Magic Under Stone

The people are so different here. They wear such colors! I see women in the street, with bare arms and half-bare legs, all wrapped in gold and emerald. They are quick to laugh. People move differently here too. They look somehow more alive. Some of the women practice magic, even. All I can think of is home, and how dark it is, and how dark I felt, and how cold. We always behaved as if someone was watching us, even if it wasn’t true. Remember how reluctant I was to dance with you, to sing with you?

And yet I feel different here. I am trying to hide it, and maybe everyone is. I keep my head down and follow all the rules. But I do think of you, and how I think you planted something in me that wants to blossom under the sun. And if it did, I don’t know what anyone would think of me.

I must beg your forgiveness for being so candid. I’m not sure if my letter will be at all welcome to you. But right now you are an ocean away, and I am sitting at my desk drinking in the heavy scent of flowers outside my window, and you feel like the only person I can safely be honest with. You and I, I think, will always feel a little bit alone no matter where our lives take us. I don’t think you shall tell anyone. My thoughts are a muddle and I need to sort them. I beg your indulgence.

Most sincerely,

Hollin Parry

I was not sure at all what to make of this letter. A part of me liked it very much, and I knew I should not.

From the start, Hollin had appreciated me more than most other men of Lorinar, but he had still not seen me for what I was. He had seen a beautiful, exotic creature from some far-off land that he dreamed of escaping to. It had always been escape with Hollin.

Yet, even while half of me despised him, he knew how to slip a hand under my skin and twist at my heart, appealing to my own sense of isolation. And, for all his many mistakes, I thought his feelings were genuine.

I made three false starts before I finally began to craft my reply. Of course, I still started with pleasantries, that I hoped the climate agreed with him and so on, and I spoke of the attractive grounds and my friendship with Celestina, as if we were all a happy family without any troubles. I didn’t want to sound like someone who felt alone.

But I understood what he meant about being honest an ocean away. He was so far from me now, and I would not see him for almost a year, if then, which felt an eternity. I might as well have been throwing letters into the fireplace, for all that he felt accessible. I should have politely reminded him that he was a married man and left it at that, but I found myself spilling words onto the paper instead.

Hollin, I know you always wanted to travel. You finally have your chance. Make use of it. If you truly believe that all people are equal, and you truly are fascinated by foreign lands, don’t be held back by men like Mr. Quendley.

But I also hope you realize that New Guinnell is not necessarily a balm to your problems. The country is not there to lull you any more than I was. The people there don’t think they are different, they are going about their normal business, and sometimes I felt that, while you respected me more than other men, you romanticized me. Someone or someplace that is romanticized can’t be real.

This is a lesson I myself learned. I came to this country thinking the streets were paved with gold. I was struck down time and time again, and I came to loathe it, and close myself off, but I still had another lesson to learn. Not all people here are cruel either. Fortunes and happiness alike come with work, wherever you are.

I was only sitting in a room with the nonthreatening objects of everyday life-pen and paper, candle, desk-and yet, my skin was burning. This was a bold way to speak to a man. Especially a prominent man like Hollin Parry.

I read the letter over, trying to think as he might think when he read it.

In the end, I decided I didn’t care. It felt true. It even felt a bit wise, certainly more wise than anything I would say in person. Would I be happier sending him a frothy thing full of pleasantries?

No.

And so I sealed the letter away, readying it for an ocean journey.

Chapter 9

When I came downstairs to put Hollin’s letter in the basket where outgoing mail was kept, Erris was there to tease me.

“We’re not going to hear what you wrote to him? What did his letter say? Don’t make me guess! ‘Dear Nimira, I am terribly sunburned and red as a lobster. If only you were here to do your traditional Slathering Cream on a Sunburned Man dance.’”

I slapped his hand with the letter and put it back in the basket. “Can you be serious for two minutes?”

“Two minutes? I can probably manage that. Are you going to tell me what he said?”

“No! Certainly not with that attitude. Anyway, it was a long letter full of nothing much.”

“You just have an awfully serious look on your face.”

“I don’t have any look on my face. At least, I didn’t. Now I’m cross. You shouldn’t insult my dancing. And Hollin isn’t like that.”

“Hollin is a bigot. With dead animals in his house. And, besides all that, as interesting as tree bark.”

“You hardly-” I stopped. If I defended Hollin, this would become a full-blown quarrel. I suddenly felt entirely irked at Erris, and quickly shook my head to free my thoughts. “I’m not going to discuss this further.”

The trouble with being upset with Erris was that I was attracted to him at the same time. It made it difficult to have a proper argument. Nor was he the arguing sort. Everything was a joke to him.

He laughed now. “No one can look so indignant as you, Nim. Well, unfortunately I can’t prowl around at night and search your room, so I will have to trust you’ll tell me if Hollin says anything unseemly to you.”

“It isn’t as if you’re my suitor, anyway,” I said, hoping to provoke him.

“Well, I should hope that doesn’t mean he is your suitor.” Erris still sounded teasing, but there was nothing teasing about the sudden slant of his eyebrows.

“No, it means simply that if he does say something unseemly, I shall defend myself.”

“I have no doubt of that,” he said with a grin. Which only irked me further.

Another couple of weeks passed. It rained frequently, and the evergreens flourished with clusters of cones. The maple, birch, and poplar began to shed their leaves of flame, and one morning I woke to the first snow, falling soft and sparse.

As the world began to tuck in for a long sleep, Violet began to wake up. Erris’s simple treatment of fresh food and hours of fresh, brisk air didn’t make her catch cold as Celestina feared but instead brought color to her pale cheeks, although she was still thin. But then, she didn’t eat much. She had a hideous tantrum when he tried to feed her raw carrots for breakfast.

The trouble with Violet’s feeling better was that she wanted to follow everyone everywhere. Whether we were cooking or all gathered around the piano, Violet was there chattering as if she had years of stored conversation to unload. She told us stories from books she was reading when we’d rather simply read the book ourselves, and she sulked when we didn’t pay attention to her. She was a champion sulker, capable of keeping the same sullen face and pose for an hour straight until it was impossible to have fun in her presence, but her good moods were almost as irritating.

One afternoon I had just set out on a walk, and Violet came running after me like an excitable puppy. She panted dreadfully when she caught up to me. I thought for a moment she might pass out.

“Nimira-where are you-going? I want to-come.”

“To the bluff.”

“Oh-near-Mother’s grave?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never seen a grave there.”

She paused to breathe a moment and then said, “You haven’t seen it? I’ll show you!” She sounded rather eager about a grave, I thought.

Along with color in her cheeks, Violet now wore proper clothes every day and not nightgowns and robes. Celestina had offered to make her trousers, but Violet had a wardrobe full of dresses and she wanted to wear them. They were the dresses of a girl, not a woman. Today it was a plaid affair with a square white collar. The ribbons in