Page 5 of Marked
“You guys were five.”
“Twelve. I was twelve when I moved to Perga with my brother, and Gavin was a relentless jerk. Some people are irredeemable. He called us the orphans.” It was more than that, but I hadn’t told Sley about my life on the streets nor the time before that—the time when I had lived in an orphanage and, aside from the love I had for my brother, knew only sadness and pain.
“Didn’t Gavin call everyone that?” Sley asked.
“No. Just me, Paul and another guy, who was also an absolute jerk, but that’s another story.” I continued to cut notches into the wooden shafts and ignored the pang in my chest. Though no one in town would truly understand how traumatic the nickname was for me, that didn’t take away the pain, or the anger.
“The thing is, Gavin wasn’t wrong,” I said. “The three of us were orphans, but we didn’t need it spat at us every day.” Placing my knife on the bench, I picked up one of the prepped shafts and dipped the cut end into the glue. “He also used to drip tree sap in my hair.”
Sley sucked in a breath. “No.”
“Yeah. One time it was so bad Paul had to sheer my hair off because we couldn’t get the sap out.” I took a deep breath. “Gavin only started being nice to me when I grew boobs.”
Sley grunted and took another sip of wine while I reached for one of the arrowheads. Holding the dipped shaft in one hand and holding the arrowhead in the other, I jammed the sharp metal into the cut, careful not to slice my hand open. “You weren’t here but trust me when I say Gavin and Graham were the town bullies. I’d give my business to anyone else if I could.”
Sadly, Perga was a small town. That meant options were limited for romance and business alike.
I slathered more of the magical glue around the contact area before wrapping Sley’s twine around the notch and base of the arrowhead. The twine tingled in my hands as I tied it off and coated the area with more glue.
I repeated the process until I had an arrowhead tied into the notch of each shaft. While I worked, Sley made a fire in the nearby hearth and hummed a song I didn’t recognize. She walked around my workshop, poking at things and peering at arrows in various stages of production before returning to my side.
“I feel like there’s a dirty joke somewhere in this whole process.” Sley waved her hand at my workbench before taking another sip of wine.
I picked up the baby arrows and blinked at Sley. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m innocently working here, slathering the slits of hard wooden shafts with my magical glue paste and you have to make it sound dirty.”
Sley choked on her wine. She coughed and laughed at the same time, spraying wine back into her glass. She coughed again and shook her head. “I deserved that.”
Leaving the arrows strategically placed near the hearth, I paused to watch the play of light and shadow along the metal from the fire. After they dried, I could move on to cutting the back of the shaft to create the notch that would fit my bowstring. I’d also add the fletching from the mystery bird’s feathers.
If I wanted to, I could work on them some more in about an hour after they’d dried. That wouldn’t happen, though. In about an hour, I’d be happily wine-drunk with my best friend, probably deep in a conversation about town gossip or the last book I read.
With that happy thought in my head, I moved to the recently finished batch of arrows. They’d finished drying and if I tested a few now, I’d have more arrows to shoot tomorrow.
I picked up the top arrow from the pile and flexed it between my two hands. The colourful shimmer of the feathers caught the light from the fire, their magic whispering along my skin.
“You know,” Sley mused. “They say phaanons had the ability to change shapes.”
Phaanons? The mythical beings cursed about in the ancient Galeon tales? Why would Sley bring them up now? An unexpected snap shattered the silence, and I stared down at the broken arrow in my hands.
“Oops.” I shot Sley a sheepish grin. “Why are you thinking about phaanons?”
“I wasn’t. At least not at first. I was thinking about how you were attacked.” Sley handed me a full glass of wine.
I placed the ruined arrow in the discard bin and plucked the glass from her hand.
“Which led me to think of one of the stories I heard growing up,” Sley continued.
“That phaanons could change shape?” I took a sip and let the heady taste of red wine flow over my tongue. Mmmm. That was good. “What kind of shape? Like…a ball?”
“Like a mountain lion or bear.” She widened her eyes. “Maybe it wasn’t a familiar who came to your aid. Maybe it was a phaanon.”
I frowned into my wine. “Phaanons were eradicated years ago. And even if they weren’t, why would one come to my aid?”
Nala whined outside the front door, and I jerked my head in that direction. We walked out of the workshop and paused our conversation to let Nala in. My familiar could’ve easily used the trap door in the shop, but she had a habit of doing this when I’d been gone for awhile—like she needed me to open the door to know I still cared. Which was silly, because she could sense my emotions better than I could detect hers. If she needed the validation, though, I’d gladly give it to her instead of making a fuss.
Nala shook her coat right beside me, spraying me with rainwater. She padded her way into the workshop where she’d plop down in front of the fire like she did every night.
Instead of following my familiar, I joined Sley on the couch in the small living room. I wanted to continue our conversation. “Phaanons despised the very existence of galeons. If phaanons still existed, it’s much more likely that the man trying to exterminate me was one, not the wolf.”