“We could.”
Joran looked at me askance for a moment. “Why would you do that?”
I shook my head. “I guess I was curious.”
“You know, there was a time when you probably would’ve followed the path without paying any attention to the weather.” He arched a brow at me, a slow smile spreading across his face. “Is that what happened to you? Were you not paying attention to the weather?”
“I was ,” I told him. “I knew the storm was coming, and that I didn’t have too long. I just wanted to try to see how far the path went.”
“How far did it go?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t take enough time to explore.”
“We’ll have to go back.”
“We’ll have to wait for the ground to dry out. It was pretty bad out there.”
“I figured that. I was surprised that you came here.”
“The road washed away,” I said. “And there were parts of the plains that flooded. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen anything quite like that.”
He looked back to the window, staring out into the darkness. I turned to Tara, watching her. “What’s wrong with your sister?”
“Nothing,” Joran said.
“Something’s off.”
“She’s been spending too much time in the city.”
“Your mother lets her go?”
“Lets her? She doesn’t really give much of a choice in the matter. She disappears, and only comes back late at night. They’ve punished her, but she doesn’t stop. My mother has a soft spot for it. It’s like she wants to encourage it. My father doesn’t really know what to do about it, and the way that he dotes on Sophie doesn’t really help, either.”
“I suppose every family has challenges,” I said.
Joran watched me. “Do you think your sister needs help?”
I frowned at him. “I’m sure she doesn’t need your help.”
He started to laugh. “I could stop by. We do have that fence to finish.”
“I’ve mostly finished the fence,” I told him.
“Then I could help you with something else. There have to be other chores you need my assistance with. We need to make it something manly, though. Something Alison can watch me doing.”
“Anything she watches you doing isn’t going to be that manly. If she wants to watch someone doing manly things, all she has to do is watch me.”
“You’re disgusting,” Joran said.
“You’re the one who’s trying to weasel in on my sister.”
“I would think you would be thrilled to have me interested in your sister.”
“She needs to get away from the farm,” I said. More than anything, I felt I needed to help Alison with that. “She needs to live a better life than the one she has now.” I swallowed. When she left, it would only be me taking care of the others.
“What about you?” Joran asked the question with an earnestness on his face that was rare for him. “I know you’re concerned about Alison. And as much as I make jokes about it, I understand.” He glanced over to where Tara sat near the fire. “But what about you? You’re just as trapped on the farm as your sister.”
“I’m not trapped,” I said, more forcefully than I intended. “Why would I leave?”
“Because…” He took a deep breath, shaking his head. “I don’t know. Because I remember when you were determined to go to the capital. When you wanted to enroll in the Academy.”
“That was a long time ago.”
“It was only a few years ago,” Joran said. “Fine. But that was before.”
Neither of us needed for me to say what it was like before. Both of us knew. I lived with it day after day and Joran lived with the memory of his role, however incidental.
“You could sell the farm,” he said. “I’ve heard my parents talking about it. I know there are people who would take it over. You sit on prime land.”
I took a deep breath, letting it out slowly, finally shaking my head. That was what Alison had been talking about as well. Maybe that would be for the best. “I could never sell it. The farm has been in my family for generations. It was my great-grandfather’s, then my grandfather’s. My father’s. And now it’s mine , I guess.”
“It was supposed to be Thenis’s,” he said.
“Yeah? Well, it can’t be Thenis’s. Not anymore.”
I leaned forward, staring out the window as lightning flashed again. When it did, I could have sworn I saw a dragon flying. It was a taunt, a reminder of what I had once dreamed of, and the way those dreams had been changed. I decided long ago I needed to alter my dreams, so that I could maintain my sanity, and find whatever measure of happiness might be available to me.
6
Morning came too quickly for me. I wasn’t fully rested. By the time I awoke, sunlight shone in through the windows of Joran’s house. It was a comforting warmth, and the fire in the hearth had burned down to little more than embers. A faint crackling remained. Sophie had slept in front of the hearth, curled up around the stone. There was something innocent and sweet about the way she lay there. Tara had stayed for a little while longer before she, too, had disappeared, leaving only Joran and me. We had talked until late in the night,reminding me of when we were younger. Those had been the days when the two of us sat and talked about dreams and wishes and the way that we thought that our lives might end up. Unfortunately, those had never come to pass, at least not the way we had intended.
I stretched, twisting in place. My body was stiff and achy from the way I had slept with my head leaning against the window, staring out into the darkness. “You’re awake.”
I turned to see Tara sitting at a table in the back of the home. A lantern rested on the table, dimmed to a pale orange light,
