Pravishthank youover her shoulder.
By the time she reached the market outside the broken wall, she was sweating. She doubled over, gasping for breath, then pushed on. A hundred conversations swirled around her from people jostling her in all directions. After a particularly violent shove, she almost ran into a hot plate sizzling over a contained fire, and the merchant’s only response was a wide smile as he offered her whatever dripping meat he’d just pulled from the cooktop.
Her stomach rumbled, and she bit her lip, but paying for the inn had eaten up almost all her money, and what little silver remained was now dedicated to whatever magic could lead her to Henry. It was the only hope she had left, and she had not crossed an entire ocean only to fail now.
Scanning the market, she saw a few stone statues on a striped rug. A Stone Caster, perhaps? Eliza forced her way through the crowd until she knelt on the woman’s blanket.
“Nirhaba!” the woman cried out, smiling widely. She wore a bright-pink scarf wrapped to cover her hair, vibrant against her rich brown skin, and her green shirt was embroidered with matching pink flowers. Leaning forward, she said, “Seykeli atin al!”
Eliza pulled her shoulders back, strengthening her spine, and she tried to speak in a voice loud enough to be heard over the chaos of the market.
“Nirhaba,” she repeated. The greeting was easy. After that, the woman had said to buy ... something. She didn’t know any Pravish words for magic or Casting, and she hadn’t thought to ask the male librarian to teach her. Eliza fought back a groan. “Seykeli... Cast?”
The woman lifted a stone statue carved in the shape of awoman. She chattered away in Pravish, gesturing between the statue’s face and Eliza’s own.
“Very pretty,” she kept repeating. “Very pretty.”
“Yes,” Eliza agreed. “Very pretty.”
“You buy!”
“No, I ...” Eliza flopped her hands uselessly, trying to think of how to communicate her need. She stitched words together like the most horrendous of scrap blankets. “I need ... thing ... Speak Pravish?”
The woman laughed, amused. She waved her hand. “Arakl sana Pravish konusturamaz.”
Well, at least Eliza heard the wordPravish. And she was fairly certainsanawas “cannot.”Konusturawas a verb for speaking—and, embarrassingly, the-mazending meant Eliza had conjugated her own attempt incorrectly. Pravish conjugations would be the death of her.
But if she understood correctly, that meantaraklwas something like “Casting.”
“Arakl!” Eliza said.
With an approving nod, the woman reached behind her to a pile of rocks. They were the same porous yellow as the Izili wall, and she easily pulled one from the top, suggesting it was lightweight.
Eliza’s heart pounded. She’d never commissioned anything from a Caster of any kind, but she’d always admired the creations of Stone Casters. There was even a bit of their work in Castle de Loegria, in the observatory tower, which stretched higher than any other part of the castle, with thin stone rafters that appeared delicate and yet remained stable through the roughest storms.
It was one thing to commission a statue or a feat of architecture. Another to ask for a Cast that affected herself.Eliza rubbed her hands on her thighs, her palms damp. She remembered cold nights spent in the cage of a curse.
After knowing the terrible touch of magic, she was asking for it again? Perhaps she would come out even worse. Perhaps after magic infected a person deeply enough, they lost themselves.
Or maybe magic canceled itself out? Maybe if she requested a blessing, it would wash away the remaining effects of the curse? That seemed too convenient to hope for.
There was so much she didn’t know. Eliza swallowed heavily. “Wait,” she whispered in Pravish. “I ... wait.”
She fumbled her red book from her pocket. The words slid like ice in her grasp, and she found nothing to tell her the right way to go.
Suddenly, the woman reached out and patted Eliza’s hand.
Eliza jumped, dropping her book to the striped rug beneath her.
With a sympathetic, motherly smile, the Caster asked, “It is boy?”
