“Are they an accurate guide?” I made sure my skepticism didn’t show.

“It depends.” Salkin spread his hands. “Those who trust the sticks are shown truth. For those who doubt, the runes fall without meaning.”

A convenient explanation for errors. “Who lays the sticks?” If the results were to be manipulated, there had to be a guiding hand.

“The seeker,” Yefri said, as if it were obvious.

“Would it work for me?” I asked slowly. “As an out-dweller and unsure of it?”

The two girls looked at Rusia, who rolled a rune stick between her fingers like a professional fixer. “It’s belief that governs the sticks. If you believe, they will speak true. I’ll read them for you if you like.”

“I’m curious,” I said slowly, “and willing to believe. Is that enough?” I let a hint of a challenge edge my words.

Rusia’s eyes shone dark and determined. She rolled the runes between her hands and pulled one free. “This is your birth rune?”

I held the polished yew wood between my hands, each image upright as I turned the three faces. The symbols were more fluidly carved than I was used to but were undeniably the Wellspring, the Harp and the Zephyr. I nodded slowly. “My father told me he drew this rune when I was born, that these are lucky symbols for me.” Could she have learned this from ’Gren or Sorgrad?

“Rusia’s always able to draw someone’s birth rune,” said Yefri with pride.

“Then he was truly of our blood,” commented Salkin. “Only the Folk take a single stick and read the three sides together. Outdwellers have all manner of strange rituals.”

“The Men of the Mountains draw a single rune,” Rusia corrected him with a hint of rebuke.

One chance in nine was not impossible odds. I looked at Rusia and pointed to ’Gren. “You’ve not spoken to him?”

“No, not at all.” She half turned in her seat. “Why?”

“Could you draw his birth rune, read something from it, even though you know nothing of him?”

Rusia nodded, a combative glint in her eye. “A test?”

“Go on, Rusia, we know you can do it,” Gevalla urged. The others all nodded, entirely confident in the girl’s talents.

Rusia took a moment to look thoughtfully at the nine sticks in her hand before taking a deep breath and plucking one from the bundle. “Are these his birth runes?”

“What do you read about him?” I countered.

Rusia pursed her lips. “The Storm is dominant of those three, a strong rune, masculine. He is inclined to temper and to trouble.”

Which could be true of any man, in the right circumstances.

Rusia turned the rune. “Lightning, so he is given to sudden inspiration but—” she hesitated. “A lightning strike can be calamitous, it sets fires and great destruction can result.”

I saw a curious detachment behind her eyes. The others were all intent upon her and I held my tongue. Rusia continued, her gaze fixed on something unseen. “The chime sounds as it is struck, so he has a reputation he does not care to deny or conceal. Striking is violence though—” She broke off. “I need his heavens sign.” She reached for another rune stick and made an inarticulate noise of surprise.

“This isn’t the heavens rune.” Yefri took the stick from her. “How ever did you mispick?”

Rusia colored and reached again but suddenly stayed her hand. “What ruled the heavens at his birth?” she demanded.

“I don’t know.” The question had never come up.

Rusia’s eyes were distant for a moment as she fingered the first stick she had drawn. “This is a rune of the mountains, linked to winds, to noise and disruption. There is something ill-omened—I cannot tell more without knowing his heavens sign.”

The group all turned to look rather dubiously at both brothers, deep in a game with a gang of young men. I walked over to stand at ’Gren’s shoulder. He turned his head briefly to acknowledge me.

“Your birth runes, ’Gren, do you reckon anything to them?” I kept my tone light.

’Gren glanced back to the noisy gambling. “Not beyond claiming that bone if we’re drawing lots.”

“What’s the heavens rune for your sigil?”

“Empty.” ’Gren turned with a wicked grin. “I was born at the dark of both moons.” He opened his eyes wide, white all around the startling blue. “Born to be hanged, that’s what they said.”

“Who said?”

“So did Sandy go off to find a pretty neck for that chain?” Sorgrad spoke over his brother with a malicious grin.

“When I left him he was tucking himself up for the night.” I looked at Sorgrad. “That was a costly gesture you made.”

He grinned in the flickering firelight. “I’d pay twice over in solid coin for that kind of entertainment. And now we know how to drive the mage out of any conversation.” He reached into a pocket and twirled an emerald signet ring on one finger. “What’ll you put up against this if I say some girl has that collar around her neck and Sandy’s got a spring in his step tomorrow morning?”

“No wager.” I shook my head. “Watch that one with the chain bracelets,” I whispered into ’Gren’s ear before returning to Salkin and his friends.

I sat down by the leather square. “He was born under no heaven’s sign, at the dark of both moons, Rusia.”

She muttered something in the Forest tongue and I cursed my lack of the language again. “What does that signify?” I asked.

“It is… ill omened,” Rusia said with a finality that forbade further inquiry.

Was this only superstitious nonsense or some lore shared by the ancient races?

“What could the runes tell you about me?”

She handed me the sticks with a challenge in her eyes. “Lay them as I tell you and we’ll see, shall we? Don’t look at them, don’t choose, just set them down.”

I took the runes from her and ran the smooth wood casually between my fingers. Polished from years of use, as far as I could tell there were none of the minute nicks or hollows that can tell practiced fingers so much more than the eye can see.

Rusia’s eyes held mine. “One first, laid crossways,” she commanded, “then two below it, crossways again and three in a line below that.” I did as I was bid. “The rest, one each at the corners of the triangle. No, pointing outward, like that.”

I sat back. “So, what do they say?”

Rusia picked up the single rune, the first I had laid. She held it up to show me the sign on its base. “You were born under the protection of the sun.”

“True enough,” I admitted, curious to find that I had laid the heavens stick first.

“This second row speaks of your character.” She looked at the two signs set upright beside each other. “Lightning, so you see yourself as creative, the Zephyr, so you consider yourself lucky.” She looked at the reversed runes on the other visible faces of the sticks. “How do other people see you? The Storm suggests they find you difficult, prone to disagreement. The Wellspring? They think you conceal a great deal.”

I smiled at her. She could try reading what I was concealing beneath my cheery unconcern if she liked.

She lifted the sticks to reveal the runes laid face to the leather. “And these speak of your true self. The Chime sounds for resolve, decisiveness. The Harp is a sign of craft, of skill, of cleverness.”

So Rusia was a shrewd judge of character, even on slight acquaintance. And news of newcomers runs around any village like a dog with a bone in its mouth. She’d doubtless been listening to gossip all day.

“What about the rest?” I pointed to the bottom row of three.

“Your mother, yourself and your father,” she said.

“Go on.” We might as well see this through. There might be something to this if Rusia could tell me anything of significance about my parents.

She showed me the Pine, first of the runes set upright and facing me. “Your mother is strong like the tree yet flexible enough to weather a storm.”

I’d certainly seen my grandmother’s anger come down like summer thunder, my mother passive yet ultimately resisting her fury.