Page 60 of Homeward for a Spell

“Bard,” Sage begins.

“Yes?” Araphi asks, aglow with hope. She’s desperate to kiss Sage. To thank her. To taste her. To stay forever in this little pocket dimension, or for as long as possible, safe from everything in the world that will eventually rip them apart.

“Much as I hate to say it, I think our ten magical minutes are nearly up.”

Araphi looks down. The light in her palm is fast diminishing, and the golden room has begun to shrink inward. Outside the pocket dimension, the swift-flowing water becomes clearer as the walls of the dimension grow thinner.

Araphi desperately wishes for her lute, but her instrument is back at the temple with her gear, her hands otherwise empty. “What do we do now?”

“Didn’t the merchant tell you?”

“I didn’t think to ask him about these very specific circumstances!”

Suddenly, a leak springs above them, icy water dripping onto their heads. Araphi leaps to her feet and grips the acorn charm as the golden walls shrink farther inward each passing second. The merchant had warned her the charm would disappear as the pocket dimension was used up. But once it’s gone they’ll be lost in the river again, lost to each other. Drowned before either of them can call out for the other.

But maybe…

An idea comes to Araphi, even as Sage stumbles to her feet and water comes pouring in through the ever-thinning walls.

What is a pocket dimension except a spot between two worlds? A transitional space. Something like a tavern or a crossroads. A place where bard magic is at its most powerful.

She grabs Sage’s hand, threading her fingers through hers. “No matter what happens,” she says, “don’t let go.”

The water is now above their knees and rising.

Araphi sings the first thing that comes to mind. It’s a lullaby—just a children’s song from the Swamplands that her mother used to sing to her—but she pours every ounce of intention into the words, begging whomever might be nearby, whether deity or devil or great creature, to come to their aid.

Please get us out of the Swallow. Please keep us safe.

The water rises to their hips, the golden light dimming around them as the dark river surges in.

Please, Araphi begs. Her voice warbles for a moment as the light wavers.

Sage squeezes her hand. “Araphi, I don’t think—”

Then they’re lifted from the water and flung onto the riverbank, the pocket dimension bursting like a soap bubble to spill them into the snow.

Araphi lands face down in a snowbank, her mouth full of dead pine needles, but at least she’s out of the river. Her acorn charm is gone, but that’s no matter.

“We did it!” she says with a laugh, shivering but alive.

Lying beside her in the snow, Sage manages a smile. “You did it.”

Araphi stands and offers her a hand. “Now we just have to get somewhere before we freeze to death.”

“Agreed, and quickly.” Sage takes Araphi’s hand and lets herself be pulled upward.

Perhaps it’s a touch too hard, because Sage stumbles forward and then pitches into the snow with a pained cry.

23

Sage

As Sage’s leg buckles beneath her, so too does her pretense—to the bard, and to herself. She is not all right. Pain radiates from her right knee like a knife wedged into the joint. With her leg stretched awkwardly in front of her, Sage gently prods the knee, then clamps her teeth to stifle a cry. It’s swollen beneath her breeches, she can tell. Whatever half injury she’s been slogging along on worsened considerably when her boot lodged in the rock, perhaps a partial tear becoming a full severing. And now, there’ll be no pretending it away.

Araphi crouches beside her, dark eyes frantic with concern. “Sage? What’s wrong?”

“Just…an old problem I should’ve taken care of,” she admits through gritted teeth.