The Spirit Stone (66 page)

‘You know women as well as you know horses,’ she said.

‘No, but I do know you. I’d rather be your Second Man than not have you at all. It’s a beggar’s bargain, but that’s what I am. A beggar, I mean, living on Prince Dar’s charity.’

Once again she smelled the bitter tang in his scent.

‘You should have been a great man among our people,’ she said. ‘You would have been, too, if it weren’t for Alshandra’s savages.’

He made a sound that might have been either agreement or scepticism. ‘Doesn’t matter now, does it?’ he said.

‘No. I’m afraid it doesn’t matter at all.’

The army had crawled towards home at its usual pace for an eightnight before the Mountain Folk announced that they could no longer endure travelling with snails. On a last wave of promises and handshakes, they assembled in the dawn light, ready to march off north at their own quick pace. Dallandra made a last farewell to Kov.

‘I’m sorry we couldn’t unravel all the runes on your staff,’ she said.

‘Oh, please don’t apologize!’ Kov said. ‘I know a fair bit more about them than I did before, and I’m grateful. Garin will be, too, I’m sure.’

‘Do give him my regards when you see him. I remember him from the siege of Cengarn, and I think highly of him.’

‘And he’s spoken very well of you to me, Wise One. Perhaps we’ll meet again someday? I’ll hope so.’

‘We may well do just that. I’d very much like to talk with Enj about Haen Marn.’ Dallandra laid her hands on her stomach. ‘But it will have to wait for a while, till the child’s born and old enough to travel.’

A scowling Brel Avro strode over to them.

‘I know what you’re going to say,’ Kov said. ‘Everyone’s ready to leave but me.’

Dallandra watched the dwarven ranks march off, hauling their carts with them, then walked through the encampment until she found Salamander, who was rolling up his bedroll. The servants had already packed away his tent. She knelt down next to him.

‘Ebañy, what are we going to do about Neb and Branna?’ Dallandra said. ‘As decent a soul as Tieryn Cadryc is, his dun is not the right place for learning dweomer.’

‘That’s true, oh mistress of mighty magicks. Now, in a few more days, the army will split again. You’ll be heading south to Mandra. I can ride east with the Red Wolf and fetch our two apprentices.’

‘That’s assuming they’ll be allowed to go.’

‘Fear not!’ Salamander smiled at her. ‘I have a ruse, ploy, or stratagem all planned. Since Meranaldar’s taking ship for the Southern Isles, Prince Dar is going to need a scribe. What better scribe than a Roundear, to celebrate the alliance between our two peoples and to cement our enduring friendship and so on and so forth?’

Dallandra laughed. ‘There are times,’ she said, ‘when your talent for blather comes in decidedly handy. I suppose Branna will simply have to go where her husband goes.’

‘Under Deverry law she has no choice. Do you think our prince will speak to Tieryn Cadryc for me? The invitation will look much more official that way.’

‘Oh, I think I can persuade him. As they say in Deverry, done then!’

When the messengers arrived at the Red Wolf dun, they brought with them the news of Tieryn Gwivyr’s death, along with the deaths of so many other good men. Branna was shocked at her own reaction. While Galla wept, mourning her brother, Branna felt very little beyond sympathy for her aunt.
It doesn’t seem real,
she thought.
Da buried in a foreign land, beside a foreign river.
As the days passed, and she found herself still unable to weep, she realized at last that death had taken on an entirely new meaning for her. She happened to be sitting on the window ledge in her chamber and remembering how it felt to fly when she thought of her father one last time.
I’ll see him again if I need to,
she thought,
or if he needs to see me. In some When or another.

The returning army arrived a full fortnight after the messengers. When they heard the tieryn’s horn announcing their return, Branna and Solla rushed out of the women’s hall and raced down the stairs to the ward. Lady Galla followed more slowly, yelling after them the entire way to mind their courtesies.

Men and horses filled the ward. The servant lasses whose men had come home rushed to greet them, while those who had lost their men busied themselves with their work, their eyes brimming with tears. Branna and Solla found a place to stand near the entrance to the great hall where they’d be out of the way of the confusion.

‘I feel like running to Gerran’s side,’ Solla said, ‘but what if he’s changed his mind about marrying me? He never came right out and asked, you know.’

‘Oh hush!’ Branna said, smiling. ‘Look! Here he comes!’

Gerran strode over to them. He’d made a heroic effort to look presentable, Branna decided, considering he’d been riding a long campaign. He was reasonably clean, freshly shaved, his hair trimmed up, and his shirt looked as if it had been dipped in a stream somewhere along the way home to get the worst of the dirt off. Tied around his left arm he wore Solla’s blue scarf. Branna stepped back out of the way and stood watching.

‘It gladdens my heart to see you, Lord Gerran.’ Solla dropped him a curtsey.

‘It gladdens mine to see you, Lady Solla.’ Gerran bowed to her in turn. ‘I have some interesting news. The Falcon clan’s going to have a new dun, down in the Melyn River valley. I’d be honoured thrice beyond my worth if you’d be its lady.’

‘My lord Gerran.’ Her voice softened to a whisper. ‘I’m a warrior’s daughter, and the sister of a gwerbret, but I’ll be the one honoured to be your wife.’

Gerran caught her hands in his. ‘Done, then,’ he said. ‘My lady.’

For a moment their rigid courtesy held; then all of a sudden she laughed, a joyous ring of laughter, and threw her arms around his neck. He caught her by the waist, kissed her, then kissed her again, while all around them the ward rang out with cheers. Branna wiped a few sentimental tears away on her sleeve, then went into the great hall.

At the table of honour Cadryc and Galla had taken their places, and Mirryn, still sulky, sat with them. Branna glanced around for Neb and saw him standing at the honour hearth, talking with Salamander. She hurried over, paused to greet her uncle with a kiss on his bald spot, and joined them.

‘I’ve received a very flattering offer,’ Neb said with a wink in her direction. ‘Prince Daralanteriel wants me to come be his scribe.’

‘We’d live among the Westfolk?’ Branna said. ‘That sounds most interesting.’

Galla caught her breath with a gasp and turned in her chair to glare at Neb and Salamander impartially.

‘Now, my love,’ Cadryc said. ‘I’ve already agreed that if Neb wants to take the offer, he can go. I’ll be the prince’s vassal in a few short months, you know, and so we’ve got to weigh his wishes carefully.’

‘I suppose we must,’ Galla said, ‘but Branni, I’ll worry about you, out there so far from home.’

‘It’s not like I’ll be lonely, Aunt Galla. The prince travels with a huge retinue,’ Branna said. ‘I shall miss you, though.’

‘And I shall miss you, dear. I do hope that you’ll be leaving us that lovely wool-spinner of yours.’ She glanced at Salamander. ‘You must get her to show it to you. The Westfolk women will probably want one, too.’

Salamander smiled and bowed. Doubtless he had no idea of what she meant.

‘Of course I will,’ Branna went on. ‘And you’ve got Adranna and the children here now, and Solla will be staying till Gerran gets his new dun. So you won’t be alone any more.’

‘Well, true spoken.’ Galla sighed heavily. ‘And no doubt the prince will visit us from time to time, and you with him. Neb, have you decided?’

‘I have, my lady. I’m so truly grateful to you for everything you’ve done for me, taking me and Clae in, letting me marry Branna, but to take a prince’s service—what an honour to come my way! Didn’t you tell Branna that one day I might be attached to a great man’s court?’

‘Oh!’ Galla made a sour face at him. ‘Snared with my own wire!’ She paused, thinking. ‘You know, though, I must admit that it’ll be a useful thing, having kinsfolk in our new overlord’s court.’

‘Scheming already, eh?’ Cadryc grinned at her. ‘Now, what am I going to do for a scribe? Curse it all, I just got used to having one.’

‘Solla can read and write,’ Branna put in. ‘It’s going to be a while before the Falcon clan gets its new dun, isn’t it?’

‘A woman for a scribe?’ Cadryc stared at her for a moment, then shrugged. ‘Well, why not, eh? A pen doesn’t weigh all that much. There’s no reason a woman can’t lift one.’

By the time the Westfolk army returned to the pastures around Mandra, the night winds hinted at the coming of autumn’s chill, and Dallandra was feeling most assuredly pregnant. Calonderiel hovered around her, making sure she had the best food to eat and the softest blankets he could find for her to sleep upon, until she was ready to scream at him to stop fussing. It was Sidro, oddly enough, who told her that she should be grateful that her man cared so much.

‘I did bear a child once,’ Sidro said, ‘to a man who cared not in the least. He did turn me out of his mother’s house in his jealousy.’

‘You mean he thought it wasn’t his child?’ Dallandra said.

‘Nah, nah, nah, but that he were jealous of the child. He knew I would love it as much as I loved him, and he brooked no rival in his house.’

‘That was Laz?’

‘It was.’ Sidro looked away, and for a moment Dallandra thought she might weep. ‘But the child, he were born sickly, and he died. Laz did want me back, then, but I went instead to Alshandra’s service.’

‘I can see why! The selfish little beast!’

Sidro considered her for a moment, then smiled, but sadness welled behind that smile. ‘He were that, then. Over the years, he did change for the better.’ She paused briefly. ‘In some ways.’

‘It seems to me that you’ve got the better man in Pir.’

‘Oh, he be that most certainly, Dalla. There be a need upon me to remember it if we do find Laz. Always has he held my heart in his fist.’

‘He hasn’t ensorceled you, has he?’

Sidro shook her head no. ‘Only if love be sorcery, and truly, at times I think it be as dangerous as any spell.’

‘I think you be right,’ Grallezar put in. ‘I do feel blessed that never did I succumb to such.’

‘But Exalted Mother,’ Sidro said. ‘You did bear children of your own.’

‘The children I loved. Their father—’ Grallezar shrugged. ‘I did pick him for his mach-fala and the lands they owned. He did have a good scent, too.’ She glanced at Dallandra. ‘They all be safe upon those lands now, far from Braemel, so I think me I did pick well.’

Sidro smiled her agreement, then paused to sniff the air. They were all sitting in Dallandra’s tent, while outside the rain drummed down, another omen of autumn. For want of much else to do, Sidro had attached herself to Grallezar as something of a serving woman and maidservant. Dallandra still found it unsettling to see the Gel da’ Thae women constantly raising their heads to sample the smells around them, but she had to admit that at times it did come in handy.

‘Exalted Mother,’ Sidro said. ‘Do you think Dallandra’s child be female?’

Grallezar paused for a deep breath. ‘I think you be right,’ Grallezar said. ‘I smell not the male taint.’

‘Well, wonderful!’ Dallandra said, simply because she knew they expected her to be pleased. ‘I’m so happy to hear it!’

She would have felt as happy—and as burdened—with a boy as well, and in fact, she’d been expecting that the child would be male. Later, when she and Grallezar were alone and able to discuss dweomer and its secrets in their private language, Dallandra brought the matter up and mentioned how surprised she was to be carrying a girl.

‘I’d been thinking that this soul would be Loddlaen’s,’ Dallandra said. ‘I was sure of it, actually, the more I meditated upon it.’

‘And why shouldn’t it be?’ Grallezar said. ‘Male or female, the dweomer doesn’t care.’

‘You know, you’re right. All this talk of Gel da’ Thae and Mountain Folk, the People and the Roundears—I’ve fallen into tribe-bound ways of thinking again, I’m afraid.’ She patted her stomach. ‘I’m sure it is the same soul. I truly am.’

‘You would know. Well, poor Loddlaen! At least you have the chance now to make things up to him. Or her, I should say.’

‘What? I don’t feel that I owe him anything. I did what I had to do. Far more souls than one needed me desperately. The times now are dangerous enough that I’ll have to do what I find the need to do again. But this time, I’ll make sure that she’s well provided for if I should have to leave her. And this time she’ll be one of the People on both sides of her line, which will make her life much easier.’

‘So it will. I just realized something. I’ve been trying to think what I might do for you, something to repay you for your generosity in taking me in—’

‘You don’t owe me anything.’

‘Oh, I know, but we Gel da’ Thae, we dislike feeling like useless guests. Look at Sidro, bustling around, washing my clothes and blankets, and her with dweomer gifts of her own! When the child’s born, I’ll be your nursemaid and help raise her.’

‘Wonderful! She’ll have a splendid start in life.’ Dallandra suddenly laughed. ‘Especially if she wants to be a commander of armies.’

Late on the following day, Salamander rode into the camp with Neb and Branna in tow. Since everyone knew that the two Roundears had come to study with Dallandra as well as write the occasional letter for Prince Dar, a tent stood ready for them on the edge of the encampment near Dallandra and Calonderiel’s. The members of the royal alar crowded round them in friendly curiosity, and that first evening, Dallandra barely saw them. It would take them some days to grow used to the Westfolk way of life, Dallandra knew. In the long tent-bound winter they would have plenty of time to begin the methodical study of the dweomer that they both needed, as she informed them the next morning.

‘It can get tedious, down in the winter camps,’ Dallandra told them. ‘But you’ll have lots to keep you occupied.’

‘No doubt,’ Branna said. ‘Dalla, will the silver dragon be there?’

‘Not in the camps, but he should turn up here soon, once it stops raining. I’ve got to treat his wound.’