“Lead on then.” He made to follow, but the slender man held out his hand.
“No. Only the woman will see Esmae.”
Logan’s face darkened. “Not without me she’s not.”
Crossing his arms over his tiny chest, the man snapped, “Then you both leave now.”
Alarm raced through her blood. No, she couldn’t leave now, not without talking to this Esmae, this Roma woman who could apparently sense their arrival.
“No, Logan, please. Let me go.” Desperation fueled her fear.
“Haven, I can’t let?—”
“Let? You can’tletme do what?” She glared at him. “I came here to get answers. There is someone here who can give them to me, and if it means you have to stay behind, then that’s what’s got to happen.”
He growled, and looked like he wanted to snatch her up and drag her to the nearest cave. “Fine, but if you need me, scream. I’ll be right there.” Slanting the skinny man a scalding look, he turned, and walked to the stream, leading the horses behind him.
Pouting a little at Logan’s attitude, but crowing at his protectiveness, she trailed after the man with the big bravado and little hands.
The man stopped beside an outcropping of rocks further down the stream from where Logan brooded, and she blinked in surprise.
Esmae had a withered, leathery face, and was crowned with wisps of gray hair. Her bright, deep-brown eyes glared out over the end of her cigar. She slowly rose to her feet, but Haven didn’t know whether to run forward and steady her, or give the old lady a salute.
Before Haven could regain her composure, the old woman spoke. “What do you want?”
Startled by her gruff, commanding tone, Haven stuttered, “Uh...I…uh...I need to know about someone named Ahmi.” There, she’d said it.
Esmae said nothing, so Haven wondered if the woman understood her, though shehadfirst spoken English. “Ahmi. I’m looking for someone named Ahmi.”
“I hear you first time.” Esmae said, mumbling something resembling a curse word in Romany.
Unsure of what to say next, she stood there, out of her element, exposed—and not in the way that would make her money.
“Come, sit.” The old woman sat, and Haven jumped to do as bid. What else could she do?
Esmae took a long drag of her fragrant cigar, and exhaled a cloud of thick smoke, filling the air with a gray screen that dampened the sounds of camp life outside the small circle where they sat. The chirping birds, laughing children, the banging and clanging of meal preparations, men and woman talking were all muffled.
It was like a single puff of smoke had conjured some kind of soundproof forcefield around them.
Haven gaped, disbelieving what she was seeing with her own eyes.
What kind of magic was this?
Taking another drag of her cigar, the old woman blew another large puff.
When a dense mantle of fumes surrounded them, Esmae turned to her, her deep gravelly voice an explosion of sound in their otherworldly cone of silence.
“You not from here.” A statement of fact, not a question.
“No.” A simple, unnecessary answer. Intent on steering the conversation in a direction of her choosing, she began, “I told you I wanted to know more about someone named Ahmi, but I didn’t tell you why?—”
“You have watch.”
Haven’s breath caught, the warmth draining from her face. “How did you know?”
Esmae smiled, her penetrating gaze doing a number on Haven’s nerves. “Esmae know many things.”
Already tired of the song and dance, Haven rolled her eyes.
