The Curse of the Blessed

Chapter Fifty-Two

We gathered in the woods behind Lark's house—all of us. In the commotion that had followed the Head Man's announcement, Reed had managed to slip away to join the secret meeting.

He took one look at Lark's face and frowned worriedly. "What's wrong?"

"It's-" Lark seemed near tears, her face worried as she forced the next words out. "It's my sister. I think she's a Blessed. And with the new laws..."

"How old is she?" I asked. "Is she young enough that she might be able to escape the consequences, at least?"

"She's nine."

"She's all right, then, for now," said Bran in a relieved tone.

Lark shook her head. "She'll be turning ten in two days. She won't be safe then. And she hasn't had any training yet."

"What are her powers?" asked Reed. "Are they something that can be easily hidden?"

Lark hesitated. "If she learns to control them... there are subtle ways she can use them without being discovered. But she doesn't have the experience for that. She can make plants grow. She doesn't know that I know—I'm not sure she even realizes what this means yet—but I saw her practicing on an acorn." She turned her eyes to meet ours. "She's powerful. She's good at it. But there was a moment when I could see she'd lost control, and it took her far too long to regain it."

"Do you think we can help her learn?" Bran asked.

"I don't know!" Lark burst out. Her hands grasped her elbows, nails biting into the skin, and she looked angry and ashamed. "Teaching her would involve having her use her powers. And according to the new rules, that's illegal. She could be killed."

"We could contact the Calamity," Reed suggested. "They'd be willing to take her in and teach her. She could come back once she's learned and say that they kidnapped her, or something like that."

"She's nine." Lark looked about to sink to the ground, so I stepped forward and wrapped my arm around her shoulders. She leaned into me and gave me a grateful smile. "I don't want to let her go out on our own like this."

"We did fine," Bran pointed out.

"We're practically adults. You're what, fourteen? I'm fifteen. We're all somewhere close to those ages."

"I'm fifteen too," said Bran, with an offended frown. "What, do you really think I'm that much younger than you?"

"You are kind of immature sometimes."

Bran scowled at me. "Right. Because no one else here is ever immature. Remember when Reed was embarrassed about having a stone butterfly for a pet?"

Lark couldn't hold back a smile at that, and I realized Bran was trying to cheer her up—trying to lighten the situation. It was working. I stifled a chuckle.

Bran turned to Reed. "What about you? Can you talk to your father? Ask him to make an exception for the first few Blesseds who are discovered? Explain what will be necessary in order to train them to repress their powers?"

"No." Reed shook his head. "There's no chance he'll listen. He'd look like a hypocrite if he went back on his word now."

"Even if he said he was doing it as a sort of... payback for what Lark did while on the quest?"

Again, Reed shook his head. "That would make him even more of a hypocrite. He already said we'd be treated the same as any other villager from now on."

"There has to be something we can do," said Lark.

"Nothing active," said Reed. "For now, we just have to hope that it'll work out by itself. We all know to cover for her if we see anything strange. We'll protect her as much as we can, but other than that, it's up to her."