by Tanya Huff
Theron gritted his teeth. “Very bardic. I thought the kigh were less … physical.”
“Usually they are, Majesty.”
“Can you stop it?”
“I don’t think so, Majesty. If I’d been here since the beginning, I might have been able to contain it, but …”
“Try!”
“Yes, Majesty!”
* * * *
“Would you stop that!” Stasya shrieked as Vencel and everyone else on the battlements frantically flicked their fingers out in the sign against the kigh. “It doesn’t work! It never works! And it certainly won’t work against this!”
Pushing people aside, she ran for the stairs in the inner tower. She had to get to Annice. If anything had gone wrong, she’d never forgive herself for not being there. She knew that if she closed her eyes, she’d see the crushed bodies of the two Cemandians etched into the lids, but the only thought she could hold onto was, I warned her about this Mother-goddess shit.
* * * *
“Just a little more, Annice, and I can help. Deep breath. Hold it. Now push.”
* * * *
Jazep began to Sing. The kigh paused, one foot raised. It shivered, as though it were shaking off a fly, and then continued to shuffle forward.
“Keep Singing,” Theron commanded.
Clear of the debris, Pjerin stood and began to run for the gates.
Exactly halfway between the two forces, the kigh stopped and suddenly swung one massive arm, the blow taking a huge chunk out of the mountain.
* * * *
“Head’s clear.” Elica bent and sucked the tiny mouth and nose free of mucus.
A faint cry of protest seemed to fill the room.
Annice tried to track the sound and failed. “What …?”
“It’s your baby, Annice. Give me one more push and we’ll get the shoulders …”
“My baby …” Staring down over the bulge of her body, Annice found herself responding to her first glimpse of an oddly shaped crescent of wet hair with a sudden surge of energy. She didn’t know whether it was caused by rapture or relief. She used it without caring.
* * * *
The kigh began to rock back and forth, shifting its weight from one leg to the other.
Jazep fought to Sing to another rhythm.
The mountain began to tremble.
The walls of the keep began to shake.
* * * *
“It’s a girl, Annice.”
Annice lay back against the pillows, the midwife’s arm supporting her shoulders. Very gently, she touched the grayish-pink and bloody bundle still connected to the faintly pulsing cord that Elica laid on her stomach. “A girl?”
“Healthy in every way.”
“You sure?” She’d never seen a baby that looked quite so … so…
“Trust me.” Wrapping the umbilical cord around her finger, Elica kneaded Annice’s abdomen with the other and began to work the afterbirth free. “I’m a healer. If there was something wrong, I’d know.”
“She’s beautiful, Annice.”
The midwife’s smile was no longer irritating. “She’s slippery.” Annice tried to cup an arm around her daughter’s tiny back, but she was just too tired. “Are you sure she’s not going to fall off?”
As if in response, the baby squirmed and made another, louder, protest.
“She looks … annoyed.”
“She’s been through a lot.” Elica tied off the cord, cut it, and wrapped the afterbirth in a piece of clean sheeting. “Let’s get the two of you cleaned up and …”
The room shivered.
* * * *
Loose rock careened down into the pass.
* * * *
The hall rose up to meet her boot. Stasya staggered and kept running. I should have been there. I should have been with her.
* * * *
The huge oak gates creaked on their hinges and the portcullis shook against its supports as Pjerin pounded into the court.
* * * *
Elica threw out one hand to support the baby and another to support herself against the bed. “What in …”
“Annice!” Stasya exploded into the room. “Annice are you all … oh.”
“It’s a girl, Stas.” Her voice was gone yet again. It didn’t seem to matter.
“Oh, Nees.” Stasya sank to her knees by the bed. “Are you all right?”
Annice reached out and touched the other woman’s cheek, realizing now what had been missing all along. “I’m glad you’re here.”
Tears in her eyes, Stasya turned her head to softly plant a kiss on Annice’s palm. “She’s …”
The room shifted again. A crack ran down the outside wall.
Suddenly reminded of what was happening outside, Stasya rocked back onto her feet and darted to the window, wrestling the shutters out of their clamps. “You’ve got to sing a gratitude, Nees.”
Annice looked up from investigating five perfect fingers. “A what?”
“A gratitude. Now.”
Elica took the bard firmly by the arm. “Stasya, this is no time …”
Stasya shook herself free and returned to Annice’s side. “Have you ever delivered a bardic baby before?”
“Well, no, but she’s a baby like any other.”
“Granted. But Annice Sings all four quarters and right now, the answer to the Song she’s been Singing the last few hours is outside indiscriminately tearing the pass apart.”
“She hasn’t been Singing …”
Annice remembered the rhythm of the pain. High notes. Low notes. “I think,” she said slowly, “I have.” She looked at her daughter and smiled. It wouldn’t be hard to Sing a gratitude.
* * * *
The kigh fell apart so quickly it very nearly took Jazep with it. He rocked back on his heels and would have fallen had Theron not flung up an arm in support.
He blinked at the pile of dirt nearly blocking the pass and let his Song trail off.
“Annice?” Theron demanded.
“She’s fine,” Tadeus was grinning broadly, his hair blowing around his head. “She had a girl. They’re both fine. Stasya’s with her.”
Jazep gestured into the pass. “Shall I try to Sing it away, Majesty?” he asked.
Theron looked thoughtful. “No,” he said after a moment. “I think we’ll leave it there while Prince Rajmund and I discuss a new treaty as a reminder of what Shkoder can call to its defense.”
“But, Majesty, we were in as much danger from it as the Cemandians were. We weren’t controlling it. Annice wasn’t even controlling it. And unless the circumstances were repeated exactly, I doubt anyone could ever call the kigh up like that again.”
The king smiled. “I don’t see any reason we have to tell Rajmund that.”
“Annice!” Pjerin entered the room much the way Stasya had, only more heavily armored. “Are you …”
Smiling up at him from the circle of Stasya’s arms, Annice stroked one finger over the soft cap of dark hair, dry now and feeling like nothing else in the world. “I told you it was a girl.”
Pushing off his helm, Pjerin slowly crossed the room to the bed. “A girl? A daughter?”
Annice watched him stare down at the baby and thought, I never believed in love at first sight before.
* * * *
“Have you decided what you’re going to call her?” The king of Shkoder looked as besotted as everyone else as a tiny hand grabbed onto his finger.
Annice shifted the baby’s weight a little and yawned. She hadn’t slept in the last two days. Although Elica had taken care of much of the pain, it seemed that every time she closed her eyes, the baby started to cry. “Well, Stasya’s pulling for Cecilie, Pjerin wants Evicka, and Gerek said something about naming her after a goat.”
“That was before I knew she was a girl!” Gerek protested indignantly from the floor by the window.
Theron smiled and held out his arms. “May I?”
He has three children of his own, Annice reminded her
“She looks like you did,” Theron murmured, lightly kissing the tiny forehead. “Her hair’s darker, but she has the same way of screwing up her face and turning red.”
Annice felt her own ears grow hot. “Uh, Theron, that means she’s …”
“I know.”
As he didn’t seem to mind, she tried not to.
“Have you decided what you want to do about raising her?” He looked over at her, his expression serious. “She needs a family.”
“I know.” Annice glanced over at Gerek, who was, he said, building a palace for his sister out of wooden blocks. “I know,” she repeated. “But I’m a bard.”
Theron shook his head and sighed. “I thought we were past that.”
“I can’t give it up.”
“No one’s asking you to.”
“Then what?” She picked at the hem of her borrowed robe. “Stasya and I can walk together for a while, and, well, we’re used to planning our lives around what we do, but what about Pjerin? I can’t ask him to come to Elbasan, or the Bardic Hall in Vidor even if the captain would agree to base us there. Which she probably wouldn’t because it’s tiny and they’ve already got someone who Sings all four quarters. And it could be years before I Walk this way again.” Reaching out, she stroked the perfect curve of her daughter’s ear. “I’m babbling.”
“If there’s anything I can do …” He laid the fussing baby back in Annice’s arms. “… will you ask me?”
Would she? “I don’t know.”
He nodded, as aware of the ten years as she was.
* * * *
“Nees, she’s beautiful.”
Annice grinned and tweaked a long dark curl. “How can you tell?”
His smile more brilliant than she’d ever seen it, Tadeus bent forward and kissed her cheek. “I’m blind,” he said softly. “I’m not stupid.”
Jazep, the baby held securely in the cradle of his hands, stared down at her, his eyes wide with wonder. “A new life,” he murmured through the catch in his voice. “A new beginning”
“You are such a suck,” Tadeus declared fondly. He reached over and with one finger lightly traced the moisture on Jazep’s face. “I just got the best idea for a song …”
* * * *
The terms of the new treaty were thrashed out much as Theron dictated.
“The world is changing,” he told a glowering Duc of Ohrid as they walked back to the keep from the huge tent that had been set up at the midpoint in the pass. “We can not close ourselves off from it because if we do it’s not only trade we prevent, but the spread of knowledge and new ideas. Ignorance breeds intolerance. Intolerance breeds war.”
Pjerin snorted. Kings and princes both he’d discovered over the last few days, were much given to that type of pronouncement. “I don’t trust the Cemandians, Majesty. Suppose they suddenly decide to start developing the kigh as weapons.”
“It isn’t that easy for an entire people to change their beliefs, Your Grace.” Or, Theron added silently, for one stubborn duc to change his.
“Will he give us what we want?”
“We’re negotiating from a position of strength. There’s no reason why he shouldn’t.”
“Will he give me what I want?”
“I think so. He has no reason to protect her and every reason to distrust her. There’s an old Riverfolk saying: ‘A snake on the left bank is still a snake on the right.’ ”
“And Albek.”
“No. By Cemandian standards, Albek is a patriot. Prince Rajmund is no fool. He’ll let it be seen that he protects his own people.” Theron raised a hand to cut off a growled protest. “You’d do the same. Don’t push on this, Your Grace. You won’t win.”
* * * *
“What about Adelka?”
Stasya shook her head. “Nees, she doesn’t look like an Adelka. What about Cecilija?”
“That’s almost the same as Cecilie,” Annice protested, wincing as the baby nursed. No one had told her that it was going to hurt—although everyone was telling her now that it would soon stop, she’d decided not to believe them. “What do you think, Pjerin?”
Pjerin turned from the window, brows drawn in. “I don’t trust the Cemandians,” he said. “Prince Rajmund still hasn’t agreed to all the terms of the treaty.”
The two bards exchanged identical expressions.
“We know that,” Stasya sighed. “But what do you think about Cecilija as a name for the baby?”
“Even when he does, I don’t think they’re going to stop trying.” His hands curled into fists. “They need to be watched.”
“Fine. Watch them.” Stasya used just enough Voice that she was sure of gaining his attention. “But first, tell us what you think about Cecilija before your daughter reaches her first name-day without a name.”
“Cecilija?” Frown lifting, he crossed the room to sit on Annice’s other side. “I don’t think so.” He enclosed a flailing hand in his. “What about Kornelia?”
“Yuk!” Stasya made a face. “I had an Aunt Kornelia. She smelled like seaweed all the time.”
“The Cemandians need to be watched …” Annice stared at nothing, her attention distracted from the ache in her breasts.
“Nees, don’t you start. He’s bad enough. What about Tasenka?”
Pjerin snorted. “Forget it. What about Milena?”
The Cemandians need to be watched. Annice smiled. She had an idea.
* * * *
“Theron? Can I talk to you?”
“Of course.” He gestured his valet from the room and closed the door behind him. “What is it?” he asked. “Does my niece finally have name?”
“Well, yes.” Annice settled gingerly into a chair. “I pulled rank as her mother and we settled on Magda.”
“Magda,” Theron repeated, pleasantly surprised.
“Grandmother’s name. Magda i’Annice a’Pjerin. Maggi. I like it.” He perched on the edge of a parchment covered table. “But that’s not why you’ve come?”
She took a deep breath and released it slowly. “No. Did you mean it when you said, if there was anything you could do?”
“Shall I have it Witnessed?”
Half-smiling, she wiped her palms against her shift. “In a way, I suppose you already did.” Ten years. Will he understand? “I’ve thought of something you can do.”
* * * *
“A Bardic Hall here? In Ohrid? In the keep?”
Theron hid a smile at the tone of Pjerin’s voice. “You have plenty of room, Your Grace.
“Yes, Majesty, but …”
“A Bardic Hall here will serve a number of purposes. The Cemandians need to be watched. Ohrid has been promised closer ties with the rest of Shkoder. Your people need to learn that the kigh are no threat. And I would just as soon not have our next war with Cemandia be a religious crusade. The more contact the Cemandians have with the kigh and with bards the better—this way, every Cemandian through the pass will have contact.”
“Ignorance breeds intolerance,” Pjerin murmured, a little stunned. “Intolerance breeds war.”
This time, Theron allowed the smile to blossom. “Well said, Your Grace.” He sat back in the chair and fingered his collar button. “It will, of necessity, be a minimal Hall, with one bard who Sings all four quarters and one other, strong in air, to Walk.”
“Majesty?” Stasya stepped forward, suddenly understanding why all four Bards had been commanded to attend the king and why Jazep and Tadeus both had been told to recall. “If you’re saying that Annice and I are going to form a new Bardic Hall here at the keep, would you please just say it.”
“You and Annice are going to form a new Bardic Hall here at the keep,” Theron said. He grew serious. “It won’t be an easy task, half of Ohrid still believe the kigh to be outside the Circle. You’ll have to work against that, against their fears. Convince them otherwise. Convince them that their future lies with Shkoder, not Cemandia.”
“We can do that, Majesty.”
Bards, Theron mused, have found more than their share of self-confidence in the Circle.
Pjerin glanced from the king to Annice, who was serenely contemplating the swaddled bundle in her arms, and back again. “Maggi will be raised here? As a bard?”
“By a bard,” Theron corrected. “And by you. The child will discover for herself what the Circle holds for her.”
“Begging Your Majesty’s pardon.” Stasya hated to bring this up, but someone had to. “But what about the captain?”
“What about her?”
“What if she doesn’t agree?”
Theron stood. “I,” he said, “am king in Shkoder.”
Annice looked up and smiled. “Witnessed.”
* * * *
“Olina i’Katica, step forward.”
A murmur ran around the court as the people of Ohrid, packed shoulder to shoulder on the ground and on the battlements tried to get a better view. Theron had intended the Judgment to be held in the Great Hall, but Pjerin had insisted that all the people of Ohrid had the right to attend.
Prince Rajmund had agreed to all the terms of the treaty.
Back straight, expression disdainful, Olina stepped away from her escort and stood alone in the only empty space in the court. Her cold gaze swept over Theron—seated in her favorite chair, she noted with bitter irony—past the bard standing beside him, and over the three bards off to one side. She stared for a moment at Annice, at the tiny bundle in her arms. No one had told her exactly how things had gone so impossibly wrong, but with the sister of the king bearing her nephew’s child, it wasn’t difficult to find the probable cause. If she hated anyone, she hated Annice.
“I heard,” she said, turning at last to Pjerin, “that congratulations are in order. A daughter?”
Teeth clenched, Pjerin nodded.
Theron sat forward. “Olina i’Katica, do you know why you are here?”
She inclined her head graciously. “So that your bards can use the kigh to put words in my mouth and a foreign king can take my life.”
The crowd stirred. The sound that followed the motion was tinted with doubt. Words had been put in the mouth of their duc. Who knew what was true anymore? Here and there, fingers flicked out in the sign against the kigh.
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