Healers Read Free Page A

gaze. She nodded, “Uh-huh, his name’s Tarc.”
    Kazy filled another bowl with soup, then asked, “Why didn’t he come with you when you rescued us last night?”
    Daussie’s eyes went back to her brother. After a long pause she said, “Um, he did.” She paused uncertainly, then continued, “He… wasn’t close by… you just didn’t see him.”
    Kazy filled another bowl, thinking of the guy who’d been hanging around in the distance last night. She let her eyes drift back to Daussie’s handsome brother. If he was there, why was his sister doing all the dirty work?
    Then, After those raiders showed me what men are like, I hate them all . Why am I thinking about her brother’s looks? Just because he looks like Daussie?
     
    Everyone had gone through the Hyllises’ food line, so Eva got her own bowl of soup and hunk of bread. Uncomfortably eyeing the rescued girl, she said, “That’s it. You girls should serve yourselves.” She busied herself pouring some of the calming tea she had brewed for the traumatized girls. By the time Daussie and the girl had seated themselves, Eva was able to go over and sit beside them on the pretext of giving each of them a cup of tea. “I’m sorry, I’m afraid I don’t know your name,” she said to the young girl.
    “Kazy,” the girl said.
    “What’s your last name?”
    The girl’s face crumpled, and as tears ran down her cheeks she said in a tiny voice, “I don’t know, do you still have a last name when everyone in your family’s been killed?”
    Eva’s own heart broke. She leaned to put an arm around Kazy’s shaking shoulders. Daussie leaned in from the other side and she and Eva hugged Kazy between them. “Sure you do,” Eva said in a low tremulous voice, “ no one can take your name away from you.”
    After a few wracking sobs, Kazy said, “Hyllis.”
    Eva stared into Daussie’s wide eyes. Some kind of feud had scattered Daum’s family a generation or so back. As far as Eva had known, Daum was the only one of the Hyllises that had moved into the area of Walterston, but people had moved away from their original home in Colesville at different times. When they left, they seldom knew where they were going. When they arrived in a new location they didn’t send messages home to say where they’d gone, after all, they were trying to leave those people behind. As the different family groups picked up and moved at different times, Kazy’s family could easily have relocated here without Daum knowing. After a little more hesitation, Eva said, “Where was your family from?”
    Without looking up, Kazy jerked a thumb further down the road away from Walterston. “Four farms down the road that way,” she whispered rubbing at her eyes with the back of her wrist.
    “Um,” Eva said, “have some more of your tea. It’s supposed to help calm your nerves. Did your family always live around here?”
    “No…” Kazy seemed about to say more, but then picked up her bread and took a bite instead.
    Eva sipped her own tea for a moment, “When did they move here?”
    “I don’t know…” Kazy looked off into the distance as if trying to remember. “My mom and dad moved here with my grandmother before I was born.”
    “And…” Eva paused, not wanting to venture onto painful ground, but feeling she had to know, “the raiders killed all three of them?”
    Kazy nodded jerkily, “And my brothers too.” She sniffed and picked up her cup for another sip.
    They sat in silence for a while; then Eva suggested they sing a song of mourning. They talked about different songs until they found one all three of them knew. They started on it, singing relatively quietly, but it wasn’t long before more and more of the rescued girls gathered around. Eva and Daussie’s singing had calmed the girls earlier that morning and they wanted more. Farmers and caravaners collected too. Some of them started to join the singing. They went through the words they knew for the song several