by Tad Williams
It took Derra most of a blustering winter day to make her way there, and by the time she arrived at the old sprawling farmhouse she was half-dead from cold and shivering too much to talk. Several women, some young, some old, but all dressed in simple shifts, brought her to the large kitchen where a fire leaped and crackled. After she had been given a cup of hot broth, which tasted like liquid white magic to the cold and hungry young woman, she was given a simple linen shift of her own, a wool blanket, and a place to sleep for the night.
The last thing they told her after showing her to an empty bed in a chamber where several other women were also sleeping was that the helpful sexton had been wrong: they were not nuns. “It’s true we Astalines are an order,” one of the older women explained. “But we have no religious practice, and we are not part of Mother Church.”
Just to be on the safe side Derra murmured as many prayers as she could remember, Aedonite and Thrithings and even a charm against She Who Waits To Take All Back, learned from a neighbor in Kwanitupul, before sleep dragged her down into healing darkness.
In the morning, after a simple breakfast shared with several dozen other women, all talking quietly but merrily, she was taken to meet the founder of the order. Valada Roskva was a windburned woman of some seventy years, round and sharp-eyed, her short hair mostly hidden by a simple linen coif. She looked the newcomer up and down and asked her name.
“Derra, Mistress.”
“Derra.” Roskva nodded and smiled. “Star. I knew you were coming, but I didn’t know who you were! Now I know.”
Derra didn’t know how to reply to this.
“Well, child, are you on a journey? Have you been hurt or attacked? Or have you simply lost your way?”
Derra had to think about that for a moment. She had set out to find her father, or so she had told herself. But she had also fled from the Stallion Clan and her mother, then let life sweep her on and on, away from any chance of finding him.
“Lost my way, I think,” she said at last.
“Well, you have found something, at any rate.” Roskva made a sound that from a younger, less important woman might have been a giggle. “You are definitely somewhere now. Would you like to stay?”
“Yes. Oh, yes!” She did not have to think about it. She had seen very little kindness since her father had left them and had not realized until now how much she had been aching for it. “Yes, Valada Roskva. I will work very hard if I can stay. I am a very good worker.”
The old woman smiled again. “Call me Roskva. ‘Valada’ is a title, and I don’t necessarily agree with it, either.” This time she laughed, although again Derra did not understand why. “You and I will talk again. Now go and tell Agnida—the woman who brought you to me—that you are staying with us for a while, and she will take you under her wing.”
She knew almost nothing about the order she was joining, and the more she saw the more questions she had, but she never doubted her choice and never had reason to.
Derra lived with the Astalines for several years, learned much about the arts of healing and weaving, and eventually had most of her questions answered. Two hundred years earlier a Nabbanai noblewoman named Asta of Turonis had renounced her vows and left the convent where she had lived much of her life. But instead of marrying, or otherwise doing what would make her family happy, Asta had devoted her life to making sanctuaries for women. The first Astaline house was outside a remote village in Nabban, but by the time of the founder’s death, a dozen such houses had sprung up all over the country—even one in the heart of the city at the base of the Redenturine Hill.
The order had grown in the years since, spreading across Erkynland and Warinsten and even parts of Rimmersgard and Hernystir. Roskva’s house had been one of the first in the far north, and the women there had come from all over Rimmsergard. They grew most of their own food, but the bulk of their income came from weaving: when Derra first saw the great barn full of looms she was astounded by how many there were—at least two dozen, she guessed—all clacking away as the Astalines worked.
She had never imagined that such a thing could be—women living together without having to ask anything of men. It set her thinking in a way that had never ended, making her consider things she had never considered before. In the end, although the Astalines helped keep her alive and even to heal her heart—which she had not known was broken—the most significant thing her time with them gave her was the understanding that things could be different than expected, that even what seemed as unalterable as a mountain could change.
* * *
• • •
It all ended, of course, on the worst night of her life.
The Astalines had lived near Hudstad for long enough that the people of the market village thought no more about them than they would have a true religious order. The villagers came to the Astalines sometimes when they were ill, or when they needed advice on medicaments for their livestock or children, and of course the farmers brought the wool of their sheep to be made into cloth. A few villagers talked darkly from time to time of “those women” and even whispered about witchcraft—people in this part of Rimmersgard were very religious—but they had eyed the balance and had seen the good that the Astalines did. And there was also the money their weaving brought.
Thus, when Derra and the others were awakened late one Novander night by screams that the house was on fire and armed men were inside the retreat, the Astalines were caught by surprise. But the shouting, ax-wielding men were not townsfolk but Skalijar—bandits.
Derra never found out if the raid had been prompted by something—the Skalijar were pagans and had attacked Aedonite convents and monasteries before—or was simply an assault on a weak target. It hardly mattered. By the time Derra made her way out of the house many younger Astalines were being dragged off by their hair and thrown across the saddles of the invaders. Some of the older women tried to save them, but were all killed.
Derra fled toward the nearest trees, moving from shadow to shadow as cautiously as she could. The last thing she saw of the place where she had lived so long and so contentedly was the roof blazing high above the house where Valada Roskva’s chambers lay, then falling inward in leaping flames and a whirlwind of sparks.
Her caution ultimately did her no good. She was caught within an hour by bandits following the prints of her bare feet in the snow, then snatched up and dumped across a saddle like her Astaline sisters.
She could remember little of the month she spent in the Skalijar camp in the largely deserted western reaches of Rimmersgard, but that was intentional: when she did recall things, every memory was colored in gray and black and blood red. She was raped by several of the bandits and treated as the lowliest of slaves. She was given picked bones to gnaw on and little else, and beaten without reason.
Derra was so desperate during that time, so overwhelmed by hopeless horror, that she planned making one last escape, this time by hanging herself from a rope fashioned from her ragged dress, but was prevented when a Hikeda’ya outland patrol discovered the bandits’ camp. The battle was terrible, mostly silent except for the screams of mortally wounded Skalijar, but so much blood flowed that by moonlight the snow of the campsite looked more black than white.
The Norns were the strangest people Derra had ever seen, immortal creatures she knew only from her father’s stories. The dead-faced soldiers carried her and the other captive women back to Nakkiga, all of them bound for the slave pens. As she was marched through the mountain’s vast, bronze-hinged gates and into the dark city beyond, a prisoner of far more terrible captors than even the murderous Skalijar, a single leaden thought went through her mind, over and over:
Nothing good can happen in a place like this. Nothing—not ever. My life is ended.
But, astonishingly, that did not turn out to be true.
15
Among the Grasslanders
Sergeant
Levias cut the last Erkynguard badge from his surcoat, leaving a strange array of darker patches on the cloth. Before pulling his outer clothes on he wiped dirt and mud across to make himself look more like the kind of masterless soldier who would be wandering the fringes of the great Thrithings gathering.
Porto made a few holes in his own garments, then removed the Tree and Dragons emblem. “I hate to do this,” he said sadly. “It was a proud day when I first took the High Throne’s service.”
Levias didn’t need to add much dirt. His face and whiskers well demonstrated the effects of a many days traveling and sleeping rough across the meadows of the High Thrithings. “You are still in service, never fear,” he said, flicking a bit of mud from his beard. “We are still the High Throne’s men. But now we are spies and must go unmarked.”
Porto eyed his comrade’s waist, which he thought just a little too portly to belong to a supposedly impoverished mercenary, but said nothing. He had grown fond of the Erkynlander in their time together. It occurred to him that in recent years he had kept company with almost no one but the knights Astrian and Olveris—and Prince Morgan, of course—and had forgotten how to do much beside drink and listen to their jests. Jests of which Porto himself was usually the butt, although he did not mind too badly: after years of loneliness following the death of his wife and child, he had been happy to find any companions at all, and he did not believe that even Astrian’s cruellest jibes were anything worse than rough barracks humor.
By God, were I to shun everyone who has ever mocked my height, my figure, or my drinking, I would have to go a-hermit in some deep forest.
Thinking of deep forests reminded him of the lost prince, and Porto felt a stab of fear. I pray you Lord Usires, our Ransomer, help the trolls find Morgan safe and bring him back to the king and queen.
He and the sergeant had halted to improve their disguises atop one of the hills that hemmed Blood Lake on the east. From where they stood they could see a great throng of humanity reduced to the size of fleas as they milled on the valley floor, a city with no walls or permanent buildings.
“They are so many clansmen!” Porto said. “Who would ever have guessed?”
“Anyone who fought in the war against them,” Levias answered, now rubbing his dirty hands on his sleeves. “I did not, but I heard my father’s stories.”
“Your father was a soldier?”
“Like me, yes. An Erkynguard, too, and proud to be one. He and his fellows held the line before the Ymstrecca when the grasslanders thought they had won—hundreds of horsemen sweeping down, screeching like demons, but the brave Tree and Dragons held firm. The Thrithings-men almost captured King Simon during that battle, you know. But did you not fight? You are, if you will pardon me saying so, more than of an age.”
Porto shook his head. “I fought grasslanders, yes, but I was in the south then, warring for Varellan, Saluceris’s father. We were sent against the southern Thrithings-men along our border and had many a battle, I can promise you. They told us we would catch the pony-riders from behind and pinch them between us and the Erkynlanders. Later I began to think we were only helping Varellan to drive back the clansmen along the Nabbanai border, and the rebellion in the north never even knew of our fight.”
“Such things are beyond me,” said Levias cheerfully. “I go where I am told and do what they bid me, and of course trust in God. The plans of kings and ministers are beyond me.”
But those plans of kings and ministers are why men like us live or die, Porto thought. He was still bitter toward Varellan, though the Nabbanai duke was years dead. A thousand soldiers from Perdruin had marched out under Varellan’s banner, but less than half had returned home afterward, sacrificed to protect the lands of Nabbanai noblemen. It had been one of the things that drove him north to King Simon and Queen Miriamele, who at least seemed interested in protecting all their people and not only the rich ones.
Levias wiped his knife on his breeks, then examined himself in the reflection on the blade. “Well, we look like proper outlaws now. Shall we go down and join them in their merrymaking?”
“Is that all this gathering is? A festival?”
Levias slipped his knife back into its sheath. “I told you, I know little beyond what I have heard. Every year the clans join together here at this lake, next to these hills they hold sacred. They trade with outsiders, barter between themselves for brides and horses, settle disputes, and sacrifice to their savage gods. It is the only time they come together, except when one of their great chiefs dies—a ‘Shan,’ as they are called. But grasslanders have not had such a leader for many years, not even in the last war. That is why we need not worry about their numbers. The only thing the Thrithings thanes hate worse than us city folk is other thanes. They do mischief to each other constantly, and each thane has more blood feuds than a hound has ticks. Now, come, Sir Porto.” He shouldered his bag and began to lead his horse down the narrow, winding trail. “It is not the grasslander thanes we need to think about now, but Count Eolair.”
Porto followed, doing his best to ignore the ache in his knees each time he took a step downhill. Thinking about Eolair was all well and good, but that would not make it any easier to find him here in the midst of thousands of city-hating grasslanders.
* * *
• • •
“My God,” whispered Levias, startled once again into taking a holy name in vain, “did you see that one? Half her bubs are on show! I thought the horse-riders kept their women hidden in their wagons.”
Porto had also turned to watch the broad-hipped Thrithings-woman who had just passed them, fascinated as much by her confident stride as by her ample cleavage. “Perhaps she is trying to find a husband.”
“I hear they sometimes take more than one wife, these grassland men.” Levias leaned close, since they were surrounded on all sides by the objects of their discussion. The sides of the muddy track were lined with wagons, some modest, some as opulent as wheeled palaces, and many of the large ones had makeshift paddocks full of horses, cattle, and other animals. “It seems to flout the Lord’s will,” Levias said. “I wonder what my wife, God rest her, would have thought of sharing me with another woman.”
“There is enough of you to go around, I think.”
Levias stared at him. “A jest!” he said, and grinned. “Porto the Dour has made a jest. Not a good one, but still . . .” His attention was distracted by a large wagon rumbling down the center of the track, driven by a grimacing, full-bearded man who clearly did not care whether he ran them over or not. Levias and Porto scrambled to get out of the way but could not avoid being splashed by mud from the wheels.
“We could simply have waited and let these cursed wagons make our disguises,” Levias said, wiping the worst of it from his knees and shins.
“Where do you think the bandits might be?” asked Porto.
“That is what we must discover. I have not the least idea.”
It was not going to be easy, that at least seemed clear. They were in a teeming and temporary city neither of them had ever visited. Campsites extended as far as Porto could see, from the base of the hills to the far end of the lake and all around its shore, with haphazard tracks wandering between them, some merely the ruts left by a few wheels, others broad, deep swathes of mud as wide as Main Row back in Erchester. Smoke from countless cooking fires hung low, making Porto’s eyes water. In places it was so thick on this mostly windless day that camps more than a dozen paces away were all but invisible.
Another stinging insect landed on Porto’s hand. He smashed it, rubbing it onto his shirt where it left a little smear of blood—not his own, he hoped. The winged vermin were everywhere here beside the lake, massive horseflies, mosquitoes, and other nasty things he did not think he had ever seen before. As he stared in disgust at the insect’s remains, he was startled by the sound of shouting close by, but it was only two clansmen wrestling in the mud and punch
ing at each other while spectators hurried toward them, shouting and jeering louder than the angry combatants.
“Wherever Count Eolair may be, we must find him quickly,” he said. “I do not like this place.” A family with a small, open cart trudged past them in the opposite direction. The children on the cart stared at the two outlanders as though they had never seen anything like them, their expressions not so much curious as openly mistrustful. “We are in the middle of ten thousand enemies.”
Levias said, “The Book of the Aedon tells us, ‘Even when I am in the midst of my foes, I will keep Your name in my heart, O my lord, Keeper of the Heavenly Garden, and I will be well.”
Porto said nothing. He knew from long experience that when men with swords and axes came for you, God’s name in your heart was not enough to keep you safe. The deaths of far too many godly men had proved that to him.
* * *
• • •
As they followed the wide, muddy track that served as the road around the northern side of the lake, the wagons jostled so close to each other and the paths were so full of different kinds of people that it seemed to Porto even more like a city. He saw dark-skinned Wrannamen, some with wagons as ostentatious as the clansmen’s, while others carried everything they owned, including their trade goods, on their backs. Many had families trailing behind, and even the smallest children carried burdens as big as they were. Each time Porto saw someone who looked to be neither a native grasslander nor one of the Wrannaman traders; he watched carefully to see where they came from and where they were going. He knew that it was not only grassland bandits who came to the Thanemoot, but also fighters and troublemakers from all over Osten Ard, many fleeing from the law. These sold their swords to various Thrithings clans, both those who had plans to overrun their neighbors and those who feared it being done to them. The work never lasted long, since the feuding season was limited, but for the dregs and mercenaries of the surrounding nations, it was a way to make money, to stay alive.