Fearless (Mirrorworld) - By Cornelia Funke Page 0,53
thorns by now. ‘What do you think will happen when you get them the crossbow?’
Nice try.
Nerron tucked the cloth with the shoot into his pocket. ‘Our clients are our professional secret, aren’t they?’ He could already hear the wolves between the trees. ‘I’m not asking you whom you’re seeking the crossbow for.’
He gave his rival one last smile.
‘I really am glad our paths crossed this way. I was getting sick of constantly hearing that you are the best in our trade. Good luck with the wolves. Maybe you’ll think of some-thing. Surprise me! They don’t leave much behind, and it would be such a pity if the vixen has to spend the rest of her life searching for you.’
Nerron jumped on to his horse just as the first wolf came slinking towards Reckless. The others would soon follow. Unlike the onyx lords, however, Nerron didn’t find the screams of a dying man very entertaining.
And Louis had probably found a virgin by now.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
A HOUSE AT THE EDGE OF THE VILLAGE
The house looked even more shabby than she’d remembered. Mould sprouting in the stone walls. The stench of rotting straw and pig manure. Fishing had made some men along this coast rich, but her father had always taken his money to the tavern than rather than bring it home. Father. Why do you still call him that, Fox? Her mother had married him when Fox was three. Two years and two months after the death of her actual father.
A stump was all that was left of the apple tree by the gate, which she had climbed so often as a child, because the world always seemed much less frightening when viewed from above. The sight nearly made her turn her horse about, but her mother had planted primroses in front of the house, just as she used to every spring. The pale yellow blossoms reminded Fox of all the good times she’d had because of her behind those shabby walls. As a child she’d wondered that something as fragile as a flower could withstand the wind and the world. Maybe her mother had always planted those primroses to teach her and her brothers just that.
Fox touched the posy she’d tucked into her saddle. The blossoms had withered, but that didn’t make them any less beautiful. Jacob had given them to her. For a brief moment, those dried flowers made her feel as though he was by her side. Their two lives, connected through a flower.
The gate stood open, just as it had on the day they chased her away. Her two older brothers and her stepfather. They’d tried to take the fur dress away from her. Fox had torn it from their hands, and she’d started to run. She had felt the bruises from the stones they’d thrown at her for weeks, even under the vixen’s fur. Her youngest brother had stayed hidden in the house, together with her mother, who’d stared through the window as though trying to hold her back with her eyes. But she hadn’t protected her daughter; how should she have? She could never even protect herself.
As Fox walked towards the door, she could see her younger self running across the yard. Her red hair braided into pigtails, her knees covered in scabs and bruises. Celeste, where have you been this time?
She’d been in Ogre caves with Jacob, and in the oven rooms of Black Witches, yet she’d never wanted to leave a place as badly as she had this one. Not even her love for her mother had been able to bring her back. Now it was her love for Jacob that led her here again.
Knock, Celeste. They won’t be here. Not at this time.
As soon as her hand touched the wood of the door, Fox was assaulted by the past. It gulped up whatever strength and confidence she’d been given by the fur and the many years away from this place. Jacob! Fox pictured his face so it would remind her of the present and of the Fox she’d become.
‘Who’s there?’ Her mother’s voice. What a mighty animal the past is. The hushed songs her mother used to sing to her at bedtime . . . her mother’s fingers in her hair as she braided it . . . Who is there? Yes, who?
‘It’s me, Celeste.’
The name tasted of the honey Fox used to steal from the wild bees when she was a child, and of the nettles that used to sting her bare legs.