By the time order had been restored, the sun was sinking low in the west, and the alar decided to camp where it was. Valandario had scried for Dallandra and the prince, seen them safe, and then contacted Dalla mind to mind. When the news spread through the alar that the Meradani army lay entombed in the boiling remains of Loc Vaed, such a loud cheer went up that the sheep nearly bolted again. The Westfolk broke out skins of mead and passed them around. Those who could play unpacked their harps and flutes. The music began as soon as the tents were raised, and the singing followed.
Branna, however, found it impossible to share in the celebration. As she told Neb, slaves and other innocent souls had died in the eruption along with the army.
“That’s true,” Neb said. “But I still thank the gods for Arzosah’s dweomer. If the Horsekin had followed the retreating townsfolk, the army would have slaughtered the prince, his guards, the townsmen—everyone they couldn’t enslave and sell.”
“And then they would have come for the rest of us. I know that. It just must have been such a horrible way to die.”
“Well, that I can’t argue with.” Neb shuddered and tossed his head as if he’d throw off the truth of it. “Truly horrible.”
Others also stayed away from the general merriment—Sidro, Pir, and the rest of the Horsekin left with the alar. Branna and Neb joined them at Valandario’s tent, which as usual stood some ways away from the noisy camp, for the evening meal. Young Vek had had a seizure, in fact, when he’d heard about the grim wyrd that had fallen upon the army.
“I did give him his usual medicaments,” Sidro told Branna. “He be inside Val’s tent, sleeping.”
“Well and good, then,” Branna said. “I—oh, by the gods! Sisi, do you remember that vision he had, back at the end of winter?”
Sidro caught her breath in a little gasp. “The tower of smoke,” she said, “and snow did fall upon the crops! The snow, it be ash, I think me.”
“Indeed.” Valandario joined them. “When I spoke to Dallandra, she told me how the smoke rose up in a pillar, and she thought of Vek.”
When they fell silent, the nearby music and laughter spilled over them. In a blaze of golden light as thick as honey, or so it seemed, the sun hovered just above its setting. When Branna shaded her eyes with her hand and looked off to the west, she could see a jagged edge etched along the skyline instead of the straight-as-a-bowstring horizon more usual to the grasslands. Neb joined her and followed her gaze.
“We’ve come a long way west, haven’t we?” Branna said.
“We have,” he said. “Those must be the Western Mountains you hear so much about, or at least their foothills. The remains of Zakh Gral are over there somewhere.”
“I was thinking more of the Seven Cities than Zakh Gral.”
“Those, too, and what do the songs call that? The Vale of Roses, that’s it.”
“All gone now. They must have been lovely.”
“Truly.” Neb looked briefly solemn, then grinned at her. “Ah, well, are you hungry? It smells to me like someone’s roasting a sheep somewhere.”
“They are. One of the poor stupid things broke its leg in the general panic.”
“No use in letting it suffer.” Neb took a deep breath. “Lots of pot herbs, and some wild garlic, too.”
After everyone had eaten, Valandario took Branna aside. They walked out into the silent grass and turned toward the east, where the last crescent of the moon hovered in the starry sky. Crickets sang in the grass, and a soft breeze blew away the sweat and heat of the day.
“Dalla asked me to relay a message to you,” Val said. “You know that she wants you to come to Haen Marn with her.”
“I do. Will we go on dragonback?”
“She’d rather use one of the hidden roads. In the morning she’ll arrive back here, and then the two of you will leave once she’s rested.”
Branna yelped aloud in sheer excitement, and Val laughed at her.
“My apologies,” Branna said. “I’ve seen so many dweomers in the past year, but I’ve only watched, except for that one ritual about reversing the astral currents. Even then, I just filled the station in the circle. All I did was speak when everyone else did. But this—getting to travel on the astral roads—it’s truly an adventure, isn’t it?”
“Very much of one.” Val turned solemn. “It could be dangerous. You’ll need to do everything Dalla tells you and do it exactly right. Do you understand that?”
“I do, and I will.” Branna did her best to calm herself. “It just sounds so fascinating, though.”
“It does, at that.” Val sighed and glanced away. “I remember being so young and enthusiastic, myself.”
“But you’re still young, I mean, for one of the Westfolk.”
Val kept silent for so long that Branna began to fear she’d offended her. All at once, though, Val laughed with a rueful shake of her head.
“I am,” Val said. “You know, it’s good to be reminded of that every now and again. But now, as for Dalla, she needs to read that book Evandar left before she can decide who will work with her in the ritual, though I’m assuming that I will.”
“Well and good, then. I have hopes I’ll get to take part.”
“That’s up to her. Now, the rest of us will join up soon with the prince and the Cerr Cawnen people. They’ll be heading east, eventually, to the Melyn River Valley. Dalla particularly wants Neb to accompany them, because the prince is minded to settle some of them on the site of Neb’s old village.”
“No doubt my uncle will be pleased. He’s talked for years about needing settlers for the valley.”
“The prince is sending him messages about just that. And those will go by dragon.”
“Well and good, then. I’d best go give Neb the news.”
With the help of some of the other men, Neb had just finished setting up their tent. Branna followed him inside to help spread the floor cloth and arrange their blankets upon it. She was expecting him to be unhappy that she would be making the trip to Haen Marn without him, but to her surprise he agreed it would be best.
“I’ve done much thinking over the days past,” Neb said. “I think your wyrd lies more with the dweomer than mine does.”
“What?” Branna said. “Of course you’re marked for it.”
“True spoken, but that’s not what I meant. We know I’m meant to be a healer. You’ll need to know some healing lore. There’s a difference. To me the dweomer’s a tool. To you, it will be your life. Do you see?”
“I do, truly.” She felt a cold chill run down her spine. “But I want us to be together.”
“So do I. Never doubt it! But there may be times we’re forced to be apart. I think that may be why I had to go play the fool in Cengarn. So I’d know I could go away and yet come back again. Now it’s your turn to go off, but you won’t be playing the fool.” He paused to grin at her. “Some of us learn more slowly than others.”
She laughed and threw her arms around him. He kissed her, and for the rest of that night, they talked of very little indeed.
With the dawn, Branna went out with Elessi to feed the changelings. As they left the camp, the pounding of wings split the silence. She looked up and saw Medea, flying east on the prince’s business, like a sleek green arrow in the rising light.
It had taken Berwynna some days to realize that Mirryn considered himself to be in love with her. Since they hardly knew each other, she doubted if he actually did love her, but he followed her around the dun, took her riding, ate with her at meals, smiled whenever he saw her, and in general made a nuisance of himself. She took to staying in the women’s hall as a refuge, where Lady Solla, who was finding the stairs leading to the great hall more and more difficult thanks to her advanced pregnancy, tended to join her.
Usually, the tieryn’s widowed daughter, Adranna, sat with them, although sadly enough she rarely spoke. Generally, Adranna sat in a chair by the window and sewed upon an elaborate embroidered coverlet for her daughter’s dower chest. A
t times tears filled her eyes; she would brush them away and bend to her needlework as if her life depended on filling up the wolves drawn into the pattern with scarlet thread. Will I end up like her? Wynni would think. Mourning Dougie all my life?
Now and then, Solla tried to draw Adranna into the conversation, but generally the lady answered briefly and withdrew into herself again. Berwynna and Solla had taken to sitting at the other side of the chamber where their talk wouldn’t disturb her.
“About Mirryn now,” Wynni asked Solla one afternoon. “Know you if he does realize that I were betrothed to another man?”
“He does,” Solla said. “But it doesn’t matter to him, and for that I honor him. Gerro asked him outright, you see, and told him that you needed time to mourn.”
“That be true spoken! Not a night does go by when I do fail to dream about Dougie. My thanks to your lord, truly.”
“He’s a good man, Gerro.” Solla hesitated briefly. “But so is Mirryn, in his way. You’ll not always be mourning your Douglas.”
“That be true as well. I do know it be so. Yet it be like a knife in my heart to be thinking I might forget him.”
“Nah nah nah, never that!” Solla smiled at her. “That’s not what I meant. You’ll never forget him, but you’ll find room in your heart for a second love. You’re too sensible a lass not to.”
Berwynna managed to smile. “My thanks, and I think me you have the right of it.”
That night at the evening meal Berwynna found herself looking at Mirryn in a new way. When his father died, he’d be lord of the Red Wolf dun, right there on the border near the Westfolk, part of a wider world than Haen Marn could ever offer. If she stayed on the island, whom would she meet to marry someday, she wondered, if Solla were right and her heart healed? One of the Mountain Folk and live underground all her life? The thought made her shudder.
“Is somewhat wrong?” Mirryn said.
“Naught, my apologies,” Wynni said. “Just thinking of a painful thing.”
“I realize, my lady, that there’s been much pain in your young life.” Mirryn sounded as if he were reciting a bit of bard lore that he’d got off by heart. “I only hope that someday all such trouble will be behind you.”
She glanced at Gerran, who sat across the table from them. He’d probably told Mirryn what to say, judging from his approving smile. When a servant girl put baskets of bread upon the table, Mirryn took one. He drew his table dagger and cut a chunk off the loaf before passing it across. He tore it in two and offered half to Berwynna, who took it from him, had a bite, then laid the rest on the wooden trencher they were sharing.
“What be the thing you truly hope for, Mirryn?” Wynni said. “I do wonder if somewhat lies behind those fancy words.”
Mirryn blushed scarlet. Wynni rested her chin on her hand and smiled at him until the blush receded.
“Well, I’m hoping you’ll favor me, of course,” he said. “Surely that’s obvious.”
“It be so, which is why I did want to drag that fox out of his hole.”
“Now that you have, does the color of his fur please you?”
“In some small way. I think me that with much time the day will come when such things do please me greatly once again.”
“When that day comes, I hope with all my heart that it’s a wolf that pleases you, not a fox.”
“A red wolf, it be a fine sight, truly, yet none of us know what wyrd the gods have in store for us.”
“That’s so, and wisely said.”
Berwynna suddenly realized that Lady Galla was leaning so sharply their way, desperate to hear in the noisy great hall, that she looked as if she might be feeling faint. In his seat at the foot of the table, Uncle Mic was struggling not to laugh. Mirryn had noticed his mother’s angle as well.
“I hear that Lord Pedrys is planning on holding a tourney,” he said, a trifle loudly. “I think mayhap I’ll ride to it. Gerro, are you up for a little sport?”
“Depends,” Gerran said. “On how my lady fares. I don’t want to be away from the dun when she’s delivered of the child.”
Conversation, and Lady Galla’s posture, returned to normal.
Berwynna had barely finished her dinner when she heard drum-beats thrumming through the sky. With a murmured apology to Mirryn, she got up and left the table to run to a window and look out. By then, the rest of the great hall had heard the sound as well. Everyone stopped talking to listen as it came closer.
“Is that your father, Wynni?” Galla called out.
“It be not so, but my stepsister.” Wynni saw a flash of green and gold circling the dun. “I think me I’d best go meet her.”
Uncle Mic joined her as she left the great hall. In the warm summer twilight, they hurried down the path to the meadow by the dun, where Medea was drinking from the stream. She lifted her head in a scatter of drops and rumbled in greeting. Strapped to the tallest spikes on her neck was a leather pouch.
“Messages for the tieryn!” Medea sang out. “And one for you, Wynni, though that one’s not in the pouch. I’m here to take you and Mic back to Haen Marn.”
“Oh, ye gods!” Mic muttered. “Another wretched, sick-making ride through the air!”
“It be too far to walk, Uncle Mic,” Wynni said. “My thanks, stepsister! My heart does long to see my mother again.”
“I assumed it would, truly,” Medea said. “Mic, will you untie this itchy pouch and get it off me?”
“I will, and I’ll take it up to the tieryn as well.”
Carrying the messages, Mic hurried off, but Berwynna lingered to ask her stepsister for news of Rori. “He’s in splendid form,” Medea began, “so, now that the war’s over—”
“The war be over? Wait, go not so fast in your telling! I knew that not.”
“My apologies. Here I was thinking you’d have dweomer, so you’d know.”
“Our sister Mara has all of that on my side of the family. I have none, and truly, I be glad of it.”
Berwynna sat down in the grass. She stayed in the meadow for some time, listening to Medea’s report of the destruction of the Horsekin army, while the twilight slowly faded into night. Above them in the clear sky the stars came out and seemed to hang close to earth, as if they too rejoiced in the death of so many enemies.
Eventually Berwynna heard someone calling her name. Medea stopped talking and swung her head toward the sound. A gleam from a lantern, held in someone’s hand, bobbed down the path toward them.
“Uncle Mic?” Berwynna called out.
“It’s not.” Mirryn answered her. “It’s Mirro. I thought you might be glad of the light and an escort back to the dun.”
He had used the familiar form of the second person, “ti,” she realized, perhaps as a token of friendship, perhaps in hope of something more. She hesitated, then decided that it would be ungracious to deny him that hope.
“It does gladden my heart,” she said. “My thanks i ti.” “To you,” again in the familiar form.
As he walked up to join her, he was smiling so softly that Berwynna made a decision.
“We’ll be leaving you on the morrow,” she said, “Uncle Mic and me. My heart does ache to see my mother again.”
Mirryn’s smiled disappeared. “Ah, well,” he said. “I can understand that.”
“But if my stepsister be willing to be so kind,” Berwynna continued, “mayhap she’ll come to the island to fetch me here again in the spring.”
“Of course I will,” Medea said.
“Then I’ll look forward to the spring doubly this winter.” Mirryn made as much of a bow as he could without swinging the lantern so hard that the candle went out. “My thanks to you, fair ladies both.”
“Most welcome, I’m sure,” Medea said. “Wynni, Dallandra asked me to tell you that Laz Moj has returned to the island with the missing book.”
Berwynna let out a whoop of pure joy that made Mirryn jump back a step. She laughed as she apologized to him.
“You ken not how that n
ews gladdens my heart,” Berwynna said to Mirryn. “I’ll be telling you the tale should you wish.” She turned to Medea again. “Will Dalla be going to the isle to fetch it?”
“She will, and knowing her, I wager she’ll get there before we do.”
Laz had taken to doing what kitchen work he could with his maimed hands. He’d worked out a way to hold a broom reasonably well, and every morning he swept out the kitchen hut while Lonna went outside to toss scraps to the island’s cats. Since the Gel da’Thae relied on ferrets to control the rodents who inevitably attack stored food, Laz had never seen house cats before coming to Haen Marn. In fact, he’d assumed that they were some species of Wildfolk until he’d seen Lonna and Mara feeding and stroking them.
After she tended the cats, Lonna would come back into the kitchen, look at the swept floor, and grunt a brief thanks. The moment was Laz’s chance to fish for information.
“Lonna,” he said that morning, “I heard the name Lin Rej once. Was it a dwarven stronghold?”
“It was,” Lonna said. “And a grand one, or so I heard as a child. It stretched for miles and miles underground, but there were gardens, too, up above. That’s how your folk got in, through the garden stairways, when they were a-burning it and slaughtering my folk.”
“My apologies! I—”
“You weren’t there.” Lonna fixed him with a gaze as sharp as a knifepoint. “My thanks for the sweeping.”
Laz bowed to her for want of anything to say and left the kitchen hut. He found himself wondering if he had been “there,” one of the Horsekin who’d destroyed the dwarven city. If so, it had happened too many lives ago for him to worry about, he decided, especially since he had a more recent set of transgressions to brood over.
Every afternoon Laz spent several hours teaching Mara dweomerlore. The need to organize the material efficiently showed him that his own training had a good many gaps, things that Hazdrubal had never told or shown him. The Bardekian, of course, had expected to be paid for his lore. Most likely he’d held things back in order to get a better price for them later, not that he’d lived to see that “later.” More and more, Laz was coming to agree with Faharn, that Hazdrubal was—not a sham, certainly—but suspect.