The Shadow Isle (32 page)

“My thanks. Here, gerthddyn, how about giving us a tale in the great hall after dinner tonight? It’ll take everyone’s mind off things, like.”

“I’ll do just that, and I’ll make it a good one.”

Gerran had wandered off, and Clae had finished with Salamander’s horse. Salamander hailed the lad as he was coming out of the stable.

“A question for you,” Salamander said. “Did your brother leave your chamber last night?”

“He did,” Clae said. “I woke up just as he was coming back in. He told me he’d gone down to the privies, because he’d eaten somewhat that disagreed with him, and he didn’t want to stink the chamber up by using the pot.”

“Ah, I see.”

“It didn’t seem worth bothering you about right then, but I’m truly afraid he’s ill. It would gladden my heart if you’d go look in on him. He didn’t eat any breakfast this morning, and he looked sort of pale.”

As he walked away, Salamander scried for Neb and saw him lying on his bed in his chamber. Salamander hurried up the stairs in a crowd of anxious Wildfolk. He found the door unlocked and walked in without knocking. The yellow gnome darted in ahead of him and jumped onto the bed, where Neb was lying with his hands tucked under his head. He wore only a loin-wrap, and his semi-nakedness revealed how thin he’d become. Every rib showed, his clavicle stuck out, and his thighs were nearly as narrow as his calves.

“Clae asked me to see how you fared,” Salamander said. “Did you truly eat spoiled food last night?”

Neb sat up, swung his legs over the edge of the bed, and turned away without answering. The gnome waved tiny fists at his unresponding back.

“Considering that Lord Blethry spotted you up on the roof,” Salamander went on, “I don’t believe your little tale.”

Neb winced and began studying the floor.

“You do look half starved, however. Let me guess. You’re fasting in hopes of making your astral visions more vivid.”

Neb never answered. Salamander walked over to the window, which Neb was facing, and sat on the wide sill.

“It’s a bad idea, fasting at your stage of the apprenticeship.”

“Oh, and how would you know?” Neb’s voice hovered just above a growl. “I don’t see what’s wrong with it.”

“That’s the crux of the trouble. You don’t.”

“Nevyn used to do it.”

“He did no such thing, and besides, you’re not Nevyn.”

Neb looked at him with murderous eyes, then returned to studying the floor.

“You’re forgetting that if you remembered me from your time as Nevyn, then I must, conversely and all that, remember him. He was not the fasting sort, especially when good dark ale and a roast swan were on the table.”

Neb sat up a little straighter.

“Let us consider this.” Salamander went on, “You say I can’t know that what you’re doing is wrong. But I can because I did somewhat similar in the folly of my youth, and you, as Nevyn, told me to stop it. Had I listened to him, I would have been spared years of madness, and the family I loved so dearly would have been spared the pain I caused them. I lost them because I refused to listen to the old man.” Salamander heard his voice choke on that remembered grief. “Now, if you wish to spend a long day listening to all of my errors, I’ll tell them in detail. But the one and only thing you really need to know is that now you’re going down the same path.”

“What path is that?” Neb spoke softly.

“Refusing to listen to the masters of your guild, sure you know better than they what’s harmful and what’s safe.”

Neb looked up again. “I do have memories, you know,” he said, “of lore.”

“But what, pray tell, is memory? The memories of our own childhoods are unreliable enough. How can you expect to remember what happened to you two hundred years ago, when you wore a different being?”

“I’ve been working on the astral—”

“Ah, building a dun at the water’s edge, where the waves slide in to undermine it. Surely Dalla’s told you how unreliable those images are, how slippery, shifting, melting, merging—”

“Oh, hold your cursed tongue!” At that moment his expression did resemble Nevyn’s, not that Salamander would have told him so. “I’ve been testing the images with sigils.”

“Has Dalla taught you those, or are you remembering them?”

“Remembering them.”

“Are you sure you’re remembering them correctly?”

Neb opened his mouth, then shut it again.

“You’re not, are you?” Salamander said. “Why are you so determined to recover those memories, anyway? You don’t need to learn the lore that way. You’ve got good teachers.”

“It’s all taking so long.”

“Ah, I see that you’ve fallen into an opposite error from one of mine. When I was a lad, I thought that my teacher was rushing along like the winter winds. I felt so burdened that I kept running away. Val didn’t much care for my wandering ways, as you might guess, but did I listen to her? Hah!”

“Valandario was your teacher?”

“She was. But here’s somewhat you may not remember. When I was a tiny child, Nevyn’s the one who told her that some day I’d be her pupil.”

If they’d been playing with swords, Salamander thought, he would have just scored a touch. Neb looked at him wide-eyed, his lips a little parted.

“I didn’t realize,” Neb said at length, “that you were taught by a woman, too.”

“Is that what’s troubling your heart? All those women around you?”

For a long moment Neb hesitated, then spoke in a flood of words. “It’s just that they tell Branna things they don’t tell me, and Branna’s so far ahead. She remembers things in her cursed dreams. I’ve never had dreams like that, so I thought I’d—” He suddenly blushed scarlet.

“Aha!” Salamander said. “I think me we’re reached the heart of the matter. So you thought you’d produce visions instead of dreams?”

Still scarlet, Neb nodded his agreement.

“Branna’s dreams, alas, are not always true. Did you realize that?”

Slowly Neb’s color returned to normal. He shook his head.

“I didn’t think you did,” Salamander went on. “I can’t reveal any secrets about her, being as I don’t know any, but here’s somewhat I can tell you. When we were at the Red Wolf dun, Branna came to me to ask me about a dream. She’d always dreamt that she could fly as a falcon. This is quite true. Jill could do that. But our Branna dreamt about flying over Bardek during her first trip to the islands. Since I happened to be with her at the time, I know perfectly well that dream was false. Jill hadn’t learned how to fly then.”

“So Branna doesn’t always get true lore in those dreams?”

“I’d say that she’s gotten very little lore, only memories of using the lore that Jill learned the same way we all do, the long slow painful way. Years of study, Neb, years of study—even I, wild lad that I was in my youth, have put in years of study. It’s the studying that builds the skills.”

“Dalla told me the same thing, but I—well, uh, oh never mind.”

“Nah nah nah, you won’t wiggle off my hook that easily.”

“Oh, very well! I thought I knew better. I thought if I could only remember enough to be Nevyn again, I’d have all the skill I needed.”

“Alas, such is not the case. Dweomer operates through the person you are in each life. You have to build its precepts into the flesh and blood and aura you have in each life. Memories of Nevyn would be just that: memories. You can remember, perhaps, a fine meal you had years ago. Will it nourish you now?”

Neb shook his head in a no, then looked away. Salamander could see tears in his eyes but made no comment.

“Let’s think,” Salamander said instead. “For example, consider our Gerran and his desire to build the Falcons a fine dun on the border, a noble aim that all approve. He now has the coin, he has an idea of the dun he wants, he has the charter from his overlord to build it—but is it finished, therefore?”

“And the coin represents my talent, and the idea my memories, and Dalla’s my overlord?” Neb smiled, a bare twitch of his lips, but a smile.

“Just that. It’s going to take the workmen a couple of years to build the Falcon dun. It will take you, alas, a fair bit longer to become a master of your craft, just as it took all of us years and years. It took Nevyn years, for that matter.”

Neb nodded, thoughtfully this time, his eyes narrow as he considered.
That’s one fever broken,
Salamander thought,
but I’ll wager that others lie ahead.
Aloud he said, “Dalla gave me permission to work with you—if you wanted.”

“She told me that, too.”

The silence hung between them, as palpable as the dust motes dancing in the sun through the window. Salamander forced himself to stay silent and wait. The yellow gnome stuffed one fist into its mouth in sheer anxiety.

At last Neb took a deep breath. “Will you help me. Ebañy?”

“I most assuredly will. And I appreciate how much the asking has just cost you.”

Neb smiled, then stood up. “I’d better get dressed. I didn’t mean to make Clae worry. It was the only excuse I could think of, when he woke up.”

“Well and good, then. By the by, if Lord Blethry asks you what you were doing on the roof, tell him that you were worshiping the Star Gods. It was the only excuse I could think of, when he asked me.”

They shared a laugh.
Ye gods,
Salamander thought,
I have an apprentice of sorts—for the nonce, anyway. I must be getting old.
The yellow gnome skipped around the chamber in joy.

The door to the chamber banged open, and Clae came trotting in. When he saw Neb sitting up, he smiled.

“I’m feeling much better, truly,” Neb said. “No need for you to worry.”

“That gladdens my heart,” Clae said, “and it’s a good thing, too, because Prince Dar needs you. He’s going to have some sort of meeting with Voran and Ridvar, and he wants you to write things down.”

“I’ll get dressed, then.” Neb stood up and grabbed his shirt from the end of the bed. “Where is the prince?”

“He says to meet him up in the chamber of justice.”

“Very well. Run and tell him that I’m on my way.”

Everyone in the dun, of course, wanted to know what the princes were saying to each other, but since the servants had been caught eavesdropping on the malover concerning Lord Oth’s theft, they were afraid to listen at the door again. Gerran and Salamander waited in the great hall with the crowd. At last, when the sun hovered low in the western sky, Prince Daralanteriel came down the stone staircase. Gerran and Salamander hurried over to meet him at the foot.

“Where’s Neb?” Salamander said, glancing around.

“Writing up his notes,” Dar said. “Here, you two, come down to the meadow with me. We discussed a good many other things, and I’d like your opinion and Cal’s, too.”

Since a prince couldn’t be seen walking through the streets like an ordinary man, Clae and two of the dun’s pages rushed to the stables to saddle horses. While Gerran and Salamander waited with Dar, standing out in the ward, Dar told them some of what had transpired in council.

“Ridvar’s furious with the way Govvin’s ignoring him. He’s decided to drag him out of his wretched temple if he won’t come voluntarily, so he’s sending his captain and some twenty-five men to fetch him.”

“And if Govvin won’t come out?” Salamander said. “Will they lay siege to the place? Twenty-five men doesn’t seem like enough.”

“Voran’s taking twenty from his warband and going with them. After all, the prince has that letter from the high priest in Dun Deverry to deliver. Besides, his men are getting restless, camping in the meadow with naught to do.”

“That should be enough men to make Govvin think about things.” Gerran joined in. “If naught else, they can hold his blasted white cows hostage.”

Daralanteriel and Salamander both laughed.

“I’m minded to offer to send some archers along,” Dar went on. “Voran and I swore a pact of mutual aid in time of war this afternoon. This isn’t a war, but it’d be a good gesture, I think, to offer aid. Here, Gerran, as my vassal, will you command the men if I send them? I want Cal to stay with me. The silver dragon’s been off scouting for Horsekin up in the Northlands, and he might meet us here. Cal has to hear his report if he does.”

“Of course, Your Highness,” Gerran said. “May I take Mirryn and the Red Wolf men with me? Mirryn needs to get used to leading the warband.”

“By all means. This will be a good opportunity for him to do just that. After all, nothing much is going to happen.” Dar suddenly grinned. “And take your silver dagger. Cal tells me he’s been beating everyone in camp at dice. I don’t want my warband impoverished.”

“I’ll do that, Your Highness.” Gerran turned to Salamander and quirked an eyebrow.

“Oh, I shan’t be coming with you,” Salamander said. “I’ve got to play shepherd to our sheepish Neb.”

“What? Has he gotten himself into trouble again?”

“Of a sort.” Salamander smiled vaguely, then continued. “Besides, the lad’s an important witness against Govvin. We can’t have him riding all over the countryside.”

On the morrow, the warbands assembled in Cengarn’s ward. Gerran watched as Mirryn gave orders to the Red Wolf men about their line of march. The men certainly obeyed him, but in their own time. That and the easy way they sat in their saddles made Gerran wonder if they respected their captain as much as they liked him. He doubted it. When Gerran walked down the line, they sat up straight and brought their horses to the ready with a slight tug on the reins. He glanced over his shoulder and saw Mirryn watching with an utterly impassive face—but watching.

The first night out, the expedition camped at the edge of Ridvar’s demesne, about halfway to the temple. Gerran and Mirryn set up their tents near the Red Wolf’s warband, but they ate with Prince Voran and his captain, Caenvyr, who turned out to be noble-born, the younger son of a younger son of the Rams of Hendyr. Now that they were away from the gwerbretal dun, Voran assumed a bluff and hearty air, as if he were merely minor nobility like the rest of them, but Gerran had no doubt that any insult would be remembered and payment demanded, should anyone there be foolish enough to offer one.

Mirryn, Gerran noticed, seemed lost in some sort of unpleasant thought. He said nothing except in answer to direct questions, few of which came his way. When they were walking back to their tent, Gerran asked him what was troubling him.