“Whoa, there—slow down, friends!” Dirk chuckled, extricating himself from the press of greeters. “We’ve brought someone to meet all of you.”
He searched the shadows, found Talia, and reaching out a long arm, pulled her fully into the light. “You all know we’ve finally got a true Queen’s Own again—and here she is!”
Before anyone could move to greet her, there was a whoop of joy from the far side of the room, and a hurtling body bounced across it, vaulting over several Heralds who laughed, ducked, and protected their heads with their arms. The leaper reached Talia and picked her up bodily, lifting her high into the air, and setting her down with an enthusiastic kiss.
“Skif?” she gasped.
“Every inch of me!” Skif crowed.
“B-but—you’re so tall!” When he’d gotten his Whites, Skif hadn’t topped her by more than an inch or two. Now he could easily challenge Dirk’s height.
“I guess something in the air of the south makes things grow, ’cause I sure did last year,” Skif chuckled. “Ask Dirk—he was my counselor.”
“Grow? Bright Stars, grow is too tame a word!” Dirk groaned. “We spent half our time keeping him fed; he ate more than our mules!”
“You’ve done pretty well yourself, I’d say,” Skif went on, pointedly ignoring Dirk. “You looked fine up there. Made us all damn proud.”
Talia blushed, glad it wouldn’t show in the dim light. “I’ve had a lot of help,” she said, almost apologetically.
“It takes more than a lot of help, and we both know it,” he retorted. “Well, hellfire, this isn’t the time or place for talk about work. You two—you know the rules. Entrance fee!”
Dirk and Kris were laughingly pushed to the center of the room, as the story teller vacated his place for them. “Anybody bring a harp?” Kris called. “Mine’s still packed; I just got in today.”
“I did,” Talia volunteered, and eager hands reached out to convey the harp, still in the case, to Kris.
“Is this—this can’t be My Lady, can it?” Kris asked as the firelight gleamed on the golden wood and the clean, delicate lines. “I wondered who Jadus had left her to.” He ran his fingers reverently across the strings, and they sighed sweetly. “She’s in perfect tune, Talia. You’ve been caring for her as she deserves.”
Without waiting for an answer, he began playing an old lullaby. Jadus had been a better player, but Kris was surprisingly good for an amateur, and much better than Talia. “He made an incredibly beautiful picture, with the golden wood gleaming against his black tunic, and his raven head bent in concentration over the strings. He was almost as much a pleasure to watch as to listen to.
“Any requests?” he asked when he’d finished.
“‘Sun and Shadow,’” several people called out at once.
“All right,” Dirk replied, “but I want a volunteer to sing Shadowdancer. The last time I did it, I was hoarse for a month.”
“I could,” Talia heard herself saying, to her surprise.
“You?” Dirk seemed both pleased and equally surprised. “You’re full of amazing things, aren’t you?” He made room beside himself; and Talia picked her way across the crowded floor, to sit shyly in the shadow he cast in the firelight.
“Sun and Shadow” told of the meeting of two of the earliest Heralds, Rothas Sunsinger and Lythe Shadowdancer; long before they were ever Chosen and while their lives still remained tangled by strange curses. It was a duet for male and female voice, though Dirk had often sung it all himself. It was one of those odd songs that either made you hold your breath or bored you to tears, depending on how it was sung. Dirk wondered which it would be tonight.
As Talia began her verse in answer to his, Dirk stopped wondering. There was no doubt who’d trained her—the deft phrasing that made the most of her delicate, slightly breathy voice showed Jadus’ touch as clearly as the harp he’d left her. But she sang with something more than just her mind and voice, something the finest training couldn’t impart. This was going to be one of the magic times.
Dirk surrendered himself to the song, little guessing that he was surpassing his own best this night as well. Kris knew, as he accompanied them—and he wished there was a way to capture the moment for all time.
The spontaneous applause that shook the rafters startled both Dirk and Talia out of the spell the music had wrapped them in. Dirk smiled with more than usual warmth at the tiny female half-hiding in his shadow, and felt his smile returned.
“Well, we’ve paid our forfeit,” Kris said, cutting short the demands for more. “It’s somebody else’s turn now.”
“That’s not fair,” a voice from the back complained. “How could any of us possibly follow that?”
Someone did, of course, by changing the mood rather than ruining it by trying to sustain it. A tall, bony fellow borrowed Talia’s pipe to play a lively jig, while two men and a woman bounded into the center to dance to it. That seemed to decide everyone on a dancing-set; Talia reclaimed her pipe to join Kris, someone with a gittern, and Jeri on tambour in a series of very lively round dances of the village festival variety. As these were both strenuous and of an accelerated tempo, those who had felt lively enough to dance were soon exhausted and ready to become an audience again.
Those who didn’t feel up to entertaining paid their “entrance fee” in food and drink; Talia saw a good many small casks of wine, cider, and ale ranged along the walls, and with them, baskets of fruit, sausages, or bread and cheese. Stray mugs and odd cups were always accumulating in the tackshed, especially during the hot summer months when Heralds and students were likely to need a draught of cool water from the well that supplied the Companions’ needs at this end of the Field. These handy receptacles were filled and refilled and passed from hand to hand with a gay disregard for the possibility of colds or fever being passed with the drink. Like Talia, most of the Heralds had brought cushions from their quarters; these and their saddles and packs were piled into comfortable lounges that might be shared or not. A few murmurs from some of the darker corners made Talia hastily avert her eyes and close her ears, and she recalled Dirk’s earlier comments about Heralds “keeping each other warm.” From time to time some of these rose from the dark, and either left for more private surroundings or rejoined those by the two fires. And over all was an atmosphere of—belonging. There was no one here that was not cared for and welcomed by all the rest. It was Talia’s first exposure to a gathering of her fellows under pleasant circumstances, and she gradually realized that the feeling of oneness extended outside the walls as well—to the Companions in the Field, and beyond that, to those who could not be present this night. Small wonder, with such a warmth of brotherhood to bask in, that the Heralds had deserted the main revelry for this more intimate celebration of their joy at the Choosing of the Heir. It was enough to make her forget the strange uneasiness that had been shadowing her the past three weeks.
As soon as she could manage it, Talia retrieved Skif from a knot of year-mates who seemed bent on emptying a particular cask by themselves.
“Let’s go up to the loft,” she said, after scanning that perch and ascertaining that none of the amorous had chosen it themselves. “I don’t want to disturb anybody, but I don’t want to leave, either.”
The “loft” was little more than a narrow balcony that ran the length of one side and gave access to storage places in the rafters. Talia noticed immediately that Skif—very uncharacteristically—kept to the wall on the stairs, and put his back against it when they reached the loft itself.
“Lord and Lady, it’s good to see you!” he exclaimed softly, giving her a repeat of his earlier hug. “We weren’t sure we’d make it back in time. In fact, we left all the baggage and the mules back at a Resupply Station; took only what Cymry and Ahrodie could carry besides ourselves. I’ve missed you, little sister. The letters helped, but I’d rather have been able to talk with you, especially—”
Talia could sense him fighting a surge of what could only be fea
r.
“Especially?”
“—after—the accident.”
She moved closer to him, resting both her hands on his. She didn’t have to see him to know he was pale and white-knuckled. “Tell me.”
“I—can’t.”
She lowered her shields; he was spiky inside with phobic fears; of storms, of entrapment; and most of all, of falling. In the state he was in now, she doubted he’d be able to look out a second-story window without exerting iron control—and this from the young man who’d led her on a scramble across the face of the second story of the Palace itself, one dark night!
“Remember me? What I am? Just start at the beginning; take it slowly. I’ll help you face it down.”
He swallowed. “It—it started with a storm; we were caught out on the trail in the hills. Hills, ha! More like mountains! Gods, it was dark; rain was pouring down so hard I couldn’t even see Cymry’s ears. Dirk had point, the mules were next, I was tail—it was supposed to be the safest place. We were more or less feeling our way along; sheer rock on one side of us, ravine on the other.”
Talia had herself in half-trance, carefully extending herself into his mind. He was fighting down his fear as he spoke and beginning to lose to it.
“The trail just—crumbled, right under Cymry’s hooves. We fell; there wasn’t even time to yell for help.”
Gently, Talia touched the fear, took it into herself, and began working away at it. It was like knife-edged flint, all points and slicing surfaces. As softly as flowing water, and as inexorably, she began wearing away at it, dulling it, muting it.
“We ended up wedged halfway down. Cymry was stunned; I’d broken my arm and most of my ribs, I think; I don’t remember much. It hurt too much to think, and where I was stuck, there was a flood of water pouring down the wall like a young waterfall. You know I don’t Mindspeak too well, and Dirk’s Gift isn’t Mindspeech anyway; I couldn’t get hold of myself enough to call for help that way, and it was impossible to be heard over the storm.”
He was shaking like a reed in a windstorm; she put her arm around his shoulders; supplying a physical comfort as well as the mental. “But Dirk found you,” she pointed out.
“The Gods alone know how; he had no reason to think we were still alive.” The tension was rapidly draining out of him as Talia shielded him from the phobic memories; not enough to make him forget, but enough to make them less real, less obsessive. “He got ropes around both of us and anchored us where we were; used something to divert the water away from me, and stayed with us, hanging on with his teeth and toenails, until the storm was over. Then he got blankets over us and sent Ahrodie off for help while he got me back up to the trail. I don’t remember that part at all; I must have blacked out from the pain.” His voice sounded less strained.
The fear was nearly conquered now; time to diffuse the rest of it. “You must have looked like a drowned rat,” she replied with a hint of chuckle. “I know you have a fetish for cleanliness, but don’t you think that was overdoing it a bit?”
He stared at her in surprise, then began to laugh, shakily. The laughter was half tears as the last of the tension was released. Hysterics—yes, but long needed.
She held him quietly until the worst passed, and he could see past the tears to her face, childlike in the half-dark.
The paralysis of fear that Skif had lived with on a daily basis for the past several months had all but choked the voice out of him as he tried to tell Talia what had happened that awful night. He’d suffered nightmare replays of the incident at least one night a week ever since. It had taken all of his control to repeat it to her—at least at first. But then, gradually, the words had begun to flow more freely; the fear had slowly loosed its grip on him. As he neared the end of his narrative, he began to realize what Talia had done.
It was gratitude as much as release that shook the tears from him then.
“You—you did it to me, didn’t you—fixed me like you did with Vostel and the rest of them—?”
“Mm-hm,” she nodded, touching his hair in the dark. “I didn’t think you’d mind.”
“No more nightmares?”
“No more nightmares, big brother. You won’t find yourself wanting to hide in a closet during storms anymore, and you’ll be able to look down over cliffs again. In fact, you’ll even be able to tell the story in a week or two without shaking like a day-old chick, and it should make a good tale to earn the sympathy of a pretty lady with!”
“You—you’re unbelievable,” he said at last, holding her tightly.
“So are you, to have been coping with all that fear all this time, and not letting it get the best of you.”
They sat that way for some time, before the murmur of voices below them recalled them to their surroundings.
“Hellfire! This is supposed to be a party, and you’re supposed to be enjoying it,” Skif said at last.
“I am, now that you’re all right.” She rose to her feet, and gave him a hand up. “Well, I’m going back to the singing, and it seems to me that your year-mate Mavry is looking a bit lonely.”
“Hm. So she is,” he replied, peering down into the lighted area. “Think I’ll go keep her company. And—heart-sister—”
“No thanks needed, love.”
He kissed her forehead by way of reply, then skipped lightly down the stairs of the loft and took himself off to the other side of the room, where Mavry willingly made a space for him beside her.
* * *
Talia rejoined the musicians just in time for Dirk to claim her for another duet. She had to plead a dry throat before they’d let someone else take the floor.
She didn’t notice the passing of time until she caught herself yawning hard enough to split her head in half. When she tried to reckon up how much time had passed, she was shocked.
Thinking she surely must be mistaken, she slipped over to the door to look out to the east. Sure enough, there on the horizon was the first hint of false dawn. True dawn was less than an hour away.
She collected her things, feeling suddenly ready to collapse. Dirk, half-propped on a backrest of saddle and several old saddleblankets, seemed to be asleep as she slipped past him, but he cracked an eyelid open as she tried to ease herself out.
“Giving up?” he asked softly.
She nodded, stifling another yawn with the back of her hand.
“Enjoy yourself?” At her enthusiastic nod, he smiled, another of those wonderful warm smiles that seemed to embrace her and close everything and everyone else outside of it. “I’ll be heading back to my own bed before long. About this time things start to break up on their own. And don’t worry about being expected on duty today. No one will be up to notice before noon at the earliest—look over there.” He cocked an eyebrow to his left. Talia was astonished to see the Queen, dressed in old, worn leathers, sharing a cloak and resting her head in easy intimacy on the shoulder of the middle-aged storyteller. And not far from her sat Alberich, finishing the last of a wineskin with Keren, Sherrill, and Jeri.
“How did Selenay and Alberich get in without my noticing?” Talia asked him.
“Easy. You were singing at the time. See, though? You won’t be missed. Have a good long sleep—and pleasant dreams, Talia.”
“And to you, Dirk,” she said.
“They will be,” he chuckled, and closed his eyes again. “They most assuredly will be.”
3
Talia didn’t usually sleep long or heavily. Perhaps the cause was that she’d drunk more wine than usual, or perhaps it was just the incredibly late hour at which she’d sought her bed. At any rate, it took having the sun shine directly into her eyes to wake her the next morning.
Since the window of her bedroom faced the east, she’d positioned her bed with the headboard right under the windowsill. That way she always had the fresh air, and her face should remain out of the sunlight until well after the time she normally rose. No matter how cold the winter, she’d never been able to bear the slight claustropho
bia that closed shutters induced in her, so the glazed windows themselves and the thin fabric curtaining them were all that stood between her eyes and the sun’s rays, and the windows themselves were open, with the curtains moving slightly in the breeze.
As she squinted groggily through the glare, she realized that it must be nearly noon, and as if to confirm this, the noon warning bell at the Collegium sounded clearly through her open window.
Well, the wine she’d indulged in last night had given her a slight headache. She muttered something to herself about fools and lack of judgment and pulled her pillow over her head, tempted to go right back to sleep again. But a nagging sense of duty (and, more urgently, a need to use the privy) denied her further sloth.
She’d been so tired last night—this morning?—that all she’d been able to do was peel off her clothing, leave it in a heap on the floor, and fall into bed. Now that she felt a little more awake, her skin crawled with the need for a bath. Her hair itched. Her mouth didn’t bear thinking about. She groaned. It was definitely time to get up.
She sighed, levered herself out of bed, and set about getting herself back into working condition.
Sitting on the edge of the bed, she rubbed her eyes until they cooperated by focusing properly, then reached for the robe hanging on one of the posts at the foot of her bed. She wrapped it about herself, then collected the clothing on the floor. The soiled clothing went into a hamper; the servant who tended to the Heralds in this section of the wing collected it and sent it to the laundry as part of her duties—and that was a luxury that was going to take some getting used to! She’d been lowborn and at the bottom of her Holderkin family’s pecking order as a child, and once at the Collegium had fallen naturally in with the tradition that trainees tended to their own needs and shared the common chores. She had become habituated to doing the serving, and not to being waited on herself!
The warmth of the smooth wood beneath her feet was very comforting, and she decided then that she would not have any floor coverings in her new quarters. She liked the way the sunwarmed boards felt to bare feet, and she liked the way the wood glowed when the sun touched it.
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