Ascalla's Daughter

by M. C. Elam

  She took the parchment from him, broke the seal and unrolled it on the table in front of her. Marcus sought her hand again and clasped it the way he used to when she was a little girl and they walked along the quiet streets of Falmora with Gram on market day. It had made her feel safe then, and despite the urgency she sensed in his touch, it made her feel safe now.

  “All is well, Marcus. King Ian must do the work of Ascalla. Nothing changes my loyalty.” She skimmed the documents then pushed away from the table. “A title changes nothing. Look at me. Do I appear any different today because of it? And the lands, Marcus, what am I to do with lands?”

  “An easy answer that be, Lady Evan, make Baline your home.”

  She sighed.

  “King Ian gave over one more thing and bid I be bringing it to your hand.”

  “What more?”

  “I carried it safe next to me skin, milady. Feared I might lose something so fine.” He opened the neck of his shirt and drew a gold chain over his head. “There be words for me to say, Lady Evan. Will you hear them?”

  At the end of the gold chain, a single black pearl gleamed in the soft light.

  “His words?”

  “Aye, milady, his words told through me.”

  “I’ll listen to the words.”

  He cleared his throat and sat a little straighter.

  “First off he said as how your spirits walk together and that the pearl be yours, Lady Evan. He had a jeweler make the chain and told as how it be yours now and ever after. King Ian begs you take it as a symbol of the words he last spoke to you.”

  Her tear-filled eyes held his gaze for a long moment, and then she took the slender chain and draped it around her neck.

  “What do you think he meant about our spirits?”

  Marcus shook his head. “Mayhap his way of saying he knows your heart.”

  “Mayhap,” she repeated, “but it’s a pure puzzlement to me why he thinks so.”

  “Not to me, milady,” he gave her hand a little squeeze. “What last words did he say, Lady Evan?”

  “That he honored me.”

  “Fine words, and true. He means what he says.”

  “Does he?”

  “Course he does. Now I be asking you straight out. Will you take me for your protector? I be privileged to serve.”

  “Marcus, I love you well, but you cannot give up your commission with the Ascallan guard. You do protect me as you protect Ascalla.”

  “You do not want the likes of me beside you?”

  “I am thankful for the likes of you beside me. But I would not see you sacrifice all that you have worked to achieve.”

  “I be ready to say goodbye to that life.”

  “I don’t think that is completely true. I know how you feel about the knights. They are your brothers. Who will train them? Who will patrol the border and keep Ascalla safe? No Marcus, you must not leave King Ian’s service. Ascalla needs you.”

  “My mind be made-up, Lady Evan.”

  She smiled when he used the title.

  “All right,” she said. “I’ll speak no more against the idea. I am proud to have you near.”

  “What be our path, milady?”

  “I think you named it already. We make for home in the morning. We head for Baline.”

  “Aye, Lady Evan, home.”

  13 - Home Ground

  “Milady, a wolf trails us,” said Marcus. “It came close last night. See here, tracks be all around camp.”

  “Maybe they belong to Chinera,” said Evan. She peered at the distinctive pad and toe marks in the soft earth.

  “Nay, track’s too deep for her. A rogue, I’m betting. He be tracking us, Lady Evan, and sure as the world, he follows Chinera.”

  “Maybe she’s coming in season,” said Evan.

  Marcus called to Chinera. He squatted beside her. One hand followed the bulge of her belly while the other stroked her ears. She wagged her tail and licked his face. “Not her season, Lady Evan. She be full up with pups.”

  “I would have noticed such a thing.”

  Marcus took her hand and placed it over a small round bulge in Chinera’s belly.

  “Pups,” he said, “I count four.”

  Evan sat down on the ground beside the wolf and put her arms around the familiar body. “How could I miss the signs?”

  “Mayhap thoughts of your own pup be what kept the signs from you,” said Marcus. He stood and kicked dirt over what remained of last night’s campfire.

  Evan’s look leveled his. Relief came like a gusher. She had worked over in her mind how she could tell Marcus. Her pup, indeed, his remark was clear and direct and enough to make her smile.

  “How did you know I am with child?”

  “I see your shine bold as day.” He offered her a hand, but she shook her head and stayed on the ground beside Chinera.

  “My shine? Tell me what it means.”

  “Aye, well, shine creeps over you and lights your face. Shine of mother’s light comes off you.”

  “I don’t understand. Do I look different?” She put her hand on her belly and noted a slight bulge. “You couldn’t tell from my belly, not yet.”

  “Nay, Evan, not from that. Shine be something Gram showed me. You be knowing well as me, Gram was midwife to many. She taught me about the shine. We played the shine game for all the years she lived, played whenever I took her out and about.”

  “Yes, I do know about her midwifery. She brought Hawk and liked to tease him when he disobeyed. She used to tell him she would put him back where babies came from to cook some more and learn manners.”

  Marcus smiled, and the linen mask caught a sudden puff of breath as he exhaled. It lifted away from his mouth. He jerked his hand across his lips to hide them and stammered a reply.

  “Gram be good for saying the way she felt.”

  “Tell me about the shine game,” said Evan. She pretended not to notice his mouth.

  Marcus sat down next to her on the ground, Chinera between them.

  “She told me first way to know when a babe be made come from the shine. We played the game until I could tell most as good as her. We’d spy a Falmora girl at market. Next I be saying if I thought she had the shine. Gram would say yea or nay to my guess. Then we’d watch. Most times, we be knowing quicker than the girls, before they called Gram to come and tell them what they suspected be true.”

  “How long?”

  He looked puzzled.

  Evan blushed.

  “How long since I started to shine?”

  “First time I saw your shine be that day you come past the stables asking me to take a message up to King Ian.”

  “That soon? You didn’t say anything.”

  “Nay, too fired on taking a chunk out of that young rascal’s hide I be to think on how.”

  “And now?”

  “My pledge be firm, Lady Evan. What ever happened, I protect you now.”

  And so she told him, told him all of it. She told him not because he asked but because he didn’t. She told him because he gave his loyalty without question and she loved him for that. He listened to the story, and when she finished, gave her hand an awkward pat. He set the linen mask carefully over his nose so that it would not flutter free when he stood.

  “A fine wee one you be shining for, milady. I got no doubts, just like his mam.”

  “A boy you think?”

  “Mayhap, can’t say for sure but a fine babe be it boy or girl, Lady Evan.”

  When he said her name with the title, she felt awkward. It created a distance between them that she didn’t want, but whenever she tried to dissuade him, he humphed at her in that way he had of making the objection seem futile.

  They reached the eastern border of Pandera’s Forest a week later and, side by side, gazed across the open plain. The Ruby River ambled like a slow-moving serpent through the waving emerald river grass that etched her banks and sent thirsty roots deep into the rich soil to taste her pure, fresh water. On she danced
for miles until her current, quickened by the fall of the land, dug an ever-deepening basin in the valley west of Baline. There the Ruby gave up the journey, and her sweet breath gushed into Elemad Basin.

  “Follow the Ruby up to the basin and we be nearly to Baline, Lady Evan,” Marcus told her.

  “How long do you think before we arrive?”

  “Before the snows for certain. I know a farmer name of Horace Runderly close to here. He’s got a herd. We be needing milk cows, and he’s a fair man for trading.”

  “I have no coin Marcus, not even a copper, and what could we possibly trade? I don’t know how you can purchase a milk cow.”

  “Not one cow, two at least and three be best,” he said.

  “Three cows? How do you expect to settle with the farmer for three cows?”

  “Milady Evan, you be heavy with coin. I carry it for you.”

  “Me? I have no funds.”

  “Not true, Evan. Gram saw to that. A shrewd one about the world, that old woman thought clear.”

  “Gram gave me coin?”

  “Nay, she be poor as poor. But she made a bargain with the king. Set coin in your name for a time when you be grown. King Ian named the sum and even Gram called it fine. A thousand gold in your name it be and added a bit to it every year.”

  “That’s a fortune.”

  “Aye, a fortune.”

  Evan laughed aloud.

  “Then milk cows we shall have. But won’t they slow our journey?”

  “A fair bit, but we need them.”

  Marcus rode ahead breaking an easy to follow trail through the long grass. Evan followed along at a much slower pace to accommodate Chinera. The knee-high grass caught a light breeze and swayed back and forth. The afternoon sun shone against her back. She knew the comforting warmth would soon disappear in the wake of the winter season. She could still see Marcus’s now distant figure ahead. His wisdom for the trail gave her confidence and made her feel safe. She hoped they would make Baline before Chinera’s pups came. What would they find in Baline? She knew Marcus and the knights had scouted the village checking for intruders each time they patrolled the mountains. Was anything left standing? His answers seemed vague, a sign he didn’t want to worry her before they arrived. Shelter aside, food was their biggest obstacle. They carried little with them, and getting through the winter might prove difficult.

  Dozens of small farms peppered the fertile soil of the grasslands. The lay of the land must be familiar enough to Marcus, but Evan knew that, without the broken grass trail she followed, the plain would open like a gigantic maw and swallow her. She rejoiced inside when he returned before an hour passed.

  “Good news, Lady Evan. Horace agrees to sell you two cows. One in the season of milk and the other bred with calf on the way. Like buying three, that be. If the new calf be a bull, your herd’s got a start already.”

  He sounded so excited and pleased with the bargain that Evan smiled.

  “Well done, my friend. Well done, “she said.

  “That’s not all, milady. He offered his barn for our rest. Roof needs a bit of fixing and I offered to lend a hand. Fair exchange for a day’s labor and gets a bit of rest for you.”

  “With all the coin you say I have, we could pay instead.”

  “Aye, we could pay, but the roof be thatch, milady. The way of a thatcher be foreign to me, and no simple task if you want to stay dry when we get to Baline. Horace be teaching me the way of it,” said Marcus.

  Evan was cautious of the locals because of Chinera, but the long days had tired her and a night or two sleeping under roof was appealing. Two miles ahead in the slowly ebbing light, she saw the smoke plume that lifted from the chimney of the Runderly cottage. She imagined a farmer and his family inside, gathered for an evening meal amid the chaos and laughter of young children, and wondered if she would ever enjoy even the smallest essence of family.

  “Do they have children, Marcus?” she asked.

  “Ah, no, milady. Horace Runderly and his wife raised up their girls. They be off to make their own way. Horace tends the place alone. His boys be lost.”

  “You mean dead?”

  “Can’t say for sure. Annabelle, that’s his wife, had a sister what lived here.”

  “On this farm?”

  “Aye, the same. She and her man took sick with fever, and Horace brought Annabelle to tend them. Feared of the fever, they left Billy and Devon in Baline. The Owlmen come and wasn’t a sign of the boys after that. Annabelle went near to crazy.”

  “My raid?”

  “Aye, miss, your raid. I expect Billy be about your age. Devon, ten seasons more.”

  “How did they end up with her sister’s farm?” The inside of her thigh began to throb the way it did before the muscle seized up, and she started to rub it.

  Marcus noted her discomfort. “That be a sad thing what added to Annabelle’s misery. Her sister and her sister’s man, both gone from the same fever. Nothing left in Baline but the sadness of the boys. Horace brought Annabelle into Falmora, and they stayed a spell down to Levon’s Tavern. When she be a might better, Horace took the farm. Many kin to Baline folk be scattered all across these plains. I expect they be knowing about you soon enough.”

  “Why do you think that?”

  He chuckled behind the linen.

  “Because I tell them about the Lady of Baline every stop we make. Every village we passed while you waited in camp I took a pint in the inns and told of you. You be the magic Lady of Baline?”

  “Magic?”

  “Aye, magic. You lived through the raid and the king gave you title. Got to be magic in you.”

  “What of Hawk and the baby, did you talk about him.”

  “Only that he be your friend, milady. I told no tale about the babe except to say you lost your man.”

  “You are wise, my friend, and more true in loyalty than anyone I know. I did lose my husband, didn’t I?”

  She swallowed hard fighting tears. Hawk still came to her in dreams. She missed him, longed for his laughter and the gaiety they shared. The dreams plagued her as unwelcome intrusions that she wished would stop. He stepped boldly forward when she awoke at first light. A hundred times a day he appeared from the shadows to overwhelm her conscious thought. She would not hesitate to exorcise his memory, but his words haunted her, whispered words.

  I am always with you.

  Yes, by damn, he lived in her heart, but she fervently wished he would go. She blinked rapidly and drove the tears away.

  “My anchor in the storm,” she said.

  “Milady?”

  “Nothing, my friend, only a day dream. Did you tell them about Chinera?”

  “Aye, Horace kept a wolf as a boy. He be good with it. Rogue’s a worry, though. He follows still. See yonder the trail he breaks through the grass.”

  ***

  They found the barn warm and dry and made their beds in the sweet smelling hay. When Evan went to draw a bucket of water from the well, Annabelle Runderly waved to her from the cottage. An invitation to take supper pleased Evan, and she readily agreed.

  “Got to warn you before you see Horace,” Marcus told her. He turned a cake of soap between his big hands until it made a rich lather then scrubbed them clean and rinsed the residue. “He be a bit of a shock at first sight. Got him a rolling eye.”

  “What does that mean? Evan asked. She was busily brushing the trail dust from her skirt in an effort to freshen it.

  “Well,” he said and took a brush to his own dusty attire, “means he’s got an eye what turns different in his head from the other. Might be cast to the right whilst the other looks down. Makes him seem right addled. Any thinks that of him be wrong as wrong can be. Horace has got him a good head. Just looks a might funny.”

  Evan stopped brushing. “How did it happen?”

  “Reckon he be born with it, milady. Never knew for certain. Most don’t mention it for want of getting him all stirred up.” He put the brush aside and went to work on his boots
with a little grease from the axel of Horace’s farm wagon.

  “Would he be angry?” Evan took a fringed shawl from her pack, angled it over one shoulder and tied it at the hip.

  “Can’t say as how I know for sure.” He finished with the boots and saw he’d dirtied his hands with the grease. “But one time down to Levon’s when he was deep in his cups, someone made a challenge and rumor tells he pretty nigh took their head off. Ridd-dee-cule be a mean thing.” He picked up the soap a second time and scrubbed off the axel grease.

  She smiled at the way he said the word. “I’m warned. Mr. Runderly offered us hospitality, and I for one care not for such things as appearance.”

  “I be two on that account, milady.”

  The meal was delicious, a rich chicken stew, full of dumplings, and to go with it, thick slices of hearth-raised bread. Annabelle set full bowl of fresh-churned butter next to the bread. The meal warmed their insides and made them sleepy. Just when they thought the meal finished, Annabelle cut huge slices from a stack cake layered high with a mixture made from dried apples, cinnamon, and sugar. She whipped a bowl of clotted cream into soft peaks, and heaved a generous dollop atop each piece. Rich, moist and completely delicious, Evan ate until she thought she would burst. Such fair only appeared on special feast days.

  “For you, Lady Evan, they honored you,” Marcus told her when she mentioned it later. I’m betting Annabelle set about fixing that meal soon as I came to fetch you. Feast of welcome for the Lady of Baline, come to bring life to the village.”

  “I’m just looking for a place to live.”

  “They see it a might different, Evan,” he said. He slipped back to his old way of addressing her.

  “And you have a hand in that, I’m sure.”

  “Not nary as much as you think.”

  They stayed two days at the farm. Marcus helped repair the barn roof, and Horace, good as his word, taught him how to thatch. His hands felt clumsy at first working the reeds, but by watching Horace, he soon caught the knack of it, all accept for turning the bond. He didn’t quite have the feel for how long he needed to soak the straw grass to make it pliable enough so that he could bend the bundle double and tie it without the whole thing breaking apart or springing open again. Horace, a good-natured sort, repeated the process until Marcus made a successful clump and then showed him how to weave the bottle shaped bond into the roof and make a dry seal that would keep the rain out.