by Carol Berg
Her horse snuffled and crunched an apple she pulled from her pocket. After patting his nose and stroking his neck, she turned him over to a groom who had hurried out from the stables. Then she walked over to the fence. She wore a tan riding skirt, tan boots, and a filmy, wide-sleeved shirt that was either blue or green, depending on the angle of the light. When she stretched out her arm in my direction, I believed she'd read my thoughts and was allowing me to see more of the long pale limb the slightest breeze left bare, but eventually her arched eyebrow and her boot on the fence rail penetrated my thick head.
She laughed as I gave her a hand to climb over. But when she stood before me in the lane, a quick sobriety clouded her face in the way thin sheets of vapor mute the sun. Her fingers twined in a knot at her breast, as if she couldn't quite decide what to say next and didn't like her choices. "I must apologize for my rudeness the other evening," she said at last. "I hope your father was not offended."
"Not in the least. Just a bit—"
"Curious, I suppose."
"I won't deny it. You didn't know he'd been a slave. But you hadn't asked; we assumed there were others here." I clasped my gloved hands behind my back.
"Of course there are. Several others."
She started walking down the road toward the trees, her arms folded tightly now. I walked beside her, not offering my arm. She was no wilting flower, and I needed to keep my wits about me.
"Their slave-taking was so despicable, so wretched." Her head and shoulders moved tautly with each word. "Amidst all their cruelties, it was so absolutely evil. When I see the scars, it makes me feel— I don't know how to describe it."
"Guilty? For having escaped it?"
She glanced up at me sharply, her eyes almost on a level with mine. "Of course. That's it. Yes. I should have known I didn't have to explain it to you."
"My father was in such pain before he came here that he couldn't move, couldn't think, could scarcely speak. You've helped him a great deal."
"And I'm glad of it. But I wish so very much . . ."
". . . that you could go back and change what happened in Zhev'Na. Because those horrors make illness such as his so unfair after what he's suffered already."
"Exactly." Her steps paused, and she crinkled her nose at me. "Do you read thoughts?"
"As little as possible."
"Then it must be that you have the same ones as I."
"I wouldn't wish them on you," I said, resuming our stroll into the trees. "Or anyone." This was not easy banter between us. Not with the ache in my head and shoulders to remind me, and the depths of sadness in her words. Talking seemed easier when we kept moving.
Unfolding her arms, she clasped her hands behind her as if to mimic me. "There's much to be said for sharing these experiences as we do. We can move on to other topics without having to dredge them up and explain."
"What other topics?" Perhaps I was at last going to hear what I needed to hear.
The dappled sunlight teased at her face and shifted the color of her silken shirt to deep purple and blue. Suddenly she stopped walking again and tugged at my arm, forcing me around to face her. "Remembering how to enjoy ourselves," she said. "I think that would be a marvelous beginning. I would state unhesitatingly that you've near forgotten it."
Without meaning to do it, I burst out laughing at such foolish words so seriously spoken. She was so unexpected. "Conceded," I said.
She threw up her hands, more animated by the moment. "I've been so involved in explaining myself, being tested, dragging Archivists about to dig up ruins of my lifetime, and trying to do some good with the gifts holy Vasrin has shaped in me, that I've not had time to remember what I was doing when I was fourteen . . . before the world changed. I know that life was wonderful, and I enjoyed it immensely. But I seem to have lost the skill. So I need to relearn it, and you must relearn it along with me."
"I don't think I ever knew how. I was only ten. . . ." And had lived in terror since I was five years old, when my nurse discovered that I was a sorcerer in a world where sorcerers were burned alive, even if they were five.
"Exactly so! The Preceptors and a hundred town guilds clamor that I must assume my father's throne right away, that it is my duty, my 'heritage,' even though the good Prince Ven'Dar is much loved and admired. But I've put them off. I've told them that I need to learn of the world as it is now and to grow accustomed to being free again. I intend to permit no distraction, not even the throne of Avonar, until I've recaptured the pleasures of being fourteen and grown up to my duties." As if to prove her point, she climbed up on a stone half-pillar, one of a pair like those that marked the roadside all up and down the lane between the paddock and the gardens.
I didn't know what to say to such things. Fortunately, she didn't seem to expect me to say anything, but pointed to the ground in front of her perch, saying "here, here" until I moved to the spot she wanted. Once I was in place, she stood tall with her hands on her hips, looking me up and down. "No child—certainly no girl of fourteen—can exist without a best and dearest bosom friend. I think you'll do nicely . . ."
"Me?"
". . . though before we begin, you must tell me what you've done to yourself. You look as if you've had a disagreement with a bull and a hay fork!" With one finger, she turned my head to the left where she could get a better view of my bruised forehead and the myriad abrasions that extended from eye to jawbone.
"A clumsy encounter with the floor of the Gaelie stables," I said, stepping back as if she might learn the cause of my injuries by touching them. "Embarrassing mostly."
"Hmm … so I must pry it out of you as part of our relearning how to be children. Ten-year-old boys are not so easily embarrassed. Tell me, what do ten-year-old boys enjoy? Ah, I've got it. . . ." And before I could answer, she hopped down from the stoop and darted into the woods. The shifting colors of her clothes made her disappear so effectively, I might have thought she was nothing but the laughing voice that echoed through the trees, calling out, "Hide-and-seek . . . and you're seeker!"
I stood stupidly in the lane, trying to decide if it would better suit my purpose to indulge her whimsy or wait for her to give it up. But I concluded that I wasn't going to get any information if I wasn't with her, so I took off through the noonday woodland, stopping every so often to listen and search for her path. She was very good at moving quietly, only occasional bursts of giggling giving her away, and she was very fast. But she knew nothing about covering her tracks, so it was only a matter of staying on her trail and waiting for her to pause too long.
Only at the end did she succeed in throwing me off, when I strode through knee-high stems of fading may apples and wood-sorrel to the center of a sunlit glade, losing her trail beneath the canopy of a monstrous oak that stood there alone. I listened, but heard nothing. I crouched down to examine the faint trail of crushed grass that ended so abruptly. She must have used some sorcery to hide herself. Or else . . .
I looked upward and a small hard missile bounced off my head. I caught the second one. An acorn. Ten more followed the first in quick succession.
"I thought I won the game if I caught you," I said, peering into the branches over my head, thinking I saw a shifting blue-green tunic somewhere in the leaves. "Not fair to attack."
"But you've not caught me yet. There's a chance I can drive you away with my weapons. And you are down there, and I am up here."
"Easily remedied, if that's what it takes," I said and swung up to the low-hanging branch that had given her entry to the tree.
"There, you see? You know how it's done. You just have to work to remember the rules."
She scrambled up higher in the tree. I followed until we were perched on the last two branches that could possibly hold our weight, a height that left us far above the roof of the woodland, able to see across the leafy green sea to the meadows and mountains, sharp-edged and clean in the morning light.
"Is this not a marvelous tree? I think we should stay up here until sunset,"
she said. "How long has it been since you were in such a joyful place as this?" Sunbeams danced in her eyes, and her cheeks were colored a deep rose.
"Forever." The answer had formed itself unbidden. I grasped feebly at my purpose. "So what is my prize for finding you?"
She pulled off two leaves, colored the bright green of new growth, and curled them in her fingers. "I'll have to think on that. Boys always have to win and get their prize, don't they? Whether at games or stories. With ten-year-old boys, winning at hide-and-seek is a matter of life's breath."
"I suppose."
"The palace in Avonar was the most delicious place to play hide-and-seek. My brothers and I knew every crack and crevice of it. Even better, D'Leon was a Word Winder, and even at thirteen, he could cast windings that made us invisible to each other, so we had to hunt through all five hundred rooms using only hearing and smell. Once D'Alleyn hid in my father's council chambers during a very serious meeting. D'Leon and I found him just at the same time, and chased him out from under the council table and around the columns and in and out of the room. Imagine ten pompous sorcerers remarking on the change of seasons causing such a disturbance in the air, assuring each other it wasn't evil spirits or evil omens for the times to come.
"But Papa knew exactly what it was, and he sent us to our country house for a month with our tutors commanded to teach us proper deportment, which we thought very cruel. My uncle J'Ettanne told me later, though, that Papa laughed himself to tears at the memory of his hoary-headed counselors looking for evil auras and portents when it was only three children playing hide-and-seek. It was one of our best family legends."
She sprawled out on the length of her branch like a cat stretching, and propped her head on her hand as if prepared to stay there forever. "Now you must tell me of times when you would play hide-and-seek. I know it's still done; children's games do not change over the centuries."
"I wasn't much for games," I said. "I've no brothers or sisters, and we lived remotely, so other children weren't about very often. My father was away. The war and all. And my mother … I lost my mother when I was small. I spent most of the time alone or with my nurse."
"So you have no family legends, no games to tell of? That's so very sad!"
Her expression revealed such shocked sympathy that I found myself trying to soothe her by spewing out words. "Well actually, my mother had one story about playing hide-and-seek in our house . . . the house I grew up in. Though not so cheerful an outcome as yours, I suppose. Maybe I shouldn't spoil—"
"No. Now you've started, you must tell the story."
"When my mother was very young, she was playing with her brother and his friends, and hid herself in an old cupboard deep in the cellars. The others abandoned the game without telling her, and she couldn't get out of the cupboard. She'd been told so many stories of wicked monsters who hunted naughty children in the dark that she was too frightened to make a sound, and it was two days until she was found. It wasn't until she met my father that she could bear being in a dark confined space again. My father says it was the only thing she was ever afraid of."
It wasn't exactly the humorous story she'd told, but I didn't think it was so awful that it would make her turn pale. The light and shadow were so tricky, I thought perhaps I was mistaken. Whatever her judgment of my tale, she didn't say, but instead, with movement faster than I could grasp, she shinnied her way down through the tree branches and dropped lightly to the turf. "I'll race you back to the house." As she disappeared into the trees across the glade, she cried over her shoulder, "The loser has to tell a secret!"
I dropped through the branches, getting well tangled and scratched, half cursing at her foolery. Though I told myself I only entered the race to win her secret and keep her out of mine, I would have run after her even without the promise of a prize.
Three fences and D'Sanya's loose apparel yielded me the victory. She had long legs, and ran with the speed and grace of the fell-deer on the Comigor heath, but my legs were longer, and I could leap the fences without slowing or catching my garments on the fence rails. I was sitting on the garden fence, trying not to appear winded, when she collapsed on the grass just beside it five heartbeats behind me.
"I'm out of practice," she said cheerfully, between deep lungfuls of the hot air. "Give me two weeks and a man's breeches, and I'll leave you gasping in the meadow."
"No doubt of it," I said, grinning at her. "You'd have had me today except for the fences. But I'll claim my prize anyway."
"Hmm … a secret. Let me think." She closed her eyes and pushed up her floating sleeves to bare her arms. By the time she spoke again, I'd almost forgotten what I was waiting for.
"I have it!" She popped her eyes open and sat up, and I did my best not to fall off the rail. "It's nagged at me ever since I began hearing everyone speaking of my father with such reverence. D'Arnath—the epitome of a kingly ruler, the symbol of all nobility, the savior of his world. One would think him a candidate for godhood! But—now this is for you alone, my play friend—what would everyone think if they knew that holy King D'Arnath was an inveterate card cheat? He hated to lose more than anything in the world, and even when he would sit in on our children's games, we'd find him slipping a card from his sleeve, or fingering the pile of them, using sorcery to discover the sword trump or whatever he wanted. What do you think of that?"
I could do nothing but laugh.
"Next race, when I win, I shall expect an equally scandalous confession from you, sir!" she said. Then she jumped up from the grass, grabbed my arm, and dragged me into her house.
I spent the rest of the day with her. We ate fruit and drank wine. We unpacked three crates of books she'd had shipped from Avonar, and I climbed up and down the steps in her library five hundred times, commanded to admire each volume and place it exactly where she wanted. Among the new books was a folio of drawings of Dar'Nethi ruins in the most ancient corner of the city. She held that one aside until our tasks were finished, and then spent two hours on the carpeted floor showing it to me, telling me what the places had been like when she knew them, and where the Archivists who'd done the sketches had guessed wrong.
Na'Cyd came in frequently to seek D'Sanya's advice or opinion about some matter of business—food supplies, painters, two possible candidates for admission— but she put him off each time. Each time the aristocratic consiliar bowed gracefully and retired without comment or sign of annoyance. When the angle of the light falling through the tall windows told me evening was near, I mumbled something about her having business to attend to. ". . . and I need to bid my father good night and start down the road to Gaelic."
D'Sanya pushed me back to the floor. "You shall do no such thing. Na'Cyd can see to all my business; he is very wise and needs to assert himself more. As for you, I have decided on your prize for winning the game of hide-and-seek—a picnic supper. I've already given orders as to its contents and delivery, and I really must insist."
Then she left me for a while, saying she was going to change her clothes and rid herself of the dust from the book crates and our adventures in the woods. She offered to send for fresh attire for me, but I said I would look in on my father and perhaps borrow something of his. We agreed to meet in the library in an hour.
As I set out through the garden doors, taking a shortcut to my father's apartments, I stumbled over a small pair of boots sticking out from under the barberry hedge just to the left of the garden doors. The boots were attached to someone's legs. "I'm sorry," I said. "I didn't see you." Before I could glimpse a face, the person scrambled away into the thick greenery. I saw only the lurker's back. Slight. Dark hair, cut short and ragged. Was it Sefaro's daughter, keeping an eye on me? I walked more slowly after that and kept my eyes open.
My father was standing on the little terrace outside his sitting room, staring into the blue-gray haze that had settled over the rim of the valley. It took several greetings to catch his attention.
"Can't say what I was dreaming about,"
he said as he rummaged through his clothes chest and pulled out a clean shirt. "Nothing of importance. Your day must have been more interesting than mine, especially if it isn't done yet, and you need a change of clothes."
I sponged myself off and changed into my father's full-sleeved white cambric shirt. Made before he fell ill, it hung large on me. As I tucked it into my breeches and grabbed a brush to clean up my boots, I told him of the day and how we had not spoken a single word of substance since the Lady's apology when I first met her. "Maybe this evening I can get some answers."
"So she feels guilt when faced with evidence of slavery, yet she was herself a prisoner."
"When we went riding, she said she'd been a prisoner for three years and was 'enchanted' when they tired of her. She claims to know nothing of the years between then and now."
"That may be exactly the truth. Just because her enchantment has this . . . deadening . . . effect does not mean the woman is evil. Perhaps she's just inexpert in the use of her power. She was so young when she was taken."
"She lived in Zhev'Na and wore no collar," I said. The glimpse of Sefaro's daughter had sobered me considerably. "Her father was the first and most bitter enemy of the Lords. I'll not believe her uncorrupted until I hear what happened in those three years. Perhaps if I consent to this game of hers, I'll get the chance. But I never imagined this business would involve playing hide-and-seek or climbing trees."
My father smiled and straightened my collar. "Sounds as if you'd best get in some running practice, too."
"She's unbelievably fast. I've never imagined a woman could come close to catching me at full speed. And when she rides …" I pressed my hands to my eyes and tried to get her image out of my head before I started babbling about how the sun caused her skin to glow golden when she lay in the grass. "I wish we could just get to business, and get it over with. I keep thinking of how the Singlars are getting on; we have so much to do yet. I need to get back. And you're trapped here. Damnation! She can't be what she seems, but I can't get her to speak anything but nonsense."
