Fire - Kristin Cashore [17]
He always asked the same question when he first arrived: ‘My darling monster girl! Was anyone mean to you while I was gone?’
Mean? Children threw stones at her in the road. She was tripped sometimes, slapped, taunted. People who liked her hugged her, but they hugged her too hard and were too free with their hands.
And still, Fire learned very young to answer no to his question - to lie, and to guard her mind from him so he wouldn’t know she was lying. This was the beginning of another of her confusions, that she would want his visits so much but fall immediately to lying once he came.
When she was four she had a dog she’d chosen from a litter born in Brocker’s stables. She chose him, and Brocker let her have him, because the dog had three functional legs and one that dragged, and would never be any use as a worker. He was inky grey and had bright eyes. Fire called him Twy, which was short for Twilight.
Twy was a happy, slightly brainless fellow with no idea he was missing something other dogs had. He was excitable, he jumped around a lot, and had a tendency on occasion to nip his favourite people. And nothing worked him into a greater frenzy of excitement, anxiety, joy, and terror than the presence of Cansrel.
One day in the garden Cansrel burst upon Fire and Twy unexpectedly. In confusion, Twy leapt against Fire and bit her more than nipped her, so hard that she cried out.
Cansrel ran to her, dropped to his knees, and took her into his arms, letting her fingers bleed all over his shirt. ‘Fire! Are you all right?’ She clung to him, because for just a moment Twy had scared her. But then, as her own mind cleared, she saw and felt Twy throwing himself against a pitch of sharp stone, over and over.
‘Stop, Father! Stop it!’
Cansrel pulled a knife from his belt and advanced on the dog. Fire shrieked and grabbed at him. ‘Don’t hurt him, Father, please! Can’t you feel that he didn’t mean it?’
She scrabbled at Cansrel’s mind but he was too strong for her. Hanging onto his trousers, punching him with her small fists, she burst into tears.
At that Cansrel stopped, shoved his knife back into his belt, and stood there, hands on hips, seething. Twy limped away, whimpering, his tail between his legs. And then Cansrel seemed to change, dropping down to Fire again, hugging her and kissing her and murmuring until she stopped crying. He cleaned her fingers and bandaged them. He sat her down for a lesson on the control of animal minds. When finally he let her go she ran to find Twy, who’d made his way to her room and was huddled, bewildered and ashamed, in a corner. She took him into her lap. She practiced soothing his mind, so that next time she’d be able to protect him.
The following morning she woke to silence, rather than the usual sound of Twy stumping around outside her door. All day long she looked for him on her own grounds and Brocker’s, but she couldn’t find him. He’d disappeared. Cansrel said, with smooth sympathy, ‘I suppose he’s run away. Dogs do that, you know. Poor darling.’
And so Fire learned to lie to her father when he asked if anyone had hurt her.
AS THE YEARS passed Cansrel’s visits became less frequent but lasted longer, for the roads