Breadcrumbs - Anne Ursu [56]
Hazel shifted. “I guess.”
“I hope the knight doesn’t mind.” She let out a laugh that sounded like it could cut something.
“Um,” said Hazel. “Do you know the white witch?” She might as well ask.
The guard stiffened, and looked around. “You’re new here, huh?” she asked, her voice lowered.
“Yes,” Hazel said. Something began to gnaw on her heart.
“And you’re . . . looking for her?”
“Yes.”
“I see.” The guard glanced at the ground. “Most people don’t admit that, they just go.”
Hazel’s heart sped up. “What do you know about her? How do I defeat her?”
“Defeat her? That’s what you want?”
Hazel did her best to look very brave. “Yes! She has my friend.”
“I see. Look, kid. You can’t defeat her. She’s never going to go away.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean she’s always waiting there, at the end of this place. All you can do is pretend she’s not there. That’s what most people here do.”
Hazel looked up at the guard, whose face was rueful and whose body seemed cloaked by more than wool. She was too tired to make sense of this senselessness. So she thanked her and walked past her, into the village.
Hazel walked down the hill to the marketplace. She didn’t know what she was looking for, exactly—some available shelter she could crawl into, some Hobbit inn that took energy bars as payment. It did not matter, as long as there was a place to sleep.
But when she arrived at the market, she forgot her fatigue and simply stared at the scene before her. The marketplace was a cobblestone square about half a block wide surrounded by little shops, all cast aglow with torches. Even at night the square was thrumming with people. Hazel felt something unknot in her as she moved toward all of them. There was solace in company. At least right now. Hazel was tired of being alone.
She would have expected to stand out in the crowd here, with her backpack and jeans and shiny green jacket—not to mention her dark skin and hair. And there were plenty of people who looked like they’d dressed up for the Renaissance Festival, with wool cloaks and tall leather boots. But she saw a man in all black leather, another in a trench coat and fedora, a woman in jeans and a bright-red peacoat. And they weren’t all white and European looking either—she saw African faces, Asian, Hispanic. It seemed like people had come from everywhere. For once, Hazel fit right in.
The noise of the market felt odd in Hazel’s ears after all that quiet. There were merchants advertising their wares, people shouting, strains of music competing for attention. And there was a general hum of activity and humanity. The air carried with it the smell of smoke, cooking meat, and horse poop.
Near her, a skinny man in old jeans and a battered army jacket was playing the saxophone. A large yellow dog was curled up next to his legs, and next to it was an open instrument case. The man looked like someone you’d see on the street downtown, except instead of bills and coins in the instrument case, people had dropped little vials of colored powders and liquids.
There were other performers, too. Hazel saw a juggler off in one corner. There was a crowd around a woman who stood on a barrel—she seemed to be telling a story or giving a speech. And off in one corner there was a girl a few years older than Hazel, dancing.
Hazel moved into the crowd, checking out the merchants and their carts. There were things you might expect—produce and meats, tools, bolts of cloth, handmade jewelry. But there were odd carts, too. Hazel approached one that was covered in identical tiny glass jars. She stared into them, at the little odd blotches inside, until she realized each had a tiny clump of different kinds of human hair. There was a cart of books, as clean and modern as the ones on Ben’s shelves. There was one that had dozens of little brass clockwork animals.
“I can make that scar go away,” one of the merchants called to Hazel. She was two carts away, but Hazel’s wound was apparently that noticeable.
Something flickered in Hazel