Half Magic | Book 2

Two: Markings and Mysteries

Schula and I stared at the coin for a long moment. When the serving girl approached our table, Schula scooped it into her lap, as well as the note the wordweaver had left with it.

"Quite a story tonight, he really got into it today," she said with a smile. "Can I get you three anything else?"

"No, thank you," I murmured, sliding money to her for our meals. "You know that wordweaver?"

She took our payment with a nod. "Oh sure, he comes in every few days. If the owner doesn't already have entertainment lined up he welcomes the show. You see how the locals love it, he's a favorite around here. He gets a free meal and a tip and we get a full house."

"Do you know where we can find him?" Nassir asked.

"Hm, that may be a tricky one. Like I said, he wanders. I think his real name is Kinza, but I'm not positive," she said.

"Munda!" A gruff voice echoed from the kitchen.

Our server, Munda I guess, nodded to us. "Well, have a good evening."

She trotted to the kitchen and out of sight.

"What do you make of all that?" Schula asked.

"Well, first I would like to know what the note said," Nassir murmured. "As I cannot see it."

"Oh, sorry. It says find me if you can, witch." Schula pulled the coin from under the table. "That must mean you, Wren. And he left a coin."

"That's not currency," I said. "None from Sulls at least."

"Then what is it?" Schula asked.

I took the coin from her for inspection. Not only had I never seen a brass coin before, I had never seen a coin so big. It was slightly larger than a golden sun piece, which was almost as wide as my thumb was long.

"On one side is a smiling mouth with a key in it..." I murmured, turning it over. "And the other side has a closed lock on it."

"Strange," Nassir murmured. "I suppose we have two trails to chase then."

"Two?" I asked, consumed with looking at the coin.

"The wordweaver or the Mist walker," Schula said. "But the Mist walker could just be a story, we've seen the wordweaver and at least we know he's real. And he mentioned the witches."

"Hmm, I'm not so sure," Nassir said, leaning back in his chair and scratching his beard. "I wonder if this Mist walker isn't an unseelie creature."

"You think it's real?" I asked. "I've never heard this story before, and I have heard most of them."

"It feels to me like a kind of wraith," Nassir said.

My whole body shuddered and I wrapped my arms around myself. A wraith. The first unseelie creature I had ever encountered was a Wraith. The second thing I had met from the Wyldes, after Thain.

"Do you really think she can bring forth spirits that have died?" Schula asked.

Silence spanned the table as Nassir thought about it, taking a long drag of his tankard and setting down the empty glass.

"It's possible," Nassir finally answered. "I've seen enough astonishing things in my time that I would not disbelieve much from a powerful enough being. It sounds like this Mist walker deals in life force though, a price I wouldn't be willing any of us to pay."

His sightless stare pierced each of us in turn, as though he wanted confirmation of something.

Schula nodded, but it didn't reach her eyes. I'm sure we all had someone we would want to see, just one more time.