As they travel into the higher, colder regions, Mina’s memory begins to play tricks on her.
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The next day brought them farther up the mountain and into colder weather. The pine forest had broken into a more open spread of broadleaf trees. The grade here was steeper and boulders jutted from the slope like great stone noses on the mountain face. Progress was slower over the rocky ground, and Edvard made no move to push the horses or mule. Yuila was bored with the slower pace, but had finally conceded to his advice not to switch the mare to a faster gait.
They broke for camp earlier than the night before, building a fire in a stand of birch trees and pulling out more clothes and blankets. Mina and Yuila changed into the woolen overdresses and flannel chemises, and the older girl decided it was time to resort to the tall boots they had gotten in Pantia.
"We'll freeze to death tonight," Yuila griped, taking the braids out of her hair.
"No, we'll be fine." Mina made her turn so she could comb out her hair, smiling at the soft ripples the braids left. "Does it snow in Prima Lūce?"
"No. Never."
"You'll be warm enough tonight, Yuila. Don't worry."
As if not trusting Mina's word on the matter, that night Yuila curled up beside the older girl, resting her head in her lap as she sat against a clump of white-barked trees. She pulled her skirts around her ankles, her hood over her head, and then she and Mina's two blankets on top her.
Mina just sighed, accepting her station in life—for the night—as bedding. Actually, the girl added some warmth, and Mina wasn't about to deny that it was a frosty night. Until Edvard sat down.
He settled against one of the closely grown trees with her, looking up at the stars that seemed especially brilliant in the cold skies. "Still cold?"
"No." Well, she wasn't exactly lying. She just wasn't quite warm yet.
"You sound like you are."
"Those are Yuila's teeth chattering."
He looked to where the Crone was submerged in blankets. "You don't have to let her drape all over you, Mina."
"She's just more afraid of being cold than actually cold." That hadn't come out as well as she wanted, but he seemed to understand what she meant. "The flannel slips are very warm." He gave her a look that she could only interpret as a brief loss of composure and she felt her cheeks redden. Maybe the slips were likened to other undergarments. "Well, I mean, they're. . ." She fumbled for different words. "I'm warm," she said with a sigh. Especially my face, she thought, not looking at him.
"Good." He situated his blanket over himself and sighed. "We should meet up with a house tomorrow, if the directions we got in the village are near accurate. I think I departed the trade road earlier than the shopkeeper told us to."
"We had to."
"I know, but it put us in the cold weather earlier."
"It's not too bad."
He grinned, looking at the fire burning strongly before them. "Mina, I think you'd say that if we were covered with snow."
"I doubt it." For a long moment they were quiet, watching the smoke trail high into the night air. She felt his eyes on her and looked to him.
"What did you learn in school?"
She shrugged, then pulled her blanket up higher as it slid. "Reading, math. Some history." She had almost said geography, but stopped herself. What kind of idiot studied geography and couldn't remember the name of their world? She sighed. She had just summed up eleven years of schooling in four words. "What about you?"
"About the same, I guess. Different history, I suppose, and maps, and the things pertaining to Sammis' business." They watched a sudden gust of wind sweep over the fire, wrinkling the flames for a moment. "Did you like the school?"
"No. Well, not the new one, but I did the old one, the larger one, when we lived in . . . well, before we moved." She closed her eyes momentarily. It was amazing how her feet could be cold and her face so hot at the same time. She focused on the fire and decided she had no choice but to lie. How could she answer truthfully about this subject?
"Why not?"
"I had no friends." That was an honest answer, she thought.
"You didn't make friends at the new one?" He moved to see her face better. "Why not?"
For a moment she returned his puzzlement. "I don't know, Edvard. I guess I thought it was such a small school compared to the old one that the students there . . ." She shrugged, looking back to the fire. "I thought they had all the friends they needed, and there would be no room for me. I didn't give anyone a chance to be friends," she added softly, more to herself than him.
"What about that girl who sits in front of you?"
She looked quickly at him. "Who?"
He frowned. "What?"
She turned, nearly dislodging Yuila on her lap.
"Sapo," came a muffled grumble.
"What did you just say, Edvard?" Mina looked at him in the fire's flickering light.
"Uh, I asked about the other girls in your school."
"What exactly did you say?"
He studied her before answering. "I said, 'What about the other girls in your school?' There were other girls studying, too, right?"
She sat against the tree, perplexed at how different his question had seemed for a moment. "Yes. They're nice, I guess. I haven't met many of them yet."
"I see. What about that girl in literature class?"
"How do you know I have literature class?" she asked sharply.
He considered her carefully. "Mina, you said you learned to read. What were you reading? Besides history. Literature? Poetry?"
Her eyes narrowed. "How do you know anything about the girl in my literature class?"
He laughed. "I don't. What girl are you talking about?"
Good question, she thought. What girl was she thinking about? That faceless, nameless one she could almost hear at the oddest moments? Try as she may, she couldn't picture any of them, not the girl, not the teacher that sat on the stool, not the bus driver of the bus she had always missed. Not even that other teacher in whose class she was doing so well.
At least, that's how she had remembered it. She thought she was doing well. . .
Actually, not recalling the bus driver was understandable. She'd never gotten to the bus on time to really see the driver. The unsettling dizziness she had had when Edvard had first said Sombra Mundi was returning. She sank into the tree base, feeling a nausea rise in her. "I guess I heard you wrong."
"I guess so." He cleared his throat. "We don't have to talk about school, Mina."
"I don't mind," she said without enthusiasm.
He nodded. "Well, maybe you'll make friends when you get back."
She let herself observe his profile for a moment, then pulled the blanket to her chin, deciding not to think anymore for the night. "Maybe I'll make friends when I go back."
Edvard stood at the edge of the hardwood clearing where the slope broke into a barren of rocks and rubble, his eyes moving over the scene in the distance. Far below them the incline reached to the trade road, but only a stretch of the curve of grassland was to be seen. It wasn't the road itself that made him uneasy, but the large tribe of Derans that moved on it.
He had awoken to voices from afar early that morning, and the horses had turned their heads at once to the low sounds. The voices were half a valley away, but traveled easily in the void of the nearby clearing. From where he stood at the edge of the wood line, he knew he would not be visible to the nomads below, nor did he want to become so.
He glanced to where Mina stood sheltered in the trees farther in, hidden in a stand of birch where the shadows hadn't yet reached. They'd left Yuila still sleeping in their pine bough bed, deciding she wouldn't wake until she got cold.
And it was plenty cold. Their breath frosted in the air as they had silently moved to where the hardwoods ended. It hadn't snowed, and Edvard decided it was probably too cold or dry to snow. He stepped back into the trees and looked to the tree line that edged the barren region of the slope farther up. It would safest to travel among the trees, but it would also mean up to half a day of added journey. He looked back down to the horde of Derans on the road. To cross through the barren area on the slope would expose them, and while it would take a day for the Derans to reach them, they may decide to do just that.
He and Mina rejoined Yuila to find the girl covered in blankets, sobbing. Mina immediately knelt beside her and pulled the blankets and hood back to reveal the weeping Crone, who swiftly embraced her.
"I thought you left without me!" she cried. "You were both gone."
Mina glanced at Edvard as he shook his head and began packing their supplies. "Of course not, Yuila. We wouldn't leave you. We were just," she looked to where Edvard was sending her a frown, "finding the best way to go. That's all."
Yuila nodded, still clinging to her. Her attention went to the horses. "You wouldn't leave without the horses."
"We wouldn't leave you behind." Mina smiled and brushed the girl's hair with her hand, then wiped the wet from her cheeks. "If you cry, your tears will freeze right on your face."
Yuila rubbed her eyes with her shawl. "Are we going to eat before we leave?"
Mina sighed. Yes, the world was right with Yuila again.
Edvard built up the small fire and they made tea and warmed up the nearly frozen soup from the night before.
They spent the morning skirting the tree line above the barren area above the trade road. Edvard kept their travel out of sight, and Yuila's humming was lower than usual, for which he was glad. He didn't want to explain to her why she needed to be quieter.
PG13, saga; teen, fantasy, fantasy world travel, teen romance, clean romance, realm, magical realism, shadow world, school/new school, high school, fiction, serial. #ReadFree with free signup. ♫♪
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Thanks to P.G. Waters for the use of her story!