Ayrlyn reached him first as he leaned against the steps. “Ryba was worried. It gets cold out there when the sun goes down.”
“I know. It took a little longer than I thought.” He looked toward the guards at the table, his eyes focusing on the cook near the end of the second table. “Kyseen. My humble offerings.” Nylan raised the pair of dead hares.
The dark-haired cook slipped from the table and hurried across the cold slate floor. “All offerings are welcome these days, ser.”
Kadran followed her. “If you can bring in a couple more, we can tan the pelts and stitch them together as a coverlet for Ellysia’s Dephnay,” added the second cook. “This tower’s not so warm as it could be for a child… begging your pardon, ser, knowing you did the best you could, but it’s not.”
“By next winter, it will be warmer.” Nylan hoped they would be around for next winter.
“You go eat, ser,” insisted Kyseen. “I’ll dress these quick so they don’t spoil, and I’ll be back up in an instant.”
“Have you eaten?” he asked. “I wouldn’t want to spoil your meal…”
“I’ve eaten, and you haven’t.” Kyseen took the two hares and started down the steps.
Nylan left the skis and poles by the stairs. He’d put them away after he ate.
“Two rabbits? That’s all?” asked Gerlich as Nylan walked slowly toward his place at the table.
“I’m still learning.” As Nylan sat, heavily, ignoring the cold and dampness in his trousers, he asked, “By the way, when did you last bring in any game?”
Gerlich flushed. “I brought in a winter deer, not a rabbit.”
“That was more than two eight-days ago,” Ayrlyn said as she reseated herself across from the engineer.
“So?” retorted Gerlich. “Everything’s scarce these days, and we’ve probably already killed the stupid ones.”
“We can’t live on stupid game,” pointed out the singer.
“The hares are another meal.” Ryba’s voice cut through the argument. “And each meal helps.” She smiled for a moment at Nylan, though there was sadness in the expression as well as pleasure and relief.
“It’s always cold and dark! Always!”
Nylan turned his head at the loud words from the lower table, where Istril had laid her hand on Murkassa’s shoulder.
“The days are getting longer now,” pointed out the silver-haired guard. “Before long, it will be getting warmer as well.”
“It’s still too cold and dark.” Murkassa’s words seemed lower, though Istril patted her shoulder again. “Even the wall stones are cold and dark.”
Turning back to the trencher before him, Nylan took a slow swallow of the warm tea, not even minding the bitterness. He reached for the chunk of bread left for him.
A portion of a mutton stew or soup also remained, only half-warm, but Nylan began to eat, hardly conscious of the coolness of the meat and gravy, or the lumpiness that marked the last of the blue potatoes… or of the continuing conversation between Istril and Murkassa.
LXIII
“I CAN’T! I can’t!”
From the corner of the furnace and woodworking room where he smoothed the sideboards of the cradle, Nylan looked toward the stone steps.
“NO! I won’t. I can’t.”
Beside him, Siret dropped the polishing cloth, then awkwardly bent over, trying to reach the scrap of fabric. Nylan retrieved it and handed the cloth back to her. “Here.”
“Thank you, ser. I feel like I can’t do much of anything easily-”
“No! It’s too white! It’s… AEEEüüi…”
Across the room, Ayrlyn set down the lutar bridge she had been working on, nodded to Hryessa, and hurried up the stairs. After a momentary hesitation, Nylan lurched to his feet and followed Ayrlyn, not knowing quite why he did, but feeling that he should.
By the south door to the tower, Jaseen and Istril held a struggling brown-haired figure-Murkassa-dressed in a heavy jacket.
“Too white! It’s too white!” Murkassa’s flailing arm caught Istril across the cheek, but the silver-haired guard pinned the arm to her anyway, ignoring the red blotch that would be a bruise.
Ayrlyn stepped up to Murkassa, whose body was stiff, and whose screams had become incoherent, and touched her forehead. Murkassa jerked away, but Ayrlyn followed the movements, again touching her forehead.
After a moment, the dark-haired woman slumped, and the two holding her lowered her to the floor.
“Whew!” muttered Jaseen.
Istril put a hand to her cheek.
Ayrlyn bent down and stroked the woman’s forehead. “You’ll be all right…”
Nylan swallowed. Had he felt that unreasoning fear and rage? He studied the figure on the stones. Murkassa’s face, though relaxing under the healer’s touch, remained drawn. Or was it just thin?
Nylan thought for a moment. Wasn’t everyone’s face thinner? His trousers were looser.
“Hut fever,” Ayrlyn said wryly, straightening up.
“Hut fever?” asked Istril.
“She’s not built for the cold-not enough body fat when she came here,” explained Ayrlyn. “We really don’t have warm enough garments-or sufficient food for a good cold-weather diet. She can’t stand the cold. She’s afraid of it-with reason-but she can’t stand being kept confined.” Ayrlyn shrugged. “The conflict just got to her.”
“What do we do?” asked the medtech. “There’s nothing in the kits, little enough left anyway, and we’re saving that for childbirths.”
“She’ll be all right.” Ayrlyn sighed, then sank onto the stairs.
Nylan could feel her exhaustion, almost the way he had felt when he had worked hard manipulating the fields for the laser-or the powernet on the Winterlance. The Winterlance seemed a lifetime ago, and, in a way, it was.
“Just take her up to her bunk. She’ll be all right when she wakes.” Ayrlyn’s voice was low and hoarse.
“You sure?” asked Jaseen.
The singer and healer nodded.
Jaseen turned and called to Weindre, who stood gaping by the stairs from the lower level. “Give me a hand.”
“Istril’s there.”
“Get your rump over here. Last thing we need is Istril lugging weights up.stairs. Then we’ll have someone else needing medical care we haven’t got the supplies for.”
As Weindre neared, Istril said quietly, “I’m sorry.”
“You’ve got nothing to be sorry for,” said Jaseen. “Someday it’ll be her turn, and she’ll need help.”
As the two guards carried Murkassa up to the next level, followed by Istril, Nylan said to Ayrlyn, “Stay here. I’ll be right back.”
He hurried down to the kitchen and cornered Kadran. “I need some bread, something for the healer.”
“Healer?”
“Ayrlyn used that healing touch on Murkassa-she went crazy, Murkassa, I mean-and Ayrlyn looks like she’s been run over by a couple of horses.”
Kadran frowned. “Just a little. You never lie anyway, ser, but some, they’d tell me anything to get more to eat, and we got to keep it fair.”
“I know. I appreciate it.”
“Here you go, ser.” Kadran cut a thin slice from the end of a loaf cooling on the table. “Just try not to talk about it, or everyone will have a tale of some sort.”
Nylan nodded wryly. “I’d gathered as much. Thank you.”
Nylan carried the thin slice of the bitter and dark bread up the stairs, where he handed it to Ayrlyn.
The healer took it without speaking and began to eat, slowly. More slowly, the color returned to her face. “How did you know?” she asked after she licked the few crumbs from around her lips.
“I could… sense it. You sort of manipulated the whiteness away from her, but that takes energy.”
For a moment, neither spoke as Jaseen and Weindre trudged back down the steps. Nylan moved to let them pass.
“We got her in her bunk. Istril’s staying with her,” Jaseen announced.
“Thank you, Jaseen, Weindre,” said Ayrlyn.
“No problem. Want you around to do that healing if I need it.” Jaseen offered a smile and a half salute. “We’re going down where it’s warm.” After the guards had disappeared into the lower level, Nylan sank back onto the stone step.
“Thank you,” Ayrlyn said.
“You’re welcome.” He added, “I saw Murkassa after you put her to sleep, and I was thinking how thin she was.” He shifted his weight on the stone.
“Everyone’s thin. Haven’t you noticed that?” Ayrlyn glanced down at the entry space by the closed south door, then back at Nylan. “The fact that Istril, Siret, Ryba, and Ellysia are pregnant takes our minds away from it-that and the bulky clothes. We’re not on what seems to be a starvation diet, but you need three to four times the food intake if you’re active in cold weather, and we have to be active-for a number of reasons-like getting enough wood to keep from freezing. So we really don’t have enough food.”
“Is it ever going to get warmer?”
“It already is. The ice is thinner on the windows, and before long they’ll stay clear all the time.” Ayrlyn paused. “I worry about the food, though. Darkness knows what it will be like by early summer.”
Nylan nodded. They needed more hares, more game… more everything. He knew what he was doing from now on.
“You can’t do it all, Nylan,” Ayrlyn said softly.“
“You can’t solve every problem.”
“But I have to do what I can.” His eyes met hers. “How could I live with myself if I didn’t?”
After a moment, she looked down at the stones. Then she raised her brown eyes to his. “I appreciate that, but it will always bring you sadness, because people take advantage of it, just like they only respond to force.” Her fingers touched his hand for an instant, and he could feel the warmth that was more than physical-and the sweet sadness-before she dropped them.
He nodded. “I know. So do you.”
Their eyes met for a moment before he looked away. Why was she the only one who really understood? Or was she?
After another long moment, he asked, “Do you need anything else?”
“No,” Ayrlyn answered with a faint and enigmatic smile. “The bread was fine. I don’t need anything else to eat.”
Nylan nodded again, and helped Ayrlyn to her feet. “I have to get back to woodworking.”
“I know.”
Again, he could feel her eyes on his back as he went down the stone steps to the lower level.
LXIV
ZELDYAN RESETTLES HERSELF in the large padded chair beside the bed, wearing a green silksheen dressing gown that, while it sets off her golden hair, barely covers her midsection. “He’s active,” she says, looking down and smiling. “I wish he weren’t quite so… strong.”
“You always say ‘he.’ ” Sillek stands up from the chair that matches the one where Zeldyan sits.
“You always question that. The child is a boy. Even if he were a girl, would it matter? We’re young.”
“It matters not to me.” Sillek steps up beside her chair, bends, and kisses her cheek.
“But it matters to all the holders, and to your enemies.” A touch of bitterness creeps into Zeldyan’s voice. She shifts her weight in the chair. “I can’t ever get comfortable these days.”
“A lord is always captive to his people’s perceptions.” Sillek glances toward the window, beyond which he can glimpse the distant fields, half white, half brown.
“You mean the perceptions of the holders and those with wealth?” Zeldyan again shifts her weight in the chair and glances toward the corner that holds the chamber pot.
“I cannot support a large standing army. So I must have the support of the large holders. They want the succession of Lornth to be ensured.”
“If either a son or a daughter could hold Lornth, there would be more stability.”
“Not as they see it.” Sillek reaches down and squeezes Zeldyan’s shoulder. “Only men can be holders.”
“Or warriors. Or lords.” Zeldyan glances up. “Even your mother feels that way, and she understands more than most men. Yet she pushes and pushes for you to attack those women on the Roof of the World. Even enlisting foreign traders.”
“Lygon… he can’t do that much, and we can make that work to our advantage.”
“For now,” she agrees. “But how can you put off .all these questions of honor that your mother raises or the idea that you are weak if you do not attack the Roof of the World?” Her lips tighten, and she forces them to relax.
“I can put that off for a time,” he muses. “But not forever.”
“I know. If you fail to strengthen Lornth”-she looks to the closed door-“Ildyrom will likely succeed in taking it. If you are successful, then all the holders will demand you reclaim the Roof of the World.”
Sillek nods slowly.
“What real good is that land? Only angels or demons could live there. Was it worth your father’s death? If a few damned women want to live there…” Zeldyan shakes her head.
“Some women have already deserted their households. One was caught; the others were not.”
“Oh… so the idea of a refuge where women are not beaten, where they can bear arms-that frightens the strong men of Lornth?” Zeldyan shifts her weight in the chair again. “I’m sorry, Sillek. It’s not you. You’ve been fair and open. And, in his own way, so is my sire.”
“I’m still Lord of Lornth, and the men have the power, and they look to me to put things right-as they see it.”
“As they see it… what they see will be the death of us all.”
“I am trying to work around that.”
“I know. I know.”
“I’ll be back.” Sillek bends and kisses her cheek again. “At midday?”
“At midday.” Her eyes drift toward the chamber pot.
LXV
“IT HURTS… NO one said it would hurt like this… damn you, Ryba! Damn you!”
Siret’s words, muffled by the steps and the ceiling and floor separating the great room from the marine quarters above, were still clear.
Nylan looked at Ryba.
“Childbirth hurts,” the marshal said, “as I’m going to find out firsthand before too long.” She winced slightly as Siret yelled again.
The space across from Nylan was vacant. Both Ayrlyn and Jaseen were up with Siret. At the base of the table, Gerlich glanced quizzically at Nylan, then whispered something to Narliat. The former armsman raised his eyebrows and looked at Nylan.
Nylan could almost sense the pain rolling down from the upper level. Finally, he stood. “Maybe I can help Ayrlyn.”
“You’re not a healer or a medtech,” pointed out Ryba.
“No… but healing takes a sort of… field strength… and I can help there. Besides,” he pointed out, tossing the words back over his shoulder, “I’m not good at standing around and doing nothing.”
The silence behind him lasted but a moment, and the buzzing of conversations rose, louder than before, even before he started up the stairs.
Siret’s face was red as Nylan approached the couch in the dimness of the candlelit third level. Ayrlyn was pale, and Jaseen glanced at the engineer as if to ask what he was doing there.
“Good,” murmured Ayrlyn.
Without asking, Nylan touched the back of Ayrlyn’s neck, trying to extend that sense of ordered power. Through Ayrlyn he could sense the wrongness.
“Need to move her,” he said quietly, “the child.”
“How?” murmured Ayrlyn.
Nylan didn’t know. He knew only that it felt wrong. He let go of Ayrlyn and touched Siret’s left arm.
For the first time, she saw him. “You came. You came.”
“Hush,” he said, embarrassed. “We’ll see what we can do.”
Jaseen frowned and mouthed behind Ayrlyn’s back, “The baby’s stuck.”
Nylan nodded, but his perceptions reached out again, almost, it seemed, ind
ependently, trying to catalogue the problems, from the cord that was around the child’s neck to the tightness of the birth canal to…
First… as though he were guiding a laser, he strengthened the flow of blood, oxygen, life force-in the confusion of mixing systems, he did what felt right, hoping that his feelings were correct, since he was no doctor, only an engineer. But there were no doctors.
“She’s breathing easier…” murmured Jaseen.
Ayrlyn nodded.
“… hurts, hurts so much,” whimpered Siret.
Nylan’s legs were shaking, and he went down on his knees beside the former lander couch, his fingers brushing the silver-haired guard’s forehead, then her abdomen as he tried to loosen what needed to be loosened, ever so gently, half wondering if he were dreaming or dead, as the room took on an aJmost surreal air, as he kept shifting the strange black-tinged forces in a pattern he did not quite understand, but could only feel.
Beside him, he could feel another black-tinged presence, sometimes helping, sometimes leading.
“There!” exclaimed Ayrlyn. “There! Push again!”
“I’m pushing,” groaned Siret.
Nylan closed his eyes for a moment, trying to get the room to stop swirling around him.
“You have to push again,” announced Jaseen. “You’ve still got the afterbirth.”
“Hurts…” Siret’s voice was low, but stronger.
“You can do it.”
“Good.”
After a time, the engineer stood and looked at Ayrlyn. “You did it.”
“No, you did it. I didn’t have the nerve to try until you started.”
“We did it, then.”
They looked at Siret, and at the girl she held to her breast, the infant with the silver fuzz on her scalp that would be silver hair like her mother’s.
Siret smiled, finally, wanly, and then said, “Thank you. I could feel you changing things… somehow. She wouldn’t have lived, would she?”
“No,” said Jaseen. “But she’s a strong little girl. So don’t you worry. Now, we’ve got to get you two cleaned up, and I can do that. Those two”-and she jerked her head toward Nylan and Ayrlyn-“they spent every bit of that magic they had on you. You’re a lucky woman.”
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