“Well, hello.” Her father’s voice was steady and strong.
Wren couldn’t remember the last time she had seen him looking so well. Her knees, which had gone weak from her rush of panic, gave out with relief. She sank onto the edge of the bed, careful to avoid his feet.
“What’s wrong?” Her father examined her face sympathetically.
“I thought…” Wren struggled to catch her breath.
The coppery taste still sat on her tongue, but seeing her father so alert and alive made it difficult for her to take the flavor of the magic seriously. It was only because she had watched the scene in the marketplace that she had panicked so. She suddenly felt ridiculous.
“You worry too much.” Her father gave Wren a pointed look. She didn’t have the energy to protest. He was right. Worrying had taken the place of any hobbies, of any hopes or dreams for the future. “In fact, I’m beginning to think my lungs could use some fresh air. What say we take a walk?”
Wren’s smile wavered. The outside world had turned so volatile and vicious, her father would hardly recognize it. “I’m not so sure about that.” She motioned for her father to lean forward, plumping the pillows that had gone flat beneath his back.
“Stop that,” her father laughed, waving away her effort. “Really, Eve, I’m fine.”
Wren froze. “What?”
“You fuss too much, Evie. I’m all right.”
Nothing about her father calling Wren by her mother’s name was all right. Wren turned to face him. “Papa.”
But the word held no weight. His face twisted in confusion. His glassy eyes looked past Wren. Looked right through her.
“No,” she said. Her father flinched at her harsh tone, but for once Wren didn’t care. She could only see what was to come next: He would lose his resilient spirit and forget his family completely. All those years of nursing him back to health would have been for nothing.
“Let me find you something to eat.” Wren’s voice shook, but she did her best to keep a smile on her face as she guided her father back onto the pillows and inched slowly out of the room, pulling the door shut behind her. She had no intention of cooking; she merely needed a rational reason to flee her father’s hollow gaze.
Wren paced the floor of the main room, tugging at her braid. The dark magic now hung so low in the sky that she could see it out of every window. It draped itself across the cottage like a cloak. She murmured nonsense words under her breath as she drew all the shutters. She sank into a chair, rested her elbows on the table, and held her head in her hands.
She had tried so hard. Had been so careful. She had burned sage to purify their small space. She had put elderberries in his tea and broth. She had covered her mouth each time she left the cottage, and upon her return she had scrubbed her hands until they were raw and red. Yet her father had been struck anyway. It felt personal, as though Wren herself had done something to cause it. As though she hadn’t protected her father the way she should have.
But Wren had done everything for him, given up everything for him. Her entire life had been one endless sacrifice—ignoring hunger’s rumble as she offered up her portion of broth to her father, peddling eggs when she should have been attending school with the village children, staying far from the Witchlands so that her father would never know what she truly was.
Or perhaps it was her fault, but not for the reasons she thought. Perhaps her constant wanting, the ache in her chest every time she turned away from magic, the awe she felt having stood before Tamsin the witch—perhaps those things were the reason he had fallen ill.
Maybe Wren had compromised her father not with her actions but with her thoughts.
And he was compromised, her existence already scrubbed from his memory. If her father did not remember his daughter, all of Wren’s sacrifices had been for naught. Her life would leave absolutely no mark on the world. She could have passed through the Witchwood and entered the Witchlands. She could have studied under the Coven, learned how to harness all the magic swirling within her. She could have been different. She could have been more.
If her father succumbed to the plague, Wren would have nothing a thousand times over.
Her sacrifice needed to matter. Her decision to put her father first needed to matter.
Wren laid her hands flat on the bare table, stared at her long, crooked fingers, her dirty nails, her bloody cuticles. Wren had the hands of a worker. The hands of someone who didn’t give up.
So she wouldn’t.
The sky had turned a glowing green. The air held a hint of bile. Wren held a sleeve to her nose, but the scent seeped through her skin, settling in the back of her mouth atop the already bitter taste of desperation. She hurried down the path toward Wells, darting past the same dangers she had encountered only hours before. Her body moved quickly, but her heart was heavy, her anxiety weighing her down.
She shoved her hand in her pocket, touching the silver for reassurance. It was the last of Tamsin’s coins. Perhaps it was silly to spend the coin from a witch on a remedy sold by a tinker, but it was the only option she could see through the fog of panic that had settled atop her brain.
The town square was even more deserted than before. The baker and her wife had packed up. The butcher, too, had closed his stall. Only the tinker and a woman offering wilting bouquets of herbs remained.
“Is this enough?” Wren stood before the wizened man, the silver coin clutched in her shaking fingers.
“What’s that, now?” The tinker did not look up from where
