Ember and Ash

by Pamela Freeman

  “You’ve made trouble for me, young man,” Garn said softly.

  “Better for you than for my people,” Ash replied. Garn snorted as though agreeing, but he raised his voice and Ash realized that there were people listening outside the archway.

  “You moved too fast for me, lad.”

  Ash watched his steady eyes and nodded.

  “I knew better than to give you warning,” he said loudly. “You couldn’t have stopped me.”

  “I’ll have to report this to the Hárugur King,” Garn said. “Wait here.”

  He went out the archway and they heard a quick conversation, then the sound of light running feet moving away from them. Garn came back.

  “Well,” he said, and the look in his eyes reminded Ash again that they were among warriors. “Get in the baths. You all stink to the roof.”

  He went out again, leaving them alone.

  Ash put a hand on Tern’s shoulder.

  “What was it, back there, lad, that had you so—” He didn’t want to say “upset”; the boy would take that as a criticism, “so surprised?”

  “That man, the painter,” Tern whispered urgently. “He killed my uncle!” His face was hard with anger and grief. “When I was ten. They raided. He killed him with an axe!”

  Ash was vividly reminded of the first time he had seen the Ice King’s men come toward Hidden Valley, their great battleaxes swinging, their battle screams filling the air. He had been seventeen, and had had nightmares for months afterward.

  Cedar put his hand on Tern’s other shoulder. “We are not here to take revenge,” he said seriously. “We must convince them to let us go. That is all.”

  Tern’s eyes flashed with anger and tears. “Aye. I know.”

  He moved away from them brusquely, stripping off his clothes and easing himself into the first pool. Cedar looked grim, and Ash thought he probably looked the same. They could not forget that these people were the enemy.

  Halda led Ember into a curtained cave with a sloping floor which led down to a pool of water. Hot water.

  Too hot. She felt the heat begin in her cheeks, then just under her heart, then in her knees, feet, shoulders… it spread and raged like a forest fire, and that thought made her realize that it wasn’t the temperature. It was Him.

  The pool below belonged to Him. He was in this cave, in the very air she breathed. She stepped back outside the doorway and bent over, struggling for breath, feeling her heart leap and race with terror. She just hadn’t been expecting it! Not here. As if it were happening at that moment, she was plunged back into the memory of Osfrid’s death, watching him shrivel and scream, feeling the whip of the burn around her wrist, the face of the Fire forming in the flames… she sank to the floor, her hands over her face, shaking, rocking back and forth, trying to banish the images from her mind.

  Halda followed her, concerned, and put a hand on her back.

  “Child?” she said, her voice uncertain. “Are you all right?”

  Ember dragged air in, scrubbed the tears from her face and sat back, panting. Then she clambered to her feet like an old woman, swallowing tears in a dry throat. As she turned, she saw several men watching them from along the corridor, looking uncertain about whether they should move toward them—guards, she thought. Of course. They would watch her.

  Politics and human threats calmed her down and let her smile with difficulty at Halda.

  “I’m all right. I didn’t expect… there is power in there.” She gestured to the archway, but she didn’t look at it.

  “Few feel it,” Halda said slowly. “None so strongly before… you are a seer?”

  Ember laughed shortly. “Me? No, no. But I have, er, had some dealings with that Power.”

  Halda blanched, making the gesture against evil which Nyr’s men had made.

  “The Ice King?” she gasped. “You’ve had dealings with the Ice King?”

  Her blue eyes were wide with a mixture of fear and awe and something buried underneath. Speculation.

  Ember froze. What should she say? If these people believed Fire Mountain to be evil, how would Halda react to a claim that the heated pool came from Fire, not Ice? Then she realized what Halda was saying, what it meant—the Ice King was a power, one of the Great Powers, like Fire or Water. Oh gods, they’d all been fools. For a thousand years, they’d been idiots, all her people!

  She’d been gaping for too long.

  “The Ice King?” she said, trying to seem calm. “No. No, I have never had dealings with the Ice King. With another Power. Perhaps I was mistaken. Power of that strength… perhaps it all feels the same…”

  Not a lie. Not a lie. Ash was adamant that they shouldn’t lie on this journey. “Lies throw up dust that blind the teller,” he’d said.

  Halda smoothed her long dress down over her thighs, considering. “What Power?” she demanded. “What Power have you had dealings with?”

  Yes, that was the right question for the warlord’s lady to ask. And she had promised Ash not to lie, but it was hard to say it. Dangerous.

  “Fire,” she whispered.

  Halda jerked back as though slapped and she made the sign against evil.

  “That one is the bane of the world,” she said. “The Enemy.”

  “He killed my husband,” Ember said with real hate. “On our wedding day.”

  Suddenly she was crying, sobbing, and Halda’s arms came around her in comfort.

  “Evil,” Halda said flatly.

  She led Ember away to a series of smaller chambers cut from the rock, furnished with narrow looms and spinning wheels, with felting tables and combing planks, and finally with beds and wall hangings. There were only a few women in the outer rooms, working by the light of closed lanterns. One was a young girl, younger than Ember, and Halda snapped some orders at her too fast for Ember to understand. The girl ran, her long red skirts flicking up around her ankles.

  Halda led Ember to a wooden armchair beside one of the beds and settled her in it.

  “Calm yourself,” she said kindly. “No one will hurt you here.”

  Ember sat and shook, feeling foolish, wishing she could be like her mother. Martine wouldn’t be weak like this. She’d dealt with wicked enchanters, with evil ghosts, with the reweaving of the compact which kept all humanity safe from the wind wraiths and water spirits. She was a hero. She would never quiver and cry in front of a stranger.

  The girl came back with a basin of steaming water and some cloths and put them carefully down on a small side table, staring at Ember with curiosity and a faint hostility.

  “There you are,” she said.

  “Thank you, Larra,” Halda said dismissively. Larra bobbed up and down, spreading out her skirts a little—something like a bow? Ember thought. Clearly a movement of respect to the lady. She would have to remember that.

  “I’ll leave you to wash,” Halda went on. “Your clothes are there.”

  Her pack was at the foot of the bed. Its familiarity in this strange, strange place made tears well up again, tightening her chest, but she managed not to cry.

  “I thank you, Lady, for your hospitality,” she said.

  Halda nodded and left, pulling a curtain which had been looped up over the archway down to cover the door.

  Ember stood up and touched the rim of the bowl. The warm water had no trace of Fire in it. She relaxed a little. Undressing, washing and redressing in the one set of good clothes she had brought with her settled her more. She brushed her hair and wondered how she should arrange it. Should she wear it loose, as unmarried girls did, or bind it into plaits around her head, as married women did, or wear a cap, like a widow? She bit back a hysterical giggle. She was all three, gods help her. All three at once, so she might as well please herself.

  She brushed her hair out and let it hang, bringing it flat next to her ears with combs to keep it out of her eyes. The strands crackled and spat sparks as she brushed, and she flinched each time. It was as though He was trying to reach her even here.
/>   Finally she was ready. She tied her boots on securely and went to the archway, lifting back the curtain hesitantly.

  “Halda?” she called.

  The girl, Larra, was waiting.

  “Queen Halda says to bring you to the hall,” she reported. As they walked together through the outer rooms, she glanced sideways at Ember’s red hair. Her own was blonde as flax. “Are you going to marry Nyr?” she asked.

  The question was like a blow to the windbox. Ember gaped at her.

  “Marry—” She smiled and shook her head. If it were only that simple! A diplomatic marriage, hah! “No, I’m not here to marry anyone.”

  Larra skipped a little, to go ahead, and Ember smiled at her back. So, Larra had plans for Nyr, did she?

  “I’m a warrior’s daughter,” Larra informed her, turning to speak over her shoulder. Ember knew a claim for status when she heard it. The tone of voice was exactly the same as a girl in the Last Domain saying, “I’m an officer’s daughter.”

  “A worthy wife for any man,” Ember acknowledged, and Larra nodded, as if they’d negotiated a settlement.

  Winding through passage after passage, cave after cave, Ember began to realize that she was in a town. Mostly empty. All the people out with the goats, the hares, the crops, wherever they were planted; in winter all those people lived here, safe.

  Winter was bad enough in the Last Domain, but at least there were doors and windows, even if they were often snowed over. At least there were glimpses of the sky, and days she could go out with her friends. To be cooped up underground for more than half the year… She shuddered.

  Then they emerged into the hall, and she stood astonished at the size, the color, the height of the roof. The fire in the center. She stood unmoving. If she went near it, would it die? Would she be revealed as an agent of the Enemy?

  Ash and the others were standing in front of the fire, being confronted by Garn and Bren. Her men were weaponless. She couldn’t remember the last time she had seen Ash without his bow. Bren had a hand on his belt knife, and two of the men who had ridden with Nyr were standing behind him, axes in hand. She went forward at a fast walk, but Halda was before her, coming swiftly from the other side of the fire.

  “What happens here?” she asked with authority.

  “He has destroyed the bow!” Bren spat.

  Ember made herself laugh. As one, the hairy men spun to glare at her. Ash looked worried, as though she were walking into trouble. But she didn’t spare him a glance. She looked straight at Bren instead.

  “What did you expect him to do? Just hand it over to you so your people could be better warriors? He knew his duty to his lord and he did it.”

  Bren paused. “Then he will teach us instead,” he said. “And if he does not, he will regret it.”

  The men with the axes moved toward Ash. Tern’s hand went to his knife, but Ash shook his head, his eyes on Ember.

  “Now is the moment,” Ember said gently to Bren, and to Halda, “when you must decide if your people will gain more advantage from trade with my father than from a new bow.”

  Halda was nodding, lips pursed, but Bren was unconvinced.

  “We will let the Hárugur King decide!” he said.

  “The Hárugur King,” Halda said, “is consulting the Ice King, and no doubt has more to worry about than a single bow.”

  Faces paled and hands made, not the sign against evil, but a different movement, a smoothing motion of one palm across the back of the other hand. Ember understood it—that was the smooth surface of ice.

  “We are grateful beyond measure to the Hárugur King for his generosity in consulting the Ice King on our behalf,” Ember said. Her voice showed her sincerity. She was truly grateful—to deliberately go and face one of the Powers for a stranger was a great and generous act. As she said so, she cast a glance at Ash and Cedar, making sure they understood the implications.

  Cedar certainly did. His eyes widened and he looked around as if reassessing everything he had seen. Tern just looked puzzled. Ash looked at the ground, then up again.

  “Yes,” he said. “We are grateful indeed.”

  Bren wasn’t mollified. He had wanted that bow badly. “The Hárugur King knows his duty,” he snapped.

  “And no doubt there will be benefits to us all in the future from his generosity,” Halda said, putting an end to the discussion. “Come and eat.”

  “No,” Bren said. “He must be kept prisoner until the Hárugur King returns.”

  People were trailing into the cave, watching them curiously. In the group around her, there was a silence that Ember knew was dangerous. These people did not respect their women much, any more than most warlords did. But Halda was the lady here, was she not? And in the lord’s absence, she was the authority. Perhaps. Perhaps it worked differently here.

  “After you have all eaten,” Halda said smoothly, with a lifetime’s practice at defusing arguments, “you shall take him to the inner cave. But you and your men have been traveling a long time and need food.”

  This is a real lady, Ember thought with appreciation. I could learn a lot from her.

  The younger men set up trestle tables on either side of the fire, and dinner began.

  Men and women ate separately, but there was no distinction otherwise. No glass table for the king’s family or for his closest officers. Everyone ate at the same long tables, mixed in.

  Women served men first, then themselves, from a central trestle. Bacon and barley soup, bread, small strips of charred veal with onions. Almost familiar food, but the soup was spiced with something Ember didn’t recognize, and the bread was flat. Children ate from their mothers’ plates. The boys, not quite old enough to join the men, formed a group by themselves, imitating the way the men sat and joked with each other. Ember watched them with a smile. That was the same, at least.

  Halda saw her looking at them, and smiled as well.

  “Boys are the same everywhere, are they not?” she asked.

  “You see a great deal, my lady,” Ember said.

  “I know what it is like, to come to a strange place and search for something which is familiar.” Halda’s voice was wistful.

  “You are not from here?”

  “I am the daughter of a tribute king, to the south,” Halda said. “To be married to the Hárugur King’s heir, as Ari was then, was a great honor. It bound our peoples close together.”

  Ember made a face. “My father let me choose my husband, but only from other warlords’ sons. That’s what daughters are for, after all—to forge alliances!”

  A bitter smile crossed Halda’s face, and she nodded. “It is a great responsibility, none the less,” she said. She paused, and took a spoonful of soup, then put her spoon down and tilted her head. “Has your father planned another marriage for you?”

  Ember shook her head and shivered, her hand cupping the brand on her wrist.

  “I must complete my task first,” she said.

  “Nyr is not married, either,” Halda said, seemingly careless but with sharp eyes.

  Oh, she knew that tone. Her heart beat slower as she thought through the implications. She had no doubt what her father would think. Her mother… Martine had never reconciled herself to the need for Ember to make a political marriage. She had accepted Osfrid because Ember was so happy, but marrying the Ice King’s son—or rather, the Hárugur King’s son—that would be very different indeed. Ember didn’t even like Nyr much. And to live in this cage of caves for most of the year—to be imprisoned by snow and ice for months and months and months… oh, no, she couldn’t do that. She just couldn’t. Let them negotiate some other settlement.

  Play for time, she thought. The essence of negotiation. Don’t say yes, don’t say no.

  “I thought Larra had plans in that direction,” she said, trying to keep it light. Halda’s hand brushed across the tabletop, sweeping Larra’s ambitions away.

  “I will find her a husband worthy of her,” she said. “Someone in a neighboring tri
be, perhaps. She need not concern you.”

  “My father believes in trade rather than warfare,” Ember said carefully. “I suspect he would welcome anything which created a lasting bond between our peoples.”

  There. That was both true and diplomatic. Halda nodded with satisfaction.

  “It is not easy,” she said sympathetically, “to be married off to a strange land. But peace is a great gift to bring to a people.”

  Peace. There could be no peace if all her people were dead or gone south. Ember sighed, suddenly exhausted, and hoped that she could go to her bed soon.

  But before that, Ash was taken away by Bren and his men. Ember forced herself to watch, seemingly unmoved. Ash smiled at her reassuringly and she smiled back, but Cedar was grave and Tern looked anguished.

  “No doubt the Hárugur King will see fit to release him when he returns,” Halda said comfortingly. Perhaps she wasn’t as good at seeming unmoved as she had thought.

  “My father values Ash highly,” Ember replied. Time to raise the stakes and use what pressure she could to safeguard him. “And of course, he is my mother’s grandson.”

  Halda frowned. “Your mother’s…”

  “My mother adopted Ash’s mother some years ago, before she met my father,” Ember explained. “I was a late child. So Ash and I are of a generation, but he is my mother’s grandson.” She laughed a little, trying to seem unconcerned. “I suppose he might be called my nephew, but we have always called each other cousins.”

  “But you are not cousins by blood,” Halda said thoughtfully. “So you might marry.”

  The thought of marrying Ash swept over her with all the force Fire could generate, turning her knees weak and her guts liquid. Fire would accept him, because he had old blood, they could be together… She took a breath, steadying herself. She would not submit to this interference with her emotions. She would not let a false desire, an imposed desire, control her. She would not insult Ash that way.

  “My mother’s first daughter married a farmer,” she said dismissively. “Ash is not even an officer’s son, let alone a warlord’s.”

  “Ah,” Halda said, satisfied. “So he is in your service.”