Sidra had never seen an ailment so unearthly, and she thought about the magical afflictions she had healed in the past. There were two kinds: wounds made by enchanted blades, and illnesses that came as a consequence of wielding magic. Weavers who wove secrets into plaids and smiths who hammered spells into steel. Fishermen who knotted nets with charms and cobblers who made shoes from leather and dreams. In the east, casting magic through one’s craft exacted a painful, physical cost, and Sidra had an array of tonics to ease the symptoms.
But Hamish’s leg? She was at a loss as to what had caused it. There was no wound, so the discoloration couldn’t have come from a blade. And she had never seen this symptom before in other magic wielders. Not even in Jack, when he had sung for the spirits.
Why didn’t you come to me? she wanted to weep at the boy. Why were you hiding this?
Sidra could hear shouts in the distance. Hamish’s father was coming. She wasn’t sure if Hamish had told his parents about his mysterious condition, but chances were that he had not. They would have brought him to Sidra for treatment if they had known.
She quickly tethered his boots back to his feet, hiding the mottled skin. This was a conversation for later, because grief was about to grip the hearts of Hamish’s parents and shatter this warm summer day.
The tide receded with a whisper. Clouds began to build in the northern sky. The winds shifted, and the air suddenly felt cooler as a raven cawed overhead.
Sidra remained at Hamish’s side. She wasn’t sure what had afflicted the boy. What had possibly crept beneath his skin and stained his blood, weighing him down in the water, causing him to drown.
All she knew was that she had never seen anything like this.
Kilometers inland, Torin stood beneath the same arcing sun and deep blue sky, staring at a southern orchard. The air was thick, laden with rot. He had no choice but to breathe it in—the damp soil, the weeping wood, the spoiled fruit. He didn’t want to fully acknowledge what he was seeing, even as he tasted it.
“When did you first notice this?” he asked, his gaze remaining on the apple trees and the fluid oozing from their split boles. The sap was thick and violet in color; it glittered in the light, as if suspending tiny shards of gold within its viscosity.
The crofter, Rodina, was pressing eighty years. She stood at Torin’s side, hardly reaching his shoulder in height, and scowled against the sunlight. By all appearances, she seemed not the least bit concerned about her sick orchard. But Torin noticed how she drew her plaid shawl closer about her shoulders, as if she wanted to hide beneath the enchanted threads.
“A fortnight ago, Laird,” Rodina replied. “I thought nothing of it at first. It was just the one tree. But then it began to spread to the others in that row. I fear it will take my entire orchard soon and my crop will be lost.”
Torin’s gaze drifted to the ground. Small, underripe apples littered the grass. The fruit had been dropping early from the ailing trees, and he could tell the flesh was mealy. Some of the apples had started to decompose, revealing cores writhing with worms.
He almost nudged one of the apples with the toe of his boot but stopped himself. “Have you touched any of the fruit, Rodina? Or the trees?”
“Course not, Laird.”
“Has anyone else visited your orchard?”
“My hired help,” said Rodina. “He was the one who first saw the blight.”
“And who is that?”
“Hamish Brindle.”
Torin was quiet for a moment as he sorted through his memories. He had never been good at remembering names, although he could recognize faces. Truly a curse for a captain-turned-laird. He was awed by Sidra, who could conjure up names as if by spell. Recently she had saved him in quite a few instances from keen embarrassment. He blamed the stress of the past month.
“A lanky lad with brown hair and two caterpillars for eyebrows,” Rodina supplied, sensing Torin’s inner dilemma. “Fourteen years old and doesn’t speak much but is smart as can be. A hard worker too. Never complains when I give him a task.”
Torin nodded, realizing why that name had sounded familiar. Hamish Brindle was the youngest son of James and Trista, a crofter and a teacher. The boy had recently shown interest in joining the East Guard. Although Torin had been forced to relinquish his title as captain weeks earlier, passing it on to Yvaine, his second in command, he couldn’t help but meddle. The long-suffering Yvaine, thankfully, let him come and go as he needed, eating breakfast in the barracks, observing the practice green during drills, and assessing new recruits, as if Torin were still one of them and not the new laird trying to learn the role that Adaira had seemed to take to so naturally.