Firewalk

by Anne Logston

  “I’ll send over a few bolts for you to try,” he said. “With your lovely dark skin and hair, you should be wearing rich reds and golds and dark orange, don’t you think, Randon?”

  “My lovely lady,” Randon said warmly, “would do justice to your best, but she’d look beautiful in plain sackcloth.”

  “Well, sackcloth notwithstanding, an exquisite picture is worthy of the finest frame you can buy,” Lidian said wryly. “But come, my friend, are you going to leave me curious all day, or do I get to see what you’re hiding in that box you brought?”

  “I thought I’d let you look at a little Bregondish artistry,” Randon said. He opened the box, took out several plain cloth samples, and handed them to Lidian. “Bregondish dyers don’t produce all the colors we fancy, so I thought you’d be interested in bringing in raw cloth and dyeing it.”

  “Mmmm.” Lidian examined the cloth thoughtfully, sliding it through his stained fingers, pulling at it in different directions, and teasing at the edges of the weave. “Interesting stuff. Light and fine as a spider web, but tough. Good and sturdy, I’ll wager, but it breathes. What is it? It’s not flax, nor wool...”

  “Ikada wool,” Kayli told him. “Ikada are a herd animal we raise for milk, meat, leather, and hair. They are hardy and can be sheared twice during warm weather.”

  “Interesting, and useful. Animal hair takes a color differently than plant fiber.” He tugged at the weave again. “Odric would be sick with envy. This is a good tight weave, but very different than his pattern. I’d wager you good money he’ll be wanting to hire a few weavers over to teach him the trick of it, and then maybe arrange to buy bales of the wool to weave himself. Me, I’d be interested in the cloth, whether he weaves it or they do. If it holds a color true, I could sell this dear in the market.”

  “So far we only have the samples,” Randon apologized. “But you’re welcome to keep some of them to show to Odric and to test with your dyes, and I’m sure we can get more soon.”

  Lidian nodded.

  “I’d be interested in buying a small amount, say a wagon-load or so, just to test,” he said, his eyes sparkling. “And the first batch is going into my personal wardrobe. I have no doubt that Odric would fill out the order, to try to duplicate the weave.” He glanced sideways at Randon. “But there’s another matter we’d best discuss, and not in front of all my apprentices.”

  He led them back to a room empty but for a table and chairs, and then fetched wine for them. When they were comfortably settled, Lidian spoke boldly.

  “Ever since the High Lady was poisoned, I’ve expected the city guard to come knocking on my door,” he said, “to haul me up before that mage of yours. I’ll tell you same as I’d say under truth spell: from the moment I walked in, neither I nor anybody I saw tampered with any food or drink, nor do I know any at that table who’d have done such a thing on the evilest day of their lives. Whoever wished your lady ill, I know nothing of it, nor do I know anybody who does. And I’ll say the same before your mage if I must.”

  Randon extended his hand; after a moment Lidian took it.

  “If I’d had any doubt of you,” Randon said, smiling, “we’d not have drunk your wine and eaten your food. And I had no end of trouble believing that my most loyal friends could sit at my table, smile politely at my face and poison my wife. No, you’d all say just what you thought in good plain words, and that would be the end of it.”

  Lidian grinned.

  “You going to see the rest of ‘em?” he asked.

  “Eventually,” Randon said, sighing. “It’s a sad day when I haven’t time to enjoy the company of my friends, but the truth is I can’t spare many afternoons. And I’m afraid my lady deserves more of my attention than she’s been getting.”

  Lidian only smiled wisely and glanced at Kayli’s belly; his expression said more plainly than words, But apparently she got enough attention to conceive your child. Kayli flushed, but pride and more than a little gratitude mixed with the embarrassment. Apparently rumors traveled quickly indeed in Tarkesh, but at least Lidian was kind enough to refrain from openly mentioning her pregnancy. Kayli supposed that even in cosmopolitan Agrond, a woman did not like to hear that her bedchamber activities were the talk of the city.

  “Well, that went better than I expected,” Randon said when they had returned to their coach. “I believed what he said about the dinner.” He glanced at Kayli. “What do you think?”

  “That he was not responsible for the poison, yes, nor knows who was,” Kayli said slowly. “And he is certain none of the others there were responsible. At least one he knows, however, does not support you—or does not any longer, perhaps. I believe our policy on slavery was less accepted than we thought. But his voice hardly faltered, and I believe he felt more irritation than true worry, so while one of your friends has not expressed disagreement, perhaps because of your friendship, I think there is no true disloyalty or danger in it.”

  “How do you do it?” Randon demanded. “Does your magic let you pluck the thoughts right out of people’s minds?”

  “Nothing of the sort,” Kayli said, laughing a little. “Learning to read the ‘unspoken language’ of expression and gesture is one of the thirty-nine arts required of every accomplished Bregondish woman of marriageable age. From your friend’s voice, the way he moved, the direction in which he turned his eyes—those told me more than his words.”

  Randon sighed again, and the tension drained from his shoulders as he slumped back against the seat.

  “It’s Odric, I’d wager my last Sun,” he said wearily. “Remember Lady Tarkas mentioned he saw cloth samples from the first caravan, so he’s had time to think about the competition from Bregondish weavers. And his guild’s one of the worst offenders in owning slaves. He used them for the worst jobs—weaver’s cough, you know, from the fiber dust.”

  Kayli knew little more of weaving than she had of dyeing, but she said nothing, only gesturing to Randon to continue.

  “Odric and Crinna, of my friends at least, stand to lose the most business to Bregondish trade,” Randon said thoughtfully. “Bregondish weaving is as good as, or better than, anything Odric’s guild can produce, and the leather shames anything in our market—soft as a feather, but sturdy as our toughest hides. I have a suspicion, too, that if any of your bowyers decide to start selling their work here, our sale of crossbows is going to drop. And the horses—”

  Kayli had to laugh.

  “Randon, you cannot expect my folk to trade everything they own! Our longbows take much work and time to make, and horses take time to breed. We have no surplus of either. And it is a little soon, I believe, to plan the whole of the trade between our countries when there is not yet even one good road crossing the border. Let us not anger your friends at the guilds any more man we must yet.”

  But even as she spoke, she wondered if the damage was already done.

  Chapter Twelve

  Lady Tarkas’s warnings quickly proved to be prophetic. Over the next days, curious peasants requesting audiences were rapidly replaced by worried tradesmen and indignant guildmasters. Only the mercantile houses seemed happy; they did not care whose merchandise they sold, so long as it commanded a good profit, and the prospect of marketing Agrondish goods in Bregond, and Bregondish goods in Agrond (at inflated prices, of course, while the novelty lasted) set their mouths to watering. For every unhappy craftsman pleading for trade restrictions and import taxes, there were two merchants willing to brave Sarkondish raiders if they could get permission to cross the border, all for the privilege of being the first to import the new goods.

  “I can’t take much more of this,” Randon said wearily after their eighth straight day of audiences, public and private. “I’m more than half-tempted to gather together all the guild heads and the heads of all the mercantile houses, lock them in a room together—preferably with weapons—and let them fight it out. Survivor wins. About the only thing they can agree on is the new proclamation about the slaves—neither
side likes it.”

  He fell silent, and Kayli knew what troubled him. He had already run afoul of Master Weaver Odric, Master Tanner Crinna, and Smithmaster Erinton over the slaves. Freed slaves from all three guilds had lodged complaints of ill treatment, and Randon had been forced to levy fines against his friends. Kayli had offered to judge the complaints herself, but Randon had refused.

  “There’s no need to give them one more problem to blame on you and Bregond,” Randon had said sourly. “Besides, it’s well known they’re my friends. It’s best to show from the start that they won’t receive special favor.”

  Kayli knew, too, that there was a deeper issue involving Randon’s friends. If none of them had poisoned her—and from Lidian’s word, it would seem not—then whoever had slipped the poison into her food or drink meant Randon to believe that one of his friends was guilty. It seemed likely to Kayli that the poisoning was a deliberate attempt to alienate Randon from his most faithful supporters. Any of Terralt’s supporters would profit by the deed, but within the security of the castle, Terralt himself remained the most likely suspect Kayli knew that Randon did not want even to consider that possibility.

  Terralt had kept busy handling the processing of the freed slaves, for the most part, and Kayli was deeply grateful that he seemed to avoid her. She wondered, however, that he continued to live in the city; Ynea was no stronger, and her birthing time was nearing. Randon had quietly brought in several healers, but even they held out little hope.

  “If I had attended her earlier, she might have been strong enough for a potion to lose the child,” one mage had said, gazing warily at Randon. “I have my doubts of even that. But as matters stand...” He shrugged helplessly. “I’ve heard there’s a mage in Erestan who specializes in birthing magics.”

  The mage from Erestan, an ancient woman, had replied tersely to Randon’s message, sent via a merchant ship down the Dezarin. She most certainly could not undertake a journey all the way upriver to Agrond, not when the High Lady of Erestan and her own granddaughter were soon to give birth.

  Terralt, unaware of these efforts, visited Ynea every day but did not linger.

  Also absent, for the most part, was Seba. The girl had approached Kayli several times, asking if she needed her help in the forge. Kayli had not dared pursue her magical studies since the Rite of Renewal, and had gently turned Seba away. She hadn’t seen the girl often since then, and had supposed that perhaps Seba was helping Endra with Ynea, where Seba’s knowledge of herbs might be useful. She learned otherwise, however, when the Bregondish groom approached her one afternoon.

  “I wondered whether you’d sent the child or she’d come of her own, lady,” the young man, Brant, said, “but she’s got the way of it and no mistake. She rides as if she grew a-horseback, and they answer to her as sweet as they would to the lead stallion of the herd. If you don’t need her inside, High Lady, I’d be beholden if you’d let her go on working with me.”

  And that was how Seba had gone from ex-slave, lady’s maid, and temple menial to assistant groom. Looking out the west windows of the castle, Kayli could often see her exercising the horses, tending them as lovingly as a mother might tend a child. Seba was obviously happy in her work, and Kayli was more relieved than she dared admit that the girl had found a position less dependent upon Kayli herself.

  Fortunate, too, that Kayli had Seba and the groom to exercise the horses, for she had no time to ride now. Randon had promised that once she conceived and they were confirmed High Lord and Lady, there would be more freedom for them, but it quickly proved otherwise. There were slave complaints to deal with; there were frightened craftsmen and angry guildmasters and greedy merchants; there were peasants and nobles frightened of an imminent Bregondish invasion; and then, besides the ordinary day-to-day business of governing an entire country in turmoil, there was still a backlog of work dating from Terendal’s death.

  It was more than a month after their wedding that Randon finally said one evening, “I just can’t take one more day of listening to complaints and signing documents. Let’s be lazy tomorrow and go on a small hunt, just us and a few guards, before the weather gets hotter.”

  Kayli agreed enthusiastically; she’d hesitated to suggest such an outing herself while there was so much to be done. They spent a glorious morning hunting, although they shot only one plump deer. When the noonday sunlight became too hot, they left their horses with the guards and walked to the small pond in the forest, where Randon gave her her second swimming lesson. The cool water was refreshing, but inwardly Kayli preferred her submersions limited to the safe confines of her tub.

  When she and Randon rode back through the castle gates at sunset, laughing together, they did not at first notice the strange silence in the courtyard or the subdued manner of the guards at the gate. When Kayli dismounted, however, and Seba did not materialize at her side to take Maja’s reins, she noted for the first time Brant’s downcast eyes.

  “Where is Seba?” she asked him. “Has something happened while we were gone?”

  “Seba’s gone to help Endra,” Brant said, avoiding her gaze. “The midwife called for her soon after you left, lady.”

  Kayli met Randon’s worried glance, and they both ran for the castle as fast as their feet would carry them. At the top of the stairs, however, they met Endra and the midwife’s expression answered Kayli’s question before she could ask it.

  “There was nothing you could have done, child,” Endra said quietly, taking Kayli’s hand. “Her heart just had no strength left to beat. It was very peaceful, and I swear she felt no pain.” She glanced over her shoulder and lowered her voice. “I wouldn’t go back there just now. Terralt’s there and he’s ‘most unhinged. We cut for the baby after she died. It’s a healthy girl, but he won’t so much as look at her. The children’s governess sent for a wet nurse.”

  A sharp arrow of grief lodged itself in Kayli’s heart, but she pushed her pain aside. Mourning and guilt would wait. Taking a deep breath, she turned to Randon.

  “You should speak to Terralt,” she said gently. “Ynea would want us to think of her daughter now, not to be blinded with grief for what cannot be helped.”

  Randon clasped her hand tightly, but turned away.

  “I doubt if that’s a good idea,” he said, his voice remote. “I’m the last person he wants to see right now.”

  A wave of impatience almost brought a harsh retort to Kayli’s lips; what kind of man would not comfort his brother in such an hour? Then she swallowed her anger as she had her grief and released Randon’s hand. “Then I will speak to him,” she said, and before Randon could reply, she had left him behind, walking as quickly as she could before she, too, found some reason to leave Terralt alone with his pain.

  Kayli stopped at the nursery just long enough to look at Ynea’s daughter. She was a large baby, black-haired and black-eyed, and her lusty howls bespoke a strong spark of life. The wet nurse had arrived and handled the baby competently, so Kayli did not linger.

  Terralt was sitting in Ynea’s room in the same chair in which Kayli had sat at Ynea’s side, his head on his folded arms on the bed. Thankfully the servants had removed the stained bedclothes and cleaned, clothed, and arranged Ynea’s body, but the room still smelled of illness, of blood and birth fluids.

  Kayli did not hesitate, but moved to Terralt’s side, laying a hand on his shoulder. Terralt jerked as if burned, and his head shot up; when he saw Kayli, however, his red eyes narrowed.

  “If you’ve come to tell me all the things I did wrong, I don’t want to hear it,” he said, his voice cold and tightly controlled. “I’m sure I’ve thought of them all already. I should have had a midwife here from the start. I should have brought in mages to examine her. I should have let her be after the first hard birth. I should’ve been more of a husband and less of a lord.”

  Kayli knelt on the floor beside his chair so she could gaze into his eyes.

  “Were you here when she died?” she asked softly.

/>   “Only by chance,” Terralt said bitterly. “I’d come to see Randon, and when I learned he’d taken the day for his own pleasure, I thought as I’d nothing better to do, I had no excuse not to visit my wife.” He ran both hands roughly through his hair, then swiped his sleeve impatiently across his eyes. “She started to gasp for air and I called for Stevann.” He glanced up at Kayli, and the bewilderment in his eyes made her heart ache in sympathy. “It happened so quickly. She was just—just gone. As suddenly as that.”

  “Then you were with her to bid her good-bye,” Kayli said softly. “That was a great gift.”

  “A great gift,” Terralt said contemptuously. “Of all the things I could have done for my wife, my great gift was to sit beside her and watch her die.”

  There were a thousand words of blame Kayli wanted to say, but what was the use? Adding pain to pain served no good and would not bring Ynea back. She squeezed Terralt’s shoulder comfortingly instead.

  “Terralt...” She hesitated. “After you left the castle, Randon and I had mages brought to see Ynea. They said there was nothing to be done for her. They said if they had seen her earlier”—she gazed into Terralt’s empty eyes and decided—“that it would have made no difference.”

  Terralt closed his eyes, and some of the hard lines eased from his face. For a moment Kayli thought he might weep, but he quickly mastered himself, reaching back to pat her hand on his shoulder. A shock ran up Kayli’s arm, but she ignored it as best she could.

  “Thank you,” he said quietly. “My pride says you shouldn’t have interfered, but to the Dark Realms with my pride. Thank you for trying.”

  Kayli smiled.

  “In Bregond we believe that we leave a part of our spirit with those we love,” she said. “We can feel it in our hearts when we remember those who have made the spirit journey, and we can see it in the faces of their children. Your daughter carries a part of Ynea now, and I know that Ynea would want the two of you to comfort each other. And you must give your daughter a name, to tie her spirit to the earth.”