She had traded regularly with the tinkers, had even spent some nights camping with them over the winters. She once explained to me that as a child, they had tried to adopt her, absorb her into their fold. But by the time she had taught herself all the footpaths in and around Nyossa, she had already made a life of some comfort for herself in her old shed. She did not want to leave her goddesses.
“They used to visit with more frequency,” she reminded me. “I saw them quite a lot, and when they camped outside Carver I would camp with them. I rather grew up with them. It was they who explained to me who fed me and cared for me in the forest. That it was Mother Earth and Sister Sea. The tinkers gave me my first net. And I used to dream about certain streams where the fish swam more slowly. Then I would wake and find the same streams in my wanderings around Nyossa. And those fish were easy to catch.”
We were both kneeling in the garden, adding into the soil waste from my herbalist work along with snippets of leaves and roots that had not made it into my decoctions. We worked these all into the ground around the vegetables, so as to enrich it.
“So, where do you think the shed came from?” I asked. “Mortal hands built that.” I so wanted to believe her and nearly did when she claimed that two deities had kept her alive and taught her to survive.
Jade reached into the bucket with the plant waste and smeared it around my tomato plants. “I think that was once a warden’s camp.”
“A warden’s?”
“The tinkers told me. The kings of Tintar have always hadscouting and tracking soldiers living in the woods, but they operate alone, one at a time. They patrol the borders of Nyossa.”
I sat back on my heels. “I have never seen one.” I could not help but play skeptic. I knew the forest, at least the small portion of it closest to my farm. I had seen no soldier.
“You wouldn’t. They are even more invisible than I ever was, slinking around the forest. They usually are men with air magic.”
“Whatisair magic?” I asked. “It’s the only one that doesn’t make sense to me. The other gods I understand, but not air.”
Jade peered at me like I was a bit slow. “It is right there inThe Life of Una?” She had sat in my kitchen while I pressed oils and had read the book cover to cover in the span of a few days.
I felt guilt at not trusting her with the book, but it was my dearest possession, and she did not seem to take offense at having to read it while it was on my property.
“You mean the part where she recounts how the world was made?”
Jade nodded. “You cannot break what is formless,” she quoted.
I finished the portion from memory, having read the book at least one hundred times. “I am not to be contained by your understanding. I am less than smoke and more than flesh, and yet I am neither. I am the mystery in the universes.”
“See?” she said. Jade had an annoying habit of offering up abstract answers as if they were obvious solutions.
I shook my head. “You are missing sentences again.”
She giggled. “Alright. I think what I am trying to say is that air magic is the most prevalent magic in Tintar for a reason. Remember Brother Air says the gift of ‘hearts and minds and swiftness’ is their power. I think it means the soul and the imagination as well as the instinct to look over your shoulder and protect yourself. All of that is tied together. The magic is how we all look at the world.”
I huffed. “Jade, that is not magic.”
She held up a hand. “What I am trying to say is the fates imitated the four gods’ handiwork when they made the othermortals, and in doing so they also gave their children hearts and minds and swiftness. But the magic of Brother Air is that those that have it? Well, I think their hearts and minds also feel and think far outside themselves. They have visions and dreams. They can see far past their own existences. And the swiftness? That is also a part of the canniness. All mortals have the animal sense, the prickle on the back of your neck. But those with air magic have it even more in their stealth and speed. There is a strain of air magic that allows for a soundless step.”
“A soundless step?”
“Yes. Many soldiers of Tintar have that. They are often the ones assigned as wardens of Nyossa. They can see far too. Like past the farthest points of mortal vision. With other soldiers who have air magic, their speed with a sword or arrow is so great the weapon is unseen when used. I have never seen this, but the tinkers told me so.”
I stared down at my hands, covered in the grime and wet of rotting plants. I wanted to believe her, to open that door in my mind that led to the room where I shelved painful things like faith and worship. I resented the idea of being enthralled by a god. And yet I knew the four gods of Tintar expected nothing from their children in exchange for being loved, for being blessed. I knew, fromThe Life of Una, that they would have been more present, more direct, had the fates not interfered.
“What is it like to have magic?” Jade asked suddenly.
I looked up at her. “I have little. I have a green thumb, and I can see the door in a god tree. That is all.” I felt the lie sit on my lips with a sourness.
“Why do you worship fire as well as earth?” she queried.
I damned Avery in my mind for sharing my secrets. “Why do you worship earth as well as water?” I shot back.
Jade never took my curtness personally, which was a credit to her own grace. She replied, “Because I have seen both at work for me. I know Mother Earth impressed upon Magda to leave all those things in the forest for me. Whole wheels of cheese and bread. Quilts, shoes,socks, flint, and tinder. Bundles of chewsticks so that my teeth did not rot. A washboard. Soap. So many things.”
I let time pass before I answered her. “Avery thinks I have fire magic.”
Her brows rose. “You are blessed twice?”
