Enlightenment

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

A woman carrying a head of cabbage and a fistful of carrots strode in their direction. Prin said to her, “We’re new here. Is the market in that direction?”

“It is. Be careful, the farmers are asking top prices for their vegetables this time of the year.”

They thanked her and promised to be wary. After a few more blocks, Sara said, “I’m not over-reacting to the danger Brice presents, you know.”

“But you’re going to teach him a lesson he won’t soon forget? Maybe the bos’n can come up here and give him one too? Or a thug on the street can punch him in his eye?”

“Brice is not our friend.”

“At least not yet, and if you continue to treat him like that, he never will be.”

Sara turned away and headed for the market with long, determined strides. When they reached it, they found nothing like the wild and bustling bazaar at Indore. The market at Gallium had an almost serene aspect to it, having none of the music, dancing, colorful flags, and loud hawkers extolling their goods and prices. Instead, the stalls were neatly lined up in rows according to markers painted on the pave stones, each with a table or two displaying the fruit or wares, a few with canvas tent roofs.

The rows were wide, the sellers polite, and there were men dressed in blue that patrolled, usually in pairs. A small disagreement between a buyer and seller broke out, and four of the men in blue descended to settle the quarrel quietly and efficiently.

Prin said, “I like the Bazaar better.”

They strolled past the stalls, buying nothing. Sara looked for specific ingredients needed for the magic spells and found a few at a vegetable stand. She also purchased a sprig of basil, some mustard seed, salt, and mint leaves.

The displays of other items drew Prin. She examined a tray of knives, finding none to her satisfaction, despite the fact she already owned two and didn’t need another. She fingered lace, and almost purchased a ball of twine so tough she couldn’t break it with her fingers. She did buy three apples, planning one for each of them.

Farmers sold their crops at most tables. Sara suggested they buy food at the last, so they didn’t have to carry it around with them. As they admired carved figurines at one table, along with a nice selection of spoons, Prin glanced up in time to see a man not-looking at them.

He was perhaps ten steps away, Sara was twenty-years-old, and even without her long black hair, her classic features and curvy figure always drew attention. Sara was the sort of beauty that if she smudged a little dirt on her cheek, instead of detracting, it would make most men think her more attractive.

But the young man looked off to their side as if something down there was so interesting he couldn’t spare the time to glance at Sara. Prin averted her gaze, but kept him in her peripheral vision, as he seemed to be doing to them. Sure enough, his eyes flicked in their direction, then away.

Prin took Sara by her elbow harder than necessary, and steered her several tables away, where they looked at turnips as if they were interesting. Prin said, “A man in pale green is behind us. I think he is watching, so don’t look.”

Sara said, “What do you think?”

Prin shook her head at the turnip seller as if the price was too high, and she escorted Sara past several more tables. At a place where customers could slip between displays to another row, Prin pulled her along. Two rows away, they paused at a display of bowls carved from various woods. Prin situated herself where she could watch behind without being obvious.

The young man in pale green emerged from a small crowd, his eyes searching, then he headed in their direction. A pair of men in darker blue, with stars sewn to their shirts, walked past. Prin caught the attention of one and hissed, “Directly ahead of you is a young man wearing light green. We’ve never seen him, but he’s stalking my sister, I think.”

Their eyes found him immediately. They headed in his direction, but the man who had been following them spun and darted off.

“Wait,” one of the constables shouted, as the other blew a whistle. The chase was on.

Several more constables raced to the sound of the whistle. Prin said, “Let’s get away from here.”

They walked quickly, but not so fast they would attract attention. Before leaving the market, at a stall near the edge, Sara paid for a plucked chicken. At the next stall, she quickly bought fresh peas, carrots, and noodles. A moment later, they were in the maze of side streets again.

With only two mistakes, they found their way back to the house. Brice sat on the steps. Sara brushed past him without speaking.

Prin said, “You might as well come on in. At least for a little while.”

He followed her, his head hung low. At the top, he paused and said, “I’m sorry.”

Sara spun around to him, face red and contorted. “Sorry? That’s all you have to say? Do you have any idea of what just happened?”

“No,” Prin said gently, “how could he?”

“Stop protecting him.” Sara sat in a chair and fumed, her eyes squinted, brows furrowed, and body tense. Prin motioned to the terrace and Brice went out there and sat in silence. Prin said nothing, and later, when she looked up, Sara was chopping the vegetables and putting them in a pot. Her chopping was furious, the pieces becoming bits instead of chunks.

After Sara cut up the chicken and added water, she put the pot on a small fire to simmer and pulled the same chair back to the edge of the terrace. Without preamble, she said, “I’m sorry. Neither of you deserved that. I was scared.”

“What happened?” Brice asked, then looked as if he wished he hadn’t said anything.

Prin answered, “There are men looking for me. Prominent men, and even a mage or two. We escaped them twice, but when we were in the market in a city we’ve never visited, a man followed us for no reason, except that he was looking at me. Not Sara. Me.”

“You say you’ve never been in Gallium?”

“They are searching all seaports, I think.”

“Are you that important?” he asked.

“Some people think so. Now I don’t know what to do.”

Sara said, “It’s not your fault, Prin. I just don’t know how we can even buy food if they are searching here for you. You may have to remain inside for the entire stay. That man found us before we’d passed a hundred stalls, so I should think there are many more searching because he couldn’t have been that lucky. What are we going to do?”

Brice began to smile. “Well, maybe here is where I help pay you back. Nobody knows me. Suppose I do the shopping and run the errands. The two of you stay inside where they can’t find you.”

Sara said, “Hey, that might work.”

Brice said, “Did the man recognize you, or just suspect it might be you?”

“Suspect,” Prin said. “He was trying to get closer for a better look, I think. Maybe they have drawings?”

“Is there any reason you need to go out before we sail? Is there anything I can’t do to help?” Brice’s voice rose in frustration that his offer hadn’t been accepted.

Sara visibly calmed. She settled back in the chair, her mind at work as she turned to him. “Can you read?”

“A little.”

“We could give him lists of what we need for shopping, including food and supplies,” Sara said, “As soon as we find out if shaving his head gets rid of that irritating fuzz around him.”

He stood and said, “Let’s do it. I’ve been thinking and realize that the two of you are helping me. If you say my hair may get me into trouble, let’s get rid of it.”

Prin used a scoop of water from the bucket and wet his hair. Then she used her fingers as a comb and brushed it back off his forehead while looking at Sara.

She said, “It is the hair. Come look.”

Prin went to stand beside Sara. His forehead was normal, so she combed it down over his eyes and stepped back. The fuzziness now shimmered down to his eyes. “How did nobody ever see that? It’s so obvious.”

“Did you live in a small village when young?” Sara asked.

Prin combed his hair back again and placed a hat on him. The hat took on a very slight haziness. She asked Sara, “Does the hat hide it?”

“No, not really, but it does cover it up some. When you look at the hair below the hat, it’s still there.”

Sara had calmed and talked in her usual manner, all traces of anger passed. Prin removed the hat and said, “You’re going to look as funny as us when you’re bald.”

“Just do it before I change my mind.”

Prin cut hanks of hair and soaped what remained. Soon, his hair was gone, his scalp white, and Sara said, “Nope, it’s as bad as ever.”

Prin saw the twinkle in her eye. “Well, maybe we need to paint his head green.”

“My head?”

“What else, silly?”

Brice stood, confused, his hands running through nonexistent hair until they burst into laughter. He asked, “Can I see me?”

They couldn’t find anything to provide a reflection. But they assured him, after passing a few looks between them, how good he looked bald, when in truth, he appeared almost deformed. Sara’s and Prin’s scalps had tanned and looked acceptable, while his dark facial skin contrasted dramatically with the white scalp.

“He should wear a hat to keep the sun off, or he’ll burn the first day,” Sara said, checking on the soup again and stirring it. “This will be bland because we didn’t buy enough spices. Mustard seed and mint will provide little help.”

Prin tasted the proffered spoon. “Yuck. Put them on the list.” She sat in a chair and said, “When I was with the Old Mage, and we camped near a river, he put a spell on everything around--one that blurred us to anyone passing by on the road. They could hear us, and he said bears could smell us, but we’d sort of blur into the trees when anyone looked in our direction.”

“Like Brice’s hair,” Sara said, crossing the room and scooping a handful of his hair and holding it beside her face. “What do you think?”

“Your face is blurred.”

Sara scooped all the hair and placed it in an empty bowl. “We may find a use for that. We’ll save it.”

“Candles, we need many of them for reading at night, and a lamp,” Prin said.

Sara turned to Brice. “I think we should all sit outside where the air is fresh and talk about what we know about magic, and what we don’t, so we are all equal in our knowledge. At least, the generalities.”

Brice said, “Then you two do all the talking, and I’ll listen because I don’t know anything. Until today, the mention of magic scared me.”

Sara pulled the chair back to the doorway to the terrace. “You see, that’s the funny thing. I think you know more than you believe, maybe more than us. So, before we tell you what we know, I want to question you.”

Prin rubbed her hands together in a gleeful manner, taking the sting from Sara’s words. “I think I’m going to like this.”

Sara said, “Tell us your story. Start when you were young and when you first ran into trouble and ran away to become a sailor.”

“Well, it didn’t happen like that, or not all at once. But small things happened and over time. Stories started to be spread.” Brice talked as he looked off into the distance and remembered. “At home, there was a boy who didn’t like me when we were growing up. I avoided him most of the time, but when he did catch me, he would beat me just because he was bigger and he enjoyed it.”

At the long pause, Sara filled in, “Then one day, something different happened.”

“When he swung, it was like his hand hit a wall. He wore a bandage, and after that, his fingers were twisted. He said I did it to him and people hardly talked to me.”

“Your mind protected your body. Understandable. What else?”

“There were a few other things, and stories got around, but nothing serious. But a little over a year ago, our family farm was drying up in a drought. I was worried, like everyone else, and one night I woke and there was rain. Our crops were saved.”

Prin said, “That sounds like a good thing.”

“It only rained on our farm.”

Sara said, “I take it the other farmers were not happy with you?”

“They decided I prevented the rain from falling on their farms so our crops would sell for more. They came in a crowd one night just after dark, carrying pitchforks and knives, and one brought a rope to hang me. They destroyed all we grew.”

“You got away?” Prin asked.

“I wanted to stay there and tell them I had nothing to do with any of that, but my father sent me away and told me to get to Dinsmore and beg for a job as a deckhand on any ship that would take me far away.”

Sara said, “Skipping ahead, things happened on the ship?”

“A few times, all of them things that helped the ship like a wind that helped us, but other ships were becalmed. The finger was pointed at me. They said I used magic.”

“And they were probably right. I think that some people can almost see that fuzziness, or they have the impression from it. Maybe they feel it when around you.” Sara paused and then said, “We have to find out how to keep people from figuring out who you are, and that means you have to learn to control your powers, at least enough to shut them down.”

“Do you know how to do that?” he asked.

“No. But we have some books.” She took a pen and paper from her sea bag and began making a list. She used the notebooks she had been studying for more and finally handed it to him. Read each of these to me.”

Brice hesitantly read them, stumbling on several, correcting himself a few times and asked for help on others. He was clearly a better reader than Prin, but not accomplished. After reading through the list once, she made him repeat it, and he got them all right. Sara slipped several coins into his hand and sent him to the market after offering advice on the items, and a stern warning to skip the effort if anyone watched him, or if he felt they were taking too much interest in him.

He placed his hat on his head and left.

Prin tasted the soup again, and agreed spices were needed especially more salt. She turned to Sara, who was reading a page she’d just marked. “Find something?”

“I remembered a spell from reading this book on the ship. It has to do with hair. If they are searching for a blonde girl and one with black hair, or two without hair, we can change that. I think I can turn our hair brown, and we can let ours grow out, so we don’t look so strange.”

“But spells weaken over time. Our hair will turn the natural color as it grows.”

“All true. But nothing says we can’t repeat the spell.”

Prin said, “When you cast a spell for a woman to make a man fall in love with her, it gets weaker over time, like the no-see-me spell Evelyn gave me. When that spell wears off, what happens?”

“Well, you’re right. But the man never hated her, he just hadn’t looked at her in the same way. As for the woman, she always believes she can change him and turn him into what she wants, which is beyond any spell I’ve ever heard of.”

They laughed at Sara’s comment, but when Prin considered her finger drawing heat from the rest of her hand, she wondered where the love was drawn from.

Sara listened to the question and said, “If I know the man loves dogs or cherry pie, I pull some from there, so he likes dogs and cherry pie instead of loves it. The extra affection is given to the woman.”

Prin said, “Do you ever question what you do?”

“No. There have been times when I didn’t think a woman should love a particular man, and I either refused to make the potent, or lied and said I did. Why? I know you’re going to ask me that, next.”

“Nope. I think I understand. At least I’m beginning to. Tell me about the hair spell.”

“I have part of the things needed. One of the ingredients will be harder, because it is a hair, and neither of us has any, which is almost a bad joke. We want to color our hair, but cannot because we don’t have any of the colors we want.”

“Eyebrows?”

“That might work. Want to try it?” Sara asked.

“Tonight?”

“Now.”