The Gathandrian Trilogy 01 - The Gifting

judge by. Or perhaps Johan did know, and it was part of this journey also. Yes, that would not surprise him.
    All these thoughts plunged through his heart as Carthen came to take his place next to him, while Isabella sat with her brother.
    “Johan asks for a story?” Isabella asked, smoothing her skirts over her legs. Her mind was once more a perfect river-stone to Simon—bland and smooth.
    “Yes.”
    “Then,” she said, “you should begin.”
    Resting his arm over Carthen’s shoulders, Simon focused his mind on Johan’s request and began.
    “My first memory of my… my mother,” he said, voice cracking only once before settling, “is the smell of the barley soup she made.”
    Once again, the magic of the words Simon said crept through his skin and into flesh and blood, becoming real, becoming life— his life—and taking him with them. He must have been three or four years old, although there was no way of knowing for sure. He was standing, fingers clutching at his mother’s skirts while she stirred the soup over the enclosed fire in the small baking room.
    “Come, little one, taste.” Her voice was like honey, golden and rich. Her hair was golden too, a hank of thick braid which she always wore up during the day when receiving visitors but down when relaxing at night. Simon’s colouring was his father’s. Dark and secretive.
    “Come,” she said again, laughing. “This will be your favourite, I’m sure.”
    Sweeping him up into her embrace, she sat down on one of the stools Simon’s father had made and laughed as he sucked greedily at the pale spiced soup. They were still giggling together, the soup-bowl empty, when his father came home and frowned at the bareness of the table.
    Simon’s mother smiled away his annoyance
    “There will soon be more,” she said. “You, like your son, will see. There will be enough for us all. Do you not believe that I am a magic-woman indeed?”
    And there always was enough. From his early childhood until the day he left home, his mother made the house warm and full of food, even though those who visited came for her skills with herbs and healing, not for companionship. Later, Simon grew to understand that his mother was an outsider. She was the only one amongst the villagers who had yellow hair and light green eyes. The rest of them were dark, like Simon’s father. Like Simon. It was because of his mother that as he grew up he had few friends. Those he knew played with him only when their mothers were busy elsewhere and, even then, the games they chose could be harsh.
    One summer, with the men in the fields working the maize and the wheat, a group of boys were playing catch-wolf near the woods. Simon could have been no more than eight or nine years old. Named by then of course, but not old enough for the little schooling granted to farm workers. His mother taught him in secret at home. The boys he saw were older, but not much, or they too would have been indoors.
    The tallest of them, the baker’s eldest, gave a low laugh and punched one of his friends on the shoulder. “Hey, look, it’s the out-worlder’s son.”
    “Shouldn’t he be at home? Where it’s safe, eh?” The speaker was plump, too big for his tightly-fitting tunic and Simon could see the stains of the morning’s breakfast on his front.
    He hunched his shoulders and tried to hurry past, as his mother had taught him to do, but their minds had already seized on their next game.
    “Hey there! Do you want to play with us? Fancy a game of catch-wolf, do you? Want to play with the big boys?”
    The questions—the lack of courtesy if Simon ignored them, and the promise of some new acceptance if he didn’t—caught him. He turned around.
    The baker’s boy—whose name came to him suddenly as Dolmar—smiled and rubbed his nose.
    “Well? Do you?” he said again.
    Simon nodded, dumb with the desire for inclusion.
    He exploded in a snort of laughter. “What is it? The Horseman got your tongue? Can’t you speak?”
    “Y-yes,” he stammered. “I’d like to play with you. Please.”
    “Good,” Dolmar replied, strolling up to him as if he were the squire and Simon the lackey. “Hey, boys, do you hear that? The out-worlder wants to play. Do you think we should let him?”
    A chorus of agreement and muffled grunts followed. Some laughter too, though Simon didn’t know what it meant.
    “All right then,” Dolmar said. “Let’s play. Hey, out-worlder.”
    “Yes?”
    “Do you think