The Shamer's Signet

by Lene Kaaberbøl

  “No,” I finally whispered, “it wasn’t like that.”

  “I want my Tavis back,” she said. “And if I cannot have that, I’ll curse you and yer family to blackest hell every day for the rest of my life.” She raised her clenched hand and held it in front of my face. Her fist was blackish gray, smeared with something greasy and dark.

  “Here,” she said. “I’m givin’ ye a gift. I give ye one night of my dreams. D’ye know what I dream? I dream that fish are eatin’ Tavis’s eyes.” And then she hit me, right between the eyes with her black hand. The blow was not a hard one, and yet it shook me more than anything Ivain had done to me. I couldn’t protect myself against this, much less strike back.

  “I never hurt your son,” I said dazedly, for this had to be the Laclan boy’s mother. “And Dina didn’t either, I’m sure of it!”

  “I know what I know,” she said, and walked away from me, her back still rigidly straight.

  “What kept ye?” growled Callan. “The horses are frettin’ to be off.”

  One of them certainly was. Falk was busy flinging his head about and pawing the ground to show how impatient he was. Callan’s bay just stood there, much too well trained for that kind of silliness. Debbi Herbs’s gray pony yawned, showing all its long yellow teeth.

  “I… I met Tavis’s mother.”

  “Mmmh. Can’t have been easy for ye.”

  I shook my head but said nothing more about it.

  “Ivain gave me this,” said Callan, handing me a long bundle wrapped up in old sacking. I knew immediately what it was, but I unwrapped it anyway.

  It was my sword, or what was left of it. Seeing that I lost, it rightfully belonged to Ivain now, but I don’t suppose he had much use for a broken blade.

  “What should I do with it?” I asked Callan.

  He shrugged. “That’s for you to know,” he said.

  At that moment I felt like flinging it on the middens. It had brought nothing but evil, and I suddenly understood Nico much better; right now I didn’t care for swords either. Still, I wrapped up the broken pieces and found a place for them in my pack. It was iron. Perhaps it could be made into something useful—a pot or some such thing.

  The marks Ivain’s sword had left on me had faded now to yellow and green, but Callan still had to help me into the saddle. I gathered the reins and made ready to ride.

  “Wait, lad,” said Callan. “Ye have something on yer brow.”

  I felt my forehead. There was a greasy spot right between my eyes, where Tavis’s mother had hit me. I tried to rub it with my sleeve, but it wouldn’t come off.

  “Did she hit you, the boy’s mother?” said Callan, suddenly looking worried. “With the Black Hand?”

  “She hit me all right,” I said. “And her hand was smeared with something.”

  Callan stood quite still. He stood quite still for so long that even the well-bred bay got impatient and shoved him gently with its muzzle.

  “What is it?” I said. “What about that hand?”

  Callan pulled something out from under his shirt, a small bag he apparently wore around his neck. I had never seen it before. “Here,” he said. “Best borrow this, at least until we can get ye home to yer mother. She is a wise woman, she understands such matters too, I think.”

  “What is it?” I asked, weighing the small bag in my hand. It was very light, and there was a faint rustle when I squeezed it. “What do I need it for?”

  “Just some dried herbs. Clover, catnip, vervaine, and dill. My gran made it. I don’t know if it works, but it’s worth a try.”

  “Works? On what?”

  “Against the Evil Eye and suchlike. The Black Hand is no jest.”

  “You mean that she… that she cursed me?” I’m givin’ ye a gift, she had said. One night of my dreams. And she had talked about cursing me and my family to blackest hell. “What was that on her hand? What is this, Callan?”

  “Grease. Ashes. Likely other stuff as well. I don’t know much about witchy matters. Put that thing on, now, and let’s get out of here.”

  Even leading the gray pony we made better time than I had done alone, as Callan knew the way much better. If I hadn’t been so sore and tired still, we might have made the trip in one day. But late in the afternoon I could barely stay on Falk’s back anymore, and Callan found us a good campsite under some birches by a small brook. I used the cold, clear water to scrub at the greasy spot until the last remnants of the woman’s black fist had gone. Her words stayed with me, though. And that night I had hideous sunken dreams of black water and slimy water weeds and cold, cold rocks. And fish. Fish eating Dina’s eyes.

  I woke in the middle of the long, cold hour when the first pale light is in the sky but the sun has not yet risen. I was so grateful to be awake and so frightened to go back to sleep that I felt like saddling Falk on the spot. But Callan was still asleep, and the horses too were dozing, heads low and haunches slumped. I leaned against the trunk of a birch tree and tried to forget about the fish and Dina’s eyes. And Mama. Most of all I tried not to think of Mama and her eyes when she heard what we had to tell her.

  We reached Baur Kensie in the late morning. It was strange to come across the crest of the hill and see the cottage there below, so small and ordinary. Naturally, it hadn’t changed much in the time I’d been away. It was only me. I had a strange feeling of… of not really living there anymore. Of not belonging. And that made me suddenly fond of every silly chicken down there, every row of cabbage plants, every turf we had so laboriously put on the roof last autumn.

  Mama sat on the chopping block by the woodshed, enjoying the morning sun. I hoped that meant she was stronger now. She would need her strength. She waved at us. And then she got up suddenly, propping herself against the wall of the shed with one hand. She had seen the gray, and the empty saddle.

  She didn’t say anything until we had reached the yard.

  “Where is Dina?” she asked.

  My mouth had gone dry, and my cheeks felt wooden. I couldn’t seem to say the words. Callan couldn’t either, at first. But then she put her hand on his knee and forced him to meet her eyes.

  “Where is Dina?” she repeated, using her eyes and her voice as ruthlessly as only my mother can. And Callan had to tell, word by difficult word, what had happened.

  “We… we found no body, Medama,” he finally ended his tale. “But no trace either of… of any livin’ child.”

  She let him go. He slumped on the horse as though she had snapped something inside him. Mama whirled without a word and strode into the cottage. I heard Rose’s voice in there, and Mama’s answering her. Then Rose came running out. She flew straight at me, like an arrow toward a target.

  “You… You…” She hit me on the thigh so hard that Falk started at the sound.

  “You fool! You numbskull! How could you do it!” Her pale braids danced, and there were red spots on her cheeks from sheer rage.

  “It’s not the lad’s fault,” said Callan, sliding off the bay’s back. “Ye think this is easy for him?”

  “Why did he have to run off like that?” spat Rose. “He could’ve stayed at home, and looked after his mother and Melli and Dina, like he was supposed to! This… this never would’ve happened!”

  A burning feeling spread through my body, a mixture of fury and shame.

  “Mind your own business,” I hissed. “Or mind your own family. Where are they?”

  It was a cruel thing to say, for Rose had more or less run away from home. To get away from Drakan, yes, but also to escape her grown-up half brother, who beat her. Rose’s mother still lived in Dunark and had made no answer to any of the letters we had helped Rose write to her.

  “At least I didn’t drown anyone!” Rose cried, tears in her eyes.

  “Neither did I,” I said, feeling suddenly more tired than angry. I got off Falk and led him into the stable, not looking at anyone.

  I stayed in the stable for a long time. Much longer than it took me to unsaddle Falk and r
ub him down and see to his water and feed. I suddenly remembered how Dina used to hang about the animals when she was feeling low. That made me so miserable and guilty that I didn’t see how I could ever face another human being. What was Melli thinking about all this? She was only five. Did she even understand what it meant that someone was dead?

  Finally the door opened. I half-expected it to be Mama, but it wasn’t. It was Rose.

  “Davin?” she said tentatively. “Aren’t you coming in?”

  “Why?” I said, my anger flaring up again. “It’s all my fault, isn’t it?”

  “I didn’t mean it like that,” she said. “It’s just… I got so scared and furious and miserable, all at once.” She put her hand on my arm, very cautiously, as if she expected me to hit her or something. “Won’t you come in? Your mother is asking about you.”

  I nodded. “I’ll come. In a minute.”

  It was a long, horrid day. An evil day. Worse, even, than the days we had spent searching and searching and not finding anything. Worse, because there wasn’t anything left to do. That night, Rose lit the fire even though it wasn’t really cold. Mama sat with Melli on her lap, looking completely exhausted. No one said much. It was almost a relief when it finally became time to go to bed, except that I was scared of the dreams that might be waiting.

  In the new cottage, I had a place of my own. One couldn’t really call it a room; it was really just a curtained-off section of the kitchen. But there was a narrow bedstead, a wooden chest, and a row of pegs, and I no longer had to share an alcove with Dina and Melli. Melli. It was a good thing we had Rose now, so that poor Melli didn’t have to sleep alone. Her eyes had looked so huge and scared all night. She hadn’t said a thing, not even to ask about Dina. It was hard to tell what she was thinking.

  I must have slept a bit, though I don’t remember any dreams. I woke because I heard something. It was very faint, and not a sound I had ever heard before. Yet I knew right away what it was.

  My mother was crying.

  I sat up. There was a light on in the kitchen. I pushed aside the blankets and pulled on my breeches.

  She was sitting in the chair by the fire. The faint glow from the fire flickered across her gray linen skirt. And something else. Something green. She was sitting there with Dina’s dark green cloak in her arms.

  “Mama…”

  She raised her head to look at me, making no attempt to hide her tears. I looked away.

  “Davin. Come and sit down.”

  When I was younger, I used to sit at her feet and lean against her legs. I was too old for that now, I thought. I sat on the bench instead.

  “It’s so strange,” Mama said quietly. “I heard her voice some days ago. And I… I sent her away. What she was doing was dangerous to a living person, so I sent her away. I didn’t stop to listen to her. If I had, we might at least have known where she was.”

  “Do you mean that she… was alive?”

  “I thought so then. Now I’m not so sure. Maybe it was because… because she was dying that she was able to come to me.”

  “I heard her too,” I said. “The day after she went missing.”

  I could feel her eyes on me, but I just kept staring into the fire.

  “What did she say?”

  “Nothing. She just called my name.”

  “How long?”

  “Just once. I nearly fell off my horse. We turned over every bush and rock in that place because we thought she might be nearby. But we found nothing.”

  For a while, we were both silent. A log in the fireplace sighed and broke in the middle. New flame leaped up, lapping hungrily at the wood.

  “Mama? What does it mean?”

  “I don’t know, my love. But I’m not about to give up hope yet.”

  We sat there quietly for most of the night, I with my thoughts, and she with hers. We didn’t say much to each other. But it was better than being awake alone.

  “Davin?” she said at last, close to dawn. “Will you… will you please look at me?”

  I tried. I really tried. But every time I raised my head, shame burned in me. Rose was right. It was my fault. In a way. And yet, it wasn’t. Was it? I hadn’t meant to… It was only because… I never intended… Excuses poured into my mind, but excuses were no use with my mother.

  “I can’t,” I whispered. “I’m sorry, Mama. But I really can’t.”

  She got up a little stiffly. “It doesn’t matter, Davin. Let’s go to bed now, and catch some rest while we can.”

  But it mattered. Of course it mattered.

  “I—I’m really sorry,” I stammered.

  “Forget it, love. It doesn’t matter. I shouldn’t have asked.”

  And then, of course, my shame stung worse than ever.

  DINA

  The Whipping Boy

  “Catch him!” yelled Blackbeard, tumbling out of the other wagon. “Catch the little bastard!”

  He was holding his nose with one hand, and blood welled between his fingers. Among the pines on the other side of the track I caught a glimpse of Tavis’s small and agile form, running as if the devil himself were at his heels. And that might not be too far off the mark; three of the false traders set off after him, two on foot and one on horseback.

  Run, Tavis! I thought. Run for your life! I looked around quickly. Perhaps, while they were all busy chasing Tavis, I could…

  “You stay here.” A hand closed around my wrist in an iron grip, dragging me back to the ground. I was still queasy and weak after the business with the witch weed, and my knees buckled limply.

  “That hurts!” I protested; it felt like he was twisting my hand off my arm.

  “What a pity,” he said drily, not loosening his grip.

  I glared at him, but he was careful not to let me catch his eyes. The false Ivain. The others called him “Lord” or “Mesire Valdracu,” and I gathered he came from Sagis and was some sort of relative to Drakan’s mother. Drakan’s cousin, more or less. Somehow, that didn’t surprise me—they probably got along famously.

  I tried to see what was happening in there among the trees, but both Tavis and his pursuers had disappeared from sight. All day we had been traveling through a dense forest of pines, and it had taken the woods only moments to swallow up Tavis, three grown men, and a horse. I could hear shouting but no hoofbeats or footsteps; the ground was covered with a thick carpet of old yellowed pine needles.

  Valdracu stirred impatiently.

  “Sandor,” he said to Blackbeard, “take the gray mare and go and see where they went. It shouldn’t take this long to catch one small contrary boy.”

  “He is clever,” growled Sandor, dabbing at his bleeding nose with his kerchief. “I untied him because he said he needed to piss, and when I was undoing his feet the brat kicked me in the face and got past me out the back of the wagon.”

  “One doesn’t need to be clever to fool you,” said Valdracu acidly. “See that you catch him. We don’t want him running all the way back to his clan to tell them he hasn’t drowned after all, now, do we?”

  Oh, yes. Please. If only he would. My family must think I’m dead, I thought. No one would come looking for me here, days away from Baur Laclan.

  Sandor swung himself onto the dappled gray mare that usually pulled one of the wagons and headed for the shouting. Time passed. More time passed. Valdracu let go of my wrist, but kept a watchful eye on me. He was not about to let me run off too, that much was obvious. But Tavis? I rubbed my tender wrist and began cautiously to hope.

  But when the men finally returned, Sandor had Tavis slung across the saddle in front of him, like a roll of blankets. Tavis had a large bump over one eye, and his face was very pale under the freckles. But he wasn’t the only one who had come to grief. The other horse, the chestnut, was limping badly, and the man who had been riding it was walking all hunched up, clutching his elbow.

  “The little rat isn’t worth the trouble,” raged Sandor. “The chestnut is lame, and Anton has a broken shoulder.�
�� He grabbed Tavis by the scruff of his neck and jerked him more or less upright. Tavis’s head dangled, as if it had become too heavy for him. “Can’t we just get rid of him?”

  Get rid of… It took me a moment to understand. They did not, of course, intend to let Tavis go. Sandor was asking permission to kill him.

  “No!” I cried, terrified, and the Shamer’s voice came quite naturally to me. “You can’t kill a—”

  Valdracu hit me so hard that I tumbled to the ground and crouched there, while pines, horses, and wagons spun around me. Then he hauled me to my feet and clapped one hand over my eyes and the other over my mouth, clutching me to his chest.

  “Shut up,” he hissed. “Shut up and listen.” His voice was low and cold, but he had no need to shout. He held me so close to him that I could feel the rasp of his beard against my cheek.

  “We still have plenty of witch weed—” he began.

  “No…,” I pleaded, or tried to, but it came out as a muffled moan because of the way he held me. I didn’t want to go back to the Ghost Country. Mama had said that I could die from it, and I believed her. Die, or become insane. It was not a place meant for living people.

  “Shut up, I said!” He shook me. “We can drug you. It’s easy, and there is no danger in it except to you. Or we can do something else. Do you know what a whipping boy is?” This time he loosened his grip to let me answer.

  “No,” I whispered.

  “Every child needs a beating now and then,” he said, as if that was a fact of life. “But in some lands laying hands upon a prince is a capital crime. How, then, does one raise a royal child? I’ll tell you. One gives him a whipping boy. If the little prince misbehaves, the whipping boy gets his beating.”

  It sounded crazy to me, and I didn’t see why he was telling me this. But I soon found out.

  “The Laclan brat is your whipping boy. If I am not happy with you, he gets the punishment. And if you ever raise your witch eyes or your witch voice to me or my men, we’ll kill him. Do you understand?”