There was a cold winter in her heart even before the winter came. She recalled other winter seasons when she had had so much less—less of a life, less to remember, less to give her mother and her father and Bress at the Winter Feast. What would come to pass? She began to nourish a small flame of hope for her destiny—she thought of Lady Pearl, the wise woman’s small, ill-suppressed gestures of excited surprise as she had read her crystal for Gael’s fate. Yet summer and that humid day at Cannford Old House seemed so far away. How could a crofter’s child aspire to any such thing as a “high destiny”?
There were the usual winter ceremonies in the Holywell Grotto before the ice closed its gate for the season. The village wives brought greenery to decorate the altar. Shivorn Maddoc was not happy at this time of the year because she was ashamed of the Maddocs’ impoverishment, though this year was a little better because Gael gave her mother her last two shields, the coins she had received from the house of Val’Nur as a reward. Then Nate Gemman from the Summer Riders turned up with a good order for oatcakes and winter wreaths and straw dolls. He asked Gael to bring the orders to the family shop and step in for mulled wine.
“By the Goddess,” rumbled Maddoc when the young man had gone, “I think he fancies our Gael, eh, Mother?”
Gael blushed and gave Bress a cuff for his laughter. But it was true-Nate Gemman had been friendly during their riding days and had kissed her once in the stable of the Halfway House. And she had let him, more or less. She began to understand how it might be with a man she “fancied.”
Now it was the time of the first snow and there were heavy falls, a pleasure for the children who brought out their sleds and had snowball fights. The chores went on, hauling supplies on the sleds—Gael and Bress brought food and firewood round the hill to Old Murrin in Ardven House. She invited them in, as she did every year, for winter treats, and they sat in the lower floor of the old house, at the fireside with Oona the grey cat. They sang songs for the season: “The Wintering of Culain” and “Raise Up the Tree” and “Lady, Bless House and Byre.” Gael and Bress could both sing in harmony and Bress could play a pipe he had made from a hollow reed. Then they went back round the hill through the snowy night, with Gael drawing Bress part of the way on the sled, and a blazing torch to guide them home.
She went along, warily, to Master Gemman’s shop, in a courtyard near the reeve’s house, and Nate welcomed her in and introduced her proudly to his parents.
The evening turned out to be happy and noisy—others came in to play games with counters, dice, and cards with pictures. There was music from a bagpiper and a fiddler and Nate brought her home on a sled drawn by a sleek brown pony. She did not begrudge him several kisses for the Winter Feast. She told the family about the games and her father went on a little about good old days when the harvests were better and the soil sweeter and the Maddoc family had given great evenings.
“Those days will come again, Da,” said Gael firmly. “Great good fortune will come to us, and to Coombe village! I swear it by the Goddess!”
“I’ll ride out with the Summer Riders!” cried Bress. “I’ll come to the Westlings, where you are a kedran, sister!” She cast a look at her little brother then, not knowing what to think, and saw her whisper of worry echoed in her father’s expression. If Bress too was a “person of the Cup,” as Lady Pearl of Andine had called her, would it be right for him too to take up a sword?
Then at last there came the feast days, and things were as warm and merry in the old croft as they had ever been. Her presents from Goldgrave suited well. In return she had a paper Lienbook from the Druda, which he had left for her mother to give her, and a smart riding cap, as the kedran wore, with a place for a badge and a feather. The Emyan card with the tree and the two children was set on the shelf in the chimney wall.
There were heavy falls of snow and the Maddocs, even Gael’s mother, dug out the approaches to the Holywell—the path from the croft under the trees, some leafless, and the lower entrance from the roadway. Some older folk in the village were taken, and there was talk of a bad round of winter croup in the villages to the south and southwest. Mostly the folk moved between house and byre, keeping themselves and their animals as warm and well fed as they could. At the Holywell Croft there were only the four goats to care for, and they did well enough.
Then, just as the weather eased a little, there was a sound at the door one night, and there, of all things, was a thin brown cat, mewing to come in. Gael saw how much better things had become for the Maddocs—they let Bress bring it inside by the fire and gave it a bowl of milk. Maddoc said that the beast could earn its keep hunting rats and mice in the storeroom and the lean-to. Her mother remembered other housecats—this was a Mouser, a gelded tomcat, who would stay and grow fat, and not go wandering. Gael thought for a day or two and then asked Bress if the cat might be called Kenit, for the old Chyrian hero who had rid a king’s palace of mice and rats. So, Kenit. The winter stray sat by the fire in early spring and grew fat on mice, and they all loved him.
Gael went on with her reading, and the days grew warmer. Nothing changed in the daily round until the Willowmoon, in her eighteenth year.
CHAPTER III
THE PRINCE OF THE SOUTHLAND
It was the seventh day of the Willowmoon, the month of planting, a mild evening in early spring. Gael was out late, hunting a strayed goat, and she came round by the sacred grotto. Riders went by below her in the dusk, on the south road from Lowestell fortress. There was a shout followed by the clash of metal; the horsemen began casting about. Gael crouched in the gorse and did not move when one man urged his charger up the bank. She heard his loud cry:
“My lord? Hem Blayn?”
Then he cursed and said:
“Where is the young devil?”
As the big horse went crashing down to the roadway Gael heard another horse whinny softly in the bushes behind her. She went quickly through to the thorn trees, white and red, that guarded the entrance to the cave.
A bay horse, caparisoned in blue and gold, stood shivering by the whitethorn. In the light of the rising moon, she found its rider, fallen onto the path. He was lightly built by the standards of Mel’Nir and all arrayed in painted strip mail; his shield showed the device of a white horse and a golden star. Gael knelt down, uttered a prayer to the Goddess, and managed to remove the warrior’s helm. He was very pale and his hair was pure gold.
Gael thought of the Shee, the fairy race, who still walked upon the High Plateau. This young lord was more beautiful than any mortal. He was so pale she feared for his life. She found a nasty gash on his leg just above his boot top and bound it with her own kerchief, none too clean. She could find no other hurt but a swelling bruise on the side of his head, where he had fallen from his horse.
Then from below came a sound of hoofbeats, returning, and the lord opened his eyes. He saw Gael kneeling over him.
“Kedran,” he whispered. “Kedran, I have no sword. They must not find me!”
She said nothing but gripped the lord under his arms and drew him into the passage that led to the grotto. Then she went out again, spoke sweetly to his horse and led it in. So they waited, with no light but a little sparkle of moonbeams through the fretted roof and no sound except the plashing of spring water. Gael went to stand at the mouth of the passage and heard the riders pass by, returning to the south.
She went about near the cave gathering bracken for the lord’s bed. Their eyes became accustomed to the darkness of the grotto. Gael watered the horse from the sacred spring, pouring water from the old leather dipper into a hollow of the rock. Then she rinsed her kerchief in the clear water and dressed the lord’s wound again and gave him drink. The lord spoke his name:
“I am Blayn of Pfolben.”
Even Gael Maddoc knew this name. Pfolben was the great lord of the Southland and this was his son.
“My sword,” he said. “My sword was taken from me, but it will come again.”
She thought his wits were scra
mbled from the blow on the head. He smiled at her.
“It is a magic blade from the Burnt Lands,” he said. “It is bound to my service.”
Gael stared at him and felt her own head swim. She said no word but knew that she, too, was bound to his service from that hour. They spoke further, and then Hem Blayn allowed her to fetch her mother. Shivorn Maddoc brought food and blankets; the young lord hardly needed their whispers of safety and secrecy.
The story was one of mutiny. A rebellious band of officers and men from the southern border fortress of Lowestell had rejected their commander and ridden away, taking Blayn with them as a hostage. They were quickly rounded up and disciplined; two officers, the sons of other southern lords, were imprisoned as traitors. Before it came to a search, Blayn of Pfolben emerged from hiding and rode home.
He rewarded the family of Maddoc, who had hidden him in the Holywell. On the third night, Gael, after she had seen to his horse, brought the lord up the dark path to their cottage. Blayn of Pfolben, who had the common touch, sat easily at their fireside while Shivorn dressed the cut on his leg, which was healing well. He spoke to Rab Maddoc, man to man, and insisted that he take two gold pieces—they had not seen very many; the yellow glitter held them a little in awe. Blayn clapped young Bress on the shoulder and promised him a place at Lowestell when he was grown. He patted Kenit the cat and returned to the sacred grotto once more. Next morning he rode out to the south, and Gael went with the lord to be his kedran.
They set out with Blayn mounted on Daystar, his fine bay horse, and Gael running behind. Ahead loomed the fortress of Lowestell, war booty of Blayn’s grandfather, for it had been seized from Val’Nur in the Great King’s War and never returned. Blayn’s banner had been read by the sentinels, and a captain came riding out with a small escort.
The captain, a huge man on a huge grey horse, had the look of one who did not like his duty.
“Hem Blayn,” he said, “you must declare yourself.”
“Captain Ulth,” said Blayn, “I am safe. I made my escape from the rebels.”
“The young lords Cahl and Keythril …”
“False friends,” said Blayn, “for they carried me off as hostage to their enterprise!”
“Some would say they are true friends,” said the Captain, “for they will say no word of your part in the mutiny!”
“Godfire!” cried Blayn. “I had no part in it. I was held captive! My sword was taken from me! I escaped, wounded and unarmed, and I was cared for by this good kedran wench, Maddoc, and her family.”
So the whole company looked at Gael Maddoc, and it was as if she saw herself for the first time in their eyes. She was a great strapping creature with a shock of red hair and a Chyrian face that no one could call more than good humored. She had been scrubbed clean, of course, and wore her uniform from the summer training and her father’s best boots.
She blushed, her heart thumped, but she stood tall and remembered the questioning she had gone through once before, at Hackestell. She could speak up in a clear voice, choosing her words carefully in the common speech. “Courage!” she told herself. “It is my destiny, as the Lady Pearl of Andine foretold. This ordeal will end, and I will be secure in the service of my lord.”
“And the Lord Blayn was unarmed?” asked Captain Ulth for the second time.
“Aye, Captain!” she answered.
Then the captain sighed and nodded to one of the mounted soldiers, a kedran sergeant.
“Sergeant Witt has your sword, Hem Blayn,” he said. “It was found about a half mile from this spot, in heavy brush near the roadside.”
The sergeant was a sturdy woman on a spirited brown mare. She rode forward now and handed her lord a scabbard of chased leather, oddly shaped. Blayn, smiling, drew out at once the sword Ishkar.
It had a broad, curved blade, the tempered metal tinged with gold and ornamented with scrollwork. The hilt was plain save for one large gemstone, pale green with a dark star at its center that winked like a single eye. The sword shone with its own light, which came and went, pulsing, as if it were a live thing.
“Who owns thee, Sword Ishkar?” cried the young lord.
Then letters shone out plainly on the blade and they spelled out his name: Blayn of Pfolben. Gael Maddoc was proud she was able to read the letters. Now her lord flourished his magic sword and gave her one of his smiles.
“Did I not say my sword would come again?”
Then he said to the sergeant:
“Maddoc will train with your company, Sergeant Witt, and be sworn a kedran in the service of the house of Pfolben.”
He rode off toward Lowestell with the captain and the rest of the escort. Sergeant Witt hung back, looking down at her new recruit.
“You can ride?” she asked.
“Aye, Sergeant!”
The Sergeant dismounted and looked Gael up and down.
“Child,” she said, “you are suffering from a common complaint in these parts. You think the sun rises and sets with that young lord.”
“I have sworn to serve him,” said Gael Maddoc.
“What did ye do in that sacred cavern?” demanded the Sergeant. “Did he lie with you?”
Gael was shocked. She went from red to white and said angrily:
“He is a great lord! Who would think of such a thing?”
“Who indeed,” said Sergeant Witt, amused. “Come, we’ll make a kedran of you, then. But mark my words—the Lord Blayn will not favor you. You have seen the last of him. Now mount up on my horse and see if you can ride to the fortress yonder without falling off.”
Gael Maddoc’s faith was strong; she managed this first task easily and every other one besides. She had taken to soldiering from the first and wondered at the way some other wenches grumbled. Did she not have three meals a day, her own horse, clothes and stout boots, a bed in a warm barracks? She sent home a portion of her soldier’s pay and planned to return to the croft on her long leave.
Sergeant Witt’s company was part of the second household regiment of the Lord of Pfolben, the Kestrels. After only a few days in the kedran wing at Lowestell, their duty changed, and Gael went with the Kestrels to the city barracks at Pfolben, capital of the Southland.
Only a part of what the sergeant predicted came true: Gael was made into a kedran, fully trained, but Hem Blayn continued to favor her. He saw to it that she rode escort more than once, and he sent her on his errands. To Gael this was the work of the Goddess, nothing less, the crowning good fortune that had changed her life. To others it must have been clear that the lord in some wise recognized the quality of her devotion.
II
The Southland was warm and exotic after the Chyrian coast. Strange fruit hung from the trees, the nights were mild with a golden moon hanging over the Bellin Hills, above the city. Gael had never lived in a city; she enjoyed its closeness. There were new things to be seen and learned in every turn of the streets.
The barracks were in the north, under the hills, behind the palaces and public buildings. Gael had a fine black gelding called Ebony, and she rode with another Chyrian, Mev Arun, and with Amarah, a golden-skinned girl from the Danasken folk of the Eastmark, whose ancestors had come from the Burnt Lands.
In the south there were the wharves and warehouses: the city of Pfolben lay on the River Elnor, which went winding through the Southland to the tideless waters, the Sea of Ara. Maurik, the Lord of Pfolben, ruler of the Southland, was very rich. He had increased his great inheritance by trading with the people of the Burnt Lands and with the Zebbecks, a race of mariners who sailed in the Sea of Ara.
Yet some said that his greatest treasure was his good wife, Lady Annhad of Andine, eldest daughter of the ill-fated Strett of Cloudhill. As a young man, Maurik had ridden out with his father, the old lord, during the Great King’s War, his elder brother having died in that ill-fated adventure of the Great King at the Adderneck Pass. Maurik brought home his bride from the Eastern Rift, plundered by the army of the Southland in the months following
the great betrayal of Silverlode.
Lady Annhad, who had come to love her lord, had borne him three children. Her two daughters were fine girls, well married now to southern lords. Blayn, the only son, her youngest child, had been a sickly infant, not expected to live. He was cosseted as a boy because he was frail, high strung, a changeling among the big-boned sons of the southern lords. This was all the explanation his mother could find for the way he had turned out. Now, at two-and-twenty, Blayn was adroit, charming, well beloved, and it mattered little that he was a head shorter than his companions.
Lord Maurik favored a rich simplicity in dress and in the food that overflowed his palace’s kitchens. All must be open handed and aboveboard in his domain. Intrigue, magic … these things belonged to the Burnt Lands.
Pfolben palace itself seemed almost to mock this attitude. Its older courts and colonnades had been built ages past, before the coming of the men of Mel’Nir, by princes from the Burnt Lands, from Ferss and Aghiras and Reshem-al-Djain. They had long been driven back over the Sea of Ara, but their ghosts remained. Who had not heard a whisper of silken robes on summer evenings, a sound of women murmuring in the walled garden? On the night of the full moon there was an inexplicable stench of blood in the stableyard.
Lady Annhad could only fret at her good lord’s blindness in certain things. He saw no ghosts. He was genial and trusting in his dealings with all men. At the same time he flaunted his own honesty like a banner and had no patience with human frailty. He swore that his son, Blayn, was like himself, honest as the day and a true man of Mel’Nir.
So Lady Annhad was not displeased when she saw her son had acquired a big honest kedran as his henchwoman. Indeed, she would have preferred him to go about with Gael and others like her as a permanent bodyguard. The Lord Blayn had need of protection: a towering shadow fell upon him one night as he walked along Orange Flower Street to some tryst. There was a flash of metal, a cry, a splash; folk came running with torches.
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