The last time Taryn’s family had ventured into the village together, she’d been five years old. That day, a man fell from the roof of Damville’s inn while trying to escape the wrath of a jealous husband. Taryn employed a series of incremental catches and instant releases, just as her father had taught her, so that the man only suffered as much injury as he would have if he had fallen out of bed. She had looked to her father for praise or criticism but Papa hadn’t been looking at her. He hadn’t even been looking at the man she’d just saved. His attentions had been focused on a different man, a man who had been staring intently at Taryn.

The next day, Papa asked her to help him build a carriage. They had spent months designing and building it to be nearly unstoppable. Taryn exhausted herself every day, bending thin metal beams into the right shapes to form the skeletal frame of the vehicle. It was her idea to include a small compartment – large enough for her to fit in – to store food. It was his idea to install a locking mechanism for that compartment; one only she, or another mutant, could operate and he’d made her study it for hours. To this day, it was the longest training exercise they’d ever undertaken. And Taryn was just realizing why.

As she and her mother climbed into that carriage for their trip into the village, Taryn realized that the carriage project hadn’t been about building a device the family could travel in to explore the kingdom for a time and return home with amazing stories. It was a reliable means of escape, if they ever needed to, and a means of protecting Taryn from arrest, if the carriage should ever be stopped. The man who had caught her father’s rapt attention had seen – or, at the very least, suspected – what Taryn had done. And now Taryn realized how truly fragile her world was, how easily her life could come apart if she weren’t more careful about using her abilities when others were around.

Taryn knew she and her mother wouldn’t pass the ride with an endless flurry of games or songs or jokes or any of the other cheerful things she’d envisioned when crafting the vehicle, but she didn’t expect the dark mood that rode with them into the village. Taryn had her own problems, though. She was beginning to doubt that Pirate-face was responsible for her nightmare and subsequent hallucinations.

They shared the road with other travelers, and though Taryn couldn’t see their faces she could see the flames that accompanied their minds through the thick walls of the carriage. She couldn’t imagine a mutant could be powerful enough to continually effect her from so far away – for he was nowhere within her range and getting neither closer nor further away as she traveled to the village. The impressions of the flames didn’t grow stronger or fade. She didn’t feel any pressure or pain in her head. The flames couldn’t be the product of external tampering.

But they could be a new mutation.

Which meant she had to tell her parents. Her mother thought three major mutations in one year was unusual enough to warrant concern. What would she say of four in a year – two of which occurred within the same week? And if there were things that other mutants could do, things her parents didn’t know – couldn’t know – she had to know about them and she needed other mutants to tell her. Other mutants could explain what was happening to her abilities. Other mutants could tell her whether or not these flames were normal – or, at least, not exclusive to her. Other mutants could teach her control.

But other mutants could be like Pirate-face, like skin-changers – mutants who liked to hurt people. And she wasn’t ready to meet her father’s mysterious band of rebels. Yet she needed to understand what was happening to her.

These thoughts kept Taryn’s mind from falling into her mother’s flame. She’d experimented with the passing travelers and learned that looking at the flames too closely made it harder to ignore the minds of the people they occupied. (This was another reason she doubted Pirate-face’s involvement.) Taryn wanted to steer clear of her mother’s mind and focus on her baby brother, fussing as he slept in the sling her mother wore. He was joyless, still tormented by the memory of Pirate-face and she really hoped Mr. Sark could make her baby brother happy again.

That was the last thing she’d thought before her mother’s flame suddenly flared, growing larger and more intense. Taryn shut her eyes and cringed but it wasn’t a physical fire. Mama’s racking guilt caught and burned through Taryn’s mind. Taryn clenched against the unshed tears and the long repressed resentment. They weren’t as hard to take as the prayer.

Prayer was pointless foolishness, Papa said. There were no gods and the Lothor Kings had no power. Taryn was the only one who could hear Mama’s silent prayer, denouncing her mutations as a curse for sins past and begging the Kings that Nayt would be spared.

Her heart broke as her jaw clenched. Her fingertips already numb around the bench, Taryn gripped tighter. She’d thought, considering all they had shared yesterday, that Mama wouldn’t have any more unpleasant episodes. That even if she didn’t fully believe Taryn wasn’t evil – that she never would be! – Mama would at least reserve judgment until Taryn gave her a reason to doubt her benevolence. She’d been wrong and it hurt to know it, to feel it. As much as she loved her mother, Taryn could not understand why Mama couldn’t simply love her back, as she loved Nayt.

Taryn wanted to scream, to demand an answer, a real explanation for her mother’s hatred. But she didn’t. She sat shaking with rage and clenching against grief, staring through a wooden panel at the passing flames and waiting for the ride to be over.

I will not cry, she told herself. I will not let her see me so weak, so pathetic. I don’t need her to love me, she lied to herself.

Then the presence was gone. It was quick and sudden and so complete that Taryn chanced a glance. The fire had been quelled, shrunk down to a candle flame, silent and void of feeling. And her mother’s eyes were on her; she looked mortified. Taryn looked away.

“I’m sorry,” Mama said.

It was a while before Taryn replied. “No, you aren’t.”

“Oh, my love - ”

“Don’t call me that!”

“Please, don’t say that. It wasn’t– ”

“No! I don’t want to talk about it. Not now.” Maybe not ever.

So they passed the rest of the journey in silence.

When the carriage finally stopped, Taryn looked again at her mother’s flame. It was still void and she thought it seemed smaller but she was too upset to be curious about it. Papa opened the carriage door and helped her mother out. Taryn raised her arm to shield her eyes from the golden sunlight reflected on the sandstone. It occurred to her, then, that she was about to plunge herself into a sea of flames. Right now, alone in the carriage, Taryn could see them but she could not hear them; she could sense them but she could not feel with them. She didn’t want to.

The only voices she heard now were from the lips of her parents and the friend who greeted them. Mr. Lycci made his business building, selling and storing anything that had wheels; from shabby little carts and wagons that children played with to the larger multi-horse drawn carriages of the wealthier travelers. He owned this lot and nearby stables where horses were kept and carriages parked and worked closely with Taryn’s father, who supplied him with lumber and designs. Mr. Lycci was one of the few souls who visited the cabin on occasion. He always had an amusing tale to tell and Taryn heard him now, greeting her parents with his jokes. Hearing her parents laugh with Mr. Lycci made her sour. She could never have what her parents shared with Mr. Lycci. Because of what she was, she would never know friendship.

“Where’s my little monkey?” Papa poked his head into the carriage. “Did you change your mind about coming?”

The world behind him looked warm and sunny, full of life. But for her it would be blistering; full of veiled misery and uninvited pain. She didn’t want to wade through that to reach the class and learn about all the fun everyone always had without her, or how much better their lives would be when they grew up. Her future held rejection, more isolation and a possible rebellion against a royal family that had ruled for over a thousand years. According to her mother, her future held a deteriorating control of her abilities and a fall into darkness. What did it matter if Ms. Elah believed she was an unapologetic prankster?

“Come along,” Papa said, his hand reaching out for hers.

“I…” Taryn began to confess that she didn’t want to get out of the carriage; that she wanted to go home. But Nayt shifted in his sling and he beckoned her; his chubby hands mimicking their father’s and grabbing at the air. And Taryn fortified herself. She couldn’t protect Nayt if she couldn’t protect herself. She took her father’s hand and climbed out of the carriage.

As soon as her boots touched the ground her mind erupted with the images of tiny flames. She could feel them all – hundreds – pressing into and against her mind. Her head throbbed and her stomach turned with the effort to keep track of them all – too many screaming too loudly for her to think.

One of the flames leapt in front of her, close enough to block out most of the others. Taryn reared back and saw Oya Lycci – skin glistened pink in the heat, thinning hair beginning to gray – studying her with a queer expression.

“Something horrible has happened to you,” he said to her. “Tell me, child,” – here he gripped her shoulders – “who is responsible?”

Taryn looked to her father, puzzled.

“So it was you!” Mr. Lycci turned on her father. “It is a truly evil thing you’ve done, robbing this child of her smile. Return it now or suffer the consequences!”

Taryn thought Mr. Lycci was joking. But he didn’t look like he was joking and no one else was laughing. Maybe he’d lost his mind, then.

“That’s a serious charge, Leech. One that shouldn’t be tossed around lightly.”

“You can’t deny it when the evidence is so damning.”

“I didn’t do it,” Papa insisted.

“Then suffer you shall.” Then Mr. Lycci lunged at her father and Taryn thought they had both lost their minds, until she was how they wrestled.

Every punch thrown was either dodged or caught, the arm twisted and its owner, shoved away. Otherwise they were wildly off the mark or just barely making contact. Yet they seemed to yield disastrous results, sending their targets reeling, making them cry out in pain. There were stumbles and slips and poorly coordinated kicks that sent their casters off balance. Papa was usually deadly accurate and perfectly balanced. Taryn was amused to see him floored by his feigned folly.

Mr. Lycci was losing horribly. He threw a wide punch and Papa caught it, ducked under it and delivered a jab to Mr. Lycci’s ribs. Mr. Lycci groaned in pain and clutched at his side and limped away. Then he screamed like a wild animal and made what would be his last valiant effort to wrest Taryn’s smile from her father.

Papa slipped past his opponent, grabbed a wrist from behind and twisted it into a painful position beneath Mr. Lycci’s head. He used his hold to force Mr. Lycci to his knees before catching Mr. Lycci’s head in the crook of his arm and locking it there. He proceeded to lower the defeated Mr. Lycci to the floor. But Mr. Lycci still fought, his free fist journeying upward in an attempt to meet his opponent’s face, all the while spouting insults, berating Papa’s inferior combat skill, and delivering promises of serious retribution the moment he was allowed up from the floor.

Taryn couldn’t stop herself from laughing at that.

“Ah-ha!” Mr. Lycci shouted, pointing at Taryn. “I am victorious!”

Papa released Mr. Lycci and stepped away smiling as Mr. Lycci, feigning legs too damaged to support him, crawled on his elbows until he reached Taryn’s feet. She saw his lids twitch with the effort to keep one of his eyes closed. He peered at her with his one good eye and beckoned her with an unsteady hand. “Come,” he said in a weak whisper. “I have an important message to relay to you.”

Taryn bent to her knees and lowered her head to meet his, brimming with anticipation even though she knew he was about to spin a ridiculously made-up tale.

“Very few things are as pure as the smile of a child,” he said. “Yet they are coveted because they are also one of the most powerful forms of magic in the world.”

“Magic?”

“Of course! All smiles have the power to transform a dull and meaningless day into something exciting and purposeful. I certainly didn’t expect to wage war against a great evil today. And to be victorious! That could only be the work of child’s smile.” He coughed and breathed laboriously. “But listen carefully, for I’ve suffered many fatal injuries and I fear I am not long for this world. Although a child’s smile is an incredibly powerful thing – only the vilest forms of evil could destroy it completely – it is also very delicate. You must take care that it remains in its rightful place. You must never hide it, you must never try to suppress it or chase it away. Otherwise, it will lose its power and become vulnerable to lesser forms of evil. And do not let anyone steal it away.”

For someone not long for this world, Taryn thought, Mr. Lycci was surprisingly long winded.

“If you doubt these truths, I challenge you to put it to the test. Keep your smile, until this day’s end, and see what wonders would present themselves to you. Look! I see it happening already.” He reached behind her ear and pulled a golden coin from the layers of her braids. “A few seconds of laughter and already gold grows from your head. Imagine how many sweets you could buy if you found a reason to laugh with everyone you met.”

Taryn took the coin he pressed into her palm and a mountain of honey cakes and pies and fruit tarts and sweet custards rose up in her mind. Her smile widened. “Thank you.”

“Thank you, pure one, for allowing me the honor of lending my life to such a noble cause.” Mr. Lycci leapt to his feet and dusted himself off. “Just let me know the next time he tries to steal your smile.” He flexed his flabby arm. “I’ll beat it out of him again.”

“Thank you, Leech,” Papa said, patting his friend on the back.

Mr. Lycci bowed and waved them off. And the family made their way to the road that would lead them into the village center.

Taryn was lost in thought, thinking about what Mr. Lycci had done for her – what her father had undoubtedly put him up to – when the sounds of village life reminded her that she still had a problem that needed solving. But it wasn’t until she looked into everyone’s faces and saw the flames appearing that she noticed they had been missing from her mind’s eye since Mr. Lycci jumped in front of her.

Then the village’s woes invaded.

Mr. Lycci’s show had been a clever distraction, a truly admirable effort. But Taryn simply couldn’t hang onto it. She tried to focus only on her family’s minds. She tried to engross herself in the happy thoughts and feelings they’d just shared, but her resolve couldn’t stand against the wave of pain, distress, anxiety, and regret that invaded her mind. The self loathing, the hatred, the anger; all overtook the happiness. They were felt too strongly for her to ignore, too passionately for her to maintain her peace.

Taryn felt she’d be sick from it all.

The family procession stopped. Mama knelt before Taryn. “Tell me what’s wrong.”

Taryn scowled and moved past her. “It’s nothing I can’t manage.”

Mama pulled her back. “Tell me anyway.”

So Taryn told them about the flames; partly to hurt her mother with the news of another evolution, but mostly because she felt the need to get it out of her any way she could. She told them that she’d first assumed that Pirate-face had sent them to torment and confuse her but now she was convinced it was her second evolution this week; she felt everything more strongly now. Taryn felt stomachaches, headaches, and swollen bruises. Fevers, burns, and broken bones. She felt furious at having been robbed. Heartbroken, betrayed, depressed and frustrated; all at the same time. And she didn’t know how to free herself from any of it. She couldn’t think clearly enough to try.

“Taryn, why didn’t you get any of this on the way here?” Mama asked after a short while of pursed lips and silent glances at her husband.

“Because we were inside the carriage,” Taryn explained irately. “I can’t feel anything from outside if I’m inside, or from inside if I’m outside.”

“But some of the injuries you mentioned would keep people bedridden – indoors. And you’re outside. How can you feel them?”

“I… I don’t know.” Taryn was suddenly confused. She realized this had happened before. She had known that Mr. Tharin had been attacked by a bear, and she’d felt his injury even though he’d been ordered to stay in bed. His was one of the minds she felt when she was out and about the village, even though he rarely left his home and butcher shop. But when inside doors, her telepathy and empathy had always been limited to those indoors with her.

“Maybe you couldn’t feel anyone outside because you didn’t think you could,” her mother suggested.

“But I know I can’t,” Taryn insisted.

“No. Why didn’t I see this before?” her mother mused aloud. “The amount of secarin you produce the limits of the strength of your abilities. But how much of that power you use is limited by what you perceive to be possible.”

“What is she talking about?” Taryn asked of her father.

“I don’t know,” he responded. “But maybe we should talk about it over here.” He led them away from the road, to a shaded corner of the lot where they wouldn’t be seen or overheard.

“I mean that you are stronger than you think you are,” her mother said. “You have these limits because you think you do. If I’m right, I may have a way for you to control your reading and empathy. Would you be willing to try an exercise to test it?”

Taryn was skeptical. Her mother assessed her abilities and her father thought up ideas to train her in controlling them. Her mother was mostly useless in that regard. But when it came to her reading abilities, so was her father. So maybe… “I’ll try,” Taryn conceded.

“Good, then. Close your eyes,” her mother instructed. “And imagine that you are home alone. Imagine that I am outside trying to get in but I can’t.”

“Why can’t you – ”

“Because you won’t let me in.”

Taryn frowned. “But why won’t I –”

“Just do it,” her mother said.

“Fine, fine,” Taryn muttered as she closed her eyes and imagined. There was her mother’s tiny flame, slowly growing larger to block out the others. “Now what?”

“Now you listen,” her mother instructed.

It was hard for Taryn to imagine herself alone in the silence of the cabin with all of the sounds around her. She heard wheels rolling against the stone around her; she heard pleasant conversations and the not as pleasant but truer thoughts; the noises from the birds and horses; distant shouts and passing murmurs. She heard excitement and anxiety and anticipation and boredom. All around her she heard life. And louder than all of that:

“Can you hear me?” her mother asked.

“Yes.” Taryn opened her eyes and realized her mother hadn’t spoken. “It’s not working.”

“Then try again,” her mother insisted. “This time I want you to imagine a house that is all your own. Make it as large or as small as you’d like. Place it wherever you want; in a village, a city, an island. Now imagine you’ve hidden yourself in this house. There are people looking for you but none can even find the house to try to search you out. All of the windows are shut and all the doors are locked. You hear them calling your name and pleading with you to come out but you don’t. Their yells tell you how close they are, tell you to hide yourself better, deeper. Think about this hiding place. Keep your eyes closed. And listen.”

A hundred structures came to Taryn’s mind, borrowed from the reality of other minds or the imaginings of her own fantasies. But the one she chose was a stone tower, hidden in the woods. She didn’t know who these people were, seeking her out, but if she were supposed to be hiding they couldn’t be friends. She imagined there was a treasure in her tower, one they would steal from her. Or worse yet, a hidden magic they would take and use for their own evil ends. And Taryn didn’t hide. If there were people coming for her, she would face them and defeat them; this was a waking dream, after all.

There were no windows in her tower, but there were arrow slits. The enemy would find her eventually and she had to be ready. She imagined there were guards posted at every level of her tower. All the entrances had been sealed, but in an imagination even stone walls could be brought down with a giant’s fist or a troll’s club. So she positioned three winged-men on the roof. They would fly down and neutralize the beasts if they could, weaken them for her awaiting army if they couldn’t. Taryn waited, spear-tipped staff in hand, on one of the tower’s lower levels, at the head of a small squad of her most elite fighters. They would defend this magic treasure with their imaginary lives.

It was a lot more than her mother asked but this was Taryn’s imaginary tower. She would bore easily if she simply hid alone in it. So Taryn waited. And beyond the tower she heard… nothing.

In reality she heard the rolling wheels, the animal noises and the voices nearby. But there was less noise. From her stronghold, Taryn couldn’t hear the nudging of the minds in Damville. She didn’t feel sad or angry, hungry or hurried. She didn’t feel anything but alone. The flames were all gone – even Nayt’s.

“Mama?” Taryn cried out in a panic as she opened her eyes and reached out. Her fingers dug into her mother’s arm. She saw her mother smiling at her. Nayt sent her curious thoughts and she felt her father standing next to her. And, slowly, she began to feel the presences of the others in the village.

“I’m here,” her mother said. “I think you’ve done it, love. We’ve found a way to control this.”

The words sounded sweet to Taryn’s ears but she couldn’t quite believe them. It couldn’t be that easy to silence the voices in her head. She’d worked for a year to get the empathetic pulls to whispers she could easily ignore, yet her mother had led her to completely silence them in a minute. There had to be a flaw.

Taryn found two.

There was the horrible feeling of loneliness that reminded her too much of that nightmare. And the moment she opened her eyes the minds leapt back to hers. She didn’t want to walk through life blind just so she could have peace of mind. So she tried it with her eyes open. She looked around at everyone she could see and tried to conjure up the loneliness of her tower. She tried to visualize silence but it was simply too difficult with everything she could already see and hear. “But it doesn’t work with my eyes open.” Taryn was frustrated that she had gotten so close to a solution just to have it slip through the cracks of her mind.

“Of course you’ll have to work up to that,” her mother said. “Try it with one mind.”

Taryn thought about this, and then bolted away from her parents. If she tried with the most difficult person to ignore, then the others would be easier to manage. So she rushed off in search of the elder Mr. Smith. He’d lost a leg in some forge accident decades ago. Whenever Taryn got near him (a three yard radius that had grown to five in the past year,) her leg felt like dead weight and refused to support her. So down the road she went, headed for the edge of the village circle to where the family’s forge bordered the southeast road. She crept through the traffic, her eyes focused on the ground so she wouldn’t be overwhelmed by all that was going on around her.

Of the flames that burned in her mind’s eye, she focused only on the one she intended to silence. She approached its glow, keeping her stronghold in mind. She tried to imagine her tower moving away from his flame as she got closer. That didn’t work. She tried to force the flame out of her mind’s sight but that didn’t work either and soon she felt her leg tingle as it hung between feeling and absence.

She stopped in the road, trying to think of another way to get the flame out of sight. The answer came to her almost immediately. Instead of moving her tower away, why not put him in it? If the goal was to force it out of her mind’s sight, then she could surround it with the stone tower in her mind, defend it with hundred of guards barring her entrance, and it should be invisible and inaccessible to her.

Taryn focused on the old blacksmith’s flame. She imagined her heavily guarded tower dropping around it. And it was gone! Her leg no longer tingled and she tested her weight on it. She didn’t collapse.

She took a deep breath to calm her excitement and braced herself for the true test. She raised her head and looked in Mr. Smith’s direction. Through the crowd she could see him, sitting outside, barking orders and criticisms to the young men loading goods onto a wagon. She forced herself to look at him, not the stub that used to be his knee. She looked beyond his face and into the place where his flame should have been, reminding herself that it was hidden within a tower. She could see the tower, if she closed her eyes. But it was invisible to her in the light of the world.

Taryn took a tentative step toward him. When she found that the tower was still in place, she took another, and another, until she was striding, half confident that the tower would remain and half terrified that his flame would flare through it. She wanted to get as close as she could. She wanted to know exactly how close she could get before her solution failed, if it ever did. The old smith grew larger and larger in her sight but her mind was oblivious to his thoughts, his whims and wills and wishes. His flame remained locked up in a tower.

“What do you want?” he barked at her when she’d gotten closer than was socially acceptable.

“Nothing!” Taryn scurried away. She had made it close enough to see the beads of sweat that covered his face. She could hear his breaths, rasped with age, but she didn’t feel the absence of his missing limb. She ran back to her mother and wrapped her arms around her legs in an exuberant hug. “Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.”

“I’m glad I could help.”

“You did more than help; you solved it completely,” Taryn smiled. Then she remembered who she was talking to. Her smile waned, and she pulled away. “Thank you,” she added soberly.

“You’re amazing,” her mother beamed. “It normally takes weeks of meditation to develop a mental defense. I suppose being a mutant would make it easier for you but I didn’t expect you to do so well so soon. I’m proud of you.”

Taryn was unsure of how she should feel; bask in the glory of her mother’s praise – which she almost never got – or brood over the fact that her mother still thought she was a curse.

“It was easier to imagine the flame locked in a tower instead of me.”

“That makes sense; mental defenses are developed to keep mutants from reading people’s minds. But I didn’t think you could impose one.”

“Do you mean people can protect their minds from mutants?”

“Yes. But only from telepathy, and apparently empathy. You already know there is no such hope against telekinesis.”

“Is that what you did in the carriage?” Taryn asked. “Your flame got smaller and I couldn’t hear anything from it after… Were you protecting your thoughts from me?”

Mama nodded. “Some thoughts should never be shared.”

Some thought should never be had, Taryn thought.

“Well it’s a good thing it did work,” Papa said. “Because your mother will be teaching you all about mental defenses while she helps you learn to control your new abilities.”

“What?” Taryn and her mother asked together.

“Your abilities are only going to get stronger and this is the first thing that’s worked – truly worked – towards giving you real control. I don’t know enough about mental defenses or telepathy and empathy to teach you. Your mother obviously does. And since you’re such a quick study, we could have you back in school in a few weeks.”

Taryn hadn’t even been thinking about going back to school. With the ability to control this, or the promise of one day being able to control it, all the things she wanted her life to be became possible again. And there was a way to protect Nayt’s mind from Pirate-face. But she would need to be near people to master her new abilities. This meant that she and her mother would be making regular trips to the village; this meant many long and uncomfortable walks together.

Taryn looked at her mother; they were both nervous about the arrangement. Taryn offered her a smile. It had gotten her this far, perhaps it had enough magic left to change her mother’s mind about her.

Her mother answered with a tentative smile of her own and the empty space inside of Taryn shrank a bit.

A truce, then.