The Hour of the Crow

Chapter 3: The Copper District

Arran sipped his mint tea, with three teaspoons of sugar as usual, and relished the refreshing taste in his mouth. His eyes closed and his muscles relaxed, at ease. For a moment, he forgot about the tunnels and the creatures.

“Better?” Zohra asked, cocking her head in a way that suggested she was still worried about him.

Arran licked his lips and smiled. “Much.”

The elderly woman pursed her lips, peering at Arran's face as if she could find the reason for his distress on it. It made him nervous all over again. He shifted awkwardly in his seat. "So, um …" He cleared his throat and started over. "About the tunnels. I didn't find them accidentally."

"Oh?" Zohra raised an eyebrow. "Then how did you learn about their existence?"

"Well, I was at Villa D'Ohara today…" Her eyebrows crept almost all the way up to her hairline, but Arran ignored her. "Turns out I had underestimated the job and I almost got into trouble with the guards. But I got help."

"From whom?"

He shrugged. His tea spilled over the edge of his cup when he put it down a bit too roughly. "I heard a voice inside my head, which led me down to the tunnels through a secret passage in the villa." Zohra remained silent, waiting for more, so Arran blurted out, "I also saw three cloaked … people in the tunnels. It almost seemed like they had been waiting for me."

Now the fortune teller looked downright upset. "Who were these people?"

The memory of the three dark creatures raised goosebumps all over his body, despite the nagging heat outside. "I don’t know. I couldn’t see their faces."

Zohra plucked at a loose thread in her qamisa and furrowed her brow. Arran reached for his tea once more, but his hands stilled in midair when he noticed the faint tremor in them. Instead, he laced his fingers together and rested them on the table, although one of his legs kept bouncing up and down persistently.

"Did those scoundrels threaten you?"

"No."

"Did they make you swear an oath that might compromise your safety or freedom sooner or later?"

His lips puffed with a surprised chuckle. "No, they didn't. They didn’t say anything at all, unless they were the ones talking to me in my head. Which may well be possible, now that I think about it." He paused, frowning. "I don’t remember much of my walk through the tunnels, though. My thoughts were a blur, like I’d been drugged.”

Zohra's coarse skin paled until its usual almond tone, much like his, had a sickly touch to it. "So someone did use a spell on you. Would you mind if I examined you real quick?"

Arran shook his head, so she stood up from her chair and hobbled around the table. Her hands were cool and dry when she laid them on his forehead. Almost a minute went by while he waited until Zohra, her eyes shut tight, had finished.

A soft rumble escaped her throat as she backed away at last. Resting one hip on the table, she brushed his messy, dark curls from his forehead. "I can sense the remnants of psychic magic on you, the magic of a mind warper. Whoever enchanted you took over your body to guide you through the tunnels."

Arran bit his nails, but Zohra swatted his fingers to make him stop, giving him a glare that reminded him an awful lot of an admonishing grandmother. 

"Somehow, the knowledge that someone may take away my free will, with or without my consent, doesn’t make me feel better,” he said.

"At least it got you out of that place," she reassured him, patting his cheek. "Best-case scenario, you never come across another mind warper again in your life. They’re extremely rare as it is, anyway."