by Holden, Ryan
After a few hours of steady progress he diverged from his upward windings to drink at a nearby stream. Removing his boots he washed his feet: dirt and what little weariness the morning jaunt had accumulated flowed away. He sank into the springy heather near the water and drank his full. Spinning around he lay on his back and looked at the clouds for a moment. No rain to fear today, he thought. He got to his feet, grabbed his boots, and found his way back to the path.
Darkness was descending when he came in sight of the cabin. His pace quickened towards the light streaming out of the solitary window. Voice inside arrested his approach.
“I won't have it,” his father declared.
“Please, please think about,” his mother asked.
Devlin's boots thumped around the cabin. “I have thought about it.”
“Sit down, my love. Hush, sit.” A chair scraped against the floor planks. “You've thought about it, and I've thought about it. But we haven't thought about it together. Talk to me.”
“I told you: I won't have it. I believe one of your gentleman wouldn't force you to sell it or keep it against your will. It would be a point of honor like their”—here Devlin laughed—“like their silly dresses.”
Who was, who were his mother's gentlemen?
After a slight silence he finished. “But I'm not one of your gentleman.”
“I know. You must know, my love, that I don't mind. Really and truly. I walked away from that.”
“That's what I used to think. But over the last year I'm not so sure.”
“What? Why?” she asked.
“I've seen how you look at your son. As if you and he aren't here, are somewhere far off. Besides, I would think you'd want to keep it, with how much time you spend twisting it around your finger and touching it.”
“Our son, Devlin,” she chided gently. “He's more important than any ring.”
Brian heard nothing for what seemed like several minutes. He realized he'd been holding his breath and forced himself to slowly exhale, hoping they wouldn't hear them.
“Our son? The one you have great plans for? That you tell stories to every night about your home you don't miss?” The chair scraped the floor and fell over as boots stomped.
“You mock my love, Devlin. It is 'our son' that I would give it up for, to keep him from hunger and cold. The kardja have kept him and us for many a cold winter. But what now? They have gone the path of all living. Is it not fit that now, since your treasure lies scattered across the mountainside, mine should depart from me too for the sake of our son?” Ramona wept.
Brian sat there, trying to regulate his breathing. The image of his mother's ring kept flashing across his mind's eye—a simple silver band with a single stone. He imagined what she looked like now: eyes red with weeping, as when his sister died.
“You're right, I'm sorry, love. That was cruel of me.” His voice sank and Brian could barely catch the words. “You must understand all will change. This is not the end. We will survive, we will find a way. If you sell it the home you wish for here but a breath, a word, from...” Brian heard the murmur continue but no more words. A horrible feeling, cold as darkness, clutched him in the stomach.
“I know,” she said.
Suddenly he feared that, conversation over, one of them would move to the door and find him. He crept away and stood for a while in the fading dusk, looking down upon the familiar cabin as if he had never seen it before.
Some distance away a man with a bright eye strode into the tavern. Despite the promising windows he'd seen from the road the inside felt darker than the unlit landscape. He made his way over to the bar and dropped onto a stool. He sat there, staring at his hands as they clenched in front of him.
The bartender came over with a half-washed flagon in his hands. He whipped a towel that was once white about it. He slammed the flagon in front of the bright-eyed man.
“What'll you have?” he asked.
“Peace,” the man said.
“That's not sold here. What'll you be drinking?”
The man looked up from his hands. The bartender noticed a red scar from his left temple to his earlobe. “Ale.”
“Ale it is.” The bartender snapped the towel and set it aside. He grabbed a pitcher and walked down a few paces to the tap. Filling it up he poured the first pint and set it down.
The man placed his hands gingerly upon the mug, overcoming his distaste for this backwater outrage. He looked round him. Another man sat at the end of the bar, back against the wall and hat down over his face. Awake, asleep, dead—he couldn't tell nor did he care.
Three, four tables behind him, none full. The foul odor of unwashed peasant wafted over him from the closest one. He didn't want to guess what combination of animals caused that. Ducking his nose to his glass he hid in the brew as he tried a sip.
Not bad. He took a long draught.
A woman's shrill voice sounded above the general murmur. “I always knew. It was bound to happen sooner or later.”
He drank again. Too bad it didn't block the noise. He sat there looking at the pint in his hands, over so fast. He picked it up and looked at it, tested its weight. No, it was the usual size. No false bottom nor extra thick walls—not that he hadn't seen those before. There was that innkeeper run out and nearly hanged a few years back: the most excitement he'd seen in years. Must be the brew.
“Another,” he said. The bartender set down some dishes opposite then returned for another pour.
Hurry up, the man thought. He was getting tired of the patronizing babble of the shrill woman. Must every jealous woman ruin the tavern over the same old story? He loved her, married her, she bore his kids and nursed him and then—the only interesting part was a quick lexicon on local cursing that was usually inserted about now—“she” came into town, or from the next village, or grew up and stole him from her.
Once he'd heard the whole story told so passionately he asked the bartender to fill in some details. The sort women never thought important to add in. “Really?” he had said, “that woman has it bad,” to conclude the conversation. The bartender guffawed. “She ain't the wife,” he laughed some more, “the wife's a neighbor of one of her cousins.” Since then he never bothered listening.
He asked for his third drink. This woman's raspy voice still broke in on his thoughts as he heard “thieving scoundrels,” “fraud,” “diabolical woman.” He opened his eyes, though, at the next.
He slowly turned on his stool. The woman was gulping at her pint in one of the few interruptions of her harangue. She soon recommenced. “Why she had to choose our village, in the name of all that's holy! Comes from away west and has brought her devil's craft with her.”
“What craft is that, being a mite more to men's liking than yourself?” he broke in. The men around the lady jeered. He allowed a smile to cross his face.
“Aye, that's all the craft you fools have wit to see. Can't hold two thoughts together in your head,” she said. Her words acquired strength and speed at jest. “But she wasn't just that. She charmed men, yes, but devils too. I've said it before and I'll say it again, she's a witch with a heart as black as her hair.”
“You don't say,” he said.
“Have you not heard a thing I've said all night?”
“Evil woman, fool of a man, your broken heart—was that all? Or did I miss the excruciating bit about how she let you think you had him for a while before shoving you into the dirt?”
“Nothing, he heard nothing!” she exclaimed. “No fool but her own fool. No, any decent woman would just steal your husband. This foul fiend went after our children. She was always going about with strange leaves and roots and bits of bark and evil-smelling drinks and forcing it down our throats. Clever too, always had some story about what had gone wrong, how she was the one healing it. But I knew all along, even before the Pestilence.”
Everyone stopped their murmurings, even the far table grew quiet.
“The pestilence?” the man asked.
“You a foreigner too? Who around these parts has not heard of it, nay lived through that withering fog of death?”
“Hear, hear,” some strangely dressed men called over from the next table, glad to be included with the locals.
She glared at them and they set their drinks back down.
“Disease, sickness, death, what's special about that? Golly, if every village” he laughed into his cup “called their own outbreak a 'Pestilence' we'd have scores to keep track of.”
“Listen, you fool,” the woman stood up. “My children—everyone fell sick, all in a day or so. This woman, running about with her filthy hands, touching them all but mine. This wasn't any ordinary sickness, and I can tell you why. The only one to die was the witch's daughter. Her spells broke, heavens be praised, and not a single victim but one of her evil brood.”
“Interesting,” the man allowed.
“Aye, that's not the half of it. The mountain itself has now rejected her, washed her off of its side just this past week. Destroyed all her family's property.”
“Aye, really?”
“Yes, saw the boy wandering through Darach myself.”
Three
Brian turned away from the cabin and walked fast to nowhere in particular. Ramona's gentlemen. Her home. Her ring. A change. Her stories—he had always thought those were made up, or of many years ago. Some weren't.
His spine tingled.
Why was the ring so important? What troubles could it unleash? His mother had always treated it with special care, putting it away when washing or cooking or grubbing about in the herb garden outside.
It wasn't like she hid it, though—she'd wear it often when the day's work was over. In fact it was while she was wearing it that he heard most of her stories. He remembered her expression wax and wane with the story, arms painting the scene before him.
Her arms intrigued him. They were smooth skinned without scars and brimmed with life. He always liked finding her freckles, the ones that had a few hairs extra long and as dark as night. He wondered why it wasn't the same on both sides. Maybe they're like dimples, not always matching. His arms had them, too.
Another evidence of how he took after his mother and not his father. Would all his thoughts of them be so poisoned? He tried to think of something else.
One of her favorite stories was the tale of Artemis and Selene. Artemis grew up a slave though she knew it not, as did her best friend Selene. They had a happy childhood, never noticing the dark shadow that ofttimes would cross their parents' faces. They were trained in many arts—history, literature, dance, embroidery, and horsemanship.
Then came the summer of their sixteenth birthdays. Many girls wish for a horse as a present, his mother would say, but on this birthday theirs were taken away. Of course, they were never theirs to begin with, just favorites at the town stables.
At first the groom had laughed at their eagerness to learn to ride, then smiled as they dreamed aloud of the day when they would ride off together on some grand adventure. On their birthday they lost this dream. The groom would not even look at them, though he let the younger girls in.
Two nights later at the second watch Artemis's brother Apollo woke her. “Up, sister, and quiet.”.
“What is it?” she asked, instantly awake.
“Dress warmly and come with me. Hurry.”
The two children walked outside, arm in arm. Apollo carried a bag over his shoulder. “Where are you taking me?” she finally asked as they walked out the back door. He said nothing until they melted under a close cluster of trees whose shadow shut out all moonlight and starlight.
“We must leave. Tonight. Men are coming for you. Unless we go now we may never see each other again.”
“What?” Her heart sank.
“We are no longer children. Though it feels improper to speak of such things, I must. You have been trained up for one purpose. Trained to be knowledgeable, witty, courteous, dextrous. Given a measure of wealth that you might remain beautiful, not worn out by outdoor work. Horses to develop a strong body withstanding fatigue, and for you to accompany someone on his journeys. Does that not suggest something to you, sister?”
She pushed him away. “It's not true. It can't be.”
“Who do you think pays for it? Mother, father? Have you seen how you dress compared to them? How your speech differs? You don't talk like us.”
Her knees failed her and he caught her up. “Do not fear. That much will help you: we must make use of your training tonight.”
“How do you know? Why hasn't father told me?”
“I heard the soldiers talking. Laughing about picking up the master's pretty property for him, sounds like there are more than one. I will explain all later. I swear to you, sister, I will not let them make you into a courtesan.”
She shuddered at the title and suffered herself to be led deeper into the forest. “Wait.”
“There's no time. By daylight we will be found out.”
“But Selene!”
She persuaded him to take her, too. And so the three of them began a long journey of which songs were still being written. The tale of Artemis ended well, but not so for Selene. She was a woman cast off by her first love and exiled.
Was that why his mother loved Selene? The same sorrows. He shuddered—was his mother a courtesan? Was he some gentleman's offspring, one who had treated her like a decoration, a slave, a plaything?
Brian wandered over to the kardja behind the cabin. He only counted six necks in the starlight, furry poles sticking up from the likewise furry logs. So few. Several moved or snuffled at his presence but he was too familiar to cause alarm. He walked to the nearest one and knelt in front of it.
“Hey Kerry, wish I was like you.” He stroked her glossy neck, burying his hand in the full winter coat. “Do you remember the others? Do you weep for them? Miss them?”
“What do you think about? What today feels like, or the green grass between your teeth, or the wind on your back? You don't remember your mother Myra, I know, not since she bore your younger brother. Or half-brother. Or she pretends not to know you and you pretend back.”
“Is it that way among kardja?” Brian sat next to her woolly back and lay against it. “I've lived with you my whole life and I barely even know you. Do you know who your father is? Or is it just male and female, adult and young?”
“You lucky creature. You don't have one male take over the herd. There are no males strong enough to mate you against your desire. There's enough grass for everyone. You don't fight over yours, or harvest it and keep ten year's worth so all the others do as you wish.”
Brian lay his face against the broad back. It was the best pillow. Kerry's warmth seeped into his frame and he slowly relaxed, the strain of the day slowly draining into the wicking wind.
“Whoa. What brings you here?” The man pulled on the reins and his horse slowed to a walk. The cart he sat on creaked to a stop. It held three bales of cloth on top and who knows what tucked away inside.
The bright-eyed man clicked his tongue at his horse and drew up alongside the merchant. “Same as brought you, I expect,” he said. He put up his feet on the front rails of his own cart and leaned back. “Not much left at the end of this road, should be no mystery.”
“No mystery indeed. I should warn you though, there's no coin in Darach.” The merchant looked at his present companion with a question in his eye. In turn he looked over the gray horse hitched to the cart then to the rather empty cart itself.
“No coin? That's a pity,” the bright-eyed man said. “I see you beat me to the town and swindled them of it.”
“Not at all, though that would have been a grand reason. The fools are as poor and proud as you wouldn't believe, the only thing they do have of value is their kardja and it's not season yet.”
“Kardja? I haven't heard that before. Some strange plant?”
“No, an animal. As if the infernal offspring of a horse and a sheep came to life.” He laughed at the other man's loo
k. “But there's no denying the wool's value. Only reason any of us bother with Darach. You're not from around here, are you? What's your name?” the merchant asked.
“Paris,” the bright-eyed man said. “I wander around, seeking new places. Can't seem to hold to the same towns again and again, gets a little boring. Sounds like this kardja might be just what I'm looking for.”
“Or too exciting, perhaps?” the merchant chuckled.
“What do you imply?” Paris asked with ice in his voice.
“Don't mind me. From the looks of things law will soon be a matter of, shall I say, persuasion this far out. I'm not one to judge how you do your business,” the merchant offered his best frank countenance, the one that went with his market price pitches. “I go by Neal.”
“Quite so. I am of the same persuasion. Good day to you.” Setting his feet back down Paris clucked at his horse and moved on up the hill.
Neal yelled back at him, “I told you, there's nothing there!” and went on his way laughing.
Paris, not caring at all what Neal thought, followed the fresh cart ruts as they wound up the hill. Such a little man, seeing no coin when, if the fates were with him, there might be a philosopher's stone. He stopped himself. No, it was too soon. He had a clue, and a good one at that, but it wouldn't do to celebrate early. He slapped the reins on his horse's back. “Giddyap,” he called. His face broke into a smile.
A few hours later he arrive in Darach. After a half-hearted attempt to generate business—he had to look under his cart's cover several times to remember what he was trying to sell, and once caught himself promoting rope of which he had none—he glanced back at the extent of the small town. Seeing neither inn nor tavern he moved off to the forest's edge and made camp.
