Wren Kael's Arc

Chapter 1 of 4

Wren Kael cured the miller's boy at dawn and was gone before the mother stopped crying. She walked barefoot down the road, her staff taller than she was, her three-legged fox limping at her heel. Behind her lay another town with the sickness in it. Ahead lay the next. She had cured coughs that glowed, fevers that hummed, sleep that would not break. In every town it was the same rot, spreading, and she still did not know where it began. That was what she needed. Not thanks. A name. An elder old enough to remember the first sick person. The road brought her to the village crossroads. Stone paths met under a soft moonlit glow. Lamps stood on posts. A wide board held flyers and notices. Wren leaned her staff against it and studied the faces of the townsfolk gathered there. "I need to speak with your oldest neighbor," she said. "Someone who remembers when the sickness first came." No one answered. A woman looked at her feet. A man turned away. They knew her by now. She fixed their children, their goats, their wells. Then she left. They had learned not to owe her anything, because she never stayed to be paid. She was a stranger who took nothing, and that frightened them more than the sickness. Wren understood then. Her leaving was the wall. They would not trust a woman who would not stay long enough to be trusted. So she did the hardest thing she knew. She sat down on the cold stones. She unrolled her blanket. She lit no fire and made no speech. She simply stayed. The fox curled against her leg. Night passed. Lamps burned low. When morning came, Wren was still there, and the crossroads filled again. A woman in a stained yellow raincoat moved along the notice board. She pressed a hand-drawn flyer onto the wood, smoothing every corner. A girl's face stared out from the paper. The woman's eyes were sunken and dark, ringed from no sleep. Wren had seen her at dusk, in the same coat, pressing the same face. She had never stopped. "You're still here," the woman said. She sounded suspicious, not glad. "I'm Wren. I'm not leaving until someone helps me." The woman stared. "Kira Joss." She touched the flyer again. "My daughter went to the old woman who keeps bees past the far field. She never came home. The old woman remembers everything. Nobody else will send you, because nobody else came back." Wren stood. "Then take me to her." Kira shook her head. "I'll show you the path. I won't go past the gate." She looked at the flyer, then at Wren. "If you find my girl, you don't leave before you tell me. Swear it." "I swear," Wren said. For the first time in a hundred towns, she had promised to stay.