Tamora Pierce - Street Magic

It was only after they’d been gone a week that Briar realized he was listening for the girls’ voices, and wondering what they were up to. It was harder to find good books without Tris, harder to get a good round of quarterstaff practice without Daja, and pouring his troubles into Rosethorn’s ears wasn’t as soothing as it was with Sandry. Sandry would listen solemnly, and sympathize, and tell him how wonderful he was. Briar knew better than to even suggest that Rosethorn treat him that way. He liked his nose—girls admired it. He didn’t want to give Rosethorn an excuse to bite it off.

The merchant woman took a loincloth and a headcloth behind the curtain. Soon afterward she emerged with Evvy. The girl was neatly dressed in the orange tunic and black trousers; a brown and orange headcloth covering her ragged hair. “I don’t see why you bother,” she grumbled.

“Because someone did it for me, four years ago. He’s always got more clothes than he needs, so he said I’d waste my time giving him more. He told me just do the same for someone else,” Briar said. He thrust the hemp bag with the other new clothes at her. “You get to carry ’em, though.” He bundled the dirty things under one arm and marched out of the stall before she asked other uncomfortable questions. He wasn’t really sure why he was doing so much for her, though what he’d said about Niko, the mage who had clothed him and brought him to Winding Circle, was true. It certainly wasn’t as if he liked this rude, impudent brat.

High overhead they could hear the toll of the Karang Gate clock. It was the third hour after noon. “Time and past to eat something,” he said as his stomach rumbled. Evvy’s eyes brightened at the prospect of a meal.

He followed his nose to a food vendor, where they bought steamed lamb and baked mushroom-onion dumplings. Steamed quinces with walnut and honey stuffing were next. Both of them were pleasantly full when they washed their hands at a fountain and headed back to Briar’s.

“How long have you been on the street?” Briar asked.

Evvy yawned. “I was six when we left Yanjing. That was the Year of the Crow,” she said. “And this is the year of the Turtle.” She calculated on her fingers. “Four years. Maybe nearer three. They sold me when we got here, and I escaped two moons before the Year of the Cat began.”

“Who sold you?” Briar asked, before he thought he might not like the answer.

“My parents,” Evvy said. “It cost plenty to come west. I was only a girl and the youngest. I ate food my brothers and parents needed. I took up space in the cart, and I couldn’t do anything to bring in money.” She rattled off the reasons, as if she could recite them in her sleep. “Girls are pretty worthless, even here. They only got two silver davs for me. I saw a boy my age get sold for twice that.”

Briar looked down. Despite her matter-of-fact answer, he felt as if he should apologize—not for the question, perhaps, but because that had been her life. Kids came to the street for many reasons, as he knew too well, but at least his mother had kept him, fed him, and loved him until she was killed on a dark street for her cheap jewelry.

Evvy suddenly laughed. “I’ll find them someday and show them what slipped through their fingers!” she told Briar. “Even a girl is worth something if she’s a pahan !”

He’d grinned, too, until the second part of her argument sunk in. “Girl mages are worth every bit as much as boy mages,” he informed her. “Believe me—I’ve been surrounded by them for four long years, and never for a moment did they let me forget it.”

“How did you get to be a pahan? ” she asked, curious. “Did you always know?”

Briar shook his head. “I was on the street after my ma was killed. I was four,” he explained. “If she’d had magic, we’d have lived better than we did. She wouldn’t have been out late the night she got killed, for certain. Anyway, the landlord tossed me. I was on my own a while, till the Thief-Lord picked me up and brought me into the Lightnings. That was our gang.” Evvy nodded. “First I learned to pick pockets, because I had the good hands for it. Then they taught me climbing, and thieving inside. The third time we were caught, I was maybe ten. You know the law.”

Evvy made a face. “Third arrest, hard labor for life.”

It was Briar’s turn to nod. “I had the two X’s on my hands, so they gave me the docks. Scraping barnacles until it killed me. But this Bag was there—”

“Bag?” she asked, confused. In Chammuri the term had no special meaning.

“Money-Bag. Takamer. Leastways, I thought he was a takamer, he dressed so nice. Niko, he was. He took me. The magistrate had orders to give him anybody he wanted. And Niko brought me to Winding Circle in Emelan.”

“Where’s that?” Evvy wanted to know.

Talking was thirsty work, so Briar got them each an apple. As Evvy bit into hers he could see she was missing teeth. He hoped Jebilu would help her keep from losing the rest. “It’s northwest of here, on the Pebbled Sea. That’s where I moved in with Rosethorn, and her friend Lark.” He went on to tell her of the three girls who had also come to live there. Together he and the girls had learned that their powers were so well hidden, so much a part of the natural world, that even Tris, whose magic was the showiest of all, had been passed over by other mages.

Evvy was giggling over his tale of the last of Tris’s animal rescue efforts, trying to teach a young crow to fly without ever having flown herself, as they reached the house. Rosethorn was up on the roof, carefully urging the beans, corn, and clover plants into another growth cycle. Of all the gardeners in the lands around the Pebbled Sea, Rosethorn was the most successful with these new crops, discovered in the unknown lands on the far side of the Endless Ocean. Briar and Evvy climbed up to join her.

“How were the farms today?” Briar asked, sitting on his heels beside Rosethorn. Evvy perched on the bench.

“The same as the rest.” Rosethorn ran a hand through the sack of corn seed she had already coaxed out of the plants. “This land is so tired. They’ve farmed it for twelve centuries. The farmers do their best to reduce the acid that builds up with too much irrigation, but some have been poor for generations and can’t afford what’s needed to turn the land around.” A single tear oozed out of the corner of each eye. She rubbed it away impatiently. “It disheartens me, to handle dirt that’s so tired.”

“But these will help,” Briar reminded her. “You said the beans and the clover will build up the soil.” Get in here, Briar urged some of the nearby plants. She needs you. To himself he added, And she’ll growl if I do anything obvious like move plants closer to her.

The plants stretched until they could rest against her. Briar had seen her worse off, but he still liked to ensure that when she was empty of power and hope, her green strength was restored quickly. After her death and revival three years ago, just the thought that she might be weary, or failing, jabbed him into action.

He glanced at Evvy, the girl stared at Rosethorn, mouth agape. Chances were that she’d never seen that much greenery on the move before, between the plants who comforted and the plants Rosethorn tended as they went from shoots to flowering growth under her hands. Of course, how many ever watched to see if plants moved? To most people they weren’t alive; they were things, without needs or instincts of their own. Even when humans knew that one plant, set in the wrong patch of earth, would die, or that another would take over, forcing every other plant out, they still refused to accept that plants were living creatures.