A Hero's Tale (13 page)

I felt my way over to the fire pit, where there were still some bits of spitted meat. I ate a little of it and used one of my shirt laces to bind the rest into a bundle. There would be enough for several days.

It was still too dark to travel. I waited for the moon to rise.

When I could see well enough to find the trail, I slipped away from the northerners' camp and went back to the river. Our boat with all its cargo still lay hidden there, and my pack was in it. I had no time to search for Maara's pack. There was nothing I needed in it anyway.

I opened my pack and took out everything I could do without. All my extra clothing, even my cloak, I left behind. For warmth the wolfskin would be enough. Hidden in its folds I found my knife, Maara's gift. Before we entered the trading village, she had me take it from my belt and pack it away. At the time I thought she was being overcautious, but whatever her reasons, she had been wise. If I had been wearing it, the northerners would have it now.

The boat's cargo included several sacks of barley. I cut one open and made a smaller bag from one end of the sack, keeping as much of the grain as I thought I could carry. I did my pack up again. Then I took my bow from its case and strung it, and fastened my quiver to my belt.

Maara had told me to take one of the boats and go down the river. That's what the northerners would be expecting. I picked out a small log boat, just big enough for one. Into it I put the things I had taken from my pack and slid it into the water. With my bow I pushed it out into the stream, until the current caught it and carried it away. I backed away from the river's edge, careful to step in the footprints I'd just made. A child could have read the signs.

The first light of dawn glowed in the mist that hung in the branches of the trees. I returned to the northerners' camp and hid myself where I could watch them, to see what they were going to do. They were awake now and cooking breakfast. They seemed unconcerned about my disappearance. After they had eaten, they sent one man down the trail to the river, while the others made ready to travel. When the man returned, he told them what he'd seen. The northerners were satisfied.

I hoped they would go south, as the other raiding parties had done, but they started down the trail taken by the red-haired woman's band. I gave them half an hour's start, so as not to risk running into them again. I had no fear of losing the red-haired woman's trail. With the hunters of the forest people I had followed the faintest trails left by elk and boar. I would have no trouble following a trail made by a band of warriors.

In a few hours I came to a crossroads. There the warriors of the raiding party had at last turned south onto a trail that would take them into Merin's land. The red-haired woman's warriors had gone the other way. With the raiding party no longer in front of me, I began to close the distance.

The trail took me north and east. Before long I reached the forest's edge, and by early afternoon I was traveling through hill country that was almost barren of trees. There I was more exposed than in the forest, but unless I was unlucky, the hills themselves would hide me.

It was only midafternoon when I reached the place where the red-haired woman's band had spent the previous night. They wouldn't have stopped this early, which meant that I was catching up to them. I kept on until it was so dark that I was afraid I would miss the trail. Before the first light of dawn I took advantage of the moonlight to get an early start. At midday I found their next campsite. I was less than half a day behind them.

Now I took more care to read the signs that told me how long it had been since they passed by, so that I wouldn't suddenly stumble into their midst or run across a straggler. When I was no more than half an hour behind, I stopped. Soon it would be dark. Once the northerners made camp, it would be both easier to find them and safer to approach them.

I hid in a gully between two hills and risked a fire to make myself a proper meal of meat and porridge. For whatever happened next, I would need all my strength. While I ate, I thought about what I was going to do. In the dark the advantage would be mine. I could be among them before they knew it. Perhaps they had grown careless enough that I could succeed in setting Maara free, but even if they caught me, she and I would be together. That was as much as I could think about.

I dared to doze a little. It had been several days since I'd had a whole night's sleep, and I woke later than I intended. Still it was not yet midnight. There would be time enough to do whatever could be done.

Now that I was no longer in the forest, the stars gave enough light to travel by. I started down the trail. It narrowed as it wound between the hills, and I grew cautious, in case the northerners' camp might lie just around the next bend.

Then I saw in the distance the flickering light of a campfire. It seemed too far away to be the camp I was looking for. A few minutes later I saw another fire, and then another. Before me lay a narrow valley, where fires burned on every hillside as far as I could see.

The familiar sight made me long for Merin's land. It must be the night of the spring festival, and bonfires like these would be burning there too. The pain of loss wrung my heart, that I was not with Maara on this night. Then I began to wonder. What people lived here? There were no farms, no cottages, only the open fires. Not bonfires. Campfires. The campfires of an army.

I lost all hope of overtaking the red-haired woman's band. They would have kept on until they reached the encampment. All I could do now was wait for daylight, to see if what I feared was true. Just before dawn I climbed to the top of the nearest hill and hid myself in the tall grass. The growing light confirmed my fears. In the valley below me, warriors of the northern tribes were gathered, many more than anyone could count, hundreds upon hundreds.

I set my plans aside. I had no hope now of freeing Maara from the red-haired woman's band. Finding them among so many people would be impossible. I would be captured before I came close enough to find them, and there my hope would end.

I tried to think of something else, of some way to follow Maara through that maze of people. Even if I could pass unseen through the camp, even if I could go around it, the trail of the red-haired woman's band was lost, trampled into dust. I couldn't send my mind any farther down that path. No matter how many twists and turns I took, it always ended in defeat.

I still had one hope left. I knew where she was going. I knew it with a certainty that conquered all my doubts. The red-haired woman would take Maara north into the wilderness. It was the quickest way to Elen's house. I had taken that same way with Maara half a year before. I might not find the red-haired woman's trail, but I could find the forest, and once in it, I could find the bathing rock, and from there, with any luck at all, I could find Elen's house.

As Maara had reminded me, there were no hiding places in the wilderness, but if I traveled at night, the dark might hide me. What other path could I take? Only the way I had just come, back to the river and through the forest. It had taken us a fortnight to come this far. The journey back would take at least as long. The journey through the wilderness would take no more than a few days.

I heard voices and the tramp of feet on the trail behind me. I made myself small in my hiding place and turned toward the sound. A band of warriors came in sight, and a chill went down my backbone. While I had been following the red-haired woman's band, I hadn't thought that others might be following me. I hadn't taken any care to hide the signs I made when I left the trail to climb the hill, but they passed by the place without taking any notice of it. That band of warriors made my decision for me. It was as dangerous to go back as it was to keep going forward.

From my vantage point I studied the valley and the hills that surrounded it until I saw a trail that bypassed the encampment, winding through the hills to the northwest. Unlike the well-traveled trails used by the northerners, this one was faint and overgrown, a game trail that would take me unseen into the wilderness.

As I sent my mind down that trail and through the wilderness to Elen's house, I began to feel uneasy. Was there something I was missing? This plan was no more hopeless than the others I had made. There was indeed uncertainty at the end of it, but not hopelessness, not until I could see farther.

Movement below me drew my eye. I turned my attention to the encampment, where the warriors of the northern tribes were living one of the uneventful days so typical of camp life. For a while I tried to convince myself that this might be a base camp from which to launch their raids, but in my heart I knew that there was only one reason to gather so many warriors together in one place. They could have only one purpose, and only one destination.

The weight of obligation settled upon my shoulders. Soon on Merin's people the might of all the northern tribes would fall. Who would warn them if I did not? Yet I could not, unless I turned my back on Maara. At the thought my heart cried out, knowing it would be torn apart.

I might have time. That was my first thought. I might have time to find Maara and free her, and still bring back a warning. At once I saw it was a foolish hope. There was a good chance I would be captured too, or worse.

My next thought was that the warriors of Merin's house must already know of the gathering of this army. How could they not? They must have some idea of the northerners' plans. Surely they understood they were at war. And if Vintel had not foreseen that this could happen, were there not wise ones still in Merin's house?

These thoughts and many more ran through my head, and all the while I knew what I was doing. Maara had taught me the danger of self-deception.

I didn't care. Why should I care for those who had betrayed me. Whatever befell them now, it was no more than justice. As Vintel had stolen my inheritance, now the northern tribes would steal from her, not only what she took from Merin and from me, but all she had, and perhaps her life as well. I didn't care.

And Vintel's warriors had seen injustice done and done nothing to prevent it. Those who owed their loyalty to Merin, what had they done? Their fear, their cowardice, had increased Vintel's power, until they had no power to resist it. They had earned whatever fate awaited them. Why should I care?

Yet I did care. Though I tried to feed it, my anger faded, until I had to tell myself the truth. No matter what they'd done, I still belonged to them, as they belonged to me.

And what of those I loved, who might still be in Merin's house? Merin herself might be there. My mother too. And Tamar. Sparrow. Namet. Gnith. The loss of any one of them would break my heart. And even if they had left Merin's house, even if they had escaped Vintel's power, how would they escape the power of the northern tribes if Merin's house should fall?

I laid my cheek against the warm earth under me and closed my eyes.

Around me stood the council stones. They held me captive in the circle. The wisdom of the ancients lay beneath them, entangled in their roots, beyond my reach. Stone is one of the oldest things on earth, so my mother told me. Water is the other. One always still, one always moving, opposites, they worked upon each other, until between them they made the world. The stone circle held me still, while within my heart the tides of love flowed back and forth, awaiting my decision.

Had I, in my anger, invoked justice? How would justice weigh the claims of love? On one hand rested the lives of many, on the other, only one. Though all the world believes that the good of many souls must tip the balance, there is a flaw in their reckoning, for the value of the soul cannot be weighed or measured but by love. If my heart held the scales, I knew which side would fall.

I wondered at my willingness to sacrifice the lives of those I loved, until I saw that my own life too lay in the balance. Their lives and mine, for Maara. Why? To keep her with me? If I lost my life, I couldn't keep her with me. For her own sake? Perhaps. Yet hadn't she exchanged her life for mine? There was a certain symmetry about it, and an irony as well.

My mind had wandered far beyond the boundaries of understanding, until it stumbled into mystery. The more my reason tried to penetrate the labyrinth, the more I understood that love is not moved by reason. I had no power to abandon Maara. I couldn't shame myself or argue myself into it. I couldn't force myself to do it. Nor could I convince myself that I was doing the right thing. I might try to find excuses or to justify my heart's decision, but there was no excuse, and what I was about to do was impossible to justify.

I lay on the warm earth, half asleep, remembering. Another time, another place, a picnic, Namet's voice telling us a story. I wished then for Namet's innocent heart. The question life had never asked her, it was now asking me, and there was treachery in every answer. I consoled myself with this -- that I would be a traitor to my people, but not to my own heart.

My hiding place in the tall grass was as good as any other. I let myself drift into sleep, to seek wise counsel in my dreams. When I awoke late in the afternoon, I had no memory of having dreamt at all.

After dark I found the game trail I had spotted from the hilltop. Before dawn I was in the wilderness. I saw no sign of anyone, but that meant little. In the wilderness travelers could be seen from a great distance. If there were people about, I would see them at the same moment they saw me. I dared not risk traveling in daylight. I found a thorn bush, its low and spreading branches thick enough to hide me. There I slept the day away.

Two more nights of travel passed without my seeing anyone. Then on the third day voices woke me. There were no bushes here. I had made a nest of bracken barely thick enough to cover me. From a distance I would be invisible, but if anyone were to stumble across my hiding place, they couldn't fail to see me. Still I felt safe enough. The ground here was uneven, and low hills made up for the lack of cover. I lay some distance from the trail and out of sight of it.