Jade sat sullenly at the table, poking idly at runny scrambled eggs with her fork. Av’ry noted that she didn’t seem especially interested in eating them though; in truth, she was looking a little rough. She had barely said a word to either of them all morning. Av’ry cleared his throat,

  “Something the matter?”

  “You could have warned me about the side effects,” Jade cringed as Mikiva’s chair scraped the stone floor.

  “Sorry,” Av’ry apologized, lowering his voice. “Got a bit of a headache?”

  “A bit?” Jade shot him a withering glare. “It would have been more pleasant if you’d just knocked me out with a paving stone.”

  “We could try that next time,” he suggested with a smile.

  “I really dislike you this morning,” she groaned, covering her eyes with one hand. “I feel even worse than I did before.”

  “That’ll wear off in less than an hour. Then you’ll feel better. Really.”

  “How exactly did you forget to mention this little bonus?”

  “I suppose I wake up hungover so often that I never really noticed the difference,” he shrugged.

  “Like this morning, I take it?” she appraised him.

  “Pfft, barely,” he scoffed. “Eat something, it’ll help.”

  Jade rolled her eyes, winced at the effort, and went back to poking at her eggs. Breakfast was finished in silence, but at least Jade seemed to perk up somewhat by the time she was done.

  “If you aren’t feeling up to it, we can postpone our trip,” Av’ry offered.

  “No! Don’t be ridiculous,” Jade huffed. “I’m fine. As soon as you’re ready, we can leave.”

  “I see no reason to wait. After all, we do need to get to Cillvala as soon as possible,” Mikiva pushed her plate aside.

  “So, where are we heading?” Jade inquired.

  Av’ry reached into his pocket and retrieved a scrap of paper.

  “Not another hand drawn map,” Mikiva groaned.

  “Don’t worry,” he chuckled. “This town actually has street addresses on their houses. We shouldn’t have any trouble finding it. In fact, if this is accurate, it should be only a few streets over.”

  “What are we waiting for?” Jade’s eyes gleamed eagerly.

  Av’ry had been afraid of this. It was why he hadn’t wanted to tell her about this before he had a chance to check it out for himself. He just hoped this wouldn’t end in disappointment.

  The tiny, brightly painted cottage was nestled away on a quiet side-street, away from the hustle and bustle. Woolly-haired mountain sheep milled around in a pen out front, bleating plaintively. They stopped only briefly to observe the interlopers, before returning to scratching at the snow in search of grass. Climbing the stairs to the porch, Av’ry rapped sharply on the front door. After a moment, it creaked open to reveal a petite woman with her hair in a dark brown braid that stretched to her waist and large, amber eyes that regarded them curiously. She wiped her hands on a towel by the door and smiled apologetically.

  “If you’ve come to buy woollen garments, I am afraid I am sold out at the moment,” she apologized.

  Judging by her own clothing, Av’ry wasn’t surprised. The thick, warm wool of her tunic was expertly woven, tailored and dyed a brilliant purple. Such a fine garment undoubtedly fetched a high price in the cold mountain climes, especially among unprepared tourists, but the woman had only a few sheep to harvest for wool, so she likely made a limited quantity.

  “You seem to do very fine work,” Av’ry replied politely. “But actually, we are here for another reason. We were hoping to speak to a man named T’oval Cryzer. Does he live here, by any chance?”

  For a moment, the woman simply stared at him, and Av’ry began to wonder if the ex-priest had moved, or perhaps he had the wrong address. Then she burst into tears.

  “Oh, I am so sorry. I…” Av’ry was at something of a loss for words.

  This was not the reaction he had been expecting, otherwise he would have shielded himself better. The grief was like a punch in the gut. He breathed, carefully distancing himself from the invading emotion. The shepherdess continued to sob, face buried in her hands.

  “Maybe we should come back another time,” Av’ry offered after a moment.

  The woman shook her head, seeming to compose herself somewhat,

  “No, I don’t think that that would help. You will not find T’oval here.”

  “It is very important that we speak with him, do you know where we could find him?”

  “I am afraid that you will not find him anywhere in this world,” she replied, voice catching again.

  Av’ry’s heart sank.

  “I am sorry,” he repeated lamely. “I… I didn’t know.”

  “That isn’t surprising. It has not been that long since, since…” she dissolved into tears again.

  “We should probably go,” he murmured to Jade and Mikiva, backing away from the porch.

  “Wait!” the shepherdess called to him. “Why were you looking for T’oval? Were you friends of his?”

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  “No ma’am,” Av’ry replied. “I had never met him. I was just hoping that he could help a friend of mine with something.”

  She studied him intently,

  “With what?”

  Av’ry wondered if it would be wise to share any of this with a stranger. But, since his lead had turned into a dead end, there didn’t seem to be any harm in trying. As long as he was careful.

  “I was looking for information on the Disciples of Tasya, specifically a ritual involving the sealing of memories.”

  Her eyes widened,

  “One of your companions,” she said slowly, eyes drifting between Mikiva and Jade. “Are they suffering from memory loss?”

  Av’ry hesitated. Sensing his reluctance, she insisted,

  “Please, I may be able to help.”

  “Yes,” Jade answered, stepping forward. “I am.”

  The woman pushed the door to the house open,

  “Please come in. I think that we should talk.”

  She led them inside, to a kitchen strewn with half-finished garments, soaking in dye or waiting to be finished. Moving aside some of her work, the tailor placed a kettle over the fire.

  “Would anyone care for some tea?” though still clearly distraught, offering hospitality seemed to calm her.

  “No, thank you. We just came from breakfast,” Av’ry declined.

  She nodded slowly, seemingly at a loss for what to say next.

  “Was there something you wanted to talk to us about, ma’am?” Av’ry prompted gently.

  “I am… was T’oval’s wife, Seryn Cryzer,” she offered by way of explanation. “May I ask your names?”

  “Pardon my rudeness. I am Av’ry, this is Mikiva and that is Jade,” he indicated his companions in turn.

  “Jade,” Seryn said the name softly.

  For a moment, she just stared at Jade, a strange mix of anger, sadness and another emotion he couldn’t quite identify emanating from her in alternating waves. Jade, for her part, remained perfectly still and silent, as if the woman was a frightened squirrel that any sudden movement might scare off, preventing her from continuing.

  “Do you know Jade from somewhere?” Av’ry asked.

  “No. Forgive my staring,” Seryn turned away, back to the fire. “I will explain. But I want you to know something of my husband first. You need to understand that T’oval was a good man, and all this wasn’t his fault.”

  “All what?” Jade asked urgently, her control slipping for just a moment.

  “Please, I will get to that. But, I need you to know why this happened. You see, it is my fault, in a way. T’oval was one of Tasya’s Chosen, her disciples. He stayed separate from the world and its petty concerns, living alone on Her sacred mountain. That was where I met him. I had gone into the mountains, hunting for an herb I used to dye my wool. It had been a bad season for growing and most of the herb patches I usually used were exhausted, so I had to climb much higher than usual, and eventually I became lost.

  It grew dark and I fell down a rocky chasm, breaking my leg badly. I am sure I would have died up there, if T’oval hadn’t happened upon me. He brought me back to his cave and nursed me back to health. He saved my life. When the day finally came that I was strong enough to return down the mountain, T’oval confessed that he loved me and he said that if I loved him too, he would give up everything to come back with me, because he couldn’t bear for us to be apart. I should have refused him,” she shook her head sadly. “I should not have lured him away from his Lady’s service. It was the beginning of all of this. But I did love him. And I will always regret that I told him so.”

  Tears filled her eyes again and Seryn was forced to stop. They waited for her to compose herself, trying not to stare, while also unable to look away. She dabbed at her eyes with a cloth, smudging a bit of still-wet dye on her cheek, then she continued,

  “For a time, we were very happy. I think sometimes he worried about the way he had abandoned his God, but he would never talk to me about it. When I asked, he would simply say that as long as we had each other, that was enough. I wanted that to be true.

  A few years after T’oval came to live here, a little over 2 years ago now I suppose, 3 men came in search of him. They had heard that he was a former priest of Tasya, and they seemed to know more about his skills than he had ever told me. They said that they had a job for him and took him into another room to speak about it. I could hear him protesting loudly, saying that he would never do such a thing, that he could not. He was very angry. He told them to get out of our house and never return. And that was when one of the men produced a knife. He held it to my throat and informed T’oval that he might want to reconsider if he cared for the safety of his ‘pretty wife’. I was terrified, but T’oval assured me that everything was going to be alright. Then he told the men he would do whatever they wanted, as long as they didn’t hurt me. Two of the men took him away. The third stayed with me, holding me hostage in my own home.

  T’oval was gone for almost two weeks and when he returned, my captor left and everything went back to normal. T’oval, however, was never quite the same. He seemed haunted by whatever they had made him do. I asked him about it, of course, but all he would say is that he had done something evil, and he was not sure how he could atone for it.

  After that, he prayed often to Tasya, and made many trips back to the mountains, but nothing seemed to soothe him. A few months ago, I suppose it all became too much,” Seryn swallowed hard, steeling herself. “That day, I came home from the market to find him hanging from a beam in the kitchen. My wonderful, kind-hearted husband could no longer live with what he had done. He left me a note, saying that he had hurt someone and betrayed his God. He said that no matter how much he prayed, Tasya would no longer speak to him, because he had turned his back on her and broken the tenets of her faith. He had used the power she had gifted him for evil, and though he had tried, he was now sure that he would never be forgiven and the only penance he had left was death.

  The final thing his note said was that if a woman ever came looking for him, a woman who had lost her memory, I was to do what he had been too weak to and help her. To set right his wrong, so that his spirit could rest in peace.”

  Suddenly, Av’ry understood the anger he had seen in Seryn. To her, Jade was the reason her husband was dead. It was like she was finally setting eyes on the ghost who had haunted him, had driven him to his death.

  “So, he knew,” Jade said quietly. “He knew what happened to me. He was part of it.”

  Seryn nodded slowly,

  “He was. But he never wanted to hurt you. T’oval was only trying to protect me,” she pleaded. “It tormented him until the end. His final wish was for me to help you.”

  Jade turned away from Seryn without a word, eyes staring at something deep in the fire across the room. Her emotions were unreadable, even to Av’ry.

  “What else did he tell you?” Av’ry asked, breaking the tense silence. “How can you help Jade?”

  “He never did tell me anything more about what really happened,” Seryn confessed. “But he left this letter.”

  She produced a slightly crinkled envelope, the name ‘Jade’ printed carefully on the front. It was sealed with wax and stained with tears and the oils from someone holding it and touching it over and over. It was clear that Seryn had agonized about opening it, reading these words from the man she had loved, but she had been afraid to discover what he had done. Afraid to know the truth. Av’ry reached out and took the envelope from her gently,

  “Thank you, Seryn.”

  “Please don’t open it here,” she whispered. “The only time that letter was open was right before T’oval… died. I do not want those words in my house again. I don’t know anything more that can help you. So please, just leave.”

  She stared fixedly down at the table, unable to raise her gaze to look at them. Av’ry stood slowly and headed to the door, followed by Mikiva. Noticing that Jade wasn’t with them, Av’ry paused and turned back. Jade was standing next to Seryn; she rested a hand lightly on her shoulder,

  “I know it wasn’t his fault,” Jade said. “I don’t blame him for what happened to me. The ones to blame are the ones who forced him to do this. They harmed you and your husband as much as they did me. And someday, I will make them answer for that. You have my word.”

  Seryn spun suddenly and embraced her,

  “Thank you! I just didn’t want you to hate him,” she sobbed into Jade’s tunic. “He was good man. I miss him so much.”

  Though she was crying, Av’ry felt Seryn’s relief. It seemed she had needed Jade’s absolution to keep her husband’s memory safe in her mind. Someone had destroyed the lives of both T’oval Cryzer and his wife for no reason other than to get to Jade. As the heart-broken woman cried on Jade’s shoulder, Av’ry fingered the letter in his hand, wondering if it would finally tell them why.