A Vine to Prune (Spirit Wind Book 2), page 1
Contents
Title Page
Also By Daniel Dydek
Dedication
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
Coming Soon
Scripture References
Copyright
Acknowledgements
About the Author
Support for the Author
A Vine to Prune
Book 2 of
the SPIRIT WIND series
A Beorn Publishing book
Canton, OH
Also by Daniel Dydek
The Triumvirs epic fantasy series
By Ways Unseen
The First to Forgive
The One Known
The Spirit Wind supernatural thriller series
A Fire to Kindle
Dedication
For Mom and Dad, who modeled love for me;
and for Erin, who loves me
1
The storm clouds massed for days, and I began to wonder if they were my imagination only—or some vision from Our Father. But by the fourth day Mahmoud had noticed and grew nervous. Thomas too, one night, confessed to me he had known strange things might happen around me but expected them to happen a little more suddenly. I could only smile weakly and shrug.
The presence within me had dwindled to barely a mustard seed. By week’s end I found myself wishing my hand would catch fire again, and had to laugh. How many days and nights had I spent with the Sisters wishing the Sacred Fire would go away? At least until Bruce’s undead army arrived and that fire was the only thing that could dead them again.
Now I spent nights in contemplation and prayer, and would find the seed burning brightly. But, like Thomas, I often wished that whatever was going to happen next would happen. But each village or hamlet we passed through seemed plain enough, and the seed lay dormant.
We needn’t have rushed.
By midweek, the second after leaving the convent, the storm clouds were nearly overhead. We came over a sharp fold of ground that dropped below us into a broad plain. In the midst of that plain, centered on a crossroad that ran east toward the mountains, was the largest village we had come to so far. Not quite big enough to be called a town, but sprawling and with a few larger homes and what appeared to be a villa. Fields lay mostly fallow this late in autumn, nearly winter, though some stretches of barley were past midway to harvest.
As we neared, spots of color showed within the village. Streamers of bright colors bedecked many a house, and some were stretched across the road where the buildings allowed. A flower-strewed sign on the road announced it as the village of Aurden. I felt the seed begin to stir.
The road we were on became cobblestone, as was the crossroad. The alleys and pathways between the houses and shops, though, were only packed earth. The streets were not full, but there was more traffic than we had yet encountered. Most smiled at us, nodding graciously or calling out a blessed or beautiful day. Children chased after a hoop, a pair of dogs baying behind them. Near the center of the village was a mule train, and even the dozen guards seemed happy despite their task. Mahmoud, too, was suddenly in good spirits.
“Have you been through here before?” I asked. He seemed to know where he was going.
But after a moment he shook his head. “Your Mother brought me from further east.”
We came to the inn, perched on the north-east corner of the cross, two stories tall but with additional windows peeping out of eaves and bulbous folds in the roof. Mahmoud went inside to inquire about rooms while Thomas and I stayed with the mule. A group of men went boisterously down the street as we waited—drunk, it seemed, but happy.
Thomas glanced at me, a question hinting in his eyes. He had done much the same in each village. But now I looked at the streamers and smiles and laughter and ease, and then up at the storm clouds almost black, and the seed sprouted a flame that burned small but intense.
“It seems a little…strange, to me,” I said.
“What do you feel?”
I shook my head. “Nothing specific yet, but the Fire in me is wakening. And why is everyone so…pleasant?” I looked at him sheepishly, and he returned a lopsided grin. “I know; why shouldn’t people be happy? And why is pleasantness strange? But it is, isn’t it?”
He gave a begrudging nod. “There’s a lot more than there was in any other village. And with those clouds overhead…” He trailed off as he glanced up, and shuddered. “I just wish it would rain already and be done.”
I had to agree. “But, maybe only once we’re inside,” I said, and we both grinned. The pleasantness seemed to be contagious.
Mahmoud came out. “They are short on rooms,” he said. “We will need to occupy only one, and it is not large.”
I glanced at him quizzically, then at Thomas with some consternation. “That is not…seemly,” I said warily.
Mahmoud shook his head. “Another will open by tonight,” he said. “That one will be yours.” He took the mule by the halter and led it toward the stables in back. We helped unload as the skies grew impossibly darker. When we came out and made for the inn’s entrance it seemed nearly night. The streets were emptying slowly, almost unwillingly. The breeze was quickening and the streamers flapped noisily, their bright colors stark. In the middle of the approaching storm they still sent a ray of joy.
As Mahmoud opened the door the first fat drop struck the cobblestones with a clap, and I startled. We spared one glance for the sky before ducking hurriedly inside. As the door shut behind us the rains came like the drumming of a thousand drummers.
Every patron in the common room looked over, smiles quickly covering their surprise. “Brought the rains with ye, did ye?” someone called, and there was scattered laughter as they returned to their food and drink.
But the rain even from inside roared, and beams creaked as the wind struck the inn. Thomas looked even more troubled than I. But before I could ask, Mahmoud was guiding us through to the stairway in the back. We went up two flights. They had given me the smallest portion of the load, but I still puffed and struggled. Walking miles will only harden someone so far; stairs are an entirely different matter. But I still wished I was more capable, especially when Thomas glanced back at me with a bemused grin. I ducked my head toward my load, cheeks flushed.
Mahmoud finally led us to the room down a narrow hallway. By the sound of the rain, and the peak in the hallway, we must have been directly under the roof. The room was, as he said, “not large”; most of it was made by the protrusion of the window out over the street. The wind, thankfully, was behind us else I fear the rain would have smote through the thin-paned window. Outside looked almost white, and I could not see the street at all.
We set the things down in what corners we could find. There was one bed, a chair, and a small table. Above the table on the wall was a lantern, unlit, and a bundle of rushes for lighting on a shelf beside it. I glanced around, then at Thomas and Mahmoud. It had been cold when we first entered, but I felt our body heat was already warming the small space.
“Where will you sleep?” I asked neither of them in particular, noting the narrow bed that even I would barely fit on.
“I will sleep on the floor,” Mahmoud said quickly. I glanced at Thomas to see if he heard the same strange tone in Mahmoud’s voice, a slight resignation it sounded like to me. But a resignation he was familiar with.
“We can switch nights,” Thomas offered.
Mahmoud’s dark eyes glittered. “We will not be here that long,” he said.
Thomas glanced warily at me, and I looked at Mahmoud. “I think we—or I—will be,” I said slowly.
Mahmoud considered me a moment. “This is no great town,” he said.
I smiled. “Neither was Holden, or the convent for that matter.”
Mahmoud placed a hand quickly on his side where he had been stabbed, and a quick pain flashed across his eyes. “Well enough,” he said. “I have business to the east. Perhaps I will come back for you,” he said.
“Mahmoud,” Thomas began, but I smiled.
“That’s fine,” I said quickly. “You were never bound to us as we are never bound to you—at least, by no oath of mine.” I looked at Thomas, who finally shrugged.
“Where will you stay?” Mahmoud asked slowly.
I looked around the room. “Here?” I said tentatively. But Mahmoud was already shaking his head.
“We were most fortunate to come today,” he said. “The innkeeper assured me there would be no rooms after tonight.”
“Why?” Thomas and I chorused.
“There is to be a wedding, of their mayor, to a…” he gesticulated. “An important lady. I forget the word. The fluttering colors,” he added, gesturing to the window where the rain still came down in sheets. The ribbons were for the wedding.
“And why everyone is so happy,” Thomas said.
The fire in me flickered. That explanation still did not sit well with me. There was something tenuous about the attitudes I saw, but I couldn’t explain so I simply nodded. Of course marriages were wonderful, happy affairs—generally—but for it to infect an entire village, even travelers, that seemed like a greater power to me. And, of course, the Fire seemed to agree.
I glanced around the room as we ate, observing the other patrons. A young man with a bittern played in the corner, though his notes only occasionally rose above the pounding rain and the murmuring. Here there still remained some of the joy we had seen on our way in, perhaps a little damped. We had certainly seen more boisterous rooms on our way south. But those had seemed fueled primarily by beer and wine. Here those drinks flowed a little slower, and the revelry was more like a deep lake than a tossing sea. Yet even in that depth there was an impermanence. Not that it was forced—I had considered perhaps they had been ordered to be joyful for the sake of their mayor, or the lady. If she had a title, I wondered if she was conceited. But there is a strain in forced happiness that always breaks through here and there. This felt more like an unfamiliarity, that the slightest thing might return them all suddenly to—if not despair—at least a hardworking grimness. But, those were all guesses.
As we were finishing, the innkeeper informed us my room was ready. We thanked him, Mahmoud left coin, and we went back up through the narrow stairways and halls. We came to Mahmoud’s room and he turned aside.
“I want to talk to Rae-Anna for a moment,” Thomas said. “Figure out what we’re going to do next.”
I sensed he was not telling all. But I opened the door, left it open as Thomas went and stood near the window. My room was nearly identical to Mahmoud’s, except in here were the remains of some writing implements. I wondered briefly who had stayed here.
“What are we going to do next?” he asked without preamble.
I went to the bed and sat down. “I’m not sure,” I said. “We’ll need to find somewhere to stay, I guess. We’re not without our means—” I cut off as he sighed and stared out the window. “Thomas, what is it?”
“I don’t have this Fire you have,” he said slowly. “I mean, I do, I guess, but I don’t know how to use it. But…” He looked at me. “I understand there’s something wrong here. I know what I said to Mahmoud, but I didn’t think he would understand. He’s not…I mean, he’s a Moor.”
“Still loved by Our Father, though,” I said.
“Is he?” Thomas asked sharply. He turned away again. “I’m sorry, I guess you would know. But here is what I know: that rain out there is destroying the winter crops and turning roads into bogs. There will be nothing to farm, and reduced trade. And in Holden, much less than that turned the people sullen and quiet. And no wedding, no matter how important, would bring them out of it—the families of the bride and groom, perhaps. But not the entire village.”
“And that’s why we must stay, I think,” I said. “There is something else at work here—it might not be as powerful or as evil as Bruce, but if Our Father called us here it was not to destroy us.”
Thomas turned to me again as he drew a deep breath, a tentative smile barely reaching his eyes. “Hopefully not yet,” he said. A pale joke. But as we gazed at each other, I felt something else stirring in me, a different fire altogether that I felt in my cheeks. His smile strengthened, but then pain too flashed across his eyes and he looked away again.
The fire sucked out of me with an icy blast made worse for the remembered warmth. “Thomas?” I said, hating that my voice quavered at the end.
“I’m sorry, Rae-Anna,” he said faintly. “I’m afraid some wounds aren’t healed so quickly as Mahmoud’s.”
I felt my eyes sting, though no tears came yet. I reached out and laid a hand on his arm. He yanked it back in reflex. I almost wish he had taken my arm out of its socket with him—the pain could not have been worse, I thought. Then he turned abruptly and left the room, and I realized I was wrong. I stared at the gaping door for a long time, then managed to get up and shut it. I fell into my bed and wept—for him, I thought. But I knew bitterly that I wept for myself.
A sharp crash of thunder woke me. I was sprawled face down on the bed, still fully clothed and booted, and the pillow was damp. The room was pitch-black, the window a square of indigo on the wall. I realized the rain had lessened. And I heard a tapping of wood on stone.
I scrubbed a hand down my face and stood, stretching muscles stiff from the awkward way in which I had laid. The tapping grated. Slow, rhythmic, and obnoxiously loud. And yet, it came from outside.
I frowned. Why would someone be hammering with all their might at this hour? I went to the window, realizing for the first time that it overlooked the street. The eaves dripped like a waterfall, but the rain itself was a drizzle. Between drips and runnels on the window I could see the road dimly, and the knock continued to grow louder.
Lightning flashed, and I saw five figures in cowled robes walking down the street, arrayed in a V-shape. The one in the lead carried a staff, from which seemed to come the knocking. I blinked and shook my head; the knocking seemed more in my head than coming from that staff—how could it? He strode normally—perhaps a little slowly, especially given the rain—but it was not as though he banged it like a gavel. And surely others would be throwing open windows to complain of the noise if he were.
Unless they came for me alone.
I opened my own window, to try to see better if nothing else. The banging continued. I could see a little better now, saw a medallion on the tip of his staff. They continued slowly, then stopped in front of the inn. The tapping continued. I found I was holding my breath.
Somewhere a break opened in the clouds, and the moon shone through, striking the five figures. Another flash of lightning, and they looked swiftly up at me. Whether it was a trick of the moon, I don’t know. But their faces were ghostly pale, almost maggot-white, their eyes dark sockets. But not like the skeletons in the convent, these had sparkling chips like frost in their depths.
Lightning flashed again, close. When I blinked, the figures were gone from down below. I glanced up and down the street. The rain lessened further, and I realized the tapping had ceased.
I heard a hiss like steam, and I whirled. The men were in my room, staring at me with teeth bared. The leader’s head snapped sideways, his rictus curving slowly into a smile. He tipped his staff toward me. I saw the medallion now carved with strange spirals in a vague star-pattern.
Instinctively my left hand came up. The blue flame did not come to it, yet I felt the Fire inside me rage forward. But the men did not recoil, or disappear, or make any comforting move other than withdrawing the staff.
Fasssinating... It came as though the leader whispered into my mind. He licked his teeth with an ash-gray tongue. As the other four took a half-step backward, he stepped forward—as though I were his to claim.
For a moment I quailed and my hand dropped to my side, but the Fire raged higher. “I already belong to another, against whom you have no power,” I said quietly, firmly.
“Do you, indeed?” he sneered. “I think he pulled away from you and left swiftly. I think he is disssgusted with your filth.”
“I’m not talking about…” I cut off. I dared not say the name—old superstitions die hard.
A strange, bitter delight came to those ice-drilled eyes, and I felt a laughter like bubbling poison. “Oh, I think you are. He consumes your thoughts, makes you his day by day. Except he will never take you.”
I struggled to keep my thoughts off Thomas, but his words bit deep. His finger bent into a claw as he dragged up in me all the passing glances of the past several days traveling, every time Thomas and I were close but did not touch, all the words I never spoke and never heard from him, he and Mahmoud practicing swordplay and the strength with which Thomas moved. And the Fire began to damp.
Now the leader’s hand grasped as he came forward, fingers curving as though he held my heart in their long-boned cage. With one last flicker I felt the Fire: No.
My hand came up again, and the leader stopped as though he struck a wall. No fire this time, but lines of blood striped across my hand as though lashed by brambles. The blood beaded in the lacerations and began to run. But I felt no pain.
