by Edith Pattou
Brie thought of the other two bodies that lay in the same waters, the men she had killed. Then her gaze fell on the wooden box. It was charred, but the runes on it still faintly glowed. As she watched, they flickered out.
Meanwhile, Hanna approached the stones of memory. The seabirds on the larger of the two stones lifted off, almost as one, and hovered above. Hanna kneeled by the stone and, using a sharp-pointed piece of iron she had found in the remains of Yldir's hut, began carving Dungalan words at the base of the stone. It took her much of the night, but when she was done she read aloud to Brie, "'Yldir of the sea did die this day in Bog Maglu/So shall his tale be told as long as the stones of memory stand.' "
The seabirds suddenly rose up and with a whoosh ascended to the sky. They were soon lost to sight. Then Brie felt something brush against her legs. It was Fara. Crouching down beside her, Brie ran her hand over the faol's back. Fara arched against the girl's hand. Her white fur was scorched and damp. Brie guessed she had swum under the peat mat to escape the fire.
Then Hanna, Brie, the two dogs, and the faol left Bog Maglu.
"Will you come with me to Ardara?" Hanna asked.
Brie was silent, threading the panner thong through her fingers. She knew not what to say; it mattered little to her where she journeyed.
"Or do you return to Eirren?"
Still Brie did not answer.
"When the snows come to the Blue Stacks, you will not be able to travel through, not until the spring thaw. But the snows will not come for two moon cycles, so there is time for you to visit Dungal, if that is your wish."
Silence.
"Biri," Hanna said, her voice gentle, "come with me to Ardara. You will find a welcome there."
And so Brie went to Ardara. She had a message for one who lived there. And who better to deliver tidings of death? she thought grimly.
During the journey, Brie remained silent. She did all that she had done before Maglu, walking, eating, sleeping, but she felt like a shadow, lost and without mooring, as though the thread that connected her from one day to the next had snapped. She set one foot ahead of the other, but knew not why.
For so long she had sought this one thing: the death of her father's killers. Now that she had achieved it, or nearly so, the deed stuck in her throat. Before her father's death ... what had directed her steps then? She could barely remember, but it seemed she had always been thrust forward, like a small boat driven by a great wind, to be the best at whatever she undertook—the best archer, the best trail finder, the best at building a stone wall. Except for those few months with Collun at Cuillean's dun, she could remember no time when she had known peace.
And Collun. What would he think of her now? Would he pity her, or would he recoil from the blood on her hands? She could not think of Collun now. Better to think of nothing at all.
***
Bogland gave way to rich farming land. Cozy, whitewashed farmhouses were scattered here and there along the way, and the people were friendly to the wandering Traveler and her silent companion.
Hanna and Brie arrived in Ardara at midday. The town was bright and bustling and full of vigor. But Brie felt like a specter moving among these people with their active, certain lives. Ardara was a well-cared-for town, if not a very prosperous one. The buildings were solidly built, and though many of the boats bobbing in the harbor or pulled up on shore could have used fresh paint, they still looked snug and seaworthy. There were all sizes of boats, from curraghs—rowing boats with turned-up prows to help them in the surf—to two-sailed ketches forty feet long or more, for handling the deep water of the sea. Dogs were everywhere on the streets of the village: intelligent, strong dogs like Jip and Maor.
Dungalans either were fair-haired with dark eyes or had hair which bore that distinctive copper hue, like Rilla's and Yldir's, with matching coppery eyes. Most of the men (and a few younger women, though not many) wore the distinctive garb of the Dungalan fisherman: trousers of homespun tweed held up by a multicolored, braided belt called a criosanna, and thick flannel shirts, dyed indigo.
Hanna and Brie did not stop in town but traveled on until they came to a large farmhold to the north of Ardara. The farmhouse stood on a rise. Looking back from the door Brie had a clear view of the sea and fishing boats, in miniature, stretched out toward the horizon.
The farmer's wife, Lotte, greeted Hanna warmly. She spoke fast, in Dungalan, and Brie understood only a few words. Hanna introduced Brie as Eirrenian, translating the woman's words. Lotte looked a little surprised, her eyes caught by the faol. But she was welcoming to Brie and tried to speak more slowly so that Brie could follow what she said.
Her husband was out in the barley field, Lotte said, and had just been saying this morning that he wished the Traveler would come soon. "It seems as though harvesttime comes earlier every year," Lotte commented. "And Garmon believes there will be an early frost." She pressed warm buttered bread into their hands, and together they made their way to the barley field.
Farmer Garmon was a prosperous-looking man with gray side-whiskers and an open smile. He embraced Hanna warmly, said his crops were well nigh bursting. Then he welcomed Brie, saying that any friend of the Traveler was a friend to him, and did she know any good tales from Eirren?
"How is your daughter in Dungloe? And your son in Mira? And my friend Lom?" asked Hanna.
"They are all well. I have another grandbairn, Sophe's second son. And as for Lom, he is spending more and more time working on that boat of his. I'll be lucky to tear him away come harvest day," Garmon said. Hanna explained to Brie that Lom was the youngest of Garmon's sons and daughters and the only one still living in Ardara.
"A fine son he is, too, though I lost him to the sea long ago." Brie could see disappointment on the man's face, but acceptance as well.
"You will like Lom," said Hanna to Brie. "He works with Jacan and his son on their fishing boat until his own is built."
Garmon showed them to the barn where they would sleep. "But treat the farmhouse as your home," he said.
"Shall we call on Jacan?" Hanna said when the farmer had left them.
Brie nodded.
***
The fisherman Jacan had a lean, weathered face, dark copper hair and beard, and the keen blue eyes Brie recognized from Rilla's panner work. He wore a leather fishing apron and smelled of fish.
His son, Ferg, was almost the duplicate of Rilla—copper hair, pale skin—but Jacan's other daughter, Hyslin, had fair hair and rose-colored cheeks. She had been paring potatoes, her sleeves pushed up over her elbows, when Brie and Hanna arrived.
They greeted Hanna warmly, but were wary of Brie, and of Fara, who sat on her haunches by the front door, eyes half closed. When Brie entered the cheerful, comfortable room with its smells of fresh bread and fish, she felt like an ill dark wind blowing cold through the house.
"There is bad news," Hanna said in Dungalan.
"Go on," replied Jacan, his face suddenly taut.
"Rilla is dead."
Hyslin let out a cry, dropping her paring knife. Ferg's pale skin went a shade paler.
"How?" asked Jacan.
"By goat-men. Murdered." Brie stepped forward, speaking low in halting Dungalan.
"The gabha?" Jacan looked disbelieving.
"I was there," Brie said. "I saw. She bade me bring you the news. And I brought her panners as well." She handed Jacan the leather pouch.
He stared down at it. "What of Ladran?"
"Dead, too. He ... died going to Rilla."
"She never should have married that raff," said Ferg, anguished.
Jacan was silent. Hyslin lifted her apron to her face and cried into it.
"We stay with Farmer Garmon until harvest," Hanna said to the fisherman, then added, "I am grieved for you, Jacan."
Brie, Hanna, and the faol left the house. Brie touched the panner around her neck.
"There is another I would have you meet," Hanna said as they walked along the harbor.
"Who?" aske
d Brie without interest.
"Sago. He is a Sea Dyak sorcerer, like Yldir. He is not as powerful as Yldir, though perhaps he is even older. With Yldir gone, I believe Sago is the last of the Sea Dyak sorcerers in Dungal. Some say he has little draoicht left and even fewer wits. But they still come to him for advice on fishing. Indeed, there is none better."
The Sea Dyak sorcerer lived south of Ardara's harbor in a secluded inlet. His home was a small, round, one-room building, called a mote, made of white stone and seashells. At the top were lodgings for seabirds.
Sago stood waiting in the shell-lined doorway, as if he was expecting them. He wore a tunic the color of seawater, and Brie was struck by how thin he was: His arms and legs looked to be no more than bone with skin stretched over them. The dome of his head was covered by a close-fitting cap of the same seawater color as his tunic; feathery wisps of white hair protruded from the cap. His skin was worn by weather and age, but his green eyes were unclouded, and they watched intently as Brie and Hanna approached.
"So," the sorcerer said to Brie with a wink, "the arrow finds its mark."
ELEVEN
Ardara
Brie gave a start, her hand going to the panner at her neck. The sorcerer had spoken in Eirrenian. Brie looked sideways at Hanna. The older woman shrugged.
"Come." Sago led them inside.
After the brightness of water and sun, the inside of the mote seemed dim, but a window of green glass provided some light. Brie had the sensation of being underwater: Green-hued light rippled on the surfaces of things. The walls of the mote were lined with shelves made of driftwood, and each shelf was jammed with flotsam cast up by the sea—shells of all shapes and sizes, feathery sprays of seaweed, frosted sea-glass, smooth sand-coins, brittle sea stars, and many other oddments.
Inside the mote were several seabirds. One tern settled onto Sago's shoulder and ate bread crumbs from his hand.
"Some sepoa?" asked the sorcerer, holding up an empty cup encrusted with bits of many shells.
"It's a kind of tea made of seaweed, sweetened with " honey and cinnamon," explained Hanna. "It's actually very good."
"Yes, please," Brie said.
They sat on cushions and drank the seaweed tea. Sago did not speak, but gazed steadily at Brie. She began to be uncomfortable under his scrutiny, and yet, as had been true with Yldir, she felt an odd Tightness about being here in this cluttered, dim mote. She sipped the sepoa tea thinking it tasted almost like ginger cake.
"Yldir is dead," said Hanna.
The bird on Sago's shoulder let out a cry, sounding almost human, and beat its powerful wings.
Sago's eyes were bright, staring out the dim green window. "The water went dark, almost black, as if a cloud had passed overhead. But there was no cloud. We knew it was Yldir." His eyes suddenly twinkled, and he said,
"There was an old man
And nothing he had,
And so this old man
Was said to be mad."
Hanna gave Brie a look, then asked Sago how the fishing was today. He did not reply, just hummed the melody to the rhyme under his breath with a benign smile.
When they had finished their tea, Sago took them to a bucket hidden in the shadows at the corner of the room.
"Sumog," he said, carrying the bucket closer to the window so they could see its contents more clearly.
Coiled in the wooden pail a dead snakelike sea creature lay. It looked greenish brown in the wavery light, and its staring eyes were large and bulging, rimmed with a delicate line of orange. There was evil in the blunt snout. Brie shivered.
"What is sumog?" she asked.
"Eats all the little fishies, heigh-ho," Sago sang.
"Sago," Hanna said sternly. "Is this true? Is that why the fish supply has been poor of late?"
Sago bobbed his head several times. "Oh, yes, and yes, and yes. This is only one, but there are many more. Out there." The seabird on his shoulder squawked.
"Do the fishermen know?"
"They don't believe."
"Why not?"
"Crafty, the sumog are. Kill at night. Swift and silent. Almost invisible." Sago carried the bucket back to the shadows.
"What can be done?"
"Kill the sumog. Hunt and kill them. But only old Sago believes in sumog." He grinned. "Enough of dark. I want the sun." He led them out onto the beach.
Brie breathed in the sea air. She looked out over the sun-sparkled sea. Again she felt Sago's eyes on her. She turned to him.
"You have come home," said Sago.
"What?"
He reached over and laid his thin fingers on her breastbone. "Here."
A petrel wheeled overhead, then dived low, its feet skimming the surface of the water.
As she and Hanna made their way back to town, Hanna said, "You will get used to Sago. He has his good days and bad. But," she added with a grin, "which of us does not?"
***
Hanna took Brie to an inn called the Speckled Trout for their evening meal. The inn was full and noisy, with a cluster of men around the ale barrels. A gow, Hanna called them, and she signaled to one, a large-boned young man with a thatch of gorse-colored hair. He was Lom, Farmer Garmon's son, and he joined them at their table. Lom was only a few years older than Brie, but he towered over her.
"So the Traveler has returned." He grinned. He had the same open, enveloping smile as his father.
Hanna lifted her glass of ale.
"And what book did you take to the havotty this season?" Lom asked.
"The tale of Gydwyn and Cessair."
"Ah, the jeweled wings and snow-white bear cub ... I look forward to hearing it during the dark months."
"How goes your boat?"
Lom's eyes lit up and he launched into a rapid description of which Brie understood almost nothing. Her eyes wandered, taking in the Ardarans as they drank and ate and talked. The innkeeper, a round-faced man with a sunken chin, was staring at Brie, a scowl thinning his lips. He looked away quickly when their eyes met.
"...in a day or two, if you'd like," Lom was saying, with a shy glance at Brie.
"Uh, I'm sorry..."
"Lorn has invited us to see his boat."
Brie politely said she would like that, then turned her attention to the mutton and potatoes the unfriendly innkeeper was placing in front of her.
"We've been to Sago," Hanna said to Lom.
The innkeeper overheard and let out a snicker. "Did he caper about and sing of fish that dance and talking birds?"
"No," replied Hanna, annoyed. "He spoke of something more serious."
"Oh, and what would that be? Ladybugs in petticoats?"
There were a few guffaws from a nearby table.
"Sumog," Hanna said loudly.
"You mean that phantom fish of his that's supposedly devouring all the fish between here and Mira?"
"I saw it," Hanna stated matter-of-factly.
Silence greeted her words. Most of the people at the inn were listening to the exchange.
"Was it bigger than a whitebelly, have large horns, and breathe fire at you?" the innkeeper persisted, his lips in a sneer.
"No. It was dead, in a wooden pail. But it had the stench of evil about it."
The innkeeper opened his mouth, but Hanna continued. "I would not underestimate the Sea Dyak sorcerer, were I you, innkeeper. He is not the half-wit he would have you believe. Now, I, for one, am ready to eat."
Shutting his mouth, the innkeeper moved away to a table of his cronies. They muttered back and forth, casting sidelong glances at Brie and Hanna.
Very early the next morning, Hanna went off with Farmer Garmon to discuss plans for beginning the harvest, and Brie, finding herself at loose ends, directed her steps toward the harbor.
Leaning against a stone wall, she gazed out at the bustle of activity. Many boats were already out, though some were still preparing for the day's fishing. Yldir had been right. There was so much of life around the sea: the constantly moving water; the birds wheel
ing and calling overhead; the fishing boats with the men aboard heaving, hauling, tightening, spooling, mending.
She felt outside it all. As if her soul were somehow back in the bog.
Watching, she stayed at the stone wall through the morning. Then she caught sight of a trim, whitewashed boat returning to harbor. It had a familiar look to it, as if she had seen it before somewhere. As it came closer she was able to make out the words Storm Petrel in black paint on the prow. Of course. Rilla had spoken of the Storm Petrel, Jacan's boat. She watched the craft with pleasure as the four men aboard, Jacan, Ferg, Lom, and another man Brie did not know, pulled the boat into the dock. Jacan caught sight of Brie and gave her a nod of recognition. Though she had no certainty of a welcome from them, Brie found herself walking down to the Storm Petrel. She had to see it up close.
Jacan's keen eyes watched her come. He must have read her face, for without being asked he invited her aboard. He introduced her to the fourth man on the boat, a spry older man named Henle, and she exchanged greetings with Lom, though she barely was aware of doing so, so caught up was she in her up close look at the Storm Petrel.
She drank it all in—the clean lines of the prow, the way the deck boards fit snugly together, the symmetry of the mast and yard, the finely proportioned hull. And all Brie could think of was that she must sail on this boat, out on the sea.
"It was a poor day for fishing," Jacan was saying. "We'll try again tomorrow. Perhaps you—" He stopped, almost as if he was surprised at himself. Ferg glanced over, also surprised.
"If you will have me, I would come with you tomorrow," Brie said loudly.