The Gift

  "I think all of us will soon know more of the Dark," she said. "The world shrinks, and a bitter winter is coming."

  Chapter VII

  THE WELCOME FEAST

  IT WAS late afternoon the following day before Maerad woke. She was so warm and comfortable that at first she didn't want to open her eyes. She thought she still dreamed, and that beyond her closed eyelids waited the grim world she was used to; but then she remembered where she was and sat up, tousled and still half-awake, rubbing her eyes. The late sunlight shafted through the open casement, touching all the objects in the room with a still, golden light, and she could hear the various voices of the fountain and behind that, strains of music. Outside she could see the top branches of a tree burdened with puffs of pink blossom, and a gentle breeze bathed her cheeks with a delicious smell. The gloomy premonitions of the night before seemed like a bad dream.

  "Good afternoon," said Cadvan. "I trust you slept well?"

  Maerad jumped and turned around. Cadvan was sitting on a chair in the corner of the bedchamber, a big, leather-bound book open on his lap. He closed it carefully and placed it on a table.

  "Someone should have woken me...."

  "Woken you up? On pain of death! Silvia is taking your welfare somewhat to heart, Maerad. Be warned! She sat here this morning, but duties called her, and she wanted to make sure someone was here when you awoke. And, as I have no duties, I was given this one."

  Maerad felt abashed. "I don't mean to cause any trouble," she said. Cadvan crossed the room and sat on the bed, taking her hand.

  "Maerad," he said seriously. "You are in another world now, where it is considered that every human being is worth the trouble of being cared for. No matter who they are. You have a Gift, a special Gift, so people are all the more interested. You must begin to understand this."

  She was silent for a time, still looking down. "They are very kind people, Malgorn and Silvia," she murmured indistinctly. "And you have been kind to me."

  "I haven't been especially kind," said Cadvan wryly.

  "You have been kind. You took me out of Gilman's Cot. You didn't have to. But I don't know how to behave here. I don't know anything. I don't belong." She felt tears gathering in her throat, and gulped them back.

  "In time you will know how you belong. Be patient. You've only just arrived. You must understand, Maerad, that I belong nowhere either. Music is my home. As it is for you."

  Maerad felt she couldn't bear his understanding, and in a way preferred his brusqueness. She gulped again, but a tear was already running down her nose. Before Cadvan scried her, she hadn't cried for years: not after her mother died, not for anyone, not for anything. The world she lived in had been too harsh for tears. She felt as if a grief dammed up in her for years was bursting its banks, about to give way, and each of Cadvan's words loosened further its bulwarks. Cadvan was looking into her face with concern, but she refused to meet his eyes and stared down at the coverlet, her cheeks hot. With all her will, she pushed back her tears.

  "I suppose I should get dressed," she said at last.

  "Your clothes are waiting for you over there," said Cadvan, pointing to a carved trunk, on which was draped the robe she had worn the night before. He stood up a little awkwardly. "I'll put this book away now. If you like, I'll come back after you're dressed and show you around the School. If you're hungry, we'll go to the kitchens and see what they have for a late afternoon snack. Would that suit you?"

  Maerad nodded, and he left the room. She got out of bed and picked up her lyre. As soon as she felt it in her hands, she felt better. It was hers, the only thing that had ever been hers. What had Cadvan said? Music is my home. She brushed a couple of chords across the strings, and was about to play when a discomfort she had been feeling in her belly suddenly blossomed into agonizing cramps. It was as if claws had reached inside her and were pulling her innards apart. It took all her will to put the lyre down safely, and then she sank to the floor, gasping. She felt something trickle down her leg. The cramps subsided a little, and she looked; it was blood, great red drops of blood. It soaked through her linen nightdress and onto the polished wooden floor. What was wrong with her? Doubled over, she crawled back to the bed, but couldn't climb onto it. She concentrated on breathing, as she did when she was beaten, to keep her mind off the pain, but it didn't go away. She was sobbing with fright.

  Cadvan knocked on the door three times before she heard him, but on the third knock he had already entered, calling her name. When he saw her on the floor he ran, picking her up and putting her on the bed. "What's the matter?" he asked.

  "I, I don't know," she said, between spasms. "It hurts so much. I'm bleeding, and it hurts." She gasped again in a paroxysm of pain.

  "Bleeding?" said Cadvan sharply. "Where?"

  "There's blood down my legs. I don't remember being hurt. . . ." She gasped again and grasped his hand so hard his fingers went white. Cadvan looked at her pale, sweating face and felt her temperature.

  "Maerad, tell me," he said. "Has this happened to you before?"

  She shook her head. He looked down, and even through her discomfort Maerad sensed his embarrassment. She had thought him incapable of blushing.

  "I think it's the menarche," he said, after a long pause. "Do you know what that is?"

  She shook her head again. "I should get Silvia," he said. Maerad grabbed his hand in panic, and Cadvan sat irresolute as she doubled over again. It was passing through his head that he would much rather deal with a dozen wers than a girl having her first period.

  "Am I going to die?" whispered Maerad, terror naked in her voice. "I'm cursed, aren't I?"

  Cadvan took a deep breath. "No, you are not going to die, nor are you cursed. It is a thing that happens to women, all women. It's a bit late for you, that's all. It doesn't mean you are sick."

  "Then why does it hurt so much?"

  "I don't know, Maerad. It does sometimes. I should find Silvia."

  "Don't leave me!"

  Cadvan sighed, and sat down again on the bed. "I'll wait a little while," he said. He loosened her hand off his, as he could feel the bones grinding together, and Maerad grabbed his forearm instead. He summoned all his patience and waited. It wasn't long before Maerad straightened up. "It's going, I think," she whispered unsteadily. She realized that she was holding Cadvan's arm so hard that her nails dug into his flesh. She let go. Cadvan was looking a little pale.

  "You'll be all right," he said. There was a short silence, and he stood up. "I should call Silvia now. She'll know what to do." Maerad nodded, and Cadvan ran from the chamber.

  Before long Silvia arrived, her eyes sparkling with amusement, holding a bottle of elixir and some cloths. She made Maerad take a dose of the elixir, which tasted bitter but not unpleasant, and then helped her to dress. Her reassuring practicality was a balm to Maerad's distress; by the time she was dressed, she felt almost cheerful. Then Silvia sat down with her on the bed and explained the bleeding of women. Maerad nodded, her face scarlet.

  "I thought it only happened to women who were cursed," she confessed shamefacedly. "They used to call it the curse. I always prayed it would never happen to me."

  If Silvia had smiled even a little, Maerad would have shriveled inside, but she answered her gravely. "It's no wonder you never bled, considering how thin you are," she said. "Here women think it a blessing, not a curse. Some call it the flowering."

  Maerad digested this information in silence. "It means that if you wish, you can now have children, that you are a grown woman coming into her power," Silvia went on. "It is dreadful that any girl should be kept in such ignorance of her own body. But still, you have no mother." She kissed her cheek and then, unable to hold it back, started giggling. Maerad eyed her warily. "I have never seen Cadvan so pale. He came flying into the kitchens as if a brace of wights were chasing him. I thought there must be a fire!"

  Maerad began to laugh as well. "I thought I was dying! I think I nearly broke his hand."

  "It wa
s a little hard to find out what was wrong," said Silvia, wiping her eyes. "He was speaking with such delicacy I thought there was something wrong with him. He hasn't had much to do with women, these past years." She picked up her bottle and stood up. "In any case, you definitely need to eat. Come, we'll find you something."

  In the day-lit corridor Maerad had her first chance to look around her. The sandstone walls bore no decoration, save the graceful carvings around the doors and windows, and a level sunbeam shafting through a long window over the stairwell turned the stone a warm pink. "Upstairs are all the sleeping chambers, and a couple of music rooms," Silvia explained as they walked. "And down are just the kitchens and dining rooms and libraries. This is a humble house, but I have grown to love it." Maerad blinked at the thought that this apex of luxury was humble, but said nothing.

  Downstairs Silvia took her through to a huge flagged kitchen dominated by a long, scrubbed wooden table. Copper and iron pots and pans hung from racks suspended from the roof, and the walls were lined with jars filled with seeds and oils and flours and rows of preserved fruits and vegetables, and bunches of dried herbs and garlic and onions hung from hooks. Against one wall was a huge hearth, and next to that a big black oven. Men and women preparing food for the evening meal smiled at Maerad, and some greeted Silvia. Silvia nodded back and made for the pantry, where she put some fresh bread and cheeses, slices of cold meat, and salad onto a plate, handing it to Maerad, and then to the buttery, where she poured a tall glass of milk from a high green jug. Then she shepherded her out of the kitchen and through a tiny roofed lane into a courtyard. Maerad realized it was encircled by the entire house, which was square-shaped, and all the inner windows overlooked it. Jasmine and honeysuckles climbed trestles set in the walls, and spring flowers of all kinds, nasturtiums and bluebells and daisies and daffodils and crocuses, nodded in garden beds artfully placed to look as if they grew wild. In the center was a close-leafed lawn of chamomile, and in one corner a small bronze pig stood on a stone plinth, water pouring from its mouth into a little pool in which Maerad could see the silver and orange glint of fish turning slowly beneath lily pads. A flagged path led to a stone table and a bench in the middle of the lawn, and here Silvia placed the milk and asked Maerad to sit down.

  "You must eat the salad and meats," she said, sitting next to her. "You'll feel better for them." She settled down on the bench. Maerad hadn't realized she was so hungry but, chastened by Silvia's presence, ate as delicately as she could. The food was delicious. The only cheeses she knew were the hard and oversalted rounds made at Gilman's Cot, and the soft white cheese Silvia had cut for her melted on her tongue like nothing she had ever tasted. The salad greens were also a revelation. She had eaten cabbage, usually boiled into a sour soup, and the green tops of turnips and kale, again boiled, but had never eaten raw leaves. She approached the salad with suspicion, and was enraptured by the sharp, crisp tastes: peppery watercress and a pleasantly bitter purple lettuce, mixed with fragrant herbs, savory and basil and mint. As she ate, she asked Silvia the names of the plants and mulled over the answers. The only herb she knew was mint.

  "I see I've got a lot to learn, about all sorts of things," she said meditatively, when she had finished. "I do feel better now." She smiled openly at Silvia for the first time.

  "We'll make you into a gourmand in no time!" said Silvia. "Pleasure is the greatest part of learning, they say. There's a bit of color in your face, at least. It will keep you going until dinnertime."

  "But I thought that was dinner," said Maerad, taken aback.

  "No, my dear. Just a snack to stave off the pangs of starvation. You missed out on breakfast and lunch, remember. If you are up to it, there is a feast tonight, for the Meet. How are you feeling? Are you tired?"

  "I'm all right," said Maerad. "Well, actually I've never felt better in my life. I feel... oh, I feel so ... happy." She suddenly felt uncertain again, as if an admission of happiness was also an admission of weakness, and she glanced quickly at Silvia. "What's a Meet?"

  "A gathering of the Bards, as you heard last night. This one is particularly important, called to determine policy in northern Annar. It is Bard business, which is to say, the business of the Light. There will be singing and saying, and much else, over the next few days. No doubt you will be part of the business discussed."

  "Me?"

  "Yes, my girl. You had better get used to it. News of your arrival has spread through the School like wildfire. I've heard already that Cadvan rescued you from a magic lion, and that he found you in a chicken coop, and that he entered the dungeons of the Shadow King and fought his way out single-handedly, carrying you on his shoulders. There are many imaginative minds here, which in the absence of facts will invent an exciting story to fill the gap. So is our strength our weakness." Seeing Maerad's discomfort, she changed the subject. "But now, tell me about where you came from. Do you remember much of Pellinor?"

  Under Silvia's gentle questioning, Maerad told the little that she knew of herself and her family, and talked of her life at Gilman's Cot. Silvia listened intently, her brow darkening.

  "Were you beaten often?" she asked, when Maerad spoke of the attempt to drown her.

  "Everyone got beaten. Even Gilman's woman usually had a black eye," said Maerad dismissively "Me less than most. I pretended to be a witch." She glanced sideways at Silvia, wondering how she would react, but her face was unreadable. "They were scared to beat me too much, you see. They thought I would curse them."

  "In Innail, no one is beaten," Silvia said.

  "No one?" said Maerad, her mouth open.

  "No one. And especially not children. To deliberately hurt a child is considered a crime."

  Maerad turned this information over in her head. It astonished her. "Then how are people punished, if they don't obey the Thane?" she inquired, and then added doubtfully, "I suppose there is no Thane."

  "There is a Steward of Innail, who lives in Tinagel, a town about five miles from here, and then there are the Bards," said Silvia. "Together they govern the Fesse, which is to say, the region and the people. It's a bit complicated. We have laws, but they are not often broken. If they are, there are punishments: a man who murders another, say, will be tried in a court of Bards and townspeople. They will decide what is best. Usually it is some kind of restitution—he might be bound to serve the family that he has hurt for a number of years, for example, or perhaps pay wergild. If he is sick, or mad, as sometimes happens, he will be treated for his sickness. Someone who steals will have to return what is stolen. In the worst instances, people will be banished from Innail. We don't imprison people here."

  "But how would that stop murder or thieving?" said Maerad, even more amazed. "If someone's not afraid of being punished, they'll just do it again, won't they?"

  "So some people argue. But the fact is, there is very little crime here," answered Silvia. "People sleep with their doors unlocked. There are no hungry people in this valley, and so people are not forced to desperate acts. The law is that the hungry must be fed, and the homeless must be housed, and the sick must be healed. That is the way of the Light."

  Maerad was silent for some time, digesting these new ideas. More than anything she had heard or experienced since she had been in Innail, they brought home to her that she was in a different world. She felt frankly sceptical of their efficacy, thinking of Gilman's thugs, but kept her doubts to herself.

  Silvia turned the conversation to music, and her interest quickened when Maerad told her of Mirlad.

  "He taught you?" she asked.

  "Yes, but only music," said Maerad. "I didn't know anything about the Schools or the Gift or the Speech until Cadvan told me. Mirlad said songs were only to pass the time more gently, until death ended all time." A vivid image of Mirlad's face rose before her: his hawklike nose, his harsh mouth compressed by—who knew what?—sorrow or bitterness, his hooded, weary eyes, in which sometimes there gleamed an unexpected gentleness.

  "He must have been a Bard
," said Silvia. "Perhaps he lost his way. Such things happen. I wonder where he was from, and what was his history? It must be a sad story. And your mother? Did she teach you?"

  "She ... I don't remember much. She taught me some songs. I was only seven when she died." Maerad's face closed, and Silvia waited, holding her breath. "I don't remember her ever telling me about Pellinor. But when Cadvan asked me, I just knew. How is that?"

  "Cadvan is a Truthteller," said Silvia seriously. "There are different kinds of Bards, as you will discover. Bards like Cadvan are the most rare, and the path they tread is the most perilous. He can bring the truth out of a person, just by asking, even if they didn't know it was there."

  "Yes," said Maerad thoughtfully. "I can see that. He is harsh, sometimes, and distant. But he hasn't lied to me."

  "No, nor will he, if he counts you friend, though he is wily too, and apt at the arts of disguise. He is a difficult person to know well. Most Bards are."

  They paused, watching the shadows lengthen over the courtyard.

  "Are you a Bard, Silvia?" asked Maerad suddenly.

  "Yes, I am," said Silvia. "My knowledge is mainly with herblore and medicine. I do not study the high knowledge of peoples long dead or the histories of Annar and the Seven Kingdoms or the great battles of Light and Dark, as Cadvan does. Malgorn's knowledge is that of beasts, the beasts of the farmyard and of the wild. Few know as much as he does of the secret ways of animals, and none more than he of the husbandry of this land. The ways of Barding are many, but all are important in the life of this land, and all meet in singing, which braids together the different knowings into a wide and subtle music, the music of living." Silvia seemed no longer to be aware of Maerad's presence, and gazed into an unseen distance. "It is a great Gift, the Gift of Barding," she said softly. "And a great love, and a great burden. For all that we care for and love so much must die. And is not all our singing a lament for all that is green and fair and must pass, like shadows on a plain, leaving no trace behind? What song, however so fair, can staunch that anguish?"