The Forgotten (The Lost Words: Volume 3) (13 page)

Nigella did not yet understand what
The Book of Lost Words
signified, but she so badly wanted to scab open its secrets. She understood, on a subliminal level, that few other humans had ever seen or read this work. It was a glimpse into another world, a swirling puzzle of endless possibilities.

She could not leave. The book compelled her.

The question was, would she be able to master it before Calemore lost his patience?

A life of compromise and fear had led her here, into this tiny cabin, into hiding. She had always chosen to flee rather than stand up for herself and her son. Perhaps this time, she could do it differently, make a change, fend for herself. People with her gift usually could not tell their own future, because you could not use magic on yourself. But now, she had been given a unique tool, a weapon really. She had the opportunity to unravel the unknown truths and use them to her advantage, if she were brave enough.

Four months since James had betrayed her did not lessen her sense of indignation and bitterness. True to his word, he had made Rob finance the upbringing of her son. But while she never considered the coin men paid her after her divination, never felt cheap and used after sex, Rob’s forced alms felt like a whore’s money. Never in her life had she experienced such degradation, such humiliation. Another woman might be glad for the silver. Another woman might swallow her pride and let the cad pay up for his bastard guilt. But she was not going to forgive either of them, ever.

Nigella opened her cabin door and went out. Dusk was settling, turning the world pink and violet. As always, she had chosen a place at the outskirts of the town, where she could
practice her work unnoticed. There was always the fear of bandits, and she might get hurt and no one would know, but she had lived this way her entire life, and she would not change now. Magic was a double-edged blade; it gave and it took, without asking. Fighting it would make no difference.

Crickets were coming to life, the air cool enough for them to start chirping. Soon, the entire place would tune to their song, drowning all other sound. Nigella watched, wondering. For the first time in her life, she had a fragile, dangerous chance to make her life something more than it was. She could dictate her fate rather than react to whatever the world spat at her.

But there was a price. As always. Devote herself to a pale-eyed madman who seemed to look at her the way a cruel child stared at an injured insect? Was she strong enough to bear it? Was she willing to commit her soul to this trial? Oh, the book, it called to her. The secrets of the future enticed her.

Courage. She needed courage. Nature had not given her much. She wasn’t very pretty, she wasn’t strong, and she wasn’t strong willed. She understood politics well enough, but few would listen to a half-Sirtai mongrel of common birth and no wealth. All she had was her gift. Perhaps once she had some dignity, but Rob and James had taken that away.

She should be grateful for her son’s trade. He would have a better future than she had. That should satisfy her. That was what mothers wanted. But somehow, that wasn’t enough.

When you could glimpse the future, you wished you could see the whole picture. After a while, shadow images and flashes only made you hungrier, more determined. The more she saw, the more she needed. And it would always be other people’s futures, never hers. Never her own. Until now.

She went inside.

Running away was the sensible thing to do. That was what she had always done. She knew that path. Her hand brushed against the book’s cover. She ran her forefingers over the edge of the tome, feeling pages ripple by too fast to count. This book was her chance to change everything. Not for Calemore. For herself.

Maybe that was the key to understanding the book, she thought with dread and excitement. It was not a book you could read for other people. You had to read it for yourself. Maybe that was why she had never managed to get any meaning from its texts.

A part of her soul cursed her, telling her she would regret it, but she was past caring now. She had committed herself the day Calemore had come to her. She had known that this would be unlike any other divination. Now, the truth was registering. It felt like icy lead up her spine.

Calemore needed her help? Very well, he would get it. But she swore that she would never again end up as a used whore. Never again. She would use the book to learn her own future, to unravel her own truths. As an afterthought, she mused, maybe she could make him appreciate her, not as a prophet but as a woman. He seemed cruel and vain and dangerous, but he liked her pies, and maybe, well, maybe he liked her. She had failed with Rob and James. Maybe her luck would turn now.

Whatever the future had in store for her, it was written in the book.

She flipped it open, squinted hard in the weak light, and began reading.

CHAPTER 9

T
anid watched the unusual child with deep, deep interest.

The boy had a slightly pudgy face, and he had strange eyes. Not eyes like most people, they were set more widely apart, somewhat oblique, and with skin folds at the corners. And his chin seemed to be missing.

The boy would not look at him, either.

Tanid sat on a rough wooden bench across the work desk, still and silent. On the boy’s left side were crates full of beeswax candles, unevenly stacked. On the right, he had smaller cases, empty and lined with tweed. With almost uncanny precision, he would dip his short fingers into the crates, produce a bundle of thin, elegant red sticks, and then place them into the smaller, slim cases, half a dozen each. Only he did this without looking at the candles, but he would always get it right. Most people would pause to count and double-check their work. Not this boy.

Tanid suspected he was special.

There were eight other work desks in the shop, with one younger apprentice and several older men and women stacking candles. They did this with care, their lips fluttering with numbers. Sometimes, one would shake his or her head over
a mistake and then empty a freshly loaded case back into the crate and start over. Hands twitched, quiet curses whipped amid a murmur of figures, and yellow and red candles clacked softly. It was a routine morning in Yefim’s candle shop.

Most had gone through their first four crates for that shift. The boy had finished his fifteenth.

Those glassy eyes stared somewhere up and to the right, although Tanid suspected they saw him and judged every little detail. The god made sure he sat still in order not to alarm the child. He had his suspicions. They seemed to be coming true, and he had to be extremely careful.

Soon, the boy finished another crate. With mechanical precision, he lowered it to the ground, pulled another close within his pudgy arms’ reach, and continued the counting ritual. Tanid decided this was the right moment to check if the boy was gifted.

He rose and, as if by accident, pushed the crate off the desk. It fell, shattered, and the candles spilled out noisily. The crowd of workers looked up, wondering, confused, their lips still ticking off individual blocks. There would be quite a few mistakes there, he noticed. But not here.

The boy glanced at the floor. “Forty-four,” he whispered, to no one in particular.

“I’m sorry.” Tanid bent down and started loading the sticks into the broken crate. The boy did the same, those strange eyes never meeting his. “Did you count them all? Forty-four, you say?”

“Forty-four,” the child intoned.

Tanid shifted slightly, so his right side was hidden from the boy’s sight, and then slipped a candle into his coat’s pocket. Then, as if nothing had happened, he helped clean up the mess.

“Forty-three,” the boy said.

“What?” the god asked, just to be sure.

“Forty-
threeeee
!” the boy wailed.

Tanid fished out the missing candle. “It’s all right, there.” The grimace of irritation slipped off the boy’s face and was instantly replaced with his calm, flaccid, emotionless expression.

The shopworkers were all watching him now, looking alarmed. Well, he’d had to do it. He’d had to know.

The boy was a Special Child.

Well, the only question remaining was, could he see into the future?

“What’s going on there?” one of the candle counters asked. Tanid ignored him.

“Tell me. What weather will there be tomorrow?” the god asked, hopeful. “Tell me.”

There was no response. The pudgy hands dug into the crate and lifted a small, precise bundle.

I need to ask my question in a different manner
, Tanid thought. “How many clouds will there be tomorrow? In the sky? How many?”

The little pink hand stopped in midair. The boy’s head tilted to one side at a weird, unnatural angle, that weak chin pointed up. Tanid waited. But the child said nothing. He did not know.

Tanid felt a knot of disappointment burgeon in his chest. “How many people will die in a year from now? How many years will King Sergei rule? How many days will the next winter last? How many years will I live?” He tried anything he could think of, anything that would be both trivial and significant, anything that might trigger an answer.

Silence.

Tanid deflated. This child might be gifted, but he could not see the future.

“Hey! I asked, what’s going on?” The apprentice was approaching now, looking angry.

The god spun and rose. “Peace, good man. I am here to study your art. I talked to your master, and he allowed me to watch.”

“I know. Yefim told me. Don’t mean you can pester Fedya. Leave him alone.”

The apprentice was a thickset man, wearing a sleeveless vest, and had graying hair sticking on his shoulders. Someone who had aged counting beeswax candles in a hot, sweaty shop. Not a person with much imagination or goodwill, Tanid suspected.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to disturb you. Or him.” The god raised his hands in what he hoped was a placating manner. Then, he reached into his other coat pocket and fished out a silver.

“That’s Eracian silver,” the apprentice said with disgust, but he took it anyway.

Tanid realized he should have chosen local coinage. Back in the Territories, people were less sensitive to where the money was minted. But in Sigurd, the merchants expected you to deal in silver stamped with King Sergei’s portrait.

He retreated, heading for the exit. Yefim, the shop master, was leaning against a wall, smoking. He had seen the whole exchange and had not interfered.

“Did you find anything, my lord?”

Tanid shook his head. “Not suitable for my needs, I’m afraid.”

Yefim jabbed the cigarette end against the wall, killing the flame. “Well, can’t say I’m sorry. Fedya’s got a knack for numbers. Better than all of that lot in there. And I only got to pay him half. Right? Half the man, half the pay.”

Tanid listened, learning about humans.

“Got him from this cheese seller two years back. Says he got him from some village somewhere. A priest came, too, but when Fedya didn’t answer no questions, he left him with me. Can’t say he would have paid half as good as you offer. Five years’ worth of apprenticeship, you said.”

“Four,” Tanid corrected him.

“Can’t say I’m sorry,” Yefim repeated, but it was obvious he would have loved the money.

There would be no deal, but Tanid knew what was expected of him. He reached into his pocket and produced a small stack, only this time he made sure to magic the right details onto the coins, just a tiny, tiny bit of magic, untraceable. Yefim extended a scar-burned, wax-smeared hand and let the silver drop into his palm.

“For your trouble,” Tanid said, as he always did.

The god left the shop. Another place, another lie, another failure. Well, at least, in the big city, it was easier to come up with convenient stories why he needed unorthodox children. He had told Yefim he was looking for someone with a special ability to enroll in his new school. Most people could not appreciate the idea of weird children playing music or dancing or sculpting except for grotesque entertainment, but they could accept the notion of an eccentric wealthy lord willing to pay for such a cause.

Other times, he claimed he needed freaks for a circus troupe, or acolytes for priesthood. Sometimes he was met with scorn and fear, sometimes with outright animosity. There were occasions when people fawned upon him, either because of religion or the promise of so much silver, or both. Greed usually won over even the most reluctant customers.

Still, it was a hard, difficult journey. The patriarchs tended to come first and snatch the Special Children for their own
needs, to use them or kill them. Those left behind were considered useless or just simple, without any hidden abilities. Society treated unnatural children as abominations, so their parents tended to keep them away from sight or, more often, get rid of them whenever they could. Let them wander alone into the desert and get savaged by animals, forget them in dark alleys or in front of orphanages, drown them in a well, or sell them off to merchants who could perhaps somehow find them some use.

Tanid was racing against the very practice he and his siblings had created.