The Thinking Woman's Guide to Real Magic

family of young sparrows. “Where’s your father, then?” Nora asked.

“Our father’s dead,” said the boy. “We used to have a bigger house, and chickens. Then Ma married Rorpin,” he said, looking at the sleeping man with distaste. “He drinks all the time. He’s been drunk ever since Irseln got killed.”

“Maybe he misses her,” Nora said.

“Maybe,” the boy allowed. “No one else misses her.”

“Why not?” Nora asked.

The boy shrugged. “She cried and complained all the time. She didn’t like us. We didn’t like her.”

“She hit me,” said the older girl. “She hit me a lot. And Gissy, too.”

“Irseln hit me,” said the smaller girl, rather proudly.

“Ma said her pa spoiled her. Irseln wouldn’t do what my ma said, ever,” said the older girl self-righteously. “Is that man in there really a wizard?”

“Yes,” said Nora.

“Is he going to do magic?”

“Probably.”

“Can we watch?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“He doesn’t want to be disturbed,” Nora said. “Where were you playing the day Irseln was killed?”

“Down in the meadow.” The girl indicated a path leading through the trees.

“Will you show me?”

“I guess so. Have you seen him do magic before?”

“Yes. A couple of times.”

“Like what? Can he turn things into gold?”

“Can he talk to animals?”

“Can he fly?”

Keeping small children entertained becomes much easier if one has spent some time in the company of a practicing magician, Nora discovered. Even a spare, relatively unemotional account of how Aruendiel had arranged her escape from the Faitoren held the children’s attention on the way to the meadow. Along the way she learned that the boy was named Horl, the two girls were Sova and Gissy, the wooden spoon that Sova clutched was actually a doll named Princess Butter, and no one seemed to call the toddler anything but the baby.

The children began a rambling, unstructured game of tag, all of them chasing one another around the meadow, except for the baby, who functioned as home base. It was a good game for unsupervised kids, Nora thought, because it meant that someone was always running after the toddler. She could not quite rid herself of the faint apprehension that Irseln’s killer might be lurking nearby, but the only other visitor to the meadow was a skinny dog that raced around with the children, barking.

His name was Browncoat, Sova informed Nora; sometimes he belonged to her family, sometimes he belonged to the family in the next hut. “Right now he belongs to them,” she said, flopping down on the grass and hugging the dog, “because Ma says we can’t feed him. Except sometimes. I miss Irseln,” she added suddenly.

“I thought you and Irseln didn’t get along.”

“No, but she could run fast. She was good at this game.” Sova twisted a lock of hair. “I wish she could have run away from the killer. Then she would still be alive.”

“We don’t know what happened yet,” Nora said carefully, but Sova shook her head.

“Gissy saw her ghost. Felt it.”

“Her ghost?” Nora said dubiously. Maybe Irseln was alive and Gissy had seen her.

“She pinched Gissy, like she always did. But there was no one there.”

The game was slackening. Gissy came trotting up slowly, tired, wisps of dry grass in her hair. “Tell Nora how Irseln pinched you last night,” Sova urged.

Gissy shook her head rebelliously. “Hungry,” she said. “I want stew.”

“Irseln pinched you, remember? Say yes, or I’ll pinch you.”

“Hold on, Sova. No pinching,” Nora said hastily. “Why don’t we go back to the house now?” Would there be anything to eat there? She hoisted the baby onto her hip and took Gissy by the hand. As she and the girls walked through the grass, Sova scolded her doll: “Did you pinch Gissy? Bad girl, do you want a whipping? There, how do you like that? Stop crying, you bad girl! I’ve never known a brat as bad as you.”

“She’s crying because you’re slapping her,” Nora said.

“If she won’t stop crying, I will hit her with a stick. She has to mind her ma. She’s a bad girl, as bad as Irseln.”

Horl ran over to them. “Are we going back?” he asked.

“Gissy’s hungry, so we’re going back to the house,” Nora said.

“There’s nothing to eat there,” Horl said flatly.

“I want more stew,” said Gissy, her face crinkling. “The stew Ma made.”

“It’s all gone now, Gissy,” Sova said.

“You be quiet, Sova,” said Horl. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I do, too!” Sova said with indignation. “My ma found a hurt goat, it was going to die,” she explained to Nora. “So we had stew.”

Horl sighed dramatically. “We weren’t supposed to say anything about that, remember? The goat might belong to someone.”

“It wasn’t Nora’s goat. Was it, Nora?”

“No, not mine,” Nora said lightly. “Was the stew good?”

“Yes. I wish we had more. Could the wizard turn a rock into stew?”

Nora had entertained similar questions. “I think so,” she hazarded. “But what if it turned back into a rock inside your stomach?”

They debated the potential side effects of transformed foodstuffs all the way back. Shadows were lengthening; the sun was low on the horizon. The dog accompanied them, running in and out of the woods with muddy paws. He carried a light-colored, knob-ended stick in his mouth; Nora found something about its shape disturbing.

When they came in sight of the house, Aruendiel and the headman were standing near the shed, talking. Horl broke into a run. “Where’s my mother?” he demanded.

“She’s inside,” Aruendiel said curtly, then watched as the boy ran into the house, slamming the back door behind him. Sova and Gissy followed more slowly, pulling the toddler between them.

Nora walked over to the magician. Aruendiel was having a discussion with the man in brown that was obviously growing heated, but had not quite risen to the level of argument. After a moment, Aruendiel broke off and looked down at her. She was struck by how somber he looked, the lines around his mouth as stark as cracks in ice.

“Aruendiel,” she said, “I have to talk to you. I think something absolutely terrible has happened.”

“Ah,” he said, seizing Nora’s arm and leading her a few steps away, “what did the children say?” He spoke more warmly than she expected; it crossed her mind that he was pleased to have an ally.

“There’s no proof,” she said, trying to marshal her thoughts and impressions, feeling dismayed because they made such a motley array. “But I have a bad, bad feeling. Irseln misbehaved, she wouldn’t mind her mother —who’s her stepmother, did you know that?” Aruendiel nodded, and Nora went on: “The little girl, Sova, she talked about hitting her doll with a stick because it was a bad girl, like Irseln. And they’re all so thin—practically starving—but they had a big meal recently. Some kind of meat, a stew. The boy didn’t want to talk about it. And then I saw the dog with a bone in its mouth, like a femur—oh, this sounds ridiculous.”

Aruendiel clenched his mouth. “No, this is an ugly business. Mistress Massy is lying about something, you don’t need magic to see that—although that’s what my magic says, too. But the headman doesn’t want me to force the truth out of her. It’s all right for that pathetic woodlicker, but not for the stepmother of the missing girl. His first cousin, too. We must find the girl’s body. Where is the dog?”

“The dog?” Nora blinked. Aruendiel repeated his question with some impatience. She looked around but