The Bitterbynde Trilogy

by Cecilia Dart-Thornton

  He tossed a handful of coins into her lap. She examined them closely—they were small disks made of copper. One side bore a numerical inscription she could not read, while the other was stamped with a face seen in profile. On every coin the side depicting the face was worn and blurred, lacking in detail.

  “Put them jinglers in yer pocket!” Sianadh trumpeted.

  <>

  “I took a silver florin from amongst the treasure. Gold or jewels would give us away, of course—a silver piece was the least thing of value I could find. Ha! The least thing of value—and to think it is more than I had in the world at one time! The loaf, I bought from a penny-pinching farmwife.”

  Still hungry, but somewhat fortified, the travelers tied the caskets on their backs, beneath their cloaks, and set off like a pair of two-legged tortoises. Soon they struck a road leading south, a rutted track whose high banks were overgrown with hedges on each side. Ripe blackberries dotted the briars, and these they picked as they walked.

  They passed several cottages. Now and then a horse-cart trundled by, bound in the other direction.

  Imrhien kept her head down, pulling her battered taltry well over her face, while Sianadh greeted the drivers with a cheery wave.

  “Keep your taltry tugged forward,” he murmured from the side of his mouth. “One look at ye, chehrna, would set the tongues of the whole countryside wagging. We must not draw attention.”

  Her load seemed heavier by the minute. Lack of food had weakened her, and walking seemed like wading through mud. At midday they rested in a beech grove off the road. Sianadh used the pennies to purchase food and drink from a farmhouse. This time he was given richer fare. As soon as she had eaten, a strong desire for sleep surged over Imrhien, but she rose to her feet and they trudged on. Toward dusk they reached the outer sprawl of Gilvaris Tarv and passed through, into the city.

  6

  GILVARIS TARV

  Pain and Perfidy

  I am the Wand and the Wand is the Tree.

  The Tree seizes the Wind in its hair,

  Holds Fire within its bones, pumps Water through its veins,

  Grips soil and stone with its long toes.

  The Tree stands between sky and ground.

  The Tree is the Wand and the Wand is I.

  CHANT OF THE CARLINS

  Silence is a spell.

  ARYSK SAYING

  A sparrow jumped along one of the warped black rafters, flicking its head from side to side as if searching. It paused, fluffed up its feathers smugly, and issued a small “cheep.” Then it took wing and flew a quick circuit of the room before darting out through the half-open shutters into sunshine. Dust motes and a downy feather slid soporifically down a chute of chartreuse light, in past the flowering chamomile springing from the window-box, and onto the foot of the bed, bringing with them the sounds and odors of the street below.

  It was not a large room to waken to. The walls were built of timber, daubed with some hard, whitish substance like clay. Here and there they were covered with stretched sackcloth that had been nailed to the joists showing through. The bed, which was wide, took up most of the space—on a stand against one wall stood a chamber-stick with a candle-end stuck in it, an unmatched ewer and basin, a wooden hairbrush, and a long-handled looking-glass. Under the window squatted a stool of birch. Everywhere, the scent of lavender permeated. From behind a thin partition drifted the rumble of familiar snoring.

  A real bed—a luxury beyond belief. Imrhien could not recall ever having slept in one. Lying back against creamy, lavender-scented linen, she visualized the events of the preceding night, turned them over, and examined them from all angles.

  Of the city, all she recalled were impressions—squares of yellow light from mullioned casements, revealing a bewildering mixture of movement, smells, sounds; a forest drowning in its own undergrowth, whose trees were the stanchions, pillars, and roof beams of buildings, whose overflow was the boil and surge of humanity—fair flower and fetid fungus. Upper stories overhung crooked tunnels of streets. Lines of pegged washing flapped like ensigns, and gutters reeked. Like bulls in a distant field, hawkers bellowed, extolling their wares. The evening was noisy with the jingle of harness, the rumble of wheels, the smack of whips, shouts, dogs barking, snatches of music. Smoke from glowing braziers thickened the air, mingled with fragrances of pastries and perfume. Armor glittered in lamplight. Dominating all loomed the light-pierced Tower of the Tenth House of the Stormriders.

  The girl had walked among all this noise and glitter and stench, staying as close to Sianadh as his shadow, keeping her taltry pulled well forward and her cloak drawn across the lower half of her face. She scarcely glanced up, except to avoid tripping over street detritus or losing sight of her mentor in the deepening shadows. Along twisting streets and lanes he led her, until she lost all sense of direction. Then with the words “Here it be—Bergamot Street,” they had turned the last corner into a narrow, dark thoroughfare. A few yards farther on, the Ertishman had knocked on a door. It opened. With the noise of a bell jangling, a heavy block of light fell out on the cobblestones.

  Then Imrhien had shrunk back, turning her face away, but Sianadh took her arm in a firm grip, propelling her forward, and without knowing how, she was inside, in the house with the door shut at her back, surrounded by moving hands, exclamations of delight, shouts of welcome.

  At this point, recollections became somewhat blurred. There had been three faces—the goodwife with the calm, searching gaze and, escaping from her wimple, a wisp of copper hair graying too much to match Sianadh’s; on her forehead a painted blue disk. The broad-faced young man, perhaps twenty years of age, with the look that questioned and the ready smile, his hair rufescent as glowing embers. The lass, of a similar age to herself, with the coloring of her brother and the eyes that, when they alighted upon the newcomer, could not help revealing stark disgust and fear no matter how she endeavored to conceal it. Her smiles did not reach her blue eyes.

  “How fare you?” they had asked Sianadh searchingly, between embraces.

  “None of your business,” he had shot back, roaring with laughter the while, lifting the red-haired lass and whirling her around so that she shrieked with genuine delight.

  Then Imrhien’s burden had been taken from her, and she was too weary to care where it was set. She found herself seated at a table in front of a bowl of pottage. Sianadh was eating and talking with his mouth full on the other side of the table, waving his spoon in one hand and a hunch of bread in the other. There was firelight and candlelight and a tankard of some warm liquid thrust into her hands that, when sipped, coursed down her throat and through her veins like green fire, refreshing and soothing. Someone led her upstairs to this room, and as she fell, clothed, into bed, the last words that came drifting up from below were Sianadh’s: “Nay, it ain’t got fleas, and ’tis a girl.”

  Downstairs in the morning, Sianadh’s sister, Ethlinn, was drawing off water from a kettle over the fire and pouring it into a linen-draped wooden tub behind a curtain of heavy cloth in the corner. She wore shades of blue and gray—the colors of a carlin. Turning as the guest descended, she smiled, then placed the jug on the table and wiped her hands on her apron. The hands flew in intricate gestures. Imrhien shook her head. The handspeak was too fast, and there were signs she had not learned. Smiling as if she understood this, too. Ethlinn gestured toward the bath. Something about fleas rankled in the guest’s mind, but she thought this goodwife had not been the one who had asked about them, and the bathwater, scented with apple-blossom, was inviting. Soon she was immersed in warm water behind the drapery, reflecting on the only other bath she could remember, feeling the long, burnished curls, once stubble, resting wet on her shoulders.

  Surely this house was the best place in Erith, and if only she could find herself a face, an ordinary face at which nobody would look twice, she could live here forever, bathing in apple-blossom and slumbering in lavender.

  A cure would cost de
arly. Struck by sudden concern as to the security of the treasure caskets, she climbed out of the tub and dried herself, reaching for clothing Ethlinn had left folded on a stool. These were not her gray spidersilk garments but peasant garb, clean and patched, probably belonging to Ethlinn’s daughter, Muirne of the disgusted eyes, who was similarly slight in build but not as tall as she. There was a linen kirtle, tight-fitting, with sleeves buttoned from wrist to elbow, a calico surcoat with a fuller sleeve reaching to the elbow, a plain girdle, a peplum for her hair, her old taltry with a newly stitched cover replacing the stained, worn one, a woollen cloak, her cracked old rooster tilhal. Girls’ clothes. There was no choice, no option, but to face reality.

  By the time she emerged from behind the curtain, she could hear Sianadh’s laughing voice filling the room with Ertish banter, and his nephew Liam’s quick replies. Muirne, setting pancakes and redcurrant sauce on the table with small, neat hands, did not raise her auburn head. Seven thin braids, like rats’ tails or sleeve-lacings, had been randomly plaited into the carnelian tresses around her face. Tiny colored beads adorned the length of them.

  The room was spacious, clean, and filled with a fascinating assortment of things. On the flagstone floor, fresh rushes had been strewn. Overhead, a horn lantern swung among bunches of dried leaves and flowers that dangled from low, smoke-blackened rafters. Wall-hooks supported a row of dented saucepans. Beside the oven and fireplace at the back, a door and a sunny window gave on to a courtyard. In the opposite corner, the foot of a bed showed from behind another curtain. Along one wall, benches and shelves were laden with a profusion of assorted objects and pungent ingredients: mortars and pestles of several sizes, spoons, sieves, a rack of knives, string, squares of cloth, stoppered bottles and jars, labeled, a small hand-mill, jugs, measures, cruets, a funnel, bowls, tongs, balances, scales, and other artifacts of the same ilk. Among this farrago crowded mounds of vegetation fresh and dried; leaves, stems, roots, berries, bark, flowers, seeds, nuts, fungous growths, grasses, seedpods, stalks, and grains.

  Central to the room stood a large table, well scrubbed, upon which a fair proportion of the bench’s contents had encroached at one end, the other presumably being kept free for dining. Along each side of it, settles of unplaned oak provided ample seating. A partition screened the room’s front end, which could be penetrated through a curtained aperture to reach the tiny shop and the front door, which opened straight onto Bergamot Street with a clang of a bell.

  Ethlinn’s hands wove signs.

  “My mother asks if ye will be seated at our table to break your fast,” said Liam, bowing slightly, stiffly. There was no hint of sarcasm in his bearing, nothing but respectful curiosity in his gaze. What had Sianadh told them of her? What, indeed, did he know of her?

  “Now, chehrna, just for your sake, we shall use only common tongue and handspeak,” said her companion of the road, “but not until we have downed a goodly portion of this fine fare. A quiet table be a busy table, and by me the cooking of Eth and Birdie here was ever beloved.”

  But the Ertishman’s high jollity could scarcely contain itself, and it was not long before he was regaling the diners with the tale of his embarrassment at the hands of the little folk—the miniature siofra, or fanes, as they were sometimes called—at their glamour-fair. The story lost nothing in the telling, and soon all diners rocked with mirth. Then a bell rang and Muirne rose swiftly.

  “I shall see to it, Mother.” She went behind the leather curtain to the screened-off front of the room. Presently she returned carrying an apron full of plums.

  “A scald,” she said. “I made up the poultice.” <> her mother signed.

  “And how long did it take ye to make the base for that poultice?” asked Sianadh. His sister shrugged.

  “I’ll wager it took hours, gathering, washing, drying, pounding, brewing, straining, and suchlike, and look what it got for ye, tambalai—a few plums. Nay, Sparrow-Bird. I be not at odds with ye, I know the fees your mother sets—ye were just abiding by her wish. But she charges far too little, allus has, and works too hard.” He sighed. “Ah, but all that has changed now, and it be time for the telling.”

  Muirne deposited the plums in a dish.

  “See, Imrhien here,” said Sianadh, leaning on the table confidingly, “she be a lady of means. She was traveling to Tarv to get a cure for paradox poisoning, but her bodyguard met with some misfortune. Luckily I chanced along, and here we be. Ye do not have to go telling all and sundry about her visit, she wants no song and dance, just a cure.” Imrhien nodded. Sianadh had a unique way of framing his explanations.

  Ethlinn signed a complicated message to her daughter.

  “At once?” the lass asked. The carlin nodded. “My mother has asked Muirne to go on an errand,” explained Liam. Muirne removed her apron and took up a basket and some coppers from a crock on the mantelpiece. Then she was gone, pulling on her taltry. The inevitable bell signaled her departure.

  “Now we can really talk,” said Sianadh. “Meaning no offense to the Sparrow, but what she does not know cannot harm her. Ethlinn and I spoke together last night when ye young ’uns were abed, and by the end of it we agreed that ye, Liam boyo, and ye only, should know the full truth of the matter.”

  “Ye do me a kindness, Uncle.”

  “Never. I know ye can make yourself useful, that is all. The rest of the matter that concerns ye be this—I came upon a lost treasure out there in the Lofties, a treasure of moonrafter and candlebutter and baubles so busy, ye cannot even dream of it. Imrhien kind of opened the doors to it, and we brought some back with us. Half of it belongs to her—we saved each other’s hides at whiles all along the way—but believe me, a tenth part of it, a thousandth part of it, would keep us all in luxury all our born days.”

  “Mother of Warriors!” exclaimed Liam. “So ’tis to be rich, we are, is it?” He jumped up and danced a little jig around the room, his mother and uncle smiling on his enthusiasm. “Rich at last!” crowed the young man. “After being dirt poor for centuries. At last we shall have all the good things we deserve.”

  “Deserve!” Sianadh barked. “Deserve! Boyo, did your mother never tell ye what our granny’s wise words were on that matter?”

  Liam ceased his hopping and eyed his uncle inquiringly.

  “She used to say nobody deserves aught in this world,” said Sianadh. “Naught, neither good nor bad. Ye get what ye get, and that’s the way of it. Those who talk of deserving or not deserving only end up with a chip on their shoulder.”

  “Ach, whatever,” Liam said lightly, sitting himself down again. Sianadh winked conspiratorially at Imrhien.

  “Hearken, boyo, point yer lugs this way. I be going back with an expedition to get more, a big haul, and I need your help. Ethlinn tells me that since last I was here my old cronies have drifted away—there be only one left of the trusty few, but he be crooked with a broken shoulder from some scrape with mercenaries in an alehouse. So I need your strong arms, boyo, and half a dozen trusty lads.”

  “But if ’tis sildron, then surely it belongs by rights to the King-Emperor?”

  “Now, do not go getting like your brother, Liam, this be the Bear you be talking to. Sure and the King-Emperor’s got more Rusty Jack’s Friend than ye could think of and would not be wanting more. But after we take all we want, we will let the King-Emperor’s Royal Court know that we have suddenly discovered a stack of riches and we ain’t touched a penny. They may claim the rest, barring the reward they would give us, of course. There be some things too big for us to take, and besides, I would rather these riches fell into the right hands, the hands of ourselves and good King James and the Dainnan, not into the clutches of bloodthirsty reivers. Ain’t that right, chehrna?”

  “By all means, Uncle,” Liam interjected eagerly. “I can drum up the boys we need for such an expedition, in no time at all!”

  “Aye—good lad. But before we set out, none of them must know the treasure exists. It be vital that there be no ch
ance of word leaking out into the city, and no matter how trusty your comrades may be, they be only mortal, and the tongues of mortals may slip. Tell them that ’tis a rich foreigner’s hunting expedition and that we are to meet this sporting noble somewhere upriver.”

  “Ye ask me to lie to my comrades?”

  “I demand that ye lie to them, or else there shall be no expedition. None but we four here at this table must know about what lies under Waterstair—not even your brother or your sister must know. Later there shall be time enough to reveal all, but not until we have taken all we need for ourselves. Now swear to secrecy, Liam.”

  The youth looked at his mother, who nodded.

  “For ye, and for riches, I swear it,” he said. “When do we start?”

  “As soon as ye have gathered a company and provisions have been purchased.”

  “And are ye to accompany us, Lady Imrhien?”

  She began to nod her head, but Sianadh cut across the gesture with a word.

  “Nay! Chehrna, the wilderness be no place for lasses. Remain in safety—I shall bring back your share, to be sure.”

  The girl frowned, shaking her head.

  Gently he said, “Remain here and undergo the cure ye have wished for. Ethlinn, can ye give her back her rightful face?”

  Imrhien held her breath. She saw the woman’s shoulders sag slightly, as though Sianadh had placed a burden on them. After a moment she signed to her son.

  “My mother says that she cannot help. Her Wand is powerful, but it may not safely cure such a bad case of paradox without possibly causing scarring,” Liam interpreted.

  <> Ethlinn signed.

  “A Daughter of the Winter Sun, that means a Carlin,” explained Sianadh. “The Carlin of whom my sister speaks is very great, perhaps the most powerful of all carlins, Maeve One-Eye. But where might she be, Eth? She travels, does she not, and is never in one place for longer than a season?”