The Silver Sun

by Nancy Springer

  Chapter Seven

  Throughout the land of Isle there was a quickening of more than of new life and green leaves. The lords, of course, knew that the King was nearing his end, and eagerly planned their strategies to seize the throne. But the wars of scheming lords were commonplace in the lives of the countryfolk, and it made small difference to them whether the wars were for a wench, a plot of land or the kingdom itself. War was war whatever the reason, and their fields were likely to be trampled, their homes burned, their sons forced into the soldiery and their lives forfeited to the indiscriminate clashing of opposing armies. What, then, caused the peasants to whisper excitedly in the village streets at night, to do the foreman's bidding by day with a sparkle behind the dull-surfaced veil of their eyes? Most of them knew only that there was something in the air, a hopefulness born of half-forgotten legends that seemed to have come to life. All the countryfolk felt it and rejoiced.

  In the town of Nemeton there was a quickening too, the quickening of love for a firm but gentle ruler. Just as hardy green shoots sprout from the stoniest of soils after a warm spring shower, so results of Hal's kindness were springing up in the strangest places. The round face of Kepp the Steward lost its constant frightened look, and his cruelties disappeared with his fear. In the practice yard, Rafe drilled the troops in place of Guy Gaptooth, the burly warrior now dead. His men were a motley lot, but they came to love hotheaded Rafe, who forged them with the fire of his passions. On the sunny hilltop outside of town, the former guards still bent to their shovels. They no longer feared imminent death, but worked with a willingness hardly understood even among themselves.

  On the day that the trenches were finished at last, Hal led the diggers to the Tower, where wagons were waiting outside the grim gates. “Today we lay your victims to rest at last,” he told them. “But I will have no cowards in my legions. Anyone who panics and runs risks joining the company of the dead."

  Strange how their hearts warmed to that word “my,” though they did not understand what Hal had said; they thought he threatened them with execution. When Hal opened the doors of the charnel pit they froze in fear of the spirits before them and the Prince behind them, each as great as the other, and they squirmed as if in a vise. Then they moved, slowly and deliberately, willed forward by a strength not yet their own. A few screamed and ran to their death on hard flagstones or the bottom of the pit, as Hal had said they might. But still the Prince urged the others to the work at hand.

  They loaded the wagons with disjointed bones and bits of human debris, the horror of the scene lost in the blackness that swam before their eyes. They followed the wagons to the communal graves they had dug, and the fear went with them. They unloaded the wagons and rode them back with fear clinging to them like an odor. They worked, though they did not know it, through the day, into the night and through the next day. Alan helped, though Hal had told him not to. When the last human remains were placed in the graves and covered with fresh earth, Hal led the men like sleepwalkers to their barracks, where they slept through half the next day. When they awoke, they remembered little and understood less. But they felt a change in themselves, and smiled in the spring sunshine as they had not since they were children.

  Within a few days, and of their own volition, the guards had managed to find a great, pillarlike stone, which they dug out of its bed and laboriously drew to the site of the communal graves. They set it upright at the crest of the hill, where it could be seen for miles around, and chipped on it the runes for honor, and sorrow, and the repose of souls. Then they knew that the spirits slept, and they turned, unburdened, to the tasks Alan set them.

  All except one. On the softest bed he had ever known, Derek of the Guards tossed and moaned in a sickness that was not of the body, and Hal sat by him, unable to help.

  Rafe did not know about Derek. He had little comprehension of the events at the Tower, and little time to wonder about them, busy as he was with the training of his men. He took hardly any time for himself, but when he could, he rode Night Storm on his rounds.

  A few days after the mass burial, Rafe went to check the sentries he had stationed at the gates, patting Stormy's neck and whistling under his breath. As he approached, his men hailed him. There was a stranger outside the gates, and they could get no sense out of him. He had showed no hostility, but even so they were reluctant to let him in. When Rafe asked them why, they fumbled with words. He looked like Death, one said at last. Rafe muttered impatiently to himself. “Let him in,” he said finally, “and I'll take a look at him."

  He continued to whistle softly as the unwieldy gates creaked open. But as the rider came through, his whistling ended in a sharp intake of breath. Rafe had not thought there could be another such horse in the world, a splendid creamy-gold creature, like a brother to Arundel. At first, Rafe was so taken up with the horse that he scarcely noticed the rider. Then he focused his attention on him, and an unreasoning chill tingled his spine. Head to foot, the fellow was covered by a long, dark cloak, and a hood concealed his face in its shadows. Moreover, he rode the incredible horse without a scrap of harness. Dark clouds scudded overhead, and the world was filled with the ominous rumblings of thunder, the eerie flickerings of lightning. In the chilly light, the silent rider seemed less flesh than a spirit of the approaching storm. The cream-colored horse shone pale as the lightning, the rider thundercloud-dark in his shroud.

  The very air was tense with waiting, though only a few seconds had passed. Time seemed to have come to a standstill; between the mutterings of the thunder silence yawned like an abyss. Rafe heard every little creak of his saddle as he rode up to the stranger. “Who are you?” he asked, trying to keep the edge out of his voice. “What is your business here?” The stranger turned toward him as if to answer. Then time leaped from its crawling pace to a race out of control, as everything happened at once.

  A malicious gust of wind caught the stranger's hood and lifted it back from his face. Rafe was dazzled by the sight of bright golden hair, a jaw chiseled to perfection by some unearthly sculptor, a face like that of a god. But it was the eyes that held him—eyes as fearful and as wonderful as eternity. He thought he would die, disintegrate with love. He wanted to flee in sheer terror, yet he longed for strength to stay. As if from another world, he heard the shouts and screams of his men. “'Tis an evil spirit! A demon—a nixie—run! Its eyes will freeze your blood, turn you to stone!” Many ran, screaming in panic. Some stood with pale, staring faces that rather looked as if they had been carved from stone. And one, perhaps the bravest, perhaps the most bloodthirsty, drew his bow, shouting that he would make an end to the evil thing.

  The stranger did not move, but Rafe reacted with desperate haste, leaning forward to strike the arrow with his hand. With blood dripping from a long, jagged gash in his palm, he turned on his men in fury. “What are you doing?” he screamed. “Would you kill someone who has offered you no harm, who does not even show a weapon? Get back to your posts, and wait till I return!” Though Rafe himself was white-faced and trembling, the force of his words made them ashamed of their fear. They returned silently to their places.

  With the eyes of his men upon him, Rafe turned once more toward that terrible personage in the dark cloak. But the hood was up, the awful Otherness veiled. The stranger held a strip of clean, soft cloth, and with this he wordlessly offered to bandage Rafe's injured hand. Unreasoning fear still gripped Rafe, but his stubborn pride took precedence. He let the hand be bandaged, and then he led the rider across the courtyard. Death followed him on a pale horse; or was it essence of life, too much life?

  Hal and Alan were drilling the horses. When they came in sight, the stranger guided his golden steed past Rafe's and sped toward them like the wind, his hood falling back and his golden hair streaming. He called out to them, a melodious greeting. Rafe had heard those haunting sounds before.... Hal and Alan turned, shouting “Anwyl!” as they rode eagerly to meet him. Rafe watched them embrace, talking excitedly. A dizziness of rele
ase came over him, turning his vision black; he clung to his saddle. He heard hoofbeats, and felt hands helping him to the ground. Then, for the first time in his life, he fainted.

  It was only a few moments later when he woke, with Hal, Alan and Anwyl all bending anxiously over him. “Rafe,” Hal told him huskily before he could speak, “from the bottom of my heart I thank you. If anything had harmed Anwyl here, my crown would have scarcely been worth the gaining."

  “I have fought strong men in battle without faltering,” whispered Rafe. “He threatens me no harm, and yet I am weak with terror of him. Why, Hal? How does he unman me so?"

  “Because he is not man, but elf.” Hal helped Rafe sit up against the wall. “You feared the unknown; you knew, without knowing, that he was not like you. Yet you neither fled him nor attacked him, but helped him in spite of your fear. You are a marvel among men, Rafe."

  “I have learned my lesson, that is all,” Rafe muttered. “When I remembered how I would have killed you once, because of something strange I saw in your eyes, I thought that someday this one might be as dear to me. But the fear—I cannot live with this fear, Hal, even if I never see him again. It clenches my heart. Is there no cure for it?"

  “Only to go through it,” Hal said slowly, “and come out the other side."

  Anwyl sat chatting with Alan, but rose gladly when Hal called him over. Panic surged through Rafe as he watched Anwyl approach; he clutched at the ground, and could not keep from trembling. Hal spoke to Anwyl in the Old Language. He and Alan knelt by Rafe, one on either side, holding him. “Look into his eyes,” Hal instructed him, “for as long as you can withstand it, and when you can bear it no longer—keep looking."

  He looked. Fear stabbed him to the heart, rent him, scattered him to the winds. He struggled until his body seemed lost to him, and his fear was a cowardice only of soul. Rafe felt as if he were floating down a long, dark corridor, hanging back at every turn. But at last, with a glow of warm light and a great surge of relief, he came out into a beautiful place of abundant life. There Anwyl dwelt, and something called Aene, and in an instant Rafe understood what he had feared—the vast, awesome, paradoxical power of love. And he knew that the elves could destroy men with a thought and a glance, and be knew that they never would. The knowledge spun in his mind like a wheel of light, fading into blackness. He woke to find himself still leaning against the wall, with Anwyl holding his hands. Tears started down his cheeks, and he buried his face in the crook of Hal's arm.

  “It is not the spirits of the night, or any spirits, or even the fiends of sorcery that cause the evil of this world,” he faltered. “Nor is it the Ancient Ones, whom men have called heartless, cunning, cold of blood."

  “Nay,” replied Hal softly, “and if the folk of the First Song could destroy evil without destroying man, certainly they would do so. But evil is as much a part of man as heartfelt love; sometimes evil begins in love, or love is called evil.... It is a hard knowledge, but better than ignorant fear, I think."

  “Far better.” Rafe raised his head to face Anwyl. “I thank you. But my head is spinning with questions, Hal. Where do the elves live? How did you and Alan come to know them?"

  Hal smiled. “Anwyl and I must go to Derek. I'll talk with you later."

  “Alan?"

  “I could tell you,” he answered, “but I'd rather not.” He turned his back and walked away, for when he looked at Anwyl the pain of remembering Lysse filled his heart.

  Derek still moaned softly and tossed upon the soft sickbed, fighting a fever of the mind. For five days he had recognized no one, said no word, touched no food or drink.

  Hal placed a brazier by the bed, and on it a pan of steaming water. Into this he put what Anwyl had brought him, and they both sat down to wait.

  Anwyl carried two canvas bags full of Veran's golden flower. “Why, Anwyl?” Hal protested. “You must have stripped the valley clean of it, laid it waste."

  “Because you will have need of it, Mireldeyn."

  “There has always been need,” Hal muttered.

  “But now the close of the Age of Veran is at hand. Soon my people will leave the Eagle Valley, and whether we live or die, we can never return. This is no time to think of saving or holding back. In the new Age, whichever way the tide turns, there will be no place for Veran's Crown, or for elves either."

  “Much that is wonderful will then be gone from our land."

  “But much new and different wonder may yet come into it, that we cannot foresee. Hold fast to hope, Mireldeyn."

  On the bed, Derek lay quiet, sleeping peacefully. Hal and Anwyl shut the door carefully as they left.

  Hal came to Derek the next day, to find him wide awake and anguished.

  “My Prince, my Prince,” he cried in agony, “I have seen my soul and it is black—black!"

  “Not one man in a thousand would have realized it, and not one man in a hundred thousand would have remembered it,” Hal said, with admiration in his eyes. “Derek of the Guards, you will make a liegeman yet."

  He looked back at him, and the sweat was running down his face. “My Prince, your forgiveness is the burden I must carry the rest of my life."

  “Will you eat now,” Hal asked him, “and grow strong again, and serve me?"

  “Ay. I must serve you the rest of my life."

  That day was the eve of May. At dusk, hilltop fires sprang up to mark the vernal half-day; the great stone that marked the graves loomed in the red glow like a tower of blood. All night, Hal and Alan wandered the grassy uplands between the fires, plucking the spring flowers and tossing them onto the raw earth of the mounds in memory of Leuin of Laueroc, wherever he might be.

  In the morning, Alan and Cory left for Laueroc. There Alan would lead the battle to regain the home of his fathers. Anwyl rode with them, bound toward Welas and Veran's Mountain. Cory stood in awe of the elf, but his previous experience with the spirits spared him an ordeal such as Rafe's. Hal and Robin rode with the three as far as the crossroads.

  “Happy birthday!” Hal remarked on the way. “Happy birthday, yourself!” Alan retorted. They were both just twenty, but they had moved as men in the world of men for years past.

  When they parted, Robin and Cory eyed each other in shy affection, saying little. Each knew that he might not see the other alive again. Hal gave Anwyl the embrace of a brother, though the elf hardly knew what to make of mortal caresses. Then, almost hesitantly, Hal offered Alan his left hand for their own distinctive grip. Alan returned the gesture, but his grasp was hasty, hard and rough, and he would not meet Hal's eyes. “Go with all blessing,” Hal said at last. Cory waved to Robin, but Alan rode away with a stiff back, without another glance. Hal bit his lip, and Robin looked at him with sidelong sympathy, for neither of them knew that Alan turned away his face to hide the anguish in his eyes.

  With the aid of old Nana, Hal had ferreted out most of the spies in the castle and sent them packing. Therefore, the great lords knew less than they would like of the doings of the Prince. The best-kept secret in Nemeton was the condition of the King. The healer was a man of peace, physician in the castle not entirely of his own will. He soon allied himself with Hal, and dropped cleverly erroneous hints. Thus, when Iscovar lay glaring at nothing but his own death, talk would have it that he might live a month or two yet. With this information the great lords had to be content.

  One May evening, when Alan had been gone a little over three weeks, the physician came and spoke privately with Hal. Days before, Hal had ordered the filthy chambers of the Tower filled with straw and soaked with barrels of oil. Now he said no word to anyone, but, taking a torch from a sconce on the wall, he strode to the main door of the prison that had been the nightmare of Isle for seven generations. He thrust the torch into each of several cells, then threw it down and made his way out to the courtyard, where he joined Craig the Grim and his men. Tongues of flame showed at the barred windows. The soldiery and the castle folk came out and silently filled the courtyard, watching and waitin
g. Suddenly the blaze streaked up the sides of the Tower and burst from its top like spray from a fountain. A pillar of fire reached hundreds of feet into the air; at its apex, flames spread like the petals of some giant, exotic flowers. There was no shouting in the courtyard, but an excitement that ran too deep for words. The fire lighted upturned faces set in lines of grim exultation. Their time had come at last.

  To the south, in Bridgewater manor, the peasants stood watching the glow in the sky with blinking awe, hardly comprehending. But westward, along the Black River, the villagers looked to the sky, and within moments their own giant piles of straw and brushwood were lit, sending the news yet farther westward. Like bright pollen from the giant flower, sparks of light lit up across Isle, on some hilltop in the domain of every lord between the Forest and Laueroc, between Nemeton and Whitewater, and northward through the Broken Lands to Lee, to Celydon, Gaunt, and on to Rodsen.

  Alan saw the fires from a cottage near Laueroc, and on a hilltop of his childhood home he lit the pyre that sent the news on to the faithful in the lowlands of Welas, and thus to Galin, Torre and Adaoun in their mountain fastnesses. Pelys saw flames in Lee, lit his own signal, kissed Rosemary and marched his troops toward Gaunt, riding in a litter between two horses. North of Whitewater, the Gypsies poured oil on the waste and set great patches of fire. Looking from his battlements in Firth, Roran knew the siege would soon be lifted. Outside of Rodsen and Firth, a smattering of bonfires carried the news on to the warlords of the far north, and they began to move.

  In their strongholds of oppression, the great lords slept a sleep heavy with years of having their own way. On their watchtowers, the drowsy guards yawned and wondered wearily what crazy superstition the peasants were celebrating now. Little did they realize that the entire land was on the move. Armed men issued from the Forest and the Westwood as quietly and relentlessly as ink trickling from the bottle. Blain and his hundreds sped in forced march toward Laueroc. Ket and his men took position around Lee. Smaller bands, and even lone men, emerged to avenge themselves where they might.