by Sandra Waugh
King. My mouth fell open. “But there was to be a Council! Of the Riders.”
“And so there is. A Council and a king. Here, now, I’ll take the wrapping from your ankle.” Since I’d not moved, Nayla came and drew my foot from beneath the tangle of bedclothes. “It’s dried quite nicely,” she murmured, inspecting the linen strips. She pulled a tiny blade from her pocket to cut them away.
“But king!” I’d imagined a simple circle of the dozen Riders, out of doors … a bonfire, maybe. “There is no need, surely! I’ve asked only for help, for a village too insignificant in size to merit the attention of a king.” Even as a trespasser, I too was insignificant; this could not be necessary. I wondered how enormous the king would be, how opulent his throne. Someone so powerful would overwhelm the Sight. What terrible history would he pass?
“Do not fret so, or I might nick your skin.” Nayla sawed at the stiffened cloth patiently until it split up my ankle and came away as one piece. Then she looked up at me. “All will be well, Mistress Lark. There, now. Try out your foot.”
All will be well. Grandmama’s words. I wiggled my ankle back and forth. Healed, no pain—nothing that could help to postpone or protest. I should have thanked her, but I did not.
“Very good,” she pronounced. “Now, then. Let us have you dressed.” She walked over to the chair and waited for me to obligingly follow. Off with one gown, on with another—she was leaving me little time to hesitate, to think on what was coming.
“A good color, I think. Come, my lady, take your look and say that you approve.” Nayla had turned me so that I faced the looking glass while she did up the buttons. A rare, full-length view. I stood tallish and slight-framed in the candlelight, a reflection too beautifully tinged by the flickering gold to be believable. Hip-length hair, serious brow, and skin, already tanned from the sun, now glowed. Even my brown eyes were dusted with golden light. I blushed and focused on the exquisite gown. Moss green: a bodice of braided ribbons stitched together with gold and copper threads, skirt and sleeves in richly soft velvet. Nayla’s nimble fingers made quick work of the tiny loops at the back.
I was suspicious too that this would fit so well, be of my favorite color. But the maidservant shrugged as she stood behind me, busy. “We have clothes to spare for our guests. I chose well, did I not? You look quite lovely.”
“Very opportune, these spares.”
Nayla finished the top button. I could feel her smile all the way through her fingers. “No spell, my lady,” she said with a little pat to my shoulder. “ ’Tis exactly as you see it. Come, now. Let us get you to the hall.”
The passages glowed with torches ensconced in iron fastenings hung high above the tapestries. I counted them as we walked, abandoning the task after thirty, for there was much to look at, to wonder at. The stones held spatters of onyx and mica; I brushed my fingers against the hewn blocks, over the rough or smooth breaks. Then my hands crossed the tapestry borders, silk and woolen threads adding layers of lush texture. I drew in warmth; I drew in a richness of time. There was history here, ancient, deep, and powerful.
I do not know how long we walked or how many turns; it seemed, at least, a complex distance. But suddenly we were before a set of enormous doors of oiled oak, carved in intricate pictures—spirals of vines, leaves, fruits, richly darkened with age and what must have been countless years of polish. Pulled by guards who stood within, they opened wide before us.
I gasped.
A golden glow from what seemed a thousand candles flooded the enormous room with brilliant warmth. More tapestries—these as wide and tall as our cottage—hung from the walls, gleaming in the flickering light. Stories played out on these weavings, green and gold tales of fantastical creatures, enchanted groves, and exquisitely blue magical lakes. Bits of vermilion stitching shone so radiant in the candlelight the color alone seemed to heat the room.
Along one length of wall stood a line of carved wooden seats, six of them, all unique, all empty. Other than that, the room was bare of furnishings, and of people. Or so I thought, until my gaze traveled to the far end, where two great fireplaces burned brightly, between which stood a grouping of men—the Riders, I imagined; there were twelve together—and four women. Gharain stood with them, I knew immediately. And there was one more: a tall, slight, white-haired figure seated in an oak chair centered on a slight platform, his hands resting on something he held in his lap. Not as opulently presented as I’d anticipated, but I did not doubt this was the king. One of the Riders shifted his stance, and I saw there was a second chair. This, like the rest, was empty.
“Go on,” said Nayla, turning to me with a smile. She stepped to the side so I was exposed.
The group faced me, and my heart shrank. More strangers to meet, more histories of violent battles—the bombardment on my senses would begin even before I had to admit my trespass and beg for help before this king. My fingers gripped the edges of my velvet sleeves.
“Go on,” repeated Nayla. “Your Council.”
She left then. The great doors shut.
GO ON.
They watched me. The king, Gharain, the other Riders—all eyes on me as I hesitated. Even from this distance I sensed the strength present here. A good strength, but so powerful I had to catch my breath. Do not let it overwhelm, I charged silently. And then just as silently, I reminded, Ninny. I took a deeper breath and walked forward, eyes to the ground, trying not to see how small I was in the enormous room.
Gharain stiffened. I felt him brace just as I braced, knew that he looked away while the others watched me approach. His rejection stung, but then the whir of the group’s energies overtook—the inevitable charge and spiral, surrounding and singing into my body. I faltered again, not from any discord but because I was not being made dizzy by their hum. Unusual and unreal in its ease, I’d stumbled because there was nothing to ward against.
“Come forward.” The king’s voice carried across the hall, propelled me center before the platform. I kept my gaze down, bowed as I assumed I must.
He did not demand, but neither was it a request: “May I see you.” I gathered courage, raised my eyes to the withered man in the chair.
A smile hinted at the king’s mouth. Lines were etched there, finely drawn, intricately webbed lines that spread out along his paper-thin cheeks. He was old—no, he was ancient. His hair was brilliantly white, with only a strand or two of gray that matched his velvet robe—a sweet gray, like a rabbit’s fur. My gaze strayed. The borders of his robe were trimmed with silvery threads, which sparkled a bit when he breathed. His hands rested on a book in his lap, a handsome, smallish, leather-bound thing tooled with inlay on the cover—a circle threaded with filigree—as ancient-looking as the fingers that touched it, and yet unworn … or unused. I thought of the fluttering books that the ugly Harker had leaped for in his panic to claim them. This one rested so still beneath the king’s wrinkled hands—
“Your eyes,” the king insisted gently.
I looked again to the aged face, to the clear, piercing stare under the white brows. I recognized then the connection: these eyes were Gharain’s eyes, green with those flecks of golden brown, earth-colored and warm. The gaze went deep, straight into my very center. Yet it was his faint smile that was unnerving. It hinted at both sadness and, more strangely, hope, as if he recognized me as well.
“Lark Carew.”
I’d not shared my full name. “Yes.”
“Daughter of Meilsa, granddaughter of Hume.”
“Yes.” A shiver ran up my spine. How did he know?
“You will be seventeen years on the seventeenth day after the midsummer mark.”
“Yes …”
“And you carry the sign.”
The sign. I shook my head, gulping. “No, I am sorry. I do not remember what happened to the feathers. I must have left them back in the forest. The Riders saw them—Wilh and Brahnt, and Gha—”
“That is not the sign I speak of. You carry a mark on your body. The mark of
Balance.”
At those words the entire room seemed to hold its breath. I looked back in surprise.
“The mark on my shoulder—” I swallowed then, to say more clearly, “The mark on my shoulder blade?”
“The mark of Balance,” the king repeated.
“ ’Tis only a small circle. An outline. It is not unusual. My cousin has the same mark—”
“But you bear the Sight. You hold connection with Earth’s creatures.”
I protested, “And she is a Healer. She is far—”
“The sign. We must see it, Lark Carew.” There was no pause to wonder if I would agree to this. “Ilone, if you would.”
A young woman broke from the group where she’d stood partnered with the Rider I recognized as Dartegn, and crossed the distance to me with a light step. Her dark brown hair fell almost as long as my own, rich against the ruby color of her gown. She took my hand with an encouraging smile—passing no frenzy of sensation—and drew me up onto the platform before the king. I was meek in her hands: letting her push me to kneel and turn me just so, letting her pull my hair from my shoulder and expose my back to the scrutiny of the king—to all, for all eyes were fixed on this mark. My mark.
“Just one,” Ilone murmured, undoing a single button, and the sleeve was slipped down.
It is not that a mark on one’s skin should be considered insignificant. Many carry a brand of some sort, birth-given, directing their paths—for good or bad. Evie and I liked that we shared a similar mark, but we’d paid little attention to these small things we could not see.
Ruber Minwl bore a mark too, when he died, came a sudden, vicious memory. We do not always wish for the brands we are given.
“Lark …,” Ilone said, nodding toward the Riders.
Gharain had stepped forward from the group, some acknowledgment having passed between himself and the king. For whatever reason he was singled out, it was an unwelcome designation. And, quiet and stiff as he was, the young Rider’s voice held true desperation. “Must I?”
The king said nothing. Gharain closed his eyes. Some agony flickered across his brow, so heartbreaking that I caught my breath to see it. Then his eyes opened, focused on some far-off detail, and he slowly walked to where I kneeled. I watched him not look at me, watched him move with deliberate purpose, with an expression of pained resignation—a dutiful servant ready to perform a loathed task.
I had the horrible thought that he was going to draw his sword.
My eyes flicked back to Ilone. She shook her head. “It is just for a moment.”
And then Gharain was there and Ilone bent my shoulder to him. My head went down, but I turned my face so that I could see out of the corner of my eye his right hand reach out. He had a mark too, on the back of his third finger just above the knuckle. It was a tiny scar, whiter than the rest of his skin—a cross of two even lines. And he was placing his mark against mine. I felt the light touch, the warmth of his skin—
A shock of brilliance burst through me. I screamed. My back arched, throwing my face into the light of the thousand candles. Their glow exploded through my vision, and something gripped me—a power beyond all I’d ever seen or felt before. A homesickness, a pain of the deepest level, ripped into my heart, simultaneously washed smooth by an ultimate, exquisite burst of joy. It was need, and it was need fulfilled.
I tipped from the small platform onto hands and knees, gasping for breath. The move broke Gharain’s touch, and almost immediately the color, the heat, and the explosion inside were dimmed. I tried to rise but my arms were jelly.
“Is she strong enough for this?” Ilone asked the king.
“She is,” he replied.
It was a terse exchange. I quit any attempt to stand and stayed crumpled on the stone, looking at the company in the room. They all stood straight, nearly severe in their attention and surprise. I looked at Gharain, caught his stare. He was as shocked as I. His face was lit with the heat of the touch, radiating a power and beauty so extraordinary. It was the release I’d seen before when he’d smiled my name.
I was hoarse. “What is this? What—what has happened?”
“You are awakened, Lark,” answered the king. “You are proved.”
My entire body was tingling, charged as if by lightning. I looked up at him. “What is proved?”
“That you are who we hoped.” His hand brushed across the book he held—striking because it was the first time, I think, that he’d moved. But then, to my utter shock, his hand went to his heart and he bowed—the traditional Merith acknowledgment of respect. Every member of the attending group followed his gesture. “We welcome you home.”
“This—this is not home.” The tingling was expanding. “I am from the village of Merith, sent to request that your Riders protect us from approaching Troths.”
“We know of your village. We know you seek our help, but it is we who have need of yours.”
“My help?” What meant any of this? The group stood, calm and silent, while waves of something huge seeped through body and mind, building in force—not painful, but powerful and uncontrollable. “I’ve nothing to offer.”
The king simply looked at me, waiting the way the Riders did up on the ridge, as if I had something of importance to say, to impart. I stood, trying not to tremble.
“You wish to go,” he said. He read what was in my mind.
“Yes! I wish to go home!” Home. I saw our cottage. I saw Grandmama and Evie and Rileg. The waves of energy heightened, and a rush of sound raced in that I pushed against. I saw myself weeding in the garden, fingers deep in the rich earth—
“You do not lose these precious things. Look deeper, Lark. Trust yourself. What else do you see?”
“How do you know?” I cried, gasping at this strange force. “How do you know what I see? How do you know me?” And yet I was looking deeper: before my eyes my garden expanded, opened, flashing rapidly the changing seasons, my hands in the dirt dug deep and gripped stone, and the stone became the walls of Castle Tarnec—
“Lark,” the king called out above the roar in my ears. I clamped my hands over them to shut out the vibrancy of all of it, closed my eyes. “You have lived your life with the Sight as a burden. Too sensitive, you shy from people to avoid absorbing their energies, good or bad, shy away from yourself even, to hide from what might expose your own energy, your own power. And yet now you stand where you belong, believing you should be frightened of Tarnec, bracing against what does not hurt you, confused that you suffer no discord, that here the people do not jar your senses, that this is the place where you are in tune.”
He paused then, before claiming, “I hear you, Lark. I know you. For it is you we summoned. And you are home.”
“Summoned! It was for the Troths!” I cried. “I don’t know what to do with this! I don’t know what this is!”
“Listen,” commanded the king. His aged fingers smoothed over the book he held, then pulled open its front cover, so very, very carefully. He brought it up close to his eyes; Ilone drew one of the standing candles near so he could see. And then he read, with a lilt that was ancient and not his own:
Circle of Balance, chosen of White;
Power of hand renders dark into light.
Sun in earth proves her worth,
And rises the Lark, set free by Sight.
It echoed through the silent hall.
“These words are the beginning,” the king finished. “But it is enough. We have found you.” He added softly, “You have the mark of Balance, and the Sight, and the white horse chose you.” He closed the book gently, pressing on the cover as if to seal it for good. “We have been waiting for you, Guardian.”
There was absolute silence in the room. Every eye watched me, watched for some reaction.
I turned and ran.
GHARAIN WAS THERE. I never even saw him move. He was simply there, his hand closing on my arm to stop me, with all its power and warmth and glorious energy shooting straight through my body, grounding me to the
spot.
“Stay,” he said. “Stay.”
Fierce regret, terrible need. They warred in Gharain’s expression before he looked away, refusing my gaze. The doors, with a creak of hinge and clanging of iron latch, were opening for me. I could go if I wanted. I drew a great breath. Relief? Surrender? I wasn’t certain.
Gharain released my arm; I’d stopped tugging. I turned around, taking those few steps back to the others, not even sure why—except, maybe, to please the young man who’d done nothing but hate me from the start. And maybe to apologize; I certainly couldn’t help them.
But the king was not upset. He smiled at me. “You run when you have no need, Lark. Do not fear your own power. These energies are your guide—the Sight is your understanding.”
I straightened. “You called me Guardian. You say I am proved, that those words claim me as the one you summon, who will help you, as if that”—I pointed at the book—“holds your answer. And yet you ask me to trust myself. So believe this: I trust myself enough to know I cannot be what or who you look for. I am no Guardian.” It was a noble enough denial.
Still, he ignored it. “We know it to be so. What was written is our clue, you might say, a clue shared with us so that we could find you. And you are proved, through your mark.”
“And I say that my mark is not special, and that is a book from which you have read but a single verse. What is the rest? May I see?”
The king’s hands quivered slightly, splayed as they were on the book, but he shook his head. “It is unnecessary, for you already see,” he said.
The seer had said something like that in my dream; I felt my cheeks grow hot at the echoed refusal. How reasonable the king was with this outrageous claim of guardianship! But then, truthfully, I could not reject it outright. I said, a little hoarsely, “I cannot change my mark, but at least tell me how you came by this … clue?”
“Call it payment, perhaps.” The king’s eyes left mine, only briefly, flickering to the young man standing so rigidly at my side. I turned.
