Bard's Oath (53 page)

“What’s wrong, love?”

“Linden—where were those merlings?”

Now it was his turn to be puzzled. “They must have been right by your ship, else I couldn’t have made use of their magic.”

“But there weren’t any merlings on that voyage. You don’t see them very often; most of my kin have never seen any. I did, on one voyage, but that was when I was second mate on my aunt’s ship. When they do come around, they’ll follow a ship for days. They like ship’s biscuits—the gods only know why, no one else does—and know that sailors will usually toss them some for luck. I would have seen them if they’d been there, Linden.”

“There must have been some,” Linden argued. “I remember straining to hold the link after finding Otter. Then, just as I thought it would snap, there was a surge of power. I realized there must have been merlings nearby. What else could it have been—”

The answer hit him with the force of mule’s kick. “Oh, bloody hell,” he said softly.

There had never been any merlings. He’d simply assumed there were because Otter was on a ship, and what other magic would be nearby? What else could have been the wellspring of the power he’d felt, used—

And woke before its proper time.
Linden felt ill. It was on his head that the dragon half of Maurynna’s soul, Kyrissaean, had been woken too early and faced dark magic before she was ready. All the problems Maurynna had faced were his fault. Thank the gods that Miune Kihn, the young Jehangli waterdragon, had been able to soothe Maurynna’s dragonsoul during the journey to Jehanglan; would she have ever been able to Change at will if not for that? He decided he never wanted to know the answer.

“Linden?”

She’d put all the pieces together as well; he could see it in her eyes. “Oh gods, love—I’m sorry,” he whispered. “If I’d known…”

They stared at each other without speaking. Finally Shima cleared his throat and said, “Would someone like to tell me what’s going on?”

“No,” they both snapped, still watching each other.

Shima threw his hands up in surrender.

Finally Maurynna said, “It’s all right, Linden—you didn’t know. No one knew.”

“I should have.…”

She sighed in exasperation. “How? I asked you once before: Are you one of the gods to know everything? Or just a Dragonlord? Stop heaping ashes upon your head, or I’ll, I’ll—” She crossed her arms. “Let’s just say you won’t like whatever I think of when I do think of it.”

But she was fighting a smile as she said it, and Linden knew he was forgiven—if she’d even truly blamed him. Perhaps she’d guessed—rightly—that he’d blame himself enough for the both of them, and would for a very long time.

“So,” he said, “what do we know?”

“We know that Conor heard music and did something that you—and I will bow to your knowledge of the man—think was not in character,” Shima said.

“Now what?” Maurynna asked.

“I can’t help feeling we’re missing something,” Linden muttered, rubbing his chin. “Some little thing we’ve overlooked.…”

“But what?” Maurynna whispered. “And can we find it in time?”

Forty-eight

“The food’s running low,” Kaeliss
said as she peered into her pack. “Even with Fiarin’s share, we’ve only a bit of the dried meat left and not much more dried fruit.” She looked up, fear writ large in her eyes. “What are we to do? I’ve not seen any berry bushes or anything else, have you?”

“No.” Pod frowned; worse yet, Kiga hadn’t been able to find any prey lately. She suspected the woods dog was keeping himself from starving by eating grubs from under logs, but she was a good way from being hungry enough to share
that
meal. Odd, though, that he hadn’t found anything. Come to think of it, it had been some time since she’d seen even a squirrel in these woods. She was just about to mention it when Kaeliss stood up.

“We’d better push on,” the Wort Hunter said, driving the thought from Pod’s mind.

They walked on, pausing throughout the day to search for whatever edible berries or mushrooms they might find. It was late morning when they made a couple of welcome discoveries.

The first was a small stream. Pod silently thanked the gods; there were only a few mouthfuls left in her waterskin. They hurried to ease their parched mouths and fill their waterskins once more. As they knelt, wiping their faces, both became aware of a sweet scent in the air.

Pod sniffed and sniffed; she’d smelled this before. It brought back a welter of emotions, some good, some bad. What was—

She toddled after Old Simmy as the grunting matriarch of the pigsty pushed through the bushes. Something smelled nice. With a squeal of rapturous pleasure, the black-and-white sow began rooting at the base of some vines. Many of the tubers she unearthed disappeared down her gullet like magic; others she pushed to Pod, who gathered them up in her tunic. She didn’t dare eat them; if
they
found out,
they’d
beat her. But maybe
they
would give her some.…

Pod scrambled to her feet and sniffed the air like a hound, tracing the delicious scent back to its source: a tangle of vines with purple-brown flowers. She followed the nearest to where it sprang up from the ground and began digging. A few moments later she held a string of small tubers in her hand. “Groundnuts!” she cried in delight.

Soon they had enough to fill their small pot. As the tubers cooked, they discussed what to do next. In the end, they decided to gather as many groundnuts as they could and press on as long as the light held, then make camp and send Kiga to hunt. If the gods were willing, perhaps he’d find a nice fat rabbit. After stuffing themselves with groundnuts, they crossed the stream and forged on, Pod in the lead.

After a time, Pod noticed that Kiga seemed uneasy. The woods dog kept stopping, looking this way and that. Now and again, he’d snarl, a soft, puzzled, uneasy snarl that prickled the hair on the back of Pod’s neck. Each time she stopped and peered around as well, her heart pounding. What was out there? Surely no animal in its right mind would confront a woods dog. Hellfire—she’d seen a
bear
back down before Kiga!

But there was never anything that she could see, or even hear. Still, her uneasiness grew throughout the day. She kept telling herself it was just because she was still tired from the failed Healing, yet it didn’t help when Kaeliss cursed behind her. She jumped “halfway to the moon,” as Conor would say.

“What’s wrong?” she asked anxiously, spinning around.

Kaeliss was on the ground, tugging at her boot. “I think I’ve got a blister,” came the terse—and annoyed—reply. “Damn it all—just what we didn’t need!”

Pod watched as Kaeliss examined her heel. “I had to be right, curse it,” the other young woman muttered. She dabbed some ointment from a small jar on the blister. Pod recognized the jar as one they’d taken from Fiarin’s pack. With another curse, Kaeliss pulled her linen stocking and boot back on and rose.

“You’d best lead now to set the pace,” Pod said. Kaeliss nodded; they set off once more, Kaeliss limping slightly.

In the late afternoon they came upon another long pile of rocks like the one they had robbed to build Fiarin’s cairn. As they clambered over, Kaeliss paused, then pointed.

“Those are apple trees!” she cried.

It took Pod a moment to recognize them; unlike the trees in the chapterhouse’s orchard, these were wildly overgrown. But as her eye grew used to the tangle, she saw that Kaeliss was right.

She could also see that despite their wildness, they were arranged in neat rows. “This was an orchard,” she said slowly.

And with that she realized what the stone piles were: the remains of old stone walls. “There must have been a village around here once,” she told Kaeliss as they hopped down. “No one would plant an orchard in the middle of the woods.”

Which explained why the woods had seemed so odd: unlike the other forests she’d been in, these were young trees, trees that had sprung up in abandoned fields and pastures.

And with that realization, her uneasiness grew. Why had this place been abandoned? She kicked at the grass, scuffing up a clod of crumbly black soil teeming with earthworms. Rich dirt, this; the people of this village hadn’t left because the soil was worn out.

She narrowed her eyes and looked around. So why …

Kiga’s whine made her turn. He stood on the old wall, scrabbling at the rocks with his powerful claws, head turning this way and that, now whining, now snarling.

“Kiga! Kiga come!”

But the woods dog ignored her. Pod whistled sharply and called, “Kiga! Come here
now
!”

At last Kiga clambered down from his rocky perch and trotted to her side. Pod scratched behind his ears. “All’s well, boy, don’t worry,” she told him—and herself.

A call from Kaeliss made her look up again. The other young woman had gotten well ahead of her. She was alternately waving and pointing to something at her feet. As the skin between her shoulder blades prickled, Pod trotted to join her.

“Look!” Kaeliss said when Pod joined her in a small clearing. “Another spring!” She pivoted and pointed to a huge clump of tall orange flowers shaped like trumpets. “And those are daylilies—fancy their surviving all this time since the village was abandoned. You can eat the buds, the flowers themselves, and the tubers beneath. I think we should rest here a day or two. I don’t want that blister to break open and get infected—and you haven’t fully recovered from trying to Heal Fiarin, have you? You still look pale.”

It was true, though she’d tried to hide it. To rest for more than a candlemark, to stay in one place for a whole day—perhaps even two! The thought made Pod giddy with delight. Besides, if Kaeliss’s foot became infected … Pod’s stomach turned over at the idea.

“I think it’s a good plan,” she answered, stubbornly ignoring Kiga’s soft whines and her own uneasiness. “Let’s cut some branches and make a shelter with the extra blanket.”

“Good idea. Then I want to put more ointment on that blister.”

When everything was ready, Pod turned to Kiga. The woods dog had stayed so close to her that she’d almost tripped over him twice. “Kiga—go hunt, boy.”

But instead of loping off, the woods dog just hunkered down. Pod frowned at him and again ordered him to hunt. Kiga refused to go.

Kaeliss looked up from re-bandaging her foot. “Why bother? He hasn’t been much use at it lately, has he?”

Really angry now—at herself, Kiga, or Kaeliss, she wasn’t sure which—Pod did something she rarely did: she lost her temper with her brother-in-fur. “Bad Kiga!” she shouted angrily. “Bad! Go hunt!” And she “pushed” at him with all her will.

Kiga jumped up as if she’d struck him. He stared at her for a long moment, a rumbling, singsong snarl deep in his throat. Then, the instant before Pod was sure he’d snap at her, Kiga turned and loped off. A mix of fright and anger made Pod yell after him, “And don’t come back until you’ve caught something!”

As the woods dog trotted across the clearing, tears pricked Pod’s eyes. She tried to call him back but the words caught in her throat. Then it was too late; Kiga disappeared into the shadowy woods.

Blinking back tears, Pod busied herself with gathering downed branches and twigs for the fire. By the time she stopped, it was full dark and she was exhausted and well-nigh sick with hunger and worry. When she finally sat down before the fire, Kaeliss wisely said nothing, just handed her a bowl of stew made from daylily tubers, groundnuts, and the last shreds of their dried meat. Pod forced herself to eat, straining her ears for the sound of Kiga’s return.

He still hadn’t returned by the time she admitted defeat and rolled herself in her blankets.

And it was the first rays of the sun, not the tickle of Kiga’s whiskers, that woke her the next morning.

Forty-nine

The noon meal—such as
it was—sat on the table. It was not, Maurynna thought as she pushed the overcooked peas around her plate, particularly inspiring. “Is this what all your meals are like?”

Raven smiled wanly and nodded. “I’d guess that while they have to house me like a prisoner of rank—thank you again for that!—they refuse to feed me like one. If you let them know you’re coming here to share a meal, I’m sure the fare will improve immensely. They might not even burn the bread next time.”

Maurynna snorted in disgust. “I just might do that—for every meal.”

Silence fell as they contemplated the pathetic meal.
The meat is grey and gristly, the peas are mush, the bread is burned, and the wine is barely this side of vinegar. Yes, I think I’ll put them on notice that I might well be sharing Raven’s table without warning.

“Maybe this is how the gods are punishing me,” Raven said suddenly.

“For what?” Maurynna asked in surprise.

“Taren.”

For a moment she didn’t know what he meant. Then she understood. She exhaled slowly and said, “Because he was a kinslayer and you helped him, you mean.” She shook her head. “Raven, the gods wouldn’t be so cruel. It’s not as if you knew what he was.…” Her voice trailed off at the look in his eyes.

“As if the gods care whether I knew or not,” he said bitterly. “Don’t you remember the story you told me after we returned from Jehanglan—what Shima’s mother, Lark, told you? How, because the captain of the ship she was the cook on gave Taren a berth on the crew, they were shipwrecked on the coast of Jehanglan, and all hands were lost save Lark, some other woman—and Taren. They didn’t know, either, and the gods certainly punished them.”

She couldn’t deny his words. Still … “Dragonskeep gave Taren hearth-room, and nothing’s happened there in all this time,” Maurynna pointed out.

“You’re among the favored of the gods, remember?” Raven snapped. “Dragonlords and Bards and Healers. No doubt the gods will forgive the lot of you what they’d crush us ordinary mortals for. Or maybe they’re just waiting. Maybe—”

The bitter tumble of words ended in something like a sob. Raven seemed to shrink in on himself like an old, old man. Alarmed, Maurynna reached out to him; the hands that caught hers across the little table trembled.