Phoenix and Ashes

There was a low stone wall in the way; she scrambled over it, and found herself in a meadow full of sheep that scattered before her, bleating indignation. She kept going; at least here there was enough light to see—

Why were the coercions so strong, suddenly?

Another low, stone wall; she left more of her gown on one of the stones. Dimly, she recognized the top of the Round Meadow where she had met Reggie so often, the upper end, where she normally couldn't go. At least she knew the way from here.

If the pain in her side and her head would let her. Her world narrowed to the pain and the next step, each step bringing her closer to The Arrows, closer to the end of the pain. The end of the pain—

Run!

Her breath rasped in her lungs, sending sharp, icy stabs into her chest. Her vision blurred and darkened; she felt branches lashing at her as she passed. But all she could think of was that she must, must get to The Arrows.

Run!

She felt hard, bare dirt and hard-packed gravel under her feet. She was in the road to Broom. She didn't remember getting over the fence.

Run, run, run!

She stumbled into the side of one of the houses on High Street; caught herself, pushed herself off, and kept running.

There was Sarah's cottage, just ahead. Then past.

She tripped and fell, bruising hands and knees at the corner; shoved herself up and kept running. Here was the Broom Tavern.

Almost there—

She stumbled again and fell into the fence around the garden of the Arrows. She caught herself, and ran the last few yards completely blind, shoving open the garden gate, and falling inside, down onto the path, as the gate swung shut again behind her.

And the pain stopped.

The mental pain, anyway.

As she lay on the ground, gasping for breath in great, aching lungfuls, she discovered an entirely new source of very physical pain. Her palms and knees burned, her side felt as if someone had stuck a knife in her, and whenever she moved, she could feel deep scratches and bruises everywhere. And all she could do was to lie there and try to get her breath back, because she couldn't move in her current state if her life depended on it.

But she could think, at least—though not coherently. Whole thoughts, rather than fragments, but they came to her in no particular order as she lay on her back with her eyes closed, gasping.

Freed from the coercions, her mind raced. I have to get cleaned up and changed. Alison and the girls will be coming home. I can't look like this—maybe I can disguise some of the scratches and bruises with kitchen ash. At least they won't be expecting me to still be awake.

Sarah would, she hoped, surely know when the coercions had suddenly tightened around her, and would take the cart and horse back to its owners. Surely she wouldn't sit there all night.

Another thought, a bleak one this time. I failed. I didn't find the Air Master—

Why had there been that breath of Air Magic around Reggie?

Oh heavens—what did I say to Reggie? Did I really tell him I loved him? How could I have done that? What on earth possessed me? I don't—

But there the thought came to an abrupt halt, because she could not, in all truth, have finished it with "I don't love him," because it wasn't true.

What was he saying to me? It had all gotten jumbled up in the coercions, in the headlong flight across the countryside. She couldn't remember any of it clearly.

Except she knew very well he hadn't said that he loved her.

But had he implied it? He'd asked if he could be more than a friend to her, she remembered that much.

The pain in her side ebbed a little, and with a groan, she pushed herself up off the ground. Her hands were tough, and little more than bruised, but her knees—well, her stockings were surely ruined, and the way they stuck to her knees argued for a bleeding scrape there.

I need to start a fire. The Salamanders can help heal this enough that it doesn't look fresh. I should sleep in the kitchen. . . .

In fact, she had a good idea that she was going to have to sleep in the kitchen whether she wanted to or not. She didn't think she could get up the stairs right now.

It was just a good thing that there was still some clean clothing, laundered and dried just yesterday, that was still waiting downstairs to be taken to her room. Everything that wasn't connected to the ball had been given short shrift in the last few days, and her own business had been last on the list of things to be done.