by Greg Keyes
“Take him,” Ensil muttered.
Aspar tensed for the battle, but then he saw the chamberlain bow and point left.
“This way,” the man said.
Aspar didn’t weep often, but when Winna’s faint breath fogged the polished steel of his knife, a single salty droplet worked its way out of the corner of his eye.
They were in a sickroom improvised from a chapel. Ehawk was there, too, unconscious but breathing a little better, along with twenty or so others, many of whom were still awake enough to groan and wail.
Aspar retrieved the berries from his pouch and was about to start force-feeding them to Winna when he took pause.
He’d been right about the greft’s intentions. He might get a few berries down Winna, but as soon as they understood that he’d lied about the complexity of the cure, they would probably confiscate the entire pouch.
“Where is the greftson?” Aspar demanded. “This would be better done all at once.”
“He’s in his own chambers.”
“Bring him then, and quickly.”
Then he knelt back down and stroked Winna’s face, his heart making weird motions in its bone cage.
“Hold on, girl,” he muttered. “Just a few more minutes.”
He touched her neck but could find only the weakest pulsing there. If she died in the time it took them to bring the other fellow down…
“I’ll need to work without eyes on me,” he told the remaining men. “We’ll need to improvise some sort of tent around their beds.”
“Why?” the chamberlain asked.
Aspar tightened his gaze on the man. “You know of the Sarnwood witch, yah? You know how few come before her and live? And yet I did, and she made me a gift of one of her secrets. But I was forced to swear a geos that no eyes but mine would witness this cure. Now, do as I say, and do it sprootlic! Bring some wine and a small white cloth, too.”
The chamberlain looked dubious, but he sent men off to bring the things Aspar had demanded. A few moments later several men bore a litter into the room on which lay a young man of perhaps nineteen winters. His lips were blue, and he looked quite dead.
“Sceat,” Aspar said under his breath. If the greftson was dead, he wasn’t walking out of there, and neither were Winna and Ehawk.
But then the boy coughed, and Aspar realized that much of the blue color came from some kind of paste that had been swabbed over him. Some local attempt at medicine, more than likely.
With poles and sheets, the greft’s men quickly built a tent around the three bodies, placing a small brazier inside, along with the wine.
The instant the sheet was closed, Aspar began mumbling in the Sefry cant of his childhood, as Jesp had done when she pretended to do magic. He was amazed at how readily it came to him, considering how much distance he’d tried to put between himself and all that. Normally his survival depended on his senses, wits, and weapons. Today it depended on how well he remembered how to play the charlatan.
Breaking between singing and chanting, he crushed some berries and, as gently as he could, pushed five of them down Winna’s throat, following that with a little wine, then holding her mouth shut until she swallowed weakly. Then he moved to Ehawk and did the same thing. The greftson’s eyes fluttered open as he began the process on him.
“Swallow,” Aspar said.
Looking confused, the boy did so.
Raising his voice, Aspar ended the chant with a flourish.
He went back to Winna, who, he saw with leaden heart, seemed exactly the same. He fed her two more berries, then drew back the flap of the makeshift tent.
The greft had been carried in on a sort of armchair and sat regarding him with skeptical eyes.
“Well?” he growled.
“Now we wait,” Aspar said truthfully.
“If he dies, so do you.”
Aspar shrugged and settled onto the stool next to Winna. He glanced at Greft Ensil. “I know how it is to lose someone dear,” he said. “I know how it is to be threatened with that loss. And I suppose I would let a stranger die if it meant saving someone I loved. I don’t fault you for the sentiment or the lie. But you might have given me the benefit of the doubt.”
The old man’s face softened somewhat.
“You don’t understand,” he said. “You’re too weak in years to understand. Honor and bravery are for the young. They have the constitution for it and no sense, no sense at all.”
Aspar maunted that for a moment.
“I don’t claim to know much about honor,” he said finally. “Especially after the show I just put on.”
“What do you mean?” Ensil asked.
Aspar produced the remaining Sarnwood fruits. “I’m tired of all this,” he said. “I gave your boy and my friends more than the amount the witch said would make the cure. I’ve tried ’em myself, so I know they aren’t poison. They got my horse better, too. Three berries each, that’s what you’re supposed to give ’em.” He reached into the bag and pulled out a few. “I’m keeping these because after this I’ll find that woorm and kill it, and I might need them. But in the meantime, there’s plenty more here. Distribute ’em as you see fit.”
“But the chanting? The song? The wine?”
Aspar ticked them off on his fingers.
“Fraud, deceit, and I was thirsty. But the berries are real.” He tossed the bag to the chamberlain, who caught them as if they were eggs. “Now,” he went on, “I’ve been riding for a few days without sleep. I’m going to try and get some. If you honorable fellows are goin’ to slit my throat while I’m with Saint Soan, try and do it quietly.”
Fingers on his face stroked him awake far more pleasantly than the kiss of a razor might have. At first he was afraid that it was only a dream, that he wasn’t seeing Winna’s half-lidded eyes looking back at him from the cot. But after glancing around at the situation, he managed to convince himself.
Winna’s hand dropped loosely by her side.
“Weak,” she murmured. Then her eyes focused on him again. “Glad you changed your mind,” she whispered. “Glad to see you one more time.” Tears streamed from the corners of her eyes.
“I didn’t change my mind,” he said. “I found the witch. She gave me what I asked for.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
She closed her eyes and wheezed a few breaths.
“I don’t feel well, Aspar,” she said.
“You’re better than you were,” he assured her. “You were close on Saint Dun’s gate when I got here. Now you’re awake.” He took her hand in his. “How in Grim’s name did you end up in the castle?”
“Oh. The girl, Haudy, told someone; I’m a little hazy. They came and took us, asked a lot of questions about you.” She closed her eyes. “I told them that if you came here, you wouldn’t have it. I didn’t think you would. I didn’t think I would see you again.”
“Well, here I am, and with the cure.”
“Ehawk?”
He glanced at the boy, who was asleep but seemed to have better color. The greft was asleep, too, guarded by four knights, but to his surprise Aspar found the greftson looking at them.
“What is this?” the boy managed. “What’s going on?”
“The story is you tried to fight a waurm,” Aspar said.
“Auy,” the young man replied. “That’s right, and then…” His face screwed up in concentration. “I don’t remember much after that.”
“Emfrith! My sweet boy!”
The guards had shaken their lord awake and were helping the frail old man move toward his son.
“Atta!” Emfrith replied.
Aspar watched the two embrace.
“How do you feel?” the greft asked.
“Weak. Sick.”
“You’ve been out of your head, unable even to recognize your own father.”
After a moment, the greft drew himself up and faced Aspar, his eyes wet with tears.
“I regret…” He paused, as if struggling up a mountai
n under a heavy load. “I regret my treatment of you, master holter. I will not forget that you have done this. When you leave here, you shall have whatever I can give to help you on your way.”
“Thank you,” Aspar said. “Food and maybe some arrows will do. But I’ll need them soon.”
“How soon?”
“Midday, if it please you, Greft. I have a woorm to slay, and I’m in a hurry to get at it.”
Winna’s hand came back to his and gripped it. “Do you understand?” he asked her. “I’d stay with you or wait until you can ride—”
“No,” she said. “No, that would be too long.”
“That’s my lady.”
He bent to kiss her and found her weeping again.
“We won’t grow old together, will we, Aspar?” she whispered. “We’ll never have children, or a garden, or any of that.”
“No,” he murmured. “I don’t think we will.”
“But you love me?”
He pulled away a bit and wanted to lie, but he couldn’t.
“Yah,” he said. “More than I have words for.”
“Then try and get killed later rather than sooner,” she replied.
She was sleeping again a bell later, but her color had improved. The greftson was actually able to sit up, and Ensil was true to his word, providing him two pack mules replete with provisions and mountain clothing.
By the time the sun stood a bell after noon, the pyres of Haemeth were darkening the sky at his back.
COMMENTS ON THE VIRGENYAN LEAST LOON
Uncommon in the world at large, this peculiar creature is found in isolated nesting places: little-used parlors, small garden nooks, and the most remote corners of libraries and monasteries.
When confronted or even noticed, they usually retreat to fortresses existing entirely in their imaginations. They feed on isolation. Peculiar among the animals, which tend to have clearly defined mating rituals, the Virgenyan Least Loon has instead a series of uncoordinated and spastic stances that, far from promoting the continuance of its kind, tend it more quickly toward extinction.
Its characteristic…
“STEPHEN,” Pale said. “Are you there?”
“Yes,” he said. “Sorry.”
“Your eyes had gone glassy, and the way down is steep. Shall I take your hand again?”
“Ah, no, thank you. I think I can manage.”
He concentrated now on the narrow trail. Earlier a cloud had come along and engulfed them, an odd experience for a boy from the low country. Now they were descending out of it into a small upland valley.
Roughly rectangular sheep pens came into view, built of piled stone. They attested to the local livelihood, as did the sheep themselves. A crooked line of smoke drifted up from the only obvious human habitation, a sod-roofed dwelling with a couple of small outbuildings.
“What’s that smell?” Stephen asked, wrinkling his nose.
“Oh, you’d better get used to that,” she said.
The shepherd was a young man with black hair, dark eyes, and long, lean limbs. He regarded Stephen with undisguised suspicion and Sister Pale with delight, clapping her in a tight hug and kissing her cheek. Stephen found he didn’t care for that at all.
He liked it even less when they started speaking in a language quite unfamiliar to him. It wasn’t the fractured dialect of Almannish he’d heard back in Demsted or likely any related language. He thought it was probably a Vhilatautan dialect, but he’d experienced those only as written languages, never spoken, and this was much changed from the millennia-old tongues he’d studied.
For the first time he found himself more annoyed than intrigued by an encounter with a speech unknown to him. What were they talking about, those two? Why was she laughing? And what was that peculiar, perhaps disdainful look the fellow was giving him?
After what seemed like far too much of that, the man finally offered Stephen his hand.
“I am Pernho,” he said. “I help you and Zemlé. Can count on me. Ah, you going where?”
Stephen stole a glance at Pale—Zemlé? In their haste to escape it was a question they had never touched upon. He tried to keep his face neutral, but clearly he wasn’t good at that sort of thing because she caught his suspicion immediately.
“I already know it’s north,” she said. “Everyone knows that. But now you have to choose: northeast, northwest, or whatever.” She nodded toward Pernho. “If you trust me, you have to trust him.”
“Yes, that’s the problem, isn’t it?” Stephen said.
Sister Pale shrugged and lifted her hands as a sign of surrender.
Stephen rolled his eyes.
“Clearly I have no choice,” he continued. With Ehan and Henne, he might have found his way across this tumult of mountains, but without them it seemed impossible.
“I love a confident man,” Sister Pale said wryly. “So where are we off to?”
“A mountain,” Stephen said. “I don’t know what it’s called now. ‘Velnoiragana’ was its name two thousand years ago. I think now it might be known as ‘eslief vendve,’ or ‘Slivendy.’ ”
“Xal Slevendy,” Pernho mused. “But we also call it Ranhan, ‘The Horn.’ That’s not so far, as the eagle goes. But way is—” He frowned and made a twisting motion with his hands. “Nhredhe. No horses. You’ll need kalboks.”
“Kalboks?” Stephen asked.
“You asked about the smell,” Sister Pale said. “You’re about to find out what makes it.”
Kalbok: As unlikely as any creature in a child’s bestiary, the kalbok seems kindred to the sheep or goat, having the same lens-shaped horizontal pupils, back-curving horns, and general woolly appearance. It stands, however, at the shoulder the size of a small horse and is muscled like one, creating an oddly massive appearance that is, however, balanced on legs that seem by comparison rather flimsy.
The inhabitants of the Bairghs favor them over horses for mountain routes, owing to their native nimbleness on rocks and steep trails. They will take a saddle or pack, although with a reluctance and lack of grace even a mule would find excessive. And it has one other inescapable, distinguishing trait.
Kalbok: A walking stench.
“I’ve never heard of people riding goats,” Stephen muttered.
“I imagine there are many things you’ve never heard of,” Pale suggested.
“I’m going to vomit again,” Stephen said.
“They don’t smell that bad,” Sister Pale replied.
“I’ve no idea what you would consider foul-smelling, but I never want to meet it,” Stephen said, fighting down his urge. “Doesn’t your friend ever wash these things? Or at least comb the maggots out of their fur?”
“Wash a kalbok? What a strange idea,” Sister Pale mused. “I can hardly wait for the next thing you’ll think of to improve life for us simple mountain folk.”
“Now that you mention it, I have some ideas for improving your roads,” Stephen said.
In fact, his nausea was only by about half due to the scent of kalbok; the rest came from its gait across what even Aspar White couldn’t possibly refer to as a road. Even calling it a trail was akin to confusing a mud hut with a palace. Their route dipped and turned along the lips of gorges and up promontories that seemed to be held in place only by the roots of straggling, half-dead junipers. Even the dogs took extra care in placing each step.
“Well,” Sister Pale said, “be sure and submit your suggestions to Praifec Hespero when we see him again. As a sacritor, he has some sway in these matters.”
“I will,” Stephen said. “I’ll distract him with a detailed proposition while his men are spiking us to trees.” A sudden worry occurred. “Your friend. If Hespero is following us—”
“Pernho won’t be there when they arrive. Don’t worry about him.”
“Good.” He closed his eyes and instantly regretted it because it only made him dizzier. With a sigh, he opened them again.
“He called you something,” he said then. “Zemlé.”
“Zemlé, yes. It’s my birth name.”
“What does it mean?”
“It’s our name for Saint Cer,” she explained.
“And the tongue you were speaking?”
“Xalma, we call it.”
“I should like to learn it.”
“Why? It isn’t widely spoken. If you want to get along in the mountains, better that you learn Meel.”
“I can learn both,” Stephen said, “if you’ll teach me. It should help us pass the time.”
“Very well. Which first?”
“Your language. Xalma.”
“So. Then I know just how to start the lesson.” She touched her hand to her breastbone. “Nhen,” she said. Then she pointed to him. “Wir. Ash esme nhen, Ju esh wir. Pernho est wir. Ju be Pernho este abe wiré…”
The lesson continued for the rest of the day as the kalboks climbed steadily higher, first through rocky pasture and then, as they crossed the snow line, into a dark evergreen forest.
Before evening the forest had given way to a desolate, ice-crusted heath where nothing grew at all, and Sister Pale’s words came muffled through her scarf.
Stephen’s paida and weather cloak were back in Demsted, and he was thankful for the ankle-length quilted robe and heavy felt jerkin Pernho had provided him. The cone-shaped hat he was less certain about—he felt he looked silly in it—but at least it kept his ears warm.
Clouds sat on them for most of the journey, but as the sun was setting, the air cleared, and Stephen peered awestruck at the giants of ice and snow marching off toward every horizon. He felt tiny and titan all at once and intensely grateful to be alive.
“What’s wrong?” Pale asked, studying his face.
Stephen didn’t understand the question until he realized that he was weeping.
“I suppose you’re used to this,” he said.
“Ah,” she replied. “Used to it, yes. But it never loses its beauty.”
“I don’t see how it could.”
“Look there,” she said, pointing back. After a moment he thought he saw movement, like a line of black ants against the white.
