Una withdrew the sword and handed it off to her apprentice, who was red faced and perspiring from pumping the bellows. Sidra thought of how the fire always burned at the forge, how its embers never fell cold and docile. If anyone was intimate with Cadence fire, knowing its temperament and power and secrets, it was Una.
As such, Una was one of the only blacksmiths in the east who wasn’t afraid to hammer enchantments into her steel. She could take a secret and an ingot, melt them together over a blistering fire, and shape them as one on her anvil. Once an enchanted blade was complete, she always fell ill with a fever and was sometimes unable to leave her bed for days.
“Sidra,” the blacksmith said in greeting, removing her thick leather gloves. “How are you and Maisie?”
“We’re well,” Sidra replied, but she felt the true meaning of Una’s question. “She’s with Graeme for now. I’m thankful that he’s able to watch her while I’m away on visits.”
“Good,” Una said, joining her at the edge of the forge.
“And how are your two children?” Sidra reached into her basket to find the tonic she had made for Una’s vitality. “It’s been a while since I’ve seen them.”
“Growing up too fast,” Una replied with a smile. “But they’re content. When they’re not at school they’re either here with me or spending time with Ailsa at the stables, keen to learn all of my wife’s horse secrets.”
Sidra nodded, wholly understanding the caution, even though Una and Ailsa’s son and daughter were adolescents now. Old enough to heed the strict rules parents were suddenly doling out with the disappearances.
As she set the tonic jar on Una’s outstretched palm, the blacksmith surprised her by saying, “Do you ever wonder if we are unknowing participants in a spirit’s game? If they move us like pawns on a board and glean pleasure from provoking our heartaches?”
Sidra hesitated. She looked deep within herself and knew the answer was yes. She had thought as much. But her devout nature had instantly stamped out those dangerous wonderings; she worried that the earth would sense that disbelief in her when she worked the kail yard, when she crushed the herbs to make healing salves.
“It’s a troubling thought,” Sidra said. “To think they gain pleasure from tormenting us.”
“Sometimes, when I watch the fire burn in the forge,” Una continued, “I imagine what it would be like to be immortal, to hold no fear of death. To dance and burn for an endless era. And I think how dull such an existence would be. That one would do anything to feel the sharp edge of life again.”
“Yes,” Sidra whispered. She was too paranoid to say anything more, and the blacksmith sensed it.
“Don’t let me keep you,” Una said. “Thank you for the tonic. I’ve been commissioned to make an enchanted blade tomorrow, so this will help me bear the effects.”
Sidra bid Una farewell and continued on her route. The day unfurled just as she had expected until a cold burst of northern wind blew through the city. She paused, watching it twine with smoke, overturn baskets in the market, rattle shutters and doors.
Sidra’s black hair tangled across her face as she stood in the center of the street.
And that was when she heard the faint whisper, like a rush of wings.
The wind brought news.
Jack waited for Adaira at the castle. It was noontide, just as she had requested for their meeting, and a servant had brought him to the music turret, telling him the heiress would be with him directly. Impatient, Jack passed the time by walking the length of the bookshelves, selecting a few volumes to sift through. He found a book brimming with music that he swiftly recognized. These were the ballads of the clan. The songs Lorna once sang on feast nights.
Jack smiled as he read the notes. He fondly remembered these songs; they had shaped his childhood, those wild days roaming the heather and exploring the sea caves. And he was pleased to discover that even years later, this music still roused a warm nostalgia within him. It drew him back to those moments in the hall, when he had savored listening to these songs. Long before he ever dreamt of becoming a bard or dared to imagine that he would one day learn the secrets of instruments.
He eventually shut the music book and set it back on the shelf. It was riddled with dust. Realizing he must have been the first person to touch the volume in years, he suddenly felt sad, thinking of how quiet the east had become without Lorna.
He walked to the harp in the center of the room, but refrained from playing. He noticed the table was cleared; all of the papers and books that had been piled upon it yesterday were gone save for a sealed letter.