by Tad Williams
Miriamele laughed and shivered in quick succession. Despite the chill, the tangy sea air had vastly improved her outlook. She no longer felt as though she might faint—in fact, she felt so much better that she did not object when the Earl of Eadne and Drina slipped a solicitous arm around her shoulders.
“You are a strange but fascinating young woman, Lady Marya,” Aspitis whispered, barely audible above the moan of the wind. His breath was warm against the chilled flesh of her ear. “I feel there is some mystery about you. Are all country girls so full of moods?”
Miriamele was very definitely of two minds about the tingling that was running right through her. Fear and excitement seemed dangerously intermixed. “Don’t,” she said at last.
“Don’t what, Marya?” Even as the storm roared and flailed outside, Aspitis’ touch was solemn, silken.
A flurry of confusing images seemed to sweep in on the wind—her father’s cold, distant face, young Simon crookedly smiling, the riverbanks of the Aelfwent flashing past, flickering with light and shadow. Her blood was warm and loud in her ears.
“No,” she said, pulling free of the earl’s clinging arm. She scrambled forward until she was out from under the canopy and could straighten up. The rain smacked wetly against her face.
“But Marya…”
“Thank you for the lovely supper, Earl Aspitis. I have been a great deal of trouble and I beg your forgiveness.”
“No forgiveness need be sought, my lady.”
“Then I will bid you goodnight.” She stood, buffeted by the strong wind, and made her way unsteadily down to the deck, then followed the cabin wall to the ladder down into the narrow corridor. She stepped through the door into the cabin she shared with Cadrach. She stood in darkness and listened to the monks’ even, sonorous breathing, thankful that he did not wake. A few moments later came the sound of Aspitis’ boots on the ladder rungs; his cabin door opened, then closed behind him.
For a long while Miriamele leaned against the door. Her heart beat as swiftly as if she been hiding for her life’s preservation.
Was this love? Fear? What kind of spell did the golden-haired earl cast that she should feel so wild, so pursued? She was breathless and confused as a flushed hare.
The thought of lying on her bed, trying to sleep while her thoughts raced and Cadrach snored on the floor, was intolerable. She opened the cabin door a crack and listened, then slipped out into the corridor and onto the deck once more. Despite the rain pelting down, the storm seemed to have lessened The deck still pitched so that she could not make her way forward without keeping a hand on the shrouds, but the sea had calmed considerably.
A trill of disquieting but curiously seductive melody drew her along. The song curved and recurved, stitching the stormy night like a thread of silver-green. By turns it was soft or hearty or piercingly loud, but the changes unfolded so formlessly that it was impossible to remember what had been happening a moment before, or to understand how anything different than what was happening at this particular moment could even exist.
Gan Itai sat cross-legged in the forecastle, head thrown back so that her hood fell loosely on her shoulders and her white hair streamed in the breeze. Her eyes were closed. She swayed from side to side, as though her song were a fast-moving river which took every bit of her concentration to ride.
Miriamele drew her own hooded cloak close and settled into the dubious shelter of the ship’s wale to listen.
The Niskie’s song went on for what seemed an hour, sliding smoothly from pitch to pitch and pace to pace. Sometimes her liquid words seemed arrows that flew outward to spark and sting, other times an array of gems that dazzled with smoldering colors. Through it all ran a deeper melody that never entirely disappeared, a melody which seemed to speak of peaceful green depths, of sleep, and of the coming of a heavy, comforting silence.
Miriamele awakened with a little start. When she lifted her head, it was to see Gan Itai regarding her curiously from the forecastle. Now that the Niskie had stopped singing, the roar of the ocean seemed curiously flat and tuneless.
“What are you doing, child?”
Miriamele was oddly embarrassed. She had never been so near a singing Niskie before. It almost seemed that she had been spying on some very private thing.
“I came out on deck to get some air. I was having supper with Earl Aspitis and felt sick.” She took a breath to still her shaking voice. “You sing wonderfully.”
Gan Itai smiled slyly. “That is true, or the Eadne Cloud would not have made so many safe voyages. Come, sit by me and talk. I need not sing for a while, and the late watches are lonely.”
Miriamele climbed up, seating herself beside the Niskie. “Do you get tired, singing?” she asked.
Gan Itai laughed quietly. “Does a mother grow tired raising her children? Of course, but it is what I do.”
Miriamele stole a glance at Gan Itai’s wrinkled face. The Niskie’s eyes peered our from beneath her white brows, fixed on the spray and swells.
“Why did Cadrach call you Tinook…” She tried to remember the word.
“Tinukeda’ya. Because that is what we are: Ocean Children. Your guardian is learned.”
“But what does it mean?”
“It means we always lived on the ocean. Even in the far-away Garden, we dwelt always at land’s end. It has only been since we came to this place that some of the Navigator’s Children have been changed. Some have left the sea entirely, which is as hard for me to understand as if someone were to stop breathing and claim that was a good way to live.” She shook her head, pursing her thin lips.
“Where are your people from?”
“Far away. Osten Ard is only our most recent home.”
Miriamele sat for a while, thinking. “I always thought that Niskies were just like Wrannamen. You look very much like Wrannamen.”
Gan Itai laughed sibilantly. “I have heard,” she said, “that though they are different, some animals grow to look like each other because they do the same things. Perhaps theWrannamen, like the Tinukeda’ya, have bowed their heads for too long.” She laughed again, but Miriamele did not think it was a happy laugh. “And you, child,” the Niskie said at last, “it is your turn to answer questions. Why are you here?”
Miriamele stared, caught off balance. “What?”
“Why are you here? I have thought about what you said, and I am not sure I believe you.”
“Earl Aspitis does,” Miriamele said, a little defiantly.
“That may be true, but I am altogether different.” Gan Itai turned her gaze on Miriamele. Even in the dim lamplight, the Niskie’s eyes glittered like anthracite. “Speak to me.”
Miriamele shocked her head and tried to pull away, but a thin, strong hand closed on her arm. “I am sorry,” Gan Itai said. “I have frightened you. Let me put your mind at case. I have decided that there is no harm in you—no harm to the Eadne Cloud, at least, which is what I care about. I am considered peculiar among my folk because I judge quickly. When I like something or someone, I like it.” She chuckled dryly. “I have decided that I like you, Marya—if that is your name. It shall be your name for now, if you wish. You need never fear me, not old Gan Itai.”
Bewildered by the night, by wine, and by this latest of many unusual feelings, Miriamele began to weep.
“Now, child, now…” Gan Itai’s gentle, spidery hand patted her back.
“I have no home.” Miriamele fought her tears. She felt herself on the verge of saying things she should not say, no matter how much she wished to be unburdened. “I am…a fugitive.”
“Who pursues you?”
Miriamele shook her head. Spray arched high over the bow as the ship nosed down into another trough. “I cannot say, but I am in terrible danger. That’s why I had to hide on the boat.”
“And the monk? Your learned guardian? Is he not in danger, too?”
Miriamele was brought up short by Gan Itai’s question. There was much she had not had time to think about. “Yes, I s
uppose he is.”
The Niskie nodded, as if satisfied. “Fear not. Your secret is safe with me.”
“You won’t tell Aspitis…the earl?”
Gan Itai shook her head “My own allegiances are more complex than you can know. But I cannot promise you he will remain ignorant. He is a clever one, Eadne Cloud’s master.”
“I know.” Miriamele’s reply was heartfelt.
The mounting storm flung down another wash of rain. Gan Itai leaned forward, staring out into the wind-tossed sea. “House of Ve, they do not stay down long! Curse them, but they are strong!” She turned to Miriamele. “I think it is time for me to sing once more. It would probably be good for you to get below deck.”
Miriamele awkwardly thanked the Niskie for her companionship, then stood and made her way down the slippery ladder and off the forecastle. Thunder growled like a beast hunting them through the darkness. She wondered suddenly, desperately, if she had been a fool to open her heart to this strange creature.
At the hatchway she stopped, cocking her head. In the black night behind her, Gan Itai’s song had been lifted against the storm once more, a slender ribbon offered to hold back the angry sea.
24
Dogs of Erchester
Joshua’s company rode north along the banks of the river Stefflod, heading upstream from the juncture with the Ymstrecca through grassland rumpled with low hills. Soon the downs began to rise higher on either side, so that the prince’s folk found themselves traveling through a meadowed river-valley, a wide trough of land with the watercourse at its center.
The Stefflod wound along beneath the somber sky, shining dully as a vein of tarnished silver. Like the Ymstrecca, its song at first seemed muffled, but Deornoth thought this river had a queer undertone to its murmuring, as though it hid the voices of a great whispering throng. Sometimes the noise of the water seemed to rise in what was almost a thread of melody, clear as a succession of pealing bells. A moment later, as Deornoth strained to hear what it was that had captured his attention, nothing sounded but the mutter and rush of moving water.
The light playing upon the Stefflod’s surface was just as dreamily inconstant. Despite the overcast, the water glimmered at times as though cold-burning stars were rolling and bumping along the river’s bottom. At other moments the gleam heightened to a sparkle like a froth of jewels. Then—just as suddenly, whether the sun was showing or cloud-hidden—the waterway would again become dark and unreflective as lead.
“Strange, isn’t it?” Father Strangyeard said. “For all the things we’ve seen…my goodness, the world still has more to show us, doesn’t it?”
“There’s something very…alive about it.” Deornoth squinted. A curl of light seemed to wriggle on the river’s agitated skin, like a radiant fish struggling against the current.
“Well, it is all…hmmm…all part of God,” Strangyeard said, making the sign of the Tree on his breast, “so of course it is alive.” He squinted too, frowning slightly. “But I do know what you mean, Sir Deornoth.”
The valley that had gradually risen around them seemed to take much of its character from the river. Willow trees stood sleepily beside the water-course, shivering as they bent to the cold water like women washing their hair. As the riders traveled farther, the river widened and slowed. Thickets of reeds appeared along the banks, resplendent with birds who shrieked from their bowers to warn all their tribe that strangers walked the land.
Strangers, Deornoth thought. That is what we suddenly seem here. As if we have passed out of the lands meant for our folk and crossed over into someone else’s domain. He remembered Geloë’s words on that night, weeks back, when they had first met her in the forest:
“Sometimes you men are like lizards, sunning on the stones of a crumbled house, thinking: ‘what a nice basking spot someone built for me.’.” The witch woman had frowned as she spoke.
She told us we were in Sithi lands, he recalled. Now we are again entering their fields, that is all. That is why things seem so strange.
Somehow this did not dispel his unsettled feeling.
They made camp in a meadow. The low grass was dotted here and there with fairy-rings, as the woman Ielda had called them, perfect circles of small white toadstools that shone faintly against the dark turf as twilight came on. Duchess Gutrun did not like the idea of sleeping so near to these rings, but Father Strangyeard sensibly pointed out that the people of Gadrinsett said the whole of this land belonged to the “fairies,” so the proximity of a mushroom ring meant little. Gutrun, more concerned for the safety of the child Leleth than herself, gave in with reservations.
A small fire, made with willow branches they had gathered during the journey, helped to dispel some of the strangeness. The prince’s party ate and talked quietly long into the evening. Old Towser, who had been sleeping so long and so deeply during the journey that he hardly seemed one of their company anymore, but more like a piece of baggage, awakened and lay staring at the night sky.
“The stars aren’t right,” he said at last, so quietly that none heard him. He repeated himself more loudly. Josua came to kneel beside him, taking the jester’s trembling hand in his.
“What is it, Towser?”
“The stars, they aren’t right.” The old man pulled his fingers free from the prince’s grip and gestured upward. “There’s the Lamp, but it’s got one star more than it should. And where’s the Crook? It shouldn’t be gone ’til harvest time. And there’s others there I don’t know at all.” His lip quivered. “We’re all dead. We’ve gone through into the Shadow Land like my grandmother used to tell of. We’re dead.”
“Come, now,” Josua said gently. “We are not dead. We are simply in a different place, and you have been in and out of dreams.”
Towser fixed him with a surprisingly sharp eye. “It is Anitul-month, is it not? Don’t think I am crazy-old yet, no matter what I have been through. I have stared at summer skies for nearly twice your lifetime, young prince. We may be in a different place, but all Osten Ard shares the same stars—does it not?”
Josua was silent for a while. A thin babble of voices rose from the campfire behind him. “I did not mean to say you had lost your wits, old friend. We are in a strange place, and who knows what stars may shine upon us? In any case, there is nothing to be done about it.” He took the old man’s hand again. “Why do you not come and sit closer to the fire? I think it would be comforting to have us all together, at least for a little while.”
Towser nodded and let Josua help him rise. “A little warmth would not go amiss, my prince. I feel a growing cold in my bones…and I don’t like it.”
“All the better, then, to sit near the fire on a damp night.” He led the old jester back.
The fire had dimmed to embers and Towser’s unfamiliar stars were wheeling in the sky overhead. Josua looked up when a hand touched his shoulder. Vorzheva had a blanket draped over her arm.
“Come, Josua, “she said. “Let us go and make our bed by the riverside.”
He looked around at the others, all sleeping but Deornoth and Strangyeard, who talked quietly on the far side of the fire. “I do not think I should leave my people alone.”
“Leave your people?” she said. There was an edge of anger in her voice, but a moment later it gave way to a quiet laugh. She shook her head and her black hair fell across her face. “You will never change. I am your wife now, do you remember that? We have gone four nights as if our marriage had never happened because you feared pursuit by the king’s soldiers and wished to be close to the others. Do you still fear?”
He looked up at her. His lip curled in a smile. “Not tonight.” He rose and put his arm about her slender waist, feeling the strong muscles of her back. “Let us go down by the river.”
Josua left his boots by the fire circle and together they went barefoot through the damp grass until the glow of the coals had disappeared behind them. The murmur of the river grew louder as they made their way down to the sandy verge. Vorzheva unfurle
d the blanket and sank down upon it—Josua joined her, pulling his heavy cloak over them both. For a while they lay in silence beside the dark Stefflod, watching the moon holding court among her stars. Vorzheva’s head rested on Josua’s chest, her river-washed hair against his cheek.
“Do not think that because our wedding was foreshortened, it meant any less to me,” he said finally. “I promise you that one day we will have our lives back as they were meant to be. You shall be the lady of a great house, not an exile in the wilderness.”
“Gods of my clan! You are a fool, Josua,” she said. “Do you think that I care what kind of house I live in?” She turned and kissed him, wriggling closer against his body. “Fool, fool, fool.” Her breath was hot against his face.
They spoke no more. The stars gleamed in the sky and the river sang to them.
Deornoth awakened just after dawn to the sound of Leleth crying. It took him a moment to realize why that seemed so strange. It was the first sound he had heard the child make.
Even as the last shreds of dream fell away—he had stood before a great white tree whose leaves were flames—he was clawing for the hilt of his sword. He sat up to see Duchess Gutrun holding the little girl on her lap. Beside her, Father Strangyeard had poked his head tortoiselike from beneath his cloak; the priest’s wispy red hair was dew-dampened.
“What is it?” Deornoth asked.
Gutrun shook her head. “I don’t know. She woke me up with her crying, the poor thing.” The duchess tried to cradle Leleth against her breast, but the child pulled back. She continued to cry, her eyes wide open, staring at the sky. “What’s the matter, little one, what’s the matter?” Gutrun crooned.
Leleth tugged her hand free from the woman’s embrace and tremblingly pointed toward the northern horizon. Deornoth could see nothing but a black fist of clouds in the most distant part of the sky. “Is something out there?” he asked.