Hwyn took the Eye of Night once more from her breast pouch and held it out for all to see. “Let me tell a story: much of it you will know already, but I think some will be new to you. In the beginning of time, when the world was new, the gods grew the sun in a secret chamber below the earth, meaning to send it skyward to light the world when it was full grown. But in the night, seeds had taken root on earth, and living things had grown. The gods feared that as the sun passed the earth, making its way to the sky, its heat would burn the new shoots, leaving the earth barren. So the Sky-Raven, older than Earth and greater, spread her wings over the earth, shielding it from the fire of the sun. The sun scorched her wings, but the Sky-Raven held her place, sheltering the earth, until she burned to death, just as the sun cleared the rim of the world. The fire of her immolation shines red in every sunrise and sunset, even now, countless ages after her sacrifice. This much you know: the story is told each winter on the Night of the Hidden Goddess. But there is more: not all was lost in the burning. I hold the Sky-Raven's Egg, hidden since the earth was new, revealed to us in a time of Troubles.”
“The prophet Evrel wrote of the Sky-Raven's Egg,” Per said. “But she said it was hidden far from sight, in the heart of the earth or the depths of the sea, and that were it moved, the earth might lose its heart. Whatever power moved it from its resting place must be great indeed. But why have you drawn it forth? Have you considered the price?”
“They were mightier than I who drew it from the heart of the earth,” said Hwyn, “and whether we are all now paying the price of their pride, or whether our Troubles are only the waning of an age, I do not know. Long ago, some mage coaxed it forth from hiding—and died for it, no doubt. Since then, it has passed from hand to hand. Its holders wielded it for their profit until its power shattered them. For thirty years or more it was held by the House of Kelgarran; it upheld their might and prosperity. It was there that I found the Sky-Raven's Egg, freed it from the bonds of necromancy, and brought it away with me. As I took it away, Kelgarran Hall fell in ruins.”
“Thirty years in the House of Kelgarran,” mused Per. “I wonder if the House of Larioneth held it till then. Thirty years ago, in the height of their dominion, they were struck down by plague and calamity. Perhaps they, too, had drawn their power from the Sky-Raven's Egg, and fell when they lost it.”
“It may be,” Hwyn said, holding the Eye of Night against her breast as though it might whisper its story directly to her heart.
I noticed that Per did not bother to ask Trenara, sitting at his side, whether the Sky-Raven's Egg had been in her family's keeping. He knew, then, that it was no use asking her. Instead, Per addressed Hwyn again: “If all who hold this treasure die for it, as you say, why have you brought it here? Don't you fear their fate?”
“I do not wield the Eye of Night,” Hwyn said. “I hold it, but I do not hold it bound. Since I broke the magic circle in Kelgarran Hall last summer, the Sky-Raven's Egg has been free—free to grow.”
“Save for a moment's time,” I interrupted, “when I used it, against Hwyn's will, to try to rescue her from prison. If there is a price for that binding, I have not paid it yet. But it was only bound a few moments, no more.”
Hwyn looked down at me with troubled brow and passed a hand gently across my hair. Then she resumed her explanation: “The life within this egg has grown since I freed it. I have followed its commands and brought it where it wished to go: here, to the northern end of the world. What I do with it here depends on its own demands. The future is still dark to me. But I think the Sky-Raven's Egg has come here to hatch.”
“What will be born from this egg?” asked Per.
Hwyn shook her head. “We will see when it comes.”
“This thing you bring us spans the ages of the world, from its birth to this moment,” Per continued. “Is this the end of the world?”
“I do not know.” Hwyn closed her eyes. “If it is, then I doubt burying the Eye of Night could have forestalled it. I'm afraid—I may need to ask your forgiveness for what I have brought you. But I did the only thing that seemed right to me. Nothing can be bound forever. Whatever lies within this egg cried out for freedom, so I freed it. If it is good, this land has need of it; if it is evil, let us confront it bravely together—for I could seek no braver comrades-at-arms than you, who dared remain all these years in the Land of Troubles. But I do not believe it is evil. I cannot believe it.”
“Let others fear this hatchling: I will trust it,” Syrc spoke up indignantly, sounding almost like Rand. “The Sky-Raven sheltered earth in the beginning of time. I will trust its child. The Returner is here; one promise to us has been kept. But we were promised three things more: strength from the earth, friends from the South, hope from the sea. The strength we feel within us; the friends,” she gestured toward us, “have come. The hope will come as well. I have no fear, though the world's end be at hand.”
“I too will trust,” Per said. “No good has come from holding this spirit bound. You can hardly do worse by releasing it than the lords of Kelgarran by binding it. In this land, too, we have seen the dangers of binding spirits against their will. King Isenmund of Larioneth, the chronicles tell us, bound the spirit of a rebellious wizard, and thought to protect the land by keeping him prisoner. But the spirit ate Isenmund away from inside until it looked out from his eyes and commanded his body. Thus a dead wizard ruled this land and wreaked long-stored wrath upon it till a Tarvon priest set him free. The ghost went in peace, then, and left his vengeance incomplete. To imprison a spirit may be prudent, but never wise,” he concluded. “I have questioned you sharply, Hwyn, because I needed to know that you were not another Isenmund. Now I see I have nothing to fear. Whatever you bring, welcome.” And the old man went to Hwyn, took her thin, rough-skinned hand, and kissed it in courtly fashion.
Tears sprang to Hwyn's eyes. “Thank you,” she said hoarsely. “You're too good, you're all too good to be true. I must have dreamed you. But do you understand what it is you welcome?”
“No,” Per said quietly. “Nor do you understand what it is you bring. We can only trust.”
“You are a brave people,” Hwyn said.
“In the last town we traveled through,” I added, “they would have killed us at a glimpse of the Eye of Night. They nearly hanged Hwyn for prophesying, even without it. Prophets, they said, bring the ghosts and the Troubles.”
“Those that feared ghosts left Larioneth years ago,” Harga said sharply.
“The people in Berall, killing prophets and lunatics, managed to hold back the Troubles. But you've learned to live with them,” I said. “How?”
“We've learned to love our ghosts,” said Modya, flushing slightly.
Kernan nodded. “We've learned, too, to save seed for a second planting in case the seasons turn backward. We've learned to hunt any nameless beast that appears in the woods, so long as it doesn't speak. We've learned to bend with the wind, to survive anything.”
“It's Harga's doing,” Syrc said, “and Per's. Without them we'd have fallen apart, wandered away, or died. There wouldn't be any Holdouts but for them.”
Harga laughed, and looked downward, embarrassed. Per's keen blue eyes were on her. “Well, Harga, it was you that called the first council.”
“I did, didn't I,” she said. “Well, why not? I was the one who had to watch the worst of the suffering. I had to do something.” She turned back to me and Hwyn. “Twelve years ago was the last and largest migration out of Larioneth. The city was unpeopled almost overnight. Perhaps a hundred of us were left—and far fewer lived through the winter. All the other healers in town—curse them for cowards!—had fled south. I was left scurrying from one house by the sea-cliff to another in the woods, half the time arriving too late, as survivors lamented that they hadn't known where to find a healer when a healer could have done something. I saw the young and the old left uncared-for, the sick dying because they had no neighbors to help them. Dying even of petty illnesses, when a dipper of
water might have saved them, had there been anyone to bring it. Before that first winter was over, I knew we needed to pull together or we'd all die.” Her eyes touched Syrc and Hart, then rested on Ash. “I sent children—Ash was one of them—through each section of the city looking for people, to bid them all gather at the temple on the next full-moon night. And when I came to the temple myself an hour before dark to wait for them all, I found Per.”
“I'd moved into the temple,” the scholar explained. “The priests who had kept it were all gone. So, too, were my Brothers and our pupils. My school was too far out in the woods for an old man alone. When Harga's young messengers called for council in the temple, people came to ask me about it, thinking I must have started it. I thought it a gift of the gods; I'd never have been able to bring everyone together myself.”
“All the same,” Harga laughed, “you made us the Holdouts.”
“I made the name,” Per said. “I thought that with a name, we might make people proud of staying.”
“It did,” said Syrc. “Since then, save for two felons we exiled, no one has left.”
Harga continued the story. “We found the castle as empty as the temple, so we moved in, thirty of us. The rest moved closer in to the center of the town: the most prosperous families had left, so there were fine houses for the taking. What was left in Larioneth, we decided, was our common inheritance. We resolved to share our goods and our labors. We apportioned tasks to each according to their talents. And we swore to have no lord, ever, except the Returner of the House of Larioneth.”
“I meant to ask about that,” Hwyn began cautiously. “Your loyalty to the royal house—it has outlived many years of hard waiting. To hold your hearts so, after so long—they must have been glorious.”
“They were a bad lot,” said Harga. The younger Holdouts, Hauvoc and Tresanda, looked shocked, but Per only smiled sardonically, and Harga continued. “Present company excepted, of course,” she said, peering about for Trenara—but the lady had already drifted away after a knot of children running races into the great hall. “But most of them were degenerate, weak as rotten wood; they were the first to leave when the Troubles began. The Plague hit them hard, I'll grant you; knights in their prime lost all strength; queens went barren; princes were born moon-touched, mad, or deformed. The king tore his eyes out at something he saw that no one else could see; his own brother killed him to silence his ghost-ridden ravings, and fled the land. One by one, the lords of the land fled their curse as fast as their fine horses could carry them. Not like the Old Days—then, if the land were blighted, the king would take the curse upon himself and do what was needed, even to dying for the land.”
“That was done more than once,” Per confirmed. “Three hundred years before my birth, Haylwin of Larioneth sailed to the world's rim and never returned. And before him, Avar the Kin-Slayer offered his blood in the center of the Sky Temple: he atoned for his crime to save the land.”
“Such kings died centuries ago,” Harga said. “Our king and lords saved themselves. We owe them no homage. But we were promised one that would love the land enough to return to it in its bleakest hour.”
“It was the prophecy of Creyusa,” Per explained, “a priestess of the Hidden Goddess who died the year of the First Migration. With the House of Larioneth fleeing like birds in autumn, Creyusa told us, ‘Let them go. One will return, the only one worth your allegiance. In the darkest time, in the dead of winter, one will return, bringing an end to your hardship.’ ”
“And one has returned,” Ash said, smiling in the direction of Trenara, who had settled herself at the far end of the kitchen, where she patiently allowed two of Hart's children to play with her hair.
“Is she—” I hedged a bit, afraid to give offense, but insatiably curious. “Are you sure of her? We ourselves know little of her, despite long companionship.”
“You saw Lancar bow down to her. You named him yourself, and know he was no impostor,” Per said.
“And so our companion is a legend,” Hwyn said. “Is she all you hoped?”
Syrc suppressed a giggle; even Per seemed ready to laugh. “We've noticed she's simple,” he said, “if that's what concerns you. Ah, well, at least some of us have. Til, I think, is still too ashamed of having doubted her to have noticed any real flaw in her. But I've had a good long talk with her and I assure you, I'm undeceived. I was, I confess, a bit disconcerted.”
“I like her this way,” Syrc said bluntly. “The others can think as they choose, but I—I think this is perfect. You see, if the only ruler we're to have is an—a—a simpleton, then the gods must mean us to go on as we've been, deciding all things in council amongst ourselves, expecting no other guidance. It's a way I've come to love. I once thought it would come to end with the Return, but now I see I had nothing to fear.”
“Ever since Trenara joined me,” said Hwyn, “I've been looking for a safe home for her, a place where someone would care for her as she is, so that I could journey freely into the dangerous lands ahead. Little did I know that her safe haven lay at the end of the road.”
“I marvel she made it so far,” Harga said, “defenseless and even pregnant. You two must have taken good care of her. I'm of one mind with Syrc: I too once feared the Returner, and grudged the oath to support even a very hypothetical sovereign. But the Lady Trenara is welcome to me: a gentle ruler, indeed!”
“I think I may know her lineage,” Per said. “Not the highest in the royal house, if I guess right. There was a cousin in a cadet branch of the king's family, one of the first to leave Larioneth, with a moontouched daughter of ten or twelve years old. They disappeared from Larioneth twenty-eight years ago.”
“You're not suggesting that Trenara's forty years old!” I laughed.
“Oh, no, of course not,” Per said. “I think she must be the daughter of the child I remember, named for her, and inheriting her frailty. But how she knew to come back to the land of her forebears, the gods alone know.”
“However she came, I'm glad of it,” Syrc said. “We'll have plenty to celebrate on the Night of the Hidden Goddess—and here I am, too lame to dance!”
“We lost track of time in the journey,” Hwyn said. “When is the festival?”
“We're not always sure of time ourselves,” Per said, “But we've fixed on the next full-moon night, and the half-moon was last night.”
The days till the festival passed swiftly. I had work to do: since hot food and rest had cured all that ailed me, I felt that like the Holdouts, I should do my share of labor. So on my third morning in Larioneth I rose before dawn and followed Ash's husband, March, down to the wharf where the fishing boats awaited us.
“Whatever else you foreigners bring, it's good to have another fisherman,” March said. “Since my father died we've been shorthanded. You are used to the ocean, aren't you? It's different from river-fishing, of course.”
I assured him that the sea was no stranger to me.
“Good,” he said. “Grim and Til usually sail with me—but maybe this time we can patch up the old Gull's Cry and go two by two. Til's a fair hand at fixing boats—”
“I was once, myself,” I said, and as Grim and March put out to sea, I hurried to join Til patching together an old boat, one of those flat-bottomed clinker-built fishing boats that seem the same in every land. It had been hard hit by its last voyage, but not beyond repair. Soon enough we had the Gull's Cry in order, and Til and I set out.
“I thought you were a landsman,” the young fisher said, adjusting the angle of a sail. “They said you'd been in the Tarvon Monastery in Annelon.”
“I wasn't born in a monastery,” I said.
Later, returning to land with our haul of fish, Til spoke suddenly. “I misjudged you. I seem to be doing a lot of that lately,” he laughed. “I thought a priest would be no help on a boat—”
“Ex-priest,” I corrected.
“—but you sail like you were born on the sea.”
“I was,” I said. “I come
from a long line of sea-traders. People in my family lose their balance on dry land, not on shipboard.” After all those years, the old family joke tasted strange in my mouth. “I knew the ports of South Magya better than the rooms of my parents' house—I spent more of my childhood there. I've sailed to Iskarron in a tempest, when everyone from the captain to my little brother, seven years old then, had to lend a hand to keep the ship afloat. Even when I ran away from home I was too sea-crazy to realize that my father wouldn't find me inland: I stuck to the coast, and was caught.”
“And yet you left it for an inland monastery.” Til shook his head. “Who drowned?”
I whipped my head around to glare into his bland face and deceptively lazy blue eyes.
“I'm sorry,” he said hastily. “I've touched a nerve. That was clumsy. I should keep—”
“No, you were right,” I said. “Everyone drowned. My whole family, the whole crew, everyone but me. You don't always misjudge, Til.”
“No wonder you left,” Til said softly. “I'm sorry.”
After that Til was a friend. In a few days' time I had more friends among the Holdouts than I'd made in six years in the Tar-von Order, and Hwyn felt more at home there than she had even in Folcsted. Each day I would come in from the sea, achingly cold and smelling of fish, to find Hwyn by the fire with Syrc, two invalids unused to rest, exercising their well-matched wits while they waited for their bodies to heal.
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