“How in the world did you know that?”
“Nysander showed me some Aurënfaie writing while we were staying at the Orëska House. I can’t read it, but I recognize the characters. I’ve had plenty of time to poke around, you know, all these nights you’ve been gone.”
“Very enterprising of you,” said Seregil, wincing a bit as the barb struck home. “But why didn’t you ask earlier?”
“I still wasn’t sure until Nysander said it would be a terrible scandal if the Lerans could make you out to be a traitor. Micum and Nysander both said you’re related to the Queen. The best thing for the Lerans would be if a relative of the Queen who is also a friend to her daughter, former apprentice to her favorite wizard, and an Aurënfaie was caught selling information to the Plenimarans.”
Alec hesitated. “You’re not angry, are you? I’m sorry I just blurted it out like that in front of Nysander but suddenly it was all—”
“Angry?” Seregil laughed, raising his head at last. “Alec, you constantly exceed my highest expectations!”
“Except at swordplay.”
“But we’ve settled that. Go on now. Pack whatever you think you’ll want.” Jumping up, Seregil headed for his room. “I’ve got an extra saddle somewhere. And be sure to take your bow. Beka’s quite an archer herself.”
“You’re not still sending me away?” exclaimed Alec, crestfallen.
“And why wouldn’t I?”
“With everything Nysander just told you? How can we just ride off like that with you in trouble?”
“I can be back in town by tomorrow evening.”
“So you’re getting me out of the way!”
Going to Alec, Seregil clasped him gently by the back of the neck and looked earnestly into his eyes. “This is dangerous work. How can I concentrate on the task at hand if I’m constantly worrying about losing you down some dark alley during a chase? I won’t feel right taking you along until I think you have some way of protecting yourself. That’s why it’s so important for you to learn to use your sword. Go to Micum; learn from him. He can teach you more in a week than I could in half a year, I promise.”
“You never thought I was so helpless before we got to Rhíminee,” Alec grumbled, trying to pull away.
Seregil tightened his grip slightly, holding him in place. “Oh, you’re anything but helpless, my friend. We both know that.” Releasing him, he added, “But trust me when I tell you that you haven’t yet seen the Rhíminee I know.”
“But what about the Lerans? Can you leave with all that going on?”
“That letter was delivered this morning, so it will be at least a day or two before they begin to guess that it’s missing. Even then, I doubt they’ll act right away.”
“Why not? If they have another copy they could just deliver it to someone else.”
“They won’t do anything until they learn what happened to the first copy, and that’s not going to happen until I’m ready to let them,” Seregil assured him with a grim smile. “Now go get packed. The day’s half over already and we still have to buy you a horse!”
22
ONE HORSE, TWO SWANS, AND THREE DAUGHTERS
The livestock marketplace lay just outside the city walls by the Harvest Market gate. Mounted on a borrowed horse, Alec looked around eagerly as they rode among the horse traders’ enclosures there.
“That’s who we want,” Seregil said, pointing out a woman in a dusty riding kirtle and boots. At the moment she was engaged in a heated discussion with several of her fellows beside one of the corrals. Dismounting, Seregil led Scrub over and joined the circle of conversation. The trader nodded to him and hooked a thumb at a large wooden building a few hundred yards away.
“Damn fool thing to do,” she grumbled. “Look at my poor beauties, what it does to them!”
“The new Butcher’s Hall, you mean?” asked Seregil, wrinkling his nose. A faint breeze carried the sickly sweet smell of the place and the cries of ravens and gulls fighting over the piles of discarded entrails in the pits beyond the slaughterhouse:
Leaning on the upper rail of the corral, the horse trader watched her horses stamping nervously as they scented the wind. “We’ve petitioned before to have a market of our own, farther away from the damned butchers, but the Council can’t be bothered with us, it seems! Cows, pigs, sheep; they’re too dim to mind the smell of blood if they was swimming in it. But my poor beauties there—look at ’em! How am I supposed to show you a steady beast when they’ve all got that stench up their noses?”
“Petition the Queen’s Court directly,” Seregil advised. “Idrilain understands horses a good deal better than the fat merchants on the Council of Streets and Markets.”
One of the other traders nodded. “Aye, that’s not a bad idea.”
“You and I, Mistress Byrn, we’ve done enough business for me to trust the quality of your beasts.” Seregil pointed to Alec, who was already scrutinizing the herd. “I think my friend here favors them, too. Let’s have a closer look.”
With a pleased nod, the trader tucked the hem of her woolen skirt up into her belt and climbed over the rail.
Seregil waded into the herd beside her, rubbing necks and rumps and crooning softly to them. Following in his wake, Alec marveled at how the animals seemed to calm under his hand. Other horses crowded up to their mistress.
“They’re just a pack of great colts, as you see,” she said, grinning at Alec over their backs. “Northern stock mostly, with a few drops of ’faie mixed in here and there. They’re strong and they’re smart. I doubt you’d find better between here and Cirna.”
Alec wandered among the shifting herd, trying to sort out those that showed the best natures and conformations from those he only liked the looks of. He was just reaching out to stroke a pale sorrel filly when a shove from behind nearly knocked him off his feet. A dark nose pushed under his arm and he found a brown mare nipping at his belt pouch.
“You, Patch!” the horse dealer shouted. “Get out of that, you hussy!”
The mare, a plain-looking beast, looked longingly back at Alec as she sidled away. Despite her unremarkable appearance, he was taken with the disdainful set of her ears. He put a hand out to her and she butted him under the arm again, nuzzling at his belt.
“It’s the leather she’s after,” the dealer confessed. “Crazy for it as others are for apples. She’s a losel with the tack, I’ll warn you.”
“All the same, she’s not half bad,” Seregil remarked, coming over to see.
Running a critical eye over joints and hocks, Alec noticed an irregular spot of white hair the size of a child’s hand just behind her right flank.
“How did she come by this scar?” he asked.
The woman smoothed a hand fondly over the mark. “Wolves got into my enclosure last winter. Killed three foals before we got out with the torches. One tore at her here, as you see, before she brained it with a kick. She’s a feisty one, my Patch, and stubborn, but she has a smooth, strong gait and she’ll go all day for you. Saddle her, young sir, and see what you think.”
A gallop across the open ground around the marketplace was enough to win Alec over. The mare showed no skittishness, and took the reins well.
“That’s settled, then,” Seregil said approvingly as he paid out the money.
Moving his saddle and pack onto Patch, Alec slung his bow over one shoulder and followed Seregil onto the Cirna highroad.
Several miles out from the city they turned onto a road leading up into the hills. Seregil seemed to be in no particular hurry and they rode easily, giving the horses their head and enjoying the crisp, clear afternoon.
Winter was beginning to take hold in Skala now, though the breeze still carried the stinging scent of smokehouse meats, yellowed hay, and the last sour tang of the cider presses from the farmsteads they passed along the way.
They’d ridden for some time in comfortable silence when Seregil turned to Alec and asked, “I suppose you’re wondering why I didn’t tell you so
oner?”
“You never say much about yourself,” Alec replied with a touch of reproach. “I’ve gotten used to not asking.”
“Delicate manners will get you nowhere with me,” Seregil advised, nonplused. “Go on, ask away.”
“All right. Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”
“Well, at first it was because you had so many misconceptions about the ’faie,” replied Seregil. “You seemed to think we were all great mages or nectar-sipping fairy folk.”
Alec’s cheek went hot as he recalled the childish fancies he’d shared with Seregil in their first days.
Seregil shot him a sidelong grin. “Oh, you northern barbarians do have some strange notions. Anyway, I decided I’d better let you get used to me first. Then I got sick.”
He paused, looking a little sheepish himself. “I’ve been meaning to tell you since we got to the city, really, but—I don’t know. The right moment just didn’t seem to come. What I said to Nysander is sort of true; I am proud of you for figuring it out on your own. What else would you like to know?”
What wouldn’t I like to know! thought Alec, wondering how long this strange humor of Seregil’s would last. “How old are you?”
“Fifty-eight, come Lenthin month. In the reckoning of my race, that doesn’t make me all that much older than you, though I’ve certainly had more experience. It’s difficult to draw comparisons between Aurënfaie and human ages; we mature differently. Under Aurënfaie law, I’m not old enough yet to marry or hold land.” He chuckled softly. “For the most part, I’ve done very well for myself in Skala.”
“Because you’re related to the Queen?”
“To some degree, though it’s a very distant and threadbare tie. Just enough to have gotten me an introduction and a place as a high-class servant. Lord Corruth, consort to Idrilain the First, was a cousin of my grandmother’s mother. My claim to Skalan nobility is a tenuous one at best.”
Alec’d had hints enough from both Micum and Nysander to know better than to ask Seregil why he’d left Aurënen in the first place. “What’s it like there, in Aurënen?”
Seregil rode on in silence for a moment, his face half turned away. Alec feared he’d taken a misstep after all and was about to take back the question when Seregil began to sing.
The language was unfamiliar, yet so liquid, so graceful in the ear that it seemed Alec could almost grasp it—and that if he did it would reveal a depth of meaning his own language could never achieve. The melody, simple yet haunting and full of longing, brought tears to his eyes as he listened.
Seregil sang it a second time, translating so that Alec could understand.
“My love is wrapped in a cloak of flowing green
and wears the moon for a crown.
And all around has chains of flowing silver.
Her mirrors reflect the sky.
O, to roam your flowing cloak of green
under the light of the ever-crowning moon.
Will I ever drink of your chains of flowing silver
and drift once more across your mirrors of the sky?”
Looking out across the empty winter fields, Seregil said in a husky whisper, “That’s what Aurënen is like.”
“I’m sorry.” Alec shook his head sadly. “It must be painful, thinking about your own country when you’re so far away,”
Seregil shrugged slightly. “Yri nala molkrat vy pri nala estin.”
“Aurënfaie?”
“An old proverb. ‘Even sour wine is better than no wine at all.’ ”
Afternoon shadows were creeping down the hills as Seregil turned from the highroad and led the way onto a stone bridge over a large stream. A flock of swans grazing in the bordering field took flight at their approach, rising into the air with a great beating of wings.
Unslinging his bow with surprising speed, Alec brought down two of the great birds and nudged Patch into a canter to retrieve them.
“Well shot!” Seregil called after him, turning his horse loose to drink. “Just yesterday I was wondering if you were out of practice.”
Alec rode back with the birds slung from his saddlebow. “Me, too,” he said, dismounting to let Patch drink. “At least I won’t come in empty-handed. Are we almost there?”
Seregil pointed up the valley. “That’s Watermead. We’ll have missed supper but I’m sure Kari won’t send us to bed hungry.”
A few miles above them they could see open meadows and a cluster of buildings nestled against the edge of the mountain forest. Below the main house flocks of sheep wandered like clouds across the face of the hills. Darker herds moved across some of the other meadows.
Alec squinted at the distant house, wondering what his reception would be.
“Don’t worry. You’ll be part of the family in no time.” Seregil reassured him.
“How many of them are there again?”
“Three girls. Beka’s the oldest. She’ll be eighteen in Lithion, I think. You’ll spend a good deal of time this week looking down her sword. Elsbet’s fourteen and has the makings of a scholar. I expect she’ll be entering the school at the Illior Temple soon. The youngest girl is Illia, just six years old and already the mistress of the whole estate.”
“I hope Micum’s wife doesn’t mind having me underfoot,” Alec said, still feeling shy.
“Kari?” Seregil laughed. “By now Micum’s told her all about the poor orphan boy I’ve dragged south. I’ll be lucky to get you back! As for being underfoot, I doubt there’ll be much time for that.”
Seregil whistled and Scrub splashed up from the stream. Patch, however, had waded out into the middle and seemed content to remain there despite any urging from Alec. Whistle and call as he might, the mare staunchly ignored him. Giving up at last, he stood scowling on the bank.
“Dark looks won’t do it,” Seregil chuckled. “I think you’re going to have to get your feet wet.”
“I’ll wet more than that,” Alec grumbled, looking at the brownish slime that coated the rocks of the streambed. Suddenly, however he broke into a grin. Taking an archer’s tab from his purse, he held the bit of leather out and called, “Hey you, Patch!”
The mare’s head came up at once, ears forward. Snuffling loudly, she came close enough to nip at it and Alec snagged her by the head stall.
“You’ll spoil that beast,” Seregil cautioned, splitting an apple for his own horse. “Teach her to come at your whistle, or you’ll have to buy a tannery to keep her.”
When they reached the summit of the hill they found the gate of the wooden palisade that surrounded the main house open to them. A pack of enormous hounds bounded out of the shadows as they entered the walled yard, growling suspiciously until they caught Seregil’s familiar scent. He dismounted and one of them, a grey-muzzled old male, rose on his hind legs and rested his paws on his shoulders, looking him in the eye. Others milled happily around Alec, slapping him with their plumed tails and sniffing hopefully at the swans hanging at his saddlebow.
“Hello, Dash!” Seregil rubbed the hound’s head affectionately before pushing him off. Wading through the pack, he led the way to the door.
• • •
Kari was the first to see them as they entered the main hall. The tables had been pushed back against the walls for the night, and she and her women sat spinning around the central fire. Meeting her eyes across the room, Seregil caught a fleeting glimpse of the old apprehension: No, it’s too soon, we’ve only just gotten him back.
That look had given him a degree of satisfaction in the early days, before the rivalry between them had mellowed into friendship. Now it saddened him a little that his sudden appearance still evoked the same flash of resentful alarm.
Before he could reassure her, however, a bundle of dark braids and flying skirts streaked from the direction of the kitchen. Dropping his saddlebags, he scooped Illia up and received a resounding kiss on the cheek.
“Uncle! Look, Mother, Uncle has come after all!” she cried, kissing him again. “But you can’t
take Father away with you, you know. He’s promised to take me riding tomorrow.”
Seregil looked down the length of his nose at her. “Now, that’s a fine welcome.”
“Illia, where are your manners?” Kari laid her distaff aside. She was dark like her daughter, with a gentle oval face that belied her brisk manner. “Seregil hasn’t ridden all this way just to have you hang on him like a burr.”
Undeterred, Illia peered over Seregil’s shoulder at Alec. “Is this the brave boy who saved Father from the bandits?”
“It is indeed,” Seregil answered, pulling Alec forward with his free hand. “Alec’s the best archer in the whole entire world, and he shot two enormous swans on the way here especially for your mother. They’re outside on his saddle if your dogs haven’t eaten them already. He’s come to learn sword fighting from your father and Beka, but I’m certain he’ll be a fine playfellow for you, in between lessons. You may have him for a week if you promise not to maul him to death. What do you say to that?”
Looking over at Kari, Seregil answered her look of relief with a wink.
“Oh, he’s handsome!” Illia exclaimed, climbing down to take Alec’s hand. “You’re almost as handsome as Uncle Seregil. Can you sing and play the harp like he does?”
“Well, I can sing,” Alec admitted as the little girl hauled him toward the hearth.
“Let the poor boy catch his breath before you take at him,” her mother chided. “Run out to the stable and fetch your father and sisters. Scat!”
With a last beaming smile for Alec, Illia dashed off.
“Come and sit down by the fire, both of you,” Kari said, motioning for her women to make room. “Arna, find some dinner for our friends, and see that a fire’s laid in the guest chamber.”