A Meeting At Corvallis

by S. M. Stirling

  It was easy to laugh, on a bright morning like this, with the sun breaking off on polished metal and bright on dyed cloth as pennants snapped, and he had a good little Arab under him—though nothing like Epona of course—one of a pair Mathilda's mother had brought out last week in a brief whirlwind visit …

  Matti's still happy with it, he thought. And I miss Mom and home so much. He squared his shoulders. Well, you're a warrior of the Clan. Act like it!

  They rode northward down towards Carpenter Creek from the castle gate, along a dirt road that ran through sloping orchards of pear and peach, plum, nectarine, cherry and apple. All were in some stage of their blossom-time now, in a froth of pink and white, drenching the mild spring air until they were almost giddy with the scent and the buzzing of countless bees, and petals drifted over them like snow with every gust of wind. The crimson clover beneath the trees was in blossom too, and the grassy verges by the side of the road were thick with wildflowers, the daffodils fading but camas bright blue, chicory the darker color of the eastern sky at sunset; taller bracts of henbit reddish purple, all thick with hummingbirds and sphinx moths feeding on nectar.

  Birds of all kinds swarmed, familiar friends from Dun Juniper; a red-tailed hawk watching them pass from the branch of a roadside tree, the majesty of a bald eagle wheeling high overhead, jays calling raucously from the bright new leaves of the cottonwoods and alders and bigleaf maples beside the stream, pintail ducks on the spring-swollen waters that tumbled down from the low mountains to the west …

  They turned upstream, in a clopping of hooves and clink of horse harness, creaking of saddle leather and the rhythmic rustling chink of chain mail, the bright morning sun casting their long shadows ahead of them. Past the orchards the field on their left was plowed and harrowed dirt, raked every two feet with furrows where a team was planting quartered potatoes, along with dollops of fertilizer. That was familiar from home too, and the oxcart full of the seed stock and another bigger one of stable-muck, and even the cauldron bubbling over a fire.

  The workers who had been at it since dawn weren't homelike at all; glum and quiet, though they'd stopped to eat the morning meal, a score of scarecrow figures—even those who owned better clothes now didn't wear them for field work. Many wore pre-Change clothing, ranging from rags to overalls still fairly intact, if frequently patched. They stopped and rose and bowed or curtsied at the sight of the lady of Ath and her party, leaving a litter of spades and hoes and buckets where they'd been sitting.

  Rudi winced at the look they gave the well-dressed riders and the armored men behind them; he recognized hopeless fear and throttled anger, and something like dull awe among the teenagers, and even the young children brought along so their parents could mind them as they worked. A few looked excited at the break in routine—except for a couple still at their mothers' breasts, of course. One ginger-haired, pug-nosed young man of about twenty was rather cleaner than most and much better dressed, in modern Portlander linsey-woolsey breeches and shirt, t-tunic and knit cap; he had a broad smile that didn't reach his eyes as he swept the cap off and bowed, and his nostrils showed like caves.

  Tiphaine reined in and turned her white courser aside; Rudi noted how its hooves sank silently in the soft turned earth once they were off the packed dirt and gravel of the roadway, and how much deeper the destriers of the mail-clad men-at-arms did as they followed; the crossbowmen spread out behind them in a semicircle, leaving him and Mathilda and Delia to peer between. A couple of short spears and the bow allowed free-tenants—no stave longer than four feet, no pull heavier than thirty pounds—leaned against one of the carts. That and farm tools would do against coyotes, dog packs and sneak thieves; there were no bandit gangs within striking distance, and tigers would rarely attack a group of humans, though they were dangerous to lone travelers in the wild. A few bundles or backpacks lay there as well, one with the heel of a loaf sticking out of the cloth wrapping, another with a dead rabbit beside it, probably shot on the way to work in the gloaming before dawn and intended for lunch. It wouldn't go far among twenty.

  "This field is demesne land," Tiphaine said, in that water-over-smooth-rocks tone. "And these are tenants doing boon-work, aren't they? And you're Keith Anton, son of the Montinore bailiff?"

  He nodded and bowed profoundly, cap in hand. "Yes, my lady," he said, the same fixed smile on his face. "I'm overseeing the planting of this field for you."

  "Then stop grinning and hand me up a bowl of that and a spoon," she said crisply, flicking the riding crop she held in her right hand towards the cauldron.

  The young man looked surprised, but he ran to obey. "Not bad oatmeal porridge," she said, handing it back to him after a considering mouthful. "There's some milk in there."

  One of the fieldworkers, an older man with a graying brown beard, spoke: "There wasn't before you got here, miss. Uh, my liege."

  A man-at-arms sitting his mount behind her stirred, and lifted the butt of his eleven-foot lance from the ring riveted to his right stirrup-iron.

  "Watch your manners, dog!" he barked, the voice blurred and menacing through the mail coif whose flap covered his mouth; only his eyes showed, dark and angry on either side of the helmet's nasal bar. "And keep your place!"

  Tiphaine held out a hand in a soothing gesture as the farmers cringed. "Easy, Bors, easy. His village hasn't had a resident lord. They're old-fashioned. You can't expect them to know modern manners yet."

  She turned her face back to the tenant-farmer, who was looking as if he wished the earth would swallow him, or as if he wished very much he'd kept his mouth shut.

  "You don't say my liege … " Tiphaine paused and raised a brow.

  "Uh, S-s-steve Collins, mmm, Lady Tiphaine. Bond-tenant."

  "—to me, Collins," she went on, and used the crop to point around at the armed men behind her. "They say 'my liege,' and their families do. They're Association warriors and my vassals, my menie, my fighting-tail. You bond-tenants just say 'Lady Tiphaine' or 'my lady d'Ath,' or 'your worship.' I prefer 'my lady,' plain and simple. Now go on."

  The man licked his lips; he had glasses on, clumsily patched where one earpiece had broken, the hinge replaced by a lump of sugar-pine gum. "Uh … I hold sixteen acres on Montinore, and my due is three days a week on the demesne, and this is the first month in the last ten years we haven't done our boon-work hungry. It used to be just oatmeal and water and salt, and only two bowls of it in a damn long day at that. Anything extra you brought yourself. Now it's better and we can get seconds. I think this … Keith … and his father had some sort of deal cooked with the steward, Wielman, to keep what we should have gotten, until you came and they were too scared. Thanks, uh, my lady d'Ath."

  "You're welcome, Collins." She turned to the bailiffs son. "I'm not going to ask too many questions about what happened before I took seizin of the fief," she said carefully. "But the law says that peons, and tenants doing boon-work, are entitled to be fed twice a day when they're working demesne land, fed 'full and sufficient' meals."

  He bobbed his reddish-sandy head and his hands made unconscious washing motions around each other.

  "Yes, your … my lady. You can see, there's plenty for everyone here, good and hot, and a barrel of clean water. And a break at nine for breakfast and an hour for dinner at one-thirty, and a rest every couple of hours, and nobody kept past the time you can tell a white thread from a black."

  She nodded. "That's all very well, Goodman, but men aren't horses; you can't expect them to work all day on oats. I don't want a harvest-home feast laid on every day—

  An anonymous snort said that the harvest feast hadn't been much to talk about, either. Tiphaine ignored it.

  "—but there should be soup or stew for midday, lentils or beans or barley with vegetables and some meat in it for the taste—sausage, or salt pork, or chicken. And a two-pound loaf of whole meal for each grown worker, and butter and cheese. And some beer; enough for a pint or two each. It's your family's responsibility to organize things
like that; it's what you give for the reduced dues. See that it's done starting tomorrow. Draw on the Montinore manor storehouses as needed."

  "You should check on whether he does it, my lady," Delia called suddenly from the rear. "He'd skin a louse for the hide, that one, and his dad's no better."

  Keith Anton evidently hadn't realized who it was behind the iron wall of the men-at-arms and under her broad-brimmed straw hat; he went white as he recognized her, flushed, started to say something, then looked at the ground again, crushing the cap between strong, calloused fingers.

  "Look at me, man," Tiphaine said quietly. When he did: "Do not let me hear that I've been disobeyed, or you'll get a whipping and a day in the stocks, with your father beside you. Steal from me and it'll be worse. Understood?"

  "Yes, my lady d'Ath. I'd never disobey my overlord, your worship."

  "No, I don't suppose you would," Tiphaine said.

  She lifted her voice slightly to take in the other workers, who stood staring at her wide-eyed. "Now listen to me; I'm your overlord, not your mother, or a priest. But I intend that the law shall be followed—to the inch. Tattletales who waste my time will go away sorry and sore, but whoever has a legitimate grievance can come and tell me about it. Understood?"

  There was a mutter of agreement and bobbing nods. Rudi thought a few of the smiles were even genuine this time.

  The party moved on; two crossbowmen riding well ahead, then Lady Tiphaine, then the two men-at-arms, Bors and Fayard—Association people tended to have strange names, he'd found, something about an old Society custom—then him and Matti and Delia, and then the varlet with the packhorses, and two more crossbowmen bringing up the rear.

  Delia was beaming—she rode with the children, of course, and was theoretically there to serve them, for propriety's sake by local custom. She called out: "My lady!" Tiphaine turned in the saddle. "I thought you said you were evil?"

  "I didn't say I was stupid, girl," she replied, grinning for a moment before she turned back to the front again; it made her rather stern face light up and look younger than her twenty-four years.

  "When my lady said she'd give us good lordship, she meant it, your highness!" Delia said happily to Mathilda, who liked her. "Things are going to be a lot better here now! We needed a real lord, one who could keep people like Keith and his father and the steward honest."

  Mathilda nodded agreement. "My mom and dad can pick them," she said proudly. "My mom raised Lady Tiphaine in her own Household, you know."

  When the others looked at him, Rudi said carefully: "She's certainly very smart. She knows what she's doing."

  Which had the advantage of being truth that wouldn't hurt anyone's feelings, particularly not people he liked like Matti, and Delia was nice too, and a Witch here where it was a hard and dangerous thing to be. But …

  Who's going to keep a lord honest if they don't want to be? People shouldn't have to cringe like that. It's not right, he thought, remembering the raucous assemblies of the Clan. Nobody's scared when Mom talks to them … not like that, at least. And they shouldn't have to lick someone's hand like a frightened dog just for not being treated badly. Tiphaine isn't as bad as she could be, but she shouldn't be able to do that. The Law should be above everyone.

  Tiphaine looked over her shoulder again and gave him a raised eyebrow and a quirking smile. She'd heard, even two horses away and with all the clatter, and she'd known what he meant. Rudi made a small thumb-to-nose gesture and she shook an admonishing finger at him, then turned back.

  The plowed field gave way to a meadow with forested hills rising on either side, like lobes stretching down towards the creek; he shook off gloom as he and Mathilda and Delia laughed at the antics of the lambs. Then they turned southward—left—onto the forest tracks. At first there were abundant signs of humankind, stumps and woodchips, the tracks of oxcarts and horses, an old gravel-pit overgrown with brush and half-full of water green with algae, and a four-by-four light truck abandoned ten years ago, overgrown. Birds exploded out of the rusted hulk's broken windows as they passed, small and blue-headed with mauve underparts.

  Nobody was there right now, and soon the scented green twilight glow of untouched deep woods closed around them, mostly tall second-growth Douglas fir, grand fir and western hemlock in rough-barked brown columns seventy feet high and better, their branches meeting overhead. He could see off a fair distance, though there was undergrowth; yew with its orange sapwood showing through gaps in the loose purplish bark, the delicately contorted branches of vine maple, nodding sword fern taller than he was; bushy Indian plum with its bunches of hanging white flowers, yellow violets and fawn lily with its golden core and rose pink blossoms. Insects darted through, their wings catching in an occasional slanting ray of sunlight, dragonflies soaring among them like glittering cobalt blue flying wolves; a squirrel ran like a streak of living silver-gray up a tree trunk and around it, then peered back at him, chattering anger.

  Sorry, little brother, just passing through, he thought. Peace between us now.

  Aloud to Mathilda, he went on: "You know, it's odd how you can tell morning sunlight from afternoon even in thick forest. Even if you don't know which way east or west is."

  "Yeah," Mathilda answered. "It's sort of … newer, somehow, in the morning. Brighter even when it isn't."

  Delia was simply clinging to her saddle—she rode badly, and had been put on a contented old plug that would walk obediently with the other horses— and looked around in awe. He'd been shocked to learn she'd seldom been beyond the edge of the forest, though she'd lived near here since she was his age.

  And her a member of a coven! he thought. Of course, we haven't had much chance to talk about that. And she has to keep it real secret. I bet she can't even tell Tiphaine. That must hurt.

  He'd always found people in love a bit ridiculous—even Mom and Sir Nigel, who were more sensible about it than most, got all spoony.

  But then, I'm too young to really know about it. Never make fun of the Lady's gifts! Bad luck, bad luck, three times three, bad luck. Mock them now, lose them later!

  He made a gesture of aversion, the Horns pointed down. They broke out of the tall forest, into what had been a clear-cut before the Change and had burned in a wildfire since; now it was spring meadow like a living carpet before the horses' feet. Tiphaine whistled and pointed for them to turn, and they rode upward, through grass high enough to brush the horsemen's stirrups, full of tall blue lupine and yellow western buttercup. The wind was in their faces, strong with the scent of the forests that rolled from here to the Pacific, when they came over the sharp crest of the hill and into the path of a herd of elk walking the other way.

  Rudi and Mathilda whooped to see them, thirty or so big fawn-and-brown animals, and Delia clapped her hands. The crossbowmen whooped on another note, and began to unship their weapons as the herd milled for an instant, then turned and flowed away like a torrent of water downhill, squealing and barking as they went and showing the yellowish patch on their rumps.

  "No," Tiphaine d'Ath said. "Not this time of year. They're mostly pregnant females, and skinny with winter. Wait until autumn, Alan, and I promise you some sport."

  "There were a couple of nice fat yearling bucks and does, my lady," the corporal of the crossbowmen grumbled, but slung the weapon again. "There's nothing like fresh elk liver right out of the beast and onto a fire in the woods."

  Tiphaine began to neck-rein her horse around, then suddenly stopped with her clenched right fist thrown up for a halt.

  "Quiet!" she said sharply.

  Everyone fell silent, the loudest sound a wet crunch as a horse bent its neck to tear off a mouthful, and the wind through the trees. Rudi closed his eyes and let his mind go quiet, with nothing to get in the way of his senses … something … no.

  "Alan, did you hear anything just then?" she asked, her voice crisp. "A horse, maybe?"

  "No, my liege," he said, shaking his head; he was an older man, a year or two past thirty, and a hun
ter in his spare time.

  Tiphaine shrugged. "Maybe a cat walked over my grave." She grinned. "In which case I should have sneezed, not shivered."

  They rode on through the meadow, and through more forest ranging from saplings to something near old growth, and then the glittering surface of the lake showed through the trees, hundreds of feet below. It was roughly a rectangle, running three miles from northwest to southeast, with tongues of water stretching into the hills that gave it the shape of a distorted gingerbread man. They had come seven miles at a gentle walk on the winding trails—Delia for one would have fallen off at anything faster—and it was a little before noon. Water glinted like hammered metal beneath them, save where the shadows of clouds drifted over the lake and turned the color intensely blue. They rode down to the water, where there was a recently repaired dock, a gazebo, and an aluminum canoe left upside-down beneath it. Mostly the shores were very steep, forested hills running straight into deep water.

  "So, what'll we do first?" Rudi said happily. "Swim, fish?"

  "Can I just sit for a while?" Delia said, rubbing her thighs in between unloading folding chairs and pillows. "Sit on something soft that doesn't move, that is. I don't see why you castle people like riding so much, my lady."

  The soldiers grinned, but didn't say the things they usually would. Rudi was glad. He didn't mind bawdy humor even when he didn't see the point, and there was plenty of it back home, but here it had an edge he didn't like at all, or fully understand.

  Tiphaine smiled slightly. "If we're going to swim, we should have a fire ready for when we get out. The water's cold."

  They built one a little way up the shore—the soldiers and the varlet had to take turns going well away for their dip, and stand at a distance with their backs turned while Rudi and the others came up out of the water to warm themselves near the fire.