“We’re not going to abandon you,” Hurst said.
Dethin smiled lopsidedly. “Then there’s Jonnor. What’s going to happen when he turns up?”
“He may not,” Mia said. “Quite a lot have chosen to stay beyond the border.”
“But if he does…” He left the words unsaid, but Hurst shivered. Jonnor returning would not be good news.
“What do you propose?”
“Well, I could leave…”
Mia cried out in dismay, and Hurst objected too. “No, we stay together brother.”
Another half-smile. “Then you two should move back into the high tower.” He waved a hand to still their protests. “No, think about it. With things as they are, your authority is reduced and Henissa gets to make all the decisions. Have you noticed that the servants take her orders over yours? You’re the lead, Hurst, you need to take control. You both need to. I can still be with Mia sometimes – more discreetly.”
“Aren’t you happy, Dethin?” Mia said.
“You know I am. I love being with you. I’m very grateful to be here at all. There was nothing for me beyond the border, or at the Ring. But I’m no Skirmisher, I’ve been a warrior for too long, and I don’t know what else I can do here.”
“There are the guards,” Hurst said. “Or some other job within the Karninghold.”
“That’s just it, what? It’s not a matter of finding work, I don’t fit in here.”
“None of us do, not anymore,” Mia said slowly. “So much has happened, we’ve all changed. All I ever wanted was to be a Karningholder, and I loved it all, but now – I don’t belong here, any more than you do.”
“Does it distress you, seeing the children, knowing what you’ve lost?” Hurst said.
“Oh no, it’s not that. It’s—” She stopped, rubbing her face with one hand. “The only time I feel normal, when everything is right, is when I’m with you two. The rest of it – it’s all meaningless.”
“So what do we do?” Hurst said, leaning back on his chair and folding his arms. “We’re agreed we want to stay together, no matter what, but it’s not working out here. So what options do we have?”
“A couple of possibilities,” Dethin said. “We could ask for another Karning, maybe try to get me into the marriage. I’m a Higher, it’s not impossible, now that the Slaves don’t have to give permission.”
“We’d have to have another wife as well,” Mia said, frowning. “I’m not sure… If it were just the three of us…”
“And I’d make a terrible Karningholder,” Dethin said, his eyes crinkled with sudden amusement. “Not much of a Skirmisher, paperwork would be a real struggle, I haven’t a clue about the law and, to be honest, I’m not sure I want to start learning. Not at my age.”
“Oh, you old man, you. What else, then?”
“There are all sorts of groups being set up just now, to keep the Karnings clean. The Council Guard, did you see that notice? Some of the Skirmishers were talking about joining.”
“Or there’s the Border Guard,” Hurst added. “The real barbarians will show up any day soon, and then there’ll be some proper action.”
Dethin’s face closed up. “No. I’ve killed enough people, I don’t want to do any more of that if I can help it. But we could set up our own group, hire ourselves out.”
“Oh, like Kestimar? Brothel security, you mean?”
He laughed. “Maybe not brothels, but trade caravans. There are plenty of merchants trading with the coast, taking goods back and forth across the plains. They all have guards.”
“The coast?” Mia said, eyes gleaming. “I’ve always wanted to see the ocean.”
“Well, now’s your chance. We’d have enough men, with your Companions, my Captains, maybe Mannigor and his Mentors. Perhaps a few of the Skirmishers would want to join. Camping under the stars, living on moundrat and tender young kishorn, whatever we can catch. A week or two at the coast, then back again. Winters in a Karning, or a town by the sea.”
“It’s a man’s job, though, isn’t it?” Mia said. “There’d be no place for me.”
“Lots of women go along, whole families sometimes. You could learn to use a bow, or a short sword, and there’s plenty of other work if you don’t want to be a warrior girl – putting up tents, tending the beasts, cooking. What do you think?”
“It sounds wonderful. Tenya would like it too, I think. Morsha and Marna – I don’t know.”
“Most such groups have a home base – a house in the trading town, with someone there permanently to organise the next trip. Morsha would be perfect for that, don’t you think? And the children could stay there.”
“Children?”
“Tenya’s and Marna’s children. If they leave here, they can take their children, that was one of the new laws. Hurst? What do you think?”
“I think – it would be perfect,” he said slowly, and then laughter bubbled up. “Yes! It would be good to leave all of this behind, all this rigid formality, the Slaves, the laws. We’ve changed too much to pick it up again after all that’s happened. But guarding caravans – yes, I’d like that. We’d be together, and no one would think us odd.”
“Hurst, our arrangement will always seem odd,” Mia said. “But it wouldn’t attract so much attention this way.”
“That’s settled, then,” Hurst said in satisfaction. “The only decision left is – which ocean? North or south?”
“North!” Dethin and Mia said in unison, then burst out laughing.
“North? Isn’t it crawling with Trannatta? I don’t want to tangle with them again.”
“There are plenty of other people up there,” Mia said. “Whole regions without a Trannatta in sight. And the north will be warm.”
“Of course. All that exotic fruit. The trading season will be longer, so we can make more money from it. We should be able to work almost up to the winter quiet.”
“You, maybe, but not me,” Mia said. “Through the summer, but then I shall have to stop.”
“Stop, why?”
Dethin made a little choking sound, but Hurst was still puzzled and Mia had to explain it.
“Because I’m pregnant, Hurst. The tower healed me.”
~~~
Within a week they were gone, for there was little point in staying. There were more than thirty of them altogether, including some Skirmishers, their women and a few children. There were several trading towns on the northern border, where merchant caravans gathered before their journey or unloaded afterwards. They would find one they liked to establish themselves, and would buy any gear they needed there.
Hurst was bubbling with excitement. He had not felt so energised since he had set off down the tunnel after Mia, and the situation was very similar – a leap into the unknown, with plenty of risk, and yet he felt certain of the rightness of their decision. They had been through so much, all of them. Nothing would ever be the same. Yet now they had a chance to make a new life, to be together.
Henissa was quietly pleased they were going. There would be no need for another husband and wife to join the Karning, for there were no skirmishes any more, and she was very happy to be left in charge. Bernast was grey-faced, and hugged Hurst fiercely.
“Write to me,” he whispered. “Let me know how things go.”
“I will. And you know where I’ll be. Come and see me, brother.”
Bernast nodded, but Hurst had no expectation that Henissa would ever let him go.
Then they were on the road again, camping in open fields, trading for food from villages, once putting in a day’s work in exchange for a meal and a sheltered camping spot by the river. Twice they were asked to root out a group of bandits troubling the locals, and once they were themselves attacked on the road, although they dispatched the robbers with ease. Once they passed a group of the newly formed Road Guards, set up by Council, escorting a train of wagons, and once it was the local Skirmishers performing the same task.
“There’ll be all sorts of local militia starting up if Council don�
��t get a grip on this,” Dethin muttered. “And I don’t like the number of villages who wanted to trade with us for bows and swords.”
“At least it means there’ll always be work for those who can fight,” Hurst said, unworried.
In fact, nothing at all worried him these days, and he saw the same contentment on Mia’s face. Dethin – well, he was always intense, always thinking ahead, he was worse than Gantor sometimes, but he supposed someone had to do that. For himself, he had never been so happy. His joy burned inside him like the sun. At the end of every day, he crawled into the tiny Skirmisher tent with Mia and Dethin, her warm body resting alongside his, and was completely at peace. Sometimes she faced him, and he kissed her, and ran his fingers through her growing hair, and told her how much he loved her, and sometimes she faced Dethin and he could hear them murmuring together. It was so good.
One night Dethin was on watch, and he and Mia were alone. The night was clear, so they bundled themselves into furs and blankets on a level patch of grass outside the tent. Hurst lay on his back gazing up at the stars, Mia tucked into one arm. Voices still murmured around the campfire, and occasionally a burst of laughter. Nearby, sheep bleated. A log settled on the fire, sending sparks shooting into the sky, golden against the silver-sprinkled black.
“I love you, Mia,” he whispered.
“I know. And I love you.”
A long silence. “You love him, too, don’t you?”
Hesitation. “Yes. I didn’t, not for a long time, but now – yes. It’s impossible not to, the way he feels about me. I love opening my mind to it – feeling the fierceness of it, the intensity. Tanist thinks it’s dangerous, and maybe he’s right about that, but it still feels wonderful to me.” Another pause. “Does that bother you?”
“No, not at all. I love you in my own way, and I love him too. He’s my brother, after all. More of a brother to me than Jonnor ever was,” he added, half to himself. “And you’re happy?”
“How can you ask me that! I’ve never been happier, Hurst. Being with both of you – I love that, odd as it is. And soon we’ll have a child and we’ll be a family, a proper family.”
“With two fathers.”
“Yes! What a lucky baby this one will be!”
She fell silent, and, filled with contentment, he pulled her closer. Wrapped in each other’s arms under the glimmering stars of the plains, they slept.
THE END
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About this book
This book was an accident. I was in the middle of writing something else, but then I had an idea: what would life be like if a marriage consisted of four people, and not just two? Perhaps it would just be two couples, but what if there was one active couple, the senior husband and wife, who slept together and had children, while the junior couple were just there as moral support, and to step into the breach if one of the seniors dies.
All of a sudden, Mia was there, fully formed - quiet, timid Mia, content to do whatever is needed, but secretly yearning to attract the attention of the senior husband. Jonnor appeared next, the handsome one, who treated Mia like a child, when he wasn’t ignoring her. And by contrast, Hurst, in love with Mia, and beautiful, lively Tella, the catalyst for everything that followed.
I sat down to write, but I had absolutely no idea where the story was taking me. When Mia and Hurst went down the tunnel, I hadn’t a clue what they would find at the other end. I didn’t realise until it happened that Tanist would turn up, that Dethin would fall in love with Mia, that Mia would have a connection. I wasn’t sure until the last moment what they would find in the tower (for a long time I thought, as they did, that it would be full of people). But somehow it all came together.
The story of Mia and Hurst is now told; there won’t be a sequel. There’s still a lot to discover about the Brightmoon world, however, and there are a few unanswered questions. Who was the father of Tella’s third child, Jinnia, the man whose name begins with an ‘I’? What happened to Tella after she left the Karninghold? Hint: she didn’t start a brothel. The answers are in another book set in the Brightmoon world, ‘The Mages of Bennamore’, which also reveals a little more about those strange globes the Voices used in interviews.
And then there’s Jonnor. What happened to him after the end of the book? I don’t know the answer to that, but what do you think? Email me at [email protected] with your theories.
About the author
I live in the beautiful Highlands of Scotland with my husband, my grown up daughter and a mad cat. I like chocolate, whisky, my Kindle, massed pipe bands, long leisurely lunches, watching TV with my daughter, chocolate, going places in my campervan, eating pizza in Italy, summer nights that never get dark, wood fires in winter, chocolate, the view from the study window looking out over the Moray Firth and the Black Isle to the mountains beyond. And chocolate. I dislike driving on motorways, cooking, shopping, hospitals. ‘The Plains of Kallanash’ is my first published work.
Acknowledgements
Thanks go to:
Lin White of Coinlea Services (www.coinlea.co.uk) for beta reading, proofreading and formatting.
Streetlight Graphics (www.streetlightgraphics.com) for the cover art, partly inspired by a pre-made design from Patty Jansen (pattyjansen.com).
Beta readers: H Anthe Davis, Bridget Koch, Neil McGarry, Amelia Smith
The good people of Scribophile for critiques, especially Matt Clarke, Cormac O’Hugh, Erasmus Ravn.
Last, but definitely not least, my first reader: Amy Ross.
The Plains of Kallanash Page 68