The Riddler's Gift: First Tale of the Lifesong (The Tale of the Lifesong)

by Greg Hamerton

  “How did you seal this clasp?”

  “The Riddler, after the fire, he put it on my neck. It wasn’t my idea,” she pleaded.

  “Impossible!” the Rector exclaimed, pulling on her chain again. At least he had the care not to pull so hard that time, but it still chafed against her skin. He dropped the chain.

  “One of the oldest rules of the Dovecote, and you break it before you even arrive. You see these two hands?” he said, shaking his hands in the air before her face. “Do you see these hands?” Tabitha nodded, wondering desperately how she could escape. It was all going horribly wrong. She hadn’t expected to begin her apprenticeship provoking the wrath of the Rector, but it was too late to avoid.

  “These are the only two hands that may orb a Gifter!” he roared, behind a fine spray of spittle. “Only the Rector learns the spell of the Vow, only the Rector selects the apprentices to take that Vow and join the service of the Light. Who is this Riddler to force an apprentice on me, who are you to so wantonly break the rules?” His voice tapered off to a clipped demand, but his eyes retained the dangerous cast.

  Tabitha cringed in her own skin. She became painfully aware of how the others who stood before the Rector were robed in white, while she wore motley traveller’s clothes. She was an interloper in the house of Lightgifters. They watched her expectantly, a little warily, as if puzzled by her duplicity. But Ashley Logán’s expression hardened to a firm resolve.

  “How was she supposed to know the rules of the Dovecote, if she was not yet here?”

  “I did not ask for your opinion, half-knot!” the Rector snapped. “You hold your tongue, or you shall get another week’s window-cleaning on top of the one you have just earned.”

  Ashley didn’t speak again, but he shot Tabitha a quick commiserating glance. She took encouragement from the fact that he had stood up for her. She didn’t feel so alone.

  The Rector looked her up and down. His expression was still indignant, but his eyes had become sly.

  “How old are you?”

  Tabitha hesitated, knowing she was cornered again. She was not yet of age to be a Lightgifter.

  Truthsayer, you cannot lie. He could find out anyway, from the records of births and deaths in Stormhaven.

  “I shall be eighteen at Yearsend. I was born on Midsummer’s Eve.”

  “Another rule you break then, pretending to be a Gifter, but not yet of age! You surely knew this from your mother.”

  Tabitha didn’t need to answer—everyone in Eyri knew the Gifter’s apprenticeship began at eighteen. She decided, instead, to appeal to the Rector’s heart. Surely one who taught healing and compassion would have some sympathy for a recently orphaned girl.

  She swallowed. “My mother taught me well, and I know what shall be expected of me as a Lightgifter. When my parents were murdered by the Shadowcaster I dedicated my life to serve the Light.” She lifted the Lightstone on its short chain. “I will do anything to make amends for this, anything at all, but as I must continue to bear it, please let me bear it with your blessing.” She met the Rector’s gaze with her genuine appeal, then bowed her head. The Rector’s eyes were as cold as an empty winter’s sky.

  She heard Sister Grace speak, though she dared not look up. “Rector, she could serve in the stables, or the kitchens, until the turn of the year. I believe her heart is true, she wants to be a Lightgifter.”

  “Many people want to be Lightgifters, Sister Grace, but few have what is needed to join the Dovecote.”

  Tabitha picked her eyes up from the fur rug. “I hear the Morningsong every dawn. I can call to the sprites, though I have little training in what spells to cast. With Ravenscroft exposed, won’t you need all the Lightgifters you can get? I want to learn, I want to help, I don’t want to do the wrong thing.”

  The Rector considered her for an uncomfortable moment of silence, then walked to his chair and sat, turning to gaze out the windows at Eyri.

  “Very well! You shall work off your guilt,” he said, still facing away. “If you wish to prove how you have reformed, how you can be dedicated to the rules of the Dovecote, then you shall have no dealings with the magic, until Yearsend, when I shall test you. You shall wear grey, like all the other servants, and you shall cover that Lightstone which you have no right to wear. You shall stay in the women’s wing. One complaint about your conditions, or the work that is set before you, and you shall be dismissed. You have already stretched my tolerance to its limits. See that you behave from now on.”

  Tabitha didn’t know what to say. Although she would not even be an apprentice, she had a chance to be, when she was of age. That wasn’t too far in the future. She would stay in the Dovecote. He had not turned her away.

  “Thank you, Rector Shamgar.”

  The Rector didn’t acknowledge her thanks, he had already dismissed her as being nothing more than a servant until Yearsend, it seemed. He was turned to face Sister Grace.

  “Why has Hosanna not returned with you?”

  “They require her for questioning, Rector, regarding her time with the Shadowcaster. But she doesn’t speak. I gave her my best healing, but she is –” Sister Grace closed her eyes. “She is damaged, in here,” she said, tapping her temple with a finger. “All the healing spells work on the body. There’s nothing I know for the mind.”

  “Well, if she was in such a bad way, why did you leave her?” retorted the Rector.

  Ashley rolled his eyes at Tabitha.

  Grace answered the Rector with calm patience. “Sister Vanessa is the Healer in Stormhaven, she was caring for her, as well as I could.”

  “I think my own skills are more likely to yield success with such a patient,” declared the Rector. “You should return to Stormhaven, and bring Hosanna back to the Dovecote for healing. I would like to hear from her what happened to the unfortunate Rosreece, and what she knows of the Shadowcaster’s magic. Tell the Sword we shall allow her to be questioned once she is healed.”

  “Rector, I don’t think –”

  “You question my ability to heal her?” the Rector challenged, leaning suddenly forwards in his chair towards the Sister.

  Grace remained nonplussed, and Tabitha admired her calm. “I don’t think she will travel all that well. She had a fit of screams and tears when we tried to move her from the cell in the Swordhouse.”

  “Well, that is something for your expert hand to solve then,” he replied, easing back into the depths of his seat. “Bring her back as soon as you are able, and I shall attempt the greater task of reclaiming her mind.”

  Sister Grace nodded. The Rector smiled, but only briefly.

  “Half-knot! Take servant Serannon down to the stores, get her fitted in a grey, and a neckerchief, don’t you forget, and present her to Wyniss. Then get to cleaning your windows.” The Rector dismissed them both. Keegan and Grace stayed in his chambers. Tabitha bowed as she left, and again at the door when Ashley did so. They scurried into the warm corridor.

  Ashley sighed deeply when he had closed the door behind him, but indicated with a finger to his lips that Tabitha should say nothing. They walked softly to the stairs, and descended. The central volume of the Dovecote’s hall dropped away beside the staircase. There was a purity to the light and air that made Tabitha feel like singing, after the tension in the Rector’s chambers. She wondered if they would let her join the Morningsong the next day.

  “Do servants get –”

  “Shhht!” Ashley said, a quick warning glance.

  Only when they had reached the middle floor did Ashley explain.

  “We are not supposed to speak on the Rector’s floor, unless we are speaking to him.”

  “That whole top floor is the Rector’s?”

  Ashley nodded, leading Tabitha on toward the grand curving stairs that led down to the ground floor.

  “Is he always like that?”

  Ashley nodded again, but gave her a wicked grin. “You’ll learn very quickly here to avoid drawing attention to yourself.”

>   “How do they stand it?”

  “Who?”

  “Keegan and Grace, he treats them like children, yet they take it with humility.”

  Ashley looked puzzled. “He is the Rector.”

  “But they are Lightgifters!”

  “You have not yet taken the Vow. You will understand when you take the Vow, at Yearsend. It is a fundamental as old as the Dovecote—to be a Lightgifter, you must accept the Rector as the Illumination, the sole channel to the Source, the final link in the chain of Gifters to the Light. The Rector is the one to allocate our essence to us. That gives him the power to withdraw the right of any Gifter to essence, which renders them powerless. Keegan and Grace are just protecting their own interests in there. Try to imagine what it would be like to be a Lightgifter, without Light to gift.”

  “So we must obey him, all the time?” It seemed an impossible task for Tabitha. She had already had a taste of how demanding the Rector could be.

  There was a twinkle in Ashley’s eye. “I didn’t say we always obey him. Just make sure you aren’t caught not obeying him. Life would be miserable if we followed Shamgar’s rules to the letter. Yet while you are in the Dovecote, it is best to appear to be doing just that.”

  * * *

  Washing. There was a heavy wooden bucket to carry to the well, a heavier bucket to return. A cauldron squatted on the kitchen hearth, swallowing more water than Tabitha thought possible. While it heated, she collected the aftermath from the dining hall—cups, bowls, platters, boards, and spoons—and brought them to the scullery bath, an armload at a time.

  She tried to make light work of it, pretending it was just another night in the Tooth-and-Tale, but there were so many people at one sitting that she knew it would take hours to finish the cleaning alone. There were close to one hundred Gifters and apprentices in the Dovecote, all told. And besides the Gifters there was the staff of ten—cooks, cleaners, grooms, the store-master and Mistress Wyniss the Matron. It all amounted to a lot of serving, a lot of collecting, and a lot of washing.

  Tabitha scalded her hand on the cauldron, trying to scoop too much boiling water into her bucket. The coarse scrubbing cloth she was given had a manner of sending bristles under the fingernails. The cook had favoured oil in the food, and the residues soon fouled the water, so that she had to replace it with another bucket from the cauldron. The soap was an ineffectual cake which liked to break apart and stick to surfaces rather than clean them.

  Sweeping. The thick-bristled broom that she was issued with did a bad job of coaxing the dust from the twisting corridors of the Dovecote, but a hard look from Mistress Wyniss had cut off any thoughts of complaint. Tabitha watched half-knots file out onto the Sandfield for the instruction that she wished she could attend. She soon learned that sweeping there was best left until after the class had tracked their dirt into the lower corridors. Even though the apprentices seemed diligent in wiping their feet on the mats, they left a trail of grit in their wake, a trail Tabitha was expected to have spirited away by sunset. She began to sweep again.

  Cooking. The onions stung her eyes to tears, but the pile would not get any smaller by crying at it. She stripped them by feel alone, diced them, and added the pieces to the cook’s stew. There were two other assistants in the kitchen, but there was so much to prepare that they all worked at a frantic pace. The others were more efficient in their scurrying. Orders were shouted through the steam and scents of the kitchen, vegetables were collected and dispensed, herbs were retrieved from the gardens, pots were hung over the fire, and others taken from it. All around was the heat, and the overly-rich aroma of cooking meat being turned over the open flame. Once braised, the meat would join the mountain of stew in the cauldron.

  Tabitha cut her finger when an onion slipped beneath the knife, and she earned a frown from the cook. She caused delay by seeking out a bandage, but she knew her presence itself was a boon for the kitchen. The sting of the onions returned the moment she set her knife to the pile once more.

  Washing. Water for the cauldron. Collecting plates and platters. Fighting the tattered cloth that pricked her fingers.

  When a strident singing voice called out through the Dovecote, she had just finished her pile of cutlery and set it in the fire-box to dry. The cook ceased tying herbs to an overhead string, and called to Tabitha.

  “Come on, luvvy, that’s the Evencall. We must be out!”

  They had just enough time to reach their room in the women’s wing before the great oak door boomed shut at the end of the corridor, sealing them from the Hall of Sky.

  There was little talk shared between the servants that night—like the others, she washed, found her allocated bed, and fell upon it.

  Her last thought before she fell into an exhausted sleep was how far away the Lightgifters had seemed all day—she hadn’t seen Ashley at all, and despite the other Gifters being close in body, they disregarded her with a gaze which passed right through her, as if she weren’t there. She had had no opportunity to talk to anyone other than the servants. It was as if being a servant made one unworthy of attention. She supposed it was better than being shouted at.

  * * *

  The Morningsong was touching, powerful, joyous and sad in the same moment. It brought to Tabitha memories of family, singing together in the crisp morns of Phantom Acres, a time that would never return. It evoked feelings of sharing, the unity of the family of the Light. Each and every Lightgifter, no matter where the sun had found them, would be joined in song with the choir of the Dovecote. The sheer volume of sound overwhelmed Tabitha, even though she stood at its fringe. The voices swelled through the Dovecote.

  Mistress Wyniss had been very firm in her answer—no ghosts took part in the Morningsong, ever. Tabitha had found that the only way she was allowed close to the Hall of Sky was to continue fetching water for the baths, a task which brought her past the singers with every bucket.

  On the second pass, she couldn’t resist setting the work aside, and creeping up to the arched hall doors. She longed to be standing amongst the ranks of Lightgifters, in the Assembly.

  Sprites swirled through the air, over the Gifters’ heads. The Gifters who she could see were turned away from her, facing inward to where she knew the obelisk of the Source would be. She spun her warm Ring absently around her finger. The Morningsong pulled at her with its familiar joy. Even though her Lightstone was carefully tied inside the black neckerchief she had been given, she could feel it vibrating in sympathy with the song.

  Yet as she stood listening and felt the spell deep in her bones, she became aware of a discord in the sound. There was a silence in the pattern where there should be a voice. There was a missing thread of song without which it could not be complete. It was not unlike the moment when she had discovered the words to the Lifesong, on the hillock behind Phantom Acres. She could no more deny the sudden knowledge than she could stop herself from singing.

  She added her voice to the theme which surrounded her. Her song was like a bird’s, following no structured melody, yet piercing the gaps with pure music. Her song had a strange lilting rhythm.

  The sprites spun incandescent through the Hall, joining into streams, suddenly thick with Light.

  She became so absorbed in the perfection of the song, in the sensation of rightness that rang through her body, that she forgot her caution. She leaned further in to the Hall, her eyes feasting in the brilliance of the Source. It was a delicate fury of Light that weaved through the Gifters.

  The Rector Shamgar caught her with his pale blue gaze.

  He was standing beside the Source, his arms raised as if guiding the sprites, his lips set in rigid parallel.

  Tabitha jumped back into the corridor, her heart pounding. The Morningsong continued its unbroken melody, but her voice had caught in her throat. She hurried away. She hefted the bucket to her side, and made for the well.

  Second day, and already I’ve broken one of the Rector’s rules.

  Her inspired mood was chased by
the spectre at her back. She had little chance of surviving the ten weeks until Yearsend without breaking the rules again. The Rector could dismiss her at any time.

  Despite that knowledge, she shouldered the burden of her duties for the day with determination. Deep in her heart, a seed had found purchase. Singing with the Lightgifters had been like opening a door to a bright new day. She tried to hold onto that feeling as the day wore on, as the hauling of water became sweeping, the sweeping cleaning, then cooking, washing, making soap, mucking out stables, cooking again, washing, beating dust out of mats, and the tired scurry to bed as the Evencall was called.

  * * *

  On the fourth day, she found someone to talk to, at last. She was sweeping the women’s corridor out through the Hall of Sky, when a clatter and a thump from above drew her attention to the windows overhead.

  She gasped. A figure moved past one of the many glass panes, high above in the vaulted ceiling of the Hall. The glass was irregularly transparent, but when the figure dropped to his knees and pressed his face to the glass, she recognised the youthful features of Ashley Logán. He waved, and Tabitha returned the greeting from three stories below. But then she noted that his hand held a rag, and he was cleaning the glass. She couldn’t be sure he had waved at all.

  Later, she tracked him to the well, where he drew water for his cleaning work. He was dressed in a grey robe, just like Tabitha. He should have been in white, like the other Lightgifters.

  “Hullo stranger,” she greeted him. There was more of a sting in her voice than she had intended.

  “Hi Tabitha,” Ashley replied mildly. “I’m sorry if I haven’t been around to talk to, I suppose it’s become so much a bad habit of mine that I don’t even think about it. We’re—forbidden to talk to ghosts. At the moment, I’m trying to keep my neck out of trouble, with the Rector the way he is.”

  “Oh.”

  “But I’m a ghost for a few hours today, so I suppose we can talk.”

  “You’re a ghost?”

  “The greys,” he explained, lifting his robe at the shoulder. “All the apprentices have a grey, we all get to be ghosts from time to time. But I’m expected to perform all the duties of a half-knot as well, so my days are rather full at the moment.”