1211 A.B.

  It was late in the morning on Fourday, and all five of us at our kitchen table were in good spirits. Bran, Elle, Mira, Nora and I were all laughing at a joke Mira made at my expense. I laughed along because it was a really good joke, and everyone knew I didn’t really have hair on my back as thick as a carpet. It wasn’t long after we met Mira and Elle when mother accepted them as new pupils at Juleen’s suggestion. Neither Mira nor Elle knew how to read, and they were both very interested in being anywhere other than at their own homes. At the time, I wondered what could be so bad about their families, and I made a mental note to not take my own family for granted.

  In the year since we met Mira and Elle, they’d made great strides in their learning. They both knew how to read and write the common trade language, and they were learning math and history. Nora altered the lessons so the four of us could learn new things at the same pace. Though Bran and I had an advantage at first, the girls caught up very quickly. Juleen didn’t join us for the lessons because she’d already learned what she needed before Bran and I even started. We all became good friends, and we opened up to each other a good bit, even Elle. Having sensed Elle’s discomfort, Bran had become more covert about his feelings for Elle, so she didn’t dread being around him anymore. There was still something about her family life that kept her away from home as much as possible, and I just didn’t know what it could be. I thought the other girls did, though. Girls talk about everything. Sometimes it seems that girls have a quota of words they need to say every day, and that they would burst into flame if they didn’t manage to get them all out.

  We were all talking about the upcoming Harvest Day celebration at the end of Ninemonth, the third harvest of the year. There were always good things to eat around the house then, and we all looked forward to the feast. Juleen walked into the kitchen with a broom in her hand, in the midst of doing her chores.

  “Mom, can we have some sweets for the feast?” I asked.

  “Sure, dear. What kind do you want?”

  “The sour ones that Frieda makes!”

  There was a chorus of “No’s” and groans from the other kids. Feeling a little impish, Mira picked up a spoon from an unused place setting and suddenly threw it at me. It was on course to hit me right in the face.

  I panicked. Without thinking, somehow I instinctively drew magic from the “source,” as I called it, and pain flared behind my eyes. Before the spoon could hit me, it suddenly bounced away from me like I had blocked it with my hand. The only problem was that I didn’t touch it, and it was obvious to everyone in the room that something strange just happened. Mira’s mouth was agape. Nora gasped.

  “What was that?!” Mira exclaimed.

  I just sat there looking at my mother with wide eyes. I didn’t know what I just did, either. I certainly didn’t know what to say.

  Nora cleared her throat. “The spoon hit him in the face.”

  Mira pointed at me. “But…”

  “The spoon hit him in the face,” Nora said firmly.

  I was certain that a gruesome death was coming for my whole family because the girls would talk. Everyone knows girls can’t keep a secret. It was only a matter of time, and I was in a state of panic. Suddenly something happened, and I wasn’t sitting at the kitchen table anymore. It felt like I’d been stabbed in the thigh, and suddenly I was sitting on my bed. I was so shocked I couldn’t breathe. I sat there for a few seconds listening to my mom calling out to me in a low voice that rose in volume as my name was repeated, louder each time. I didn’t want to face everyone because they’d treat me like a freak, but my mom was really scared for me. I could hear it in her voice.

  “I’m here, mom!” I yelled. I got up and shuffled out of my room, then back down to the kitchen.

  Nora could see my eyes were bloodshot and that I was trembling, and she gave me a hug. “Thank God you’re not hurt,” she said. “What happened?”

  “I dunno. I just appeared in my bedroom. I didn’t even know I could do that,” I said in a small voice. I cast a sidelong glance at the table, and the others all had their mouths slightly agape and looked at me with wide eyes.

  Mother withdrew some candies in wax paper from her dress pocket and handed one to each of us. It seems that the act of opening the sweet and eating it forced our minds to focus on something other than what just happened. The shock wore off rather quickly, to my relief.

  “We’re the Stonekeep Castle of secrets, Jeron,” Elle said as she chewed. “We won’t tell anyone.”

  “Well, I am,” Mira said mischievously. “I could make some serious money if I snitched on him to the prince.”

  “You would not,” Elle said with mock severity.

  “Of course I wouldn’t,” Mira said. “I was just kidding.”

  “Not funny,” I said.

  “Look, it was a bad joke,” Mira said, reading the room. She saw how genuinely upset I was, and she decided to make it right. “Sorry. I’ll give you some dirt on me so you can be sure I won’t rat you out. I’ve been spying on the thieves in Stonekeep, and in return, I’m being taught illusion magic by a wizard every Threeday and Sixday when it rains. I’m sorry I didn’t tell anyone. It’s dangerous and I thought I was protecting you,” Mira said in a rush. “But now you know my secret, too.”

  There was a pause as we all digested that.

  “I can heal injuries like the ancient priests used to do,” Elle said softly. “I channel that power to heal my mama when my father hurts her. He’s a monster.” Elle looked down at the table with sadness, but then looked up at me steadily.

  Holy flyspecks, I thought. No wonder Elle was here. We all calmly regarded each other, and each of us knew things had just changed. It was a moment I knew I would never forget. There was a bond formed then that I felt would hold us together against the rest of the whole world if need be. The moment passed, but the feeling of being part of a circle of trust would stay with all of us.

  “Sometimes I fart and pretend Jeron did it,” Bran announced, breaking the tension. We all burst out laughing. Fart jokes are the best.

  “I told you!” I said to Nora, pointing an accusing finger at Bran. I threw my fist up into the air. “Vindicated at last!”

  Eventually the laughing fit subsided, and I said with all seriousness, “It seems I’m a Mordonian sorcerer, though I don’t know much about being one yet. I don’t feel evil, and I’ve never blown anyone up. But it doesn’t matter if I haven’t done anything evil. We’ll all be killed if the wrong person finds out.”

  “Yeah, we all know how that works,” Mira said. “No one’s gonna hear anything from me.”

  “Nor me,” Elle said, thoughtful. “But…”

  “Yeah, I was adopted, by the way.”

  “We’re still brothers,” Bran said calmly.

  He went to punch me in the arm, which I saw coming and most certainly didn’t want. Suddenly, with a whooshing sound, I was standing on the couch on the other side of the room. There was a burning pain in my arm. Everyone looked at me aghast. Again.

  “You’d better get some control over that, Jeron,” mother said. “For all of our sakes.”

  “That’s really incredible,” Mira said.

  “I wish I could do that,” Elle said. Suddenly she put her hand over her mouth and giggled.

  “What?” I asked.

  “Your hair is pink, Jeron,” Bran said. “Though I think that color suits you,” he said with a laugh.

  I looked at Mira. Yep. She was grinning fiendishly. I took a bit of my hair in my fingers and held it up before my eyes. Bright pink. Lovely. Then, much to my relief, it turned back to its normal color.

  “That’s a really good trick, Mira,” I said. “Can you do other stuff?”

  Mira reached into a pocket and whispered something, and a fart noise came from Bran. Thankfully, without the usual smell. That got a laugh from all of us. As I said, we all loved fart jokes.

  “I’m learning to create little noises, the illusions of objects, and things like that,” Mira said. “It’s hard to master, and I didn’t have a place to practice except at my teacher’s house. Here’s one that I find pretty useful, though.”

  Suddenly a normal wooden door appeared in front of Mira. Yeah, I could see how that could be useful when skulking through the city. That reminded me of what she said about her spying activities. Mira had a lot more guts than I gave her credit for. She was only eleven years old and she was in an adult’s world doing things that mattered.

  “I think you’re all done with lessons for today,” mother said. “Jeron, Bran, I think your father will need your help. Juleen, could you do the shopping for dinner, please?”

  We all replied in the affirmative, and mother handed Juleen some money from her dress pocket. All five of us took the stairs down to the smithy. Bran and I were already looking at the depleted coal bin when father nodded at the coal buckets, not even pausing his hammering. We picked up the two coal buckets and went out the door a little behind the girls. We were all going to the lower city, so we walked together for this part of the journey. Two blocks later, I heard an unpleasantly familiar voice from an alley on our right. Just when I thought this day couldn’t get worse.

  “Well, well. What do we have here?” Kromwell said to his cronies in a nasty tone. All of them were in attendance today. Kromwell, Sethor, Raynold, Bermin and Lerg moved out of the alley to cut us off, with Sethor and Raynold doing a complete circuit to get behind us and cut off our retreat. This was not looking good. My heart beat faster, and I concentrated hard on not doing anything magical.

  This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  Kromwell, their ringleader, was a dark-haired youth who wore very nice clothes, including shoes, which none of us had, and who thought that fact made him better than the rest of us. Everyone in Kromwell’s gang was bigger than any of us, and they were all two or three years older than me. The rest of them wore the same kinds of whitish shirts and brown or gray woolen pants that Bran and I wore, but they were not as well kept. They all had greasy hair, which seemed to match their personalities.

  Kromwell’s gaze lingered on Juleen’s figure, then on Elle, and his leer was very telling in what he was thinking about. Elle stood there trembling, shoulders slumped, head down. Kromwell strode forward, close to Juleen, and brazenly put a hand on her shoulder.

  “Why don’t you ladies hang out with us for a while?” Kromwell slimily said. I didn’t know a voice could sound that sleazy. It made me clench my teeth in anger.

  Lerg, who was the biggest person here, and thus Kromwell’s chief enforcer, chuckled stupidly. “Yeah, stick around,” he said.

  Bran and I shared a glance, then moved forward at the same moment. He was probably thinking along the same lines I was. It would be over my dead body that Kromwell would touch Juleen like that. Bran smacked Kromwell’s hand off of Juleen’s shoulder hard enough that seam of her dress tore a little bit at the neckline, and Kromwell took a step back.

  “Oh, ho! What is this? This puny thing dares to challenge me?” Kromwell crowed.

  His toadies all laughed. Bran was almost as tall as Kromwell, and may be as strong, but I knew the odds were bad. We didn’t know how to fight, and there were five of them and two of us, not including the girls. I tightened my fist on the coal bucket. I tried to stare down Lerg, but he was a lot bigger than me and just grinned. Suddenly, Kromwell launched a punch at Bran, which landed on Bran’s eye. Bran staggered back into Juleen, who held him steadily by the shoulder. Sethor, behind us all, roughly grabbed Mira from behind by her upper arms. Lerg took a step forward and punched me in the stomach. I focused all my willpower on not using any of the magical tricks I had up my sleeve, and it was a close thing. I gasped for breath after the air was knocked out of me, crouched over with my left hand over my midsection. I fought for breath as the bullies laughed cruelly, and finally caught a rasping breath that partially filled my lungs.

  Just then, a constable’s whistle blew from down the street behind Kromwell. He lost his composure and looked behind him, as did Lerg. Using the distraction, Mira stomped on Sethor’s foot, and he released his grip on her arms, yelling in pain and hopping on his good foot. I took the opportunity given me to spring upward and hit Lerg in the nose as hard as I could with the bucket. It wasn’t a very hard hit, but it made his nose bleed and his eyes watered for a crucial moment.

  Mira shouted, “Run!”

  The girls surged forward. Bran punched Kromwell in the ear while his head was turned, then made a break for it, straight towards the gate where the constables or militia would be. The girls and I were right behind him. The bullies gathered around Kromwell for a second as he clutched at his ear. That gave us a few precious moments to get a lead on them. If they caught us, this was definitely going to go badly for us.

  Kromwell, his face red with rage, yelled, “Get them!”

  All five of them raced after us. We ran down the street as fast as we could, with Elle taking the lead easily. I was surprised by that for a moment, then just concentrated on catching up with her. We sped past the gate to the lower city where the guards were lounging against the stone wall. They did nothing to help us, of course. We ran on, which was the only thing we could do. We ran through the marketplace and to the right, trying to break their line of sight in the crowd. Elle was leading the whole way, so the rest of us were really just following her. She ran towards the outer gate in the lower city wall. I hoped she knew what she was doing. Maybe she didn’t. She ran past the incredulous guards and right through the outer gate, then down the road that went through the farmers’ fields towards the dark woods. The woods were where we could hide, sure, but it was far more likely that something deadly was in there waiting to pounce on us instead. Kromwell and his gang were still running after us, and they wanted blood. We ran on.

  A litany ran through my mind… Spike berries, death lilies, renders, quill beasts, stroks, pit spiders…

  Elle ran past the fields, down the road between the trees, then abruptly turned to the right and ran into the woods. She ran through the trees a little way and stopped behind a big oak tree. We all stopped beside her, panting for breath.

  “Are you crazy?” Juleen said as she gasped for breath.

  “Sshhh!!” Mira hissed.

  We couldn’t see the road from our hiding spot, but we could hear the bullies at the road. They were breathing hard and debating whether or not to go after us. Wounded pride or not, even Kromwell wasn’t foolish enough to run into these woods. They paused for a minute or two, then turned around and walked back to the gates with a whole lot of swearing and a shouted promise of revenge. We waited for a few minutes, wary of a trick.

  “I think they’re gone,” Bran said.

  We had about caught our breath by now. I took a careful look around, straining to hear anything out of place. It was quiet, though. Quiet like the city of Stonekeep never was during the day. This was new, and the peace of the woods would be nice if it wasn’t so dangerous to be here. We waited for a few minutes when nothing immediately leaped out at us. None of us wanted to risk an ambush as we walked back to the market. I caught sight of Juleen’s torn dress and couldn’t let her walk around like that. Hiding the pain, I magically mended it for her. It was getting easier to do that, which was almost as worrisome as the consequences.

  “Thanks,” Juleen said.

  I nodded to her. “That constable’s whistle blowing was your doing, wasn’t it?” I asked Mira.

  She nodded.

  “Nice one. I think that saved our bacon,” I said.

  A minute later, we heard a snapping sound, and a squeal of pain that sounded like it came from a small animal.

  “What was that?” Bran asked in a harsh whisper, his eyes wide.

  We all looked in the direction it came from. The brush was very sparse here where the leaves blocked almost all the light, but we didn’t see anything. We could hear small cries of pain coming from a little further into the woods, though. It sounded pitiful. Mira started stealthily walking toward the sound. She could sneak very well even in dry leaves. We followed, curiosity or protectiveness (not sure which) overriding our common sense, walking as quietly as we could on our bare tiptoes.

  We stepped around the gnarled roots of a huge tree, and before us was a gray raccoon with a black mask and a black and gray striped tail that had blundered into an immature spike berry’s trap. The plant didn’t have a berry bush with which it could lure in prey, which made it impossible to detect, but its root system had developed enough to make its trap work. There were sharp roots sticking like spears through the poor raccoon’s hind legs, pinning it to the ground. We all stood still, not knowing where it was safe to walk.

  Mira picked up a nearby stick and used it to prod the ground before she took a step. It was a small plant, thankfully, and she got very close to the poor, hurt raccoon. The raccoon was aware of our presence, of course, but it didn’t make a sound as Mira got closer. It didn’t even snap at Mira as she took a little folding pocket knife out of her dress pocket (Did she have that knife the whole time?). Pinching one of the roots with the fingers of her left hand, she cut the root off at the ground. The raccoon still hadn’t tried to bite Mira yet, and I thought it may have been in shock. It was a sharp knife, but those roots were tough. The poor little raccoon had passed out during that process. When the raccoon was free of the roots, Mira picked it up and brought it back to where the rest of us waited.

  “Elle, do you think you can help her?” Mira asked.

  “I think so. Pull the spikes out, and I’ll do what I can,” Elle said.

  Mira set the raccoon down on the ground, belly up. Each of the three girls got a hold on a spike or two, and then pulled them out at more or less the same time. The raccoon stirred with a whimper and bled freely. Elle bowed her head in concentration with a hand placed on the raccoon’s side. She whispered a short prayer, and a soft, golden glow emanated from her hand. The wounds quickly closed, and the raccoon stirred. It was a female, as Mira had already noted, and she licked Mira’s hand while Mira held her.

  “Aww, she’s so cute,” Mira gushed. “Look at her little bandit mask.”

  The raccoon rolled onto her side, stretched out her little legs, then rolled over onto her belly. She got up, walked about three feet away, as if to test her legs, then sat down on her haunches and looked at us. She almost seemed to be smiling, I thought. Animals don’t smile, do they?

  Bran brought us back to reality. “Look, this is very interesting, but we have to get out of these woods before something smells the blood and finds us.”

  “Let’s go,” I said. “The blood ‘ll definitely attract stroks.”

  “You can come with us if you like, Mrs. Raccoon,” Mira said.

  We all started walking back to the road, and to our surprise, the raccoon actually followed us. That was unexpected. I thought about how difficult it would be to have a raccoon as a pet, but I didn’t want to be the party pooper, so I just kept walking, and kept on the lookout for monsters. We made it back to the road and walked to the fields without incident. The raccoon was still following Mira, staying about three feet behind her. When we got to the gates, we all relaxed a bit. I thought the raccoon would surely go back to the woods when we got close to other people, but I was wrong. She kept walking behind Mira, looking all around and sniffing the air. When we got to the marketplace, I thought she would get scared and run off, but I was wrong again. She just kept up with Mira, her little black nose wiggling and eyes darting everywhere.

  “I have to shop for dinner still,” Juleen reminded us.

  I held up the coal bucket mutely. It had a satisfying dent in the shape of Lerg’s nose, I noticed.

  “We’ll see you all back at the house for lunch,” Bran said.

  He rubbed his eye tenderly when Elle was gone, then Bran and I started walking to Charl’s coal shop. When we were done there, we lugged the heavy buckets back to the smithy and helped father and Darek with the bellows of their forges. Father saw the dark semicircle forming under Bran’s eye but said nothing. I wondered why Bran didn’t ask Elle to heal his eye. Maybe he was trying to be tough in Elle’s estimation. Or maybe he actually was very tough, and the bruise didn’t bother him. Either way, we had had a busy morning and I was ready for a break when the girls got back, and mother called us upstairs for lunch.

  When we got upstairs to wash up, Juleen, Mira and Elle were already at the table. To my surprise, the raccoon was there also, sitting placidly on the floor next to Mira. Father noted the little creature’s presence and glanced at Nora, who smiled a little half-smile as she served sandwiches and shrugged. We all sat down and began eating. I was surprised to note that mother had made the raccoon a half-sized sandwich to eat. Mira handed it to her, and the raccoon held it with both her little front paws while sitting on her haunches and devoured it like she didn’t have a care in the world.

  “Your mother tells me a lot’s happened today,” father said casually.

  I choked on my sandwich a bit. “I may have learned a couple things,” I said evasively.

  “I made a new friend,” Mira said, changing the subject. “Isn’t she cute? I named her Bandit.” I couldn’t have thought of a more appropriate name for a raccoon. It fit both her looks and disposition, I thought. Good choice.

  “The eye?” Dortham asked Bran.

  “Kromwell’s gang,” Bran said.

  “You’re going to have to find a way to deal with that on your own, you know,” said Dortham stoically. “Bullies are bold when they’re together, but it’s the rare exception when a bully your age really knows how to fight. They get their power from intimidation, size, or numbers, and they’ll never stop exploiting your fear until you do something that changes the status quo. Usually that means giving them the certain knowledge that you can beat the snot out of them any time you want. You two, being smaller than most every member of that group, wouldn’t stand a chance in a fair fight. For the time being, you should avoid them and let this storm blow over.”

  I was going to have to think about that. I didn’t want to let it go, but we didn’t know how to fight. Who did we know that could teach us? Terrans loved to pummel each other while drinking, but the only Terran we knew was Hamot, and he didn’t live in Stonekeep. Elric was learning to fight in the militia, and he was almost done with the two years of service required of him, but he wouldn’t be relieved of duty until New Year’s Eve, more than three months away. I looked at Bran, and I could see his mind working as busily as mine was. The rest of lunch passed in relative silence, each of us lost in their own thoughts. When Bran and I were going down the stairs to help father, I said what was on my mind.

  “We’re definitely going to have to avoid Kromwell for the time being,” I said. “But he’s got a long memory. We’ll have to be careful.”

  Bran was quiet, but he had a firm set to his jaw as he tenderly rubbed his sore eye. He hated the injustice of it. We helped father and Darek for the rest of the day in the smithy, brooding. I had the feeling that the situation would get worse with Kromwell. In the coming days, we would have to avoid him like the plague.