“Nina,” I said. “What are you doing here?”
“Looking for you.” She thrust out her chin proudly. “I knew you must be from here cause you knew all sorts of magic.” She looked around. “But it’s bigger than I thought it would be. I know you didn’t give anyone in Trebon your name because then they’d have power over you, but I have to say it makes you terribly hard to find.”
Had I not told anyone my name in Trebon? Some of my memories of that time were vague, as I’d had a bit of a concussion. It was probably for the best I’d kept myself anonymous, given that I’d been responsible for burning down a sizable portion of the town.
“I’m sorry to put you to so much work,” I said, still not sure what this was all about.
Nina took a step closer. “I had dreams after you left,” she said, her voice low and confidential. “Bad dreams. I thought they were coming for me because of what I told you.” She gave me a meaningful look. “But then I started sleeping with the amulet you gave me. I made my prayers every night, and the dreams went away.” One of her hands absentmindedly fingered a piece of bright metal that hung around her neck on a leather cord.
I realized with sudden guilt that I’d inadvertently lied to Master Kilvin. I hadn’t sold anyone a charm, or even made anything that would look like one. But I had given Nina an engraved piece of metal and told her it was an amulet to set her mind at ease. Before that she’d been on the edge of nervous hysteria, worried that demons were going to kill her.
“So it’s been working then?” I asked, trying not to sound guilty.
She nodded. “As soon as I had it under my pillow and said my prayers, I slept like a babe at the tit. Then I started having my special dream,” she said, and smiled up at me. “I dreamed about the big pot Jimmy showed me before those folks were kilt up at the Mauthen farm.”
I felt hope rise in my chest. Nina was the only person alive who had seen the ancient piece of pottery. It had been covered with pictures of the Chandrian, and they are jealous of their secrets.
“You remembered something about the pot with the seven people painted on it?” I asked excitedly.
She hesitated for a moment, frowning. “There was eight of them,” she said. “Not seven.”
“Eight?” I asked. “Are you sure?”
She nodded earnestly. “I thought I told you before.”
The rising hope in my chest suddenly fell into the pit of my stomach where it lay heavy and sour. There were seven Chandrian. It was one of the few things I knew for certain about them. If there were eight people on the painted vase Nina had seen . . .
Nina continued to chatter away, unaware of my disappointment. “I dreamed about the pot for three nights in a row,” she said. “And it weren’t a bad dream at all. I woke up all rested and happy every night. I knew then what God was telling me to do.”
She began to root around in her pockets and brought out a length of polished horn more than a handspan long and big around as my thumb. “I remembered how you were so curious about the pot. But I couldn’t tell you anything cause I’d only seen it for a moment.” She handed me the piece of horn, proudly.
I looked down at the cylindrical piece of horn in my hands, not sure what I was supposed to do with it. I looked up at her, confused.
Nina gave an impatient sigh and took the horn back. She twisted it, removing the end like a cap. “My brother made this for me,” she said as she carefully drew a rolled piece of parchment from inside the horn. “Don’t worry. He doesn’t know what it was for.”
She handed me the parchment. “It’s not very good,” she said nervously. “My mum lets me help paint the pots, but this is different. It’s harder doing people than flowers and designs. And it’s hard getting something right that you can only see in your head.”
I was amazed my hands weren’t shaking. “This is what was painted on the vase?” I asked.
“It’s one side of it,” she said. “Something round like this, you can only see a third of it when you’re looking at it from one side.”
“So you dreamed of a different side each night?” I asked.
She shook her head. “Just this side. Three nights in a row.”
I slowly unrolled the piece of paper and instantly recognized the man she had painted. His eyes were pure black. In the background there was a bare tree, and he was standing on a circle of blue with a few wavy lines on it.
“That’s supposed to be water,” she said, pointing. “It’s hard to paint water though. And he’s supposed to be standing on it. There were drifts of snow around him too, and his hair was white. But I couldn’t get the white paint to work. Mixing paints for paper is harder than glazes for pots.”
I nodded, not trusting myself to speak. It was Cinder, the one who had killed my parents. I could see his face in my mind without even trying. Without even closing my eyes.
I unrolled the paper further. There was a second man, or rather the shape of a man in a great hooded robe. Inside the cowl of the robe was nothing but blackness. Over his head were three moons, a full moon, a half moon, and one that was just a crescent. Next to him were two candles. One was yellow with a bright orange flame. The other candle sat underneath his outstretched hand: it was grey with a black flame, and the space around it was smudged and darkened.
“That’s supposed to be shadow, I think,” Nina said, pointing to the area under his hand. “It was more obvious on the pot. I had to use charcoal for that. I couldn’t get it right with paint.”
I nodded again. This was Haliax. The leader of the Chandrian. When I’d seen him he had been surrounded by an unnatural shadow. The fires around him had been strangely dimmed, and the cowl of his cloak had been black as the bottom of a well.
I finished unrolling the paper, revealing a third figure, larger than the other two. He wore armor and an open-faced helmet. On his chest was a bright insignia that looked like an autumn leaf, red on the outside brightening to orange near the middle, with a straight black stem.
The skin of his face was tan, but the hand he held poised upright was a bright red. His other hand was hidden by a large, round object that Nina had somehow managed to color a metallic bronze. I guessed it was his shield.
“He’s the worst,” Nina said, her voice subdued.
I looked down at her. Her face looked somber, and I guessed she’d taken my silence the wrong way. “You shouldn’t say that,” I said. “You’ve done a wonderful job.”
Nina gave a faint smile. “That’s not what I meant,” she said. “He was hard to do. I got the copper pretty okay here.” She touched his shield. “But this red,” her finger brushed his upraised hand, “is supposed to be blood. He’s got blood all over his hand.” She tapped his chest. “And this was brighter, like something burning.”
I recognized him then. It wasn’t a leaf on his chest. It was a tower wrapped in flame. His bloody, outstretched hand wasn’t demonstrating something. It was making a gesture of rebuke toward Haliax and the rest. He was holding up his hand to stop them. This man was one of the Amyr. One of the Ciridae.
The young girl shivered and pulled her cloak around herself. “I don’t like looking at him even now,” she said. “They were all awful to look at. But he was the worst. I can’t get faces right, but his was terrible grim. He looked so angry. He looked like he was ready to burn down the whole world.”
“If this is one side,” I asked, “Do you remember the rest of it?”
“Not like this. I remember there was a woman with no clothes on, and a broken sword, and a fire. . . .” She looked thoughtful, then shook her head again. “Like I told you, I only saw it for a quick second when Jimmy showed me. I think an angel helped me remember this piece in a dream so I could paint it down and bring it to you.”
“Nina,” I said. “This is really amazing. You really have no idea how incredible this is.”