by Tad Williams
Marya nodded, thinking. Simon trailed his fingers in the cold water.
They passed eleven more bridges, or “gates” as Binabik called them, since they had for a thousand years or more marked the river entrance to Da’ai Chikiza. Each gate was named for an animal, the troll explained, and corresponded to a phase of the moon. One by one, they drifted beneath Foxes, Roosters, Hares and Doves, each one slightly different in shape, made of pearly moonstone or bright lapis, but all unmistakably the work of the same sublime and reverent hands.
By the time the sun had climbed behind the clouds to its mid-morning station they were just slipping beneath the Gate of Nightingales. On the far side of this span, on whose proud carvings flecks of gold still glimmered, the river began to turn, bearing west one more time toward the unseen eastern flank of the Wealdhelm Hills. There were no surface-roiling rocks here; the current moved swiftly and evenly. Simon was in the midst of asking Marya a question when Binabik raised his hand.
As they rounded a bend it was before them; a forest of impossibly graceful towers, set like a jeweled puzzle within the larger forest of trees. The Sithi city, flanking the river on either side, seemed to grow out of the very soil. It seemed the forest’s own dream realized in subtle stone, a hundred shades of green and white and pale summersky blue. It was an immense thicket of needle-thin stone, of gossamer walkways like bridges of spiderweb, of filagreed tower tops and minarets reaching up into the high treetops to catch sun on their faces like icy flowers. The world’s past lay open before them, breathtaking and heartrending. It was the most beautiful thing Simon had ever seen.
But as they floated into the city, the river winding around the slender columns, it became apparent that the forest was reclaiming Da’ai Chikiza. The tiled towers, intricate with cracks, were netted in ivy and the twining branches of trees. In many places, where once there had been walls and doors of wood or some other perishable substance, the stone outlines now stood precariously unsupported, like the bleached skeletons of incredible sea creatures. Everywhere the vegetation was thrusting in, clinging to the delicate walls, smothering the whisper-thin spires in uncaring leaves.
In a way, Simon decided, it only made it more beautiful, as though the forest, restless and unfulfilled, had grown a city from out of itself.
Binabik’s quiet voice broke the silence, solemn as the moment; the echoes quickly vanished in the choking greenery.
“ ‘Tree of the Singing Wind,’ they named it: Da’ai Chikiza. Once, can you imagine, it was full of music and life. All the windows burned with lamps, and there were bright boats at sail upon the river.” The troll tilted his head back to stare as they passed beneath a last stone bridge, narrow as a feather quill, clothed in images of graceful antlered deer. “Tree of the Singing Wind,” he repeated, distant as a man lost in memory.
Simon wordlessly steered their little craft over to a bank of stone steps that ended in a platform, nearly flush with the surface of the wide river. They climbed out, tying the boat to a root that had pushed through the cracked white stone. When they had mounted up they stopped, staring silently at the vine-draped walls and mossy corridors. The very air of the ruined city was charged with quiet resonance, like a tuned but unplucked string. Even Qantaqa stood seemingly abashed, tail held low as she sniffed the air. Then her ears straightened, and she whined.
The hiss was almost imperceptible. A line of shadow leaped past Simon’s face and struck one of the attenuated walkways with a sharp crack. Sparkling chips of green stone exploded in all directions. Simon whirled to look back.
Standing not a hundred ells away, separated from the companions only by the rolling expanse of river, stood a black-garbed figure holding a bow as long as he was tall. A dozen or so others garbed in blue and black surcoats were scrambling up a pathway to stand beside him. One of them carried a torch.
The black figure lifted a hand to his mouth, showing for an instant a flash of pale beard.
“You have nowhere to go!” Ingen Jegger’s voice came faint above the sounds of the river. “Surrender in the King’s name!”
“The boat!” Binabik cried, but even as they moved to the steps black-clad Ingen reached out some slender thing toward the torchbearer; fire blossomed at one end. A moment later he had nocked it on his bowstring. As the companions reached the bottom step, a bolt of fire leaped across the river, exploding into the side of the boat. The quivering arrow ignited the bark almost instantly, and the troll had time only to pull one of the packs from the craft before the flames forced him back. Momentarily hidden behind the leaping fire, Simon and Marya darted up the stairs, Binabik close behind. At the top Qantaqa was running from side to side, uttering hoarse barks of dismay.
“Run now!” Binabik snapped. On the far side of the river two more bowmen stepped up to Ingen’s side. As Simon strained toward the cover of the nearest tower he heard the awful hum of another arrow, and saw it skid across the tiles twenty cubits before him. Two more clattered against the tower wall that seemed so achingly far ahead. He heard a cry of pain, and Marya’s terrified call.
“Simon!”
He whirled to see Binabik tumble to the ground, a tiny bundle at the girl’s feet. Somewhere, a wolf was howling.
28
Drums of Ice
The morning sun of the twenty-fourth day of Maia-month beamed down on Hernysadharc, turning the golden disc atop the highest of the Taig’s roofs into a circlet of brilliant flame. The sky was blue as an enamel plate, as though Brynioch of the Skies had chased the clouds away with his heavenly hazel stick, leaving them to lurk sullenly around the upper peaks of the looming Grianspog.
The sudden return of spring should have gladdened Maegwin’s heart. All over Hernystir the untimely rains and cruel frosts had drawn a shroud over both the land and her father Lluth’s people. Flowers had frozen in the ground, unborn. Apples had dropped small and sour from the gnarled branches in the orchards. The sheep and cows, put out to graze in sodden fields, came back with rolling, frightened eyes, unnerved by hailstones and gusting winds.
A blackbird, insolently waiting until the last moment, hopped up from Maegwin’s path into the denuded branches of a cherry tree where he trilled disputatiously. Maegwin paid him no heed, but hitched up her long dress and hurried toward her father’s hall.
She ignored the voice calling her name at first, unwilling to be hindered in her errand. Finally, reluctantly, she turned to see her half brother Gwythinn running toward her. She stopped and waited for him, arms folded.
Gwythinn’s white tunic was disordered, and his golden neck torque had ridden halfway around to the back, as though he were a child instead of a young man of warrior age. He caught up and stood panting; she gave a snort of dismay and set to straightening out his garments. The prince smirked, but waited patiently while she pulled the torque around to lie against his collarbone. His long brown mane of hair had largely pulled free of the red cloth holding it in a careless horse tail. As she reached around to tie it, their faces were eye-to-eye, although Gwythinn was by no means a short man. Maegwin scowled.
“Bagba’s Herd, Gwythinn, look at you! You must do better. You will be king someday!”
“And what has being king to do with how my hair is worn? Besides, I was handsome enough when I started out, but I had to run like the very wind to catch you, you with those long legs.”
Maegwin flushed as she turned away. Her height was something about which, try as she might, she could not be matter-of-fact.
“Well, you’ve caught me up now. Are you going to the hall?”
“I certainly am.” A sterner expression ran across Gwythinn’s face like quicksilver, and he tugged at his long mustache. “I have things I must say to our father.”
“As do I,” Maegwin nodded, walking now. Their strides and heights so evenly matched, their sorrel-colored hair so alike it might have been spun from one wheel, any outsider would have guessed they were twins, instead of Maegwin five years older and from a different mother.
“Our best brood sow, Aeghonwye, died evening last. Another one, Gwythinn! What is happening? Is it another plague, like at Abaingeat?”
“If it is a plague,” her brother said grimly, fingering the leatherwrapped hilt of his sword, “I know who brought it here. That man is a sickness on legs.” He slapped the pommel and spat. “I only pray that he speaks out of turn today. Brynioch! Would I love to cross blades with that one!”
Maegwin narrowed her eyes. “Don’t be a fool,” she said crossly, “Guthwulf has killed a hundred men. And, strange as it may seem, he is a guest at the Taig.”
“A guest who insults my father!” Gwythinn snarled, pulling his elbow from Maegwin’s gentle, prisoning grasp. “A guest who brings threats from a High King drowning in his own poor kingship—a king who struts and bullies and spends golden coins like they were pebbles, then turns to Hernystir and demands we help him!” Gwythinn’s voice was rising, and his sister darted a glance around, worried who might hear. There was no one in sight but the pale shapes of the door guards a hundred paces away. “Where was King Elias when we lost the road to Naarved and Elvritshalla? When bandits and the gods know what else descended on the Frostmarch Road
?” Face flushed again, the prince looked up to find Maegwin no longer at his side. He turned to see her standing, arms folded, ten steps behind.
“Have you finished, Gwythinn?” she asked. He nodded, but his mouth was tight. “Good, then. The difference between our father and yourself, fellow, is more than only thirty-some years. In those years he has learned when to speak, and when to keep his thoughts inside. That is why, thanks to him, someday you stand to be King Gwythinn, and not just the Duke of Hernystir-Duchy.”
Gwythinn stared for a long moment. “I know,” he said at last, “you would have me be like Eolair, and bow and scrape to the dogs of Erkynland. I know you think Eolair is the sun and moon—regarding not what he thinks of you, king’s daughter though you be—but I am not such a man. We are Hernystiri! We crawl for no one!”
Maegwin glared, stung by the jab over her feelings for the Count of Nad Mullach—about whom Gwythinn was exactly right: the attention he showed her was only that due to a king’s gawky, unmarried daughter. But the tears she dreaded did not come; instead, as she looked at Gwythinn, his handsome face twisted by frustration, by pride, and not least by genuine love of his people and land, she saw again the little brother she had once carried on her shoulder—and whom she herself had, from time to time, teased into tears.
“Why are we fighting, Gwythinn?” she asked wearily. “What has brought this shadow down on our house?”
Her brother lowered his gaze to his boot tops, embarrassed, then extended his hand. “Friends and allies,” he said. “Come, let us go in and see Father before the Earl of Utanyeat comes slinking in to bid fond farewells.”
The windows of the Taig’s great hall were thrown open; the sunlight streaming through was full of sparkling dust from the rushes spread across the floor. The thick wall timbers, hewed from the oak trees of the Circoille, were fitted so carefully that not a gleam of light showed between them. Up among the roofbeams hung a thousand painted carvings of the gods of the Hernystiri, of heroes and monsters, all twisting slowly in the rafters as reflected light shone warmly on their polished wooden features.
At the hall’s far end, sun splashing in on either side. King Lluth ubh-Llythinn sat in his huge oaken chair, beneath the carved stag’s head that strained upward from the chair’s back, antlers of real horn fixed to its wooden skull. The king was eating a bowl of porridge and honey with a bone spoon while Inahwen, his young wife, sat on a lower chair at his side, putting a tracery of delicate stitching onto the hem of one of Lluth’s robes.
As the sentries banged their spear points twice upon their shields to signal Gwythinn’s arrival—lesser nobility such as Count Eolair received only a single beat, while the king himself received three, and Maegwin not a one—Lluth looked up and smiled, placing his bowl down on the arm of his chair and wiping his gray mustache on his sleeve. Inahwen saw the gesture and gave Maegwin a despairing woman-to-woman look that Lluth’s daughter resented more than a little. Maegwin had never really gotten used to Gwythinn’s mother Fiathna taking the place of her own (Maegwin’s mother Penemhwye had died when Maegwin was four), but at least Fiathna had been Lluth’s age, not a mere girl like Inahwen! Still, this young, goldenhaired woman was good-hearted, although perhaps a little slow of wit. It was not really Inahwen’s fault she was a third wife,
“Gwythinn!” Lluth half-rose, brushing crumbs from the lap of his belted yellow robe. “Are we not lucky to have the sun today?” The king swept a hand window-ward, as pleased as a child who has learned a trick, “It is a certain thing that we need a little, eh? And perhaps it will help to put our guests from Erkynland,” he made a wry face, his mobile, clever features shifting into a look of bemusement, eyebrows arching above the thick, crooked nose broken in his boyhood, “to put them in a more agreeable mood. Do you think?”
“No, I do not think that, father,” Gwythinn said, approaching as the king settled back into his antler-crested seat. “And I hope the answer you give them today, if I may presume, will send them away in an even fouler one.” He pulled up a stool and sat at the king’s feet just below the raised platform, sending a harper scuttling. “One of Guthwulf’s soldiers picked a fight with old Craobhan last evening. I had a hard time preventing Craobhan from feathering the bastard’s back with an arrow.”
Lluth looked troubled for a moment, then the look was gone, hidden behind the smiling mask that Maegwin knew so well.
Ah, father, she thought, even you are finding it a bit hard to keep the music playing while these creatures bay all around the Taig. She walked quietly forward and sat on the platform by Gwythinn’s stool.
“Well, the king grinned ruefully, “sure it is that King Elias could have chosen his diplomats with a bit more care. But today in an hour they are gone, and peace descends again on Hernysadharc.” Lluth snapped his fingers and a serving boy sprang forward to take his dish of porridge away. Inahwen watched critically as it went by.
“There,” she said reproachfully. “You didn’t finish again. What am I to do with your father?” she added, this time directing her gaze to Maegwin, smiling fondly as though Maegwin, too, was a soldier in the constant battle to make Lluth finish his meals.
Maegwin, still at a loss as to how to deal with a mother a year younger than herself, hastily broke the silence. “Aeghonwye died, Father. Our best, and the tenth sow this month. And some of the others have gotten very thin.”
The king frowned. “This cursed weather. If Elias could but keep this spring sun overhead, I’d give him any tax he asked.” He reached down to pat Maegwin’s arm, but was not quite able to reach. “All we can do is pile more rushes in the barns to keep out the chill. Failing that, we are in the godly hands of Brynioch and Mircha.”
There was another metallic clash of spear on shield, and the doorspeaker appeared, hands nervously clasped.
“Your Highness,” he called, “the Earl of Utanyeat requests an audience.”
Lluth smiled. “Our guests have decided to say farewell before they take to their horses. Of course! Please, bring Earl Guthwulf in immediately.”
But their guest, followed by several of his armored but unsworded men, was already moving past the ancient servant.
Guthwulf dropped slowly to his knee five paces before the platform. “Your majesty…ah, and the prince, as well. I am fortunate.” There was no hint of mockery in his voice, but his green eyes held an unsubtle fire. “And Princess Maegwin,”—a smile—“the Rose of Hernysadharc.”
Maegwin struggled to maintain her composure. “Sir, there was only one Rose of Hernysadharc,” she said, “and since she was the mother of your King Elias, I am surprised it should slip your mind.”
Guthwulf nodded gravely. “Of course, lady, I sought only to pay a compliment, but I must take exception to your calling Elias my king. Is he not yours, too, under the Hig
h Ward?”
Gwythinn shifted on his stool, turning to see what his father’s reaction would be; his scabbard scraped on the wooden platform.
“Of course, of course,” Lluth waved his hand slowly, as if beneath deep water. “We have been through all this, and I see no need to belabor it. I recognize the debt of my house to King John. We have always honored it, in peace or war.”
“Yes.” The Earl of Utanyeat stood, dusting the knees of his breeches. “But what about your house’s debt to King Elias? He has shown great tolerance…”
Inahwen stood up, and the robe she had been sewing slid to the floor. “You must excuse me,” she said breathlessly, plucking the garment up, “there are things in the household I should attend to.” The king waved his permission and she walked quickly but carefully between the waiting men and slid out the half-opened door of the hall, as lithely as a doe.
Lluth breathed a quiet sigh; Maegwin looked at him, seeing the always-surprising lines of age that wreathed her father’s face.
He is tired, and she, Inahwen, is frightened, Maegwin thought. I wonder what I am? Angry? I’m not sure—exhausted, really.
As the king stared at Elias’ messenger, the room seemed to darken. For a moment Maegwin feared that clouds had covered the sun, that the winter was returning; then she realized it was only her own apprehension, her sudden feeling that something more than her father’s peace of mind hung in the balance here.
“Guthwulf,” the king began, and his voice sounded bowed as though beneath a great weight, “do not think to provoke me today…but neither think that you can cow me. The king has shown no tolerance for the troubles of the Hernystiri at all. We have weathered a bitter drought, and now the rains for which we thanked all the gods a thousand times have themselves become a curse. What penalty that Elias can threaten me with can exceed that of seeing my people frightened, our cattle starving? I can pay no greater tithe.”