The White Hart

by Nancy Springer

  With a scream of fury, Night Storm scrambled to his feet. Never, from the time he was a tiny foal, had he met with any treatment but deepest respect. Now his only thought was to crush, maim, kill the one who had done this indignity—but the man was not within his reach. A weight was on his back, and a coldly mocking voice said, “Now, you coward, run!” And, unbelievably, the sword struck again.

  Night Storm whirled away like the wind of his name. He did not realize that day had dawned, that the blackness before his eyes was not the blackness of night. Blinded by exhaustion, hatred and shame, he ran until he felt his heart would burst. He ran for fear of the punishing sword. He ran in unreasoning hope of leaving the terrible man behind. He burned with mortification and the angry desire to prove his greatness, to win revenge with his own suffering and death. He ran until, incredibly, he was pulled to a stop. But his legs which could still carry him along would not support him, standing. Blackness engulfed him as he fell gently to the ground, conscious of nothing until Corin woke him.

  Miles away, darkness had come before Alan's eyes also. He laid down his head and entrusted to Alfie the task of taking him with all speed to Celydon.

  He came with the first sunlight of the new day. Rosemary heard the clatter of Alfie's swift hooves on the cobbles of the courtyard below, and in a few minutes Rare had helped Alan to the bedside. Alan was a ghastly sight, with blackened, bloodshot, sunken eyes in a hollow face that twitched with sleeplessness. But Hal was like a spirit barely visible in daylight. So wasted was his body that he only seemed to live in the tortured soul that cried from his gray eyes. Fever burned him like torment, but it was not that which troubled him. He still cried out softly, in unintelligible words, and would have moved if he had had the strength.

  Servants brought a brazier with boiling water, and Alan shakily placed the little flower in it, whispering words Rosemary did not understand. But she sensed it was a prayer, and bowed her head. In a moment a feeling of peace and comfort crept over her, and the anxious lines of strain fell from her face. She looked at Hal, no longer in desperate suspense, but in breathless hope; her mind's eye saw him sleeping sweetly. Alan knelt, leaning on the bed, and from under his tunic he pulled a green stone. “Lysse,” he breathed, as if to a presence in the room, “you and your people, help him.” Alan pressed the cool stone to his lips, and though his eyes showed unconsolable longing, Rosemary saw that the quivering nerves of his face had stilled.

  Hal stirred and sighed, murmuring something she did not understand, something about Adaoun. Then his lids closed gently over eyes deep and calm as a mountain lake. Alan, scarcely breathing, reached out to stroke his peaceful face, and Rosemary also came close to touch. She smoothed the pillow and drew up the covers around Hal's neck, but Alan buried his face in the blankets and wept for sheer relief. Rosemary touched his shoulder, then left him there with Rafe.

  “He is sleeping quietly,” she told her father, where he sat keeping Robin company in Corin's absence. Then, feeling not at all strange, she went to the stable, to where Arundel and Alfie shared a large box stall. “He lives,” she told them. “He lives. Do you understand me?"

  Arundel arched his lovely neck, and over the serene waters of Celydon he sent a great, ringing neigh of triumphant joy.

  Chapter Five

  Alan never remembered going to sleep after his four-day ride. When he awoke, much later, he found Rafe sitting by him anxiously, as if he were the invalid. He ducked Rafe's offers of food and hurried to Hal's chamber. Hal was awake, with Rosemary in attendance, but too weak to do more than gaze with faintly wondering eyes. Alan could see that he scarcely knew where he was.

  In the days that followed, Alan and Rosemary tended Hal constantly. Rosemary held the cup or the spoon while Alan raised the helpless head on the pillow. Alan lifted and bathed the frail body while Rosemary changed the sheets. Together they put on fresh bandages and dressing. Within a few days Hal started to mend. His wounds closed and dried, and he gained some flesh. He moved sometimes, trying to care for himself. Once in a while he whispered a few words in answer to some query of theirs. He slept most of the time. But when he woke, his eyes were puzzled, wondering how he had come from the horrors of the torture chamber to the care of these loving people.

  On the third day, Corin came back with Night Storm. Alan met him at the gates. “Hal is much better,” he told him gladly, and told it to the steed in the Elder Tongue, with fervent thanks. Stormy lifted his handsome head, and for a moment Corin's sober face glowed with happiness. Then he asked about Robin.

  “He is mending well,” answered Alan, wincing guiltily. He had only been to see Robin once. The youth had been seriously hurt, and deserved more attention from his friends, but even Corin had been torn from his side. Alan could only hope he understood. Snared in his thoughts, he burst out, “Cory, it had to be you. You had traveled that way with me, and knew the place I named."

  “Of course,” replied Corin in surprise, and peered at Alan. “Your troubles are not yet over, are they."

  “I'll take the horses to the stable,” said Alan gruffly. “You go to Robin."

  “And Hal."

  “Nay, not Hal. He is not yet ready."

  Another person came to the castle that day, anxious about Hal, a daring and unaccustomed visitor: Ket. Rafe brought him to the lady, and he was glad enough to give her his news. The kingsmen, after searching near Whitewater for a few days, had backtracked into the Forest, and Ket's men had dispatched them. Rosemary thanked him for his good tidings, but explained that Hal was not yet strong enough to see him.

  “Would it help if you spoke to him in that—that secret language of yours?” Rosemary asked Alan, privately.

  “Perhaps. But it would be like pulling a flower into bloom. He will come to himself in his own time, and his own peculiar way."

  Hal's way was to dream. He no longer slept quite so much, but spent hours staring into the distance with clouded eyes. Alan sat silently by, hours on end, as if his wordless presence could somehow be of help; he did not dare to offer any other help. Rosemary looked in on them from time to time, and then quietly went away. She sensed that she was not needed—not yet.

  Sometimes, in his trance, Hal would whisper words in the Elder Tongue, snatches of song and legend. He spoke of Bevan of Eburacon, and later of Veran, and Brand, and Brent; all the Blessed Kings. He spoke of Adaoun and Claefe, even of Lysse. Alan watched and listened day by day, waiting for the name of Mireldeyn.

  “Elwyndas,” Hal murmured. “Elwyndas, mir belledas kellarth."

  His trance broke like a thread, and he sat bolt upright with a cry; tears rolled down his face. Hastily Alan caught at him, afraid he would fall.

  “My brother, my brother!” he choked. “How could I have forgotten!” He stared wildly into Alan's eyes, and Alan put his arms around him, trying to steady him with his embrace. In a moment, Hal let his head fall to his brother's shoulder.

  “You gave me your blood,” he sobbed.

  “Some time ago,” Alan acknowledged. “I would do it again if I thought it would help. Softly, Hal."

  “It all rolls on me now, like a tide,” Hal groaned. “The accursed Tower, and Roran, and you riding away.... And Robin, wounded! And Arundel!” Hal stiffened in anguish.

  “They are nearly healed,” Alan told him earnestly. “Robin is longing to see you, but we thought it would distress you. Softly, Hal!"

  “Softly!” Hal pulled back to face him as if facing his judge. “I had forgotten them; I had forgotten you and—and Rosemary....” His voice trembled with the magic of the name.

  “Hal,” Alan charged him gently, “do not be so hard upon yourself. You have been hurt to death; indeed you have passed through death's dark realm with only your innermost strength of will to sustain you. You have been spent in body and spirit. It is not strange that your heart has rested, these days past."

  “Still....” Hal faltered.

  “Still, nothing!” Alan barked in exasperation. “Not another word, bro
ther. Lie back; you are ailing."

  Hal settled into his pillows with a tremulous smile. Alan stood by his side.

  “If you like, I will send her to you now,” he added.

  Hal nodded. Alan touched his hand, then strode off to find Rosemary.

  The next day he and Hal talked for hours, retracing the events since they had taken different paths. Hal recalled little of his illness, but one thing he did remember: the pitiless majesty of Elwyndas. “You made me swear....” he murmured.

  “By the burden of your birth.” Alan said it for him.

  “Why, Alan? Was not the pledge of our love enough?"

  “My love would have let you leave me, or forgiven you for breaking your word. You knew that,” Alan explained grimly. “But the burden of your birth has no escape and no forgiveness to offer. I could bind you by nothing less.” Alan's eyes were lowered. “Do you hate me for it, Hal?"

  “You brought me Veran's balm,” answered Hal, and that one sentence said all.

  But in the week that followed Alan saw less of Hal, as Rosemary and the others saw more. When Hal and his love were together, Alan roamed the castle aimlessly, unable to set his mind to anything except the thoughts of Lysse that tormented him. He was glad of Hal's happiness, and of the healing comfort that Rosemary gave him, but Alan had no such solace. Sometimes Rosemary glimpsed the darkness in his face, quickly hidden, a sadness too noble to be called envy, and she wished she could bring him to his lover. She never guessed what distance of more than miles separated Alan and Lysse.

  She was astonished daily at the change in Alan. There was a new knowledge in his eyes; wisdom, indeed. Rosemary had always thought of him as a straightforward, generous fellow, his greatness shining in his face and deeds. But now he had known some sorrow which was not easily defeated, and the bearing of it had given him stature that made him seem more Hal's brother than ever before. Rosemary wondered about the strange green stone she had seen, the pendant that hung, hidden, by his heart. Whence had it come, and what was the meaning of its glimmering light?

  Somehow Alfie seemed to have changed along with his master. Next to Arun or Asfala, he had always seemed an awkward, ramshackle beast. Now he looked as sleek and finely molded as a greyhound or a deer. He moved with a powerful grace born of rightful pride. His muscles rippled in his long limbs; his flanks shimmered in the sunlight; his eyes sparkled with a golden glow. Gazing into their amber depths, Rosemary thought she saw something of the mystery that was in Hal, for Hal was always uppermost in her thoughts.

  How he had reached out to her, once he had come back to himself. He had whispered her name, pressed her hand to his thin face; later he slept with the warmth of her lips still lingering on his. Even in his weakness he thrilled her, his words and his touch at once tender and bold. No question, now, that he loved her! He no longer kept a courtly distance between, them, and every hour with him brought her new happiness.

  One day, when Rosemary went to the walled garden to gather flowers for the sickroom, Alan stood there, waiting beneath the trees. She saw at once from the set of his jaw that something was afoot.

  She had just come from Hal. “How is he?” Alan asked, and for a moment she forgot Alan's brooding face in her joy. “Much stronger,” she replied. “Today he sat and ate without help. I think he will soon be able to walk."

  “Then the burden will soon be on him again,” Alan muttered. “As soon as he has taken a few steps, you will find him swinging a sword, preparing himself to take up his journey once again.” Striking his thigh with a fist, he turned to her. “I am no good here, ray lady. I am leaving."

  “Leaving! But Alan, why?"

  “As the best gift I can give to him and you. I give you both the precious days for your own. Let him have time for healing, and let him be yours alone, for the time. Let him not think of his task, or of leaving you, until I have returned."

  She sensed the pain that underlay the gift, and her eyes brightened with unshed tears as she gave him the only comfort she could. “Oh, Alan,” she whispered, “it is no wonder that I love you like the brother I never had."

  For a moment his face softened as he reached out to her in mute thanks. Then he turned away, and she watched the hard set of his back as he strode off to see Hal.

  “There is nothing for me to do here,” Alan explained to Hal, a little later. “I will go to Laueroc, to see how time turns in the home of my fathers. I shall be back before the leaves fall."

  “Will you take Cory with you?” asked Hal, after a long silence.

  “Nay. He needs the rest.” That was not true, and Alan groped for a better reason. “I would rather have him here with Robin. I feel that I must go alone."

  Hal looked searchingly at him, seeing love and foolishness and perhaps a touch of shame. He found no words to give to Alan. “Go with the One at your side,” he said at last, and held out his left hand. They passed their grip in silence; then Alan quickly left. Hal lay staring at a closed door.

  There was a sort of timelessness in Celydon, Hal found, timelessness which Alan had given at some nameless sacrifice to himself, but it had its source in the lady. Rosemary sat at the bedside, sewing Hal shirts of soft linen, for hours, or days, he scarcely knew which; the time passed on tiptoe, unnoticed. As he grew stronger, they talked more, and sang to the plinset, old songs and new. Soon Hal was strong enough to spend part of each day in the garden. Rosemary could almost see the sun and air nourishing him, as if he were a blossoming plant. After a while they took walks, longer each day, until they were roaming far afield. When they rode the horses, they roamed farther yet. Hal was strong and healed by then, but he did not visit Ket in the Forest or go to the practice yard. Never had Rosemary seen the burden lie so lightly on him. For whole afternoons they would lie in the sun amidst the long meadow grasses, and he would make her flower garlands for her hair. They would talk of love, and kiss long kisses, deep and warm. Rosemary would gladly have given herself to him entirely, but he would not take her; not while the likelihood remained that he would be killed to leave her destitute and dishonored. Only in this way did he acknowledge his burden—except for one day.

  It was three days after Alan left. Hal had asked Rosemary to fetch her father to his bedside, and when Pelys arrived Hal asked for her hand in marriage. But before Pelys gave his consent, he felt, he must reveal his birth to them both. Pelys would hear nothing of it.

  “Tut, tut, lad, do you not think that I know you after all this time? You are wise, and brave, and well suited to be my daughter's husband. I do not need to know anything more."

  “There is peril all around me. It may well reach out and touch her, and you."

  “I always knew that you walked in peril! She knew it too. Do you not know that the gravest peril of her life is to be without you?"

  “I must tell you!” Hal said desperately.

  “Ay, ay, tell it then, if you must,” Pelys acceded. “But understand that she is yours, not by your words or my consent, but by the choice of her own heart."

  “I am Hervoyel,” Hal burst out.

  “I thought your other name was Mireldeyn,” Pelys remarked.

  Haltingly Hal told them his story, searching for words that would help them understand the pitfalls of his destiny. Pelys whistled and looked somber, but Rosemary, with the insight of love, saw beyond the danger and the awful responsibility to the deepest wound in Hal's soul.

  “Oh, poor Hal,” she whispered, almost in tears. When he told about his mother's death, and his torment in the Tower, she cried outright. He put his good arm around her. “It is not a pleasant tale,” he murmured. “I am sorry, love.” But her tears were balm on his wounds.

  As the narrative continued, he explained why he had not taken her more into his confidence. “I knew that Nabon of Lee would make his move soon, likely within the year. Ket and his men watched him while I was gone, and also guarded you, my lady, as well as they could. But even so, if you had been captured—perhaps taken for extortion—then a hint that you k
new something of the Welandais Prince would have spelled your death in some foul torture chamber. I know your courage, but you cannot keep your thoughts from showing in your face; your eyes are like mirrors for truth. So, for your own sake, I judged it best that you should know little of me or my doings. But the danger is over, for the time, and before Nabon has gathered his strength again we can expect to put an end to him, in an unseasonal feast of fires."

  The tale flowed long into the afternoon, and Hal grew tired and weak before he was finished. There was much that Pelys and Rosemary did not yet understand. Most of Rosemary's questions, if she had asked them, would have been about Alan, and the hidden ache in his eyes, and the green stone which hung from his neck. But she did not ask them, for Hal slept, and when he awoke he was purged of care. Throughout the lazy, happy days which followed, Rosemary kept her perplexities to herself.

  So she was now betrothed. She and Hal would wed within the year, if he lived. She shivered when she remembered how closely death followed on his heels, but as much as she was able, she turned her thoughts to the present and its joy. Still, she was often puzzled. So much more she knew about Hal now, and yet she hardly knew him at all. He spoke to the horses sometimes in words she could not understand, and did not tell her what language he spoke. There was a mystery in his eyes that went beyond facts of birth or life, a knowledge and vision which she could not begin to name or explain. She wondered when he would tell her what it meant, if he ever would, or could. Her musings made her sad, sometimes, and wistful. Looking at her, Hal thought his heart would break for love of her, though he could not understand her moods; this maiden, of all things, was a mystery to him.

  When the leaves began to turn and a chill came into the air, Hal's cares came back with a vengeance. Time ceased its slow, stealthy passing and began to rush by, Hal started spending his days in the practice yard with Cory and Robin. His time with Rosemary no longer passed in long, dreamy wanderings, their thoughts and their talk roaming like their feet. Instead, they sat in silence, clinging to each other like desperate children, their kisses made urgent by the pressure of the passing days.