Free Strands of Starlight by Gael Baudino Page B

dropped her eyes. “Nothing . . . at present, Varden. Thank you for healing me. I'm not sure you did any good, though: I have to kill him now, and I'm not sure I can. You probably should have let me die.”
    “Be at peace.” He laid a hand on her forehead. “Sleep now. You have traveled far, and my powers cannot achieve everything. Sleep.” Though soothing, his words carried the essence of command, and she obeyed.
    ***
    She slept fitfully, wandering through labyrinthine corridors of dream, trapped by doorways bricked up with montages of groping hands, leering faces, pain, blood. She awakened frequently throughout the night, not knowing where she was, crying out, falling back into nightmare as though she were a swimmer too storm-tossed to pull herself onto shore.
    Varden remained by her bed; and when, infrequently, her dreams parted enough for her to peer out into consciousness, she saw him, his eyes shimmering with the stars. Once, in the hours just before dawn, she fled into consciousness with a shriek and found herself clinging to Varden, her cheek pressed against his tunic.
    “You are safe here, beloved,” he said, laying her back down. “There is nothing here that will harm you. Rest.”
    After that, her dreams were more tranquil, and she had glimpses of starlit skies and sunlit forests. For an instant before she awoke, she saw a grassy plain under a night sky. A woman walked there, robed in blue and silver.
    Miriam blinked at the pale morning light that washed the room. For a few minutes, she was too groggy to remember anything, and she was content to know that she was in a soft bed and that there was a fire on the hearth.
    Then memory returned. She winced, her stomach cramped, and the white-hot anger blazed up again.
    Rolling over, fists balled beneath the pillow, she gritted her teeth and fought. She had to control her anger. There was a task before her now, and she had to think, to plan. Somewhere, sometime, she would find the stranger; somehow she would kill him. She had run too long. She would no longer be a victim for the world. The change started now.
    The hammering in her temples subsided slowly, and she sat up. Varden was gone. Fresh clothing lay neatly folded on the table. A pitcher of water and a basin sat beside it.
    Resolve had calmed her, and she rose, washed, and dressed herself in the simple blue gown that had been left for her. Someone had estimated her size very well, though the style seemed more fitting for a young girl than for a woman who had been battered by life for most of a decade. The flowered trim on the hems seemed superfluous, even frivolous, but at the same time it comforted her, as though the idea that a seamstress had thought to adorn clothing so innocently implied that somewhere, innocence was safe.
    She found her bundle at the foot of the bed, and she dug through it for the brush Mika had given her, then took a moment at the mirror by the door and ripped at the stubborn tangles in her hair.
    Innocence. Had she ever been innocent? Fear alone had dominated her existence since she had first lifted her infant hands and cured a playmate's cut. Fear blotted out everything. Even her parents had been afraid, and eight years ago, in fear, they had put her out of the house.
    She looked again at the gown. It was an unkind reminder of what she had never possessed. Such innocence was safe here in Saint Brigid, perhaps, but it had best stay far away from little vagabond healers lest it be blasted.
    A distant knocking. The sound of muffled voices.
    She listened at the door and distinguished Kay's cheerful tenor and a woman's gentler inflections. “No, she's not up yet,” the priest was saying. “But I expect her soon. There's a hot breakfast waiting for her.”
    “Did she spend a hard night?” It was a girl's voice, actually, firm and clear, with a touch of water in it.
    “Varden sat with her.”
    “Bless him. Mother sent these along with her best wishes.”
    Miriam lifted the latch and