Rhohaz was furious. His fingers crumpled the paper lying in front of him, his ears turned bright red. If it took any longer literal steam would have been shooting out of those ears, no question. His eyes, filled with anger, narrowed. The last thing he expected at his morning gathering with a few of the villagers to decide on who should be filling the two open spots for their trip to Elioth this week was his bold sister, Roza, and a clueless Vanya hiding behind Roza’s shoulder.

“That’s not fair, brother! We always let volunteers join the trip to Elioth. Besides, we have less than the minimum count we require. You must let us join,” Roza urged, flailing her hands around hoping to get the few gathered to agree with her.

Rhohaz sighed, annoyed, “When was the last time you went to Elioth with us? That too, to sell fish in the market?”

Roza rolled her eyes, “That’s beside the point. You need volunteers and here we are! Shouldn’t you be happy?”

She tried getting a reaction out of the crowd but they mostly stayed silent, bouncing their gazes off of Rhohaz and each other.

The chilly sea breeze passing through the village this morning made Vanya chatter her teeth. They were in a hut with skinny short walls and a straw roof over them. She snuggled her thin cloak Tilly let her borrow but that did nothing to keep the chilly wintery weather strolling in from greeting her so coldly.

In fact, the last thing she thought she would be doing this morning was to be outside. Roza suddenly appeared at her room door and grabbed her saying she had a solution to everything. Vanya naturally perked up at Roza suggesting anything to help with Joan’s injury and had without a question followed her out of the house. She did not expect, however, to end up seeing Rhohaz’s face the next moment. Utterly confused and partially embarrassed she hid, almost contorting herself behind Roza’s back, hoping that would have Rhohaz not glare at her anymore. She did not know where Roza was going with this but hoped whatever Roza had planned with this sudden trip to Elioth would actually work out in the end.

“The leader has a point, Roza. Neither you nor Jade has any experience,” Stu spoke sitting at a corner.

“Oh please! There’s always a first time for everything. And honestly, it’s about time I learned too, don’t you think?” Roza pressed on but the men only looked away trying not to have her land her sharp gaze on them.

“She does have a point…,” Greta, who was in charge of the food for the trip, and getting everyone fed whilst in Elioth, spoke up making Roza smile, “...We wanted to have a few new people trained, might as well start now.”

Roza looked to Rhohaz with her eyebrow cocked. He sighed deeper. He knew instinctively that Roza had no intentions of truly volunteering to simply train herself to be a permanent member of the crew going to the Elioth market to sell fish. He knew she had something up her sleeve, something she had been savoring the opportunity for. What he could not understand was how and why Vanya was there hiding in Roza’s shadow.

“Fine. You may join…” he said with a bitter taste taking over his tongue. Roza smiled satisfied and held onto Vanya’s hands exchanging a triumphant look. “...Only you may join. She stays back.”

Rhohaz’s words made Roza swing back in anger. “Why not?! I want her to join with me!”

“She’s not a part of us!” he bellowed back.

“Well, what if she wants to join us to Elioth?”

“She clearly doesn’t. Look at her, you’ve clearly dragged her in here,” Rhohaz pointed to Vanya making her retreat back behind Roza’s shoulder.

“Calm down, you two…,” a blond head popped up from beyond the short wall, “...I can never nap in peace with you two in one place.”

“Stay out of this, Timmie–,” Rhohaz started but stopped seeing Timmie hop over and stand right next to him. Vanya saw it then, the slight discomfort in Timmie’s eyes as they grazed past Roza’s face that did not even glance at him. Vanya thought Timmie hid it well under that charming wicked smile of his. He quickly looked away from Roza, his lively nature kicking in.

“Let’s a do a draw, shall we? Settle it that way,” Timmie started, “Why don’t we write down a list of potential volunteers…”

“Volun-tolds,” Roza corrected him.

“...who would take the final spot, mix the chits up and you, Rhohaz, draw a name out. Leave it up to luck.”

That was the first mistake there. Rhohaz only thought for a few moments before going with Timmie’s idea seeing Roza object to it wholeheartedly. They tore paper and wrote names of people who had no clue were in a draw to join the crew to Elioth leaving in a few hours. Timmie eagerly lent his cupped hands to lay the chits and shuffled all the names around. He made Rhohaz look away and reach his fingers in to draw out a chit.

Rhohaz was absolutely sure that the probability of Vanya’s name being pulled out from the number of chits that were present was near zero. He in fact was delighted that Timmie actually suggested something useful for once.

He held the chit he selected in his hand while Timmie ran around building anticipation. Vanya rolled her eyes thinking her chances were gone, lost to the wind. Roza looked absolutely disgusted.

“Alright, Timmie, settled down…” Timmie ran to Rhohaz, “...Let’s see who is it.”

With the rest of the crowd peering in curiously, Rhohaz did not hesitate one bit before opening it up in his palms with Timmie hanging over his shoulder. Rhohaz’s eyes which were lit in joy, froze, his lips mouthing the name as if he had seen letters for the first time in his life. And then immediately his eyes dimmed in realization. Timmie gasped clasping his palm to his mouth.

“The Gods, Rhohaz, they have spoken,” Timmie whispered, plucking the chit out of Rhohaz’s fingers and showing it to the peering crowd, “It’s Jade! It’s Jade’s name!”

Vanya’s eyes lit in shock. She found Roza turning to her with a smirk across her face but quickly concealed it as the rest of the crowd followed with loud gasps of shock.

“There you have it, brother dear,” Roza grabbed the chit from Timmie along with the rest of the chits on the table, “...I’ll discard these on my way out. Now, excuse us while we prepare for the journey ahead.”

Roza quickly grabbed Vanya’s hand before they could be stopped by anyone for any reason. Vanya barely had any time to even glance at Rhohaz, who was hunched over in anger.

She turned around and kept up with Roza till they left the hut.

“I can’t believe it…” Vanya spoke for the first time feeling as if she herself forgot what her voice sounded like, “...How? There were so many names–”

Roza held up the crushed ball of chits in her hand, “Well, he could only pick one name if they were all the same, don’t you think?”

The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

Vanya was confused for a moment and then it clicked, “You changed the names on the chits?”

Roza gave a quick wink and a smirk took over her lips, “Let’s just say all the days I spent learning every word in the grimoires I possess came quite handy!”

***

Vanya was biting into her lip so much so that she started bleeding letting the fresh cut sting as the chilly air breezed past her. Her teeth chattered and she snuggled up to her sack of clothes Joan quickly wrapped for her when she announced quite suddenly that she would be leaving Shalom for a few days.

Joan looked worried yet she hid it well while thinking of everything Vanya would need for the journey and kept repeating to Vanya that she should not leave Roza’s side at all. Vanya simply agreed to everything Joan said, not wanting Joan to be thinking too much about her while she was gone.

She gulped while standing there being ignored by the crowd that was too busy packing up their carts and readying their donkeys. It was the first time Vanya had seen the donkeys everyone was raising. She had only seen their mad cow Betsy up until then.

They were all busy shuffling around with foreheads wrinkled in worry. You could not blame them for not spotting Vanya for it was made very clear that they were behind schedule and that they should have left over an hour ago.

“Timmie, stop playing! We have already lost enough daylight. Hurry up!” Rhohaz shouted from a corner startling Vanya, who did not expect to see him so soon.

She tried orienting herself so that he would miss her just like the rest of his villagers. But that did not work at all. His eyes widened as he spotted her instantly. He stopped by his horse who was stocked up with his belongings shortly before beginning to make his way to her.

“Damn it,” she whispered to herself, seeing him making his way down to her from the corner of her eye.

She rubbed her hands together while her eyes watered from the cold breeze. She did not know how to react. The cold was making it unbearable to stand outside any longer and with Rhohaz coming into the picture she just wanted to run back to Tilly’s for cover.

Suddenly, she felt a thick coat drop on her shoulders. Its weight made her knees buckle making her almost fall to the ground. Yet its warmth engulfed her in an instant making her finally feel as if she could finally stop shivering.

“You could have just asked one of us,” she heard Rhohaz speak with a gruff voice behind her back.

She took a moment to gather herself before whipping her head around to question, “Ask for what?”

“Something warm. You were clearly struggling with that thin piece of cloth,” Rhohaz pointed to the longer cloak she was already wearing.

“Grandma Tilly gave it to me,” she retorted with her fingers feeling the thick soft coat around her, thawing her.

Rhohaz let out a laugh, “Well, she doesn’t really need anything thicker so she probably gave you the best one she had.”

Vanya wondered if it was because Tilly was warming herself with magic. Roza was the same. She barely had anything warm on this morning and she simply brushed it off when Vanya suggested she wear something thicker saying she did not need one.

She eyed Rhohaz, who was more sharply dressed than usual with his shirt tucked in and a layer or two keeping him warm.

“Is this yours?” Vanya asked, pointing to the wonderfully cozy coat around her shoulders realizing Rhohaz was missing his coat. She wondered if it was because he was also warming himself through magic, for she was sure regardless of the ban on practicing magic in Shalom, he was at least a student of it. His eyes gave it away enough times for her to believe it so firmly.

“It is. Why do you ask?”

“Well, I don’t want to take your coat away from you–”

“Please, take it. I don’t want you to get ill from being cold. Besides as the leader of Shalom, it is my duty to watch out for everyone, including our guests.”

“Oh! So you do give your coat out to anyone who is in need then?” Vanya retorted. Something in her getting jealous that this was not a one-off instance according to Rhohaz.

Rhohaz looked at her puzzled then smirked, “Why? Can I not?”

Vanya rolled her eyes, “It’s a bit odd, don’t you think?”

“Giving my coat? Not at all…” he sounded brash, “...What’s odd is you wanting to volunteer to go to Elioth. Tell me the truth, Roza put you up to this, didn’t she?”

“What?” Vanya tried her best to act surprised, “No, she did not. I was only getting bored at home. And well…I’m spying on her for you, am I not? This is me, doing my best. She expressed interest in wanting to go to Elioth and I said I’ll come with her…willingly.”

Vanya thought she sounded convincing yet Rhohaz did not buy it for a second. Vanya watched him breathe deep in contemplation as if he were analyzing every word she spat out.

“Well then, you should know I was outside Grandma’s porch last night waiting for you to come and present me with what you’ve found on Roza. You remember, don’t you? You agreed to report to me every night.”

Vanya started to panic. Last night was when she, Roza, and Joan barely made it in one piece from the cave they witnessed Roza’s power in while listening to the growls of Ombrahs from afar. The three of them struggled to claw their way back with injured Joan on their shoulders, making them slow. She wondered if he saw them or heard them. But by the way, he stared ahead, with his eyes calm and his chest wide, Vanya sighed a breath of relief as it did not seem like he had any idea of it. She wondered what he would have done if he knew that she witnessed Roza performing magic right in front of her very eyes that night.

“I remember our agreement. I’ve only not met you because I had nothing of importance to report,” she hoped her lies resembled some sort of sense.

Suddenly, Rhohaz turned to her to gaze into her eyes. She felt as if he was trying to spot it, the guilt in her from lying to him.

“Just know that no one from the council knows you are joining us yet,” he said stoically.

“Will that be a problem?” Vanya asked, nervous.

“It will, if you cause trouble. They don’t usually care for our trips to Elioth to sell fish in the market. You must promise me, that you will let me know if Roza has anything nefarious planned.”

He peered into her and waited for her response. With every moment Vanya took to reply his brows furrowed, doubting her loyalty.

“I’ll let you know,” she replied out of character, for she would have usually bit back at Rhohaz’s commands. And feeling her reply be inauthentic to her, she ended it with an eye roll making Rhohaz laugh out of seeing her antics.

He turned to her with a slight crouch as if speaking to a child, who was forced to obey orders, and lifted his hand to pat her head twice and say, “Good girl.”

This ticked Vanya off. She slapped his hand away in disgust which made Rhohaz laugh out even louder.

It was refreshing to see him so relaxed. And even though she hated his guts at teasing her, she let him have his fun laughing till he heaved to a stop. He seemed lighter, more confident, and quite pleasant to be around for once.

He seems different…

A thought crossed her mind which she immediately got rid of.

“There you are!”

The voice of Roza heading to them from a distance made Rhohaz stop his leftover giggles and be stern. Roza sprinted across to get to Vanya and grabbed Vanya's sack of belongings she was desperately holding on to.

“I’ve set my stuff on Kev’s cart. He said he has room for yours too,” Roza said but stopped to eye the coat around Vanya’s shoulders.

“Is that your coat?” she asked Rhohaz to which he immediately replied, “She-was-shivering. Shouldn’t-you-be-watching-out-for-her?”

“Well, I was busy getting some warm clothes for her from Cecil this morning,” Roza retorted and turned to Vanya, “I have them with me in Kev’s cart. Let’s head that way.”

Roza signaled Vanya, and with a glare at her brother, she left promptly hoping Vanya was just behind her.

Vanya quickly handed Rhohaz’s coat back to him with a nod as thanks. She was about to run down to Roza when Rhohaz stopped her with a gentle hand on her shoulder.

“Remember, you must tell me what she is up to in Elioth. Elioth is not like Shalom. It’s not as safe. You must let me know. You might not be able to handle it all at once, both Elioth and her.”

Vanya scrunched her nose and patted him back to reply, “I know. I’m from a much bigger city than Elioth. I’m pretty sure I can handle Elioth and Roza all at once.”

She saw his eyes settle into an annoyed expression after what she said. Yet he did not speak to drive his point again, he only simply looked at her hoping she knew his sister was not going to let her take it that easy. Roza was a force plowing through anybody in her way, looking for answers she did not even know the questions to. Vanya had only tasted a glimpse of Roza’s mind.