The White Road of the Moon

by Rachel Neumeier

  He couldn’t be a witch, not with blue eyes, but he wore no priest’s medal at his throat. Not a witch, not a priest, yet he still anchored a ghost….Any ordinary person might anchor someone they’d loved, a ghost who’d chosen to forsake the God’s Road and linger, quick, in the real world after death. But Meridy didn’t believe that could be the explanation in this case. The ghost boy was too old, had been quick too long. No ordinary person could hold a ghost for so long, keep him so much himself for so long, stop him for so long from either taking the White Road of the Moon or losing himself in the real.

  No, she thought this man must actually be a sorcerer. If that was so, his magic would be rooted in the real. He would be able to affect the world directly, rather than depending on this ghost of his to help him touch the ethereal so he could bring dreams and imagination into the real. Yet he’d bound this ghost and held him, even though he probably didn’t need him as a conduit for his magic. Meridy knew what that meant, or thought she did: according to Ambica’s stories, the magic of a sorcerer like this might not be limited to the real world. He would probably also be able to reach from the real into the ethereal, the other way around from what a witch did. He would be different from anyone she’d ever met. Certainly he’d have no reason to be afraid of an untrained girl like Meridy, even if she was a black-eyed witch.

  People mistrusted witches because they could bind a ghost, keep it from taking the God’s Road; because they were rumored to be able to steal the souls of the living; because they mostly carried too much of the Southerner’s foreign blood; and because too many witches had once followed Tai-Enchar when he’d betrayed the High King and the Kingdom. But in all the old tales, sorcerers were actually more powerful and unpredictable.

  According to the tales, some sorcerers started as witches and then also learned to touch the real world without needing to work through ghosts. That was what Meridy had dreamed of learning to do, if she’d born during a higher, brighter age. But other sorcerers weren’t witches at all, and those were the ones who were supposed to be more powerful. Some were said to be able not only to root their magic in the real world but also to step from the real into the ethereal realms and back again. Some were said to be able to take other people with them, somehow make them into servants or slaves. Or something. Tales offered wildly different ideas about exactly what happened to ordinary people who fell afoul of a wicked sorcerer. But sensible people were wise to be cautious around sorcerers; on that, all the tales agreed.

  Yet it was hard to picture an actual sorcerer dying in the woods alone, or tucked up by the hearth of a ruined inn. The man’s shirt, hung now near the fire to dry, was plain homespun, not so much better than the shirts they made in Tikiy. Surely a sorcerer would be wealthy. It was all very puzzling.

  The man finished the roll and the tea and looked around the inn, right past and through the ghost boy—now lounging more at ease on the table, his elbows on his knees and his chin resting on his laced fingers—and also past the innkeeper’s wife, and the innkeeper, and the clutter of other ghosts who had gathered near. Well, blue eyes. She shouldn’t have expected he would see any of them, even if he was a sorcerer. And maybe he wasn’t. She still wasn’t sure.

  There was a drawn look to his face. Lines of exhaustion and pain touched the corners of his mouth and his eyes, but there was something else there as well, less readable; Meridy thought it might be irony. His expression was oddly distant, as if most of his attention were on something else. Yet at the same time, for all this abstraction, he looked about the worn rafters and worn stones of the inn with a kind of wondering astonishment, as though of all places he might have found help, this ruined inn was surely the least expected. Above all, he no longer seemed like a man wandering close to the White Road.

  The cornflower gaze finally fell upon Meridy. Fine eyebrows arched slightly in wondering appraisal. Meridy felt herself flushing. She could imagine what he must think of her, highborn as he plainly was, and faced now with a black-eyed village girl carrying the obvious stamp of Southern blood: the dusky skin and flyaway black hair, the broad-boned face and stocky frame. He wouldn’t be surprised by her eyes. Southern blood for witchery, as the saying went, and northern blood for sorcery. She, at least, must seem a fitting occupant of this crumbling Tikiy inn, where otherwise only ghosts dwelt. Anger at the thought stiffened her back and let her meet his eyes as directly as she imagined her mother might have.

  “An ethereal rose?” the man said at last. “I suppose we must be relieved you had no need of it, though I appreciate the thought. Did you make it yourself?”

  Meridy, without thinking, lifted a hand to touch it and felt it dissolve beneath her fingertips. Her face warmed with embarrassment at her carelessness.

  The ghost boy said coolly, “I made it for her. It seemed you might need it, as you were so incautious as to be wounded so far from any reasonable hope of help.”

  The man lifted one fine eyebrow but declined to answer this. “Forgive the manner of my acquaintance,” he said to Meridy. “And believe me grateful for your attention. It was most good of you to offer assistance.” His voice, in contrast to his worn appearance, was beautiful: rich and warm and expressive. His accent, quick and smooth and light on the ends of words, was nothing that he had learned in the shadow of the Anchor of the World.

  Meridy inclined her head slightly, not at all sure she welcomed such flowery gratitude. She said, deliberately echoing his formality, “Perhaps you would be good enough to tell me who you are, and where you are from, and what you are doing here.”

  The innkeeper’s wife said softly, “He’s from up the north road, dear. Maybe Linn or Talina, or even Surem up in Moran Tal. See that fine skin and that pretty hair? You only see hair like that on northern men.” The innkeeper’s wife faded in and out of visibility in gentle waves, but her voice was perfectly audible for a ghost’s. She added wistfully, “I knew a man from Surem, once, I did. Hair like that, gold on corn silk, just like that, but it was a long time ago….” She faded gently away into memory.

  The man looked around, startled. “This is a ghost town, then? It doesn’t have quite the usual feel. ‘Dorahd y hana caniy’—”

  “—‘umano y rahid caniy siërrid,’ ” Meridy finished blandly. “A trifle overdramatic, I think, although in the moonlight one does pick up a certain odd feeling at times. Still, I think Barihd captured the idea better in U Munohd, U Cahy. Where did you say you’re from?”

  The man smiled a little. “Persistent child.”

  “And well-read, to cap your quotes,” commented the ghost boy, his tone neutral but his gaze lingering on Meridy’s worn skirts and work-roughened hands. “I must commend your teachers, girl. And your dedication to poetry, to learn those lines in the original Viënè.”

  The boy did not say, Astonishing, for a mere village girl. But Meridy heard that implication and resented it. She ignored him, keeping her own gaze on the living man instead.

  “Kamam,” the man said, with just the merest trace of amusement carried in that beautiful voice. “I’m from Kamam, originally.”

  ‘The city walls that, in the setting sun, Recall the running flames that cast the ramparts down; And let within the conquering sword….’

  Meridy interrupted him, giving the ghost boy her haughtiest look as she completed the lines:

  ‘Red stone fever-hot, streets full of blood, Fear trapped in the shadows of the walls, Wind-caught the voices of the dead.’

  “I’ve heard that it’s beautiful, but not as grim as Laor Sinn made it sound. Who are you? If you’re from Kamam, then you’re from Tian Sur.” From the other end of the world, in fact: as far north as one could possibly get without falling into the sea. “What are you doing here?”

  But the man only asked, “Heard from whom?”

  Meridy shrugged. “The ghosts tell me stories. One of them, Ambica, used to be a poet himself, I think.”

  “Did he?” the man said thoughtfully. “And bold enough to criticize Laor Tai-Si
nn, king of poets. The rebuilt part of Kamam is lovely, but your Ambica is right that it doesn’t hold memories. It was in the ruins of the old city that Laor Sinn heard the voices of the dead. Since we have wandered onto the subject, perhaps you would be good enough to tell me whether you are able actually to see the quick dead as well as hear their tales?”

  He was asking whether she was actually a witch or merely dark eyed. That much was obvious. “Why should you care?” Meridy asked warily. “It’s nothing to do with you.”

  “She can certainly see us,” said the ghost boy, brief and decisive. “But it’s more than that. She’s heavy. Light breaks around her. She could learn to step into the realms of dreams, I’ve no doubt of it, and if she did, I believe the moonlight there would also run around her like water around a stone.”

  “Indeed,” said the man. He glanced in the boy’s general direction, though he plainly couldn’t see him. “Witches for bringing dreams into the real, sorcerers for carrying the real away into the realm of dreams, as they say. Interesting. And she was born so far out of the way that…no one…ever discovered her.”

  “Wonderful,” said Meridy, giving both living man and quick boy her best annoyed look for talking about her like she wasn’t even present, though she was too interested in who could possibly be meant by that fraught no one to be angry. She said, hoping to draw one or the other of them, “I’m glad to be interesting, I’m sure, and I suppose you’re claiming to be a sorcerer, is that right? Or are you a priest?”

  The boy gave her a tiny shrug.

  “Forgive me if I have worried you, child,” the man said, clearly amused. “I’m not precisely a sorcerer, or a priest. Not in the ordinary sense. Not tinker, not soldier, not candlemaker—no one you need worry about, I assure you. But it’s interesting, finding a girl like you here, so far out of the way. A girl, moreover, who seeks out the ghosts of poets and storytellers. Indeed, perhaps that’s why…” His hand went to his side in an unthinking gesture.

  Meridy stiffened. “I didn’t have anything to do with your being hurt.”

  “Certainly not,” the man said at once. “I did not mean to imply any such suspicion, child. I was only thinking that the God clearly saw fit to put me in your way. I don’t for a moment imagine it’s chance that cast me from the realms of dream into the real at nearly the very doorstep of an untrained witch-girl such as yourself.”

  “ ‘So once more swift on the goalless road the traveler proceed—’ ” began the ghost boy.

  “Well, well, that’s neither here nor there, just at the moment, perhaps,” the man cut in smoothly.

  Meridy thought for a moment and then said triumphantly, “That’s from Ilonn Tivona’s epic about the death of the sorceress Aseraiëth! I know that one. Her road led neither to the realm of the God nor back into the real; it didn’t lead anywhere but looped in a circle, so she was trapped between realms, half living and half dead. I could never decide whether the poet meant us to be sorry for her or not. He didn’t make her sound very nice.”

  The man’s mouth twitched. “Well,” he said to the boy, “you’re the one who declared her well-read. You might have taken that a bit more to heart.”

  “But what does that mean?” demanded Meridy. “All that about you finding yourself here, I mean. You don’t think the God actually guided your steps?”

  “Who can say? The God does have these little whims. I wonder whether you would be so kind as to tell me where exactly it is that I find myself. Somewhere in the deep South, of course, to have Linn referred to as a northern city, but precisely what locale?”

  She hesitated, but she could think of no reason not to tell him. “Tikiy. The nearest big city is Riam, and that’s days and days away. Ten days, maybe twelve, maybe more. Sann is the closest town, but it’s still three days’ walk and not very big.”

  “As far south as that.” The man sounded as though he were coming to terms with something he had half expected but not truly believed. “In the shadow of the Anchor, on the very edge of the world!” He regarded her with still more interest.

  Meridy eyed him. “You know, you haven’t explained how you came to be bleeding to death in the woods outside Tikiy.”

  The cornflower eyes narrowed with warm amusement. “Well, child, I think perhaps I was indeed finding you.”

  “Because the God put you in my path.”

  “Is that so difficult to believe? Doesn’t the God turn events toward the right path? You are, I believe, quite a powerful young witch.” His glance was uncomfortably acute, and he added, his tone still light and yet with an underlying seriousness to it, “How fortunate that you were born in the shadow of the Wall. Indeed, in a village so small that you could grow up untroubled, in these days when so many young witches meet an unfortunate fate just as they come into their gift.”

  Meridy scowled at him, annoyed that he could make her feel ignorant and bewildered. “Oh, do they? How does that come about? And what business is it of yours? You’re not a witch. Are you a priest? You’re not wearing a medal.” Not that it mattered. She didn’t care whether he was a priest, or a sorcerer either, just so long as he didn’t interfere with her.

  The man only smiled at her. “You may call me Carad Mereth, if you like. And I have been a priest, from time to time.”

  “Oh, from time to time? And I don’t believe Carad Mereth can possibly be your name.” In Viënè it meant “storm crow,” and Meridy flatly refused to believe it was anybody’s name.

  “It’s one of my names, in fact. And if you live long enough, you may find, my prickly child, that one may indeed be a priest from time to time.”

  She had an impression, stronger than ever, that the man was laughing at her, but though she looked at him carefully, his manner remained perfectly sober.

  “And your name, child? If you will do me the favor to offer it to me?”

  “You can call me Imariy,” Meridy said coldly. “If you like.” The term was not a name at all, but a word that specifically referred to nameless things.

  The ghost boy smiled, a swift, surprising expression, and gave her a little salute, just a flick of one finger, as if she had scored a point in some tricky and unfamiliar game. Carad Mereth’s eyes crinkled with humor, though she knew he couldn’t have seen that gesture. He said, “More poetic than mine, at least. Very well, my impressively well-read nameless child. I’m pleased to make your acquaintance.”

  He bowed slightly, from his seated position. The gesture did not look the least bit affected. He might as well have been in the constant practice of bowing to threadbare girls in ruined village inns. There was no way this man had gotten his manners in any farmer’s house.

  She asked, “Are you a sorcerer, those times when you’re not a priest? Can you step from the real into the ethereal? Is that how you got here, by crossing into dreams and then crossing back?” That would explain a lot, actually.

  “I am not precisely a sorcerer—”

  “He certainly is,” said the ghost boy, almost loud enough to be heard by the living, from his perch on a nearby table.

  The man peered around irritably. “I beg your pardon?”

  The ghost boy shrugged, not seeming impressed.

  While at least one of them seemed forthcoming, Meridy said, “You’re his anchor, even if you’re not a witch. All right, I know anyone can anchor a ghost. But he’s too old to be kin to you, so how can you hold him? Sorcerers can’t usually bind ghosts; they work with the real, mostly. Unless they’re also witches, I mean, except you aren’t. But somehow you’ve bound him anyway, haven’t you?”

  Carad Mereth, leaning wearily against the broken stones of the hearth, answered, “It’s more or less true that no one but a witch can use one of the quick dead as a conduit between the ethereal and the real. However, it’s not quite so true that only a witch can bind a ghost. Such categories are the arbitrary creations of men, as they say, and the God does not often trouble to consult our philosophies.”

  Meridy nodded. “So you�
�re a sorcerer who’s bound a ghost. An old ghost, held long past his time.” She didn’t say, So you’re the kind of sorcerer everyone admired and feared most in the old stories, aren’t you? He probably knew what she meant, though, judging from the tilt of his eyebrow.

  The ghost boy laughed without sound. “Even raised here at the edge of the world, she knows better than to be distracted by facile evasion.”

  The man shrugged, looking faintly irritated. “I have a few skills I’ve collected in my life, that’s all. I do what is put before me to do, in whatever way I am able to do it. As do we all.”

  Meridy studied him. The man raised his eyebrows back at her, copying her expression as though he could not imagine how she could possibly have any further questions. Meridy started to speak—and paused. She had a thousand questions yet that she wanted to ask, so many that they all jumbled together and she could not think how to frame any of them.

  “Of your generosity,” Carad Mereth said in the pause, “might you be kind enough to build up the fire a trifle? This does hurt a good deal.” He gestured vaguely toward his side. “I would like to think warmth might be of some use.”

  Meridy had built the fire up high right at the beginning, so now she was almost out of wood. She would have to leave the half-roofed inn to gather more. She was almost certain that was the point: get her out of the way so he could talk to his ghost without her overhearing.

  Then she was ashamed of her suspicions. Maybe he did want her out of the way for a little while, this man who said his name was Storm Crow and insisted he wasn’t a sorcerer, him with his blue eyes and his old ghost. But he did look cold, despite the fire. His face was still drawn and tired, and Meridy knew that injury and blood loss could lead to fever even in summer. So she pushed herself to her feet and, because she didn’t want him to think he had successfully distracted her from the question, told him, “I’ll be back in just a minute. And then you can tell me what purpose brought you to the edge of the world.”