Free Sword Sisters by Alex Bledsoe, Tara Cardinal Page A

what they were capable of.
    As if Amelia wouldn’t tell them the first chance she got. She had gone to talk to the elders, after all.
    On the lone chair lay a neatly-folded girl’s dress. Unless I wanted to parade around for all to see, I’d have to wear that. I hated dresses and not just because they made me think of those god-awful dinners at the castle. They were impractical for fighting. They tangled in your legs and gave your opponent way too many things to grab onto. But when you have no choice, you take what’s in front of you.
    I stood, waited for the brief dizziness to pass, then walked over to the dress. As I was about to put it on, an older woman entered. I held it in front of myself.
    “No need for modesty, dearie,” she said, wary but kind. She tried to peer around the dress. I held the dress that much tighter. “I undressed you and bathed your wounds although they look almost healed up now.”
    “They are,” I said. “Thank you.”
    “I’m Sela.”
    “Are you Amelia’s mother?”
    “I am. I thank you for bringing our daughter back to us alive. And for killing Lurida Lumo.” She began straightening the bed. “Well, these blankets will have to be soaked to get all this blood out.”
    “I’m sorry. Be careful with those big hairs. They’ll stick you.”
    “Not your fault, dearie.”
    As she stripped the bed, I started to pull on the dress, but my bitten shoulder was still sore, and when I tried to raise that arm, I felt the dregs of the poison burning deep in the muscles.
    I must’ve gasped aloud because Sela appeared behind me. “Here, dearie, let me help. You don’t want to tear it on your, ahm…pointy bits.”
    I felt my face burn red, but I faced away from her so she couldn’t see it. She guided the dress over my head and down my back, pulling it away from my spines.
    When it fell into position, I luxuriated in the soft cloth. Reaper clothes were practical, not luxurious, and the gowns I wore to dinner were thin and claustrophobically clingy. This, though…I’d been wrong. A girl could move in this. Maybe not fight, maybe not run, but it made the day-to-day toil of a normal life seem bearable.
    Sela turned me to face her. “You look lovely. Well, except for your hair.”
    I ran a hand through it. Or rather, I tried. It was tangled and matted from sweat and fighting, and nothing short of a long wash or a shearing would detangle it. “Yeah, no one much likes my hair.”
    “Amelia’s hair tangles something fierce too. I’ve got some special lotion that makes it easier to brush. If you’d allow me, I’d be glad to use it on you.”
    I narrowed my eyes. I’d been taught that humans weren’t often kind to Reapers without an ulterior motive. The exceptions, like Aaron and Amelia, were rare. Maybe it was just people whose names begin with A. “Why are you being so nice to me?”
    Sela gave me a look that I imagined she’d given Amelia many times in her life. “Let’s see. You saved my daughter from an awful fate and freed our village from a terrible curse. Seems the least I can do is get some tangles out of your mane.”
    I smiled. “Well, since you put it that way…”
    “Mommy?” a new voice said.
    In the doorway stood two children: a little boy—though it was hard to tell with the long, blond hair that most peasants sport—and a taller girl. The girl was older, with brown curls not unlike Amelia’s, and the blond little boy tightly held her hand while half-hiding behind her full but dirty skirts. She watched me carefully as she said, “The other kids made fun of Hatho. They said he was a baby.”
    “He is a baby,” Sela said, not missing a beat with the housework.
    “No, I’m a big boy,” Hatho said defiantly although he was still hiding.
    Sela put her hands on her hips. “Horva, did you beat up the other kids again?”
    “Only that mean old Borsaw. He deserved it.”
    “He’s fifteen years old!”
    Horva grinned. She had lost two teeth recently. “He cries