Exile's Return

by Gayle Greeno

Amber eyes locked on F‘een, Khar watched the ghatt squirm once, then turn to stone. Interesting, he acted remarkably guilty, as if he’d done something or knew something, and she narrowed her stare accordingly to press him. Hmph! Remarkably reluctant to back down, his conviction of righteousness working overtime. Seniority and experience be damned. Look how she’d had to cow him not to tell Doyce about Jenret’s capture, and it still rankled him. She stalked in his direction, bottle-brushing her tail for emphasis. “What is it? Tell me, F’een. What do you know? And I want it right now.”

  Backed tight against the door, he looked for an escape, head snaking. “Well? I’m waiting.” And still he remained stubbornly silent, right side practically imprinting the door, left forepaw raised as if to ward her off.

  “Gone,” he squeaked, triumphant.

  “Where?” She narrowed the space between them, weightily ominous, ghatta avengeant. “When, F’een? And where? You know more than you’re letting on, you little—”

  “Not telling!” he spat in her face. “Could tell, but won’t!”

  Francie’s shocked inhalation drew their attention to the silent confrontation too late. Without warning Khar had launched herself on F’een, jaws pincering the back of his neck, her superior size and weight pinning him in place. Might not be as lithe and supple as he right now, but she’d struck the first blow, would squash the breath out of him! So much for fancy fighting tricks. She slipped sideward without loosening her grip, shook him soundly. He pummeled her back with all four feet, his claws sheathed, but she had no such compunctions and swatted hard, ripped a clump of fur. Knew she’d scored the skin beneath it.

  “Khar!” Doyce shouted and Cady waded in, cursing, trying to separate knotted bodies. But Inez was faster, cha kettle in hand, tilting it ominously.

  “I won’t have caterwauling and wrestling like that in my house, good-natured or ill-natured. You hear?” The kettle’s angle increased, a drop poised at the end of the spout. F‘een squinched his eyes, body contracting in anticipation of the hot, streaming deluge. “You, Missy Khar’pern, let him go. Mayhap he’s deserving of a thrashing, but not in my house. I can switch your behind just as I used to Doyce’s. In fact I’ll switch both your furry little behinds for fighting in the house—no favorites.”

  “I’ll tell, I’ll tell,” F’een sobbed with pain. “Just let me up, Khar.” Reluctantly she relaxed her jaw muscles, rolled clear.

  Cady scooped up F‘een, hand under his chin to force him to meet her eye. “Ghatti don’t lie. Do you know something we should know about where Davvy is? Do you?” She shook him slightly. “ ’Fess up, F’een.”

  “I went for a run early this morning, saw him take Lokka out,” he confessed in a rush as Doyce scowled. “Rode for Ruysdael.” No call to say he’d ’spoken the boy, wished him well, envious despite himself.

  “Ruysdael!” At Doyce’s exclamation Francie and Inez turned to look at her. “What else do you ‘think’, F’een?”

  Writhing in Cady’s arms, he blurted it out in a rush. “He’s going to beg a boon of the Marchmont king, ask him to rescue Jenret!” There, let Khar try to stop him from telling the truth now! He hated keeping secrets!

  “You scrawny, flea-bitten excuse for a ghatt,” Khar snarled, practically hissing her dismay, “you swore you wouldn’t tell her!”

  “Rescue Jenret from what?” Doyce had sat, very pale, clutching her stomach. Too much bother to repeat the ghatt’s words for her mother and sister, so she contented herself by making sure they at least heard her side of the conversation. “Has he been captured? By whom? And Khar, what do you know about this?”

  Khar licked at her soft white underbelly, pretending to lose herself in its expansiveness. “Some of the Resonants Jenret was searching for captured him. They’re holding him hostage to ensure the safety of other Resonants and Normals, make the Reapers stop killing.” A sigh. “Sarrett and Yulyn and Towbin Biddlecomb offered themselves as hostages as well. It’s really not that bad, you know, or Rawn would have told me.”

  “Did you two know about this?” she pivoted on the chair to confront her mother and sister, but they mutely shook their heads. “Cady, how did Davvy find out?”

  The Novice Seeker only shrugged. “I didn’t tell him, honestly. Unless he overheard me arguing last night with F‘een about telling you. I agreed with Khar’s reasoning, though F’een didn’t.”

  “Which was?” Lady bless, did she have to extract every word?

  “That you shouldn’t be worried so close to your due date, that you’d rush off to rescue him, put yourself and the baby in danger.”

  “Well, at least that’s one thing she can’t do,” Inez interjected, anxiously folding the potholder between her hands. “Davvy’s got Lokka, so she’s not likely to ride off.”

  “But what can Davvy hope to accomplish by seeing the king?” Francie added.

  Cady stared hard at F‘een, then answered, “He believes the king and Arras Muscadeine can rescue Jenret, bring him back to Doyce. F’een apparently agreed with Davvy’s reasoning.”

  Blast Davvy and blast Jenret! Both them and their chivalry and idealism as well! And if she were in a rational state, they’d all be better served! Find a solution, she ordered herself, the baby inside her jumping and racketing like popping corn inside a lidded iron kettle. “Khar? Jenret is all right, isn’t he? And the others? Truly? You wouldn’t hide that from me, would you?”

  “They’re fine, I promise. But what about Davvy?” Inez echoed Khar’s thought. “Doyce, if Jenret’s been captive this long, a little longer won’t hurt. But what about Davvy? I don’t like the idea of him alone in Ruysdael ... being what he is, mind you.” The word refused to pass her lips.

  Davvy alone amongst a host of strangers? How would the town react to the royal progress—sullen and shuttered? Wary and unwelcoming, with spying eyes peering from behind curtains? Secret gatherings to plot? Or would there be a host of gawkers, inquisitive and curious, the novelty of seeing a king outweighing the fact he was a Resonant? Or did that add a special fillip, a frisson of illicit excitement to the momentous event? She’d argued for the latter last night, but feared the former was a more realistic assessment. Pessimistic but realistic.

  “Francie?” she asked, helpless to know for sure. “I’ve been away too long. How will the town react to the king’s visit? I’m afraid Davvy will be suspect, a stranger wandering there alone.”

  Francie chewed at a thumbnail, considering. “Well, you know the attitude of most Canderisians—don’t provoke a beast, don’t jab a sharp stick in its eye, and it’s most likely it’ll leave you alone.” Inez chortled despite herself, then pursed her lips. “What I mean is, there are some out there, obviously, who’d do anything they could to thwart or kill Resonants, that’s clear. But most people are more cautious, not quite willing to judge, though one side of the scale is heavily weighted with rumor and gossip. Put the king and his court on the other side of the scale and we’ll see how it balances.

  “And have you forgotten what the date is, Doyce?” she smiled forgivingly at her sister. “You have been away too long. This is the last open air market of the season, a final chance for people to have a fling, some fun before winter sets in in earnest. A chance to show off, celebrate. I’ll bet people are coming from even farther than usual to catch the royal progress—it’s enough to enliven a whole winter’s worth of debates, pro and con.”

  Doyce stood, straining the shawl around her shoulders, hands buried in its ends to hide her nerves. “Cady, get the horses harnessed and the surrey ready. You wanted to see the royal progress, Francie. Here’s your chance. You and Mother, scoot and get. dressed.”

  Inez wagged a finger under her nose. “You’re not going to Ruysdael, Doyce. The excitement won’t be good for you. Best stay right here. We’ll find Davvy and come right home. You stay put.”

  “As Davvy would say, ‘Smerdle!’ ” She captured and stilled her mother’s hand. “Better I have a nice half-day’s ride in a surrey than set off
alone cross-country to find Jenret, isn’t it, dear?”

  “Then you’d best get some clothes on as well—no child of mine goes on rescues in her nightshift!”

  An explosive crack, a dragged-out, protesting screech and Doyce found herself jolted out of her thoughts and nearly out of the surrey. Good leg grimly braced against the seat back, Francie thrust her cane across Doyce and she clung to halt her slide along a suddenly canted seat threatening to chute her out the surrey’s listing side. “Bloody damn, damn bloody, misbegotten wheel!” Inez roared as Cady frantically reined in the team. Her mother’s language shocked Doyce but didn’t begin to do justice to the situation. But then, Inez ever tended toward moderation, just as her daughters normally did.

  A rumbling thud alerted her that Khar had rolled like a barrel across the floor boards and now attempted to right herself. “If you’d prefer stronger language, don’t worry about my delicate ears—or your sister’s,” the ghatta sounded distinctly put out, and Doyce could sense the soreness of bruised ribs, the blow to the stretched flesh surrounding the unborn ghatten. “Don’t you humans have some sort of saying about bad luck coming in threes?”

  F’een regarded them over the back of the seat, saved from a tumble by Inez’s strong, skinny arms. “Isn’t this three, then?” His whiskers twitched as he enumerated, “Jenret’s capture, Dawy’s running away, and now this? What if there’s more?” Given Khar’s baleful expression, he subsided, pretended to enjoy Inez’s .jittery stroking as Cady jumped down to inspect the damage.

  “Axle broke.” Her announcement surprised no one, though Doyce clambered down to inspect it. “It’s all my fault, shouldn’t have pushed the horses so fast.” Cady walked a few stiff paces, spun back, mouth blade-narrow, eyes bleak. “What are we going to do? Davvy’s out there by himself.”

  Sliding along her seat, Inez stepped from the tilted carriage, prepared to steady Francie’s dismount. Stung by their forgetfulness, Cady and Doyce rushed to help, lock her leg brace, locate her other cane. “What you’re going to do, my dear, is unhitch one of the horses and ride for help, rent another wagon.” Hair disarrayed, Inez repaired it, as if its very untidiness affronted her thoughts. “And I’d suggest you snap to it before one or the other of my daughters seizes on the idea. They both tend to be resourceful that way. Often don’t even wait to be told—unlike yourself.”

  Flushed with purpose, Cady hurried to unharness the horses, improvise reins. “See if you can’t use a strap, stuff your tabard under it, make a pad for F’een,” Doyce suggested as she walked around the surrey, stared into the distance. Lady give her strength! Better yet, Lady give her something to do, to occupy her mind because anything was better than sitting and waiting, worry winding through her head, strangling her thoughts. Jenret captured. And Davvy blithely flinging himself into the heart of a drama beyond him, an innocent stranger at large in a suspicious land already swamped by misconceptions about Resonants. Should he say something to the wrong person, the consequences could be beyond their wildest imaginings. Do something, do something, she screamed inside. I can’t let my world collapse !

  Khar limped to her side. “Did you hurt your leg, love? Is it serious?” Selfish!—she’d not spared a jot of worry for Khar.

  “It’ll loosen up if I walk for a bit. Why not settle your mother and sister on the blankets, then walk with me.” She hurriedly reassured, “Oh, we’ll stay in sight, of course. But you could use the exercise as well.”

  Once Cady and F’een had trotted off, Doyce made sure Francie and Inez were comfortable, sheltered from the wind, and walked slowly with Khar. Head bowed, hands clasped behind her back, she studied the ground as she trudged. Above her a skein of geese mourned their exodus. “Khar, I don’t think I can handle much more. Everything’s building up inside, churning. I’m trying to keep my fears at bay or I’ll be no good for anything.” She kicked a stone, followed after it, edging it ahead with the side of her boot. “All I keep thinking of are What Ifs, and the harder I chase them the quicker they circle back on me. ”

  “What if you thought of something to take your mind off things?” The ghatta leaped on a tree stump, circled as if she’d settle, thus enticing Doyce to it. All ghatti knew that if they even considered napping in a favorite chair, a human would immediately covet it.

  “Any suggestions for a pleasant distraction?” She rewrapped her cloak, flipped back the hem so Khar could shelter beneath it.

  A familiar weight draped across her feet. “That’s easy. What town is Matty due to visit?”

  She considered. “He’s been in Alkmaar with his father, so I think it’s... Ruysdael next. I peeked ahead in the diary. Don’t need it, but I couldn’t resist. Funny coincidence, isn’t it, Khar? Ruysdael? A good omen, I hope. Matty and Kharm going there, you and I as well, though I hope they had better luck reaching it than we’ve been having.” At least nothing horrible had happened in Roermond or Alkmaar. Far from it.

  It caught Khar unawares with the force of a blow. Ruysdael? Had she not remembered, not known? What good were the Elders if not to guard them from predicaments like this? And worst of all, she couldn’t remember what awaited Matty and Kharm in Ruysdael—impossible, because no ghatti would forget a Major Tale. She prickled with a peculiar premonition that the episode wasn’t pleasant. But Doyce had already slipped into that state between being and not-being, hovering between worlds like a gull on an updraft. Nothing for Khar to do but guiltily follow, trail her as if she were a thief, steal into her mind for the journey.

  Everyone except Manuel was footsore that evening as they reached Ruysdael’s outskirts, especially Tah’m, who’d collapsed into deep slumber inside Jaak’s basket pack. Typical of a ghatten to squander every bit of energy and exuberance, husband nothing, and then tumble into limp, exhausted sleep.

  “Well, at least he’s not climbing every tree to see what’s at the top,” Kharm sniffed in a superior way. “I was never that bad.”

  “Which means Jaak doesn’t have to climb up and rescue him every other tree. ” Matty stumbled in the dark, stubbed the same toe he’d abused not twenty paces back. “I wish you ghatti’d learn that what goes up must come down.”

  Doubtful Kharm considered it. “Then he should jump, land on Jaak’s head?”

  Ahead, Manuel gave a swooping wave to draw them after him. “Look, Ruysdael! Late for so many lights, and all in one spot—as if they’re holding a meeting.” Distinctly unfair to have a father, someone so much older, capable of such zesty energy after a five-day walk from Alkmaar, much of it on winding, down-slanted trails that made the backs of one’s legs scream with strain, the effort of not pitching forward. And Manuel accomplished it in worn, flapping sandals, robe kirtled high, bare legs flashing like a mountain goat’s. Getting used to a father wearing a robe, clothed in women’s garb, still flustered Matty. But then this Manuel wasn’t the old one, had metamorphosed into something different, better, surely, even if Matty couldn’t fully grasp his motivations. The Lady’s worship had given him a focus, a worthwhile partnership on which to expend his energies.

  Jaak caught up, panting but cheery. It was a given about Jaak for which Matty was deeply grateful, although there were moments when his sunny disposition grated on his nerves. Well nigh impossible to wallow in a good sulk, a fit of depression, a doubt with Jaak there to dispel it. “Late for this many lights. Looks as if we’ve a welcoming committee.”

  “I don’t think so, although they may be glad to see us.” A dawning surety grew, the scene uncannily reminiscent—the season, the central fire ringed by torches—but he’d needed time to examine it from his new perspective, aloof from it, not part of it. “I think they’re holding a conciliation meeting. If they were celebrating, there’d be movement, flow, laughter, but everyone’s still, as if they’re all listening.” A mate to that meeting in Coventry when Miz Killanin attempted to expel Mad Marg, covetous of her house. The thought of Granther, Henryk, Nelle, even Mad Marg, loyal friend in her own way, made his eyes sting. Ruysdael wa
sn’t that far from Coventry—should he go home and visit, bring Manuel—prodigal lamb returned as Shepherd?

  Manuel was tramping down the track, walking staff spearing the ground. He had no need of support, but liked the heft of it, Matty decided, especially when flourished as an exuberant extension of his marching stride. “Doesn’t he ever slow down?” Jaak moaned. “He’s a bad influence, Matty, a bad influence, making us work all too hard. Were there flowers, we’d have no time to smell them.”

  “Well, come on, come on,” Manuel’s words drifted back, “if you’re Seekers after truth, mayhap there’s some truth that needs finding in Ruysdael. Not to mention people who might listen to a simple Shepherd spread Our Lady’s word. Fallow ground, lads, fallow ground, so let’s cultivate it.”

  Despite themselves Matty and Jaak grinned, shook their heads in admiring despair as they plunged after him. “Do you think they might need us in Ruysdael? I’d like to see you and Kharm at work, especially now that Tah’m’s old enough to appreciate it.” Jaak gave his basket a thump with his fist. “If I can wake him up.”

  “You saw us seeking in Roermond. Did a little yourself,” Matty protested.

  “But I knew everyone there, friends, neighbors, relatives. I want to see you two in action when I don’t know anyone involved, where I don’t fall back on my own suspicions and prejudices, no matter how hard Tah’m tries to disabuse me of them.” His gait spraddled as he slowed, swung back, “You know, someplace where I’m a total stranger.”

  Those final words struck a dissonance in Matty, a hunger to belong, a yearning to lay claim to something, someone beyond himself, but “We’ll see,” was all he said. Ruysdael. He’d been there once as a child; it had been where he’d seen the little piglet. Ruysdael, bigger than Coventry, but smaller he guessed, than Jaak’s beloved Roermond. And, as Granther had so often bemoaned, populated with suspicious, surly individuals, all faintly soured on life. Not total malcontents, but grouchy, grumpy, not just at the surface, but deep inside. He shrugged.