Lynn Flewelling - The Bone Doll's Twin

“What are you doing here?” he demanded.

“I be here, waiting for you,” she replied.

This time it was Arkoniel who stepped closer. His heart was racing, but he felt no fear of her now.

She looked smaller and more ragged than he recalled, as if she’d been hungry for a long time. There were thicker streaks of white in her hair, too, but her body was still rounded and ripe, and she moved with the same challenge in her hips that had so unnerved him. She took another step toward him, then tilted her head and set her hands on her hips like a fishwife, regarding him with a combination of heat and wry disdain in her black eyes.

He was close enough to smell herbs and sweat and moist earth, with something else mixed in that made him think of mares in heat.

“When—when did you arrive?” he asked.

She shrugged. “I be here always. Where you be, all these times? How you take care what we make, be gone so long?”

“You mean you’ve been here , near the keep, all these years?”

“I help the lady. I follow and keep watch. Help that spirit not be so angry.”

“You haven’t done much of a job of that,” Arkoniel retorted, holding out his splinted wrist for her to see. “Tobin’s life has been a misery because of it.”

“It be worse, I don’t do as the Mother show,” she retorted, shaking a finger at him. “You and Iya, you don’t know! A witch make a spirit, she …” She held her wrists up, crossed, as if she were bound. “Iya say, ‘You go home, witch. Don’t come back.’ She don’t know.” Lhel tapped her temple. “That spirit call out for me. I tell her, but she don’t listen.”

“Does Rhius know you’re here?”

Lhel shook her head and an earwig squirmed loose from a tendril of hair and skittered away down her bare arm. “I close always, but not to be see.” She smiled slyly, then faded from sight before his eyes. “You do that, Wizard?” she whispered, behind him now and close enough to his ear for him to feel her breath. She’d made no sound as she moved, nor left any mark on the ground.

Arkoniel flinched away. “No.”

“I show you,” she whispered. An invisible hand stroked his arm. “Show you what you dream.”

The memory of the men emerging from the air intruded on his thoughts again.

She was doing this.

Arkoniel jerked back, caught between the water and the invisible hands that tried to stroke his chest. “Stop that! This is no time for your petty teasing.”

Something struck him hard in the chest, knocking him backward into the mud at the water’s edge. A weight settled on his chest, holding him down, and Lhel’s musky unwashed scent overwhelmed him. Then she was visible again, squatting naked on top of him.

His eyes widened in wonder. The three-phase moon—a circle flanked by two outfacing crescents—was tattooed on her belly, and concentric serpent patterns covered each full breast. More symbols covered her face and arms. He had seen such marks before, carved into the walls of caves on the sacred island of Kouros, and on rocks along the Skalan coastline. According to Iya, such marks had been old long before the Hierophant came to the Three Lands. Had Lhel somehow hidden these markings before, he wondered, unable to move, or were they another illusion? There was certainly considerable magic of some sort involved. Strength greater than her small body could account for held him flat as she took his face between her hands.

You and your kind dismiss my people, and my gods. Her true voice intruded into his mind, devoid of accent or stumbling grammar. You think we are dirty, that we practice necromancy. You are strong, you Orëska, but you are often fools, too, blinded by pride. Your teacher asked me for a great magic, then treated me with disrespect. Because of her I offended the Mother and the dead.

For ten years I have guarded that spirit, and the child it is bound to. The dead child could have killed the living one and those around her if I had not bound it. Until its flesh is cut free from the one you call Tobin, it must be so bound and I must remain, for only I can do both unbindings when the time comes.

Arkoniel was amazed to see a tear roll down the witch’s cheek. It fell and struck his face.

I have waited alone all these years, cut off from my people, a ghost among yours. There’s been no full moon priest for me, no harvest sacrifice or spring rites. I die inside, Wizard, for the child and for the goddess who sent you to me. My hair turns white and my womb is still empty. Iya put gold in my hands, not understanding that a great magic must be paid for with the body. When she first came to me in my visions, I thought you were for me, my payment. But Iya sent me away empty. Will you pay me now?

“I—I can’t.” Arkoniel dug his fingers into the earth as the meaning of her words dawned on him. “It … such intercourse … it takes away our power.”

She leaned over him and brushed her heavy breasts across his lips. Her skin was hot. A hard brown nipple brushed the corner of his mouth and he turned his head away.

You are wrong, Orëska , she whispered in his mind. It feeds the power. Join with me in flesh and I will teach you my magic. Then your power will be doubled.

Arkoniel shivered. “I can’t give you a child. Orëska wizards are barren.”

But not eunuchs. Slowly, sinuously, she slid back until she was straddling his hips. Arkoniel kept silent, but his body answered for him. I need no child from you, Wizard. Just your heat and your rush of seed. That is payment enough.

She pressed against him and pleasure bordering on pain blossomed through his groin as her heat seeped through his tunic. He closed his eyes, knowing she would take him if she chose. There was no way to prevent it.

But then the pressure, the heat, the hands were gone. Arkoniel opened his eyes and found himself alone.

It had been no vision, though; he could still taste her salt on his lips, smell her scent on his clothes. In the mud on either side of him the prints of small bare feet slowly filled with water.

He sat up and rested his head on his knees, drawing in the musky woman smell that clung to him. Cold, aching, and strangely ashamed, he groaned aloud as he conjured her warmth pressing against him.

I thought you were for me.

The words made the breath catch in his throat and his groin pound. He forced himself up to his feet. Mud and pond slime oozed from his hair and dripped down inside the front of his tunic like cold little fingers seeking his heart.

Illusions and lies , he thought desperately, but as he made his way back toward the rotting keep, he could not forget what she’d shown him, or the whispered invitation; Join with me, Wizard—your power will be doubled.

Tobin’s head started to hurt during his sword practice. It ached so badly it made him sick to his stomach, and Tharin sent him up to bed in the middle of the day.

Brother came without being called and crouched on the end of Tobin’s bed, one hand pressed to his chest. Curled on his side, cheek pressed to the soft new coverlet Father had sent from Ero, Tobin stared at his baleful mirror self, waiting for Brother to touch him or weep as he had in the dreams. But Brother didn’t do anything, just stayed there gathering darkness around himself. Queasy from the headache, Tobin slipped into a doze.

He was riding Gosi up the forest road toward the mountains. Red and gold leaves swirled around him, bright in the sunshine. He thought he could hear another rider just behind him, but he couldn’t see who it was. After a moment he realized that Brother was sitting behind him with his arms wrapped around Tobin’s waist. In the dream Brother was alive; Tobin could feel the other boy’s chest pressing warm and solid against his back, and Brother’s breath against his neck. The hands clasped at his waist were brown and callused, with dirt under the nails.