by Tad Williams
“Can you cheat at this game?”
Aditu looked up from arranging her pieces. She was wearing one of Vorzheva’s loose dresses; the combination of her unusually modest attire and her unbound hair made her look a little less dangerously wild—in fact, it made her seem disconcertingly human. Her eyes gleamed in the light of the brazier. “Cheat? Do you mean lie? A game can be as deceptive as the players wish it to be.”
“That’s not what I mean. Can you do something on purpose that is against the rules?” She was eerily beautiful. He stared at her, remembering the night she had kissed him. What had that meant? Anything? Or was it just another way for Aditu to toy with her one-time lap-dog?
She considered his question. “I am not sure how to answer. Could you cheat against the way you are made and fly by flapping your arms?”
Simon shook his head. “A game that has so many rules must have some way to break them....”
Before Aditu could try again to answer, Jeremias burst into the tent, out of breath and agitated. “Simon!” he shouted, then drew up short, seeing that Aditu was there. “I’m sorry.” Despite his embarrassment, he was having trouble containing his excitement.
“What is it?”
“People have come!”
“Who? What people?” Simon looked briefly to Aditu, but she had returned to her study of the arrangement before her.
“Duke Isgrimnur and the princess!” Jeremias waved his arms up and down. “And there are others with them, too! A strange little man, sort of like Binabik and his trolls, but almost our size. And an old man—he’s taller than you, even. Simon, the whole town has gone down to see them!”
He sat for a moment in silence, his mind whirling. “The princess?” he said at last. “Princess ... Miriamele?”
“Yes, yes,” Jeremias panted. “Dressed as a monk, but she took off her hood and waved to people. Come on, Simon, everyone is going down to meet them.” He turned and took a few steps toward the doorway, then pivoted to look at his friend in astonishment. “Simon? What’s wrong? Don’t you want to go see the princess and Duke Isgrimnur and the brown man?”
“The princess.” He turned helplessly to Aditu, who gazed back at him with feline disinterest.
“It sounds like something you will enjoy, Seoman. We will play our game later.”
Simon stood and followed Jeremias out of the tent and into the hilltop wind, moving as slowly and unsteadily as a sleepwalker. As if he passed through a dream, he heard people shouting all around, a rising murmur of sound that filled his ears like the roar of the ocean.
Miriamele had come back.
21
Answered Prayers
It had grown steadily colder as Miriamele and her companions made their way across the wide grasslands. By the time they reached the seemingly endless plain of the Meadow Thrithing, there was snow on the ground, and even in full afternoon the sky remained a dull pewter stained with streaks of black cloud. Huddled in her traveling cloak against the predatory wind, Miriamele found herself almost grateful that Aspitis Preves had found them; it would have been a long and miserable journey indeed if they had been forced to make it on foot. Cold and uncomfortable as she was, however, Miriamele was also experiencing a curious sense of freedom. The earl had haunted her, but now, although he lived, and might still conceivably seek some kind of vengeance, she no longer feared him or anything he might do. But Cadrach’s flight was another thing altogether.
Since their escape together from the Eadne Cloud, she had begun to see the Hernystirman in a different way. He had betrayed her several times, certainly, but in his odd way he had semed to care for her as well. The monk’s own self-hatred had continued to loom between them—and had apparently driven him away at last—but her own feelings had changed.
She deeply regretted the argument over Tiamak’s parchment. Miriamele had thought she might slowly continue to draw him out, might somehow reach through to the man beneath—a man she liked. But, as though she had tried to tame a wild dog and had moved too quickly to pet it, Cadrach had startled and bolted. Miriamele could not rid herself of the obscure feeling that she had missed an opportunity that was more important than she could understand.
Even on horseback, it was a long journey. Her thoughts were not always good company.
They rode a full week to reach the Meadow Thrithing, traveling from first light until after the sun had vanished ... on those days that they saw the sun at all. The weather grew steadily colder, but remained something just short of unlivable: by mid-afternoon of most days the sun struggled through like a tired but determined messenger and chased away the chill.
The meadowlands were wide and, for the most part, flat and featureless as a carpet. What slope there was to the land was almost more depressing: after a long day’s ride up a gradual incline, Miriamele found it hard to rid herself of the idea that they would eventually reach a summit and that it would be somewhere. Instead, at some point they would cross a flat table of meadow no more interesting than the upward slope, then gradually find themselves moving down an equally uninspiring decline. Even the idea of having to make such a monotonous journey on foot was disheartening. Acre after empty acre, mile after trying mile, Miriamele whispered quiet prayers of gratitude for Aspitis’ unwitting gift of horses.
Riding on the saddle before her, Tiamak quickly recovered his strength. After some encouragement, the Wrannaman told her—and Isgrimnur, who was happy to have someone else share the burden of storytelling—more about his childhood in the marshes and his difficult year as an aspiring scholar in Perdruin. Although his natural reticence prevented him from dwelling on his ill-treatment, Miriamele thought she could feel every slight, every little cruelty that wound through his tale.
I’m not the first person to feel lonely, to feel misunderstood and unwanted. This seemingly obvious fact now struck her with the force of revelation. And I’m a princess, a privileged person-I’ve never been hungry, never been afraid that I would die unremembered, never been told that I wasn’t good enough to do something that I wished to do.
Listening to Tiamak, watching his wiry but somehow fragile form, his precise, scholarly gestures, Miriamele was dismayed by her own willful ignorance. How could she, with all her native good fortune, be so consumed with the few inconveniences that God or fate had put in her way? It was shameful.
She tried to tell Duke Isgrimnur something of her thoughts, but he would not let her slide too far into self-loathing.
“Each one of has our own sorrows, Princess,” he said. “It’s no shame to take them to heart. The only sin is to forget that other folk have theirs, too—or to let pity for yourself slow your hand when someone needs help.”
Isgrimnur, Miriamele was reminded, was more than just a gruff old soldier.
On their third night in the Meadow Thrithing, as the four sat close to their campfire—very close, since wood was scarce on the grasslands and the fire was a small one—Miriamele finally worked up the courage to ask Tiamak about his sack and its contents.
The Wrannaman was so embarrassed he could scarcely meet her eye. “It is terrible, Lady. I remember only a little, but in my fever I was certain that Cadrach meant to steal it from me.”
“Why would you think that? And what is it, anyway?”
After a moment’s consideration, Tiamak reached into his bag, drew out the leafy bundle, and peeled away the wrappings. “It was when you spoke of the monk and Nisses’ book,” he explained shyly. “I can believe now that it was innocent, since Morgenes also said something about Nisses in his message to me—but in the depth of my illness, I could only think that it meant my treasure was in danger.”
He handed her the parchment. As she unrolled it, Isgrimnur moved around the fire to look over her shoulder. Camaris, seemingly oblivious as always, stared out into the empty night.
“It’s some kind of song,” Isgrimnur said crossly, as though he had been expecting more.
“... ‘The manne who though blinded canne see’ ...” Miriamele
read. “What is it?”
“I am not sure myself,” Tiamak replied. “But look, it is signed ‘Nisses.’ I think it is part of his lost book, Du Svardenvyrd.”
Miriamele took a sudden breath. “Oh. But that’s the book Cadrach had—the one he sold off page by page.” She felt something squeeze in the pit of her stomach. “The book that Pryrates wanted. Where did you get this?”
“I bought it in Kwanitupul almost a year ago. It was part of a pile of scraps. The merchant could not have known it was worth anything, or else he never inspected what he had probably bought as scrap himself.”
“I don’t think Cadrach actually knew what you had,” said Miriamele. “But, Elysia, Mother of Mercy, how strange! Perhaps this is one of the pages that he sold!”
“He sold pages of Nisses’ book?” Tiamak asked. Outrage mingled with wonder. “How could that be?”
“Cadrach told me he was poor and desperate.” She weighed the idea of telling them the rest of the monk’s story, then decided she should consider the matter more carefully. They might not understand his actions. Even though he had fled, she felt the urge to protect Cadrach from those who did not know him as she did. “He had a different name then,” she offered, as though somehow it might absolve him. “He was called Padreic.”
“Padreic!” Now Tiamak was nothing short of astounded. “But I know that name! Can he be the same man? Doctor Morgenes knew him well!”
“Yes, he knew Morgenes. He has a strange history.”
Isgrimnur snorted, but now he, too, sounded a little defensive. “A strange history indeed, it seems.”
Miriamele hurried to change the subject. “Perhaps Josua will understand this,”
The duke shook his head. “I think Prince Josua, if we find him, will have other things to do than look at old parchments.”
“But it may be important.” Tiamak looked sideways at Isgrimnur. “As I said, Doctor Morgenes wrote in a letter to me that he thought these were the times that Nisses warned about. Morgenes was a man who knew many things hidden from the rest of us.”
Isgrimnur grunted and moved back to his own place in the fire-circle. “It’s beyond me. Well beyond me.”
Miriamele was watching Camaris, who was surveying the darkness as calmly and possessively as an owl poised to glide from a tree branch. “There are so many mysteries these days,” she said. “Won’t it be nice when things are simple again?”
There was a pause, then Isgrimnur laughed self-consciously. “I’d forgotten the monk was gone. I was waiting for him to say, ‘Things will never be simple again,’ or something like it.”
Miriamele smiled despite herself. “Yes, that’s just what he would have said.” She held her hands closer to the fire’s reassuring warmth and let out a sigh. “Just what he would have said.”
Days passed as they rode north. Snow thickened on the ground; the wind became an enemy. As the last leagues of the Meadow Thrithing disappeared behind them, Miriamele and the rest grew more and more downhearted.
“It’s hard to imagine Josua and the rest are having any luck in this weather.” Isgrimnur was almost shouting to be heard above the wind. “Things are worse now than when I came south.”
“If they are alive, that will be enough,” Miriamele said. “That will be a start.”
“But, Princess, we don’t really know where to look for them.” The duke was almost apologetic. “None of the rumors I heard said much more than that Josua was somewhere in the High Thrithing. There’s more than a hundred leagues of grassland up ahead, no more settled or civilized than this.” He waved his broad arm at the bleak, snowy expanses on either side. “We could hunt for months.”
“We will find him,” Miriamele said, and in her own heart she felt almost as certain as she sounded. Surely the things she had been through, the things she had learned, must be for something. “There are people who live on the Thrithings,” she added. “If Josua and the others have made themselves a settlement, the Thrithings-folk will know.”
Isgrimnur snorted. “The Thrithings-folk! Miriamele, I know them better than you may think. These are not town-dwellers. For one thing, they do not stay in one place, so we may not even find them. And we might be just as glad if we don’t. They are barbarians, just as likely to knock our heads off as offer us news of Josua.”
“I know you fought against the Thrithings-men,” Miriamele replied. “But that was long ago.” She shook her head. “And we have no choice that I can see, in any case. We will solve that when we come to it.”
The duke stared at her with a mixture of frustration and amusement on his face, then shrugged. “You are your father’s daughter.”
Strangely, Miriamele was not displeased by this remark, but she frowned anyway—as much to keep the duke in his place as anything. A moment later she laughed.
“What’s funny?” Isgrimnur asked suspiciously.
“Nothing, in truth. I was just thinking of all the times when I was with Binabik and Simon. Several times I had decided that within a few moments I would be dead—once when some terrible dogs almost got us, another time a giant, and men shooting arrows at us ...” She shook her hair from her eyes, but the maddening wind immediately flung it back. She tucked the offending strands back into her hood. “But now I don’t think that any more, no matter how dreadful things are. When Aspitis captured us, I never believed that he would truly manage to take me away. And if he had, I would have escaped.”
She slowed her horse for a moment, trying to put her thought into words. “You see, in truth it’s not funny at all. But it seems to me now that there are things happening that are beyond our strength. Like waves on the ocean, huge waves. I can fight them—and drown—or I can let them carry me, and swim just enough to keep my head above the water. I know I’m going to see Uncle Josua again. I just know. And Simon and Binabik and Vorzheva—there’s more to be done, that’s all.”
Isgrimnur looked at her warily, as though the little girl he had once knee-dandled had become a Nabbanai star-reader. “And then? When we’re all together again?”
Miriamele smiled at him, but it was only the bitter-sweet tip of a great sorrow that washed through her. “The wave will crash, dear old Uncle Isgrimnur ... and some of us will go down and never come up. I don’t know how it will be, of course not. But I’m not as frightened as I used to be.”
They were silent then, three horses and four riders fighting their way into the wind.
Only the amount of time they had been riding told them when they had crossed over into the High Thrithing: the snow-mantled meadows and hills were no more memorable than anything they had crossed in the first week of their journey. Strangely, though, the weather did not worsen as they continued to move northward. Miriamele even began to believe that it was growing a bit warmer, the wind a little less biting.
“A hopeful sign,” she said one afternoon when the sun actually appeared. “I told you, Isgrimnur. We’ll get there.”
“Wherever ‘there’ is, exactly,” the duke grumbled.
Tiamak stirred in the saddle. “Perhaps we should make our way to the river. If there are people still living in this place, they are most likely to be near moving water, where there might still be fish to catch.” He shook his head sadly. “I wish that what I remembered from my. dream was more precise.”
Isgrimnur pondered. “The Ymstrecca is just south of the great forest. But it runs most of the length of the Thrithings—a long way to go a-searching.”
“Is there not another river that crosses it?” Tiamak asked. “It has been long since I looked at a map.”
“There is. The Stefflod, if I remember rightly.” The duke frowned. “But it is little more than a large stream.”
“Still, in the places where rivers meet you often find villages,” Tiamak said with surprising assuredness. “So it is in the Wran, and in all the other places that I have heard of.”
Miriamele started to say something, but stopped, watching Camaris. The old man had ridden a little way off to the
side and was watching the sky. She followed his stare but saw only dingy clouds.
Isgrimnur was considering the Wrannaman’s idea. “P’raps you’re right, Tiamak. If we continue north, we can’t help but strike the Ymstrecca. But I think the Stefflod must be a little to the east.” He looked around as though seeking some landmark; his eyes stopped on Camaris. “What’s he looking at?”
“I don’t know,” Miriamele replied. “Oh. It must be those birds!”
A pair of dark shapes were swooping toward them out of the east, whirling like cinders caught in the draught of a fire.
“Ravens!” said Isgrimnur. “Gore crows!”
The birds wheeled in a circle above the travelers as if they had found what they had been seeking. Miriamele thought she could see their yellow eyes glint. The sensation of being watched, marked, was very strong. After a few more turns, the ravens dove, their feathers shining oily-black as they approached. Miriamele ducked her head and covered her eyes. The ravens flew past, shrieking; a moment later they banked upward and hurtled away. In moments, the birds were two dwindling , specks vanishing into the northern sky.
Only Camaris had not lowered his head. He watched their retreating forms with an absorbed, contemplative look.
“What are they?” Tiamak asked. “Are they dangerous?”
“Birds of ill omen,” the duke growled. “In my country,
we chase them with arrows. Carrion eaters.” He made a face.
“I think they were looking at us,” Miriamele said. “I think they wanted to know who we were.”
“That’s no way to talk.” Isgrimnur reached over and squeezed her arm. “And what would birds care who we were, anyway?”
Miriamele shook her head. “I don’t know. But that’s the feeling I have: someone wanted to know who we were—and now they do.”
