The First Girl Child

by Harmon, Amy

  He’d had a poor view for the king’s descent from Temple Hill, but he’d climbed a tree with wide branches that hung over the thoroughfare, and as the king’s procession turned the corner into the village square, he would have an unobstructed view of the entire parade, all the way to the very end, where the purple robes of the Keepers of Saylok rounded out the procession.

  The chieftains, each carrying a standard emblazoned with their clan crest, rode at the front, a sign of support for and fealty to the new king of Saylok. Their hair was bound tightly in plaits that had no length, with ribbons extending down their backs, a symbol of hope that their braids would grow long under the new reign.

  Bayr inched out onto the largest limb, his belly to the branch, so close that the gold flag of Leok would pass right below him. Banruud of Berne—of Saylok, for now he was king—rode behind the five chieftains on a horse so big and so black, the people pressed back, not wanting to spook the beast. The king, draped in red, was as intimidating as his horse, but though his progress was marked by the rippling wave of bowing onlookers, it was the girl child the people most wanted to see.

  Behind the king, in a carriage not unlike the one that had transported King Ansel’s coffin, Banruud’s wife, Alannah, the new Lady Queen, sat holding the princess, though nothing was visible from Bayr’s branch but a small bundle in a sea of red. Red was the color of Berne and now the color of the throne. Bayr didn’t think the deep blood red suited the new queen or the tiny girl in her arms, and as Bayr watched the procession approach, he felt a tremor of foreboding run down his small back and settle in his hands. The Lady Queen, her face wreathed in smiles, waved to the crowd and tipped the babe toward the people to the left and then to the right so they could see her.

  Below Bayr’s perch, the people writhed and pushed, shouting out to their chieftains and raising the name of the new king, and, as was the nature of most crowds, tempers grew short and people were caught in the crush. A figure, cloaked from head to toe in drab brown, the cowl of her hood extending far beyond her bowed head, lost her balance in the swell. She was stooped in such a way that she appeared old, feeble, and the people ignored her as they moved and pushed around her, trying to get a better view of the oncoming parade.

  Without a second thought, Bayr swung from his branch and dropped into the fray, shoving people aside in order to help the old woman to her feet before she was trampled. She felt frail to him beneath her cloak, but she rose with an agility that belied her age. She clutched at her hood, her hands covered in fingerless wool mittens, though the day was too warm for such attire. Bayr was shorter than she, and though she tried to shield her face, he had only to look up to see what she tried to keep hidden.

  She was human—eyes, nose, mouth, smooth cheeks, and an unlined brow—but otherworldly, and Bayr was too young to know he shouldn’t stare and too innocent to ignore her strangeness. She was not old, and her oddity was not in the formulation of her features, but in the complete absence of pigmentation from her eyes, skin, and hair. She was whiter than goat’s milk. Whiter than the clouds that hovered over the peaks between Joran and Leok, whiter than the snow in winter, whiter even than the death that had settled on King Ansel’s face in the sanctum.

  The woman touched Bayr’s shoulder, and her lips—the only color in her face—murmured her thanks. Bayr understood the word, but he could not place her accent. The clans all had their own variations of tone and speech that made a man from Adyar in the north sound slightly different from a man from Ebba in the south, but the woman didn’t sound like she’d been raised in any of the clans.

  Then he saw the tears on her face, the agony that twisted her otherwise regular features into grief’s grimace.

  “A-are y-you h-hurt?” he stammered.

  “No,” she said with a brief shake of her head, but her silver eyes had risen to the passing king. The crowd genuflected, clearing the view in rippling waves, and the woman began to tremble so violently, Bayr thought she might fall once more. The hair rose on his neck, and the people around them began to fidget and turn, sensing her distress. Unease rippled around her like a gathering storm, a disturbance in the air, felt but not seen.

  The black horse carrying King Banruud suddenly shrieked and reared, and the crowd echoed the sound, collectively pulling back and cowering before the pawing hooves of the wild-eyed destrier. The king kept his seat, clinging to the flying mane, gripping the horse between powerful thighs, but he was not the only one in danger of being thrown. The once-docile white horse draped in red, pulling the carriage of the queen, suddenly rose on his hind legs, bucking and twisting in crazed contortions. The crowd gasped as the driver was tossed from his seat, hurtling into the screaming crowd.

  The queen sat in the rear of the carriage, and though she was thrown to the floor, she managed to cling to her child and the side of the carriage. Beside Bayr, the white woman groaned, her agony becoming horror, and her distress was echoed throughout the crush. The white horse reared again, the carriage teetered wildly, and the crowd cried out once more. Bayr pushed his way through the flinching onlookers and rushed into the street, planting his legs and waiting for the white horse to thunder past him.

  He heard Dagmar shout his name from somewhere in the distance, but his focus was centered on the careening carriage. He threw himself at the bolting horse, curling his hands into its mane and swinging himself onto the creature’s back. Digging his small knees into the horse’s withers, he gritted his teeth and bore down on the mane. The horse shrieked again, pawing the air in pain and desperation, his head folded back into Bayr’s chest.

  “Whoa,” Bayr demanded. “Shh,” he soothed, and the horse, quaking and chuffing, his eyes rolling back in his head, came to a complete halt. The crowd cheered, and the horse trembled, but he didn’t lurch or bolt.

  The parade came to a standstill, the keepers holding their formation in pious dismay, the crowd frozen in fear and fascination. The chieftains, still bearing the flags of the clans, looked on with incredulous grins, though their smirks faded when they saw the Lady Queen. Blood seeped from a gash at her hairline, but she rose under her own power, her wailing infant daughter clutched in her arms, and was helped from the carriage by the king’s shamefaced guard. There would surely be a reckoning, though none of them were to blame. It was the white woman’s fault, he was certain, though he could not say why.

  Bayr thought he saw Dagmar racing toward him, but the king demanded his attention.

  “What is your name, boy?” Banruud asked, lifting his voice for the sake of the crowd. He’d brought his own horse to heel and seemed cross that the carriage driver had not been able to do the same. His procession had suddenly become a fiasco, and he was no longer the center of attention.

  Bayr tried to answer, but the word clung to his tongue. He tried again, stammering pitifully, and hung his head in embarrassment.

  “His name is Bayr, Sire.” Dagmar lifted his arms to pull Bayr from the back of the white mount, but Bayr clung to the horse’s mane, afraid to release him for fear he would bolt again.

  “Release the horse, Bayr. You’re hurting him,” Dagmar insisted, and Bayr, surprised, loosened his arms. The horse wilted, hanging his head in dizzy relief, and Dagmar pulled the boy from his shuddering back, clutching him to his side. The king watched with glittering eyes and frowning lips.

  “Dagmar of Dolphys. It has been too long,” Banruud boomed. “Or must I call you Keeper Dagmar?”

  Dagmar bowed deeply.

  “A dozen years, Sire. At least. Congratulations.” He didn’t remind the new king that he’d stood in the sanctum during the selection process, that he’d taken part in the coronation, and that he’d borne witness to the blessing of his daughter. He’d purposely hung back. Blended in. Averted his eyes. In his purple robes with his shaved head, standing among brothers similarly adorned, he was easy to overlook, and Banruud had clearly not noticed him until now.

  The king reined his horse around and approached Bayr and his uncle, who watched
his advance with shared trepidation.

  “Bayr. It is a good name,” the king said, nodding to Bayr. “You have shown great skill . . . and courage.” The king’s jaw was tight, and his nostrils flared like those of a beast catching the scent of his prey.

  “The Temple Boy has saved the princess and the Lady Queen!” someone shouted, and Temple Boy, Temple Boy, Temple Boy rippled among the horde, reaching those who had not seen the events unfold.

  The king unsheathed his sword and, playing to the crowd, laid the broad side of his blade on the boy’s bowed head. Dagmar flinched, but Bayr remained still, silent, subservient.

  “I dub thee a protector of the throne and a friend of the king, young Bayr.”

  The crowd roared again in a new wave of wonder. Bayr shrank back into Dagmar, embarrassed by the adulation, and King Banruud withdrew his blade. The king turned away and raised his sword, and with a blast of the trumpet, the procession continued without the queen, who, along with the princess, was being escorted back to the castle in a cart pulled by men and surrounded by an armed guard.

  “I th-thought h-he was going to k-kill m-m-me,” Bayr stammered, turning to his uncle with wide eyes.

  Dagmar shuddered and said nothing, but his silence reinforced Bayr’s conviction: the king did not like him.

  “The p-p-pale w-woman s-scared the h-h-horses,” Bayr whispered, badly shaken.

  “What woman?” Dagmar replied.

  Bayr shook his head and shrugged. It was too hard to explain, and he didn’t want to get the woman in trouble. The king wouldn’t like her either, Bayr was certain of it.

  “I fear that we have placed a masked man on the throne,” Ivo grumbled, after asking Dagmar to remain when everyone else had left the sanctum. It had been several weeks since the coronation, and Temple Hill had been a flurry of activity. A new king meant new policies, new rules, new discomforts. Banruud was preparing for war, with whom no one knew, and his warriors were in constant training, making worship and reflection on the adjacent grounds much more difficult. Banruud had very little interest in the keepers—or the temple—though he’d sought Ivo’s company once to query the gods. He’d been having bad dreams.

  “He has a fear of ghosts, of pale wraiths stealing his soul . . . and his daughter,” Ivo revealed. “He has his men on the lookout for phantoms. I told him the gods have assigned the princess a protector in young Bayr. The king did not seem to like that response. He has demanded a sacrifice be made to Odin and runes hidden over every door.”

  “What do you mean, a masked man, Master?” Dagmar asked.

  “Banruud is two men. One you see, and one you don’t. If you loosened his braid, I suspect you might see another face, hiding beneath his hair.”

  Dagmar shivered at the image that rose behind his eyes. Ivo had a flair for the dramatic.

  “I don’t understand, Master. He was a good chieftain. Berne is wealthy. His people have not registered complaint. He is a powerful warrior and a worthy leader.”

  “This is all true. And yet . . . our duty has never been to embrace the obvious . . . or the easy. I fear we have done both.”

  “Master—” Dagmar protested, his guilt doubling the size of his chest.

  Ivo waved his hand, silencing him. “Enough, Dagmar. You were not wrong. You love the boy. And you chose for him, not for me. Not for yourself. Not even for Saylok.”

  Dagmar’s guilt grew another head. “Saylok needs a man on the throne, Master. Not a boy,” he argued, weary. He had made the argument more times than he cared to.

  “Better a boy than a beast.” Ivo sighed, a petulant ruffling of feathers. “But it is done. And we must make the best of it.”

  “Do you truly think he is a beast?” Dagmar whispered.

  “If Father Saylok had wanted only one man to choose the king, he would have appointed only one keeper. Our system has worked for centuries, and I trust it will continue to work, regardless of my distrust of—and distaste for—the new king,” Ivo said, relenting.

  “And the girl child?”

  Ivo huffed, but his ruffled feathers settled as a rueful grin twisted his black lips. “She is a wonder. I have great hopes for little Alba.”

  “As do I, Master,” Dagmar agreed. His hope had had him kneeling for hours in supplication.

  “The king would do well to heed my advice,” Ivo mused.

  “Oh?”

  “He should keep the boy close,” Ivo said.

  “I would rather he not.”

  “You speak selfishly, Dagmar. Bayr is a guardian.”

  “Bayr is Banruud’s son,” Dagmar whispered, trying not to hiss.

  “And a threat to his power,” Ivo said, nodding. “Banruud is jealous of the boy. But still . . . the king should heed my counsel, for the sake of the princess. The boy will not fail her. He will protect the girl child. I have seen it.”

  Dagmar’s hands shook beneath the wide sleeves of his robe, and he folded them together. He did not want to know all that Ivo had seen. Sometimes visions made a keeper blind to intuition. Dagmar’s intuition screamed that Bayr should stay far away from Banruud.

  “Was there something else you wished to tell me, Master?” he asked, desperate to leave the sanctum. The day had been long, and he hadn’t seen Bayr since dawn.

  “You have not seen any pale-faced wraiths . . . in your dreams or otherwise, have you, Dagmar?”

  Dagmar didn’t believe in ghosts. Surely the gods called all spirits home. Briefly he considered the woman Bayr had seen on coronation day, and then dismissed her with a mental shrug. It was not a crime to be pale-skinned, and she was a woman, not a wraith.

  “No, Master,” Dagmar said, sighing. “I have not.”

  “Hmm.” Ivo rubbed his stained lips. “You must tell me if you do.”

  Ghost was weary, and her breasts ached. She’d bound them tightly to keep them from filling with milk, but the liquid seeped out and soaked the rags she’d wrapped around her chest, chilling her beneath her cloak. She expressed the milk by hand when she could, needing to maintain her flow. Her baby would need milk if ever they were reunited. Unfortunately, her scent, ripe and loamy, drew the bugs.

  It was spring, and the rains were frequent, soaking the Temple Wood and making her circumstances even more difficult. She’d been a shepherd and was accustomed to sleeping outdoors, to scavenging and hunting, but she was not accustomed to patrols. The king’s guard traipsed through the forest and over the hillside as though they sought her. She’d discovered a crawl space in a small outcropping of rocks that provided a place to hide whenever they were close. She’d had to coax a family of field mice to find a new place to live, but mice and bugs were the least of her worries.

  Everything she’d owned had been in Bertog’s house in the land of Berne, and Bertog’s house had been burned to the ground. She’d acquired a few things in the King’s Village—a sharp knife, a cake of soap, a length of rope, and another dress—but people stared when she made her purchases, and that terrified her most of all. The shopkeepers would remember her face if someone asked about her.

  She had an iron pot and a small box filled with gold coins that she’d dug up from the charred remains of Bertog’s house. Bertog had been good with money. He collected favors the way his wife gathered eggs—gleefully, greedily, noting their size and their weight. Even the despicable Balfor had been in his debt. Bertog had kept his gold in a hole beneath his floor, but in the end, the gods—and Ghost—had owed him nothing. Ghost had seen Bertog count his gold. She’d seen him stash it too. When Balfor burned the house down, the box of coins—and the iron pot—had escaped unscathed.

  Bertog and Linora had not been so lucky.

  Ghost felt no sadness for them. They had been foolish to trust the chieftain. She’d been foolish to trust them. Now they were dead, and her child was gone.

  Chief Banruud had stolen her daughter. He had claimed Alba as his own, he and his smiling, lying queen. And Ghost had no recourse. The knowledge filled her with helpless rage.
/>
  She had followed him from his keep, trailed his caravan like a beggar gathering scraps, walking in a sort of stupor from the valley of Berne to the rising plateau of the temple mount. It was beautiful, the soaring palace heights and the jagged temple spires, but she’d seen only the walls and the warriors and the distance from her child.

  She had enough gold in Bertog’s box to run away, enough to make her life bearable for a while if she was careful. She had hidden it in the cradle of the tree, where the heavy branches left the trunk and spread outward. But she had nowhere to go and she could not leave. If she managed to reach her child, to steal inside the palace walls, she and the child would not get far. She could not escape her cursed skin. She could not hide a babe in the woods. So she haunted the hills in hopes that for once in her life the gods would be merciful and return what was hers. Or at the very least, let her slay the king.

  Ghost saw that the Temple Boy, the one who’d calmed the horse, had been assigned to watch the sacrificial sheep. The old keeper who’d guarded them since she’d arrived had developed a hacking cough during the spring rains, and the boy had taken over his duties. He was a natural, keeping the herd together and happily circling the perimeter, watching for wolves and other dangers.

  He’d sensed her.

  Ghost had seen it in the furrow that marred his smooth brow. The sheep had sensed her too. She had that effect on animals. She always had. Often her affinity was of great benefit. Other times, like the day of the parade, she drove them mad. She hadn’t meant to spook the horses in the processional. At least not the horse that pulled the carriage. She’d been so angry—so desperately sad—and her turmoil had set them off. The king had not been harmed, but the carriage had almost overturned. Ghost had run away, terrified by the danger she’d put her daughter in, and she’d hid among the trees until the sun had set and her tears had dried.