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My teacher found less joy in living the longer she endured it. Some are cheerful all their lives, but Idra’s temper was otherwise. She might have seen what Aeredh was immediately, though, and perhaps stung me with a switch-strike when I overlooked it.
So much talent, and yet so lazy. Come now, daughter of Gwendelint. Look, and see more deeply.
We halted past nooning, and if the Northerners had guarded us before, they hemmed us closely as our own breathing now, giving each other bleak glances. I shivered as the wind rose, spatters of snow falling from gently moving branches, and Arneior stood at my shoulder while the business of the midday stop was attended to.
“Do you hear that?” she whispered.
I did indeed, though I did not know quite what it presaged. A jagged snarl rode the sharpening breeze, faint as the song of runestones and felt in a slightly different place. My eyes half-closed, my ears tingling through their numbness.
“It sounds… wrong,” I whispered back, and deeper shiver slipped down my back. I patted the lump of myseidhr-bag, though I had not call to use anything in it yet.
I had not even time to look for winter herbs, or bark that might be useful.
Aeredh approached us as the Northerners tended the horses in the way those without Elder aid could. “You sense summat amiss,”he said quietly, and the set of his shoulders told me he was far more worried about Arneior’s reaction than mine.
“We are being followed.” My shieldmaid did not utter it as a challenge; she stared at the forest, as if daring it to birth some danger. “Is it more of those sheep-monsters?”
“No.” The Elder’s cheeks bore no blush of cold and his hands were bare, lacking even the half-gloves the other Northerners wore. “Those cannot leave the Hidden Ways without great effort, and then they are easily dispatched. Especially by men of Eol’s kind.”
I wondered if he thought us unaware of those possessing two skins in the south. “That is a comfort, at least.”
“Is it?” Aeredh looked in the same direction Arn did, and his look of listening was akin to hers as well. “There should not be such activity here, especially at this time. We have done ill, Lady Solveig, yet with the best of intent.”
Arn had no sharp word, which was a wonder in and of itself. She merely leaned upon her spear. Her generous mouth was set with disdain, her dark eyes narrowed, and against her fair freckled face the blue woad-stripe stood out sharply.
She had not even drained the skin of mead gifted us at departure from Lady Hajithe’s, a sure sign of unease. And she left the greater share of ale for me; I needed every drop, my body consuming its deeper stores to fuel the warming breath.
“Perhaps not so ill,” I granted, not very grudgingly. After all, the sheep-things were dead, Arn and our captors had found me upon the mountainslope, I was learningseidhrand witnessing wonders. Besides, even if their leader disliked me for what Bjorn had done to his brother, I could not protest overmuch. Such is the fate of a weregild. “Though if ’tis war the North is facing, my brother would have been better for your purposes.”
“Would he?” One shoulder lifted, dropped; the Elder was almost feline in that moment, wintersky eyes lambent in peculiar snowlight. “I ask you to pardon Eol. His temper is somewhat harsh, but he seeks not to offend. We rode south to find what aid we could in the houses of the South, for the fires of Agramar are renewed. Our journey has been marked with much misfortune; indeed, you represent our onlyluck, yet we were attacked upon the Hidden Road and nearly lost what we had found. And now this. We are balked at every turn, and grow passing desperate.”
Indeed he was fair-spoken, and this was the most conversation I had been granted for two days. Yet my stomach was a knot at that word—Agramar. It was a term of ancient nightmares, and I did not like how the light about us dimmed when the Elder pronounced it. The ill shade was short-lived, certainly, but I did not even shiver.
I was too cold to twitch, and that was a bad sign.
These men had been closeted with the elders of Dun Rithell, making some manner of appeal. Was alliance, and a quota of warriors sent North, the sum of their pleading? But then, why would they ask for me instead of a youth gifted with battle-madness who could fell one of their kind with a single ham-fisted blow?
And now I thought I had not mistranslated that word,traitor. Some crucial piece of the design was missing, and thread I could have knotted into a pleasing tapestry pattern was all asnarl.
My numb hands, gloved and tucked safely inside mantle-sleeves, clutched at each other. “I am sorry your journey has been so ill-starred,” I answered, cautiously. “My father’s father, and his grandfathers as well, held it true that the Black Land is merely spent ruins. And in the South we think the Children of the Star either all departed or lingering only to leave in secret when it pleases them.” I did not add that clearly his kind wished it that way, if they hid themselves withseidhr-seeming while traveling.
“Ill-starred? Hardly.” Strangely, the Elder seemed pleased; his smile turned warm though absent, yet it soon faded. His cloak-pin gleamed, a silver wolf’s head beautifully shaped with green-gem eyes, though it did not look of Elder make. “Yet it is true, my lady. We bought partial victory—or at least, a lesser defeat—over the Enemy at the Dag Saekirrin, and with the aid of those of your kind we call Faithful. After that even some among us thought the Black Land defeated, though the wise held we had achieved a mere breathing space.”
“But…” I did not now think he would taunt a weregild; I was forced to consider him earnest. Why was he speaking upon this now?“You asked the elders of Dun Rithell for warriors to ride north.” I was careful not to let the end of the sentence lift as a question, though it was merely a guess.
And my patience was answered at last, for Aeredh spoke softly, in almost the same tone he used for conferences with Eol.
“We did, though they were not inclined to answer quickly, if at all. It is sad, for once your Dun Rithell was named Aen Haergar and many of your ancestors rode north to our banners long ago—including Hralimar the lord of that place.” The Elder’s gaze dropped to the ground, and the words turned quieter still. The sawing whine upon the wind grew no stronger, but it did not fade either. “None survived the Battle of Great Fires, and fair fields before the Cold Gate became the Gasping upon an eve of lamentation. The lands of Naras, among others, were lost in a single night of flame and hard battle.”
Some have the trick of reciting sagas as if they had personally witnessed the deeds within. I could not decide if Aeredh was one of their number, or if his tone was that of memory itself. He wasElder; they do not age as we do. If no great grief or violence winnows them, they endure.
The Northerners were engaged in their own murmuring conference near the horses. I could not clearly discern the words, which may have been Aeredh’s intent, and Arn did not know the Old Tongue. Something was decided and they broke apart, moving with purpose. Efain and Eol disappeared into the trees; Soren and Karas moved hurriedly about, finishing the last of the midday work. Gelad lingered near the horses, scanning the forest, and his left hand rested upon a daggerhilt.
My back prickled, though my voice was steady enough. “I know some little of that saga.” I remembered tales of Hralimar, the son of Gwenlara from whom my own mother descended. After his fall and the loss of several warriors Dun Rithell had many a year of woe, though now we fared well enough. “Hralimar stood amid waves of the Enemy’s thralls, and they broke upon him six times. Yet even he fell with many a wound at the seventh attack. There is a song.” I had learned it to please Mother, and sang it in our hall one Midsummer.
Even Idra had judged that performance well done.
The Elder nodded gravely. “We sing some part of that battle as well, but not what happened after. It…” His throat worked for a moment, his gaze darkening. “It is a good thing, to know it is not forgotten.”
