by Jo Walton
“He can certainly not be called that. It is an improper construction, certainly, and it would be very strange to put mother into the name.” He was right in point of fact, for ap means sired by and could mean nothing else. I thought of Ulf again and felt even more resolute not to give his name. But the heathen form would do. The child was half a Jarn, and he would be growing up in Urdo’s kingdom where there would be peace for those who would hold by the law. A Jarnish-shaped name would be little handicap.
“Let us call him Darien Suliensson.” Father Gerthmol’s mouth opened, then closed again as his eyes rested on Arvlid, who was smiling. Garah raised her chin in approval.
“So be it,” he said, and turned and left me to fall deep down into blessed sleep.
8
So through the woods the old lord came,
to stand beside the ancient place
where he might hear his fathers speak
and cold and hard he set his face.
“Whose seed, oh ancient stones, oh trees,
grows in this boy I show to thee?
Whose child is this my wife has borne
who looks so wild and strange to me?”
There came no answer, then the wind
howled loud and shook the branches bare
and from behind his forebear’s voice
came clear and cold upon the air.
“Know this, oh latest of my line,
and be content and ask no more:
to thee this boy shall be more true
than ever was a son before.”
—“The Ballad of Cinon the Loyal”
I had just come in from riding, I was covered in my sweat and Apple’s sweat. My breasts were tight and aching, and milk was beginning to leak through my shift at the front. Garah came rushing out of the stables towards me as I walked Apple towards the trough.
“Sulien! Quick, quick, the Queen of Angas is here and she wants to see you!”
“Me?” Sunlight and riding had made me slow. The routine of Thansethan had crept into me and did not want to be disturbed. It was time to feed Darien. I did not want people. “Why would she be interested in me?”
“She was interested enough in Darien.” Garah looked a little uneasy. “He was crying. Brother Thossa sent for you, and I went up to tell him you wouldn’t be long.”
“I was late. Sorry. Apple needed a good run.” I slid down from his back and patted the side of his neck. “We went like the wind. I’ll go to Darien straightaway if you’ll rub Apple down for me.”
“No. Thossa’s giving him cow’s milk. It’s time he started in on it anyway, whether he likes the cup or not. We’ll be leaving in half a month when the king calls for us.” I frowned. My breasts hurt. I was ready to feed him. Much as I longed to leave Thansethan, at that moment I only wanted to relieve the ache, the bursting feeling. “Anyway, the door flew open and this strange woman rushed in. She was wearing dark dark red with little pearls sewn on and a gold crown on her head like something in a story.” Apple snorted at the water, finished. I led him toward his stall.
“If she’s Angas’s mother then she is the queen of the north, of Demedia,” I said, remembering. “And the old High King’s daughter; she’s Urdo’s half sister. She’s entitled.” My father had told me of the great crown Urdo had placed on his head at the coronation, the ring that symbolized his marriage to the country.
“She’s nothing like Angas, nor Urdo either, who are both polite enough to notice that there’s somebody there. ‘Ah-ha!’ she said, ‘so this is the little summer hawk.’ Then she laughed, and then when she stopped laughing she looked around as if she’d suddenly noticed there was someone else there, and asked what his name was. Brother Thossa said that he was Suliensson of Thansethan, and she asked who Sulien was and where, and said she wanted to see you right now. So Brother Thossa sent me to tell Arvlid to send some milk up for Darien and then to find you wherever you were and send you to the queen.”
“You had better rub Apple down anyway, then.”
Garah raised her chin. “I was going to!” she said.
“Are these her horses?” Six fine horses and a pony were standing in the stalls across the stable. I walked over to them. The pony was the color of fresh cream without a dark hair on him. He was in perfect condition. The horses were less striking, but all good beasts, shuffling a little in the unaccustomed place. One bay stallion shied away from my hand, and I looked closer. His mouth was torn. He wouldn’t let me close, but it looked far worse than Apple’s had been when he first escaped from the Jarns. I looked around, but the place was deserted; none of the brothers were there just then. I looked over at Garah. “If I’m not back before you’ve finished, see if you can get this fellow to take some salve on his mouth. The good stuff, there’s plenty in the tack room.”
Arvlid intercepted me as I walked quickly across the cloister towards the guesthouse. “I’ve just taken some milk up for Darien, and the Lady of Angas wants to speak to you.”
“Is everyone going to tell me so?” I snapped, then, “Sorry, Sister, I was just on my way.”
“She’s in Father Gerthmol’s room.”
“Then she doesn’t want to see me until later?” I was relieved. I could go to Darien.
Arvlid frowned. “They’re staying in Father Gerthmol’s room.”
I was surprised. There had been visitors from time to time while I had been at Thansethan, although it was winter and not pilgrimage season. All of them had stayed in the guesthouse in the little narrow rooms all alike. Urdo had stayed in one when he stayed the night. I raised my eyebrows.
“The Lord of Angas keeps saying he will embrace the faith,” Arvlid said, lowering her voice, “and Father Gerthmol says he has real hopes of it this time. His last pilgrimage here was to pray for a child, and a son was born nine months after, the fourth child. They are here now to have a ceremony of acceptance for that boy in the sacristy. I heard it’s because it was the White God’s intervention and something went wrong with the pagan ceremony. Which could mean that they may convert in truth this time.”
“But how can he convert?” I was amazed. “He is a lord—Arvlid, no offense, I know the White God means a lot to you and you were brought up with the faith, but a lord must hold the land peace between the place and the folk. He cannot convert and be a lord. His ancestors and the holy ones would not allow it.”
“King Custennin has,” said Arvlid, looking at me as if I were a simpleton. “Holy Dewin scattered holy water on the land and converted all the Earth spirits in Munew. Dewin married King Custennin’s sister, and they have built a great church at Caer Thanbard. He’s one of the king’s closest advisors.”
I shook my head. “So who keeps the land peace in Munew?”
“God.” Arvlid touched the stone hanging around her neck.
“On his own? A lord stands between the holy ones and the folk.”
“The holy ones praise the White God, too.” I drew breath again, but Arvlid patted my arm. “If you’re interested, you can find plenty of people to talk to about it in great detail.” We laughed. She knew how I went out of my way to avoid such conversation. “But now I have to help move a hive before the next bell, and you should get on to the queen.”
I walked up the stairs still puzzling over this. I was about to scratch at Father Gerthmol’s door when it opened and a child of four or five came running out, almost knocking into me. He was a beautiful boy, sturdy yet with a sure grace of movement. He had a little of the look of Urdo in the angles of his face, which must have come from his mother’s side. He was dressed very finely in woven reds and greens. He ignored me and hurtled past me down the stairs. Immediately after him came a grey-haired man wearing riding leathers. He had a definite look of Angas, and I bowed my head politely. He smiled at me with an offhand charm that also reminded me of his older son.
“Excuse me, but I have to catch that rascal,” he said. I stepped aside and he clattered down the stairs after the boy. Then I scratched, and went in.
The Lady of Angas was sitting on Father Gerthmol’s best chair. She looked like an emperor on a throne. She smiled when she saw me. She was beautiful, and the tall gold crown suited her. She had the same grace as her younger son, and she reminded me of a great owl that can swoop so silently over the dark land.
“You are Sulien?” she asked. She knew my name of course, because she had been told my son’s. I raised my chin in assent.
“I am Sulien ap Gwien, of Derwen.” There, now she had a polite way to address me. “And you are the Lady of Angas, Queen of Demedia?”
“Oh yes.” Her smile was perfect, but held perhaps a little too long. She looked at me. I felt very conscious of the horse sweat, of the milk stains, of her exquisite clothes and beautiful face. “Sit down, daughter of Gwien, don’t tower over me like that.”
I sat on the stool I used when I came to speak to Father Gerthmol. “So why did you wish to see me so urgently, my lady?” I asked.
“Why, to tell you I have seen your son in the water,” she said. I gasped. She took my hand and stroked it gently. Looking into water to see the future was the work of an oracle. There were no oracles in Tir Tanagiri and had not been for many years. The last there had been had looked into tree rings and seen the end of the world, a hundred and fifty years ago. Yet, I believed her. Her voice was soft, low and gentle. While she spoke I was enthralled, listening to her. “I do not see the future, of course, such things are impossible. There are many futures, maybe many worlds, and I can see the different paths in them. I can see the roles people will play, if not how they will play them. I knew Urdo would be a great king when he was yet a small child. Your son will be a great hero, one of the best armigers in the world. He will succeed in a great quest. I see shadows in the water of what will be, or what has been elsewhere and may be here. I can act to bring such things to pass, or to prevent them. You though, you seem to have no shadows.”
Dead of starvation in the wood. Or killed as a slave in Jarnholme. Dead of a spear thrust gone a different way. Maybe in those worlds Darien lived and took my place. I shook my head, and tried to speak, but it was very hard.
“In some worlds the gods walk tall and people cower before them. In others the gods are withdrawn altogether and it is hard for people to hear them. In this world have you given your trust to any gods especially, Sulien? You are not a follower of the White God are you?” I could not quite understand what she meant. I shook my head. I felt as if I was falling asleep, and knew I must not. “You are a thread in the pattern that is in this world alone, and I do not know what you will do. You will not tell anyone this, Sulien?” I blinked, and took a deep breath, forcing myself to think clearly.
“I—” I hesitated. “Why are you confiding in me like this, Lady of Angas?” My words came slowly and sounded very grating in my own ears. She was Urdo’s sister, Angas’s mother, we were in the heart of Thansethan, where she was a welcome guest, she was an oracle and wise and thus favored of the gods, and furthermore everything about the way she spoke seemed to encourage me to trust her, to give her my faith, to promise not to tell. Yet somehow I kept thinking about the bay horse’s torn mouth. I wondered absurdly if that was her horse, she who was so gentle-spoken and regal.
“Do you trust me, Sulien?” she asked, explicitly. She was holding both my hands. I was not sure of the answer to the question. I was confused. If it was no, I could not say it without causing great offense. I would have to fight Angas after all. A tear ran down my face, for whether I killed him or he killed me it would be sad. If he challenged me, I should choose lances, and he would win, but he might in honor insist on swords, and then I should.
I knew I should say yes, or no, but could not. “Angas is going to marry Eirann Swan-Neck,” I said. “And it is a terrible thing to die with no children.”
“I don’t know where my son Gwyn comes into this,” she said, stroking my wrists. “Do you care for him, Sulien?”
“He is my friend,” I said, thick-tongued. She should not have said his name, for Angas had never told it to me.
“And where does your loyalty lie?” she asked, almost purring, looking into my eyes.
Even in that strange state I was utterly sure of the answer to that one. “I am the loyal servant of Urdo, true king of Tir Tanagiri.”
“A pity,” said the queen, coldly, still holding on to my hands and still looking like an owl—beautiful, silent, and deadly—a creature of night. “But with a will that hard to overpower I do not think I could have let you live anyway.” Then suddenly the room was dark, and I could neither move nor breathe. “Do any gods cast their protection on Sulien ap Gwien, that I may not slay her now?”
I had willed no protections, and had no will free now to seek any. In a flash of lightning the Lord of Light came towards me, his hand outstretched to protect me, an arrow pointing upwards towards the dark queen. In the shadows behind him stood others, ranks of them. They had come for me anyway. I felt breath beginning again deep in my lungs. She smiled, and spoke a word, and they faded a little, then grew more solid.
“By my name!” she said. “Your day is done, and this is not your place. Sulien spoke your names and was faithful to you, yes. You may give back her name and take her on to new life, there is no binding but that. Go, you are no stronger than my will.” They wavered again, although I knew if I could have called to them they would have saved me. I tried to reach, to call, to exert my will, but it was out of reach, I was cut off from it. Then they were gone. I realized then in a detached and distant way that she was changing the world by her own will alone, without the sanction of any god. My breath was almost gone. I knew I was dying. I would never master the lance, never take part in a real charge, never see Urdo or Apple again, never see Darien grown. Then someone stood behind me. I could not see him, but I could feel a chill. The Lady of Angas looked up.
“You!” she said. “She can have sworn nothing to you!”
“She is my sacrifice,” said a voice, dark and laughing, harsh as a raven’s call. “She is dedicated to me, and my choice to take her or not to take her. I do not choose to give her to you, Morwen, Avren’s daughter, whatever you may have given to me in the past.” I was breathing again in the dark and could feel Morwen’s hands tight on my wrists.
“She is not in the pattern,” Morwen said.
“What are your patterns to me? She has borne me a son,” said the voice, the one-eyed liar, the Father of the Slain. I had read about him in the monk’s book, how he hung on the World Tree nine days to learn the secret of writing.
“Bah, begone!” said Morwen, tightening her grip. “Your day is done too, old fool, the White God will win and be worshiped everywhere, you will never have this land. I have seen it.” The god laughed, with the sound of crows disturbed from their feasting on a two-day-old battlefield.
“Long is a night on the wind-wracked tree, queen with a fair face. Gapes, and grows hungry does hand-pledger’s foundling; Terror’s barley is still to be threshed. Embla’s gift given to this weapon-tree as much as thee, and who shall say what is mine?”
Morwen blinked, and her brow creased. The god’s voice was almost a chant. “Think you Necessity makes a hero’s deeds?”
She drew in a sharp breath, as if this shot had gone home. “Oh no. I have found him,” she spat “a different wife.”
“Of course, of course,” he said, and it was the cawing of dark birds, I felt their wings, and he was gone. Morwen lay back in her chair, eyes closed, her hands limp at her sides. Sunlight was streaming in through the window. I could move again.
I leapt to my feet and went down the steps and into the cloister, panting and gasping and drawing breath into my parched lungs. I must tell, I must tell, but as I ran I knew that there was nobody here who would believe my word against hers. She would smile and say I was gone mad. She would say I laid hands on her, she could kill me as easily with a knife or in the process of law. I needed to rescue Darien and be gone. Yet no. I stopped, two steps taken. Darien was safe her
e. She had seen him in her pattern; she would not hurt him. I must go to Urdo, who would listen to me, even though she was his sister. Urdo would be at Caer Tanaga, thirty miles.
I made for the stables. Nobody was chasing me, but monks looked up in surprise to see me run. Garah was there, crooning to the wounded horse as she spread on salve.
“This is terrible,” she said, seeing me. “He’s been wrenched and wrenched, poor fellow.” I looked. It was worse than I thought.
“Could you ride him?” I asked. Garah sighed and smiled quizzically.
“No, really. Could you ride him if you had to? Is he too big for you?”
“He’s not as big as Apple, and I rode him out when you were too near your time. But—”
“Saddle him up. I’ve got to go, now, Garah, no waiting for Urdo in half a month, and you’d better come. You don’t have a horse, and this chap doesn’t deserve to stay with someone who has done this to him and will again.”
“Are you telling me to steal a horse?” Garah spoke to my back, I was fetching Apple’s things from the tack room. “Do you know I could be hanged for it?” she inquired, as I began to saddle Apple.
“Rescue a horse,” I said. “The woman is a sorceress.” I half turned. Garah was getting a plain saddle. “She tried to kill me. Just do it.”
Ten minutes later we rode out of Thansethan in the direction of Caer Tanaga as if the Wild Hunt was after us. The two stallions huffed at each other in rivalry, each trying to draw ahead of the other. “I don’t know why I’m doing this!” Garah called, when I finished explaining what had happened. “Nobody wants to kill me!”
“You’re brave and you love horses!” I called back.
“The penalty is hanging if you steal a greathorse!” she said, as we galloped towards the river. “You can put on my monument ‘Here lies Garah ap Gavan, she was brave, and she loved horses, and she listened to Sulien ap Gwien one time too many!’”
