Witches: Wicked, Wild & Wonderful (34 page)

“But—herbwife—you did not ask me—I did not tell—”

“You saw,” Meg answered slowly and firmly, as one might speak to a child learning its letters, “and I am a healer. We all have gifts, good sir. Even as you have yours. Out of love of learning, you have striven hard and given much—”

Never taking his eyes from hers, he fumbled in the pouch at his belt and brought out a coin.

“Herbwife, I know not what you are—but there is good in what you do, of that I am sure. Just as”—his eyes had dropped as if against his will to the flowers and he gave a start—“just as those are real! Yet it is out of season, and some I have not seen for long. For such grew once in a garden eastward where I can no longer go. I thank you.”

Meg was busy with the bouquet, freeing from its tight swathering a spike of violet-red flower. As she held it up, it did in truth seem to be fresh plucked.

“This for your hearth-home, scholar. May it bring you some ease of heart for not all memories are ill ones.”

He seemed unable for a moment or two to realize that she meant it. And when he took it between two fingers, he was smiling.

“Lady, how can one thank—”

Meg shook her head. “Thanks are worth the more when passed along. You had one who has given much, scholar—therefore to you shall be given in turn. Remember this well”—and there was force in those three words.

It was almost as if he were so bemused by the flowers that he did not hear her. For he did not say one word in farewell as he turned away from her stall.

Those shadows awakened in the afternoon from the walls about the market square were growing longer when Almadis came. As usual Osono was at her side, and behind her Urgell. Though she had been free of l’Estal since childhood, taking no maids with her, it was insisted that she ever have some guard. And usually the armsmaster took that duty upon himself.

There were feuds brought into l’Estal, for men of power arose and fell in the lowlands, and sometimes a triumphant enemy suffered the same fate as his former victim. Lord Jules had been a mighty ruler of a quarter of Klem before his enemies had brought him down. His lordship became this single mountain hold, instead of leading armies he rode with patrols to keep the boundaries against the outlaws of the western heights; his palace was this maze of ancient cold and crooked walls, and warrens of rooms. But he was still remembered and feared, and there were those who would reach him even if they must do so through his only child.

So Urgell went armed, and Almadis carried in her sleeve a knife with which she was well trained. There was a sword also sheathed by Osono’s side, though as a bard he supposedly had safe conduct wherever he might go. Might go—that was no longer true—there was only l’Estal. No man or woman asked of another what had brought one to exile here, so Almadis did not know the past tale of either of the men pacing with her now, but that they were of honor and trust she was sure, and she welcomed their company accordingly.

Meg’s stall had been a popular one this day. Most of those coming to buy had been dealt with briskly, but there were some with whom she spoke with authority, and twice more she had drawn flowers from that amazing bouquet and given them to the amazement of those with whom she dealt. So it had been with Vill Blacksmith, who had come seeking a herb known to be helpful against a burn such as his young apprentice had suffered. He went off with not only his purchase, but a sprig of knight’s honor gold-bright in the hand of his bonnet. And there was Brydan the embroideress, who wished a wash for aching eyes, and received also a full-blown heart’s-ease, purple and gold as a fine lady’s gem when she fastened it to the breast of her worn gray gown.

Oddly enough it seemed that, though Meg plundered her bouquet so from time to time, it did not appear to shrink in size. Her neighbor began to watch her more closely, and his frown became a sharp crease between his eyes. Now and again his own hand arose to caress a certain dark-holed stone which hung from a dingy string about his throat, and once he muttered under his breath while he fingered it.

He was the first to sight Almadis and her companions, and his frown became a sickly kind of smile, though there was no reason to believe the Castellan’s daughter would be interested in his withered roots of vegetables, the last remaining from the winter stores.

Indeed she crossed the market as one with a definite mission in mind, heading straight to Meg’s stand.

“Goodwill to you, herbwife,” she said. “I trust that trade has been brisk for you. We have but very few here who follow such a calling.”

Meg did not curtsey, but smiled as one who greets an old friend.

“Indeed, lady, this is a fair market, and I have been well suited in bargaining. We spoke of meadowsweet for the freshening before times—”

“Lad’s Love—dove’s wings”—Osono paid no attention to the women, his was all for the bouquet—“Star fast—”

“Falcon feather!” Urgell’s much harsher voice cut across the smooth tones of the bard.

“You are well learned, good sirs,” Meg returned, and her hand hovered over the bouquet. “Those are names not common in these parts.”

Osono’s gaze might be aimed at the flowers, but yet it was as if he saw beyond them something else—as might grow in a meadow under that full, warm sun, which never even in summer seemed to reach into these stark heights.

Meg’s fingers plucked and brought forth a stem on which swung two white blooms, star-pointed. She held that out to the bard, and he accepted it as one in a dream. Then she snapped thumb and forefinger together with more vigor and freed a narrow leaf, oddly colored so that it indeed resembled a feather.

“For you also, warrior.” And her words held something of an order, as if to make sure he would not refuse. Then she spoke to Almadis:

“Meadowsweet, yes.” She swept up a bundle of leaves and wrapped them expertly in a small cloth. “But something else also, is it not so?”

“Red-rose,” Almadis said slowly. “My mother strove to grow a bush, but this land is too sere to nurture it. Red-rose—”

The flower Meg handed her was not full opened yet, and when Almadis held it close to her, she could smell a perfume so delicate that she could hardly believe such could come into the grayness that was l’Estal.

“Herbwife,” she leaned a little forward, “who are you?”

“Meg, my lady, a dealer—a friend—”

Almadis nodded. “Yes, of a certainty that.”

She brought out her purse. “For the meadowsweet”—she laid down one of the coins.

“Just so,” Meg agreed. “For the meadowsweet.”

Osono was fumbling at his own purse with one hand, the other carefully cupping the starflower. Then he caught Meg’s eye, and flushed. Instead he bowed as he might to the lady of some great hall where he had been night’s singer. “My thanks to you—herbwife.”

Urgell’s bow was not so low or polished, but there was a lightening of his harsh features. “And mine also, mistress—your gifts have a value beyond price.”

There were others who sought the herb dealer after the castle’s lady had departed. But few of them were favored with a gift of bloom. Perhaps six in all bore away a leaf or flower, but still the bouquet appeared to grow no smaller. When Meg, in the beginning twilight, gathered up her wares and repacked them, two small figures appeared.

Behind them still ambled their horned and bewiskered companion. For the second time Nid touched noses with Mors, who was hardly taller than he. And Kaska voiced a small hiss.

“Help you, mistress?” Tay shuffled a bare foot back and forth in the straw which strewed the market square in marketing days.

“But of course. Many hands make light of work.” Meg swung one of her cord-tied bundles to the boy, and he hurried to fit it into the panniers, which his brother had already placed on Mors.

“You are not out with the herds, youngling?” she added as she picked up the last of her supplies, that bouquet.

Tod hung his head. “They will not have Nid now—he fought with Whrit, and they say he has too bad a temper—that any of his get are not wanted. They—set the dogs on us and Nid savaged two, so—so they talk now of—” He gulped and his brother continued:

“They talk of killing him, mistress.”

“But he is yours?”

Both small faces turned toward hers, and there was a fierce determination in the chorus of their answer.

“Before times, he was herd leader, mistress. When Lan, our brother, was herder. But”—now their voices faltered—“Lan died of the green-sick. And the herd went to Finus—they said as how Lan had told him so—that we were too young. And Finus—he said as how there was much owed him by Lan, and that he had the rights. Only Nid would come with us, and he stayed. But—” Tod stopped as if to catch breath, however Tad’s words gushed on:

“They won’t let us to the pasture anymore. Finus, he lives in our house and says it is his.”

“What have you then as shelter?” asked Meg quietly. She was holding the flowers close to her, beneath her chin, as if she breathed in for some purpose the faint scents.

“Inn mistress Forina—she lets us in the stable—but they say that Nid is bad for the horses.”

“Not for this one,” Meg nodded to Mors. “Let he and Nid bed down together, and we shall see what can be done.”

They made a small procession of their own out of the marketplace. Meg carried the flowers and humped Kaska’s basket up on one hip with the familiar gesture of a countrywoman bearing burdens. Mors trotted after her, no leading rein to draw him on, and he was matched by the goat, the two forming a guard, one to each side.

There were those who watched them go, narrow-eyed and sour of face. It would seem that just as there were those who had been drawn to the stall during that day, so also there were those who shunned it. Now a darker shadow moved forward to stand beside the stall which had neighbored Meg’s.

“You have kept eye on her, goodman?” it hissed a question.

“I have, priest. There is that about her which is not natural right enough. She is weaving spells, even as a noxious spider weaves a web. Already she has touched some here—”

“Those being?” The voice was hot, near exulting.

Now the stall keeper spoke names, and those names were oddly companioned—lady, bard, soldier, smith, scholar, needlewoman, a laborer in from one of the scanty hill farms, a gate sentry off duty, a washer-woman, the wife of a merchant and her daughter—

And with the speaking of each name, Thunur nodded his head. “You have done well, Danler, very well. Continue to watch here, and I shall search elsewhere. We shall bring down this slut who deals with the Dark yet! You are a worthy son of GORT, the Ever-Mighty.”

Within the keep the ways were dark and damp as always. Though in some of the halls there were dank and moldy tapestries on the walls, no one had made any attempt to renew them, to bring any hint of color into those somber quarters. Even candles seemed here to have their halos of dim light circumscribed so that they could not reveal too much of any way.

Almadis tugged at her heavy-trained skirt with an impatient hand. She had but little time, and this was a way which had not been trodden for long. She could remember well her last visit here, when rage at all the world had seemed to so heat her, she had felt none of the chill thrown off by the walls. The loss of her mother had weighed both heart and spirit.

Now the pallid light of her candle picked out the outline of the door she sought. But she had to set that on the floor and use both hands in order to force open the barrier, which damp had near sealed beyond her efforts.

Then she was in, candle aloft, looking about. No one had cared—there had probably been no one here since last she left. Yet the mustiness was still tinged with a hint of incense. The room was small, its floor covered with the rotting remnants of what had once been whortle reeds, which trodden upon, gave back sweet scent.

There was a single window, shuttered tight, a bar dropped firmly in place to hold it so. Beneath that stood a boxlike fixture which might be an altar.

That was shrouded with thick dust, a dust which clouded the round of once-polished mirror set there, gathered about the bases of three candlesticks.

For a long moment Almadis merely stood and looked at that altar and its furnishings. She had turned her back on what this stood for, told herself that there was nothing here beyond what she could see, touch, that to believe in more was folly—a child’s folly. Yet her mother—

Slowly Almadis moved forward. There were still half-consumed candles in those sticks, grimed, a little lopsided. She used the one she carried to touch the wicks of those into life. Then, suddenly, she jerked her long scarf from about her shoulders, and, in spite of its fine embroidery, she used it to dust the mirror free, dropping its grime-clogged stuff to the floor when she had done.

Lastly she turned to the window. Straining, she worked free the bar, threw back the shutter, opened the room to the night, in spite of the wind which wove about this small side tower.

For so long it had not mattered what rode the sky; this night it did. And what was rising now was the full moon in all its brilliance and glory. Almadis returned to the altar. She could not remember the forms. Those other times she had merely repeated words her mother had uttered without regard for their meaning. There were only scraps which she could assemble now.

But she stationed herself before that mirror, leaning forward a little, her hands placed flat on either side. On its tarnished surface she could see reflected the light of the three candles—but nothing else. There was no representation of her own face—the once-burnished plate was too dim.

Nor had she that learning which could bring it alive. Yet she had been drawn here and knew that this had meaning, a meaning she dared not deny.

Tucked in the lacing of her bodice was that rose Meg had given her. Dried it might be—with great skill—yet it seemed to have just been plucked from a bush such as her mother had striven to keep alive.

The girl moistened her lips.

“One In Three,” she began falteringly. “She who rules the skies, She who is maiden, wife, and elder in turn, She who answers the cries of her daughters in distress, who reaches to touch a land and bring it into fruitfulness, She who knows what truly lies within the heart—”