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So we left Redhill, and ventured into lands even the Elder calledthe Wild.
Whistle, Bone
Girt with shadow and hope, Lithielle left her home to find her mortal husband; ever after that land mourned, having lost what was dearest. Yet into the Wild she passed without pause, for if even the Blessed bow before love, how can a Child of the Star gainsay?
—The Song of Wandering
Mornlight strengthened as we passed, dawn creeping between snow-laden firs lightly as the Elder upon snow-crust. We walked in silence, but swiftly enough. The Northerners spread out, nearly vanishing among fir-pillars yet somehow keeping pace; my own steps did not disturb the packed-tight white since Aeredh’s arm stayed light upon my shoulders, his fingers tense against my mantle.
I do not know what it cost him to keep my mortal weight from leaving traces of our passage. None of the Elder sang; we simply moved as ghosts among heavy-laden trees. The hush was absolute, save for an occasional sharp creak or crack in the distance as a tree was caressed by Lokji or kissed by black-ice sprites, shivering to pieces under that painful pleasure. Oddly, the sound comforted me—sometimes in hard winters, the slopes of Tarnarya the mother-mountain of my home held such metallic cries, bouncing over the river.
There were tracks upon the snow’s back. I saw the discolored marks made byorukharpassing, and signs of animals venturing eveninto this cold, from leaping fox fishing in the drifts for sleeping mice to the paired scoop-shoe shapes of great horned deer. Some of the latter bore traces of furred paws after them, and there were also strange signs like shod hooves, but blackened at the edges and with trailing tails, scorched and refrozen in the same moment.
Aeredh caught my interest in those and shook his head, his lips pursing.
We halted at midmorn, having come much farther than seemed possible in deep snow. The light was failing somewhat, for the clouds had thickened and it warmed enough for heavy wet flakes to fall in fitful spatters; the far reaches of the forest began to sough with rising wind.
It was not the deepfreeze, but this weather was not fit for travel either. We sheltered again near noon in a tiny dell, Eol’s men melting out of daylight shadows to draw close. Snow lingered in their hair and upon their shoulders. Their eyes were bright indeed; Efain’s scars were flushed, and Soren’s sides heaved as if he had been running, though his breath was soundless and his mouth did not gape.
“Something ill has passed close by, keeping to the valleys,” Eol murmured, his shoulder almost touching Aeredh’s. They faced opposite directions, keeping watch upon each other’s backs during rest. “At least one of the Seven, perhaps more. The stench is thick.”
I had scented nothing but the forest, and thought my mounting anxiety merely the result of traveling in this manner. The mystery of those strange tracks was solved as I listened to them speak—the steeds of the Seven, those nightmares even the servants of the Enemy hold in caution, make such a pattern when they ride in haste. But Arn’s nose was wrinkled too, and two spots of color stood high upon her cheeks as she and her woad-stripe glared at the day. The harpist did not hold her as close as Aeredh kept me, yet she did not protest at Daerith’s grip upon her left arm.
So she was uneasy as well. I tried to find some comfort in the fact, but a sense of impending doom lingered over me, darkening the daylight.
“The snow will aid us,” Aeredh replied. “Well, my ladyalkuine? Do we go to Dorael, or will you trust me?”
Yes, I had told Arn I could not decide. Maybe her refusal to speakupon either course was because she knew I already had, down in the secret chambers of my heart, and simply could not voice it before that moment.
“I said I would go where Eol of Naras willed.” I kept my voice as low as possible without whispering. “For the asking, and for his truth henceforth.”
I had bound myself as his ally, after all. Not that it mattered; we were at the mercy of these men more thoroughly than ever, and though I dreaded the thing they wished me to attempt I could hardly back away from it.
Not after the Council. Certainly Eol had lied to my mother and father, and to me as well. He had also challenged Elder insults in my direction, and clearly believed in Aeredh’s purpose enough to risk his own life—and the lives of his men—for it. Both he and the Elder agreed that Faevril’s sons would do some harm to Aeredh if they could, and I suspected part of his eagerness to travel even in this weather was to deny the Hunter and the Subtle a chance at tracking us, or at least to slow their pursuit.
Then there was the matter of the curse upon him. Perhaps he was constrained from speaking of it openly; such things happened in the sagas about great maledictions I had myself memorized and sung. If I were fated to perform such a service, attempting to turn aside would do no good at all, and much ill besides.
I had merely been putting off admitting there was no other choice but to do as I was bid—though not as a weregild. At least I accomplished that much.
“North and west, then.” The son of Tharos did not glance at me, hunching his black-clad shoulders as if struck. His mantle had been mended, though not with the care I might have shown; the wolves of Naras attended to such things as all without women nearby must. “I hate to mention it again, Aeredh, but have you thought of…”
“Fear not, my friend.” Aeredh’s arm over my shoulders did not alter, but he felt about in his own sable mantle with his free hand and produced a small glittering thing. “I had the chance to visit my old house well before the gates of my father’s city were sieged, and to gather what might be useful.”
It was a whistle of carved bone, with silver filigree like branching horns. He put it to his lips, but it made no true sound. Still, a thrill ran over me, hairs stiffening and attempting to rise, and I shivered, though snow-cold is not as fierce as the deep clear freeze.
Seidhrwas in that high piercing unsound, invitation and enticement twined like ivy running up a tree’s trunk.
It did not take long. A faint clicking arose like pebbles against each other in shallow, fast-flowing water, drawing nearer with each breath. Tall shaggy shapes melded from the strange yellow snowlight, and the Elder with us were all smiling like children upon a festival morn. The black-clad Northerners drew away, for the shadows were horned deer—large ones, their coats winter-rough and the females wearing proud antlers, their eyes turned blue as my mother’s for the winter. The largest male stood slightly aside, eyeing the Elder askance until Yedras spoke to him in the Old Tongue.
“We mean no harm, my brother.” The words were full of pebble-clacks very like the walking-sound the beasts made, and the male—all the deer were taller than even the Northerners’ white horses—turned his head to regard the harpist sidelong. “We merely ask, if you’re willing.”
I let out a sharp breath of wonder. The nearest deer flicked her ears at the sound, her mild gaze very much like Farsight’s for all it was winter-blue. My heart hurt, hoping the horses had escaped Nithraen’s fate somehow; the pang is still with me today, fear and wonder and longing mixed together, a nail driven deep into seasoned wood with one swift blow.
The deer did not like the black-clad men of Naras, who withdrew even further, watching solemnly. “Much quicker this way, and the snow will cover us,” Aeredh said, smoothing the long face of a large female while she investigated his mantle, her breath full of fir-scent and living warmth. I stood stock-still, afraid to move lest the creature take some exception to my presence. “Will you and my lady Minnow consent to ride?”
I do not think I could keep Arn from trying.“Arneior?” I met her dark gaze, and her freckles stood out against her paleness.
She nodded, beyond speaking, and once her spear was fastenedto her back she even put her snow-caked, booted foot into Daerith’s interlaced hands, gaining a winter-deer’s back with a huff of effort; though a shieldmaid does not need to set aside her weapon for such an endeavor, a mount might take it ill if unused to such treatment. The deer, though, did not move beyond craning her neck, blinking at her new burden.
