Deep Water (8 page)

He had wondered. To set a murdered ghost to rest, the killer had to acknowledge guilt and then offer his own blood to the
ghost. Ash shivered, remembering the touch of ghostly tongues on his own flesh, when he had offered his blood as reparation
to two men he had killed — men, he reminded himself, who had been trying to kill Martine. No need to feel sorry for those
two. But the ritual was specific. Each ghost needed blood. Although, he remembered, those ghosts had refused blood from Martine.
“Blood’s just a symbol,” they had said. “Didn’t you know?”

There was too much they didn’t know, he thought, and that might be the death of them all.

After dinner at Heron’s, he went out to the garden behind the house for a breath of air, then stayed, sitting on a bench,
looking up at the clear sky. A big lilac bush shed its petals over him as the night breeze stirred its branches. The scent
reminded him of another night, camping by an abandoned house whose garden was full of lilacs. His father had taught him the
love counting song that night:

There are ten white flowers my lover gave to me

Here are the petals of those sweet sweet peas:

Honesty

       
That’s one!

Verity

       
That’s two!

Poetry

       
That’s three!

And Lo-o-ove

       
Ch: Love can’t be counted

       
Love can’t be caught

       
Love must be given

       
Never sold or bought

It was a sugary, sentimental song and he’d never liked it, but his father, Rowan, had enjoyed playing it on the flute, giving
it lots of trills and flourishes. Ash didn’t want to think about his father, so he concentrated on identifying the northern
stars he had heard about but never seen before. There was the white bear, there was the salmon… a noise behind him made
him spin around, knife springing from his boot to his hand as if it had a life of its own.

Martine stood there, holding a cup of cha, her pale face showing clearly in the moonlight but her eyes unreadable. She raised
an eyebrow at the knife.

“If I’d wanted to kill you, you’d have been dead long since,” she said.

He flushed. He was so on edge that he’d almost welcome a good fight. “Sorry. But… I don’t like it here much.”

“Mmm. It’s not a comfortable time, I’ll give you that.” She smiled suddenly. “Have a cup of cha, lad.”

He took the cup with as good grace as he could and Martine sat down beside him, bringing her feet up to sit cross-legged.

“Do you want to tell me where you’re going?” she asked.

He paused, not entirely sure what to say. “To find my father,” he said finally.

“Do you know how to find him?”

He looked down at the cha and nodded. “I know where he’ll be at this time of year.”

“You’re going to Gabriston?” Martine asked carefully.

His head whipped up in astonishment. She should not know. No woman should know.

“How . . .?”

Martine shrugged. “I’m a stonecaster. We get to know lots of things we shouldn’t.”

He relaxed a little, but he was worried, all the same. He didn’t know how much she knew, and so couldn’t risk talking about
any of it. He thought, instead, of the fact that his father had not taught him all the songs. Not all.

After so long away from his parents, after so much doubt and betrayal with Doronit, after taking on responsibility from the
gods, who would have thought two words could hurt so much? They knifed into Ash’s stomach, into his heart. It had been the
one certainty of his life, that his father had trusted him with all the songs,
all
the songs, so they could be preserved as they should be, voice to voice.

How could he go back and ask? If his father had wanted him to know — had
trusted
him — he would have taught him the songs already.

“How are you planning to pay your way?” Martine asked.

He’d been worried about that, too. He had nothing — and the only thing he owned of value, the brooch, had been commandeered.

“I thought, Cael might . . .”

“I’m not sure they have much to spare themselves,” she said thoughtfully. “I think you might need these.”

She pulled a pouch out of her pocket. For a wild moment, he thought she was giving him her own pouch of stones, but then he
saw it was the stones she had taken from the stonecaster’s son last autumn. It seemed like years ago that they had helped
the stonecaster’s ghost to find rest. He had made the new pouch for these stones himself last winter, sitting by the fire
at Elva and Mabry’s, the month before their baby was born. Just the thought of little Ash warmed him. Having a namesake who
was being raised Settled, a loving family around him, strong walls to protect him, made Ash feel stronger himself. Older and
more competent. Not enough to make him take the stones, though.

“You’ll know them,” Martine reassured him. “They speak loudly, at first. They want to be known. And remember, just answer
whatever question you’re asked. Don’t make my mistake and tell people more than they ask for.”

“I’m not a caster,” he said hastily.

“You could be. You have the Sight. You know it.”

He didn’t
know.
Just suspected. He didn’t
want
to know. He was strange enough already; able to see ghosts, to compel them to speak, speaking himself with the voice of the
dead. Having the Sight would just make him even odder.

“Stonecasters aren’t thought of as freaks, you know,” Martine said, seeming to read his thoughts as she so often did. “We’re
just part of the furniture of the world, really.”

He laughed unwillingly. It was true, stonecasters were accepted everywhere. When she offered him the pouch, his hand seemed
to rise of its own accord to take it.

The heavy softness of the leather, the stones within it, fit into his palm as though he had held it a thousand times before.

“So,” Martine said. “So.” She sounded disappointed, and reached to take the pouch back.

“What?” Ash said, startled. His fingers tightened on the pouch. Martine paused.

“They are not in harmony,” she said.

He had no idea what she was talking about. She was surprised in turn.

“You can’t hear them?”

Ash shook his head. Martine’s face was unreadable, as it had been the first time he met her. It was as though she had withdrawn
from him. As though he had failed her.

“The stones sing. Well, not exactly. Not like humans. But when they do not have a caster, they sing constantly, out of tune,
out of rhythm. It’s unpleasant. That’s why I rolled this pouch up in a blanket. So I wouldn’t have to listen to them.”

“And?”

Martine hesitated. “When they find their caster, and he or she takes them in their hand, they come into tune.”

Ash stared down at the pouch, which seemed as silent as the grave to him. “I can’t even hear them,” he said. “So I suppose
they didn’t come into tune.”

“No,” she said gently, resting her hand on his shoulder. “I was sure you were a caster. I even cast the stones about it, and
they said yes, definitely. I don’t understand —”

“What’s to understand?” he shot back, suddenly angry. He tossed the pouch into her lap. “I can’t do it. Just like I can’t
sing. Or play the flute. Or
anything
to do with music.”

“That may be,” Martine said slowly. “But my casting was quite clear. I’ve never known the stones to be completely wrong. I’ll
cast again.”

“Don’t bother,” he said. “I still won’t be able to hear them.”

He strode off and walked the streets of the silent town until the salmon star had swum its way below the horizon. Then he
went back to the lodging house and lay in the green-ceilinged room, trying not to think of all the things he was useless at — all
the people he had failed. Perhaps his father had been right not to trust him. The only thing he seemed to be good at was killing.

F
IRST LIGHT WAS
early so far north, even in spring, and they were all yawning and shivering as they met outside Safred’s house and followed
her through the alleys and streets of the town to a small wooded area on its outskirts. A score or so of townsfolk came with
them, and they greeted one another with nods and yawning half-smiles so simply that Bramble knew they took the walk to the
gods’ wood every morning.

The wood was surrounded by fields and some houses, and it was clear that the town had expanded around the altar, but had left
enough space to keep the gods happy. They didn’t like being crowded, it was said.

Bramble could feel them, lightly, in her mind. It was not the uncomfortable pressure they used when they wanted her to do
something. This was almost companionable. It was the first time she had felt this way, going to greet them. At home, in Wooding,
she had hated the dawn prayers, surrounded by those afraid of the gods, or of life, by the pious and by those who wanted to
be thought pious, like the Widow Farli. But here, she sensed nothing from these people but simple devotion. No doubt it was
harder to pretend to be pious with the Well of Secret’s eyes on you.

The rock was in a clearing, surrounded by old beech trees, huge and knotted and twisting overhead so that their branches met
and the altar seemed to be at the center of a domed room. Moss and young grass covered the ground and Bramble could hear the
trickle of a stream which the gods always liked to have nearby. Although they were close to the town, she felt as though she
were deep in a forest, perhaps even the Great Forest that she had dreamed about so often. The hairs on the back of her neck
raised, and she knew that the gods had turned their attention to all of their followers, not just her.

They came to the altar in the silver light just before dawn, and knelt together, in silence, as the winds of dawn began to
blow. Safred bowed her head; Martine and Ash looked down at their hands, which was not quite the same thing. Zel was praying,
her mouth moving silently, her hand clasping Flax’s. His face was blank. Surprisingly, Cael was also praying fervently, hands
clenched against his chest.

Bramble’s mind was empty of prayers. All she could do was feel: grief for Maryrose and a dark scouring of blame and anger
for the gods, because they hadn’t protected her sister. They gave her no reply in words, but she had a strong sense of their
regret. It wasn’t enough to ease her grief, but her anger cooled a little, and turned toward Saker. I will kill him, she thought.
The pressure on her mind increased with the thought, but for the first time ever, she had the sense that the gods were undecided.
Should I kill him?
she asked them, but she heard no answer except,
Not yet.

As the first light touched the tops of the trees, throwing shadows down onto the altar, the other townsfolk stirred and got
up, backing away respectfully until they were beyond the circle of trees. But Safred motioned to their group to come closer.
She laid a hand on the altar.

“Today we part. But we’ll meet again, to bring the parts of the answer together.”

“Aye,” Cael said. “But where, and when?”

They looked at Safred, who hesitated. Bramble could tell there was no answer from the gods.

It was Martine who answered. “Turvite,” she said.

“The stones?” Safred asked. “The stones say so?”

“Common sense says so, which is worth more,” Martine replied briskly. “It was Acton’s last big battle. It’s the biggest city
in the Domains. Sooner or later this Saker will go there, and he will bring his army.”

“Oh, yes,” Bramble said, feeling Martine’s words ring true. “He’ll want Turvite. He’ll want to succeed where the old enchanter
failed.”

“Yes. He will want to surpass her,” Safred said slowly.

“So,” Cael said. “Turvite.”

Ash flinched, just a little, as though Cael’s voice had been a prod to his memory. “Um… Turvite might not be so healthy
a place for Martine and me,” he said.

Martine laughed. “True,” she said. “Perhaps we should meet just
outside
Turvite. There’s a village a few miles up the river, called Sanctuary. We could meet there.”

“As soon as we can,” Safred said reluctantly, and it was an irritant to her, they could all see, that she did not know the
time and date.

“Where will you go to find the songs?” she asked Ash.

His face closed down. “South,” he said.

“But I need to know —” Safred began, and at the same moment the gods roared into Bramble’s head, forbiddingly.
No!
they ordered. Safred jerked as the command hit her. Ash shook a little, as though he had heard them too, but his face stayed
stony.

“No,” he echoed the gods.

Safred stared at him, her eyes burning and her face pale, but at last she nodded and the pressure in Bramble’s mind eased
off. Bramble could see the effort it took her not to ask more. She waited for Safred to say some final exhortation or blessing,
but she just stepped back from the altar and walked away, her back to the altar. That unsettled Bramble, who always backed
away, out of a mix of respect and caution. It seemed to her that Safred took the gods for granted, and that was not quite
safe. She shrugged. None of her business. She had to see to the horses for the journey.

They walked back to the town and Bramble went straight to the stables instead of to Safred’s house with the others. She led
the horses around to the house, trying not to think about being separated from Cam and Mud. There was no choice, really, but
she took a few moments as she led them to talk to them, telling them they would meet again, soon, soon. Trine got jealous
and bumped her head against Bramble’s side. Instinctively, she braced for a lance of pain from her arm, but of course there
was none. She was healed. She wasn’t sure she would ever get used to that.

Bramble had bought provisions for a few days’ journey from Heron and had insisted on paying for the room as well, over Ash
and Martine’s protests. “Least I can do,” she said. She never had liked being in someone’s debt and only the knowledge that
the gods had sent Ash and Martine to her at the right time allowed her to bear the gratitude she owed them. She grinned at
Ash. He was still walking stiffly from the long ride. She remembered how much learning to ride hurt.