Chapter 3

New Version as of 2/8/20:

Later, as Jane and Bear made their way into town, Bear continued to bemoan the death of his brilliant plan. "Spring would have been the perfect time to have the wedding," he said. "The flowers would be in full bloom and everything."

Jane, astride Moose, shook her head. "It would never have worked. Farmer Beverly's garden is way too dour for Sally. He grows too many beets, and Sally is a dandelion girl. Imagine what their children would look like."

"Fuschia dandelions?" Bear asked.

Jane laughed. "Or fluffy pink veggies. Now that I think of it…."

The ride to town was slower than usual, due to the mud on the road and Moose's missing shoe. Jane pretended that it wasn't also Moose's age. Moose, whose name had once been Anabanana, had been ten years old when Jane's parents had brought Moose home. Jane turned a blind eye to Moose's rapidly graying withers but made sure not to work her any more than absolutely necessary. In fact, Jane would have left Moose at home if they hadn't both had shoe problems at the same time.

However, the trip felt quicker than usual, partly because Bear seemed determined to keep Jane entertained, and partly because Jane was dreading seeing Sarah. Anxiety is a voracious eater of time. Sarah, the smith's daughter had been Jane's best friend until a big fight they'd had a few years ago. The careful manner in which they treated each other was, now, more painful than their actual fight had been, but neither girl had managed to apologize first.

Jane couldn't avoid Sarah because she needed to stop by the smithy. However, she could probably avoid The New Commissioner. Everyone in the village knew about the prophecy, and felt a vicarious pride in Jane. But The New Commissioner was a little too enthusiastic.

He constantly arranged meet-and-greets with nearby towns. Jane had patiently endured these, as the neighboring towns were already aware of who she was. The only interest The New Commissioner could drum up for Jane was with children who quickly realized that Jane hadn't actually saved the world yet, and held more promise than experience.

Jane's last straw with The New Commissioner had been last year when he sent Jane on a three-month tour, where kingdom after kingdom threw parades in her honor. Jane had worn an ill-fitting but shiny silver breastplate and carried a shiny silver sword, both of which The New Commissioner had borrowed from The Prophecy of the Red Moon Museum in Erinrae.

Adults who were unaccountably more naive than their own children, had lined the streets for the chance to glimpse Jane, and if possible, to touch her for good luck (hers or theirs, she wasn't sure). She'd started wearing two shirts; one for modesty, the other for people to tear off of her body.

There was something embarrassing about being celebrated for a thing that she hadn't even done yet. To be fair, the prophecy intimated that Jane might die protecting the world, so this might be their only chance to soak in her heroism. But it had been a humiliating and exhausting experience overall and Jane had refused to speak to The New Commissioner since. This did not stop him from talking to her, at length.

He'd stopped pestering her at home when her mother had answered the door with a butcher knife and a dangerous smile. Jane wished that she could intimidate a grown man with a smile. A resigned sigh didn't seem to have the same effect on The New Commissioner, who had doubled his efforts to engage with Jane when he saw her in town.

Jane and Bear reached the outskirts of town just as the sun was making its downward journey in the sky from behind a thick blanket of clouds. The outskirts of town were unusually quiet, but a rumble of voices floated from the direction of the town square. Jane knew that sound. It was a town meeting. She and Bear exchanged glances.

His face was inscrutable, which meant that he wasn't telling her something. Her gaze turned suspicious as she realized that he'd been trying to distract her from the reason he'd wanted to join her.

"What's going on?" she asked.

"I don't know," Bear said. "I just had a feeling that something was happening." He looked serious, which was enough to alarm Jane, as Bear's default expression was a mild smugness. This generally didn't bother Jane; she actually found it reassuring. Besides, Jane figured Bear had earned a bit of smugness, having accumulated millennia of knowledge and experiences.

"Let's drop Moose off at the smith and then head over to the square." Bad news could always wait. Besides, she could tell that the meeting hadn't started yet. The pitch and intensity of the voices coming from the town square indicated anticipation rather than resolution.

The smith was set on the outskirts of town, a necessity due to the smoke and noise that it generated. Jane and Sarah had spent a decent amount of their childhoods sitting on benches just inside the smithy, watching Sarah's mother forging horseshoes, nails, knives, and anything else that the village needed.

The smell of coal dust and molten iron were as old a friend as Sarah herself, but unlike Sarah, the scent always greeted Jane warmly. The smithy was silent as Jane, Bear, and Moose entered. Sarah was pouring a bucket of water into a forge that had already been raked out.

She was dressed in a sleeveless leather tunic with equally sturdy pants and boots. Her arms were freckled with a confetti of small scars. Her face and shaved head were smudged with coal but clear of scars, due to the mask the she wore while working. She looked surprised to see Jane. Not pleased. Not displeased. Just surprised. "Isn't there a meeting about you in the square?" she asked.

There wasn't any rancor in her voice, but Jane tensed at the question. Sarah's eyes narrowed, indicating that she'd noticed.

"I--no, I don't think so." Jane said. "I didn't realize there was a meeting until we got to town." She shrugged. "I need a shoe for Moose."

Sarah turned her gaze to Moose and her expression softened. She walked over and stroked Moose's nose. Moose whuffled and Sarah grinned.

"I'm done for the day," she said. "I figured that after the meeting, I wouldn't get any more work done anyway. But I have some extra shoes. I'll fix her up with one after the meeting." She patted Moose on the neck. "Let's put Moose in the stable and then we can walk over to the square. My mom is already there." She said all of this to Moose.

Also without looking at Jane, Sarah led Moose from the smithy to the nearby stable. She unbuckled the saddle and hung it on the wall along with Jane's saddlebags. She brushed Moose down quickly, crooning as she worked.

When she was done, she set Moose up with a feed bag and then she joined Jane and Bear. "It looks like you need a new shoe, too," Sarah said, as they walked.

Jane looked down at her boot. She'd wrapped the sole to the boot with twine, which loosened slightly with each step. "Yeah, I was going to visit Georgie, too," she said. "I guess I'll do that after the meeting."

They walked in silence. They were almost at the square when they ran into Rufus. Rufus was the village butcher. He was tall and sturdy with graying hair at the temples, strong arms, and the matter-of-fact attitude of a man who works with death for a living. Jane could see that he was wearing his good apron; it only had a few blood spatters. Rufus' home was even further on the outskirts of town than Sarah's, partly because he was a private man, and partly because of the smell.

He smiled and waved when he saw Jane's group. "What is the meeting about?" he asked, falling into step with them.

The question was addressed to Jane, who flushed. "I don't know," she said. "I thought you might."

Rufus shook his head. "I guess we'll all find out together," he said. "Aren't these meetings usually about you?"

Jane flushed and snuck a glance at Sarah who didn't react to the question. "I don't know about that," she said. "But I wasn't aware of any meeting until Bear and I got here."

Both Rufus and Sarah looked over at Bear and blinked, as though they hadn't noticed him until that moment. People rarely paid Bear any attention, which had always puzzled Jane. Not only did Bear look -- different -- but he also had a presence so powerful that Jane could unerringly find him in a large crowd, in a matter of seconds.

He had also healed half of the town after near-fatal incidents, which was a talent unheard of even in the more technologically advanced kingdoms. But unless people were in a specific need of Bear, they seemed to forget he existed. To be fair, he seemed to prefer this. In fact, Jane wondered if he somehow made himself forgettable, but she couldn't imagine how he would manage that.

Old Version:

"Are you happy now?" Bear asks as we make our way out of town.

"No," I say. "My feet are killing me. I'm getting a blister from all of this walking."

The moon is rising and it is indeed the bloodred the prophecy indicated it would be. We turn our backs to it and head back toward the farm. No way anyone in town is going to let us sleep over now. They all hate me. It starts to rain and I pull the hood up on my cloak and clutch it more tightly around me and focus on keeping my right big toe away from the seam in my boot that is rubbing it raw.

Bear sighs. "You never wanted to be the hero," he reminds me. "You must be thrilled."

"I don't appreciate the sarcasm, Bear," I say. "I didn't read the prophecy wrong for hundreds of years, I didn't build a statue, I never even believed I was the savior, none of this is my fault."

"Tell that to your mother," Bear mutters. Somehow, the rain doesn't even touch his clothes, it just slides right off.

Gods, right. My mother. "I'll stay in the barn tonight," I say. "I'll face her in the morning." I'm such a coward. How could anyone ever have mistaken me for a hero?

We walk in silence for a while, me trudging through the ever more mucky road, Bear gliding along, none of the dirt touching him, as usual. My usual resentment at his effortless flawlessness tries to flare up, but I'm too relieved for it to really take hold. I feel like I've been holding my breath for my entire life, and now, for the first time, I'm able to exhale. My shoulders feel lighter, now that the burden of savior has been lifted off of them. My stomach relaxes for the first time in, I think, ever. Everyone else may be upset that I'm not going to save the world, but aside from the faintest touch of disappointment, I feel euphoric. 

 About a mile from home, the sound of carriage wheels come rumbling down the road. Bear and I move to opposite sides of the road, to it pass. I tense, not wanting to be confronted by any of the angry townsfolk, but after a few minutes, I realize that the sound is coming from in front of us rather than from behind. I let out a sigh of relief and another minute later, I can make out the shape of the wagon. It's Farmer Clarence.

My heart lightens just as the rain stops. I push my hood back and smile at the timing. Farmer Clarence is one of the men who killed my father, and he is one of my favorite people in the world. Even in the dark, I can see the white-gray of his bushy eyebrows and the flash of his teeth as he pulls up and stops. Winnie, his mare, blows a foggy greeting at me and I pat her withers before walking up to the wagon.

"Greetings, Janie! What's to do?"

There's no way I can answer honestly, so I just say, "I am well, Farmer Clarence. What's to do with you?" Let the townspeople tell him what a deficit I am with me safely three miles away.

"Just bringing some of these apples to town," Farmer Clarence says. "Oh, hello Bear," he says, who has rounded the back of the wagon to stand next to me.

"Farmer," Bear says, with a nod.

"I got a late start and then had a bit of trouble with one of my wheels, but it's a fine night. He raises his face to the rain and laughs. It's a warm sound, like the creak of the floorboards closest to the fireplace.

"Sure," I say, "Other than the red moon."

Father Clarence laughs again. "Oh, yes," he says congenially. Then he frowns. "What?" We all look up at the moon. Small clouds obscure part of it, but it's no longer red. It's a pure, glowing white. Bear and I look at each other.

"It was red before, right?" I ask.

Bear nods, frowning.

"I've been on this road since before nightfall and the moon has been white this entire time," Farmer Clarence says.

I groan. "What does this mean?"

Bear's frown fades and morphs into a grin. His eyes regain their usual sparkle. "We've been tricked!" he says. "Ahaha!" He shakes me. "Do you get it? That hero was an imposter!" He lets go of me and paces to the end of the wagon and back. He throws up his hands. "I knew something was wrong! I could feel it! It's just been so long, it took me a while to figure out what it was."

"What was it?" I ask.

"Sorcery!" Bear exclaims triumphantly.

"Sorcery!" Farmer Clarence and I echo.

"Hogwash," Farmer Clarence adds.

"It's not!" Bear says. He hugs me from behind. "Look at our Janie," he says. "You've known her, her whole life. There's magic about her, is there not?" He rubs his knuckles into the top of my head.

I jerk out of his grasp and smooth my hair back into place. I hate it when he does that, but I'm glad he's not mad at me anymore. Although, the deeper ramifications of his words are tying my stomach back into knots.

"I've always thought so," Farmer Clarence says gruffly.

Bear ignores my awkward blush and throws and arm around me. "Just the girl to stop an apocalypse if I've ever met one -- and I've met a few!"

"Sure, sure, everyone knows that," Farmer Clarence says with a kind nod to me, but his bushy white eyebrows furrow in the middle. He's clearly confused. So am I, but I think I know where Bear is going with this, and I really don't like the direction he's going in.

Bear looks at me. "That big ol' muscle-bound freak is a fraud!"

Ugh. I was afraid he'd say that. "No..." I protest weakly. Dammit! He was a fraud, wasn't he? He was too perfectly heroic.

Farmer Clarence looks back and forth between me and Bear. "I think you two better tell me what's going on," he says.

"Yes!" Bear says, brightly. "If you let us hitch a ride back to town, I will fill you in."

And, so, minutes later, Bear sits up front with Father Clarence, relaying the afternoon's events in the town square to him while I keep the apples company in the back. The apples don't seem interested in my side of things. When Bear finishes his story, Father Clarence tugs on the reins to stop Winnie. He turns to me. "Welcome to the family?" he says incredulously. "Janie..." he shakes his head.

Humilation is a flame within my skin that licks and bites at my bones. Not knowing what to say, I shrug.

He shakes his head, turns away, flicks the reins, and we continue forward.

About a mile from town, the moon turns pinkish and gets redder the closer to town we get. Bear turns to look at me and I nod. I've never seen sorcery, but this is definitely it.

That big dumb hero guy turned the moon red in order to trick the town. But why? Is he really intending to save the world in my place? Is he just trying to trick them out of money? Ha! Good luck with that, there is none. What is his game? Whatever it is, I have to say, I fell for it. He knew exactly how to exploit my insecurities. Some bumpkin with little education and no muscles is supposed to save the world? It's like he built a person to be everything I knew I was not so that I wouldn't even think about it when presented with him. I shake my head, trying to dislodge the detritus of paranoia from the raging river of my thoughts. In the end, it doesn't matter why James Anthony Sawyer -- or whatever his name is -- is doing what he's doing, so much as how to thwart him. The mantle of responsibility for saving the world settles around my shoulders once more, but it's itchy and tight and even more ill-fitting than it ever was.

***

Farmer Clarence and Bear have decided that it would be best if the townfolk don't see me just yet, so Farmer Clarence pulls up the wagon just outside of town and Bear and I alight. The combination of today's walking with the stress of the day makes my muscles heavy and clumsy as Bear helps me down from the wagon. The ground bites up through the soles of my boots as Farmer Clarence nudges Winnie with his reins and heads toward the square. From the edge of town, we can see lights flickering in the square. A dull roar indicates a lot of voices talking at once. The town is definitely awake. Bear and I sneak past Sally's shop. I can hear the roar of fire in her furnace and the jumble of voices that indicate that her shop is a hot spot in town at the moment.

Bear and I make our way to Rufus the Butcher's shop. He lives on the top floor, with his shop underneath. The building is dark and for a moment, I panic. What if he's not home? The New Commissioner thinks he's in charge of the town, but really, Rufus is the font of common sense and wisdom that the townsfolk draw from. 

Just as I decide to try knocking on the back door, Rufus's front door opens and he emerges. I freeze. With my cloak hood up, I'm nearly invisible, and Bear is never seen when he doesn't want to be. Rufus is carrying a large sack over his shoulder, and is only a few feet from his doorstep when he pauses at my hiss.

He looks around, squinting in the dark. I pull the hood back a little so that he can see my face. He steps back in surprise. "Janie?"

"Shh...I need to talk to you," I whisper.

Rufus thinks for a moment and then nods. He leads me to the back of his shop and opens it up. I go in first and Rufus follows. He shuts the door, but opens again as someone knocks. He opens the door to reveal Bear. "Of course," Rufus says with a sigh as Bear glides past him with a jaunty wave. He closes the door and drops the sack he was carrying in front of it. "Follow me," he says and climbs the stairs to his apartment.

The fire in his fireplace is embers and he takes a moment to stoke it up. The room is small but cosier than I'd have expected from a bachelor. The fireplace takes up most of one the shorter walls with a window facing it that looks out onto the town. A neatly made bed under the window takes up about half of the room. There's a wardrobe set against the wall between the bed and the fireplace, and a bookcase facing that. The bookcase is nearly full of books, with a few small jugs and knicknacks. I shouldn't be surprised that Rufus has so many books, but outside of The New Commissioner's house, I've never seen so many books in one room. I stifle an itch to stop everything and read them. My mother taught me the rudiments of reading and Bear has supplied me with a neverending stream of books since I was a child -- but I can never get enough. A rocking chair is the only other piece of furniture in the room. The chair has a folded quilt hanging over one arm and a worn old book on the seat with a title that I can't make out.

Rufus picks up the book and puts it on the mantle. "Would you like to remove your cloak?" he asks. I do and he hangs it up on a hook next to the door. He removes his and hangs it next to mine. He picks up the quilt from the chair and indicates that I should sit down. After I do, he unfolds the quilt and places it around my knees. I didn't realize how cold I was until now, with the fire and the blanket warming me. My skin burns from the drastic change in temperature. Rufus leans against the mantle and waits. I glance over my shoulder at Bear who has settled, cross-legged in the middle of Rufus's bed. He meets my gaze.

Now that it's time to speak, I don't know what to say. I clutch the quilt to my chest and balance my feet on the rockers. Best to speak plainly; the situation is confusing enough. "Bear and I were almost home when we realized that the moon wasn't red anymore," I said.

Rufus blinked in surprise but didn't say anything.

"Bear thinks that sorcery made the moon look red to trick the townspeople into thinking it's the end of the world and that that James Anthony Sawyer character is here just in time to save them."

Rufus regards me for a moment. "What do you think?"

"What?"

"You keep saying what Bear thinks. What do you think?"

"Uhm- I agree with him. I mean, I can't think of what else it could mean."

Rufus nods. "So...?"

"So, I don't know! They need to know, right?

"Do they?" Rufus asks mildly.

I'm starting to get uncomfortable and I can almost feel Bear's stillness behind me. I thought that all I'd have to do was tell Rufus the problem and he'd spring into action, bring the town together to kick my faux half-brother's butt. No one takes The New Commissioner -- or even the old Comissioner -- seriously, but everyone has always listened to Rufus. What if he won't help?

"What if James Anthony Sawyer isn't a fraud?" Rufus asks, watching me carefully. "What if the pretend red moon is a coincidence -- or perhaps whoever created the illusion knew that the true savior was on his way into town and set up the illusion at the same time?"

"That's stupid!" I say. I stand up and let the quilt fall onto the floor. I march over and stand nose-to-nose with Rufus. "A brand-new hero shows up to displace me just as a fake red moon signals the beginning of the end of the world? No way! Everything in the prophecy points to me being the -- savior -- " I choke on the word a bit, but continue. "Everyone knows it's me. Everyone knows I'm the one."

Rufus stares at me calmly. "Everyone but you," he says.

I step back from Rufus. I feel I've been slammed in the gut by one of Sally's sledgehammers. He's right. If anyone should be able to recognize whether or not I'm the one, it should be me, right? And I've never felt it. I've never felt anything but terrified of my own inadequacy.

Rufus's hand on my shoulder brings me out of my stupor. I look up at him, all of my will destroyed and wait for him to deal the final blow to my sense of self. Instead he sighs and leans forward, his eyes locked on mine. "Your father," he says. He pauses, choosing his words carefully. "He was a bad man. He taught you...he taught you that the world was something to be afraid of. And there is a lot to be afraid of," he adds with a rueful laugh. "But there's so much -- more." He shakes me with the hand he still has on my shoulder. "You are so much more..." He grins. "Everyone," he says, echoing my own words, "sees it but you."

He straightens, leaving me feeling somehow both sick and hopeful. He marches past me to the door, and tosses me my cloak. "Let's go talk to Sally."

***

Sally's forge is also on the outskirts of town, which we passed on the way to Rufus's place, is still bustling. Bear and I wait behind the shop while Rufus goes to get Sally. He returns with Sally's daughter, Sarah. She has an incredibile understanding and appreciation for metal, even moreso than her mother, and leans as much on intuition as what she's been taught. When we were children, we bonded over both having dead fathers, although Sarah misses hers. We had a falling out a few years ago, and our relationship has been more careful than friendly ever since. I still relish watching her work, any time Moose needs a new shoe or something. When she is heating up or pounding down metal, her generally benign expression is overtaken by sheer intensity and focus. Oddly enough, even though she forgets that I'm standing there when she's working, I always feel that same closeness we had in our younger years.

Despite the weather, Sarah is dressed in a sleeveless leather tunic with equally sturdy pants and boots. Her arms are dotted in a confetti of small scars, but her face is flawless, as always. She has large eyes with thick, stubby eyelashes, a tiny nose that comes to a perfect point, and rosy, full lips. I'd always known she was beautiful but didn't start to hate her until I realized that I wasn't. Sarah nods at me cordially and her eyes flick over Bear in acknowledgement of his presence. She has a pack on her back and a heavy blanket draped over her arm.

***

"Let's go," Rufus whispers. He starts walking, and Sarah follows. Bear and I exchange glances and then follow as well. Rufus leads us to Kate's bakery. Kate answers Rufus's knock, takes the rest of us in in a glance, and then steps back to let us in. Kate, like everyone in town, is taller than me, but only by a couple of inches. She's a fleshy, red-cheeked woman with an enormous heart and a genius for bread.

 Like Rufus, Kate's business is also her home, but hers is much larger, and all one story. "Everyone is in the study," Kate says, closing the kitchen door behind us. The air in Kate's house is always permeated with the scent of bread, even on the rare occasion when none is baking, although right now, the ovens are fired up. Leonard, Kate's husband, nods. He's manning the ovens with a long wooden paddle. He does not have Kate's talent for baking, and is therefore keeping a careful eye on an hourglass timer that sits on one of the counters. He's tall (of course) with strong arms that come from constructing houses and a paunchy belly that comes from living with the world's greatest baker.

Kate pats his behind as she passes by, and he grins. We follow her into the second heart of her house, a large room with large windows on walls that face east and west. Windowseats with huge, plump cusions line those walls, and the middle of the room holds three overstuffed chairs and one long sofa, all in a mishmash of colorful patterns. The heavy, blue curtains are shut for the first time, I think, since Kate's mother died five years ago. A fireplace on the wall opposite us as we enter is ablaze, with a closed door on either side to it, but I know that the one of the left leads to the childrens' bedroom, the other to Kate's and Leonard's.

Any time of day or night, Kate has company of some sort. If Rufus is known for his advice, Kate is known for her sympathetic ear. Equally commonsensical when pressed for an opinion, she feels less inclined to fix her friends' problems than to give them voices. Now, people mill around her living room, some warming their hands in front of the fire, most in small groups of quiet, intense conversation.

"Janie!" Emma, Kate's 7-year-old runs over to me and tackles my leg.

"Janie!" Gordon, Kate's 4-year-old toddles over and clings to my other one.

I can't help but grin. I don't know why they like me, children are rumored to be intuitive about the innate value of a person. I fear their mental capacities will prevent them from leading productive lives when they get older, but I appreciate it anyway. I pat their heads, while Kate pries them off of me one by one and then sends them scampering off. They run over and climb onto the only person in the room who is sitting. David, the old Commissioner and Kate's father, grins at their antics and laughs when they immediately get bored, climb down, and then run off again.

When Emma yelled my name, the room went mostly silent and now the only sound is the crackling of the fire. The room is heavy with unexpressed emotion. No one seems surprised to see me, although, no one is particularly happy to see me, either, other than the old Commissioner. He gets up, beaming, and catches both of my cheeks in his hands. "Janie!" His voice booms through the quiet room. "How could you let my foolish son dethrone you so easily?"

Everyone in the room collectively exhales, and amidst chuckles, Kate shakes her head at me. "Honestly, my brother has a lot of good qualities, but he was really taken in this time."

I look around the room. "You mean, you all still believe that I'm the prophesied one?"

Sarah snorts from behind me and pushes past me into the room, which makes me realize that I'm blocking the doorway. "Of course," Sarah says, with a roll of the eyes.

The old Commissioner and I make room for Rufus to move past me, as well. "Yes," the old Commissioner says. "We are all here to set you up for your journey."

I look around the room more closely and recognize the shoemaker and his apprentice, the tailor and his two apprentices, and the librarian. Farmer Clarence and two other farmers stand in front of the curtained window that usually looks out into the square. Near the fireplace, Rufus's apprentice has clearly been drawn in by Kate's sister Imogene's abundant charisma and hovers near her without standing next to her. Her own amused expression indicates her awareness of this, and as I look at her, she winks at me. I can't help but smile.

I shake my head, and focus on the old Commissioner. "My journey?" I ask, with a frown. "The red moon is fake, we don't have to worry about that, right?"

The Librarian, Phillip Myer, steps forward. I suppress a sigh. Mister Myer is a nice man, I tell myself. Again. He's an old man in his mid-twenties with an air of gravity that is oppressive. He arrived in town about three years ago, brought in by The New Comissioner to improve the town. He's one of the only changes the town has tolerated well but he's always trying to talk to me about the prophecy and every time he does, I'm filled with a combination of sleepiness and terror. Now, he approaches me as though I'm a skittish cat, and seeing the lethargy start to fill my eyes, he stops and holds up his hands in a gesture of placation. "It is written," he says, avoiding the word prophecy, "that the false moon preceeds the real moon by a very short period of time".

I cross my arms. "Isn't that nice and vague," I say sarcastically, and see a flash of impatience in his eyes for the first time ever in his dealings with me.

"I have triangulated the best route to take us to Binyne," he says. His voice is as monotonous as always, and doesn't betray the flash that I'm sure I saw a moment ago. "We should be able to reach it in about two weeks, if we leave tonight."

"We?" I say. This is new. Since when do we save the world? And we have to go somewhere? I always assumed the apocalypse would come to me. Some inflamed devil would show up one night and I'd find a magical sword just in time and then, poof, world saved.

The Librarian nods. "Several of us have agreed to escort you." He pauses, choosing his words carefully. "I have tried to talk to you about preparation, but you were never ready to hear me." He lets out a breath. "Now we're out of time."

I frown. "Everyone here is leaving all of the sudden? That's going to look weird."

The Librarian shakes his head. "Only a few of us are going. I will lead the way with my maps. Mr. Butcher, Ms. Smith, Mrs. Mason, Ms. Ward, and of course," he adds, "we assume that Mr. Bear will be joining us."

"Indeed," Bear says drily. He hasn't moved from the doorway and is leaning against the doorframe. He flashes me a small, supportive smile and then goes back to looking bored. I look around at Rufus, Sarah, Kate, and Imogene. If I had to choose any four people, aside from Bear of course, to help me, it would be them. But it's uncomfortable, realizing that they are not only going to be putting their lives on hold for me, but that they have clearly been planning on doing so for a while. It's hard to meet their gazes, especially Sarah's since we aren't really even friends anymore.

"And what's everyone else doing here?" I ask gruffly.

"We're here to kit you out," Tailor Tomlinson says with a grin. The grin spreads around the room. Even Rufus' apprentice tears his attention away from Imogene and manages to look a little smug.

"Yeah," Sarah says, stepping forward. She lays the large, folded-over blanket she's been carrying on the back of one of Kate's chairs and then lifts up the hem to reveal several layers of fine chainmail. 

Tailor Tomlinson goes into Kate's and Leonard's bedroom and then reenters, pulling a rolling rack of tunics. Hans approaches me, holding a pair of supple leather boots.

***

Even with thick, new stockings, my toes have room to wriggle in my new boots and I delight in the sensation, even as Farmer Bev's wagon jolts over every bump in the road. The blister that had been forming earlier in the day has nothing to chafe against, and it'll most likely be healed in a day or so. Every stitch of clothing I'm wearing is brand-new and made especially for me. I know now, that my mother was complicit in getting my measurements to Tailor Tomlinson and to Sally and Hans.

I turn to Bear, who was too kind to decline the gifts that the tailor, blacksmith, and cobbler bestowed upon him, and red moonlight glints off of his chainmail. It doesn't seem to affect him at all. For my part, it's not uncomfortable, but it has had the effect of forcing me to sit up straight. The rain is heavier than before but it melts right off of my new cloak and boots instead of seeping in, and I'm aside from the roughness of the wagon wheels, I'm as cosy as if I were inside, in front of a fire. The wagon hits another bump. Okay, almost as cosy.

I'm not sure what to ask Bear. He never lies to me, but there's a lot he won't say, and I hate asking questions he won't answer. It makes me feel foolish and childish. His profile is serene, but I can feel that he can feel me bursting with unanswered questions. Did he know that this was going to happen? Did he know it was going to happen tonight? Did he know about the townspeople getting together to sneak me out of town? Did he know about my 'escort'? Had he previously agreed to be a part of it, or was it assumed, as Mister Myer said? Not much surprises Bear; he's seen too much. It's impossible to say what he knows, and equally impossible to make him tell me.

I give up on trying to figure out what to ask, and watch the moon fade to pink. We're about two miles out of town, heading west this time. Farmer Adams is in front of us, his wagon transporting The Librarian, Kate, Rufus, Sarah, and a lot of weapons. I mean, a lot. More than we could possibly need, surely, although there's a cold tension that runs through my body when I wonder why they think we need so many weapons.

On our wagon, Imogene sits up front with Farmer Bev. I think that Imogene is my unofficial bodyguard, which makes sense. Imogene has Kate's features and coloring, but is bustier, with a tiny waist. She has a sultry, mysterious air about her, which is fitting for her (secret) job as a trained assassin. She more closely resembles the statue in the town square than I do, so for festivals, special occasions, and any time a tourist wanders into town looking for the savior, Imogene pretends to be me. She's quite famous because although my identity is well-known to the people in the town, they also protect it from the outside world. Imogene even goes on tours as me, travelling which serves as a convenient cover for her actual purpose. Although her own (technically my own) assassination has been attempted many times, it has never been successful. Just one of the fun little details of my existence that keep me awake at night, although she doesn't seem to mind.

 The moon fades completely to white, which means we're free of the spell. I look behind us, looking for a clue as to where the spell fades, but it's all just dark, wet foliage. I'm sure I should feel something; anticipation, fear, anger, something. But it's been a long day, and I kind of just miss my mom.