Gifted Page 2

  “Are you sure he wrote the letter?” the boy nearest me queried. His name was Alec, and he was seventeen like me, with typical Enorian black hair and eyes, and golden skin. He was also very handsome, and one of the few who weren’t already wed or betrothed. Unfortunately his tastes didn’t run to ‘cute’ – so my feelings weren’t reciprocated. I felt my cheeks heat.

  “Yeah, it’s his,” Missus Streeth said, saving me from answering. “He always smudges the ink.”

  “But what if he was forced to write it?” Alec challenged. He stared at the emissary. “Was he?”

  Damon lifted his chin, apparently unconcerned. “He was told that he could not leave until this bargain is completely fulfilled,” he replied calmly. “And I have been instructed to give the same information. I will leave first thing tomorrow. If you wish to send one of your girls with me – a sweet-natured beauty, of course – then Master Alden will be free to go, and your people free to move into the valley unchallenged. If you do not wish to send one, then I will leave alone, and your Master Alden will stay with our people until our ruler decides otherwise.”

  I felt my cheeks redden a little more at the request for a ‘sweet-natured beauty’ being announced so loudly. “Can I talk to him in private, please?”

  No one was keen on that idea, but Damon and I managed to move about ten feet away from the rest of the crowd. “Look,” I said quietly. “We all know that we need your goodwill more than you need ours. And I’m quite fond of my father, and would also like him back. But really, honestly, would I do? Because we don’t have anyone else.”

  Damon looked up, and I saw his eyes settle on Tabitha where she stood at the edge of the crowd, watching us. “Anyone else available,” I cut in. “You said you needed a maiden.”

  Oh, Tab would hate me for saying such a thing since I was pretty sure she and Hairy Ned had never gone there, but I was saving her. Hopefully she’d never find out.

  The Veest turned back to me, looking me up and down. Then he shrugged. “Why not.”

  And that was that. I turned to move back to the others, but he set his hand on my arm. “Wait. Who was that boy you were talking to? The handsome one.”

  Now I really felt my cheeks heat. Generally I was hard to embarrass, but any mention of Alec would make me blush. “Alec is just another settler.”

  “No…friendship?”

  “We’re not really friends,” I muttered, sparing a glance at Alec from the corner of my eye. He seemed to be arguing with Tabitha, something he did with enthusiasm. “But we know each other, as does everyone. There’s nothing else to it.”

  “Hmm,” Damon said. And that was all.

  “You’re a bold one,” Missus Streeth declared that evening in the privacy of the main tent. “You might look small and sweet, but you’ve got a spine of steel. Providing they’re not the beasts that people claim them to be, then you’ll do well.” She exchanged a glance with her husband, and her lips tightened unhappily. “But I don’t like this. Your mother was my friend, and I don’t think she would have liked it either, us sending you off to the Veest caves to have half-animal babies.”

  Then seeing my appalled expression, she sighed. She wasn’t at her best in this chaos, but I knew she was a kind woman. “Oh, it might not be as bad as all that, Claire, but it’s a big ask. Marrying a Veest? I hear they spend half their time as animals! Some of them might not even be able to change back, and they want us to send you into that?”

  “It might not be true,” I murmured half-heartedly, but even I didn’t believe that. So I lifted my chin and said, “If I go, it will be by choice. I know you’d never make me. It’s just…”

  “You’re afraid of a horrible death?”

  “No!” No matter what anyone said, I was sure they weren’t cannibals, and perhaps not even violent. Mostly sure. Just look at that boy with his too-pale colouring and calm manner. He looked too mild to ever devour anyone… “I was thinking about what Damon had said, about what sort of girl they were expecting. They might be disappointed if they end up with me.”

  “Fishing for compliments, are we?”

  My cheeks heated. “Of course not. I just meant that they seem to be expecting a beauty, and I’m…”

  “Short, cute rather than pretty, and with no dress sense?”

  Ouch. “I was going to say ordinary, but that’s one way of putting it. And I can’t see that my dress sense is any worse than anyone else’s here.” All our dresses turned the same shade of sun-bleached brown within a few months, and the sun had turned my skin to almost the same colour, and had put hints of brown in my curly black hair. Not a match with my name that meant ‘pale’, but that couldn’t be avoided.

  “That boy didn’t seem to mind,” Master Streeth pointed out. “Besides, how do you know what they’d find beautiful? Probably a girl with a face like a pig and hair like a wild dog. You’ll be gorgeous in contrast.”

  I didn’t point out that the Veest boy was hardly ugly, just pale. Instead I said, “It seems like we’ve got more to gain than lose here. I think I should go.”

  This time Missus Streeth didn’t contradict me. Instead she looked across at her husband. “Well?”

  “Let her go. Who knows, maybe we will be able to settle here. Sounds a good sight better than going back to that dust bowl we came from in Enoria.”

  Missus sighed. “Fine. But if they cause you trouble, Claire, you don’t hold back, alright?” She made a fist to demonstrate, her thumb tucked outside her fingers, then jabbed at the air. “Just like we showed you. Nose, throat, gut or lower. Understood?”

  “Understood,” I replied a little dryly. They’d taught all of us girls – and boys – to defend ourselves, but up ’til now I’d never needed to use those skills. I hoped I could still say that in three months’ time.

  The news spread like wildfire – Claire’s going to marry a Veest! – and I had more conversations that evening with some settlers than I’d had in a year. Everybody had to hear it for themselves, and repeating it over and over should have made it feel more real to me. But it didn’t. It just felt like one of those articles I liked to read, the sort which would make me think ‘isn’t that interesting’, and then would be forgotten about.

  Of course my sisters cared that I was leaving, but they were more concerned about Father coming home, and that maybe we could all stay in this area after all and not have to pack up our lives once more in search of somewhere liveable. We’d – they’d – have to move a few hours north into Rose Valley, but it was nothing compared to the travel we’d already done from Enoria.

  I didn’t have much I could take with me. We weren’t rich, and all I had was just that silver comb and mirror from my mother. Pretty, but you couldn’t exactly live off them. But then neither the letter nor the emissary had said anything about needing a dowry – just a bride.

  A sweet-natured, beautiful, unmarried girl. Argh…at least I could claim the last requirement, pretend the second didn’t matter, and fake the first.

  I made my way back to my ‘room’, which was actually half of the tent I shared with my sisters. My space was cut off by a sheet hanging from the ceiling, and I was finally alone. Just me, my bedroll, and my few bundles of clothing. I unfolded the largest bundle to expose the aforementioned silver dowry, then picked up the mirror and idly studied my reflection.

  Round brown cheeks, round dark eyes, curly black hair sticking to my forehead from the heat. Yep, all normal…except for those downturned lips. That wasn’t normal, because I was starting to feel quite sorry for myself. Did anyone even care that I was leaving? Or was I just a convenient sacrifice?

  Realising how that sounded, I twisted my lips in a half-amused, half-annoyed pout. “Don’t be a martyr,” I told my reflection. “You’re choosing this, and you know what’s at stake.”

  Peace with the Veest, everyone being able to settle somewhere safe and beautiful…and my father’s freedom, unless they’d been joking about that. I didn’t think they had been. So with that in mind
, I could handle marrying a stranger who might also turn into a hairy beast on occasion. Maybe I could arrange to have him stay outside during those times, just like you wouldn’t come inside with dirty boots.

  I was still musing on exactly what waited for me when a light cough sounded from just outside. “Claire? Are you alone? It’s Alec.”

  I’d recognised his voice immediately, and felt my heartrate pick up. “Um, yes. Just…talking to myself.” Damn. I hadn’t meant to say that out loud.

  There was a pause. “Can I come in?”

  Of course he could! He was one of the few boys my age, and he was also one of the few I’d really miss. “Just a moment.” I quickly checked my hair again in the mirror, decided that it wasn’t going to get any better, then smoothed my hands over my plain brown skirts. “Come in.”

  There he was in all his tall, dark, handsome glory, right down to the thick-lashed dark eyes. He pushed aside the sheet/door, taking care to leave it hooked so that it was ‘open’. It wouldn’t do to have any rumours about the two of us alone in a bedroom right before I went off to get married – that would likely wreck the entire point of going, and for nothing. Alec wasn’t interested in me that way. He’d made it more than clear in the past.

  “Everyone’s saying that you’re leaving with that pasty-faced Veest,” he said.

  “Then everybody would be right,” I replied, turning away to fold one of my better dresses, the one I used for celebrations. Perhaps it would be my wedding dress, white or not. “I go first thing in the morning.”

  “Just like that.”

  “Just like that,” I repeated calmly.

  “Were you even going to say goodbye?”

  I looked up at him in surprise. Yes, he really did look annoyed, and that made me a little annoyed right back. “I wouldn’t have thought it would make any difference to you. You never cared before.”

  “I cared, I just always thought…that you’d be here. I didn’t think you’d just run off to marry some monster! Stars above, Claire! Do you think your life is worth this…this peace they say we’ll get?”

  “I am ninety-nine percent sure that I won’t be killed, eaten or even maimed,” I said lightly. “So yes, I think it is worth it. And we don’t even know if my betrothed will be a shapeshifter. Maybe I can think of it as an adventure.”

  Alec stared at me intently. “I wish you wouldn’t go.”

  Now a spike of irritation shot through me. His timing was terrible! “Oh, shall I tell them I have a previous commitment? Shall I stay and marry you, Alec, and we can find some other way to rescue my father and somewhere else to live that the Veest haven’t already claimed? Or maybe we should just go back to Enoria, and make the hard work of the last few years for nothing.”

  I’d been sarcastic, but there was a part of me that was honest, too. I’d given him this chance to speak up about how he felt about me, but his silence gave the answer I’d expected. I turned away, regaining control of my temper and pretending to straighten the embroidered sheets I was adding to my bag. “Never mind. When it all works out and you lot can all finally build permanent homes in Rose Valley, then you’ll see I did the right thing.”

  “And do you really think you’ll be happy, married to one of those animals?”

  “Well, he won’t be an animal all the time,” I retorted. “Now if you don’t mind, I have some packing to do.”

  Two

  The Veest

  I was up at first light the next morning, kissing my sisters goodbye and fixing a pleasant smile on my face. The Streeths and a couple of others got up to watch me go. Alec wasn’t one of them.

  As for Damon the Veest, he didn’t have much to say once we got moving except, “Can you lean either forward or back? I can’t see past your head.”

  I sat sideways in front of him on the horse, my small bags hanging from behind me, and I blushed a little, trying to get out of the way. “I’m surprised to see you have a horse. I would have thought-”

  “That I’d turn into a wolf and run the whole way? Sorry to disappoint, but I don’t have the gift.”

  “The gift…?”

  “The ability to change into a wolf, a bear, an eagle, or one of the many other shapes that can be taken. Not all Veest do, you know. That’s why it’s called a gift, it’s special.”

  “Special as in one in five have it?”

  There was a long silence as if he was deciding whether to reply, then he said, “More like one in three. But I’m one of the ungifted.”

  “Why did they send you to us, then? You couldn’t have defended yourself if my people had attacked.”

  I couldn’t see his face, but I felt him flinch. “Maybe the same reason that you’re coming with me,” he answered lightly.

  “And what’s that?”

  “You’re agreeable…and you’re expendable.”

  Now that was a conversation killer. I sat quietly, rocking with the movement of the horse and thinking…expendable.

  I wasn’t, was I? But I couldn’t stop thinking about that, and about people turning into wolves or eagles or whatever Damon had said earlier. He didn’t speak again either, so we just rode in silence until we stopped for lunch. We’d followed the road steadily upwards and around corners until the hills bordered us steeply on each side, but they’d changed quickly from brown tussock to purely green. I knew from my reading that landscapes could affect weather, but it was a shock to see it outworked so dramatically. The trees around us grew taller and lusher, and the smell of something lovely filled the air.

  “Mm, what’s that scent?” I asked.

  “Peaches,” Damon replied. “Help yourself, but be careful. There are wasps.”

  There were, but they didn’t stop me from eating at least three. Peaches, that was, not wasps. I’d had very little fresh fruit in months, and these were small and thin-skinned with juicy yellow flesh – well worth risking any sting.

  I was considering a fourth when a rumble from behind me made the hair stand up on the back of my neck. I lowered my hand and turned slowly. Right behind me was an enormous brown bear, easily seven feet tall, and watching me blankly with small black eyes.

  I didn’t react well. I froze with fear, and a squeak came out of my mouth. The peach I’d grabbed fell and rolled to land at the bear’s feet.

  It looked down, then back at me, then seemed to shrug before ambling off into the greenery. That was when I saw that Damon had been standing there the whole time, eyebrows raised. “You’ll have to control yourself better than that when we arrive at my home. What will you do if you see a Veest in animal form?”

  “I didn’t know it was a Veest,” I finally managed to say. “I thought it was just a bear.”

  He didn’t look impressed. “Around here, assume everything is a Veest, because if you don’t you might be sorry. No hunting, no running or screaming, alright? Your betrothed’s people carry this gift, so if you want peace then you’ll need to learn better.”

  I swallowed. “I’m not betrothed yet, surely.”

  He turned away, moving back over to the horse. “You were betrothed the moment that you agreed to come with me.”

  Oh. Now that felt very serious, and I finally got the courage to ask. “My, um, betrothed – does he have the gift?”

  “You don’t want to know his name?”

  “And his name,” I added, but several seconds too late. “Tell me whatever you know.”

  Damon paused. “His name is Kajus,” – he pronounced it like Kay-joos – “and he is both my cousin and a good man. He will be nineteen next winter, and he does have the gift. As for what form it takes…”

  A little older than me, then. “Yes?”

  “You’ll have to see it for yourself.”

  Now that made me more nervous than anything else. From the reports I’d read about the Veest, they could turn into a whole range of creatures from eagles to wolves, pigs and bears – the last I’d just seen in person, of course. What could be so complicated about my betrothed’s form th
at Damon couldn’t explain it in one sentence?

  I pondered the question while we rode along a tree-lined path, well-trod but increasingly green and thick with undergrowth. I could hear things moving about in the forest; shuffling sounds that I knew had nothing to do with our own movements, and it took a real effort not to react. They’re just people. No matter what they look like, they’re just people…

  “So I heard that some Veest can hold a form halfway between animal and human,” I said eventually. “Is that true?”

  Damon paused a moment before answering. “It is. It’s considered a sign of great strength to be able to do so for any length of time. It’s good that you know this – you’ll probably be met by some in such forms once we reach Veestlun.”

  “Veestlun? Is that…”

  “Home of the gifted. Our city.”

  We wound our way around the steep sides of green hills and then down into a wide, curving valley, following alongside a small creek that turned into a substantial river. I heard the city before we reached it, those sounds of many people living all alongside each other reminding me of our old home. Perhaps no matter what language people spoke, no matter how they looked, once all together there was a similar sound, a similar feel. I hadn’t been inside a large city in several years, but the memories lingered in my mind.

  Where the cities of Enoria had been built of sun-bleached, golden sandstone, Veestlun was made of palest grey granite mottled with darker streaks, likely quarried directly from the surrounding hills. But where Enoria had been dry, this place was lush green. Green outside, green growing up the walls in the form of moss, green inside the city from trees planted in the streets, from pots lining windows and full of herbs.