The Star Shard

by Frederic S. Durbin

  It seemed so pointless, their life of selling and tallying. What good was a mountain of gold? Having one only made a person want a second mountain or a third. The sun and the trees belonged as much to a peasant as to a king—if only one had the freedom to walk beneath them. Shut within their stalls, the merchants did not allow that freedom to their slaves or even to themselves.

  During a rest break, Cymbril sat on a rock, breathing the scent of tilled soil and letting the breeze flutter her hair. A falcon turned in lazy circles high up in the blue. Beside Cymbal's hand, a fat green caterpillar crawled across the stone. She knelt to watch it.

  The worm moved steadily, crossing the small world of the boulder's surface just as the Rake navigated the larger land. Are you going to turn into a butterfly? Cymbril asked the worm in her mind. Do you want to change, or do you like the way you are?

  She sighed, telling herself she was being foolish. The worm could not choose to stay a worm.

  Her eyelids were drooping when a shadow blocked the sun. In the middle of a yawn, she looked up into the face of Master Rombol.

  "You look tired today," he said, eyeing her from beneath the brim of his plush, tasseled hat. "Didn't you sleep well last night?"

  "Well enough, Master." She tried to sound as cheerful as Loric always did. "This sunshine makes me sleepy."

  He seemed about to say more, but a fine lady called to him from across the greensward, and he waved and strode in that direction, suddenly congenial.

  Cymbril was given lunch in the Kettle Tent, where the cooks sold their famous fourteen varieties of soups and stews to the crowds. Having eaten her fill, she grew drowsier than ever and was in no hurry to get back to her stage. As she circled the market's edge, basking in the warmth and brightness, an odd sight stopped her in her tracks.

  On a grassy hill, a procession threaded among peach trees. Cymbril shielded her eyes against the glare. At first she thought people were playing a game, though they seemed too old for follow the leader. These were youths—all boys, except for the leaders, who were two maidens with shining golden hair that cascaded to their waists.

  Cymbril cocked her head. Some of the boys were Rombol's people, merchants' sons. Some appeared to be local folk. But the lovely, laughing girls ... they wore aprons and plain dresses, not the gowns Cymbril would have expected from the look of their elegant faces and alabaster skin. Whichever way the girls turned, the line of boys followed, shoving each other, their hats in their hands, all vying for the maidens' attention.

  Peering again at the nearer girl's face, Cymbril felt her breath stop. If she'd been carrying an armload of the finest porcelain vases, she would have dropped it.

  She was looking at the Curdlebree sisters.

  Cymbril stared, her eyes and mouth open wide. She fingered a lock of her hair and compared it to the magnificent hair of the two girls. The Nixielixir had definitely worked. She supposed she should be happy—and relieved that she hadn't poisoned the sisters or turned them into newts—but she was too stunned to feel much of anything. "You're welcome," she muttered at last. "I'd say we're plenty even now."

  Banburnish was another two-day market, and the Armfolk trudged to the river ravine for the night. On the way, Urrt sat and listened to a few of Cymbril's songs. "You haven't come to the Pushpull Chamber lately, little thrush," he said, when the press of villagers had left her and were applauding a fire juggler.

  Cymbril locked her hands around his wrist and dangled. He lifted her high above the ground, as he had since she was a little girl. Her weight was still nothing to Urrt, no matter how tall she grew. "I know, and I've missed you all." She lowered her voice. "But I'm going to help the Fey boy escape. Urrt, I've found out something. My father was one of the Sidhe."

  "That he was," said Urrt, his wide brow wrinkling. "A Dweller Under Stars. I thought you knew that, nightingale. Ah, I always forget that you do not understand our songs. But escape—that's a dangerous thing to do. Master Rombol has dogs and soldiers." He crooked his elbow, and Cymbril sat in the bend, her feet swinging.

  "It's not safe," she agreed. "But we have to try. Loric doesn't belong here any more than I do."

  Urrt gazed across the crowded market, his huge eyes slowly blinking. "That's true," he rumbled at last. "Very true. So you mean to go with him. Yes, that's as it should be."

  A sudden pang of regret shot through her. She had mentioned the escape casually, but surely Urrt would miss her. She would miss him. "Are you sad?" she asked.

  He seemed to ponder the question. "No, not when I think of you among Loric's people. We Urrmsh sing our songs, and we push and pull, all together. You belong with your own flock, little bird." He lowered her to the ground and bent close. "On the night when we're nearest the Fey country, if you get him loose from that chain, flee down to the aft hold. A hatch there will be open."

  Cymbril smiled and hugged his broad hand.

  At the long day's end, Cymbril hurried to Loric's room on her way to her own, counting on the tumult of everyone's return to give her a few moments. No one was in the hallway outside his bolted door. To use the Star Shard, Loric had said, she and he must be near each other. Pressing it to her forehead, she silently called, Loric, are you there?

  I'm here. His mind-voice sounded sleepy.

  Quickly, Cymbril told him of the hatch Urrt would open.

  That's good, he said, but getting the key won't be easy. I'm working on a plan. Gorhyv Glyn is still several days away. You'd better not come to the bow tomorrow night. Something was there last night. Did you see it?

  No, but I heard it. So Loric didn't think the grunting thing had been a runaway pig. What do you suppose it was?

  It didn't feel like any animal I know. If I get a chance to talk to a cat, I'll see if it can tell us more. Until we find out what it was—and whether it's still on the Rake—I don't think you should leave your room at night.

  Cymbril didn't like that idea at all. She'd already been working on a strategy for sneaking back to the bow. Embarrassed that her thoughts might make her seem stubborn and childish, she hurried to her next question. I haven't been able to guess. How did you overcome the touch of iron?

  With patience, he said. Not being able to touch worked metals seemed a disadvantage, so I decided to see what might be done. In our land, there is a marshy meadow that was the place of a great battle long ago, when the doors of the Fey world were open. All sorts of old mysterious treasures lie half-buried, tangled in the grasses' roots: broken swords, shields, horses' shoes, and wagon wheels.

  I found some iron nails there, put one in my pocket, and carried it for a cycle of the moon, then added another. I brought my hand closer and closer to an old, rusting helmet until I could touch it. Then I touched it for longer and longer each day until there was no more pain. I would feel better without this collar on, but I can endure it.

  She thought about the explanation. Loric's patience was like the lever the Urrmsh had described, the one long enough to turn over a mountain.

  Finally, she told Loric that the Nixielixir had worked.

  I noticed. Well done. Are the sisters happy now?

  I'm sure they are. She pulled the stone quickly away from her brow. Of course you noticed, she thought privately. You're a boy.

  Chapter 13

  The Threshold of the Wild

  The second day in Banburnish Crossing crept by. In the afternoon Master Rombol brought Loric out again. As the people petted him, Loric's smile began looking a little strained. Patience has limits, Cymbril told herself. Collars have to come off.

  By evening talk of the Curdlebree sisters had spread to every corner of the Rake. None of the young men were of any use to their parents. They left booths unattended, ignored customers, spilled grain, and made mistakes when counting money. Cymbril got no supper that evening and spent a very unpleasant time in the garrison room, explaining again and again to Rombol and Wiltwain where she'd gotten the magic potion that had transformed the sisters. She made no mention of Loric, but implied
rather that she'd found the enchanted forest deck just as she'd found the hallway off Tinley. And she was distinctly vague on the subject of coins.

  The more she talked of the Night Market, the angrier Rombol became, insisting that no such things took place aboard his Rake. When Cymbril led the Master and the Overseer to the court of the spidery statue, of course the second door was gone without a trace. There was only the ominous door to the dwelling of the Eye Women, with the hatch for the frog.

  "Ask the women who live there," Cymbril said in desperation. "They're in charge of the Night Market."

  "You will speak of it no more," Rombol ordered, leading her away with a tight grip on her arm. He was so angry this time that he consigned her to the kitchens, where she spent two days peeling potatoes, scrubbing pots, stirring, carrying flour bags, sifting, emptying slop—and whatever else the cooks could find for her to do. She missed the markets at Andridge and Crallagh, while Master Rombol made his point that the Rake could do perfectly well without its Thrush. Cymbril had to sleep in a chamber shared by seven other kitchen maids, all on pallets and under the beady gaze of Mistress Reech, a sharp-chinned cook who dozed in a chair and awoke if one of the girls so much as rolled over.

  On the second evening, just as the Rake rolled out of Crallagh, there came a loud blaring of trumpets, and the wagon city drew to a halt. Servants ran through the kitchen, shouting of knights and banners and a company of riders in fine coats and furs.

  Cymbril dashed with the other girls to the outer railing. They were just in time to see the splendid entourage coming aboard, men in velvet hats and tasseled cloaks, riding horses with braided manes. "The King's household!" someone exclaimed. "They're here on business for the King himself!"

  Not supposing her punishment could get any worse, Cymbril sidled away as the other girls began to speculate. She had not far to go to reach the ramp bailey. Hiding would have been pointless. A crowd of merchants and servants bunched at the balcony rails, jostling for a view of the grand floor below. Cymbril found a place from which she could peer down at a portly, bearded man with a brilliant red feather in his hat. As Rombol and his closest associates listened, the man read from a long scroll.

  Most of what he read were flowery, formal greetings and establishments of His Majesty's greatness and generosity. But slowly Cymbril pieced together what was happening.

  The King's scout had chanced to see the Curdlebree sisters in Banburnish Crossing and had ridden straightaway to the capital to inform the King, who was seeking brides for his two middle sons. Indescribable beauty, it seemed, was the only requisite for princes' wives. The King's envoys had come to shower Master Rombol with gifts and to ask for the hands of Berta and Gerta in marriage to the Princes Rowan and Jeldspar.

  Rombol gave an impassioned speech about how the beautiful Curdlebree sisters had long been the pride of the Thunder Rake—and how they were as gentle, sweet, and clever as they were comely. Through a tangle of their admirers, Cymbril glimpsed Gerta and Berta, who blushed and beamed and fiddled with their hair. Their mother, laughing giddily and fanning herself, swooned twice.

  When asked if they would consent to His Majesty's invitation to come at once to the palace, the Curdlebrees all three nodded vigorously, and the mother swooned again.

  That very night Cymbril was let out of prison. Wiltwain came by the kitchen with orders for her to return to her old bunk. He gave no explanations but only gazed once at her and said, in his business-like tone, "Sea-blue dress tomorrow, with the belt of coral."

  Back in her own bed again, Cymbril rubbed her face with callused hands and laughed and cried herself to sleep. I've set three people free of this place, she was thinking. Four, counting Hysthia Giltfeather. And none of them was Loric or me.

  Next came the town of Fencet, a short half-night's journey away over mostly level meadows. The Rake's market there was poorly attended, and the merchants didn't bother unloading their finer wares. Fencet's people had little money to spend. They struggled to scratch out meager crops from hillsides above the gloomy Groag Swamp. Cymbril was happier to sing for these plain folk, for the songs seemed to encourage them.

  Truth be told, she was happy to be singing again in the sun and fresh air, and not working in a sweltering kitchen.

  Near the day's end, an old man hobbled toward her on a crutch. He'd sat under a tree all afternoon, listening to her sing as he worked on something in the grass. Now Cymbril saw it was a long necklace woven of swamp flowers, pale purple and glistening white in the dusk. With a toothless grin, the man draped the garland around her neck and tottered away. Cymbril's throat felt tight as she called her thanks. This was a much different sort of gift than when the fine lady in Highcircle had flung her ring into the dirt and told Cymbril to keep it. The old man had made this garland for her.

  ***

  It was hard to sleep that night as swamp birds cawed, as the Rake forged across sandbanks and mires. Cymbril longed to prowl the decks for a peek outward between the tree branches on Eaves Lane or from a hatchway along Clerestory. But even she was tired of anything that might lead to trouble.

  Counting things could make a person drowsy, so after a few hundred griffins, she thought of the names of all the Armfolk she knew, then the names of all the cats. Lulled by the scent of the flower necklace above her bed, she was just listing the cats on the Rake's second level, front half, when she floated off to sleep.

  Rombol fairly bounced with satisfaction the next day. The Thunder Rake had arrived in Ardle, a hamlet the wagon city normally didn't reach until its returning loop after many days farther east.

  Rising onto her toes in a wagon bed, Cymbril let the early breeze tickle her face. Ardle stood on a ridge, where the country dropped away on all sides. To the south lay the higher trough of the Groag Swamp, through which the Rake had come. To the east, the ridge slanted away to other villages under a haze of morning mist. But on the north and west, the slopes sagged into a gray tangle of knotted trees and sluggish waterways, shadowy even in the morning. A brooding lowland swamp stretched like the ugliest of carpets for three leagues and more before the ground rose again into cleaner hills.

  This was the Lower Groag—"Weepwallow," they called it in the surrounding towns, a part of the true Witching Wild. Only a few roads led through its more passable regions, and Cymbril had often heard Rombol complain about the detours it imposed. The old cooks and servers said deep in the Wild lived robber kings who dwelt in stone castles grander than that of the King himself. And there were beasts in the swamps that made bears seem as puny as the Rake's cats. That might or might not be true, but to be sure, this was Wildhair's country. Poisonous bogs were her lawns. The howling of wolves lulled her to sleep, if she slept at all. As always, Cymbril felt a tremble in her chest at the very thought of Wildhair, and the vision of the Lady's cloaked riders filled her mind.

  Brigit. In her preoccupation with everything else, she'd almost forgotten that Brigit had been at the Night Market, too—and had called Cymbril by name. "You've grown," Brigit had said. So they must have met when Cymbril was younger. Cymbril had no memory of the meeting, and it was maddening, like a voice she could not quite hear. But hadn't Wildhair's messenger looked familiar on that first night, when the Rake had stopped for her? Cymbril wished there were some magic that could show her the past.

  She had sprinkled her flower necklace with water, and it was still fresh—a perfect match for the lavender dress she wore. The blossoms wreathed her in a cloud of fragrance.

  The men of Ardle busied themselves in building a wooden lookout tower, so the marketgoers were not as plentiful as the merchants had hoped. It gave Cymbril a chance to crawl behind a wagon and eat the rolls, plums, and meat pie she'd been given for lunch.

  There was no longer a need to listen for the stealthy approach of the Curdlebree twins—no reason to fear a chunk of firewood landing in her lap. Would the sisters be happy as princesses? Would the King's sons be happy with them? What, she wondered, would they possibly have to talk abou
t? But maybe princesses weren't expected to talk. If all they had to do was squeal in delight when presented with hair ribbons, then maybe it was a good arrangement for everyone.

  She was sipping a crock of cool milk and thinking she'd ask for biscuits and cream tomorrow when she heard voices on the other side of the wagon.

  Master Rombol and Wiltwain were discussing business. Cymbril drew up her knees and listened.

  "Seeing isn't the problem," Wiltwain said. The wagon lurched as he propped a foot on it. "We could plow through Weepwallow by daylight without the elf boy, and it would still be a deathtrap. And don't we have enough to worry about, with—?"

  "There are ways," said Rombol. Paper crinkled. "Drier ways, marked on the map. See? I have the safe paths traced in red ink. The Groag is a shortcut to everywhere!"

  "Of course it is. That's why the Lady makes her home there, with the snakes and the water rats. And she's not alone. Every cutthroat who eludes the King's knights hides down there. The ones tough enough to survive become Wildhair's soldiers. Some say the dead ones join her army, too."

  "We've nothing to fear from the Huntress," said Rombol. "If we learn to use the swamps, we cut weeks off our circuit—including all the stretches when we do nothing but travel."

  "I rather like those," said Wiltwain.

  "Think of it, Master Overseer," said Rombol. "We'll make enough to retire ten years before we'd planned."

  Wiltwain had no answer for that but made an appreciative sound.

  "So tonight we head straight across for Windwall, where they replace their lost teeth with gold ones."