Warmoon [ONC 2020]•[Shortlisted]•[Honorable Mention List, Stunning Worlds]

3. Mistakes

Halfway back to Ardusk, the drizzle began turning into rain. By the time Rhoa reached White's Ridge and started down into the valley, what had been miserably damp was now miserably drenched, and a stiff wind had picked up, whipping the rain ahead of it, stinging her face. She made it through Ghaffig's Bog but wound up leading her exhausted mare the last mile to the village; getting home to a hot kitchen fire and a mug of spiced wine was all she could think about.

Nevertheless, she brought the mare to a halt on the hill above the village, looking down over the picket walls at the cluster of drab wattle-and-daub buildings and muddy, unpaved streets. The market square was empty, the stalls boarded up. No one was there to buy goods or hawk their wares because there wasn't anything left to sell. All of it had been handed over to the Divine Order for safekeeping in the Storehouse.

There was still movement, though.

A door slammed, and Old Marjan went galumphing across the wagon-ruts of the square to the alehouse. Three of the village crones were sitting on Mother Mouri's front porch, smoking their clay pipes. Boz Ghaffig came slogging along the street that ran perpendicular to the main road, heading for the mill, his watchman's club slung over his shoulder. Sedir was in his smithy, the sound of his hammer striking hot iron audible even in the rain.

Worse than that, on the northern edge of town she could make out several people standing in a soggy line outside the Diviner's Storehouse, waiting to get their rations.

Rhoa caught herself reaching to cover her scars again and sighed. Her mother was right. The villagers didn't all hate her. Sedir didn't. Neither did Orla and her parents, or Tettony's family. It wasn't hatred that had driven Reinosh and his followers, either. He had been afraid and desperate, and now he and his followers were dead.

She wasn't seven, anymore. She was fully capable of defending herself.

Rhoa looked at the mare. "Maybe no one will notice us and we can sneak right through?"

The mare snorted, then whickered, flicking her ears forward.

"Is that so?" Rhoa muttered, cocking an eyebrow. "Yes, well, figures you'd say that, they don't throw rotten eggs at you... But you have a point. We're not going to get home standing here."

With a quick check of her dagger and throwing axe, she gave a tug on the reins and started down the hill.

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Boots squelching through ankle-deep puddles, Rhoa walked down the middle of the main road, head down. It was easier to avoid the stares that way. Easier, but not entirely possible. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught Old Marjan making a warding sign with his thumb and forefinger, his lips drawn into a cruel, disgusted leer as he watched her from the shelter of the alehouse doorway.

The three old women smoking their pipes on Mother Mouri's porch scowled and whispered as she walked past, and one of them spat in her direction, then made that same warding sign, forefinger crossed over thumb. Mother Mouri lifted her Diviner's amulet and made a show of pressing it to her wrinkled lips while mumbling a prayer for protection.

Rhoa turned away and kept going, thankful when Sedir came to the front of his open-air smithy and lifted his hand in a friendly wave.

They might not all hate her, but the new Diviner's tithe certainly wasn't making her any friends. The two dairy maids ahead of her in line for the Storehouse took one look behind them and hurried off.

Being born under a Warmoon did have some benefits. Teeth pressed tight together, Rhoa shook her head and moved up two spaces, then leaned against her mare's shoulder. At least it was Diviner Longstruik manning the counter and not First Diviner Rokstag. Rhoa suppressed an involuntary shiver and shot a glance around. Rokstag could still be lurking somewhere, but perhaps he had gone on an errand, or been called back to Lubelin. Or fallen off a cliff. She could always hope.