Son of Avonar

by Carol Berg

  And when the boy was only twelve, so Baglos had told us, his desperate people had sent him into a magical war for which he was unprepared. I rinsed the bloody rag in the pail of water, wrung it out, and gave it back to the Dulcé. “He has no right to hurt you, Baglos. Many people have terrible childhoods and impossible duties, but they live their lives with grace.” How could this callow hothead be kin to the J’Ettanne? “Is he even capable of what’s needed to save your people?”

  Baglos was a long time answering, his face hidden in the rag. “He is, dear lady. Whether he wishes it or no.”

  One might have thought the Dulcé’s cuts and bruises magically vanished when I asked if he felt well enough to prepare a meal for us. While Baglos busied himself with my pots and poked about in the garden, the meadow, and the larder dug into the hillside, Jacopo and I hauled water to my neglected garden.

  “Does Emil Gasso still have extra horses?” I asked as we splattered the contents of our pails onto the dry soil.

  Jacopo had relaxed a bit, now he was busy with something not smacking of sorcery. “He does. Old buzzard figures he’d best get gold for ’em soon or the king’ll have them for the war.”

  “If we’re to get these two out of here in good order, they’re going to need another mount. Maybe two. I’m not sure if Baglos’s horse is reliable.” I was not yet willing to tell Jaco that I was planning to accompany them. My plan was still too flimsy to expose to the daylight.

  “Gasso’s got at least three good mounts, so it shouldn’t be a problem.”

  “Would he lend them? It would take far more than I have to buy even one.”

  “Not likely. Emil Gasso is as penny-pinching as a body can be, so he’ll not let the beasts out of his sight without the coins in his purse.”

  Baglos interrupted, asking for salt, so I went to show him, while Jacopo finished watering the garden. There wasn’t room in the cottage for all of us to eat, so I had Jacopo help me move the table outside, and then sent him to drag Paulo from his nap in the woodpile while I fetched D’Natheil.

  The Prince was no longer behind the cottage or anywhere that I could see, so I walked over to the copse where the horses were tethered. He was kneeling by the spring, frantically scrubbing at his hands. Curious at his odd frenzy, I held back and watched. After drying his hands on his breeches, he wrapped his arms about his face and head and bent over until his elbows almost touched his knees, releasing a quiet groan of such heart-tearing misery, such private and profound despair, it seemed to swallow the last light of the sun. Disdain and condemnation died on my tongue. Any man in such pain was suffering more than any reproach of mine could cause him. And so I retreated. Even if I had cared to ease him, I had no remedies for that kind of wounding.

  Not long after I had returned to the cottage, D’Natheil came striding across the meadow, haughty and composed, displaying no remnant of the emotion I had glimpsed at the spring. I motioned him to the table, where Paulo leaned on his elbows yawning and a frowning Jacopo tapped his knife idly on his empty bowl. The sky had deepened to a rich blue, and I set out candles that flamed against the evening like two new stars. An odd company we made: a peasant sailor, a village urchin, a disgraced duchess, a diminutive cook, and a mute, half-mad prince. I sacrificed the flask of wine that I kept for emergencies, shared it out, and when Baglos set his fine-smelling dish on the table, I raised my cup to the company. “J’edai en j’sameil. To life and beauty everlasting!” I said the words first in the archaic language of the J’Ettanne and then in Leiran.

  D’Natheil’s eyebrows lifted slightly as he raised his cup and tipped his head in gracious acknowledgment. The season had changed yet again.

  Baglos’s mouth fell open, and he almost dropped his cup. “The Avonar feasting wish! Where have you learned those words, woman? And spoken in the most ancient tongue of the Dar’Nethi! Has D’Natheil—How could he have taught them to you?”

  “He hasn’t. It’s my story, Baglos, and I’ll tell you some of it, but right now we feast on your magic. What incredible thing have you done with my bits and pieces?”

  Whatever the shortcomings of the little Dulcé, they did not include his cooking. Thin slices of ham were rolled up around a savory filling made of bread and nuts and onions. Tart monkberries from the hillside were sweetened with honey and made into a sauce to go over it. To top it all he brought out apples, baked in the coals with butter and honey. Hard to believe they were the hard early apples that were always so tasteless. None of us could get enough. From what conversation went on during the meal, one might think we were all as mute as D’Natheil. Paulo came near bursting with unbridled ecstasy when we gave him the last bites, as well as the pot to scrape.

  Jacopo left for Dunfarrie soon after we were done. He bowed politely to Baglos, but granted D’Natheil only a disapproving stare, his terror of sorcery momentarily super-ceded by disgust at the Prince’s unmanly behavior. The pleased Dulcé returned the formality. D’Natheil ignored him. Jacopo set out across the moonlit meadow, stopping to wave just before disappearing into the trees.

  “That ranks among the finest meals I’ve ever eaten, Baglos,” I said as we cleaned up the mess, “including those at the tables of kings and nobles. Any great house in Leire would make your fortune were you to agree to manage its kitchen.”

  “Please excuse me,” said Baglos, as he wiped the pots and stacked them neatly by the hearth, stood on a chair to hang the net bag of onions in the rafters and set the small tin of salt on my shelf. “But I have great curiosity. What woman who lives . . . excuse me . . . as you do, has ever dined with kings and nobles? And how is it possible that you know the ancient language of the Dar’Nethi?”

  While the moon rose above the eastern horizon and a dry breeze nipped at the candle flames, I perched on the table and told the Dulcé and D’Natheil something of myself and something of the J’Ettanne and something of how I had come to live as I did. Not so very much. Only that the descendants of J’Ettanne knew nothing of these things Baglos had told us, that they had been exterminated, and that it was possible my own husband, a Healer, and my son, a newborn infant, had been the last of them.

  Baglos was in shock at my story, exclaiming his horror even as he translated it for the Prince. “The Exiles all dead . . . and their gifts outlawed. Burned alive . . . slaughtered at birth . . . Vasrin guide our steps from this place. I think the Lords of Zhev’Na have already won!”

  “You see why I believe you’ve been sent to me? It’s possible there’s no other soul in the Four Realms who even knows the name J’Ettanne.”

  “That seems indisputable.”

  “And you see why D’Natheil must do no magic where anyone can see? Make sure he understands that. Our law is absolute.”

  “Much is now explained. Will you not tell us more, woman? About J’Ettanne’s people, about their life in this land? Why did they no longer come to the Bridge?”

  “I told you, they had no lore of a Bridge or of a kingdom such as yours. I’ve no answers that can help you. As for their life—it doesn’t matter anymore.” The past was done. Karon and the J’Ettanne were dead. Dwelling on their stories would not repair that. I hated speaking of them.

  When Baglos told D’Natheil all of this, the Prince indicated that he remembered my teaching. He displayed no fear, of course. Bullies never believe they’ll experience the kind of wickedness they parcel out. He retrieved his birchwood—now a slender chip the size of his palm—sat himself in the light spilling from the cottage doorway, and began carving on it with the tip of his silver dagger. Once I felt the slightest stirring in the air, a faint sigh that was not the cooling breeze, and I looked over to see him running his fingers over the blade of his knife. I wondered if he was invoking some enchantment, but I wasn’t about to ask.

  Baglos and Paulo moved the table back into the cottage. Paulo mumbled something about seeing to the horses and strolled into the night with his hands in his pockets. The boy would not consider taking Thunder down to Dunfarrie. The sh
eriff had told him to ride the horse as far as Jonah’s cottage, and Paulo was unwilling to jeopardize his privilege by straying one finger’s breadth from the instruction. A fine meal, responsibility for Rowan’s horse, mysterious princes, and talk of sorcery—Paulo had likely never had such a day in his thirteen years.

  A short while later, as I dumped out the water we had used to clean the dishes, D’Natheil suddenly jumped to his feet, dropping his woodcarving into the dirt. Grabbing my pail and throwing it aside, he shoved me toward the doorway of the cottage, and then, with vehemently expressive hands, demanded to know where Paulo was. Just like him not to notice anyone else until he wanted something for himself.

  “What do you want with—?” Before I could finish my question, D’Natheil bellowed in frustration, waved his hand to the sky and the meadow and the wood, and then slapped his fists together ferociously. Danger. Even as I squinted at the darkening edge of the trees, trying to see what bothered him so, a gray haze shadowed the moonlight, and the cheerful flickering of candlelight faded, though the moon was unclouded and the candleflame yet burned. An alien wind swept through the valley, leaching the warmth from the summer night, bearing on its back the scents of smoke, ash, and decay. “He’s with the horses.” I pointed to the copse.

  With long, graceful strides D’Natheil dashed across the stretch of grass to the dark grove, and soon returned with a squirming Paulo over his shoulder. The young man pushed me farther into the house, dumped Paulo on the floor, and slammed and barred the door. Breathing hard, he leaned his back against the door, and his defiant chin challenged me to argue.

  Baglos said, “What is it? Wild beas—? Holy Vasrin! The Zhid!” He cast his almond-shaped eyes to the roof and the walls, climbing onto my bed to close and bar the shutters.

  Paulo picked himself off the floor, rubbing his arms. “He’s balmy.”

  “Never mind it, Paulo,” I said, urging the boy away from the Prince and toward the fire. “There’s danger about, and he wants you safe. It will pass.”

  “What of the sailor?” said Baglos. “How far had he to travel? I pray Vasrin he is not out.”

  My heart stopped for a moment in fear for Jaco, thinking of him on the exposed lower slopes of the Dunfarrie path, but then I considered the time and shook my head. “No, it’s only an hour’s walk to the village, and it’s been at least two—”

  “—and he is not the one they seek,” said Baglos, patting my arm. “Build up the fire and do not think of what passes outside the door. In Avonar, we would tell stories when the Zhid were seeking, hoping to bar them from our thoughts.”

  The wind gusted and howled and pawed at the cottage, rattling the door and shutters, seeping through the log walls. Beneath its bluster was an undertone of uttermost desolation, a song worthy of a world mourning for a dead sun or a race lamenting its lost children. I needed no urging to build up the fire. “If there are to be stories, someone else will have to tell them,” I said, pulling a blanket about my shoulders. “I don’t think I can.”

  D’Natheil sat on the floor beside the hearth, eyes narrowed and head cocked to one side, his senses fixed on something far beyond the fire. As the rising flames gnawed at the logs, his expression gradually lost its intensity, as if he were mesmerized by the play of light and colors.

  “Mie giro.” Baglos sat down on the worn woven rug beside his master and plucked the Prince’s sleeve. “Mie giro, ne pell don . . .” D’Natheil ignored him. His narrow face tight, the earnest Dulcé persisted. He spoke softly to his master, shaking his head and pressing a fist to his heart, coaxing and cajoling until D’Natheil dragged his gaze from the fire, blinked, and nodded.

  “The Prince has agreed that I may tell a story of his childhood to distract him from the Seeking. I hope it might make him remember.” Baglos spoke first to me and then to D’Natheil, as before.

  “When my lord was six years old, he was a wild boy, who wished to do nothing but fight. He greatly admired his older brother, Prince D’Seto, a young man both honored for his courage and fighting skills and beloved for his great good humor. One day D’Natheil stole a sword from Prince D’Seto, not understanding that it was only a flimsy ceremonial sword that his brother had enchanted so as to make the one who carried it irresistible to the ladies and tireless in . . . ah . . . adventures of the heart. D’Natheil was so small that the strength of the enchantment acted on him like an excess of wine. . . .”

  Baglos proceeded to tell us a long series of D’Natheil’s embarrassing adventures among the warriors and ladies of Avonar. The Dulcé was a fine storyteller. I found myself shaking my head in amused disbelief, Paulo giggled, and even D’Natheil was flushed and smiling. And amid the humorous escapades, I caught vivid glimpses of a cultured city and a courtly people bitterly scarred by war.

  After a while, however, Baglos’s tale flagged. He struggled to continue as if a lead weight were attached to his tongue, and as his voice faded, so did our laughter. I huddled deeper in my blanket, cursing my foolish imagining that I might be able to help anyone avoid horror. I hadn’t even been able to keep my own child alive. D’Natheil took up his listening posture again. He watched the fire, and Baglos watched him, gingerly touching his sleeve or his knee, whispering in his ear, but unable to distract him. Only Paulo remained serene. He fell asleep, curled up on the wood floor.

  After perhaps half an hour more, the Prince startled me by leaping to his feet and yanking open the door. The moon was bright, casting silver-edged shadows over the meadow. The wind was gone along with the morbid chill. Evidently, the Seeking had passed.

  The past two days had been exhausting. I had been awake since well before dawn, and I managed to keep my eyes open only long enough to tell the others that they should remain in the house. “This won’t hurt my reputation,” I said, when Baglos expressed concern at three men sleeping in the house with an unmarried woman. “I’ve none to worry about.” It would be crowded, but only for a night. “Tomorrow we leave for Valleor. I know someone who may be able to help you.” Then I curled up on my bed and knew nothing until dawn.

  Paulo was off to Grenatte with the sunrise. As he proudly mounted Rowan’s black horse, I loaded him up with jack and hearthbread. “Whatever the sheriff asks you, tell him only the truth. But carefully, Paulo. You’ve heard some strange talk here, and you must be cautious about what you repeat of it . . . lest someone get wrong ideas.”

  “I mostly hear more’n people think,” he said, “but my head’s too thick to keep hold of much.” The boy gave me a sideways grin, and then he and the horse were racing down the trail to the south.

  I set off for the village shortly after, trying to decide how to broach to Jaco the news that I was leaving Dunfarrie. He was limping about the shop and grumbling about the mess Lucy had left him. “Busybody,” he said, before I’d even had time to wish him a good morning. “Don’t have nothing better to do than try to set everything to rights. Junk shops aren’t supposed to be set to rights. Who’ll ever think they’ve found a treasure if it’s all laid out in front of them like I’ve looked at it careful? She even cleaned the window. Fool woman. If I wanted more light in here, I’d of lit me a lantern. Blasted leg is seized up good this time or I’d be up there smoking up the glass again.” He pointed at the clean window with his walking stick.

  “Jaco, stop this. Listen to me. Did you see anything strange on the way down last night?”

  He wouldn’t stop fussing about. “Nope.” He limped slowly to the back room and returned with a roll of chain.

  “The shadow came again after you left. Like we saw on the ridge, only worse. Closer. The night went dark even though the moon was up. The wind was cold and smelled like death.”

  “I saw nothing like that. It was a fine night. I walked down, sat and smoked a pipe for a while, stopped in at the Wild Heron. It’s your imagination all roused up by these two strangers. I’ve a hard time even remembering what it was like that day on the ridge. The more I think on it, the more I believe all this magical bus
iness is just foolery, and we really didn’t see nothing at all. This Aeren—or whatever his name—is addled from his fever. And there must’ve been a crack in the rock.” He dumped a barrel of neatly folded clothes on the floor, kicked them into a muddle, and then stuffed them back in the barrel.

  “No. It was real then, and it was real last night. We stayed in the house as Baglos said, and he told us stories to take our minds away from it. He says these Zhid feed on fear.”

  “Listen to your foolish talk. You must be rid of those two, Seri. Send them away.” He unstacked a nest of iron pots. Into one he threw some bits of rope. Into another he dumped a wadded cloak, three spoons, and a battered tin of tea.

  “Exactly so. I’m taking them to see a man I know in Yurevan. Jaco, you—”

  “Taking them? Yourself?” For the first time I seemed to get Jaco’s attention. His head shot up from his puttering. “Never heard anything so foolish. Why would you do that? Who is this man?”

  “Someone who might be able to help unlock D’Natheil’s confusion.”

  “You need to tell me . . . who is it? What’s his name?” His brow was creased, his face red. “So’s I can find you if need be. Maybe I ought to go with you. Yes, that’s what I must—”

  “His name is Ferrante, a professor at the University who knows about the J’Ettanne. He used to live just outside of Yurevan. I don’t even know if he’s alive.”

  Only after I so stupidly blurted everything out did I think what a predicament I was leaving Jaco in. “Listen, I know the sheriff is your friend, but you mustn’t tell him any of this. Rowan fought at Avonar. Leiran soldiers slaughtered everyone in the city just because some of the citizens were sorcerers. They burned the sorcerers and their families and friends. Even their children, Jaco. Rowan helped them burn the J’Ettanni children.”