Arrow's Flight

by Mercedes Lackey

  Arrow's Flight

  least once before he got too far away for the sounds to carry to her. It was a measure of his own dejection that he didn't even have the spirit to swear.

  She set out herself, often having to detour around high drifts that she didn't dare try and climb. Her eyes ached from tears and snowglare, and she was as tired as she'd ever been in her life. She was grateful that she was lighter than Kris; the snow crust was holding beneath her without any such mishaps as he had had.

  The silence was eerie— frightening. As frightening in its way as the howl of the storm had been. Talia was shivering long before she reached her turnaround point, and not just from cold. There were no sounds of birds or animals, no indication that anything else lived and moved here besides herself. That horrible feeling of something watching might be gone, but there was still something uncanny about the Forest of Sorrows, something touched with the chill of death and the ice of despair. Whatever power held sway here, it was unsleeping and brooding; she knew it beyond doubt, and somehow knew she was feeling only the barest touch of its power—and she didn't really want to trust to the supposed protection of her Whites by venturing too far alone. She was more than relieved to find a half-buried crossroads sign; that meant she could plant her gaudy staff in the snowcrust at the peak of a drift and retrace her steps.

  She was never so glad to see another human being as she was to see Kris, picking his way across the snow, coming toward her.

  * * *

  Back in the Station, Talia surveyed what was left of their supplies. "They'd better come soon," she said, trying to keep doubt out of her voice. "Even if we're careful, we don't have much. It'll probably last for a week, but not much more."

  "If they're as worried as I think— as I hope— they'll be working around the clock, even by torchlight," Kris said, sheer exhaustion making his voice toneless. "It just can't be too much longer."

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  "They may not recognize us as Heralds at all," she replied, trying to joke a little. "I doubt they've ever seen Heralds looking so shabby. I've had to practically rub holes in my things to get them white again. Our appearance is hardly going to enhance the Heraldic image."

  She screwed her face up in imitation of an old man's grimace, and croaked; "Heralds? Yer be not Heralds! Yer be imposters, for certain sure!

  Gypsies! Scalawags! And where got ye them whitewashed nags, eh? Eh?"

  Kris just stared at her for a long moment, then suddenly began to laugh as helplessly as he'd wept earlier. Perhaps it was their weariness that made them as prone to near-hysterical hilarity as to tears. Talia began to giggle herself, then crow with laughter. They collapsed into their bed-nest together, legs too weak to stand up, and for a long time could hardly stop laughing long enough to breathe. No sooner would one of them get himself under control, and the other start to follow suit, when one look would set them both off again.

  "Enough— please—" Kris gasped at last.

  "Then don't keep looking at me," Talia replied, resolutely staring at a stain on her boots until she got her breath back.

  "Berrybay has a Resupply Station," Kris said, doing his best to maintain a serious subject. "We can get new uniforms there, and we can get our leathers bleached and re-treated. I'll warn you, though, the sizes will only be approximate."

  "Just so that the Whites are white and not gray, or full of holes."

  "I don't suppose you know enough sewing to alter what we get?" Kris asked wistfully. She could tell by his expression that his fastidious nature was mildly disturbed by the notion that he would be looking considerably less than immaculate in outsize uniforms.

  Talia raised an eyebrow in his direction. "My dear Herald, I'll have you know that by my third year at the Collegium I was making Whites. I may very well have made some of your wardrobe."

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  "Strange thought." He pulled off his boots, slowly. "It— it wasn't you playing tricks on my mind?"

  "No," she replied. "Not until you shouted at me."

  "Gods— I think I must be going mad."

  She was rubbing her white, cold feet, trying to restore circulation.

  "Don't— please— it's the isolation, the worry," she responded, with a clutching of fear in her chest. "Not enough rest, not enough food—"

  "Are making me see things? Are you seeing things?"

  "No," she admitted, "But— it seems like the forest is— watching. Almost all the time."

  Kris started. Talia saw him jump, and bit her lip.

  "It's nothing," he said. "Just— Tantris says you're right. He says the forest is watching us. Dammit— I thought it was you, doing things to me.

  Sorry."

  "Kris— I lost it again—" Tears stung her eyes.

  "Hey, not as bad as last time— and you got control back by yourself.

  Right?"

  "Sort of. Whatever it was— when I turned on you, it suddenly felt like it was going to do something to me if I touched you. That was when I got scared back into sense."

  "And you got control back. However it happened, you got control back.

  Don't give up on me, little bird. And don't give up on yourself, either."

  "I'll try," she said, a faint tremor in her voice. "I'll try."

  Leaden silence hung between them, until he took it upon himself to break it. "Jadus left you his harp, so I assume that you know how to play it, but I've never once heard you do so. Would you?"

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  "I'm nowhere near as good as you are," she protested.

  "Humor me," he insisted.

  "All right, but you may be sorry," she curled into the blankets to try and keep a little warmth in her legs and back and took the harp from him when he brought it from its corner.

  This was the first time she'd played in front of anyone but Jadus. The way the firelight caught the golden grain of the wood brought back those days with a poignant sadness. She rested her hands on the strings for a moment, then began playing the first thing that came to memory.

  * * *

  The song was "Sun and Shadow," and Kris was very much aware from the first few notes that she performed it quite differently than he did. Where he and Dirk emphasized the optimistic foreshadowing of the ultimate solution to the lovers' trials, and made the piece almost hopeful in spite of its somber quality, she wandered the lonely paths of the song's "present," where their respective curses seemed to be dooming the pair to live forever just out of one another's reach. She was correct in insisting that she wasn't as technically adept a player as Kris, but she played as she sang—with feeling, feeling that she made you hear. In her hands "Sun and Shadow" could tear your heart.

  The last notes hung in the air between them for long moments before he could clear his throat enough to say something.

  "I keep telling you," he managed at last, "that you underestimate yourself."

  "You're a remarkably uncritical audience," she replied. "Would you like her back, or shall I murder something else?"

  "I'd like you to play more, if you would."

  She shrugged, but secretly was rather pleased that he hadn't reclaimed My Lady. Her mood was melancholy, and it was possible to find solitude by losing herself in the music— solitude that it wasn't possible to create when he was playing or she was singing. She continued, closing her eyes and 216

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  letting her hands wander through whatever came to mind, sometimes singing, sometimes not. Kris listened quietly, without comment. The few times she looked up, his face was so shadowed that she couldn't read his expression. Eventually she ran out of music fitting her mood, and her hands fell from the harpstrings.

  "That's all I know," she said into the silence that followed.

  "Then that," he replied, taking the harp from her, "is enough for one night.

  I think it is more than time enough for bed."

  She had doubted she'd be able to sl
eep, but the moment she relaxed, she was lost to slumber.

  * * *

  Three days later the Station seemed to have shrunk around them and felt very confining, especially to Talia, who had always had a touch of claustrophobia. Her temper was shortened to near nonexistence... and she feared losing it. Greatly feared it. "Kris—" she said, when his pacing became too much for her to bear. "Will you go out? Will you please go somewhere?"

  He stopped in midstep, and turned to eye her with speculation. "Am I driving you out of patience?"

  "It's more than that. It's—"

  "That feeling of being watched. Is it back?"

  She sagged with relief. "You feel it, too?"

  "Not now. I did a little while back."

  "Am— I sending both of us mad?" She clenched her hands so hard that her nails left marks in her palms.

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  He sat on the floor at her feet, took her hands in his, and made her relax them. "I don't think so. If you'll remember, Tantris told me that the forest was watching us."

  "What is it?"

  "I only have a guess; it's Vanyel's Curse. It's made the whole forest aware somehow."

  "I don't think it likes me," she said, biting her lip.

  Kris had the "listening" look he wore when Tantris Mindspoke him.

  "Tantris says that he thinks it's disturbed by you; you're a Herald, but you're a danger to me, another Herald. It isn't sure what to do with you."

  "So as long as I stay in control, it will leave me alone..."

  "I would surmise." He rose to his feet. "And to keep you from losing control, I am going out."

  * * *

  Kris had decided to flounder his way down the road toward Waymeet, in hopes of meeting with a road crew. He entered the Station to have an entirely unexpected and mouthwatering aroma hit him full in the face. "I'm hallucinating," he said, half-afraid that once again he really was. "I'm smelling fresh meat cooking."

  "Pretty substantial hallucinations, then, since you're going to have them for supper," Talia replied, with a sober face. Then, unable to restrain herself, she jumped up from the hearth to throw her arms around him in a joyful hug. "Two squirrels and a rabbit, Kris! I got them all! And there'll be more— the fodder is attracting them! I didn't even lose or break any arrows!"

  "Bright Havens—" he said, sitting down with a thump, hardly daring to believe it.

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  There was no denying the stewed meat and broth Talia ladled out to him, however. They ate every scrap, the first fresh food they'd had in weeks, sucking the tiny bones dry, then celebrated with exuberant loving. They fell asleep with untroubled hearts for the first time in many days.

  * * *

  They were awakened the next morning very early; the chirras were stirring restlessly, and both Companions seemed to be listening to something. Rolan was overwhelmingly relieved and joyful, and Talia went deeper to find out why.

  "Tantris says—" Kris began.

  "There're people coming!" Talia finished excitedly. "Kris, it's the road crew!"

  "There's a Herald with them, too. Tantris thinks they'll reach us sometime after noon."

  "Have they reached our marker yet?"

  "Yes. The Herald had his Companion broadcast a Mindcall to ours when he found it. I might even have met them yesterday, if I hadn't gone in the wrong direction— idiot that I am!"

  "How were you to know? How many are there?"

  "Ten, not counting the Herald."

  "Should we go out and try to dig the path out farther to meet them?"

  "No," Kris said firmly. "The little we can do won't make much difference, and I'm still tired. We'll pack up, straighten things up here, and meet them where the path meets the road."

  * * *

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  It seemed strange to see the Station barren of their belongings, with only the empty containers that the supplies had been stored in to tell of their presence there this past month. It took longer than Talia had thought it would to repack everything; they did not leave the Station until almost noon.

  When they reached the road, they could see the newcomers in the far distance. They waved and shouted, and could tell by the agitated movements of the other figures that they'd been spotted. The work crew redoubled their efforts, and before too long— though not soon enough for Talia and Kris— the paths met.

  "Heralds Talia and Kris?" The white-clad figure that was first through the gap was unfamiliar to both of them, though his immaculate uniform made them uncomfortably conscious of the pitiful condition of their own.

  "Yes, Herald," Kris answered for both of them.

  "Praise the Lady! When the Guard learned that you hadn't stayed at Waymeet and hadn't arrived at Berrybay, and that you'd left on the very eve of the storm, we all feared the worst. Had you been caught in it, I doubt you would have survived even one night. This was the worst blizzard in these parts in recorded history. Oh, I'm Tedric. How on earth did you manage?"

  "We were warned by our chirras in time to make the Waystation, but I doubt that we'd be in any shape to greet you now if it hadn't been stocked by someone other than the regular Resupply crew," Kris replied.

  "Whoever it was, he seems to have had an uncannily accurate idea of how much provender we'd need, and what kinds."

  "That's the Weatherwitch's doing," said one of the work crew, a stolid-looking farmer. "Kept at us this fall till we got it stocked to her liking.

  Even made us go back after first snow with some odd bits— honey 'n oil, salted meat 'n fish. We had it to spare, praise Kernos, and she's never yet been wrong when she gets one o' these notions, so we went along with it.

  Happen it was a good thing."

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  "Praise Kernos, in very deed! I see you've got your gear. Come along with me and I'll have you warm and dry and fed before nightfall. I'm with the Resupply Station outside of Berrybay. I've got plenty of room for both of you, if you don't mind sharing a bed."

  "Not at all," Kris replied gravely, sensing Talia struggling with the effort of maintaining what little shielding she had against the pressure of fifteen minds. "We've been sleeping on straw next to the hearth for warmth. Right now a camp cot would sound like heaven, even if I had to share it with Tantris!"

  "Good. Excellent!" Herald Tedric replied. "I'll guide you both back; these good people know what they're doing, and they certainly don't need me in the way now that we've found you."

  The members of the work crew made polite noises, but they obviously agreed with him.

  "Fact is, Herald," the red-faced farmer whispered to Kris, "Old Tedric's a good enough sort, but he don't belong out here. He's too old, and his heart's more'n a mite touchy. Waystation Supply post was supposed to be a pensioning-out position, if you catch my meaning. He ain't the kind to sit idle, even though he hasn't the health to ride circuit no more. We're supposed to be keepin' an eye on him, make sure he don't overdo— job's set up so's he could feel useful, but wouldn't have to do anything straining.

  Guard's supposed to do all his fetching and carrying for him. But what with this storm and all, Guard's busy clearing the roads, seein' to the emergencies— when he found out you two was missin', nothing would do but that he go out with us. Gave us a real fright a time or two, gettin' short of breath and blue-like when we thought we might've found bodies. Good thing you turned up all right, or I reckon we'd have had a third body on our hands."

  This put things in an altogether different light. Kris felt a sudden increase in respect for the talkative and seemingly feckless Herald. On closer examination he saw that Tedric was a great deal older than he had first appeared, partially because he was bald as an egg, and partially because he had the kind of baby-soft face that tends not to wrinkle with age. His 221

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  Companion cosseted him tenderly, flatly refusing to race headlong down the road so that he co
uld prepare the Station for his guests.

  * * *

  Talia and Kris took turns telling him what had transpired from the time they discovered the plague in Waymeet. "So you're the Queen's Own, the one with the Gift for emotions and mindHealing?" he asked Talia, peering at her short-sightedly. She could sense his faint unease around her, even through the shields Rolan was holding, and mentally shrank into herself. "I wonder if you could do something for the Weatherwitch?"

  "Considering that we obviously owe her our lives, I'll certainly be glad to try," Talia replied, trying not to show her own unease and her real dismay at being asked to use her wayward Gift. "Just who is she, and why do you call her the Weatherwitch?"

  "Ah, it's a sad story, that," he sighed. "A few years ago, it would be, when I'd only just been assigned this post, there was a young woman named Maeven in Berrybay who'd gone and had herself a Festival child— that's a babe that no one will claim, and whose mother hasn't the faintest notion who the father might be. People being what they are, there was a certain amount of tsk-ing, and finger-pointing, until the poor girl heartily wished the babe had never been conceived, much less born. That's what made what happened to her all the worse, you see. You know, 'be careful what you ask for, you might get it'? I'm sure she often wished the child gone, and when the accident happened, she blamed herself. She was taking her turn working at the mill, and she left the little one alone for longer than she should have. Poor mite was just beginning to crawl about, and it managed to wriggle free of the basket she'd left it in. It crawled straight to the millrace, fell in, and drowned. She was the one to find the body, and she went quite mad."