Chương 15: Chapter 267 - Seven Years of Winter

Siobhan Month 5, Day 10, Saturday 8: 30 p. m. When Siobhan was young, Grandfather had told her a story about the time immediately following the Cataclysm. It was so long ago, and the world had been thrown into such devastation and chaos, that no one living now really knew much about what had happened back then. But there were many stories. It was said the sky broke like a shattered mirror, the sea turned to acid and boiled, and the earth opened up ten thousand mouths to eat the creatures living on its surface.

People died in droves until only a few scattered groups of the hardiest—and luckiest—remained. Even some of the Titans fell. This lasted for a few years, and then the earth opened up those cavernous maws and vomited out the ashes of everything it had eaten and burned in the fires within. The remnant people watched as the heavens darkened and knew the doom that awaited them.

Their diviners threw the bones, peered into their crystal balls, and Sacrificed lives to read the future in the spilled entrails of those they slaughtered. The readings did not change. Seven years of winter had descended, and there would be no place untouched by the darkness or the caustic rains, and no hero strong enough to cleanse the heavens. The people looked to the purple and red sky and despaired, for who could survive the days ahead? Grandfather always ended the story on that bleak note.

The first hint of the sun was the start of a different story entirely, for most people would never live to see it. Siobhan, Rory, and Claudio pressed against the wall as Mr. Hagarty and several of the other, still-sane villagers corralled the dreamers, planning to lock them inside the town hall for the night—for their own safety, as well as that of everyone else. For some reason, she was reminded of Grandfather's story now.

Perhaps it was that sunset was fast approaching, and with the ominous events that seemed to be suffocating their village, the dark was even more frightening. Or perhaps it was the fact that she did not know how they would get through this without him. How she would get through this without him. Grandfather had left, just like Mom. Just like Father. And just like them, Grandfather, too, hadn't even bothered to say goodbye. The common factor in all of these things was Siobhan. Was it her? Did she deserve this?

Did she drive people to stop caring about her? Her eyes burned, and in a sudden panic, she hugged herself and dug her fingers into her arms until the pain made her cheeks tingle and the tears recede. The thought of crying right now, where anyone might see, was one straw more than she could bear. With Grandfather gone, more horrors like what happened to Old Pappy O'Kervick could arise, but there would be no one to clean up afterward.

Having left before the town hall, Grandfather hadn't seen how bad things had gotten. He hadn't left any protection for her. Siobhan was alone, and so she alone needed to be enough. She tugged Claudio's and Rory's sleeves, and they slipped out of the building. She looked toward the flower-bright colors of the sunset.

"Some of the people who have been having nightmares didn't get caught." She looked up at Claudio.

"You need to tell Mr. Hagarty and the others their names, so they can round them up, too."

"Make me a list. I will see you safely home first and then return. I suspect I will be up all night, going from family to family and providing what little resistance to the effects that I can." Rory's mother was standing in the crowd of people in front of the town hall, and she lunged out and grabbed her son by the arm. She yanked him away from Siobhan's side so hard he almost lost his footing, glaring at Siobhan as if she thought Siobhan might infect Rory just by sharing the same air.

Several people watched unabashedly, muttering behind their hands. Siobhan caught the words "Miakoda" and "curse" easily enough and knew what they feared. Suddenly, an entirely new danger presented itself in her imagination. Sometimes, when a village thought a thaumaturge was practicing blood magic, they would form a mob and burn the house down while the thaumaturge slept, or circle around and cast stones from afar until the person was beaten to death. Had Grandfather even considered that before he left?

"Ma!" Rory protested.

"You're coming home with me, and you're not to step one foot outside the house!" Rory's mother snapped, dragging him away while still staring hatefully at Siobhan. Claudio grabbed the end of Siobhan's braid and tugged it, then gestured toward the road with his chin.

"Let's go," he said quietly. Several people tried to stop him, pleading for his help, but he gently yet firmly pried himself away and continued to escort her.

"How long until Grandfather returns?" Siobhan asked.

"Three days, at the earliest. A week at the latest, I imagine," Claudio said.

"Even if he cannot get help, I would guess that he will return to take you to safety."

"Why didn't he just take me with him in the first place? He could have dropped me off somewhere safe." Claudio didn't respond, and Siobhan's stomach tightened with dread.

"That wouldn't have worked?" she guessed.

"I'm already infected?" When he still didn't respond, she continued.

"Or…I'm the source? Taking me somewhere would have just spread the curse to more people?" She had to stop for a moment because her legs were shaking. She rested her hands on her knees and tried to breathe deeply past the dizziness. Claudio stood beside her silently for a long while, then chuckled humorlessly and threw his head back to look up at the sky.

"I was excited. When I got Raaz's letter, maybe I should have been fearful, but I was excited. And Raaz was reluctant, but he couldn't contain his curiosity." He looked down at Siobhan.

"Your grandfather is a great man, but he has one serious flaw. His curiosity grows easily into fascination, and from there into obsession."

"What does that mean?" Siobhan asked.

"You're making it sound like…" She grabbed the fabric of Claudio's shirt at the waist, fisting it in a tight grip.

"You're making it sound like Grandfather caused this. He didn't. He didn't!" Claudio wrapped his much larger hand around her fist and squeezed a little too hard, though his expression was almost bland.

"Let me ask you a question, young Siobhan. What is the difference between causing something and having the option to stop it but failing to do so?" She released her grip and tore her hand free from his.

"What happened to my mom?" she demanded, her voice hoarse and urgent.

"You are no less worthy than Miakoda," he said. It was as if something scalding had exploded inside her.

"That's not an answer!" she shrieked. Tears spilled from her eyes, and she smacked and rubbed at her face violently to push them away, but once they had started, they wouldn't stop. She turned and began to walk toward the house again, striding as quickly as she could and sometimes stumbling due to her blurred sight. Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

"Lock your door," Claudio warned her when they got to the house. She ran up the stairs and slammed her bedroom door behind her without replying. She had trouble sleeping that night, but as if Aimee had guessed it, around midnight the young woman knocked on her door and offered her a small sip of calming potion along with a glass of warm, honeyed milk.

"Everything will be okay, my little beauty," Aimee said softly. Siobhan took the last swallow of milk and handed the glass back to her.

"Will it?" she asked.

"A blood egg means the death of a child," she reminded her. Aimee flinched. She gave several groundless promises to reassure Siobhan, but Siobhan turned her back and drew up the covers around her shoulders.

"I want to sleep." Siobhan stayed in her room over the next two days, allowing Aimee to bring her meals up to her. She spent most of her time thinking. There was a good chance the curse had something to do with her. If so, this was likely due to Mom's emotional or physical connection to Siobhan. And if that was why Grandfather refused to talk to her about it or allow her to be involved at all, there was also a good chance that he thought Siobhan's thirteen-year-old psyche would collapse once she knew.

But also, as far as she could tell, she was not going crazy. Whatever the villagers were experiencing, she was safe from. And that meant that she was also one of the few people who stood a chance of helping. Those two days were hard on Aimee, too. Worried to the point of exhaustion, the woman admitted to Siobhan that things seemed to be getting even worse down at the village.

She hadn't visited personally but had seen strange lights during the night, at least one large fire—quickly extinguished by the rain—and heard some strange, horrific screaming that was loud enough to make it all the way to the edge of their property. Siobhan left her room and found Claudio near the entryway, just sending off an extremely thankful villager.

He looked worse than she had ever seen him, with hollow cheeks, a greenish-grey pallor to his dark skin, and a crusty line of dried fluid along the line where his eyepatch met his cheek.

"You need to rest," she said. Silently, she hoped that the symptoms he was displaying really were just from pushing himself too hard and not the curse trying to take hold in him. Or, a tiny voice in the back of her mind piped up, a sign that Grandfather really had been poisoning Claudio.

"I will have a chance to rest soon," he replied with a tired smile.

"One way or another." Siobhan wondered if he thought he might die. She hesitated because of his condition, but still asked, "Would it help stop or slow the curse if you used your magic on me?" Claudio turned to look at her with sudden concentration. His uncovered eye roved over her features, then down to her hands, which were fisted at her sides, before returning to her face.

"I really want to, Siobhan. Very much." Sheer earnestness was clear in his tone and the intensity of his gaze. It was perhaps the strongest, most honest emotion she had ever seen from him.

"But?" she asked.

"But I think that should be saved for… a last resort." There was something about the way he hesitated that made her think he was dissembling. Did he think that she would infect him if he tried? Or was he planning to put things off until there was no hope at all, then let her last moments alive be a sweet dream? She didn't ask. On the afternoon of the third day after Grandfather left, Siobhan suited up in all of Mom's old gear that she had pilfered from her parents' room and slipped out.

She'd wanted to go in the day, because the night was too frightening now, but had worried about getting caught. However, Aimee was nowhere to be found. Siobhan kept the family-sized umbrella gripped tight, ready to smack people about the head, and wore the bone bracelet on her left wrist for anything she was willing to harm. It was obvious how horribly things were going even before she reached the village. From the road, she had seen the signs of several burned-down buildings.

More disturbingly, animal skeletons and half-decayed carcasses were strewn about, all facing the village as if they had been walking toward it before suddenly collapsing again. Each one had its ribcage split open and was lying in a puddle of goo. With some trepidation, she approached the body of a somewhat fresh raccoon, then crouched down and poked at the slime with a stick. It was half dried and had that same strange, almost sweet smell she remembered from the sheep. There were no dismembered baby parts.

Siobhan breathed a sigh of relief, dropped the stick, and wiped her sweaty palms on her pants before continuing on. Old Lady Hebbers's house was empty, but the door yawned open wide. She had thought that the streets might be empty, but that wasn't the case. They were just empty of anyone with any remaining sanity. Mrs. Cusack's son, Jack, who Siobhan and everyone else except his mother knew was a thief, was stumbling about on the main road through the middle of the village.

His right arm was missing the hand entirely, and what remained of his forearm was merely a long spike of bloody bone with small bits of meat and viscera still hanging from it. Somehow, he wasn't dead. Unable to tear her gaze away, Siobhan watched as Jack lifted that forearm to his mouth and tore away some of the remaining flesh from the bone. He chewed it and swallowed, then gagged. Some bloody spittle ran down his chin and slid along the curve of his neck, but he did not vomit.

"Have to keep it all down," he muttered to himself.

"Have to keep it inside so I can absorb the energy, have to eat the being, have to digest the self-ness." He took another bite and repeated the process. Siobhan's knees shook so hard she almost collapsed to the ground, and her bladder burned with the need to release itself from sheer fear. She fumbled the bracelet from her wrist into her hand, plucked a hair from her head and tugged on it until it came loose from her braid, then touched it to the bone bracelet, hoping that would activate it.

Why hadn't she practiced with the weapon artifact at least once? She didn't even know exactly how it worked! Through some kindness of fate, the bracelet caught the hair with some kind of force, stretching it vertically and letting it hang in the air an inch or so away from Siobhan's left wrist, as if it were strung to a real bow. Siobhan left the umbrella where she had dropped it in the street. There were no threats to her safety here that she was unwilling to harm.

Luckily, even when she walked past his ambling form, Jack didn't seem to notice her. She passed several other villagers along the way: an old woman with a skeletally thin frame who was kneeling while tearing apart her clothes, thread by individual thread; a man who had his hands wrist-deep in the guts of one of the village dogs and was eating its entrails; and a man whose eyes and nose were leaking blood as he sat and stared at nothing, his eyes absent the spark of intellect that made people themselves.

It was as if, without ever being a thaumaturge, his Will had broken. Siobhan almost didn't recognize the plump woman who had been eating chicken at the town hall meeting, and the sight of her brought on an almost irresistible urge to start sobbing out of pure terror. Her limbs were suddenly and strangely thin, but her stomach was distended, almost as if she were pregnant. Siobhan wondered what she would find if the woman's chest and belly were split open, and desperately hoped that it was not what she thought.

The woman was speaking in a singsong voice.

"I am the one who travels the paths beyond. I will devour the shining one and the bearer of blackest night. I can build myself in my own image. I am the All, the Undiminished, the Empyrean." Siobhan didn't even dare to cross her line of sight, instead cutting across a side street and putting a house between the two of them. She followed the smell of smoke to the southern edge of the village, where there was a smoking house with a few scattered pieces still on fire. Here, she found a couple dozen of the villagers.

At first, she thought they might be a group of the sane, trying to put out the fire before it could spread. But that would have been too kind to her frayed nerves. The people milling around the house certainly didn't appear concerned with the still-burning fires at all. They, too, were skeletally gaunt with round bellies, and a few even had skin so thin that the light shone through, like old parchment that had been scraped clean and reused several times.

That the fire hadn't spread was likely due to the slimy, viscous fluid that covered every burnt surface. She didn't have to smell it to know that it was more of the same substance she had seen before. Within that slime were the beginnings of some pale, almost fleshy growths that reminded Siobhan of the time she accidentally broke open an egg with a baby chick inside, barely starting to form. These seemed to be growing under the coaxing of the villagers, who were cooing and tending to them.

Siobhan backed up silently, then jumped and almost let out a terrified shriek when the sound of a shutter opening came from behind her. She spun, but saw only the fearful face of one of the village women peeking out. The woman looked both ways, then waved Siobhan closer.

"Girl," she greeted, her expression strained.

"I beg you, try to speak to your mother's spirit and appease her." Siobhan opened and closed her mouth again.

"I… That's not something—""You have to try, at least!" the woman urged, then shrank back as if afraid her raised voice might draw attention. According to Grandfather, it was only superstition that the spirit of any particular dead person could be called upon. While shamans could access more truth about history than thaumaturges from most other crafts, they could not allow someone to truly speak to a deceased family member. Only charlatans pretended otherwise.

But the thought made Siobhan realize that, even if the chance was small, there was potentially something she could do to help. She might not even be a real Apprentice-level thaumaturge yet, but she was brave, she knew the way to the shaman's house a few villages over, and most importantly, she didn't trust the job to anyone else. Who knew how many people who might already be touched by the curse but not yet be showing overt signs of it?