“An active little one, I see,” I say with a smile. Vivienne purses her lips.
“Always. May I offer you some wine?”
“It pays to be family, Arthur. Breaking open the wine for us? Our lucky day.”
“We’ll both have some,” Arthur answers Vivienne, who disappears through a door in the far wall. I stretch my legs out comfortably. Arthur looks around with interest, and notices three sleeping dogs near the fire.
“Morgan’s hound must have pupped. Look at those two.”
“Very nice,” I say with only a cursory glance at the dogs. “Are you ready to speak to Idris? Do you know what you’ll say?”
Arthur tightens his lips. He looks older than his twenty-five years in the firelight, grim and resolute.
“I think so. I’m not too hopeful about this meeting, honestly, but we need to try. Their dissonant voices are upsetting our unity. Given a bad harvest, or enough talk, and the other lords may start to listen to Idris.”
“There are a few unshakeable loyals on your side. But I agree, men are fickle when they’re frightened. Eliminating the temptation is a sound move.”
Vivienne returns, bearing two wooden cups half-full of warm wine with an aroma of cinnamon. I sniff appreciatively.
“Many thanks, Vivienne. By the way, you’re looking well. Is motherhood suiting you?”
“When I’m not kicked awake by the little monster, yes.” Vivienne eases herself onto my bench with a relieved sigh.
“Merlin, tell her what the baby will be like,” says Arthur. He takes a sip of wine, then looks alarmed. “You told me she knows, right?”
“Yes, she knows.”
Vivienne places a hand on her stomach. She looks wary.
“How?”
I put my hands out toward her stomach, but stop short of her lauvan.
“May I?”
“It won’t hurt the baby?”
“Not in the slightest.”
She removes her hand reluctantly, and makes no move to stop my own. Carefully, I pluck one frail pink lauvan from the cluster and close my eyes. My own lauvan gently twist around the baby’s lauvan. The connection opens my mind to the baby’s personality. In one so small, personality is mostly unformed, but there is a faint echo of the person to come if I concentrate. As I quiet my thoughts, hints of the future person swim into my mind. “Strong-willed,” I say at last. “No surprise there. The child will keep you on your toes. But there is a generosity of spirit here that’s worth cultivating. This child will make you proud, if you allow it to. You won’t regret it.”
I open my eyes to see Vivienne’s moist ones. She dashes tears away with the back of her hand.
“This pregnancy is making me soft.”
“I hear that’s common.” I smile at her, and she returns a reluctant one of her own. “The baby will appreciate it, even if you don’t.”
Vivienne sniffs and sits up, self-possessed once more.
“Thank you, Merlin.” She tilts her head and listens. Voices and the thud of horse hooves drift through the closed door. “My master and mistress are here. I must greet them—please excuse me.”
When Vivienne passes through the front door, I turn to Arthur.
“Ready to face your sister?”
Arthur nods, his lips tight.
“Ready as I’ll ever be.”
CHAPTER XXI
I walk out behind stragglers of my last class the next day to find Jen waiting for me.
“Hi, Jen. I’m glad you’re here. Turn around and let me look.” She twirls slowly and the reforming knots in the lauvan on her back become evident. “Yes, I need to fix those knots. It’s too bad I didn’t get them when I picked up my car last night. How are you feeling?”
“A little sore. Can I get a ride to your place? I’m meeting Alejandro there.”
“Of course. I’m parked in the north lot.”
That’s interesting. I wonder why she’s meeting Alejandro? His connecting lauvan pull from Jen’s center like a taut string in the direction of my apartment.
We keep the conversation light until a few blocks from the apartment. Jen uses a small silence to change the subject.
“It’s hard to believe my back was broken yesterday. Have you done that before?”
“Yes.” She might feel better about her optimistic prognosis if there is a success story in my past. As predicted, her lauvan ripple with relief.
“What happened then?”
“My friend fell off his horse the wrong way, landed on the side of a stone bridge. He was fine after I’d dealt with him.”
“A horse?” Jen raises her eyebrows then shakes her head. “That’s good to hear. Do you remember, you sang to me after you healed me? What was the song? I couldn’t recognize the language, but it was really beautiful.”
Jen’s lauvan are tense and waiting, at odds with her casual demeanor. She’s onto me. I try to dissemble.
“It was an old lullaby my mother sang to me when I was small. I don’t know what the language is. Nonsense words, I always assumed.”
Jen’s lauvan grow stiff to match her frustrated voice when she speaks.
“You know as well as I do that’s a lie,” she says sharply. “Please don’t insult my intelligence.” When I don’t respond, she sighs. “There’s something going on, and I wish you would tell me. Your secrets are building a barrier between us. You can tell me anything, you know that, right? There can’t be anything weirder than lauvan, and I managed to come to grips with that.”
I let out a mirthless chuckle involuntarily. What is stranger, immortality or otherworldly powers? One day, I’ll let her decide. But not today.
“I don’t know what to tell you, except that I’m not ready to share with you yet. Correction, I don’t think you are ready to know.”
Jen looks out of the front windshield, her jaw tight.
“Then you’d better make me ready if you want to stay friends. Whatever this is, it’s getting in the way.”
Damn. Has this issue come to a head already? She’s not wrong—I can feel her discontent brewing between us, and she’s too inquisitive to let it slide—but I can’t tell her yet. It was only a few short weeks ago that I told her about the lauvan, and that was a rocky transition. It will have to be soon, though. I’ll need to decide on the best approach for Jen, the best way to broach the subject that will not scare her off immediately.
Fortunately, we’re close to the apartment building, because the silence in the car is thick and stifling. The elevator ride is no better—Jen is grim and I’m contemplative—and it’s a relief to open my door and hear Alejandro’s cheery greeting.
“Merlo, Jen, hello. I’m almost ready, Jen.” Alejandro disappears into the bathroom and I wave toward the kitchen.
“Drink?”
“No, thanks,” Jen says stiffly. “We’re leaving soon.”
That was a dismissal, loud and clear. I walk into my bedroom without another word and drop my satchel on the bed. Keys and wallet end up on the dresser. I dither by the window for a moment, then get angry with myself. It’s my apartment—I won’t be stuck foolishly in here waiting for Jen to leave, like a wayward child. If she doesn’t want to talk to me, she can leave.
Jen’s back is to me, my sketchbook open on the table in front of her. A flare of annoyance is quickly washed out by a wave of resignation. People are what they are, and Jen isn’t one to let a good mystery go unsolved. How can I be angry at her, when curiosity is an inborn human trait?
I pace silently across the room until I am behind her. The page is open to Isabella, my sixth wife I met while in what is now Spain during the Umayyad dynasty. She was an outspoken butcher’s daughter, and a spark of mischief peeks out through her painted eyes, even through the stiff artistry of the early eleventh century. I always drew the best I could with the most progressive techniques at the time, but this was a long time before the advances of the Renaissance. The parchment is singed from edge to binding and my heart contracts.
My han
d reaches over Jen’s shoulder to gently close the charred cover. Jen jumps guiltily.
“That’s too far, Jen,” I say softly. I can’t bring myself to show indignation, and I slide the sketchbook back onto the bookshelf. I turn to face Jen, and her eyes are wary. “I will tell you soon, I promise.” Jen’s eyebrows twitch in disbelief and hope. “Give me a little time to figure out the best way how. All right?”
Jen nods. I turn her around by her shoulders and sit her on a chair.
“Now, sit still while I fix your lauvan.”
There isn’t much to tinker with, and I finish just as Alejandro saunters into the room.
“Are you ready, Jen?”
“Yes, she is.”
“Oh, that’s better.” Jen stands up and touches her toes carefully. “Thanks, Merry. Bye.” She gives me a small wave.
I nod back and they leave. The apartment is too quiet when they go. If Jen can’t accept my truth, it will be this silent for a long while. I’ll have to leave Vancouver—my comfortable job, my apartment, my new friend Wayne—and find somewhere new to hang my hat. At least I can stay in contact with Alejandro. That’s something. I wonder what Tokyo is like these days. I haven’t spent enough time in Asia, but now that the world is so cosmopolitan, it’s easier to travel to places where I don’t visually fit in.
What am I doing? I should be planning how to tell Jen, not plotting my escape.
I should do both.
***
Dr. Dilleck looks tired. The lauvan covering her eyes are sparse. I wonder again what she is coming to terms with. Whatever it is, she’s losing sleep over it. She is silent about our meeting in Steveston, so I follow her cue and don’t mention it.
“How are you today, Merry?”
“Fine, thank you.”
“That’s good to hear. What emotions are surfacing for you today?”
I think carefully. Jen immediately springs to mind.
“Frustration, resignation, fear.” I think of Alejandro and Wayne fighting at my side against Drew. “Gratitude, triumph.” Then Anna slinks through my thoughts, sexy and duplicitous and missing. “Anger and mistrust.”
“That’s better. Thank you, Merry. I see we have a lot to discuss today.”
She moves suddenly to touch her head with a grimace.
“Are you all right?”
“Yes, thank you.” She quickly covers her pain with a forced smile. “Just a headache. Now, you mentioned frustration first. What triggers that emotion for you today?”
“A friend of mine wants me to tell her something I’ve been carefully hiding, for good reason. Honestly, I don’t know how she’ll react when I tell her—it could be the start of a much closer friendship, or the end of what we have.”
“You said ‘when’ you tell her. Not if?”
“If I don’t tell her, she’ll drift away. It has to be done.”
“Resignation. But you’re fearful she’ll react badly.”
“I don’t have enough people in my life that I can afford to lose one.”
Dr. Dilleck presses her hand to her temple once more, then withdraws it quickly. She looks at her notes to cover her actions, but her lauvan are more conversant. They act oddly—spasms of discomfort, and some strange behavior toward me. Some twitch sporadically as if nervous of me, and a few twist sinuously in my direction, in motions that indicate attraction. It’s intriguing, but mystifying. Attraction is well and good, but why the nervousness? I haven’t said anything too off-putting in these sessions, have I?
“What about the gratitude and triumph?”
“A few new friends really pulled through for me, and we managed to beat the odds.”
“That’s wonderful news, Merry. How does it feel that somebody has your back?”
I smile.
“Pretty good.” From the mess of brown lauvan at my center sprouts a cluster of multicolored ones. I’m beginning to amass quite the collection of connections. With interest, I note that the navy-blue strands that connect me to Dr. Dilleck have increased in number. My eyes travel up to hers. Her eyes are even more beautiful now that I can see them better through her lauvan.
“And lastly, the anger and mistrust. What do those spring from?”
Another blue lauvan snakes through the air from Dr. Dilleck’s center, and to my surprise is readily met by one of mine. What is going on here? I didn’t think we were getting close enough for a rate of connection like this—I’m sharing plenty about myself, but it’s entirely one-sided.
“Anger at myself, mainly. You remember I told you about Anna coming to my place? Well, it turns out that she was only there to—well, for purposes other than seeing me.” It’s getting difficult to remember what I’ve told Dr. Dilleck, and what I want to keep hidden. “Hence the mistrust. It was foolish to let her in again. I knew she was bad news, but she seemed sincere.”
“It’s not a crime to look for the good in people,” she says gently.
“Perhaps. I should have known better, though. I was just—lonely.” I smile despite myself. “There’s that word again.”
Dr. Dilleck smiles back.
“It’s good to recognize when it crops up. Nicely done.”
It feels strange on one level to discuss my romantic encounters with Dr. Dilleck considering the ever-increasing lauvan strands between us, but entirely natural for the same reason.
“Something else came up this week. A book of pictures, of my wife and others I’ve lost, was almost destroyed. I lost control. A friend managed to talk me down, but it made me realize how reliant I am on the book to preserve my memories.”
“Memories are certainly important. They are how we define ourselves, shape our future. But be cautious about letting your past rule you.”
We speak a little more about memories. Near the end of our session, I’m blindsided by Dr. Dilleck’s next statement.
“I’m afraid we will have to stop our sessions, Merry. I’m reducing my practice size for personal reasons.” Her lauvan squirm with the lie. She’s only dropping me. Why? “I can recommend Dr. Simon, down the hall. He’s a terrific therapist. I can have reception transfer your files if you like.”
I don’t know what to say. I’m bewildered, and a little hurt. Why would she get rid of me, alone? I thought we had a good rapport, and I never got the sense that she felt otherwise. Am I somehow the cause of her anxiety? I have no interest in seeing another therapist—I only started this for fun. I’ve lasted this long without a shrink; I can manage without one again.
But as I contemplate the future without our meetings, it looks very bleak. I enjoy my time with Dr. Dilleck, speaking freely about the workings of my head without worrying about too much filtering.
All this hits me in an instant, then I smooth my features, paste on a smile, and reach forward to shake Dr. Dilleck’s hand.
“Thank you for our sessions. I wish you all the best in the future.” I stand. “No need to pass on my files. Goodbye, Dr. Dilleck.”
She stands as well, looking taken aback at my alacrity.
“Goodbye, Merry. Be well.”
My eyes rake over her face once more. Is this really it? Why do I feel so lost when I imagine my future without her in it? It’s likely a common reaction, feeling strangely close to someone to whom you’ve opened your mind.
I leave quickly. Time to move on. I can handle my own thoughts from hereon out.
CHAPTER XXII
Dreaming
I close the door against the bitterly cold Norwegian night full of blazing stars and turn to face Koll. I push my hood back from my lye-bleached hair so he can see my face. He looks puzzled, and takes off his bearskin hat slowly.
“Please sit, Koll. I need to tell you something.” I take a deep breath. I’ve grown close to Koll over the past year. We’ve worked in the fields together, drank the same mead, even journeyed on a raid to Alban a few months ago. Only one other person in this village knows my whole truth, but it’s time to tell Koll. He’s too perceptive for me to keep it from him fo
r much longer.
“I’m listening.” He remains standing. I brace myself against the cold wooden door.
“I haven’t told you the whole truth about myself. I’m much older than I look. Much, much older.” I pause to assess Koll’s reaction. He looks skeptical, so I plough ahead. “I’ve lived for hundreds of years, never dying, traveling where no one will recognize me. I don’t know how, or why. I was born of a woman, long ago, so I am a man. But more than that, I don’t know.”
Koll’s body and lauvan are both completely still. I can’t tell yet what he is truly thinking. I try to soften the news, bring Koll’s focus back to our friendship.
“I wanted to tell you, because you’ve been like a brother to me, and I couldn’t bear keeping secrets from you.”
Koll says nothing for a long moment. His breathing becomes heavier and heavier. Panic flickers in his eyes, which dart to the corner where his sword hangs. I know what he will do a moment before he does it. He lunges sideways to grab his sword and unsheathes it in one smooth motion.
The sword tip lands on my neck. I haven’t moved. I’m mourning the loss of our friendship, of my life in this village. I had hoped to remain here for some years to come. I truly thought Koll was ready. How could I be so wrong, yet again? How long will it take before I can predict the outcome of my truth-telling?
“What are you?” he breathes, his eyes wild. “Get away from me. Stay away! I should kill you right now, here where you stand.”
I’m suddenly weary, so weary. Why do I try so hard to stay alive? Perhaps I should let Koll slit my throat. It would be a quick death, after all. I’ve seen it often enough.
But I can’t do that. Prophesies and promises swirl in my mind, and I grab a handful of Koll’s lauvan before he can react. While he doubles over, wheezing, I twist the sword out of his hands and throw it to the corner of the room.
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