Moons' Dreaming (Children of the Rock)

by Krause, Marguerite

  “I am that,” Jordy agreed dourly. “There are one or two in any village who will be tempted by greed. I’ve been speaking only to those I know well, and respect.”

  “And?”

  “It’s going well. Better than I thought it would,” he admitted grudgingly. “Thanks to the prince, as a matter of fact. He’s pushing, laddie. Pushing everywhere. As I expect you’re aware.”

  “The conscriptions, you mean?”

  “And the extra taxing, as your corporals will have it. Stealing, I call it.”

  “So do I, Jordy,” Dael reminded him. “None of those troops are sent by me. There’s no longer a single king’s guard in Rhenlan, although Damon doesn’t know I’ve noticed that. There are some who report to Damon directly. I know who they are, or who most of them are.”

  Jordy’s grouchiness was replaced by worry. “This is dangerous for you.”

  “I know. I keep friendly with Damon’s favorites. Just as I’m still on the best of terms with Damon. I think I’ve identified his chief informer. A stableman named Palim.”

  “Watch him, lad. Watch all of them.”

  “Every minute,” Dael agreed.

  Jordy looked out over the lake. Dael concentrated on eating, using the tea to wash down half a gravy-soaked biscuit at a time. His mother would have nagged him to chew his food. The thought of her cheered him somewhat. He popped the last biscuit into his mouth whole. Gravy leaked out of the corner of his mouth, and he ducked his head to catch the warm liquid on the back of his wrist.

  “You should chew your food,” Jordy commented.

  Dael started guiltily. “I’m in a hurry.” The excuse had never worked at home, but it was all he could think of.

  “A wife would feed you properly. Keep you out of inns, on a sensible schedule,” the carter suggested.

  “Not for me.”

  Jordy tilted his head toward the serving girl, busy behind the bar. “You don’t lack for interested suitors.”

  “They’re interested. I’m not. The only one I ever cared for is long gone.”

  The carter, thank the gods, made no answer to that. He stood and stretched. “I’m leaving for home first thing tomorrow. I’ve done all I can for this year. The winter will keep me in Broadford.”

  “You’ve planted the seeds,” Dael assured him. “We’ll see what the spring brings.”

  “Look for me before Spring Festival, if the weather is mild.” With a wave, he left.

  Dael leaned back in his chair. More biscuits? He wasn’t sure whether or not to look forward to their next talk. At least he wouldn’t have to bear sad tidings again. He hoped.

  * * *

  “Just because I’m Dherrican doesn’t mean I like the cold,” Ivey grumbled as he shrugged a light cloak across his shoulders. Mist floated on the still surface of the water between the shore and the ship, tendrils stretching up to seep across the sand where they’d made camp. Overhead, a few lonely gulls circled the ship, complaining bitterly, white bodies barely visible against a pewter sky.

  Chasa looked up at them. “Don’t blame me. Weather is Aage’s responsibility, and he’s not here.”

  Ivey rummaged through his pack. “There’s a heavier shirt in here somewhere.”

  As Ivey added shoes to the pile of odds and ends beside him, Chasa said, “You’ve acquired a whole new wardrobe. Having your help is expensive.”

  “Expensive?” Ivey regarded him skeptically. “Passage on that weather-beaten excuse for a ship and a few new personal items isn’t much compensation for my fearless company in battle.”

  Chasa snorted. Unlike their battle with the sea monster, yesterday’s encounter had been nothing like a real fight. They’d found the reported Abstainers, but the band of dangerous marauders had turned out to be five thoroughly insane old people in a leaky fishing boat. He’d killed three with his javelins before they could draw alongside, then leaped across the gap between the rails, sword in hand, and dispatched the other two with more mercy than Abstainers deserved. Ivey had watched the entire episode from the boat. It had not been a battle. It had been an extermination. It was all that could be done when Abstainers started preying on settled folk, but Chasa had never learned to like doing it.

  Now the task was finished. They had anchored on the coast west of Cross Cove, only a few days’ overland travel from Edian. Ivey was eager to resume his usual life.

  Chasa was not.

  He dreaded Raisal. He didn’t want to walk back into that house, into a farcical situation which everyone else pretended not to be aware of. No, not everyone else. But the one person who counted insisted on ignoring it. Ignoring him.

  Someone else was ignoring the problem, too. Chasa forced back the surge of anger that rose within him. No. He was not going to think about Dad.

  A long-fingered, callused hand dropped onto his shoulder. “Let’s have breakfast,” Ivey suggested. “We need to talk.”

  Chasa followed him to the campfire. The aroma of fresh fish and brown biscuits caused his stomach to rumble. The ship’s cook deftly slid hot breaded fish and the round biscuits from the pans onto wooden plates, which he handed to Chasa and the minstrel. Nodding his thanks, Chasa silently followed Ivey away from the fire to a flat-topped rock near the high tide line.

  Ivey attacked the food with enthusiasm. Between mouthfuls, he said, “I thought you’d be hungry.”

  Chasa lifted his gaze. “I thought you wanted to talk.”

  Ivey popped one more piece of biscuit into his mouth, then licked his fingers. “About the girl,” he said.

  “Which one?”

  “Not mine.” Ivey leaned forward on the rock, plate balanced on his knees. “Nothing to talk about. We’re going to enjoy married life, though she hasn’t asked me yet.” He smiled. “Keepers need convincing about everything. The convincing can be quite pleasant. Take your girl, for example.”

  A heavy pause fell between them. Finally Chasa said, “Was that a joke?”

  Ivey didn’t move. “It was advice. From an almost-married man much your elder.”

  “Four years isn’t much,” Chasa corrected him.

  “More experienced, then. With Keeper women. I’ve been watching you and Feather. Your behavior makes no sense to me. Are you betrothed, or aren’t you?”

  “Good question.” Chasa picked the coating off a piece of fish, the grease warm and slippery on his fingertips. “She doesn’t remember me.”

  “What’s that got to do with it? Feather doesn’t need to remember some child she once played with. She needs to get to know the man you are now. If you want her, that is.”

  “Of course I want her!”

  Ivey sat back. “Why?”

  “Another good question.” Chasa looked out over the gray water, still fidgeting with the fish. “She’s concise. Funny. She makes Dad laugh.” He wasn’t going to think about Dad.

  Chasa forced his mind back to the list of Feather’s good points. “She’s beautiful. She’ll be a strong consort, someone who’ll help Jeyn and me run the kingdom someday. The staff all like her. Jeyn likes her.” Dad likes her. Stop thinking about Dad!

  “That’s all very rational,” Ivey said with dry approval. “A woman with attributes like that deserves to be recommended for Brownmother training.”

  “She already is a Brownmother.”

  “Yes—but are any of those reasons to marry?”

  “I like her. I love her!”

  Ivey nodded. “Actually, I noticed.”

  “She doesn’t.”

  “Well, you never show her!”

  “How can I? She doesn’t like me.”

  “She doesn’t know you.”

  The words jolted him. She didn’t know him, didn’t remember him. That was the whole problem. “So what am I supposed to do?”

  “Go get her,” Ivey advised. “A lass likes to be courted.”

  “Is that what you did with Jeyn?”

  Ivey’s smile was reminiscent. “No, lad. She got me.” He fingered the pale blue material
of his cloak. “She appealed to a sense of luxury I didn’t know I had. Think of something that’ll appeal to your Feather.”

  Chasa gazed into the mist obscuring the landscape. Something to appeal to Feather.

  What could he give her his father couldn’t?

  Chapter 32

  Vray straightened with a sigh from the washtub. Several strands of damp hair fell in front of her nose. She pushed them aside with the back of her forearm, wiping the sweat from her face in the process. The day was cool, but the hard work had warmed her.

  “Pepper, you can go down to the village after we finish this.”

  The mornings had started to bring frost. There was no telling how much longer they’d be able to use the clotheslines strung across the yard. Vray didn’t think that clothes dried in a wash house or before the hearth had quite the same quality as those dried in the fresh air. She was determined to get everyone’s warm clothing washed and ready for use before the snow arrived.

  “How much longer?” Pepper insisted.

  “Never, if you don’t take that pile of skirts up to our room and bring me Matti’s tunic.”

  Pepper gathered up the clean clothes, each motion slow and grudging. “I don’t know where it is.”

  “Look for it.”

  “But—”

  “Go!”

  Vray removed the last of the bedclothes from the water and carried them to the wringer, water dripping on the wooden floor. The wet coolness chilled her feet. The sheet fell from the wringer onto the top of the now-full basket, which she then lifted and carried out to the line.

  Pepper wandered out onto the porch, waving a scrap of blue. “This one?”

  “That one.”

  “What should I do with it?”

  Vray gritted her teeth. “Put it in the washtub!” They had been repeating this scene once a nineday since she’d taken over the family washing. Laundry was one chore Pepper simply hated. It would have been faster—and easier—to do the work without her, but Jordy had been firm about Pepper’s having to help.

  Pepper drifted back toward the house. “Then can I go?”

  “Yes, then you can go.”

  A few seconds later Pepper tore down the hill. Vray watched her go, wishing she could join her. It had been a bright morning but the afternoon was growing cold. Heavy clouds hung overhead, dull and threatening. The gloomy skies didn’t help Vray’s loneliness. How Cyril could sit for hours at her loom, isolated from even trivial conversation, was incomprehensible.

  “Later,” Vray promised herself. “I’ll go see Canis.” She draped the first sheet over the line. No wind. That was convenient, at least.

  As she finished, a man’s voice called, “Anyone home?”

  Vray stepped away from the laundry to peer toward the road. The familiar voice didn’t belong to anyone in the village, which frightened her for a moment. The man who rode up the path on a black horse had curly brown hair, tied back off his neck. The leather-encased neck of a guitar was visible over his shoulder. His eyes lit with a smile when he saw her by the wash line.

  “Hello! Remember me?” he asked as he dismounted.

  “Ivey. Hello.” Vray looked at the minstrel’s travel-stained shirt and cloak, and at the bulky pack slung tied to the saddle horn, her mind still on washing. If he’d come to stay, she would end up doing his laundry, too.

  “Where is everyone?”

  “The girls are off playing. Cyril’s inside.”

  He stopped a respectable distance from the clean clothing on the line, and put his pack down beside him. She tried not to look dismayed, but his widening smile proved she’d betrayed herself somehow.

  “Don’t worry. I’m not staying. Just wanted to see how you are.”

  She stepped away from him. “Cold.” The word sounded angry, and she wasn’t. At the Spring Festival, the minstrel had shown that he was concerned about her welfare, though she didn’t know why. She wanted to accept him as a friend. She certainly didn’t need another enemy. “Other than that, I’m fine, thank you.”

  “You’re looking much better.”

  She tugged at her wet skirt. “I look like a dishrag.”

  He laughed. “Laundry does that to people.”

  He looked around the empty yard. Then his eyes met hers. “I’m here on business for the king of Sitrine. Any messages?”

  Vray stared at him. The king. In Raisal. She had purposefully stopped thinking about kingdoms and their rulers years ago. “Messages? From me?”

  “To King Sene.”

  A chill unrelated to the weather prickled her skin. “He knows about me?”

  “I think he knows everything,” Ivey said lightly. “I try to keep him informed.”

  Vray folded her arms tightly across her chest. “I think you should leave now,” she told the suddenly dangerous-seeming man. Any man working for a king could be dangerous. She’d lived long enough in Hion’s court to learn that much before she was sent away. She’d learned quite a lot about all three kingdoms, considering she’d been fourteen and not in the king’s favor.

  Ivey spread his hands. The gesture of harmless appeal made her all the more nervous. “What did I say?”

  “Is Sene going to tell my brother where I am?”

  “Certainly not!” Was his outrage real? Or simply an example of his storyteller’s art? “He doesn’t like your brother. You’re safe here. As safe as you can be anywhere in Rhenlan. This is where the Dreamers want you to be.”

  Vray’s head began to ache. How had her nice, quiet afternoon of backbreaking work gone awry? Think, girl, she chided herself. She hadn’t been thinking about survival lately. It was time to resume that habit.

  “I have no news for any king.” she told him, stiff with caution.

  “Well, the king has a message for you.”

  Vray hugged herself tightly. When she remained silent, the minstrel went on, “He asks that you begin to consider your choices. You’re safe and where the Dreamers want you, but is it where you want to be?” A teasing smile brightened his face. “I think I remembered all of it, Redmother.”

  She wished she could put him and everything he’d said out of her mind, but that was a luxury lost to Redmothers. Besides, something in his words was too uncomfortable for her to ignore.

  “Choices?”

  Ivey said, “What would you like to do?”

  Keep away from my brother, she thought bleakly. Ivey probably knew that already. After all, he was a messenger for Sene of Sitrine, who knows everything.

  “I don’t know,” she admitted softly.

  He accepted her statement without censure. “How much have you heard about what’s gone on in the world in the last three years?”

  “We never discussed policy in the scullery at Soza. I don’t know anything.”

  “You’ve got an opportunity here to find out what you missed.”

  “From you?”

  “You don’t need me. You’re a carter’s daughter. He must hear all sorts of news, meet with all sorts of fascinating people, in the course of a summer.”

  She shrugged. “To hear his neighbors talk, he does.”

  The minstrel took a step back to pat his horse’s neck.

  “Jordy,” he said in his light, conversational way, “is the most well-traveled, well-informed man in the three kingdoms. Excepting myself, of course.”

  “Of course.” She peered into his face. “Minstrel, what are we talking about? What do you—what does Sene—expect from me?”

  “Just remember, Jordy’s horse and cart go everywhere.”

  Pepper, followed by a herd of children, came racing up the road from the village. Somebody spotted Ivey and called out his name. Shouts of delight at the prospect of songs and stories shattered the stillness of the afternoon.

  “Looks like you’re going to be busy,” Vray said. “And I’d better get back to work.”

  “Think about it,” he challenged her as the crowd of children surrounded him. Amid noisy questions and requests, Ivey mou
nted his horse, pulling the youngest of the children up behind him. He set off, followed by the rest of the crowd.

  Vray watched them go, wishing she didn’t remember every word he’d spoken. As for thinking about his words, she would. Eventually. When she was ready. Today she wasn’t ready. She turned and hurried back into the wash house. The prospect of housework and solitude—and, later, Redmother tales for squabbling little girls, and Cyril’s mercifully unquestioning silence—seemed no longer a burden, but a haven.

  * * *

  Chasa yawned as he followed his father through the house. His father had wakened him with the announcement that he wanted to get to the practice yard in the cool of the day. Chasa agreed, in theory, but wished the king hadn’t persuaded him to get out of bed quite so early. His ship had just gotten in the night before, and he wasn’t rested yet. He hardly noticed when they turned to take a short cut through the reception room. He did notice that they were suddenly surrounded by a great many busy people. Alert at last, he looked around the big room. From all the activity, he guessed today was one of Raisal’s gathering days. In addition to holding midsummer and midwinter gatherings like smaller towns, Raisal’s larger population required additional days for vow taking. Chasa edged toward the wall behind his father, trying to weave between the tables which a small horde of servants were setting up without getting in the way.

  “No, put that over there!” Feather’s impatient demand echoed slightly against the hardwood floor of the reception hall. “The Redmother has to stand where everyone can see her, and she’ll want the bowl within reach. What do you expect her to do, stand on a chair?”

  The chastised servant hastily transferred the large bowl he was carrying to the table Feather indicated.

  Sene beamed at the chaos. “Coming along nicely,” he called to Feather.

  She had to step around a servant in order to locate them. “Are you here to help?”

  “No, ma’am, just passing through,” the king replied. “You seem to have the gathering well organized.”