Auri
Aurielle Fareview, fourth daughter of Tomas and Scarlett Fareview, stood in the marriage market booth next to her sisters, Brinna and Tarley, waiting for the prospective husbands she weren’t sure would ever arrive. She leaned over the balustrade separating them from the aisle and noted the nearly empty corridor. Instead of feeling upset about the lack of eligible marriage partners in attendance, relief fluttered through her like a refreshing summer breeze.
The building was quiet but for the sparse and sporadic conversations being had between traders echoing in the cavernous space between the wood planked floor and the roughhewn beams crisscrossing the space above. Mullioned windows offered additional light though the rustic, round chandeliers shining with lit candles, hanging at even intervals from one end of the building to the other, were the primary source of light.
Auri and her sisters were currently the only women in the marriage market waiting to be looked over by eligible men. It was usually the case. Aside from booths selling wares, food, rations, and supplies to hunters and fur-trappers, there weren’t many who were looking for wives. Those who lived in their village were already married, widowed, or weren’t yet looking to comply with the law. The young trappers and hunters would come by their booth to flirt with them, which was a fun way to pass the time, but those young men didn’t have the same impending deadline concerning their duty to the Marriage Law. They had ten additional years before needing to take a wife and could buy permits to attend the birthing houses if they wanted.
Auri turned from the corridor back into their dark booth, the flame waving under the glass chimney. Brinna, her older sister by a year, was pushing a needle strung with blue thread through the taut fabric stretched between wooden embroidery hoops. She squinted in the lowlight, but it didn’t seem to bother her. She insisted she’d rather keep her mind busy than be idle dreaming up the worst. Tarley, on the other hand, hated embroidery and everything else for that matter. She folded the months old, Kaloma bulletin she’d been reading and set it in her lap. “Can you see what the weather is like?”
“I don’t think it’s snowing. Poppa and Mattias should be on time,” she said, wishing this thrice-weekly endeavor was over.
Tarley, her older sister by two years and in danger of being collected that coming spring, frowned. Tart Tarley might not have wanted to marry, but the impending deadline was a horrific reality offering equally horrifying consequences if she didn’t. She sighed. “If I could hide away in the woods and avoid this ridiculous law, I would, but I’d never survive the blasted snow.” She leaned forward and looked up and down the corridor. Tarley’s brown hair was drawn up into a loose bun that sat like an egg in the puffy nest her hair made around it. Tendrils curled down her neck. She sat back down and sighed again.
Auri noted her sister’s hand wrap around her wrist. Probably finding comfort in the ribbon tied there like Auri so often did herself. She’d seen Brinna do the same thing, and Jessamine, their oldest sister, as well. They all found comfort in the simple gift their mother had given them before any of them could remember. Auri now knew it was because their mother had tied it on when they were babies; she’d watched her mother gift Mattias, their younger brother, his when she’d been seven.
“There’s an idea,” Auri said. “What if we found a cave?” She leaned forward to try and catch Tarley’s eyes. Discussing ways around the law had become a standard practice to pass the time. They’d considered dressing as men and becoming hunters. They’d imagined seeking out a Whitling witch to invisibility spell them, which brought about gales of laughter at all the things they could do while invisible.
“Too bad the kingdom sends out hunters,” Brinna replied, offering the flaw. This was always a part of the game. For example, finding a witch was impossible; magic didn’t exist.
“But if we found it when the snow thaws, stashed away inside before the first snow, then we could avoid being tracked,” Auri said, hoping to make Tarley feel better.
“Bears,” was all her older sister said, then with a puff of her cheeks, blew out a puff of air. A tendril of hair fluttered around her face. It was clear she wasn’t getting the enjoyment from their schemes as she usually did. Of course, of the three of them, she was at immediate risk. Auri had the horrible impression her usually unflappable sister was on the verge of crying and wasn’t sure how to handle it. Tarley fluffed her burgundy skirt—the finest she owned—which Auri thought was more of an exercise in spending energy to keep her emotions corralled than concern over her appearance.
Auri wished she could take away her sister’s immediate concerns, but even more wished she could change the circumstances for them all.
“Maybe we could escape to Jast,” Brinna whispered so no one else would hear. Bring up Jast in such a way could be construed as treason, not that there was anyone there to hear them. After the war, there was no love for the kingdom north of Sevens that had decimated Kaloma, though it had been long before any of them had been born. All that separated Kaloma from Jast was the Whitling Woods and the treacherous peaks of the Jast Mountains.
“No collection there,” Brinna added. At twenty-five, she was in danger of collection too if she couldn’t find a match in the next year.
“No Marriage Law either,” Auri said.
She was right behind her sisters having turned twenty-four, and though she had a little more time than Tarley or Brinna, in a provincial village of Sevens, it wasn’t likely. They would all face the collector’s wagons that rolled through the village each spring filled with unmarried men and women and surrounded by armed guards carting them to Kaloma’s capitol city, New Taras. There, they would face a forced marriage arrangement to a stranger’s household, placement in the King’s or some Highlord’s harem, assignment to a birthing house in the kingdom, or death.
Tarley snorted with derision. “Escape to the kingdom who forced the king to sign the Kaloma Marriage Laws in the first place?” Her tone was biting. Auri figured Tarley would probably choose death if given the option. “Brilliant, Brinna. Seriously. Who knows what kind of terror awaits women in the kingdom that decimated ours over a slight? Your imagination will get you into trouble one day.” She took a breath. “Besides, I hear those mountain passes are treacherous.”
“I don’t know that he had to sign that law,” Auri observed, smoothing her green skirt, then twisting her red ribbon around her wrist. She’d read about the pressure put on the king to sign the law when she’d explored the old bulletins stacked in the loft of the barn. Neither of her sisters responded to her observation. It didn’t matter now, anyway.
“Fareview girls!” A crackly voice grabbed ahold of their attention.
Auri leaned to look past her sisters at Mr. Cobble, who traded leathers and dried goods a few booths down. He smoothed the five gray hairs he had over his speckled, bald head and smacked his gums with a mostly toothless grin. “There’s some fellows wandering this way. And since you all are the right, prettiest girls inside these woods, I reckon they’ll stop.”
Auri didn’t have the heart to tell him that besides the Fareveiw sisters, the only other unmarried girls in their village, other than the women at the Birthing House at the edge of the village, were the two Pennington girls who were ten and twelve, and the Jenzas, whose twin daughters were still toddling about. Any other eligible maiden traveled outside of Sevens to attend the larger marketplaces for better prospects. Auri’s family didn’t have that kind of income.
Mr. Cobble’s intentions were kind, however, so she held her tongue. His one and only wife had died some years prior. They’d never had children, and he’d taken a fatherly liking to their mother, Scarlett, who provided him with her homemade tinctures, that helped with his joints, along with baked goods and jams she sold on non-marriage market days.
“Maybe I should just offer to marry Mr. Cobble,” Tarley remarked late one night in their bedroom as they prepared to sleep. “He’s a single man—old as the tree at the center of Sevens, but kind—and it would get me off the market to avoid collection. I could help him.”
Jessamine had smiled in that normally subdued way she did, while Brinna and Auri had collapsed into a fit of laughter.
“Mr. Cobble wouldn’t allow it,” Jessamine said while brushing her long dark hair. “He’s too honorable a man.”
“You think there are honorable men,” Tarley remarked her eyebrows high over her hazel eyes. She barked a laugh. “He would do it because he’s a man like all the rest, and I’m being serious,” Tarley said. “I’d rather do that than face collection.”
“You’d lie with Mr. Cobble?” Brinna scrunched her nose and glanced at Auri.
While they were all aware of the mechanics of what happened between a man and a woman to get children, they weren’t exactly sure of the specifics. It was against the law to know beyond the confines of marriage or birthing houses, anyway.
“He’s too old,” Tarley stated.
Jessamine smiled and chuckled. “Momma has a tincture for that. She makes it all the time.”
Brinna giggled.
Auri frowned unsure why one would need a tincture. “Tarley. You’re going to want children one day. Besides, that’s the point of the law in the first place, and Mr. Cobble probably isn’t eligible anymore.”
“I don’t know that I will. Would you want to bring a daughter into this world? To face this?”
They all grew serious understanding her reasoning. She had a point.
Now, the old man used his head to indicate there were men moving down the aisle at the market toward them. Their boot falls echoed in the large building like the sound of an ax hitting a tree trunk as they walked across the wooden floor. When one of them stopped at Mr. Cobble’s booth, the old man pointed in their direction.
The men—three of them—approached the booth. Auri’s stomach clenched with dread at the realization that there was one for each of them. One man was tall and wiry. His light hair was thin and sparse on the top of his head. He had kind eyes, however, though that didn’t always reveal truths.
Old Mrs. Flimm on the other side of the river had married a man with kind eyes, but he’d been violent with drink and had met a violent end in the woods with a bear. Or so it was said. The explanation didn’t save Mrs. Flimm, who’d been accused of being a witch who cast spells on the bear to get rid of her husband. She’d been weighed down with rocks and thrown in the river to keep her spirit from casting more spells.
Another of the men was dressed rather elaborately for someone in Sevens. Auri figured he was a lord flaunting his status. He was rotund, which hinted at his wealth, and older, which meant he wasn’t looking for a first wife. She didn’t like his look—a little too eager— and it made her wary.
The third man was handsome-ish if a little unkept—his red beard, his hair, his haphazard homespun attire. He reminded her of a skittish animal, and his eyes were disconcerting, jumping between her and her sisters as if they were horse flesh. She had the impression he wanted to inspect their teeth and feel the width of their bones.
While the romantic idea that one of these three strangers might prove to be a love match darted through her mind like a hummingbird, Auri was a realist. Love matches like their parents were hard enough to come by. Most likely, these men were desperate. Sevens wasn’t a marketplace that enticed noble men, so those that came through, if not desperate, were hard-boiled and practical, or worse, depraved. Unfortunately, the latter were more common in a remote marketplace like Sevens where they could get away with it. Women in a small marketplace were desperate to avoid collection, desperate to avoid a birthing house or a harem. Like Tarley. They couldn’t afford to be choosy. It was easier to gamble with what could be seen rather than what couldn’t.
Tarley sighed heavily again. “Gods, I hate this,” she muttered, and it made Auri sad for all of them. Auri looked down at the table and fought the tears climbing up the back of her eyes, clogging her throat.
Brinna reached over and grasped Auri’s hand.
Auri ran a thumb over the ribbon tied around her sister’s wrist, then met her sister’s watchful gaze.
Brinna’s smile seemed to say: It’s okay. We’ve got each other.
Auri wanted to reply, but for how long? Instead, she returned Brinna’s smile, lifted her chin, and felt comforted by the feel of her sister’s hand in her own. But it couldn’t alleviate the discomfiture and unease regarding the marriage market. She was practical enough to know that three men didn’t just drop into Sevens every marriage market day. She’d been forced into being at the marketplace too long and knew better. Giving these men time was the right course, even if every part of her was screaming that she needed to run.
“Good day, maidens,” the ostentatious man said. He offered a bow then straightened, tugging on the bright purple jacket stitched with golden thread. He smiled, his gaze started with Tarley and lingered as he said, “I’m Midlord Buteress.” He had a strange mole on his chin with a bunch of stubby hairs growing from its center that Auri couldn’t stop watching as he spoke. It was horribly distracting. “My companions are Lowlord Gromley.”
The tall, thin man with the easy eyes inclined his head but didn’t smile, then his gaze stuck to Brinna.
“And this is Mr. Crossbie, a farmer.” The skittish man grinned showing his stained teeth, but the smile didn’t reach his eyes, so it looked like a grimace. Auri noticed his eyes were a color like the sky on a hot summer day. When his intense gaze met hers, she looked away.
Tarley spoke for all of them. “I’m Tarley Fareview. These are my sisters, Brinna and Aurielle.”
“It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance,” the pompous one said.
A silence stepped in between them and stretched its arms, the span of awkwardness stretching with each passing moment. Auri watched the men exchange glances, either unsure themselves, or unsure what protocol dictated, for it appeared they weren’t familiar with one another.
Gromley stepped forward into the silence and filled it. “Miss Fareview,” he said to Brinna and smoothed a hand over his drab, brown jacket, seeming to check to make sure all the clasps were closed properly. Auri’s gaze caught on his hands as they moved over his clothing, thin, soft, and supple. So different from their father’s wide hands, course and calloused from work.
“I’m looking for a first wife. I have a modest manor several days travel from Sevens to the southeast. It makes a healthy living, and my deadline is approaching. I’m thirty-four. Perhaps, you would consent to consider my suit? I need a wife to help me with running the home. And–” he paused, his skin pinking as his lips puckered at whatever he’d been about to say.
“Offspring,” Crossbie finished his eyes darting from Gromley to Auri. His gaze ran from her face across the bodice of her dress to the hem and back up. “We’re all here for that.”
Mr. Crossbie was very off-putting, Auri decided. She didn’t like him or his manner.
While Gromely appeared a good sort, his pragmatic approach wouldn’t appeal to her dreamy sister. Of course, Brinna was wise enough to recognize a safe option, but Auri figured she might hold out a bit longer for a love match they all wanted. Having parents who adored one another made it difficult to accept anything less.
Before Brinna could respond to Gromley, however, Buteress interrupted, stepping up to the railing. “I should think that perhaps my expansive estate could provide for you and your fair sisters. One and all.”
Gromley and Crossbie looked nonplussed by Buteress’s insertion, their heads snapping in his direction, confusion marring their foreheads with lines.
Buteress continued, “It’s to the south, near Fulstrom.”
His gaze swept over each of them, Auri noticed, taking in not only their faces, but skimming the bodices of their gowns. He lingered on Auri, and lifted his gaze to hers, smiling with yellowed teeth. It made Auri feel like she needed to rush home, lock the door, and bathe. The fact he was looking for another wife and had just offered for all three of them sent disgust rioting through her body. It made her think this man was the deviant sort. He could have gone to the Fulstrom market but had probably over shopped his welcome and was now forced to the outer kingdom markets.
She shuddered.
“Now, come man,” Crossbie said, his voice as sharp as his gaze. “We agreed this would be done civilly. Three of us. Three of them. One for each.” His gaze jumped back to Auri. “I’m nearing the arrest mark,” he told Auri. “I need a woman, and I need her with a child. I don’t want the older one.” His head tilted in Tarley’s direction. “I need a younger one.” He pierced Auri with that disturbing gaze before looking at the men next to him. “You have children Buteress, and you have two years, Gromley. I’m in a hurry, here.”
Auri’s face opened with shock at the man’s bluntness. He was hard and cold. Perhaps his pragmatism would have spoken to her normally practical nature, but there was a difference between being a realist and just being rude. She was right in her assessment that she was nothing more than horse flesh to this man.
Tarley cleared her throat, pressed her lips together in frustration and narrowed her eyes, a tell of her sister’s impatience. If there were a queen in Sevens, then Frosty Tarley would take the office, that is if women were allowed to do so.
“Let us be clear, gentlemen, we are sitting here in compliance with the law. Nothing more.” She looked down her nose at all of them, and Auri loved her sister’s spirit despite the circumstances.
Auri wanted to be more like Tarley: brave and bold. She found often that she imagined she could be brave, but then wilted when she faced something she was afraid of, like these men.
“We haven’t deigned to agree to any one of your suits, nor are we obligated to, so perhaps you should be on your best behavior rather than your worst,” Tarley concluded.
Buteress’s fisheyes jumped from Auri to Tarley and assessed her in a new way. His smile indicated he liked something he saw in her. “Ah. Miss Fareview.” A lecherous glow lit his pudgy face. “I’m delighted by your spirit.” He interlaced his leather-gloved hands in front of his heart and bent slightly at the waist. “But you are nearing collection, are you not? Perhaps you would consent to my suit.”
Auri watched Tarley blink slowly, but nothing else gave away the disgust she could tell her sister felt at the prospect of marrying this man. Auri could see the wheels spinning in Tarley’s head. She was twenty-six. Did she take the gamble to be collected and possibly assigned to a birthing house, or consent to marriage with such a man? Knowing her sister, she’d stand up, walk over to Cobble’s booth and tell him they were about to marry, hightail it out into the woods to hide there, or she’d run herself through with a weapon from Mr. Dennig’s table.
“Do you have a wife, Midlord Buteress?” Tarley asked.
His smile deepened. “I do, Miss Fareview. I am acquiring a fourth.” He said this with pride, as if it was in his favor because he had the economic means to support all of them, which would be the only way he’d be allowed to marry repeatedly. He looked well fed, which revealed he had enough to provide, but Auri knew that didn’t mean he did. She’d overheard stories told between trappers and traders of things they’d seen and heard.
Auri watched Tarley tense and could sense her sister’s disgust as clear as if it were stewing in the bottom of her own gut. A deviant. This man was a collector—not the same as the spring collector, but a different kind. A collector of women and he had the means to do it legally in Kaloma. There were rumors about these kinds of men and how they treated their wives. The dark things they did to them behind closed doors, and sometimes even to their children.
Auri shivered.
The clanking sound of the marketplace bell rang out signaling the close of the day.
Her father and brother would be along shortly to escort them home, which brought Auri relief. Though Sevens didn’t get dark—it hadn’t since Auri’s childhood—it was far safer to have an escort. One couldn’t predict what sorts of unsavories or dangers were lurking about in the woods.
“Perhaps I could call upon you next market day?” Gromley asked Brinna. “Will you be here then?”
“I don’t have much of a choice now do I, Mr. Gromley,” Brinna replied.
“Lowlord.”
Brinna glanced at Auri. She squeezed her sister’s hand with frustrated understanding, and turned back to the stoic man, who now just seemed austere and unfeeling. “Forgive me, Lowlord Gromley, for my mistake.”
His face turned hard and grim, and his eyes flitted from Brinna to Auri as if trying to measure their complacency. His already thin lips tightened and puckered a moment, then he said, “I don’t like mistakes, Miss Fareview. I want propriety in my wife and offspring. They will need to know their place, and I would discipline them when necessary.” He slapped his leather gloves against his thigh.
Brinna squeezed Auri’s hand harder.
“Daughters,” their father’s voice interrupted with a congenial shout as he entered the building. It was his usual greeting on market days. Usually there weren’t any suitors.
Auri turned her head toward him and watched Tomas Fareveiw walk up the wooden walkway with her brother Mattias a pace behind him, their steps loud and even. They arrived as if they carried safety with them like a blanket.
Both were large men, imposing, even if their personalities weren’t. Her father’s brown beard was full, his dark coat covered a dark homespun shirt, stretched across a broad back built from years chopping wood, woodworking, and farming their small patch of land. He had a dark hat on his head, a walking stick in his hand which he didn’t need, but always carried when it wasn’t holding an ax.
Mattias, the youngest Fareview, who at eighteen still had many years before he had to worry about this endeavor, resembled their father with giant body and his brown hair, though his eyes were lighter like their mother’s. Her brother would have had a beard if he could grow one, but as it was, it looked rather patchy. They teased him incessantly for it. He, too, had on his dark winter coat with his hat pulled low over hair that needed a trim. His hands were shoved into pockets of his pants as he walked toward them.
“Are you ready,” their father said, then noticed the men standing outside their booth. Auri watched her father’s warm molasses gaze jump between the faces of the strangers to his daughters. His smile faded, eyes narrowed—a Tarley-look if Auri had ever seen one—and the sugar glaze inside of them hardened.
Mattias was also frowning. He pulled his hands from his pockets and took his hat off his head.
For some reason, Auri thought about how her brother had once expressed his desire to go to second school in New Taras to study law and repeal the Marriage Law for his sisters. As sweet as the sentiment was Tarley pointed out, “While the thought is noble, brother, it’s not like it will do much good for us by then.”
Auri noted Buteress’s greedy gaze sweep over Mattias. “Mr. Fareview? You have lovely daughters. And a son? He looks strong and like a good worker.” He licked his lips.
She wanted to jump over the table and stand in front of her brother. There were rumors about these kinds of men, too. Those who would pay the poor for their boys and girls for their servitude to their land, only that wasn’t what became of those children. Using children in such a way was against the law, of course, but Kaloma officials did an excellent job of looking the other way when enough coin was involved.
Mattias grip on his hat tightened, and his knuckles turned white. Instead of speaking to the older man as rules of propriety required, Mattias ignored him. “Come on, sisters. Let’s get home.”
“Now, wait a moment,” Crossbie said, stepping closer to the rail. “I need a wife. I’m going to have one of these women. I want this one,” he said and like a striking snake, snatched Auri’s wrist before she saw what was happening, yanking her toward him.
Auri’s hip slammed against the handrail; it creaked and wobbled, threatening to topple. “Unhand me!” She wrenched her arm out of his grasp and scurried backward away from him.
Mattias—stars bless him—intending to help her though she extricated herself before he could, placed himself between Crossbie and Auri on Crossbie’s side of the rail. Crossbie had her brother by several stones even if Mattias had height and youth on his side.
“Try and touch my sister again, you prick,” Mattias said, his voice low and dangerous.
Tomas stepped between Mattias and Crossbie. “It doesn’t work that way, and if it did, I wouldn’t allow you to take my daughter,” her father said. Auri could see that the diplomacy he usually employed in situations that involved bartering was nonexistent. He was seething, his jaw tight as he spoke.
“It does. Law says so. I get the wife of my choice,” Crossbie said.
“As long as she accepts your suit,” Gromley added. He was very in tune with rules and regulations.
“Why wouldn’t she?” Crossbie’s eyes were still on Auri, looking around Tomas and Mattias, who were blocking the farmer’s line of sight to her. “She’s unlikely to find a better prospect up here in the boonies.”
She had the horrible feeling he would toss her over his shoulder, run, and rut her like the bull she’d seen with the cows if he could. There was a story of a woman from the outer region found on a farmer’s land; she’d been attacked and left for dead in the river. Instead of harboring her, she’d been returned to her family, then forced to marry her attacker. The thought made Auri shudder.
Her father lifted his walking stick, so it rested on his shoulder. “The law provides for a woman’s choice.”
That wasn’t exactly true, but it didn’t seem prudent to correct her father. Auri didn’t want to argue the point, rubbing Crossbie’s touch from her wrist and checking the ribbon, surprisingly still tied there.
Mr. Cobble shuffled over from his booth.
Auri liked that the old man cared enough to see what was happening but didn’t think he’d be very effective helping her father or Mattias if it came to it. She glanced at Brinna, whose eyes were the size of cream saucers. Then at Tarley, who was frowning. She glanced at Auri, watched Auri rub her wrist, and shook her head in disgust.
A few of the other men they knew in the marketplace, Mr. Hemmis—a woodworker—and Mr. Dennig—a metalsmith—wandered over as well, standing to the side should her father and brother need assistance.
Midlord Buteress, recognizing the odds had shifted, offered a nod of his head, and reached out to block Crossbie from stepping any closer. “Please, accept my apologies for Mr. Crossbie. He’s not familiar with the marketplace, given this is his first attendance. I shall endeavor to help him with his approach for tomorrow’s visit.”
“See that you do,” her father said, his affability now a winter’s day. “The market is closed.” He lifted his chin toward the exit. “See yourselves out.”
Two of the three men—the lords—bowed but Crossbie stabbed Auri with one more stare before turning and walking away.
Auri shuddered another breath of relief when the sound of their footfalls on the wooden walkway had disappeared altogether.
Her father turned to look at them, his face drawn and bleak with frustration. He ran a hand over his face. “Gods.” He looked up and glanced at the other men and nodded at them, offering his gratitude for their support. “I’d hoped for more time,” he muttered more to himself than anyone else.
Auri didn’t understand her father’s strange comment, but then he was prone to random thoughts at strange times. Perhaps he was referring to Tarley’s coming deadline? She didn’t have an opportunity to ask because Mr. Dennig interrupted her curiosity.
“We’ll see you folks out. Make sure there isn’t anything unsavory beyond the doors of the marketplace.”
“I’d appreciate that.” Her father paused and took a deep breath to clear away whatever bitterness he was feeling. “Come. Let’s get you safely to the cottage.”
Auri, Tarley and Brinna, led by their father and hemmed in from behind by their brother were flanked by the village men. They started from the market house.
“That was rather dramatic,” Brinna said as they moved down the walkway. “I can’t wait to tell the story to Mother and Jess.”
“They aren’t home. Mrs. Grenden’s baby is coming,” Mattias said.
“Pray for sons,” they all said in the common blessing upon learning of a pregnancy or a birthing.
Her father glanced around to make sure the men were truly gone. “Let’s get home before the sun falls. Don’t need to be traveling in the woods without the sun.”
“It won’t get dark,” Brinna said. “We should see anyone coming.”
“There are clouds,” Father said. “Storm coming. It will be dim enough in the woods to hide in the shadows. We won’t be safe until we get to the cottage.”
Once they were settled in the wagon, they started toward home. The trees from the forest thickened the further they traveled from the village, the bushes, brambles, and trunks outlining the snowy roadway. When they were beyond the village, their father said, “None of you will go to the market tomorrow.”
“What will we do?” Tarley asked.
“We’ll stay close to home. Work about the cottage.”
“Not that. About the marketplace. The men. The collection.” Tarley worked the ribbon around her wrist.
“Isn’t there anything we can do?” Mattias asked.
“Got a magic spell that can whisk you all from Kaloma?” Their father asked. He snapped the line to get the horse moving a little faster. “We’ll figure something out. Mama and I always do.” He looked over his shoulder at them, then refocused on the rutted road ahead. The wagon lurched over a divot but rolled onward. “I promise.”
Auri wasn’t sure what could be done. She looked up at the dark, gray sky and wished she could change things. She didn’t hold any illusions that that magic existed to change their circumstances, however.
“Auri?” Her father’s voice drew her from her wishes.
“Yes, Father?”
“You’ll be in the woods collecting tomorrow. Jessamine and Mother will be with the Grendens a while, I think. Mattias and I will be in the woods with you, cutting.”
“Yes, sir,” she said. Maybe she was supposed to hate that he’d given her that tedious chore but rather than being a drudgery—like sitting in the marriage marketplace—foraging for winter herbs felt like being granted a wish: freedom.
