A Shadow Bright and Burning Read Free Page A

collarbone like some obscene necklace and ran down his back and left arm. Sometimes, when the pain was extreme, his hand would go rigid and his fingers would curl into his palm. Korozoth himself had mutilated my friend during an attack on a camp of brick makers. The soldiers who’d rescued Rook brought him to shelter at Brimthorn, thinking he’d be dead by morning. Eight years later, and that morning hadn’t come.
    I rubbed the paste into his palm, kneading the skin until his fingers loosened. I straightened them out, ignoring his hissed intakes of breath at the pain. Within a few minutes, his hand relaxed. Rook closed his eyes in relief.
    “Thank you,” he murmured, clasping my hand in his. Slowly, I twined our fingers together.
    “Your grip is still strong,” I said, smiling. When I reached to touch his chest, he flinched.
    “You needn’t help me more than necessary. I’m in your debt enough as it is.” He often shied from my touch these days. It made me feel clumsy and perverse, as if I should be repulsed by his scars when I wasn’t at all.
    “Let’s look at your back,” I grumbled. Dabbing at the paste, I sat behind him and gasped.
    Besides the scars, long red welts blazed on his skin. Someone had struck him with a birch cane.
    “Bastard,” I hissed as I tried to soothe the wounds.
    “It was my own fault,” Rook said. “I wasn’t able to help with the horses. Colegrind had to come out and see to it himself.”
    “Of course you’re slow when the scars flare up. He should know that by now.”
    “I don’t want special treatment,” Rook said, his voice firm. I held my tongue and worked quickly. Finished, I laid my hand on his back.
    “Movement should be easier now,” I said.
    “Oh yes.” He sighed, shifting beneath my hand. “God knows what I would do in this world without you, Nettie.”
    “Stop calling me Nettie, Rook.” I smiled. This was an age-old battle. A terrible childhood nickname, Nettie made me sound like an old lady or a hen.
    “Have to call you Nettie, Nettie.” I felt him laugh. “You can’t break with tradition, as Colegrind tells us.” Rook leaned away from me and took up his vest. With a grunt, he began to pull it over his head. I held back, knowing he’d be cross if I tried to help now. “The sorcerer’s gone?”
    “Yes. That was far too close.” Unladylike as it was, I flopped onto my back and stared up at the sky.
    “Even if you are a witch, it’s not as though you’re Mary Willoughby herself.” Rook sighed, lying down beside me. “She’s dead and gone.”
    “Her legacy isn’t, though.” For thousands of years, witches had existed on the fringe of society. They were known as strange women, a bit dangerous if you weren’t careful, but they’d mostly lived in peace. That all changed when a witch named Mary Willoughby opened up a portal between worlds and summoned the Ancients, starting this long, bloody war. I remembered a book I’d had when I was ten,
A Child’s History of the Ancients.
In it, there was a picture of a lady with wild black hair and insane eyes, her hands raised to a stormy sky.
Mary Willoughby, the worst woman in the kingdom,
the caption read.
    “She was burned,” I said. “All witches are burned.” If Agrippa had found me out…well, I actually couldn’t be burned, could I? He would have to be creative with my death. Lord, what an unsettling thought.
    “Seems un-Christian, don’t it? Burning people alive.”
    “Especially when you consider she had help,” I said.
    “Yes, from the magician.” Rook smiled as I sat up in surprise. “You taught me to read with that old Ancients book, remember? Howard Mickelmas. He helped open the gate. Never caught him, did they?”
    “No, magicians are tricky by nature.” Magicians were filthy beasts, full of deception.
Everyone
knew that. At least witches had an air of tragic nobility about them.
    “Why d’you think they burn one kind and not the other?” Rook said. “Why aren’t