Oracle Read Online Free Page B

coo outside in the silence, and the yells of the boys trying to hit them with their slingshots.
    ‘There are no spears at the door, and only one skin on your bed,’ Nikko put in quickly, as the silence grew uncomfortable. ‘I think you have no husband and no sons. I don’t think you like men much,’ he added.
    The hag looked at him, her face expressionless. ‘So you watch too, do you? But you don’t see the truth. Well, girl? Is what your brother says correct?’
    Thetis shook her head vigorously. ‘No. I think you had a husband. Maybe you had a son too. But they died.’
    The hag’s skinny fingers whitened as she gripped her knees. ‘How do you know that?’
    ‘The people here do not like you. They give you cheese and grain, but they wouldn’t give you a finebearskin like that one. So your husband or your son must have speared it.’
    The hag gave an almost smile. ‘Not quite the truth. But near enough. The bear killed my husband and my son. The other hunters speared it. They brought its fur back to me, with their bodies, and when I sleep with it I can remember them. Only men would risk their lives just for a bearskin. I remember that as well, as I lie warm under the fur. What else do you see?’
    Thetis considered. ‘I don’t think you want a husband now. You let your hair go wild and you are smelly. Mother says you must smell sweet and braid your hair if you are to get a husband.’
    ‘Thetis…’
    The hag gave a bark of laughter. ‘No, let her speak. Why should I want another husband, child? A man to tell me what to do, who expects me to serve him barley bread and wait for the crumbs when he has finished? Why should I want another son? A few years of joy and then a lifetime of remembering and grief.’ She grinned, but it was more wolf’s grin than woman’s, the strange strong teeth within the wrinkled face. ‘What else?’
    ‘I think you don’t like the people of this village either. I think you smell like old Antigone did too, before she died, which means you have pains here and here,’ she touched her stomach and then her back, ‘and that you will die soon as well—’
    ‘Thetis! Be quiet!’ Their mother clutched her tighter, muffling her voice against her chest. ‘Mistress, my apologies, she does not know what she is saying.’
    ‘Oh, she knows,’ said the hag. ‘She knows exactly what she says. She watches and she tells the truth.’ She smiled again, but this time the smile was mocking. ‘I did not think you would regret your daughter’s voice quite so soon.’
    Their mother gave a startled gasp. She loosened her hold. Thetis looked from her to the hag, a little wary now.
    ‘Well, child,’ said the hag again.
    It is as though she and Thetis are alone, thought Nikko suddenly. As though Mother and I have vanished.
    ‘You are mostly right. I do not like most people. Most people are stupid, but that is not why I do not like them. I dislike them because they love their stupidity, because they do not want to know. Most people like lies instead of truth. Lies are so much simpler to understand. Magic is easier than the hard work of grinding snail shells. As for the rest—yes, I am dying.’ The smile grew to another grin.
    She is enjoying this, thought Nikko.
    ‘We are all dying, but I will die first. But you are wrong about the pain. There are flowers up on the mountain that take my pain away.’
    She was silent for a moment, then looked up at their mother. ‘If you leave your daughter with me I will teach her all I know—or all I can teach her before I die.’
    ‘I—’began their mother, but Thetis’s high clear voice interrupted.
    ‘You want me here to care for you when you are weak, because the village people won’t.’
    ‘Ha.’ The hag slapped her knee. ‘I take back my offer. I want my dying months to be quiet, not interrupted by achild who both sees and tells the truth.’ She shook her head. ‘If I had known…’ She glanced out the door at the mountain. ‘But only