The White Road of the Moon

by Rachel Neumeier

  Meridy took an experimental step, watching in the mirror as the weighted hem swirled heavily about her ankles.

  “Very nice,” pronounced the woman, and then bowed her apology as another customer summoned her. She slipped away, promising she would soon return.

  The autumnal dress was irresistible, though Meridy couldn’t help but lean toward Jaift and protest quietly, “I’m sure it costs far too much. How can I let you spend all that money on me? My own things aren’t new, but they’d do—”

  Jaift took her hands, cutting her off. “Mery,” she said patiently, “your old dress wouldn’t do; people don’t trust a woman who looks poor, and it’s worse if you’ve got dark eyes. A dress is a small thing. You’re my friend. You saved the twins, or at least you made it possible for Niniol to save them; and you healed Jihiy and the guards; and if you have ghosts bringing you warnings of dire danger and horrible sorcerers trying to kill you, at least you’ll be able to face them all knowing you’re decently dressed!”

  Meridy blinked hard. “I’ve never—” she began, and stopped, because it was too embarrassing to say I’ve never had a friend before. She said instead, “But I’m the one who drew you into the…the dire danger from horrible sorcerers! I don’t know—I think maybe you should go find the Derem family’s town house and get away from me.”

  “Mery, I will die of curiosity if I never find out about the ghost boy and Tai-Enchar—”

  The woman came back with a dress of blue and brown and turquoise for Jaift, murmuring that it ought to be nearly the correct length and that it would take but a moment to let out the hem a trifle, and so it was impossible to talk about ghosts or long-dead witch-kings or sorcerers with dead black eyes and two shadows; impossible, too, for Meridy to urge Jaift to leave her. Meridy was selfishly glad of that and let the subject die. She let Jaift pay for the autumn-colored dress, and also for a tray of pastries and fruit to while away the time it would take for the other dress to be altered. All this seemed terribly self-indulgent, but Meridy was utterly unable to resist.

  —

  The suite at the inn was small and pretty, its walls painted pale gold and coppery red. The bed was bigger than the one Meridy had shared with two cousins in her aunt’s house, and the mattress softer, too. A wide doorway led to a second room that seemed intended to serve as a sewing room or sitting room, and a private bath let off one side, with brass plumbing and—luxury indeed—hot running water. The window in the sitting room even had a tiny balcony overlooking an interior courtyard of raked gravel and flowers, roses and mallows and pinks, all blooming in neatly kept beds.

  “It’s all so…nice,” Meridy said hesitantly, looking around. “Is your house in Tamar this nice?”

  Jaift smiled. “It’s really not. My family does well enough, but there are so many of us, things do get…cluttered. And smudged.” She perched on the window seat, the setting sun giving her honey-colored hair a gold nimbus and washing the color out of her blue eyes. The waxing moon was already visible in the sky, high up above the city.

  Jaift looked at Meridy expectantly. “Here we are! Safe, or safe enough, or at least as safe as we’re likely to be. So tell me all about your ghosts, and that horrible empty wasteland, and the white tower. Tell me everything.”

  Meridy sat down opposite Jaift, tucking her feet under the chair and running her fingers over the old-gold velvet of the cushion. She glanced out the window toward the moon. The sun was lower now, the horizon carmine and orange, the moon bright against a paler flaxen sky, the first stars glimmering faintly in the lavender blue above the sunset colors. Meridy said, “I think I might know who he is—the ghost boy.” Then she hesitated.

  Jaift straightened her back attentively, folding her hands in her lap. “Well? Yes?”

  Meridy bit her lip. Then she said obliquely, “It seems impossible. Only who else would Tai-Enchar, the witch-king himself, hunt all across the world after death? And the boy is the right age, and dressed like a young lord, did you notice? And Iëhiy is his dog, really, not mine, and there’s breeding in that hound—you just have to look at him. They even call dogs like that king’s hounds, you know, in stories.” All this seemed so impossible and yet, when she laid it out like this, obvious. Almost inevitable.

  “Yes,” Jaift said, not quite patiently. “Who is the boy, then?”

  “I think,” said Meridy, and paused again. Then she said out in a rush, “I think he’s Inmanuàr.” But Jaift only looked at her blankly, so Meridy went on, trying not to sound impatient, “Inmanuàr—the High King’s son. High King Miranuanol. You must know the story! About the Southerners, and how High King Miranuanol gathered all his sorcerers together and did the great working to cast the Southerners back and raise up the Wall. But at the very height of the High King’s great sorcery, he was betrayed—”

  “By Tai-Enchar, yes, but I never really paid attention to all that ancient history.”

  Meridy waved a hand. “He was Enchaän, called Tai-Enchar, a petty king who ruled a little kingdom in the south of the High Kingdom. He had a good deal of Southern blood himself, as you might expect since he was both a witch and a sorcerer, and some tales say he’d bargained with the Southerners on that account. Most of the tales agree that his ambition was to raise up a new kind of kingdom, where witches ruled over lesser men and where he himself ruled over all. That’s how the stories put it, that he wanted to rule over all. So Tai-Enchar struck down the High King in the midst of that great sorcery. But the High King couldn’t protect both himself and his working at the same time, so he raised up the Southern Wall and fell—and when he died, all the violence of that freed sorcery poured down on his heir, Inmanuàr Incuonarr, who was too young and couldn’t contain it, so he died, too, before he could ever be High King in his turn. And that’s who Inmanuàr is.”

  “That’s so sad!” Jaift protested. “It’s a terrible story.”

  “Yes, and you must know this part, that under that storm of sorcery, all the land, for a hundred miles and more around, sank down and the waters rushed in to cover Moran Diorr, and everyone drowned. They say you can still hear the drowned bells ringing far below the waves, on moonlit nights….”

  “I have heard that one.” Jaift rubbed her hands over her arms as though she were suddenly cold, and Meridy surprised herself by shivering as well. Both girls fell silent for a moment, half listening for the muffled ringing of thousands of bells.

  Meridy had told the whole story before she remembered how her cousins had loathed her knowing stories and said she was putting on airs. A village girl trying to make believe she’s highborn, like making a bell out of straw and expecting it to ring, her cousins had said, scornful, and thrown handfuls of straw at her. Your voice isn’t so sweet that anyone wants to hear it.

  “I think the twins like that kind of story more than I ever did. I always just did figuring and accounts and things,” Jaift said at last, a little apologetically. “The High King and the Wall and everything, that was all so…so long ago. Can ghosts truly linger so long?”

  “You must have seen how old the ghost boy is. It’s like he’s more dense or heavy or something than most other ghosts, but less real.” Meridy waved a hand, giving up on expressing the idea, but Jaift nodded in understanding and agreement. It was so strange, taking to someone who understood about things like that. Even if Jaift didn’t know anything about history.

  Meridy went on, “So I think our ghost boy is Inmanuàr. Because if Tai-Enchar’s pursuing him, there has to be a reason, and I think being the High King’s heir is reason enough. The witch-king could bind ghosts—”

  “But you said Tai-Enchar drowned too?”

  “Well, yes, that’s the way the tale ends. But he was a sorcerer as well as a witch, and powerful, so who knows? Maybe he stepped out of the real before the sea came in and saved himself. They say sorcerers can do that—step out of the real themselves, and not just bring the ethereal here the way witches do.” It occurred to her that she and Jaift had actually done exactly
what sorcerers were said to do, fleeing the witch-king’s servitor out of the real into the terrible empty land. But then she shook her head, realizing that wasn’t the same. It was the servitor who had opened the way between the real and the realm of dreams; she and Jaift had simply stepped through a door that already stood wide open.

  She leaned forward to explain the important part. “And, listen, if Tai-Enchar didn’t die with the rest, then who knows what he might want with the ghost of the High King’s heir? I wonder if he could still be all caught up in that long-ago battle. Although”—and Meridy leaned back again, considering, then said more slowly—“none of this explains Carad Mereth.”

  Jaift lifted her eyebrows, an invitation for Meridy to go on.

  “Inmanuàr’s anchor. Or an anchor. I would have said he wasn’t a witch, but then, your eyes are blue, so I don’t know.” Meridy sat up straight. “Jaift, could you show me how to turn my eyes blue, do you think?”

  “I really don’t know how. Truly. My uncle—”

  All this time the sun had been sinking, the sky darkening, the moon brightening, and now out of moonlight and shadows stepped a ghost, indistinct at first, which made Meridy jump to her feet with a cry half of relief and half of alarm, thinking it must be Niniol and he had found her, or else it must be the ghost boy bringing disaster at his heel.

  But it was neither Niniol nor Inmanuàr Incuonarr. It was Diöllin.

  “Diöllin!” Meridy said in astonishment. “Princess Diöllin? You are the princess, aren’t you? Are you lost again? Don’t you know if you get lost, you’ll start to fade and maybe never find the White Road? You can’t depend on anybody helping you find me every time, you know! Why don’t you stay with your brother, Prince Herren? He’s your first and best anchor, isn’t he?”

  The ghost gave Meridy an affronted look. “Of course I know that!” she said. Her voice was the murmur of a ghost, but she spoke with a clear, brittle arrogance that all by itself confirmed her identity. “I’m not going to get lost, not this time. I know my name and my way, but they’ve got him! My brother! Of course he’s my anchor, but our enemies have him now. It’s pure wickedness, that’s what it is! He calls to me, but I can’t help him, I can’t get to him. But I found you. You—you’re heavy. The moonlight runs around you like water around a stone. So I found you—”

  Jaift had backed away, alarmed. Now she came forward with a curious step. “Who?” she asked. “Who has your brother? Not—not your mother?”

  “Her!” Diöllin said with furious scorn. “She’s not my mother, not anymore! That sorceress took her—she wanted me, but then I died, so she took her instead, and it serves her right! But then she gave Herren to Tai-Enchar! You have to help him!”

  She sounded really determined about this last, which made Meridy almost like her despite her peremptory tone.

  Then the princess looked Meridy up and down and added more doubtfully, “You will help us, won’t you? I mean, you’re of Southern blood just like him—anybody could see that.”

  Meridy changed her mind about liking her.

  But Diöllin went on, quick and imperious, “Well, if you weren’t, you wouldn’t be so heavy and strong in the ethereal, I suppose, and besides”—her voice strengthened, as much as a ghost’s voice could—“besides, I know you’re not his servant. You showed me my way when I was almost lost; you helped me hear Herren’s voice. That was you, wasn’t it? You must help us again now, when it matters most. You must!”

  Meridy scowled at the princess. But Diöllin’s plea was clearly sincere, despite her arrogant manner. “If the witch-king’s your enemy and he has your brother, what can I do to help?” Meridy asked. Another thought struck her, and she added more hopefully, “What does he want with your brother, anyway? Do you know?” The ghost boy had explained so little, but surely Diöllin must know everything about what had happened….

  The princess cried impatiently, “How should I know? What do I understand of sorcery? I only know he took him! I thought Roann—Roann Mahonis, my father’s seneschal—I thought he would be able to help me, but I can’t find him either—he’s not where he should be, and he’s not a strong enough anchor for me to find him. And if I go to my brother, the witch-king will bind me.” There was more outrage than fear on that last. But then Diöllin wrapped her arms around herself, shuddering, and added in a small, tight voice, “Then he’ll use me against Herren, somehow, and against our people. I can’t let him do that. You have to help me. You must anchor me yourself before he can do it. You have to anchor me and save Herren!” Diöllin held out her hands in a gesture not only of entreaty but also of command. “He is your enemy, too,” she warned Meridy. “If you’re my anchor, you can use me. That would be better for us both. I’ll help you as much as I can, but you have to be the one to bind me!”

  Meridy looked helplessly at Jaift, who stared back, eyes wide.

  Diöllin took an urgent step forward. “You have to bind me! Bind me!”

  Meridy definitely didn’t want to set herself up as Tai-Enchar’s enemy, and yet she thought it was probably too late to avoid that. Besides, what else could she do? She could hardly let some horrible witch-king bind a ghost who was right here pleading with her—and kidnapping Diöllin’s little brother, that was terrible. It would be awful for any little boy, but whatever Tai-Enchar intended to do with the new young prince, surely it would be worse.

  “Please!” said Diöllin. “You have to anchor me!”

  At least Meridy knew how binding was supposed to be done, in stories. She stepped forward and held out her hands, letting the ghost lay her insubstantial hands against hers, palm to palm. “Diöllin,” Meridy said to her, exactly as witches did in the old tales. “Diöllin. Diöllin! By your name I call you and by your name I anchor you and by your name I bind you to the world.”

  She didn’t feel anything happen, but Diöllin must have, for she cried, “Yes! Thank you, thank you! May the God defend you! Take care. Take care for yourself and take care of my brother. He’s north, north of this place. I’ll find him—I’ll show you—”

  And she was gone, flicking out like a candle, or like moonlight when a cloud comes across the moon.

  Meridy stared at the empty place where the ghost had stood. Then she looked cautiously at Jaift, who stared back at her, eyes wide and shocked. Probably Meridy looked just as shocked herself. She had no idea what to say.

  “Do you realize who that was?” Jaift asked, sounding stunned. “You’re anchoring Princess Diöllin?”

  Meridy scrubbed her hands across her face. She wanted to laugh. Or maybe scream. In the end, she only said, “I think that sorceress, Aseraiëth—I think if she’d gotten Diöllin the way she wanted, she’d have had her hands full. I hope I can hold her. It would be bad to lose her after all this.” She just hoped that Iëhiy and Niniol would be able to find her as easily as Diöllin seemed to be.

  Jaift wasn’t listening. She shook her head in dismay. “But how in the world are we supposed to save Prince Herren from the witch-king?”

  “We aren’t! You are going to wait here for your family, and I’ll go—” Meridy looked around vaguely. “North, I suppose,” she finished, rather weakly, because she honestly had no idea where she might be going, and wouldn’t until Carad Mereth or Inmanuàr or someone turned up to explain what was going on and what she should do about it.

  In the meantime she could head for Cora Diorr, maybe, and see if she could find Diöllin’s brother. Cora Diorr! The City of Spires, the city that rested in the bowl of the sky. Ambica had told her the tale of how the mountains around Cora Diorr had been raised up by magic by the first prince of Cora Tal, who wanted to make sure his city was the greatest after Moran Diorr drowned and the High Kingdom broke into pieces. Meridy wanted very much see the City of Towers, although…she wasn’t certain she wanted to see the famous city by herself.

  But Jaift was eying her dubiously. “Oh, is that what you suppose? Well, it’s easier to see a question from all sides in daylight, my father s
ays, and my mother says arguing at bedtime brings bad dreams. Are we going to have any more, um, visitations, do you think?”

  Meridy opened her mouth, shut it again, and shook her head helplessly.

  “Right. Well, let’s assume not. This day’s been long enough, and tomorrow, who knows? I guess you can blow out the lamps now. But you can tell me some poetry, because otherwise neither of us is going to get any sleep at all! Something peaceful. Soothing.” Jaift decisively closed the balcony window and beckoned Meridy to come into the other room.

  Meridy hesitated. Sleep seemed impossible, but…she was very tired. She blew out the sitting-room lamp and followed Jaift, sure she wouldn’t even be able to close her eyes for fear of dreams and ghosts.

  Old poetry. Peaceful poetry. Soothing. Meridy knew a long epic about a woman who fell in love with the sea and built a boat of white wood with blue sails and swore never again to set foot on land. It was sad, but it was a peaceful kind of sadness. Maybe she could tell that one to Jaift, in a minute, as soon as she remembered exactly how it started.

  —

  She dreamed about a dusky-skinned Southern girl who fell in love with the sea, only the girl was not living, she was a ghost. Then the sea became a wide white river. The ghost stood in the center of the river, cool moonlight pouring over her like water and splashing into the river. The river flowed away from her left hand to her right, so smoothly its motion was indistinguishable from stillness. It had neither beginning nor end, and nothing broke its flow—no matter what she did, the girl couldn’t check the river’s course by so much as an inch or an instant. Meridy knew that, and somehow the knowledge was soothing.

  Meridy woke with the familiar sensation of a half-remembered dream pressing at the back of her mind, but she was instantly distracted because Iëhiy was standing with his front feet on the bed, staring at her intently. As soon as she opened her eyes, he yawned eagerly and licked her face. Meridy fended him off, but she was so relieved to see him that she couldn’t mind his enthusiasm. “Where have you been?” she whispered to him. “I was worried!”