"Aye, it may be so."
"But that would be hundreds—no, thousands of years after the First Undoing. And there are no accounts in the histories of Ahn Norvys of the First Undoing."
"Aye, yes, Kal, it was the dawn of time, but it was also the time of the People. It is all in the 'Lament,' as I said. And the evil of that time was the evil at the time of Ardiel and is the evil of this time, too. It is ancient and powerful, now as then. But listen, Kal, listen." Katie shifted where she sat.
"The singers changed song, and soon the forests themselves ceased their music, and the Gleacewhinna began to fail, becoming diseased—some, the young ones, even dying, leaving nothing but bole and branch, as cold, hard, and lifeless as stone. You see, the singers' song was to the Gleacewhinna as water and sunlight are to any other tree in Ahn Norvys. So with the death of the Ina Pik Whinnan song did the darkness of the world come seeping into Beldegrayne. This was part of the First Undoing, and with the First Undoing came the Age of Echoes.
"But some of the Ina Pik Whinna recognized what was happening. Among them was a woman named Jodris, herself daughter of the king singer of the People. Some say it was the anagoroi, some even say Ruah herself, that gave warning and so inspired a handful of the People to make ready to leave Beldegrayne. In secret were three ships built—ships in a manner of speaking, for the People were never a seafaring folk. The Ina Pik Whinna had never left their homeland isle, because there had never been need to leave it. But three ships were built, fewer than twenty people in each, and in each were smuggled a pair of Gleacewhinna saplings, pairs because a single Gleacewhinna cannot propagate on its own . . . . Ah, me, but the Ina Pik Whinna had to turn to stealing from the Ina Pik Whinna just to save all from being lost." Katie paused a moment, absorbed in her thoughts, and sighed.
"With no knowledge of the ways of the waters," she continued, "the three vessels and the people in them were at the mercies of wind and sea. By good fortune's favour, and with the aid of the anagoroi, no doubt, the three ships sailed out from the mists of the Breathing Sea, across the Dumoric Sea, through the Straits of Tindárman and into the Cerulean Ocean. But the Cape of Winds is aptly named. The three ships had made it safely that far together, only then to be caught in a gale. That storm blew for three days, sank two ships, and left the third wrecked on the rocks of the Black Cape. Jodris and most of the people with her in that third ship survived the wreck, but only one of the saplings did, the last surviving Gleacewhinna in all of Ahn Norvys."
"This one?" Kal said.
"Aye, yes, this one."
"But that would make it—"
"Ancient. Yes, very ancient, Kal."
Kal thought a moment, then said, "But, Mistress Katie, what of the Gleacewhinna in Beldegrayne?"
"You said that legend holds that the Ina Pik Whinna lived in an area that is now a part of Kêl-Skrivar, but it was not the People of the Tree that were taken to the valleys east of the Alnod River—it was the trees. Even before Jodris and those with her fled the island, Conna-gwyhn had begun to plunder the forests of Beldegrayne. He took hundreds of saplings to his own land. The Gleacewhinna will grow to mature size in but a matter of a few years, if tended carefully. Conna-gwyhn did take a few singers of the People to be guardians of the stolen Gleacewhinna. You see, the Ina Pik Whinna who remained in Beldegrayne all perished when the capricious favour of Conna-gwyhn turned against them. He had taken what he desired, the Gleacewhinna, so he killed the People. Without the People, the trees would not survive."
"What of the glence trees taken by Conna-gwyhn? Did they not survive?"
"Little is known, Kal. The People on Beldegrayne had been slaughtered, and those few who escaped with Jodris . . . Well, they planted the lone Gleacewhinna and settled in the forests of the Black Cape to protect it. The Woods of Tircoil were then not nearly as expansive as they are now, and the few surviving Ina Pik Whinna ventured from them occasionally at first to learn what they could of their new home and its peoples, but soon gave that up for the sheltered isolation of the young wilds of the Black Cape. They soon mingled with the folk that were already here, sharing their deep lore of the woods, adjusting to a new land, and teaching them love for the Gleacewhinna. In time they lost their language, but not their woodland ways nor their reluctance to take part in the wider world, preferring the hiddenness of life in the Woods of Tircoil."
"So they became waldscathes."
"Aye, Kal, over time. The legend became a convenient way to ward off unwelcome intruders."
"Just like the foggy mists around Beldegrayne," Kal said.
"Something like that, yes. It's been a protection, a welcome protection that none of us has ever abandoned, and very few from the outside, yourself and Gwyn included, have ever enjoyed."
"So, what happened to the trees taken by Conna-gwyhn?"
"As I said, little is known, other than rumours gleaned in the early years of the Ina Pik Whinna in the Black Cape. It was said that, in their exile, the singers taken to the valleys east of the Alnod River repented of the evil they had allowed to corrupt their hearts and their song. They did nurture their trees, but no sooner had the forests grown than Conna-gwyhn killed the singers, every last one, and sought to use the trees to his own purposes. But the Gleacewhinna, by their nature, become that for which they are desired and used, and, as evil begets death, the trees all perished.
"It is said that the very remains of Gleacewhinna in that place mourned the destruction of their singers, of the Ina Pik Whinna. It is said that the people native to that land, touched by the splendour of the Gleacewhinna even in death, heard their lament, and they themselves loved the dead trees and learned their whispered song. It is said that these were the first echobards, for the Age of Echoes had descended upon Ahn Norvys. Centuries upon centuries later, at the dawn of the Harmonic Age, glences would be built, glences built according to the ancient wisdom left by the great echobard kings, glences fashioned to resemble the Gleacewhinna." Katie paused again in her account and looked out into the shaded interior of the glence tree. She looked back at Kal and said, "Even your Great Glence, Master Kalaquinn. It was the first."
"You speak as if you were there. You're not . . ."
"Ageless? Immortal? As old as this Gleacewhinna?" Katie tossed her head back, laughing, the dim light beneath the limbs of the glence tree sparkling in her eyes. "Ah, me! No, Kal, no. I was not there. I am not that old. I have seen few more than seventy springs renew the life of these Woods. But I am of the People, and what has happened to the Ina Pik Whinna at any time in the past has happened to me and affects me as surely as if I had been there. The past of the People is my past. It is a part of me, and I am inseparable from it.
"It is like this cloak," Katie said, folding her arms to embrace the mantle she wore. "The woodencloak. It is nearly as much an emblem of the People as is the Gleacewhinna, for if the Gleacewhinna was a gift of the anagoroi to the People, then the woodencloak was a gift of the Gleacewhinna to the People. It was made from the first Gleacewhinna to grow in Beldegrayne and is the symbol of blessing upon the People. It has come down to me from Jodris."
"Jodris?"
"Yes, to preserve it also from the corruption that afflicted the People on Beldegrayne, she stole it from her father. She was the first Wood Maid of the Black Cape, and so the woodencloak has come one generation to the next, daughter to daughter, down to me. But it was Jodris's young son who became our first singer in the Woods of Tircoil. It is he who wrote the 'Lament of Beldegrayne' as an account of the Ina Pik Whinna and the events of the First Undoing. It was written in the tongue of the Ina Pik Whinna and later made over into the language adopted by the newcomers from those native to these parts."
"You mean it was rendered into Arvonian?"
"Old Arvonian first, yes, then later into the common tongue, and, in that way, has the history of our people been preserved, for, in the Woods of Tircoil, the original language of the Ina Pik Whinna has been lost from the earliest generations."
"How is it
that you speak our common tongue and sing the orrthon—Gelanor is a bard—if you have been isolated from the rest of the world?"
"Yes, yes," Katie said, nodding, a smile on her lips. "We may be isolated from the world, but do not think that we are unaware of the happenings and ways of the world beyond these Woods. We are still the People of the Tree, guardians of the song. Our ways change in time and harmony with the ways of Ahn Norvys. Only Wuldor remains the same. We bowed our necks to the yoke of the Age of Echoes. We lifted our voices with Ardiel of the Long Arm. We have sung with Hordanus through the ages. And we wait, we wait." Katie held Kal in a long and steady gaze. "We are the People of the Gleacewhinna, and our fate is still bound to its fate. We must be, and are, ever ready to serve those who would serve it."
Kal shook his head and cast his eyes to the ground at his feet. He found the woman's intense stare slightly discomfiting. "An actual account of the events of the First Undoing," he said at length.
"Yes, Kal, the events as I have just told you. Of course, they are far more beautiful as set in the verses of the 'Lament of Beldegrayne,' and even more so in the tongue of the Ina Pik Whinna." Katie paused. Kal rose to his feet and stepped towards her, his face alive again with wonder.
"May I make so bold as to request a copy of the 'Lament of Beldegrayne,' " he said. "As Hordanu, I must add it to the histories of Ahn Norvys."
"It is a fair and just request," Katie said, nodding slowly. "I will ask Gelanor to set about the task of copying the 'Lament' and all histories of the Tircolian people. It is right that you should have them. It will be an arduous task, but one that I'm sure Gelanor will be happy to perform. The texts will be here for you when next you visit us."
Kal shook his head again in wonder. "So, you mean to say that not even Wilum knew the secret of these Woods?"
"Not even Wilum. We're a close, secretive people. We've had to be, for our own sake, but even more so for the sake of guarding the Gleacewhinna. Most secretive—even Gelanor, for all his outgoing humours."
"Humours of which I've had experience," Kal said ruefully.
"Do not waste sympathy on your own behalf, Kalaquinn," Katie said in a light tone. Then suddenly she gained a serious aspect as she stood away from the opening to the small chamber and held his gaze, both her hands clutching her woodencloak close around her as if against the cold. "You do well to remember that you are the first Hordanu, indeed the first person save one other outside of the People, to have seen what you see, to learn what you have learned about the mysteries of the Black Cape and of the People. Over the centuries, others have come to join us in our solitude, but they must wait sometimes years before becoming one of the People and being shown the Gleacewhinna and learning what has been revealed to you in just this past hour. It is out of respect for you, my lord Myghternos Hordanu, and in the sure knowledge that times are ripe, that we have laid all our secrets bare."
"I am honoured, Mistress Katie. But . . ." Kal stumbled in his speech, struggling to collect his thoughts. "But who was the one other?"
"Ah, Kal, it is right that you should ask. In the early centuries of the People in these Woods of Tircoil, an echobard king came to the Black Cape. Undeterred by the rumours of waldscathes and wilds, and as if by some unspoken power, he slipped past all eyes and was discovered standing by the Gleacewhinna, the only one from outside the People to have ever done so. He bore a token of peace, an image embroidered on cloth. It was the image of a Gleacewhinna, and he said that he had come bearing a message. This prophecy he spoke to the Tircoilians, the guardians of the Gleacewhinna, beneath these very branches, within this very tree. 'One will come in time to restore peace,' he said. 'A singer will come to the Gleacewhinna. He will be the binder of what has been unbound, and the renewer of the order undone,' he said." Kal's mind swam as Katie's eyes rested on him, grey and serious.
"The echobard left as mysteriously as he had come," Katie continued, "but not before he requested a boon of us—a single slip, a twig in leaf, from the Gleacewhinna. A strange request it was, for a slip would never root and grow, leastwise not into a Gleacewhinna. But we gave it him. We gave it in gratitude for the hope he had engendered in our hearts by his word. Then he left. Some say he spoke of a hidden land, a dark realm beneath the heights of what are now the Burren Mountains. We never saw him again, nor heard of him." The old woman paused, her gaze drifting towards the entrance to the glence tree.
"That is when we built the Well," she said dreamily. "Ruah appeared to us then for the first time and led us to the place where we built the Well. We built it for her, and for the people, for the people of all Ahn Norvys."
"Within the Woods of Tircoil?"
Katie recollected herself. "No, it was just beyond the edge of the Woods at the time. The Woods of Tircoil have slowly but steadily marched, encroaching over the centuries on the lands that lie beyond its bounds. Mousehold and its glence are all that remain of a village that was once on the verge of the Wood. When the forest overgrew them, the village was abandoned and the glence fell to ruins. Since then, Mousehold has been the home of the Wood Maid."
"And the echobard's prophecy? What of it?" Kal asked.
"We thought it had come to fulfillment at the time of Ardiel. We waited for him to come, but he didn't." Katie's face softened, and she drew her arms from the folds of her cloak and stood. "But come now, Master Kalaquinn, I have burdened you with the great weight of our stories. I can see it in your eyes. We should return to Mousehold. But before we do, you must grace this glence with your song." She pointed to the harp resting in the corner behind Kal.
The young Hordanu nodded, acquiescing to the Wood Maid's request, and stood to retrieve the harp from its stand.
"But first listen . . . ," Katie said. "Listen to what song the Gleacewhinna would have you sing."
Kal sat again on the stool, cradling the instrument in his lap and closing his eyes. Far above him, a breeze stirred the leaves of the tree. Delicately he set his fingers to the strings, plucking the notes one at a time, letting them reverberate hauntingly through the hollow trunk and beyond. The Holdsman paused again.
"How's that?" he asked, opening his eyes.
"Wonderful," Katie said, recognizing the simple melody. " 'The Summer Anthem.' The Gleacewhinna calls you to your most immediate task as Hordanu, for it is the orrthon for the Summer Loosening that you must soon sing. But don't stop."
Kal bent his head and continued playing the tune, its rise and fall a hypnotic backdrop to his chanting.
"So bends the Year, with Spring's warm breath
That once did herald Winter's fall,
She sighs, in Summer's sufficiencies
Content that what was once conceived
Will fill field and fold, toft and croft
In the care of Wuldor, the Husband.
"What wonders are weaved in lengsome days,
When warp of sun and weft of rain
Plait golden pledge of swollen rick.
The batten beats back Spring's woof
and ties the twine for Summer's stuff,
In the web of Wuldor, the Weaver.
"The weanling Spring gambols game,
Battens on the greenling mead,
Crooks at brookside, then sated
lies somnolent beneath fat sun.
All is promise, all is hope,
In the croft of Wuldor, the Shepherd.
"Now the waxing midyear days
will swell the hips of failed-flower Spring.
Between its stem and blossom end,
Fair flesh will blush, will cradle seed,
Will redden, ripen, hang plump, await
The hook of Wuldor, the Grower.
"In Wuldor's keeping, Summer comes,
Soft verdant days, a growing peace.
Ah! Naught is lost in Ahn Norvys,
For all falls under his watchful care—
The Foldsman, the Fruiter, the Farmer, is he,
Wuldor, the Father of all."
Soon his voice, a
nd that of the harp in his hand, stilled and fell silent.
"Beautiful, my lord Myghternos Hordanu. Ah, 'The Summer Anthem.' But where will you sing the Loosening?" Katie asked.
"Wherever I happen to be at the solstice." Kal shrugged, placing the harp back on its stand. "Who knows where?"
"I would that you might stay with us the few days until then, but I must not deter nor detain you from your journey. It's strange, though, to hear someone other than Gelanor sing here," Katie said wistfully.
"How so?"
"Oh, no, no, it's not that there's anything wrong with your singing. It's just that Gelanor has been bard here in the Black Cape for so many years, time out of mind, it seems, and to see somebody else sit on that stool plucking at the harp . . ."
"Years?" Kal lifted a brow.
"Aye, many years. He's older than he looks. Ah, waldscathes." Katie sighed. "They age well in the Woods of Tircoil. It must be the freedom and the fresh air."
"And the wholesome fear they inspire. No vile human predators. Makes for a long life, I wouldn't doubt," Kal said lightly as Katie made way for him and he stepped back down onto the ground outside the trunk.
"Not only that, but Gelanor was made bard at an early age."
"Like Wilum."
"Like yourself, Kalaquinn, although in the case of Gelanor it so turns out that he inherited the role from his father, and his before him. Such is our way. It's Gelanor's father that I remember, too, from my youth, and Gelanor is his very image. It's uncanny at times how direct resemblances can be passed from generation to generation. But, speaking of Gelanor, we must get back. There's a good chance he and Gwyn will have returned to Mousehold by now."
Kal stepped quickly to the leafy wall, stooped and plucked up the leaf he had dropped to the ground. "May I . . . ?"
"Yes, please do, Kalaquinn. As a token," Katie replied, then spun about on her heel and hurried past the harpstone out of the shelter of the glence tree back into the open air. Not a woman to waste time, Kal thought as he followed her blinking into the mellow afternoon light and broke into a jog to keep pace. Soon they crossed the thin spit of grass, climbed over the stone bridge, and were retracing the miles back to Mousehold through the deep shade of the Woods of Tircoil.
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