Royalt slowed the wagon and eased it toward the open shed beside the stable, where the wiry man stood.
'Royalt… glad you all could come. Mairee was hoping you'd be here."
'Wouldn't have missed it for anything, Kustyl," replied Royalt as he set the wagon brake.
'You mean your lady wouldn't have." Kustyl grinned.
'That, too." Royalt vaulted down from one side of the wagon as Kustyl offered a hand to Veryl to help her down on the other side.
'You can put the team in the shed there. Got water and some grain."
As the two men talked, Alucius offered a hand to his mother, who took it with grace, although she did not need it to descend from the wagon.
Lucenda looked at her son. "You be careful with that clean shirt, Alucius."
'Not that careful," Royalt added with a laugh, interrupting his conversation with Kustyl. "Have a good time, boy."
Alucius looked toward the long porch, and then to the three boys on the far corner who were playing shoes.
'Go on," urged his grandfather. "The shirt be sanded."
Alucius grinned and began to run toward the three, although he only recognized Vardial. He heard—and ignored—the words behind him.
'Father…"
'He is a boy, daughter. Let him be one before he has to be a man."
Alucius slowed as he reached the end of the long porch.
'Here's Alucius," called Vardial, perhaps a span shorter than Alucius, but far broader. "That makes it even. Alucius and me against Jaff and Kyrtus."
'Fine," called the tallest youth, "Kyrtus and me, we'll make it quick."
Kyrtus's eyes lingered on Alucius, focused on the newcomer's dark gray hair, for just a moment. "That we will."
'No, you won't," Vardial predicted.
Alucius and Jaff took the pit closest to the porch, a sandy circle with an iron rod pounded deep into the ground and projecting about a third of a yard above the sand.
'Odd or even?" Putting one hand behind his back, Jaff looked at Alucius.
'Odd—on two. One… two." Alucius thrust forward two fingers.
'Even, it is." Jaff had offered two fingers. "You start."
Alucius picked up the pair of black-painted horseshoes, and shifted one to his left hand. Standing to the right side of the iron rod, he pitched it toward the opposite pit, where it landed two spans short of the rod and skidded perhaps a shoe's width past.
'Not bad for starters," Jaff said, taking his place on the left side, and tossing a green shoe toward the other pit. His shoe skidded past the rod, touching it enough for a brief clang.
'Jaff's within a shoe," Vardial called back to Alucius.
Alucius tossed his second shoe. While it struck a glancing blow to the green shoe, it didn't knock it away from the rod. Jaff's second shoe struck the ground just short of the pit and bounced sideways.
'Too short… wanted to slide it in," explained Jaff.
Kyrtus began from the other end, but his shoe skidded well past the rod, as did Vardial's first throw. On the second pitch, Kyrtus got his shoe close to the rod, but Vardial knocked both away.
Jaff started the second round, with a pitch that ringed the rod, and then spun off, landing nearly half a yard away. Alucius slid his first shoe almost to the rod, deep enough into the loose sand that Jaff's second shoe bounced off. Alucius tried to slide his second shoe to the rod on the second side—and did, but not quite close enough.
Over the next glass and a half, the four played five games, and, as Jaff had predicted, the two older boys won, but not easily, with all games being decided by less than four points, and with Alucius and Vardial winning two, if each of those by only two points.
'Wind it up, young fellows!" called Kustyl. "Ribs and chicken'll be ready in a bit. Wash up and get yourself some punch."
'Good game," offered Jaff.
'It was," Alucius replied. "You and Kyrtus are good. Thank you."
'… he always that polite?" murmured Kyrtus to Vardial.
'… his grandsire's strict…"
As Alucius walked up the steps to the porch, he glanced toward the other end where a girl in pale blue trousers and a white shirt and a brown leather vest was helping ladle out the punch. She wasn't as slender as Kyrtus's sister Elyra, and her hair was straight and brown. But there was something about her. Alucius looked away for a moment.
'That's Wendra," whispered Vardial. "She's Kyrtus's cousin. Her father Kyrial is the cooper in Iron Stem. He never had enough Talent to be a herder, like his brother Tylal. Father says he's the best cooper Iron Stem ever had, though."
Alucius glanced back at Wendra, watching as she smiled and then laughed. He looked away quickly when she lifted her eyes in his direction. Then he crossed into the house, following Jaff to the washroom. After washing, and patting his hair back into place as best he could, Alucius eased through the large kitchen, not that any stead had a small one.
Vardial slipped up beside him. "I saw that."
'Saw what?" Alucius kept his voice even, stopping himself from turning to go back and help his mother and another woman who were wrestling a kettle off the iron stove.
'You were looking at Wendra."
'I was also looking at where the punch was."
Vardial laughed, but softly. "Just be careful. Kyrtus is sweet on her."
'They're cousins," Alucius pointed out.
'That makes it worse."
Alucius could see that. "Thanks."
'She is nice. I like Elyra, though."
The two slipped onto the porch, and Alucius eased up to the punch table behind Jaff. When the taller youth had taken his punch and walked along the railing, Alucius stepped up and smiled pleasantly. He hoped his smile was merely pleasant.
'Do you want the lemon or the berry?" Wendra asked.
'The berry, please."
'You're Alucius, aren't you?" She handed him one of the tumblers, three-quarters filled.
'Yes, and you're Wendra?" Alucius looked directly at her.
'Yes." She smiled, not quite meeting the directness of his eyes.
'Vardial said you lived in town."
'We do, but Grandfather Kustyl always insists we come to the summer gather. He says that no one can make ale like Father, and he won't drink it unless Father's here."
Alucius made the slightest of gestures toward the one empty bench. "Everyone has punch."
'I shouldn't…"
'Go ahead, Wendra," interjected the older Elyra. "You've been serving everyone. I can get a glass for Vardial."
The slightest flush ran up Wendra's long neck.
'If we sit there," Alucius nodded to the bench, "you can see if you need to help Elyra."
'I suppose that would be all right." She slipped onto the bench gracefully.
Alucius sat down and turned to face her, careful to leave space between his leg and hers. "I've never seen you in town."
'During the week, I'm in school."
'I get lessons from there, but they come in a package, and it's usually for a month."
'Your mother goes over them with you?"
Alucius shook his head. "Mostly, my grandsire does."
'Vardial said he was strict."
Alucius shrugged. "He's fair, and he wants me to learn." He could see that Wendra's eyes were a greenish gold, or maybe a gold flecked with green. He wasn't quite sure, because they seemed to change. "How do you like school… I mean, learning with all the others?"
She grinned. "I like it, especially the mathematics. Madame Myrier is going to start teaching me bookkeeping next month. That way, I can help both Mother and Father."
'Your father's the best cooper…"
Wendra's laugh was musical. "You sound like Vardial. Everyone he likes is the best."
'He's my friend." Alucius flushed. He flushed even more when she touched his hand, even fleetingly.
'I know." Wendra grinned.
'What about your mother?" Alucius asked quickly.
'She's a seamstress. She
has a special machine that makes flour bags, too, so that Amiss can sell flour in smaller lots than just the barrels…"
'The food's ready! Don't let it get cold!" called Kustyl, stepping onto the porch. "We've got tables on the side porch and in the big room and in the kitchen."
'Would you like to eat—" began Alucius.
'I promised Mother I'd help her." Wendra smiled once more. "I really did. After supper…?"
'After supper," Alucius affirmed.
He didn't really remember much about dinner, except that he didn't see Wendra, but for when she served him, and that he thought the ribs were better than the chicken. And that Vardial kept looking at him and grinning.
Alucius finally managed to draw Wendra aside in the late twilight, and because the porch was crowded with the older folk, they walked out toward the low ridge to the east of the stead. The air was warm, and the scent was that of sand and quarasote and the lingering odors of chicken and ribs. Alucius had to blot his forehead with the back of his forearm. At least, he thought it was because the air was warm.
The last sparkles of light were fading from the quartz-studded western rim of the plateau, and the three-quarter orb of Selena hung in the greenish purple sky above the plateau—appearing as a massive stone rampart that marked the eastern borders of the Iron Valleys. They stopped at the top of the low rise, a good hundred yards from the main house, far enough not to be heard, and visible enough not to worry anyone, Alucius felt.
For a moment, neither spoke.
'Have you ever wanted to climb the plateau, just to see what's there?" Wendra asked.
'I've dreamed about it, and once I asked Grandfather about that." Alucius smiled wryly and briefly. "He said that there were more than enough mysteries in the Iron Valleys, and that anyone who wanted to climb more than six thousand yards straight up was a sanded fool, and anything but a hero."
Wendra laughed. "From what I've heard, that sounds like your grandsire."
'He's very practical. He's a good herder, and I've learned a lot from him."
'Are you going to be a herder?"
'What else would I be?" He frowned. "I wouldn't want to be crowded in with other people. There's something about the valley, and even about the plateau."
'Nightsheep can be dangerous. That's what Grandfather and Uncle Tylal both say…"
'We understand each other. I mean, the nightsheep and I do."
'Is it true that you raised a ram from when you were only five? And that he'll do whatever you want? Vardial said…"
'That's Lamb. Not a very good name for a grown nightram, but I was only five. He was an orphan, and I got him to nurse from a bottle for my mother. We've always been close."
'You understand him… with your father…" Wendra swallowed. "I'm sorry. I wasn't…"
Alucius touched her shoulder. "That's all right. It was a long time ago."
'How about the others… the other nightsheep? Do they obey you?"
'They seem to. I haven't ever taken out the full flock by myself, at least not out of sight of the stead. Grandfather says I should be ready to any time."
'So you are a herder." She smiled again, warmly.
'Well… I'm going to be."
'We'd better get back," she said abruptly. "I can see that Father's getting the team ready."
'I wish…" Alucius laughed, softly. "Yes, I suppose we'd better. Grandfather will be getting restless before long. Even with the moonlight, he doesn't like to drive that far at night."
'Neither does Father."
They turned and began to walk slowly back down the ridge to the west, and toward the stead. Alucius reached out and took Wendra's hand, gently.
Her fingers linked with his, and she did not release his hand until they neared the stable.
'There you two are!" called his grandfather. "Told Kyrial you'd be here before we had the teams hitched. I was almost right."
'Wendra?" called another voice, feminine.
'I'm right here. Alucius and I just walked a little ways."
'Your father has the team ready."
Alucius turned to her. "I don't get to town often."
'I don't get out to the valley at all, except for the gather. But, if you do get to town, I'm usually at the shop, in the back." Wendra smiled, then stepped back and hurried to the wagon with the sign on the side—KYRIAL, COOPER.
After watching the cooper drive away with his daughter, Alucius had to hurry and climb up into the rear seat of his family's wagon, settling beside his mother.
'She seems awfully nice, Alucius," Lucenda murmured.
'She does." He just hoped it would not be that long before he could see Wendra again.
'It was a lovely gather, Royalt," Veryl said. "Now, aren't you glad you came?"
'Suppose so. Worked out a trade with Jelyr, and a few other things…"
No one said another word about Wendra on the entire ride back to the stead.
Alucius and Royalt rode on opposite sides of the flock, behind the lead rams, as the sun rose over the rolling rises south of the plateau. The morning was clear and cloudless, like any other working morning, and chill, as was often the case in early spring. So chill that, until the sun was clear of the plateau and filled the valley with light and warmth, Alucius's breath steamed.
The youth kept his eyes moving, looking to the flock and beyond, and then back to his grandsire, trying to keep an even two hundred yards between them. The tenth of a vingt separation would widen to twice that, or more, once the nightsheep reached the area where Royalt decided they could begin grazing on the tender new stalks of the quarasote bushes, bushes that generally grew no closer than a yard to each other, and often much farther apart. After a year's growth, the lower shoots of the bushes toughened. After two years, not even a maul-axe with a knife-sharp blade on the axe side could cut through the bark, and the finger-long thorns that grew in the third year could slice through any boot leather. In its fourth year, each bush flowered, with tiny silver-green blossoms. The blossoms became seed pods that exploded across the sandy wastes in the chill of winter. Most of the seeds ended up as food for the ratlike scrats or for the grayjays, but enough survived to ensure new quarasote every year.
Within weeks of seeding, the old bush died and left behind stalks that contained too much silica to burn or to break or cut. Yet by spring, those stalks were gone, devoured by the shellbeetles that burrowed through the red sandy ground, and new bushes were sprouting.
The two rode slowly, without speaking, in a northeasterly direction down the long eastern side of Westridge. After almost a glass they reached the quarasote-covered flats stretching for more than ten vingts eastward to the rolling hills that formed the approach to the plateau. Overhead, the silver-green sky shimmered, and the early morning stillness had been replaced with a wind out of the northeast that carried the faint, but cold and iron-acrid smell of the plateau itself.
Alucius glanced up, catching sight of an eagle almost directly overhead, circling ever higher into the sky.
'Alucius!" Royalt called and then gestured.
The youth eased the gray mare toward the older man, around behind the flock, absently using his Talent to chivvy some of the laggards forward.
'Good. Saw you moving the stragglers up," Royalt noted as Alucius rode closer. "Best keep 'em moving early, when they're ready and restless, and then let 'em graze their way back in the direction of the stead." Royalt eased the bay alongside the smaller gray mare that Alucius rode. "See the marker wedge there?" He gestured to his left.
The youth squinted, slowly scanning the low rise beyond his grand sire, well to the left of the black backs of the nightsheep. Finally, he caught sight of a crystal on top of a black pole striped with yellow. He pointed. "Is that it? A quarter off north-northeast?"
'Good! Another glass past that and we'll swing south for about two glasses, depending on how they're grazing and what the shoots look like. So far, they've not been growing back so quick as I'd like. Been drier this spring, though. H
ope we're not coming up on another drought."
'How can you tell?"
'You can't. Not until it happens. Except less rain falls." Royalt glanced back.
Alucius followed his eyes. "Those three are dropping back again."
'Having you along makes it easier for an old man," Royalt said. "One herder to watch the flock and the other to keep in stragglers before they get too far out."
Alucius liked it when his grandsire called him a herder. "You're not old, sir."
'Old enough, son. Old enough. It was a long time since I was your age."
'Things were different then?"
'The things dealing with people were different. People change faster, and maybe it's just different people. The land is the same. The stead was pretty much like it is now, except the processing barn is new. Had three sheds then. This way is better." Royalt gestured toward the plateau. "That looked the same then as now. So did most of Iron Stem. Few more people then."
Alucius would have liked to have heard more, but he could see the three laggards were getting more and more separated from the rest of the flock. "I'd better get to them, sir."
Royalt nodded.
Alucius turned the gray and worked his way through and around the scattered quarasote bushes, making sure his mount avoided the larger and older bushes particularly. The animals needed to graze more to the east, nearer the plateau, for their wool to be the best, and dawdling near the stead would only cut back on nearby forage, which might be needed in times of bad weather and make the wool less valuable.
The nightram's black undercoat was softer than duck down. It was also cooler than linen in summer, and warmer than sheep's wool in winter, but stronger than wire after it was processed into nightsilk. The wool of the rams' outercoats was used for jackets stronger and more flexible—and far lighter—than plate mail. The fabric stiffened to a hardness beyond steel under pressure, although its comparative thinness meant bruises were not uncommon, something that Royalt had stressed to Alucius. The underwool from the yearlings or the ewes was equally soft, but not as strong under duress. The fabric loomed from it was used mostly for the garments of the lady-gentry of such cities as Borlan, Tempre, Krost, and Dereka.
'Come on, you laggards," he murmured as he chivvied the three, mainly with his Talent, watching as they ambled forward, slightly more quickly than the rest of the flock, to catch up.
Legacies Page 5
