The Shadow Isle (7 page)

“We?” Dallandra asked, smiling.

“I’ve become part of the town, yes, at least for the winters.”

“I’m going to need you to come with us when we leave.”

“And I’m ready to ride, or at least, I will be once I finish packing up my things. Don’t worry about that.” Val paused for a glance around. “But I’m hoping to come back in the autumn.”

The house in which Valandario was staying was a grander affair than most, two stories high, the lower of stone, the upper of timber planks, with proper wooden shutters at every window and a slate roof. Inside the fenced yard, chickens pecked and squawked in the spring greenery. Although she couldn’t see it, Dallandra could smell a cow as well.

“Your hosts must be prosperous people,” Dallandra said.

“Yes, they’re the town potters,” Valandario said. “The kiln’s round back, and their shop’s on the ground floor. And Jin’s teaching some apprentices how to make pabrus, too, as well as how to throw pots.” She pointed to the side of the house. “We’ll go up the side stairs here.”

The creaky wooden stairs led to an off-kilter door of planks laced together with rope. Val opened it and ushered Dallandra inside to the kitchen, a big room with a brick hearth at one end, a long table in the middle, and crates and barrels along a side wall. Doorways led to various rooms, including the Wise One’s. Just like her old tent, Valandario’s chamber gleamed with bright colors on the walls and on the floor. Blankets and a pile of cushions lay on the narrow bed jammed against one wall.

“Do sit down.” Valandario waved at the bed. “You look like you could use a rest. Is the baby due soon?”

“A pair of months.” Dallandra sat down with a sigh of gratitude. “About. I’m not sure when exactly. Probably she’ll come at the most inconvenient moment.”

“Babies seem to, yes. I know this is practically treason to our kind, but I’m glad I never had one.”

“Well, I’m hoping that things work out better for this soul than they did the last time he was born. I won’t abandon him this time, for one thing.”

Valandario stared at her with abruptly cold eyes. “Are you saying that it’s Loddlaen?” Her voice dwindled to a whisper on the name.

Too late, Dallandra remembered who had murdered Valandario’s only lover. Val stood so still that it seemed she’d stopped breathing, waiting for the answer. From outside came the noise of the inhabitants returning to their town after greeting the prince— laughter, chatter, snatches of song, the barking of dogs and the high-pitched shrieks of children.

“I won’t lie to you,” Dallandra said at last. “Yes, it is, but she— and notice that I said she—she’ll wear a different personality this time around.”

“Of course.” Val turned away and walked over to the window. “Forgive me!” She paused again, while the everyday noises from outside seemed to mock old griefs. “It would be a terrible thing to carry grudges from life to life,” Val said at last. “Maybe that’s one reason we don’t remember lives, so we can let old hatreds die.” Again a long pause, until the laughter and shouting had moved on. “I won’t revive mine, I promise you. The news just took me by surprise, that’s all.”

“I’m sorry I let it slip like that. I should have prepared you—”

“It doesn’t matter.” Yet Valandario continued staring out the window. “You were gone when the murder happened. I can’t expect you to remember the particulars.” Her voice nearly broke on the word “particulars.” “It’s just that all sorts of little things have happened, just lately, to remind me of Jav.” She turned around at last. Her eyes glistened with tears. “And I still miss him. Elven lives are so long, no one stays together forever, but for us, everything ended too soon.”

“Very much too soon, yes.”

Val went back to her worktable. For a moment she stood, letting her fingers trail across the tooled leather cover of a volume lying there; then with a sigh she sat down in one of the two chairs standing behind it.

“I’ve put together some interesting information about crystals.” Val’s voice was steady again. “I’ve compiled a set of notes for you. Grallezar brought us some immensely valuable books.”

For some hours they discussed Valandario’s findings. When the light in the chamber faded, Val lit candles. Sidro came and went, bringing food and news. With warm bread came the information that Branna had gone with Grallezar and the Gel da’Thae. Chunks of roast lamb accompanied the welcome bulletin that thanks to a speech that Devaberiel had composed, Prince Daralanteriel had impressed everyone at the banquet. Along with a flask of Bardek wine for Val, Sidro reported that Calonderiel was discussing the town’s defense with the mayor and the leader of its ill-armed militia.

Dallandra was resting on the bed in Valandario’s chamber when Sidro came in for the last time, carrying a pottery cup of boiled milk with honey for Dalla to drink. At her table Valandario had spread out her scrying cloths. Sidro noticed them and lingered for a moment.

“I did want to ask you, Wise One,” Sidro said to Val, “if there be aught I may do to help you find Laz. I know but a little dweomer, though it would gladden my heart to learn more, but what I have I’ll happily use if it would give you any aid.”

“Thank you,” Val said, “but I don’t know—”

“Val,” Dallandra interrupted in Elvish, “did you know that Sidro can read and write?”

“I didn’t, no,” Val answered in the same. “That might be useful. ”

“It’s time to record your gem scrying.” Dallandra gave her a stern look over the rim of the cup. “The lore’s too valuable to risk losing.”

“Oh.” Valandario looked surprised, then nodded. “Sidro,” she said in Deverrian, “there’s indeed somewhat you can do for me. How would you like to learn how to use these cloths and gems to search for omens?”

“That would gladden my heart indeed.”

“Good. I’d like you to write down what I teach you, too. Could you do that?”

“I can, though the only letters I know be Horsekin ones.”

“It won’t take you long to learn the Deverrian letters,” Dallandra said. “I can teach you. There’s only thirty of them.”

“Oh, well, then!” Sidro smiled at her. “It be easy, truly.”

“Splendid!” Valandario said. “We’ll start on the morrow, but for now, why don’t you just sit down and watch, to get an idea of the process, I mean.”

Sidro pulled a chair up to the table and sat down while Valandario went to a hanging tent bag and brought out a leather pouch of gems. Dallandra meant to watch the lesson, but the hot milk combined with her weariness from traveling, and she fell asleep with the empty cup clasped in her hands.

Valandario took the cup from Dallandra without waking her, set it down outside the door, then seated herself at the table next to an eager Sidro. She poured out her pouch of gems, then chose twenty for a simple reading. In the candlelight they glittered, a chaotic rainbow. A crowd of sprites appeared to dart among the glints of colored light. One settled briefly on Sidro’s hair, then darted away again.

“We want four gems each of the five colors,” Val told her new apprentice. “They represent the elements and the Aethyr, of course.” She put the rest of the gems away. “Now, if we were considering an important matter, we’d add other colors, but this will do for now.”

Valandario spread out the scrying cloth, a patchwork of Bardek silks, some squares embroidered with symbols, others plain. Sidro listened carefully as Val explained each symbol.

“I’ll repeat this on the morrow,” Val said, “so you can write it down. At the simplest level, a gem that falls upon its own color represents what most people would call good fortune. It’s all based on the compatibility or incompatibility of the elements.”

“I see.” Sidro leaned a little closer to study the cloth. “So if a blue stone, it do fall upon a fire square, then that be a dangerous sign?”

“Exactly. Very good!”

Valandario shook the gems in her cupped hands like elven dice, then strewed them out with a careful motion of her wrist. For a moment she studied the pattern formed.

“What do you think this means?” Val said. “I know you don’t know all of the system yet. Just give me an impression.”

Sidro frowned, tilting her head this way and that as she studied the layout from different angles. “Forgive me,” she said at last, “but I can see naught in it.”

“Then you’re going to do well at this.” Val grinned at her. “I can’t either. This is the most confused reading I’ve ever seen, probably because we’re doing it just as a lesson.” She let the grin fade. “I hope, anyway.”

“What would it mean if you were asking it about the future? Aught?”

“I’d have to say that it signified some sort of standoff, a balance of forces that were locked together like this.” Val held up her hands, hooked her fingers together, and made a pulling motion. “I couldn’t say between what or whom, since we never focused our minds on a particular question.” She felt a sudden irritation, as if a stinging insect were flying around and around her head. The feeling was so strong that she lifted a hand to brush it away but found nothing. “Let’s put these back in their pouch. I must be more tired than I thought.”

“It were a long day, truly,” Sidro said. “I’ll fetch the banadar so he can carry his lady to their tent.”

That night Valandario dreamt about Jav and the black crystal pyramid. They stood together on a sea-cliff and looked down at a heap of stones on the beach below. He was trying to tell her something, but she couldn’t hear him over the sound of the waves. Finally she woke to a sudden understanding.

“The place where he found the crystal. That’s what he was trying to show me.”

The gray light of dawn filled the room. Valandario got up and dressed while she considered the meaning of the dream. Could there be another crystal at the tower? But Aderyn had told her, all those years ago, that Evandar must have found the black stone elsewhere and merely placed it in the ruin. She left the house on the chance that walking along the cliffs might clear her mind and allow her to delve further into what the dream-cliffs had signified.

To her surprise, she found Prince Daralanteriel there ahead of her. He was standing and looking out to sea with his arms folded across his chest. As she walked up to him, her footsteps crunched on the sand among the beach grasses, and he turned to greet her with a wave of one hand.

“Dar?” Valandario said. “Is something wrong?”

“No, not really,” Dar said. “Just thinking about the road ahead.”

“Will we be going to the trading grounds?”

“No, we’ll be traveling north along the Cantariel. There’s a Roundear lord—Samyc’s his name—who’s my vassal now. We should make sure that he’s safe. I’m thinking of asking for volunteer archers to spend the summer in his dun, just in case Horsekin raiders come his way.”

“Do you think the Horsekin will dare?”

“No, but I’d rather not be proved wrong. And then we need to cut east to visit Tieryn Cadryc.”

“That’s a long ride away.”

“Yes, it certainly is.” Dar got a harried look about the eyes. “I’m thinking that I need to build a winter residence up north. Not exactly a palace, though I suppose it amounts to one. The gods only know where I’ll get the stone to build it or the craftsmen, either. And then there’s Lord Gerran. I owe him a new dun as well.” Dar paused to look miserably away. “I never wanted to be tied down to a town. Everything’s changing, Val. I don’t know what to do!”

“That’s why you have us. Wise Ones, I mean. When Gavantar comes back from the Southern Isles he’ll bring new settlers with him, and they know all about building towns. Look at Mandra.”

“Just so.” He smiled, sunny again. “We’ll have one last summer of freedom, anyway.”

Is that what this is?
Val thought.
Our last summer as wandering Westfolk?
Their lives would pass into legend, she supposed, a time wrapped in wistful mist that hid the mud and chill of winter, the black flies of summer, the constant search for wood or the collecting of dried dung from their horses and sheep for meager fires, the endless striking of tents only to raise them again. She turned and looked out over the farmland around Mandra. In some of the fields the winter wheat stood a couple of feet high, bowing and rising like ocean waves under the south wind. No one would have to trade with Deverry men for the bread and porridge it represented.

“To be honest, Dar,” Valandario said. “I, for one, won’t miss the wandering.”

“Carra said the same thing. So have a lot of the other women.”

“But the men agree with you? Will they miss it?”

“Mostly, yes. Well, maybe in the summers, those who love to wander can take the herds out, while the rest stay behind in wherever it is, town, farms, whatever we eventually have.” He shook himself like a wet dog, then repeated himself. “We’ll have our last summer of freedom, anyway.”

“So we will. Are we leaving today?”

“On the morrow. It’s time for the Day of Remembrance, and I thought we should hold it here with the townsfolk.”

“Yes, that’s an excellent idea. The more you can do to remind the townsfolk you’re their prince, the better.”

“So Devaberiel said, too. He’s composing a special poem for the occasion. I’m not sure where to hold the gathering, though. There isn’t any town square or the like.”

“I know!” Val smiled at her own idea. “About a mile to the west there’s a ruined tower. Some Deverry lord built a dun out here, back when Calonderiel was a young man, I think it was. I wasn’t born yet, of course. Anyway, the People drove him out again. The ruin would be an interesting reminder in itself.”

“Splendid! We’ll do that. I’ll just go tell the mayor.”

Some hours before sunset, the townsfolk and the alar, minus a few herdsmen who’d volunteered to watch over the herds and flocks, gathered at the ruined dun. Over the past few years, the People in Mandra had pulled down much of the outer wall to use the stone for their town, but the tower still stood inside the fragment of arc left. Brambles, ivy, and weeds grew thick inside what had once been the ward. The wooden doors and outbuildings had long since rotted away, as had the floors inside the broch tower itself, or so Calonderiel told her.

“We had a couple of stiff fights at this dun,” the banadar said. “The first one was when we cleaned out the rats that had infested it.”