Part One: Santana
Chapter Two: The Price
Sunstone Port was a seaside town for visitors & merchants — busy, joyous, and bustling in the morning sun.
A fisher called across the small bay, and another sailor answered. Seabirds scattered into the sky like last night’s dreams. It would be hot later, famously so, but that morning there was a coolish breeze.
Holder Stone was up before any of the others. She’d answered their questions well into the morning, before they’d passed out, and still slept a good 12 hours.
“Please send word to the Mothers,” Holder Stone said quietly to a Dry Witch she found just up from the docks. “We seek a powerful boon.”
The attendant nodded, her jangling headdress tinkling in the morning light. Holder’s tone had hopefully indicated this would require big magic.
In truth, she learned later, the Witches had been on watch for something like them, showing up ragged like this, for a week. Dry Witch soothsayers don’t mess around.
Neither does Holder Stone.
She returned to the Actæon and drowsed then, wearing the formal purple gown she’d packed, waiting for it all to begin. She looked at her family, scattered around the cabin.
Sleeping like the dead, she thought. She wondered again what it had been like, to die. She hoped it wasn’t ugly. She hoped it was quick.
One by one, the Dreamers awoke in the softly rocking Actæon. They had all dreamed what felt like big dreams — though perhaps they were just extra creative dreams, without memories to act upon.
For instance, Our Lady Maeve dreamt of fire, and ice, and being tied down. She awoke in a panic She quickly hid away. The golden Goddess of Ællaë had dreamt of things She would rather not remember — and couldn’t let Holder Stone see.
She’d worry, Our Lady thought. What She really feared, if She were being totally honest, was that Holder would see something ugly about Her, and stop loving Her.
Our Lady’s black-clad, horse-skulled bodyguard, Queene Death, had awakened while Holder was out, and bent to prepare their morning coffee out on the deck, under a newborn Sun. They had dreamed of nothing but unending, featureless desert with occasional bones.
The Bard Thomas, in his open red shirt and dark mustache, carefully climbed over the still-recovering Sailorboy and joined Queene Death on deck.
“I dreamed about a place I’ve never seen,” Thomas said, almost worriedly. “A rich red desert. Incense. I was all alone and didn’t know what to do. So I just started walking.”
Benjamin of the Beasts was curled up in a corner, a young Wolf for the night. He snored a bit, offering up a cute and classic honkshoo every now and then. His dreams were hot and green; he dreamt of running under a full Moon in every shape imaginable.
The fox-faced Diamond Dogs left their masks on for sleep, just like the Queene. One of them seemed to have a male body and one female, but neither really registered as one or the other. By design, Holder was sure. Not that it matters, she added automatically.
The Diamond Dogs slept curled round each other easily, like their namesake, and woke easily, stretching in the Sun. Their dreams were shadowy, but not frightening.
Sailorboy rose last, in his blue and white sailor suit, but seemed right as rain. Red healthy cheeks and an easy smile, that sadness never quite leaving his eyes. Holder was relieved to see him suffering no ill effects from his brush with death.
“I wonder if there’s herring,” he mumbled on waking, and instinctively located breakfast for them all in the boat’s miraculous hold.
It wasn’t stealing — this was his boat, he remembered proudly. My little boat.
They gathered on deck to eat, smiling sleepily and a little shyly. The Goddess and Her shadow, the fox faces by themselves, and Thomas and Sailorboy, laughing with Benjamin and Holder. It felt like home for a moment.
“To be reborn,” Our Lady said delicately, “You have to die.”
She said it like she was quoting someone, and she was. Our Lady heard a man’s ugly, buzzing voice in Her holy mind. He said it like it was a wonderful truth: To be reborn you have to die.
“You’re not wrong,” began Holder carefully, but that was as far as it went. Maeve was pretty sure She knew the score, though.
A shivering, clashing sound — like a hundred keys, like a hive of bright brass bees — came to a halt outside the boat’s cabin, and an older woman’s clear voice rang out.
“I greet you, crew of the Actæon. I am Most Virtuous, Mother Joan, and I am your emissary today. We welcome you to Santana freely, with one exception. May we enter?”
Thomas nudged Sailorboy, whose little boat it was.
“Yes, Mother Joan.”
“Most Virtuous, please.” She said it with slight apology. “Mother Laitha is my counterpart among the Witches this long season, and she is addressed as Most Perceptive. It is a heavy burden.”
“Most Virtuous,” he said agreeably. “Please enter.”
She did, with her retinue. Like the other Sisters they had seen, Most Virtuous wore a thin red veil covering her whole head, hanging down to her hips.
It reminded Maeve privately of a child’s ghost costume cut from a bedsheet. To every cult their fashion, I suppose. She wondered what Her own followers wore, and knew it must be lovely.
Most Virtuous wore a garland crown of spiky yellow desert flowers across her temple and smelled of poppies and ginger. She wore a dark lip and her eyes were blacked with kohl under the veil.
Her retinue was bedecked with brass and gold charms, bells, keys, and lengths of chain. There seemed to be no common themes.
“Most Virtuous,” Holder said respectfully, “We seek your counsel.”
“You shall have it, child. All will be explained. We saw you coming. There is but one matter to which we first must attend.”
One shaking, bony finger rose from beneath the veil to indicate the Bard Thomas.
He rolled his eyes and inhaled, ready to party.
“That one may not return to our Land. He was banished.”
Thomas put on that hundred-watt smile Maeve already found so annoying. Flirting immediately.
“Can’t we talk this out? I’m not that man — I haven’t done whatever you say he did. Do you understand, Most Virtuous? I have no memories, they’ve been taken from me. Surely that’s a victory in your eyes? That man is unmade.”
She smiled behind her veil, sadly.
“And you would have me bring him back.”
“I am only what I am, Most Virtuous.”
He seemed almost desperately sad for a moment. Mother Joan shook her head sharply.
“I’m not saying I won’t let you back onto the island, I’m saying no one can let you back onto the island. You’ve been hexed. Powerfully. You have been bound.”
Thomas was scandalized by all of this, clearly, but greatest of all was the fear: He needed to know who he was. Maeve could identify.
“Am I to be denied my memories, then? Surely there’s a middle ground we…”
Most Virtuous was unimpressed, cutting him off.
“— You cannot leave this Port, and that’s the reality. It’s not up to any of us, young Thomas.”
Holder sighed, waiting for Thomas to back down, but Our Lady Maeve couldn’t resist. There was something curious here.
“You’re talking like you know him, Most Virtuous. But he hasn’t been here for a hundred years or more.”
Mother Joan smiled archly at Her.
“And I appeared no different then. I’m a Witch, girl.”
Maeve’s chin jutted out, unimpressed.
“And I am no mortal girl, Most Virtuous. You may not know who I am, but let Me assure you…”
“— Our Lady Maeve. We’re well aware of You. They say You’ve been missing from Ællaë for a week now. Interested parties may come knocking.”
Maeve strategically backed down. That was absolutely a threat — she couldn’t tell what it meant, but it carried the unmistakable air. Most Virtuous wasn’t messing around.
She continued, firm but not unkind.
“From what we can tell, interested parties call your group the codename Dynasty. Four to — …Seven? Eight? — seemingly supernatural individuals.”
She took in the group, one at a time — all eight of them, counting both Dogs — before continuing. A Bard, a Goddess, a healer, two uncategorizable foxes, a horse skull, a little boy and a sailor. Your motley saviors, Maeve thought. How they all must look!
“…Deemed highly dangerous, disruptive. Worth referring for erasure. But by whom — the people who are after you… I’m sorry, but we still have no ideas. They’re either well-funded or well-hidden or both.”
Benjamin became a wolf. His fur was thin, and his eyes were wild. His lolling tongue hung as he panted.
“We won’t meet you until this night, at dusk. Take this child to the Burning Springs, meantime. He’s in trouble.”
The wolf whined, pawing at his snout.
“Is all of this really necessary?” Maeve could feel Her holy face getting hot. Just fix the boy. Just fix us.
Mother Joan took another look in Maeve’s eyes and whispered archly, “Our Lady, did You forget who You are? How to get back home?”
Was She being mocked? Something behind the Dry, some kind of irritation with Our Lady in particular.
Holder would later admit she recognized this reaction from many centuries of watching Our Lady try to control everything.
“Most Virtuous, we are not without information of our own.” Holder hoped that would calm things down. She still loved the Dry Witches, but didn’t like where this was headed. “I am over one thousand years old, and in that time I have learned much. Much you’d kill to know, quite frankly.”
Our Lady nodded coolly, refusing the bait. She imagined knocking Most Virtuous about a bit. Maeve would never really fight an ancient Witch, not without a very good reason, but it was nice to think about. Just for a moment.
“We can help. The Dry Witches of Santana can help you. But nothing comes without price. Do you understand?”
They weakly assented. Mother Joan turned briefly, nodding to Queene Death for this last.
“Meet us at the Bonfire Circle tonight and you’ll have what you seek.”
“And in return?” asked Holder, and Maeve looked up. These Witches can’t afford to do anything for free, She realized.
The Witch’s eyes were steely, piercing, even through the veil. They almost seemed to shine. Her dark lips were a thin, firm line.
“In return, you’ll do something you were going to do anyway. Don’t fret about it. Don’t worry. Yet.”
Maeve could feel the Witch bringing things to a close, and cleared her throat. You have to shoot your shot.
“About the Dry Witch part, Most Virtuous? What makes one Dry?”
“Time, effort. The right kind of dreams. Privation.”
The old woman was definitely playing with Her. Our Lady shook Her holy head.
“But specifically. What does it mean, Most Virtuous?”
The Witch nodded, taking Our Lady’s measure once more.
“To be Dry is to want nothing, fear nothing, hate nothing. Dry is an ancient bone left on the sand — what’s Dry is what remains when everything unnecessary is stripped away by Sun and Wind.”
“…Want nothing, fear nothing, hate nothing. I like that.”
“Like it or not, this is Dry.”
Chapter Three — The Dragon, coming soon.