Sable Morrow's Arc

Chapter 6 of 6

The shrine had taught Sable all it could. Now she had to call her light in daylight, where people could see. She left the boarding house at dawn and walked to the woodland hollow. The sun came up thin and gray through the trees. She rolled her sleeve to the elbow and held her bare wrist in the light. This was the real test. She found a flat stone outside the shrine and sat. She fixed her eyes on a knot in a nearby trunk and breathed slow. The warmth rose in her palm, faint and gold. It held. She almost smiled. Then a twig snapped behind her. Sable yanked her sleeve down and spun. A woman stepped from the brush. She wore a worn leather jacket and a tracker's compass on her belt. Her green eyes moved over the ground, the trees, Sable's arm. She missed nothing. Sable had heard the lodgers whisper about her. Vera Traceway hunted strange things for sport, and she was good at it. "You're up early," Vera said. Her voice was light, but her gaze stayed on Sable's wrist. "Saw a flash of gold out here. Thought it was worth a look." Sable's heart slammed. Gold threatened to flare under the cloth. She remembered Kael's words. Pick one thing. Hold it. She fixed her eyes on the compass at Vera's belt and breathed. "Sunlight on the stone," Sable said. Her voice came out steady. "The old shrine catches it." Vera tilted her head. She crouched and touched the ground where Sable had sat. "Been hunting something odd in these woods for weeks. A light that isn't fire." She looked up. "You seen anything like that?" Branches cracked beyond the hollow. A low shape moved in the shadows. Kael, in wolf form, watching from the trees. If Vera turned, she would see him. Sable's fear spiked. Gold bloomed hot beneath her sleeve, bright enough to show through the weave. Vera's eyes flicked toward the glow. Sable did not run. She held the compass with her eyes and pulled her breath long and slow. The fear did not vanish. She simply stopped feeding it. The gold under her sleeve dimmed, then died. By the time Vera looked, the cloth was plain gray again. "Just a seamstress," Sable said. "I come here to sit." Vera studied her a long moment. Then she stood and brushed off her knees. "Huh." She glanced at the trees where the wolf had been. Nothing moved there now. "Tell me if you see that light." She turned and walked back into the brush. Sable waited until the footsteps faded. Her hands shook, but she had done it. She had called her light in daylight and steadied it under a hunter's eyes. She had also learned the cost. Vera was still hunting the glow, and now she had a scent. The woods were no longer safe for either of them.