The Sweetest Spell Read online

  “What’s this?” tax-collector Todd asked, pointing at Griffin’s chin. “Is this the tragic wound we’ve heard so much about? Did our very own Emmeline do this to you?” Heads whipped around. Glares shot my way. “From what your mother was saying, I thought you’d be unrecognizable. But this? Someone get me a magnifying glass so I can see it.” The tavern men burst into laughter. Griffin scowled.

  I hadn’t told my father about the encounter with Griffin. But he didn’t react to the uproar. Still standing with the tavern men, he’d turned away from the stage and was looking down the road that led from the village square.

  Todd took another drink from his flagon, then stomped his boot. “We’d best bid on Griffin Boar first. None of these other wretched oafs will get a single coin until Griffin’s out of the way.”

  The brides started pushing again. One scrambled onto the stage and shoved her coin bag at Griffin. “He’s mine,” she said as one of the guards pulled her away. “Mine!”

  “No, he’s mine!” another bride hollered, and a fight broke out. One bride punched another in the face. Two brides fell onto the ground, wrestling like mad women. Griffin folded his arms and smiled. I cringed. It wasn’t their fault they were acting like idiots. What else did a girl have to look forward to? A village girl was supposed to marry and have children. She was supposed to serve her husband. Nothing more was expected. Nothing more could be achieved.

  “I love a good fight!” Todd hollered.

  Father didn’t appear to notice the fighting. He walked a few paces down the road, his steps cautious, his head cocked as if listening for something. Had the donkey gotten loose? I held tight to the post, leaning forward to watch him. Suddenly he spun around and looked through the crowd, right at me, his gaze filled with fear.

  My heart skipped a beat as the sound of horse hooves thundered in the distance.

  Chapter Five

  Villagers scrambled to their feet and parted as fourteen horses and fourteen soldiers rode into the village square. The crest of Anglund, a white swan in a sea of yellow, hung over each horse’s flank and covered the front of each soldier’s tunic. It was rare to see royal soldiers in the Flatlands. They occasionally brought messages to the tax-collector, but never more than two or three soldiers at a time. Why would the king send so many?

  A stunned expression swept over tax-collector Todd’s face as the soldiers spread out along the edge of the square. Their yellow tunics shone brightly against the drab browns of Flatlander clothing. Three wagons came to a halt outside the square. The drivers jumped out, then led their horses in a half circle, turning the wagons around to face away from the square. The drivers waited, reins in hand, as if to make a quick exit.

  The lead soldier maneuvered his horse right up the staircase and onto the stage, which creaked beneath the creature’s weight. My gaze darted between the stage and my father. I could tell by his clenched expression that he was worried. Something serious was about to happen.

  The lead soldier dismounted, then handed the flag to the huntsman’s son, who looked as bewildered as everyone else. “I’m Captain Finch.” That seemed a fitting name since his nose was small and sharp like a beak. “You are the local tax-collector?” Todd nodded. Captain Finch opened a saddlebag and removed a scroll. “This proclamation is sent from His Royal Majesty, King Elmer. You are ordered to read it immediately.”

  Murmurs arose as Todd unrolled the scroll and read to himself. His shoulders slumped. My father began to push through the crowd. “Emmeline,” he called. He wanted to tell me something. I squeezed between two little boys who were sharing a bag of walnuts. This time, villagers did not step aside to let me pass. They were transfixed on the scroll.

  Todd and Captain Finch turned their backs to the crowd for a muffled conversation. The captain nodded his head, confirming whatever news had been delivered. Shouts arose from the crowd. “Tell us!”

  Todd wore a stiff expression when he faced the crowd. “Listen,” he demanded, waving the scroll. “Listen.” The crowd quieted. “The news is bad. Very bad.” The scroll dropped to his side. “Anglund is at war.”

  I stopped in my tracks. Father, now only halfway across the square from me, also stopped. No one moved as the word slithered though the crowd like a poisonous serpent. War? I’d heard stories of war, but they were of generations long dead. The kingdom had been at peace all of my life.

  War.

  Captain Finch tucked his feathered helmet under his arm and cleared his throat. His sword handle caught the sunlight as he stepped to the edge of the stage. “The war wages in the east where the barbarians are trying to lay claim to our mineral fields. King Elmer needs more soldiers. All unmarried men must accompany me to Londwin City immediately.”

  “What?”

  “What did he say?”

  “Did you say all unmarried men?” Nather Trog, the gravedigger, shouted.

  “All unmarried men,” Todd confirmed. “That’s the order.”

  Villagers murmured and shook their heads. “Why should our sons fight this war?” a man cried. “We pay our taxes but the king gives us nothing.”

  “We are forbidden to own our land.”

  “We are forbidden to leave.”

  “We have no rights as citizens. Why should we sacrifice our sons?”

  “That is treason,” Todd said, waving a fist at the crowd. “The king allows you to live here, you ungrateful dirt-scratchers.”

  Captain Finch scowled. “You’ll fight this war because King Elmer has ordered you to fight. You must obey your king.”

  “But what about the law?” The question came from my own mouth. I’m sure I wasn’t the only one shocked by my act. Captain Finch stared at me. I nearly choked on my next words as I forced myself to speak. “It’s against the law for a Flatlander to carry a weapon. How can our men fight without weapons?”

  Silence fell as we looked to the captain for an answer.

  “The king is the law,” Captain Finch said. Then he pointed to the waiting wagons. “All unmarried men will prepare for immediate departure.”

  Griffin Boar tried to run off the stage, but his escape route was blocked by one of Todd’s guards. “You can’t take away our young men,” a woman called. “It’s planting season.”

  “I have children to feed,” said the unwanted man who still stood on the stage. “Who will take care of them?”

  Beneath my boots, tremors of unrest rippled. Villagers began to push, panic blanching their faces. “Hide,” mothers told their young sons. “Go, quickly. Hide.”

  Three of the soldiers dismounted and marched onto the stage. Captain Finch pulled his sword from its sheath and pointed at the line of men who’d thought the day would end with a bride and a wedding bed. “Into the wagons. Now!” As one of the soldiers pointed his sword at Griffin, Missus Boar fainted in her husband’s arms.

  “No!” a desperate bride screamed, climbing onto the stage. She grabbed Griffin’s arm. “You can’t take him away. He’s supposed to get married today. I’ve got the coin right here. Marry us now. Marry us now!” She shook her coin purse in the soldier’s face. He grabbed the purse, then pushed her off the stage. She landed on two other girls, her elbow jabbing one in the face. The soldier’s gaze was cold and without regret.

  That’s when chaos erupted.

  As villagers tried to escape the square, the soldiers and guards drew their swords. In the uproar, I lost sight of my father. “Don’t panic!” tax-collector Todd hollered, but no one listened. “Stupid dirt-scratchers. I’ll hang every last one of you if you disobey the royal command.”

  Mothers burst into tears as their unmarried sons were rounded up. Only the youngest boys, the ones still scrawny and smoothfaced, were spared. A few men tried to dart into the blacksmith’s house to escape but were dragged out by soldiers. “Father!” I called, tripping between villagers. Then suddenly, he stood before me.

  He clutched my shoulders, his eyes wild. “What will you do? What will become of you?”

  �
��Father …” I had no idea what to say. My legs felt as if they were melting. Soldiers’ shouts and women’s wails swirled around us. “Father …”

  “You can’t take care of the farm by yourself.”

  “I can. I can do it.”

  “You’re not strong enough,” he said as a soldier grabbed his arm.

  “You got a wife?” the soldier asked. It was the same soldier who’d pushed the bride off the stage.

  “Aye,” I said, stepping in front of my father. I clenched my jaw, trying to keep my chin from quivering. “I’m his wife.”

  The soldier motioned, and tax-collector Todd, who’d found another flagon of ale, staggered over. “Is this one married?” the soldier asked.

  “Please,” I begged our tax-collector. “Please tell him that this is my husband.”

  Todd ignored my plea. He glared at my father. “This one is named Murl Thistle. He tried to lead a revolt last year against the potato tax. Caused me some trouble.” He narrowed his bloodshot eyes. “He’s not married.”

  The soldier shoved my father toward the waiting wagons. “No,” I cried, holding tight to my father’s thin arm.

  “You’ll have to find work,” he said to me. “Leave the farm and find work.”

  “I can’t leave the farm.” My eyes filled with tears. Why was he saying such a thing?

  “Listen to me,” he said as we reached the first wagon. The huntsman’s son staggered past. He’d put up a fight. His nose dripped with blood as he cursed the soldier who shoved him into the wagon. “You must find work. It’s your only chance.” Father grabbed my hand and pressed two coins into my palm. “It’s all I have.”

  I closed my fingers around the coins. “I will work the farm and keep it for you. For when you come back.”

  He grimaced, the truth making its painful way to the surface. “I will not be back.”

  The soldier pushed me aside, then forced my father into the wagon, next to a trembling boy from the village of Seed.

  “Make way,” the driver hollered as the first wagon, the one carrying my father, started down the road. Hot tears in my eyes, I followed, ignoring my pain to run alongside as mothers screamed their sons’ names. Fathers froze, as still as trees, as if life had drained from their limbs.

  “Father,” I called again.

  “Out of the way,” another driver ordered as the second wagon began its journey.

  “Find work,” were the last words I heard before the second wagon caught up to me. Milkman Boar tried to steady his wife as the second wagon gathered speed and headed down the road, carrying Root’s most desired son to war.

  Griffin Boar met my gaze as he passed by, his eyes also filled with tears.

  For the first time in my life, I felt equal to my fellow Flatlanders. A curled foot or a handsome face made no difference—in the end, each of us was at the mercy of fate.

  And that’s when the rain began to fall.

  Chapter Six

  Clouds rolled in. The sky let loose as if it, too, were grieving. Villagers gathered around the tax-collector, bombarding him with questions.

  “Will we ever see them again?”

  “I can’t do the planting without my son.”

  “Who will we marry?”

  Shivering, I stood at the edge of the crowd, rain dripping off my eyelashes.

  “They’re gone,” Todd grumbled, his words slurred from drink. “There’s nothing I can do. Now leave me be.” He staggered toward his home, his guards following. His heartlessness was no surprise.

  Only a few families were untouched by the royal proclamation. With Todd and his guards drinking behind locked doors, Fin Bitter, the blacksmith, took over. He was one of the oldest men in Root, and we looked up to him as a sort of elder. “Gather the orphaned children,” he said. “We must take care of them.” The unwanted’s five were rounded up, their faces streaked with tears and rain. I was too old to be considered an orphan. Not that anyone would take me. “Those of you who’ve suffered no loss today, I urge you to take one of these orphans,” Fin said. Then he split up the children. It had to be that way. No family could afford to take on two additional mouths. Fin himself took the smallest boy. “I could use some help stoking the fire,” he said, patting the boy’s head.

  Soon after, the village square cleared. Villagers hitched their donkeys and headed for home. Griffin Boar’s parents and sister climbed into their cart. Maude curled into an angry ball on the back seat. Milkman Boar put an arm around his wife, comforting her.

  Floral wreaths, once adorning the heads of dream-filled brides, lay abandoned on the ground. I crushed one as I hobbled toward the donkey field. What would become of me? What would happen to my father? Panic swept over me as I hitched our donkey to our cart. The creature knew the way home without guidance, so I climbed into the back and lay on the wet wooden planks. The rumble of wheels and hooves hid the sound of my sobbing.

  The rain fell hard, soaking through my dress. When we reached the cottage, I put the donkey in his shed, then sat at the table. War had come to Anglund. The unmarried men were gone, carted off like beasts. Father was gone. I stared at his empty chair. How could he fight in a war? He’d been born a Flatlander. A seed-sower. He’d never used a sword in his life.

  What if he never came back?

  There were chores to be done yet I had no desire to do anything but sit. I didn’t eat, didn’t drink, didn’t move. The two coins Father had given me now lay on the table. How long would they keep me from going hungry? Get a job, my father had said. But who would employ me, a dirt-scratcher girl with a curled foot? A dirt-scratcher girl who was supposedly unnatural?

  The sky darkened until day looked like night. Exhausted by grief, I fell asleep at the table only to awake to something dripping on my face. The rain had broken through a patch in the roof. Not bothering to light a candle, I stumbled to Father’s bedroom, and for the first time since my mother’s death, I lay on their bed. Mother’s scent was long gone. But Father’s scent of dirt and sweat wrapped around me and eased me back to sleep.

  All night long and all the next day it rained—the kind of angry rain that stings the skin. A stream of water ran alongside the cottage and into the road, where huge puddles formed. On the third day of rain, the field turned to mud. The potato tubers that Father had planted lay exposed as the soil around them washed away. I sank to my ankles in the muck as I tried to replant, but the next day they lay exposed again. And on the fifth day of nonstop rain, a current of water ran through the field, carrying the tubers toward the river. I was in serious trouble. The village itself was in trouble, for all the fields were suffering the same fate. A season without planting meant starvation.

  On the seventh day of rain, a cart rode by carrying a family, their belongings stuffed into the back. Soon after, another family rode past, then another. I threw my shawl over my head and hurried through the mud to the edge of the road. “Why are you leaving?” I called.

  The man and his wife ignored me, but their little girl, whose wet hair hung in her eyes, said, “The river ate our cottage.”

  The river?

  As the cart rode away, I looked down at my boots. The water on the road was ankle-deep. My soaked skirt clinging to my legs, I climbed up our ladder and stood on the donkey shed’s roof. River Time lay at the edge of the neighbor’s farm. I took a deep, worried breath. After seven straight days of rain, the usually gentle river rushed with rage—white, churning water overflowed its banks and poured into the neighbor’s field. My mother once told me a story of a terrible spring, long ago, when too much rain had made the river rise and flood the village. Many people had died in the rising water, but those who’d gone into the hills above the Flatlands had survived.

  Back inside the cottage I grabbed a few belongings—Mother’s rocking chair, the rug woven by Mother’s mother, the wooden bowl that Father had carved. I loaded these into the cart, along with a bag of potatoes and turnips. Water seeped beneath the cottage door. I tucked the two coins into my dress
pocket. By the time I’d pulled the last bunch of winter carrots from the sand barrel, water covered our stone floor. The stones had been taken from the river long before my birth, but now the river had come to reclaim them with its icy fingers.

  Offering a carrot as a bribe, I managed to get the donkey out of the shed and hitched to the cart. The creature didn’t like walking through water. It snorted and flattened its ears. “It’s okay,” I cooed, trying to keep my voice steady and calm. But even with another carrot to entice, the donkey couldn’t pull the cart from the mud. I pushed but the wheels sank deeper. “Please,” I begged. “Please.” It was no use. Neither the old donkey nor I had the strength. I collapsed against the cart and closed my eyes. Fear wanted to consume me. But if I gave in, I might crumple to the ground and never get up again.

  After a long, deep breath, I wiped rain from my eyes and looked toward the distant hills. I’d have to leave the belongings and go on foot. As I unhitched the donkey, another cart approached carrying Milkman Boar and his family. Six brown cows trailed behind. Not one had a white face.

  I dropped the donkey’s reins and sloshed through the water. “Where’s Snow?” I asked, blocking the way. “Where’s the white-faced cow?”

  “She’s old,” Milkman Boar said as his cart rolled to a stop. Maude and her mother, who sat on a wheel of cheese, peered out from beneath a soaked blanket.

  “I know she’s old but where is she?”

  “I don’t know,” he grumbled. “I couldn’t find her. Now move out of the way. There’s not much time.”

  “Where are you going?” I asked.

  “Wife’s got family in Furrow, in the foothills. It’ll be dry in the foothills.”