Plain Kate by Erin Bow

Author:Erin Bow [Bow, Erin]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, General, Fantasy Fiction, Juvenile Fiction, Fantasy, Magic, Fantasy & Magic, Body; Mind & Spirit, Family, Occult Fiction, Animals, Cats, Orphans & Foster Homes, Orphans, Witchcraft & Wicca, Human-Animal Relationships, Wood-Carving, Witchcraft, Wood Carving
ISBN: 9780545166645
Publisher: Scholastic Inc.
Published: 2010-08-31T16:00:00+00:00

nine

the bear cage

Rye Baro’s words produced first a stun of silence, and then a chorus of shouting. Stivo wrenched Plain Kate around. She could see how his shadow spun like a cape around him, how everyone’s shadow stretched in the early slant of light. “No shadow!” Stivo cried, and someone screamed.

On top of one of the vardo was the iron cage that had once held a dancing bear. They hauled it down and shoved Kate into it. She lurched up, banged her head on the bars, and fell sprawling. “I didn’t!” she was shouting. “I didn’t do anything.”

Stivo was locking the cage door. He was in such a rush to back away from her that he dropped the key. Kate reached for it. Stivo put his boot over it and kicked at her hand.

Plain Kate rolled over and looked up at the gathered Roamers. The cage bars cast shadow bars all around her. She crouched up and heard the gasp: Behind her the lines of shadow stretched straight, uninterrupted by the shadow she should have had, across the dirty straw and the white droppings of the chickens. She could almost feel them, going right through her like cold spears. The faces that looked down on her were marked with awe and fear.

“No shadow,” whispered Daj. Even she looked afraid. Plain Kate crouched there, breathing hard.

“They were right.” Stivo’s voice was flat with wonder. “In Samilae, where they wanted to burn you. They were right. You are a witch.”

“I’m not,” she sobbed. “I’m not.”

“It’s the gadje burn their witches,” said Rye Baro. “That’s nothing to do with us.”

“But it’s us they burn!” Stivo exploded.

“I’m not a witch! Stivo, please.” Plain Kate reached through the bars and touched his boot. “Ask Drina. Ask Drina, she knows—”

“Drina!” Stivo jumped back from her hand as if she were a snake striking, scrabbling the key up from the mud as he staggered away. “Drina! I told you not to bring your trouble on my Drina. My God, what she has already seen, without falling in with—” he sputtered. “With demons!”

Horror closed Kate’s throat. She could only whisper, “I’m not.”

“We are taught,” said Rye Baro, his voice still thoughtful, kind, “that only the dead have no shadows. But Stivo has told us of his wife’s brother, who gave up pieces of his shadow to give power to the dead. We do not know which is the case here.” He cut off the rumble of voices with one raised hand.“Plain Kate Carver. What can you say about this?”

She swallowed, and sat up as straight as she could. “A witch.” Her voice cracked. The crowd held its breath like one great creature. “A witch took my shadow.”

“And what can you say about Wen?”

She tossed her head like a nervous horse. “I—It’s not me. I don’t know what’s happening.”

“And Drina?”

Kate’s throat tightened. “She…” It came out as a whisper, and even in her own ears, she could hear the guilt in it. A mutter rose from the gathered Roamers. “She was only trying to help me.

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