Beneath their ledge, in the narrow pass between Dettcrag and Mount Thurfos, the army of the Dark Servants was passing. They were nearly as silent as the two who watched them; only a creak of snow, the occasional crack of a broken branch, or the faint jingling of armor or harness betrayed them. She marveled at the discipline their silent passage revealed; marveled, and feared. How could the tiny outpost of the Border Guard that lay to the south of them ever hope to make a stand against these warriors who were also magicians? Bad enough that they were outnumbered a hundred to one—these were no simple barbarians coming against the forces of Valdemar this time, who could be defeated by their own refusal to acknowledge any one of their own as overall leader. No, these fighters bowed to an iron-willed leader the equal of any in Valdemar, and their ranks held only the trained and seasoned.
She started as Vanyel’s hand lightly touched the back of her neck, and came out of her half-trance. He tugged slightly at her sleeve; she backed carefully out of the thicket, obedient to his signal.
“Now what?” she whispered, when they were safely around the ledge with the bulk of a stone outcropping between them and the Dark Servants.
“One of us has to alert the King, while the other holds them off at the other end of the pass—”
“With what army?” she asked, fear making her voice sharp with sarcasm.
“You forget, little sister—I need no army—” the sudden flare of light from Vanyel’s outstretched hand illuminated his ironic smile, and bathed his white uniform in an eerie blue wash for one moment. She shuddered; his saturnine features had always looked faintly sinister to her, and in the blue light his face had looked demonic. Vanyel held a morbid fascination for her—dangerous, the man was; not like his gentle lifemate, Bard Stefen. Possibly the last—and some said the best—of the Herald-mages. The Servants of Darkness had destroyed the others, one by one. Only Vanyel had been strong enough to withstand their united powers. She who had little magic in her soul could almost feel the strength of his even when he wasn’t exerting it.
“Between us, my Companion and I are a match for any thousand of their witch-masters,” he continued arrogantly. “Besides—at the far end of the pass there isn’t room for more than three to walk side by side. We can hold them there easily. And I want Stefen well out of this; Yfandes couldn’t carry us double, but you’re light enough that Evalie could easily manage both of you.”
She bowed her head, yielding to his reasoning. “I can’t like it—”
“I know, little sister—but you have precious little magic, while Evalie does have speed. The sooner you go, the sooner you’ll have help here for me.”
“Vanyel—” she touched his gloved hand with one fur mitten. “Be—be safe—” She suddenly feared more for him than for herself. He had looked so fey when the King had placed this mission in their hands—tike a man who has seen his awn death.
“As safe as may be, little sister. I swear to you, I will risk nothing I am not forced to.”
A heartbeat later she was firmly in the saddle, Evalie galloping beneath her like a blizzard wind in horse-shape. Behind her she could feel Bard Stefen clinging to her waist, and was conscious of a moment of pity for him—to him, Evalie was strange, he could not move with her, only cling awkwardly; while she felt almost as one with the Companion, touched with a magic only another Herald could share.
Their speed was reckless; breakneck. Skeletal tree-limbs reached hungrily for them, trying to seize them as they passed and pull them from Evalie’s back. Always the Companion avoided them, writhing away from the claw-like branches like a ferret.
“The Dark Servants—” Stefen shouted in her ear “—they must know someone’s gone for help. They’re animating the trees against us!”
She realized, as Evalie escaped yet another trap set for them, that Stefen was right—-the trees were indeed moving with a will of their own, and not just random waving in the wind. They reached out, hungrily, angrily; she felt the hot breath of dark magic on the back of her neck, like the noisome breath of a carrion-eater. Evalie’s eyes were wide with more than fear; she knew the Companion felt the dark power, too.
She urged Evalie on; the Companion responded with new speed, sweat breaking out on her neck and flanks to freeze almost immediately. The trees seemed to thrash with anger and frustration as they eluded the last of them and broke out on the bank above the road.
The road to the capital lay straight and open before them now, and Evalie leaped over a fallen forest giant to gain the surface of it with a neigh of triumph ....
Talia blinked, emerging abruptly from the spell her book had laid on her. She had been lost in the daydream her tale had conjured for her, but the dream was now lost beyond recall. Someone was calling her name in the distance. She looked up quickly, with a toss of her head that threw her unmanageable hair out of her eyes. Near the door of the family house she could make out the angular figure of Keldar Firstwife, dark-clad and rigid, like a stiff fire iron propped against the building. Keldar’s fists were on her hips; her stern carriage suggested that she was waiting Talia’s response with very little patience.
Talia sighed regretfully, put up her wool and the wire brushes, and closed the worn little cloth-bound volume, laying aside the rocks she’d used to hold down the pages as she’d worked. Though she’d carefully marked the place, she knew that even without the precious scrap of ribbon she used to mark it she’d have no trouble finding it again. Keldar couldn’t have picked a worse time; Herald Vanyel was alone, surrounded by the Servants of Darkness, and no one knew his peril but his Companion and Bard Stefen. Knowing Keldar, it would be hours before she could return to the tale—perhaps not even until tomorrow. Keldar was adept at finding ways to keep Talia from even the little reading she was grudgingly allowed.
Nevertheless, Keldar was Firstwife; her voice ruled the Steading, to be obeyed in all things, or suffer punishment for disobedience. Talia responded to the summons as dutifully as she could. She put the little book carefully away in the covered basket that held carded and uncarded wool and her spindle. The peddler who had given it to her last week had assured her many times that it was worthless to him, but it was still precious to her as one of the three books she owned and (more importantly) the only one she’d never read before. For an hour this afternoon she’d been transported to the outside world of Heralds and Companions, of high adventure and magic. Returning to the ordinary world of chores and Keldar’s sour face was a distinct letdown. She schooled her expression with care, hoping none of her discontent showed, and trudged dully up the path that led to the Steading, carrying her basket in one hand.
But she had the sinking feeling as she watched the Firstwife’s hardening expression that her best efforts were not enough to mislead Keldar.
Keldar noted the signs of rebellion Talia displayed despite her obvious effort to hide them. The signs were plain enough for anyone with the Firstwife’s experience in dealing with littles; the slightly dragging feet, the sullen eyes. Her mouth tightened imperceptibly. Thirteen years old, and still fighting the yoke the gods had decreed for her shoulders! Well, that would change—and soon. Soon enough there would be no more time for foolish tales and wasted time.
“Stop scowling, child!” Keldar snapped, her thin lips taut with scorn, “You’re not being summoned for a beating!”
Not that she hadn’t warranted a beating to correct her attitude in the past. Those beatings had done precious little good, and had drawn the feeble protests of her Husband’s Mother—but it was the will of the gods that children obey, and if it took beating to drive them into obedience, then one would beat them with as heavy a hand as required, and pray that this time the lesson was learned.
It was possible that she, Keldar, had not possessed a hand heavy enough. Well, if that were indeed the case, that situation would be corrected soon as well.
She watched the child trudge unwillingly up the path, her feet kicking up little puffs of dust. Keldar was well aware that her attitude whe
re Talia was concerned was of a harshness that bordered on the unfair. Still, the child drove her out of all patience. Who would ever have imagined that so placid and bovine a creature as Bessa could have produced a little scrap of mischief like this? The child was like a wild thing sometimes, intractable, and untamable—how could Bessa have dared to birth such a misfit? And who would have thought that she’d have had the poor taste to die of the birthing and leave the rearing of her little to the rest of the Wives?
Talia was so unlike her birth-mother that Keldar was perforce reminded of the stories of changelings. And the child had been born on Midsummer’s Eve, a time long noted for arcane connections—she as little resembled the strong, tall, blond man who was her father as her plump, fair, deceased mother—
But no. That was superstition, and superstition had no place in the lives of Holderkin. It was only that she had double the usual share of stubbornness. Even the most stubborn of saplings could be bent Or broken.
And if Keldar lacked the necessary tools to accomplish the breaking and bending, there were others among the Holderkin who suffered no such lack.
“Get along, child!” she added, when Talia didn’t respond immediately, “Or do you think I need hurry your steps with a switch?”
“Yes ma’am. I mean, no ma’am!” Talia replied in as neutral a voice as she could manage. She tried to smooth her expression into one more pleasing to her elder, even as she smoothed the front of her tunic with a sweaty, nervous palm.
What am I being summoned for? she wondered apprehensively. In her experience summonings had rarely meant anything good.
“Well, go in, go in! Don’t keep me standing here in the doorway all afternoon!” Keldar’s cold face gave no clue as to what was in store. Everything about Keldar, from her tightly wrapped and braided hair to the exact set of her apron, gave an impression of one in total control. She was everything a Firstwife should be—and frequently pointed this out. Talia was always intimidated by her presence, and always felt she looked hoydenish and disheveled, no matter how carefully she’d prepared herself for confrontations.
In her haste to edge past the authoritative figure of the Firstwife in the doorway, Talia stumbled a little on the lintel. Keldar made a derogatory noise in the back of her throat, and Talia felt herself flush. Somehow there was that about Keldar that never failed to put her at her faultiest and clumsiest. She regathered what little composure she had and slipped inside and into the hall. The windowless entryway was very dark; she would have paused to let her eyes adjust except for the forbidding presence of Keldar hard on her heels.
She felt her way down the worn, wooden floor hoping not to trip again. Then, as she entered the commonroom and she could see again in the light that came from its three windows, her mouth suddenly dried with fear; for all of her Father’s Wives were waiting there, assembled around the rough-hewn wooden table that served them all at meals. And all of them were staring at her. Eight pairs of blue and brown eyes held her transfixed like a bird surrounded by hungry cats. Eight flat, expressionless faces had turned to point in her direction.
She thought at once of all her failings of the last month or so, from her failure to remember her kitchen duties yesterday to the disaster with the little she was supposed to have been watching who’d gotten into the goat pen. There were half a hundred things they might call her to account for, but none of them were bad enough to call for an assemblage of all the Wives; at least, she didn’t think they were!
Unless—she started guiltily at the thought—unless they’d somehow found out she’d been sneaking into Father’s library to read when there was a full moon—light enough to read without a betraying candle. Father’s books were mostly religious, but she’d found an old history or two that proved to be almost as good as her tales, and the temptation had been too much to resist. If they’d found that out—
It might mean a beating every day for a week and a month of “exile”—being locked in a closet at night, and isolated by day, with no one allowed to speak to her or acknowledge her presence in any way, except Keldar, who would assign her chores. That had happened twice already this year. Talia began to tremble. She wasn’t sure she could bear a third time.
Keldar took her place at the head of the table, and her next words drove all thought of that out of Talia’s head. “Well, child,” she said, scowling, “You’re thirteen today.”
Talia felt almost giddy with relief. Just her Birthing Day? Was that all it was? She took an easier breath, and stood before the assemblage of nine Wives, much calmer mow. She kept her hands clasped properly before her, eyes cast down. She studied the basket at her sturdily-shod feet, prepared to listen with all due respect to the lecture about her growing responsibilities that they’d delivered to her every Birthing Day she could remember. After they were sure that she’d absorbed all their collective wisdom on the subject, they’d let her get back to her wool (and not so incidentally, her tale).
But what Keldar had to say next scattered every speck of calm she’d regained to the four winds.
“Yes, thirteen,” Keldar repeated significantly, “And that is time to think of Marriage.”
Talia blanched, feeling as if her heart had stopped. Marriage? Oh, sweet Goddess no!
Keldar seemingly paid no heed to Talia’s reaction; a flicker of her eyes betrayed that she’d seen it, but she went callously on with her planned speech. “You’re not ready for it, of course, but no girl is. Your courses have been regular for more than a year now, you’re healthy and strong. There’s no reason why you couldn’t be a mother before the year is out It’s more than time you were in a Household as a Wife. Your Honored Father is dowering you with three whole fields, so your portion is quite respectable.”
Keldar’s faintly sour expression seemed to indicate that she felt Talia’s dower to be excessive. The hands clasping the edge of the table before her tightened as the other Wives murmured appreciation of their Husband’s generosity.
“Several Elders have already bespoken your Father about you, either as a Firstwife for one of their sons or as an Underwife for themselves. In spite of your unwomanly habits of reading and writing, we’ve trained you well. You can cook and clean, sew, weave and spin, and you’re trustworthy with the littlest littles. You’re not up to managing a Household yet, but you won’t be called to do that for several years. Even if you go to a young man as his Firstwife, you’ll be living in your Husband’s Father’s Household. So you’re prepared enough to do your duty.”
Keldar seemed to feel that she’d said all she needed to, and sat down, hands folded beneath her apron, back ramrod straight. Underwife Isrel waited for her nod of delegation, then took up the thread of the lecture on a daughter’s options.
Isrel was easily dominated by Keldar, and Talia had always considered her to be more than a little silly. The Underwife looked to Keldar with calf-like brown eyes for approval of everything she said—nor did she fail to do so now. She glanced at Keldar after every other word she spoke.
“There’s advantages to both, you know; being a Firstwife and being an Underwife, I mean. If you’re Firstwife, eventually your Husband will start his own Steading and Household, and you’ll be First in it. But if you’re an Underwife, you won’t have to ever make any decisions. And you’ll be in an established Household and Steading—you won’t have to scrimp and scant, there won’t be any hardships. You won’t have to worry about anything except the tasks you’re set and bearing your littles. We don’t want you to be unhappy, Talia. We want to give you the choice of the life you think you’re best suited for. Not the man of course,” she giggled nervously, “That would be unseemly, and besides you probably don’t know any of them anyway.”
“Isrel!” Keldar snapped, and Isrel shrank into herself a little. “That last remark was unseemly, and not suited to a girl’s ears! Now, child, which shall it be?”
Goddess! Talia wanted to die, to turn into a bird, to sink into the floor—anything but this! Trapped; she was trapped. They’d
Marry her off and she’d end up like Nada, beaten every night so that she had to wear high-necked tunics to hide the bruises. Or she’d die like her own mother, worn out with too many babies too quickly. Or even if the impossible happened, and her Husband was kind or too stupid to be a danger, her real life, the tales that were all that made living worthwhile, would all but disappear, for there would be no time for them in the never-ending round of pregnancy and a Wife’s duties—
Before she could stop herself, Talia blurted out, “I don’t want to be Married at all!”
The little rustlings and stirrings of a group of bored women suddenly ceased, and they became as still as a row of fenceposts, all with disbelief on their faces. Nine identical expressions of shock and dismay stared at Talia from the sides of the table. The silence closed down around her like the hand of doom.
“Talia, dear,” a soft voice spoke behind her, breaking the terrible silence, and Talia turned with relief to face Father’s Mother, who had been sitting unnoticed in the corner. She was one of the few people in Talia’s life who never seemed to think that everything she did was wrong. Her kind, faded blue eyes were the only ones in the room not full of accusation. The old woman smoothed one braid of cloud-white hair with age-spotted hands in unconscious habit, as she continued. “May the Mother forgive us, but we never thought to ask you. Have you a vocation? Has the Goddess Called you to her service?”
Talia had been hoping for a reprieve, but that, if anything, was worse. Talia thought with horror of the one glimpse she’d had of the Temple Cloisters, of the women there who spent their lives in prayer for the souls of the Holderkin. The utterly silent women, who went muffled from head to toe, forbidden to leave, forbidden to speak, forbidden—life!—had horrified her. It was a worse trap than Marriage; the very memory of the Cloisters made her feel as if she was being smothered.
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