We always moved our location, and we always used different ferns for the tents. We took different paths to the spring. Naji said that would keep the island from changing too much, though he didn't explain how. At least that was back to normal.
Things fell into a routine. I didn't get used to 'em, but they were at least a routine.
Then one morning I woke up and Naji was gone. The familiar sick panic set in. I was on my feet immediately, tearing the tent apart, screaming Naji's name. A million possibilities raced through my head. Maybe he'd turned into moonlight after all, and I was next. Maybe he'd turned into a fern and I was ripping him into shreds in my fear.
I dropped the fern and I stepped back, almost stepping into the fire. The beach was silent save for the wind and my racing, terrified heartbeat.
"Naji?" I said one last time. All my hope was lost. That wasn't much of a surprise, though, cause I really didn't have much of it left.
"Ananna? Are you alright?"
Naji popped up in the shadow of a tree.
"You!" I shouted. "What's wrong with you?"
He blinked at me.
"I thought you got turned into a fern."
"Oh. Oh, Ananna, I'm sorry, I didn't think–"
"You go on and on about how I can't be left alone and then you just leave me here?"
Naji walked up to me. He moved with his old grace, slinking across the beach instead of shuffling. I'd hardly noticed that particular quality was coming back along with the magic.
"I was restless," he said. "I'm sorry. You weren't in danger."
I suppose that was something, but my heart was still beating too fast.
"I have something to show you."
"What could you possibly have to show me? Did your sword turn into a courtier's dress?" I narrowed my eyes at him. "Or did you find the wizard? Did you–"
"No. I'm not that well yet. But I think you'll appreciate it nonetheless."
He turned and headed off down the sand. I followed him because I didn't much want to be left alone again. After fifteen minutes we came across an old fallingapart little shack, set back into the woods, still within sight of the beach.
I didn't trust it at all. "Does somebody live here?" Though I had to admit it looked long-abandoned, the stones in the walls cracked and warped, the thatched roof dotted with holes.
"Look at it, Ananna. But the answer's no, no one lives here. I cast a history spell. A small one, but enough to tell."
I stepped up to the shack's door and nudged it with my foot. Inside, the stone floor was coated with sand and old ashes and the thin, glassy sheen of sea salt. There was a tiny hearth in the back, where Naji had started a fire, and a pile of stone jars and a rotted bed in the corner.
The warmth spread over me, welcoming as an embrace, but I just looked on it with suspicion
"It's some island trick," I said, turning toward Naji. "It'll be like the lean-to. We'll go fetch water and come back to find it turned into a big pile of stones." I thought about the stones on the beach and shivered.
"It's not. I cast a history spell, remember?" Naji leaned up against the doorway. "It's been here for almost seventy-five years. And the first spell cast on it was one of protection."
"And it's still working?"
"It was very strong magic. Very old magic."
I glowered at him. He stepped inside and the fire flickered against his rotting clothes. "Would I do anything to put you in danger?"
He'd done plenty to put me in danger. He'd dragged me across the desert in the white hot heat. He'd gotten me stranded on the Isles of the Sky. But I'd let him. I'd done it all cause I wanted to break the curse as much as he did.
I shrugged and didn't look him in the eye.
"You should sit by the fire. It's a work of magic in and of itself that you haven't gotten sick yet."
"I'm fine."
"Let's not risk it."
I had to admit, the firelight looked awfully inviting.
And Naji looked healthy, not in any pain at all. I took one step cautiously through the doorway, and then strode across the shack to the hearth. The heat soaked into my skin, and I sat down, drawing my knees up to my chin. Naji sat down beside me.
"Why'd you do this?" I asked.
"Do what?"
"Find a shack."
"Because we need it," he said. "I don't know how long it will be until I'm fully healed, and it isn't helping that we have to sleep out in the cold every night."
I didn't say nothing, just leaned closer to the fire. Naji got up and paced around the room liked a caged jungle cat.
"I hope the wizard can break your curse," I said, speaking into the fire.
Naji stopped pacing. I looked over at him, and he stared back at me from across the room, the firelight flickering across his scars. But he didn't say a word, not about the curse, and not about anything else, neither.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
The shack looked halfway destroyed, but I was grateful for it when a storm blew through later that week, cold driving rain and dark misting winds. There was a hole about the size of my fist up in the roof, and water sluiced across the far wall, opposite the hearth, but me and Naji huddled up next to the fire and stayed dry. Naji kept rubbing his head, though, and I think it might've had something to do with the whispering on the wind. This time I could make out what it was saying: a voice speaking a language I didn't understand.
The next morning, the sun broke through the clouds, sending down pale beams of light that dotted across the beach. It was hard to imagine the storm from the night before and harder still to remember the voice, which seemed more like a dream as the day wore on. I thatched the roof with fern fronds and pine needles, and Naji swept out the inside with a broom I made for him from more pine needles. When we finished, we sat down to eat berries and some pale creamy tuber Naji dug out of the ground. Neither were very satisfying.