“Get moving, man,” another man said, shoving Matthew. He glared at the other. “And you shut that stupid mystical babble about the Red Queen coming back. Everyone knows she’s dead.”
Then the dragon appeared, smashing through the wall and howling. It snatched Matthew up, and he screamed as it bit into him.
I shuddered but forced myself to read on. There were two more brief entries within which Matthew appeared, breaking rock with a mallet in some sort of quarry, and a third entry of him staring at boats in a harbor. Finally, I laid the book aside, thinking of the similar details reported by the dreamers. It could only mean that they had seen Matthew in reality—a slave in a hot, red land over the sea.
“Are you coming, Elspeth?” Gevan’s coercive mental prod hammered into my mind.
I sent that I would come as soon as I had visited the Healer hall.
“Make it fast, then. You can collect Roland and the twins on the way.”
I gave my almost dry hair a shake to loosen it and dressed hurriedly. The shawl I had been gifted was incredibly soft against my skin, and the slippers fit perfectly. I dabbed on some rose oil and ran downstairs, leaving the door ajar for Maruman.
Roland and Kella met me at the entrance to the Healer hall, their eyes widening as they took in my finery.
“Oh, Elspeth! You look beautiful!” Kella sighed, fingering the embroidered shawl. She was dressed in her normal drab gray and white skirt and shirt, the little owl fixed to her shoulder like an oversize shawl brooch. Seeing my amusement, she said it was less trouble to let it use her as a perch than to have it fly about, banging into things looking for her.
Miky and Angina came out of their borrowed chamber, clad in matching lavender tunics with violet trimmings.
“You did a good job last night,” I told them warmly. “The dragon did not once visit me in the night.”
“It was more tiring than I expected,” Angina admitted.
“Oughtn’t you to be sleeping now?”
“I had a couple of hours when I was sure everyone else was awake,” the empath said. “But I don’t want to miss the moon fair.”
“But tonight…,” I began.
“He will be fine,” Roland rumbled. “I’ll siphon off fatigue until I can’t stay awake, then Kella will relieve me. It’s just a pity the dragon isn’t as charmed by Miky’s music. It would have been a lot simpler for them to alternate.”
“I wonder why it prefers your music, Angina,” I said. “After all, Miky is a fine musician as well.”
“Better than I am,” Angina said firmly. “Stronger.”
“Maybe so, but strength is obviously not what Dragon needs,” Miky said.
The subject lapsed as we came out into the sunlit courtyard where Maryon and Dell, clad in palest blue tunics, waited with Garth. The Teknoguildmaster merely wore a cleaner version of his normal brown tunic, and Gevan was dressed in a shining black robe trimmed with rather gaudy red cloth flowers, but beside him, Miryum looked no different than usual, her clothes as somber as her expression. I guessed her mind was less on the moon fair than on the meeting she must later have with the Sadorian, Straaka. I would have to find a moment during the day to let her know what I had told him.
“I have the potmetal bracelets,” Garth said. “I also have some exciting news!”
“Let’s get moving while you talk,” Gevan pressed, and ushered us into the maze. Most of the snow was melted now, and the leaves were losing their numbed look.
“You found the base of the Reichler Clinic building?” I guessed.
He nodded. “It was buried under a mass of silt and mud, and though that is going to be cursed difficult to shift, there is at least one level above the ground intact. This means the main entrance is accessible.”
“What about the basement?” I asked.
“Well, that will be trickier, but I think we will manage it,” Garth said, looking positively demonic in his enthusiasm.
Alad was waiting for us at the farm gate, clad in moss-green velvet. With him were Gahltha, Faraf, and the pale-eyed Rasial on behalf of the beasts, and Louis Larkin on behalf of the unTalents. He had even brushed his wild mop of hair, which made him look only slightly less ferocious than usual. The rest of Obernewtyn’s populace was arrayed by the barns in the distance. The sight of them, Talents, unTalents, and beasts assembled together, brought a lump to my throat.
Alad welcomed me to the farms formally as Master of Obernewtyn in Rushton’s stead. Then he welcomed the other guildleaders and our Sadorian guests, and led the way down the orchard path to the crowd assembled around the small grassy patch under a pear tree where Rushton traditionally spoke to open the festivities. I made a short speech praising everyone for their work during the year and inviting them to enjoy the day of rest and celebration. My words felt uninspired and brusque. In truth, I felt rather nervous having to talk to so many people all at once.
Dell then retold the story of the Battlegames in Sador with simple eloquence, pointing to the self-knowledge we had acquired in losing to the rebels. When she unfurled her guild’s annual gift to Obernewtyn, there was a universal sigh. The tapestry was truly magnificent. None of the futuretellers had ever seen the desert lands, yet they had managed to capture perfectly the burning dryness and blinding salt-white heat of the sand dunes, contrasting them with the carved stone cliffs and the dazzling blue of the sea. They had even included a ship and several ship fish at one corner.
I thanked them for their gift, managing to be slightly less stilted, because most of the audience were concentrating on the tapestry. “We have made many efforts to redefine ourselves since the Battlegames. Let us hope that we will soon see the fruit of our efforts ripen. Let us hope that just as Gevan’s magi are applauded and admired, Misfits, too, will someday be accepted at last.” I paused, searching for a way to end my speech, but I realized there was one important thing yet to be said.
“This tapestry also reminds me of another thing, and that is the absence of our beloved Empath guildmaster. I know you are all as disappointed as I am not to have him with us today. He remains with the Sadorians in order to receive high and deserved honors from the tribes, which will further cement our friendship with them. But our honored Sadorian guests have promised to faithfully render a tapestry of words to him of this day so that he can share it with us.”
There was a spontaneous burst of clapping, and I stepped back with relief, my task done. Alad took my place and invited everyone to find a soft piece of grass and wait for oiled groundsheets to be handed out. After everyone was seated, midmeal would be served.
The guildleaders traditionally sat together at the celebratory moon-fair midmeal. We spread two large canvases and a scatter of cushions under the pear tree and were soon joined by Enoch and Louis Larkin and by the Sadorians. Miryum slipped away to join her coercer-knights, and I saw Straaka’s eyes follow her with longing, but he made no move to go after her.
Katlyn’s helpers handed out plates and knives and sturdy mugs, and I leaned my back against the pear tree and breathed in the delicious savory smell of pies and pastries and herbed soups.
“You seem very self-satisfied,” Alad said, looking amused.
“And why not,” I said, smiling lazily at him. “It is a beautiful day, and a splendid feast is about to be laid out for us. And although my words were less impressive than Rushton would have managed, they are over and done with.”
“Truly no one has his gift for speechmaking,” Roland said. “But I daresay he’ll make up for it tonight at the guilding ceremony. And I am very curious to hear what news he’ll bring from the lowlands.”
Gevan said, “I might just as well tell you all that Enoch has just brought me news that the Councilman of Sawlney wants the magi to play at his daughter’s bonding ceremony. The invitation and a request to see that it reaches us was made to a group of halfbreed gypsies who, of course, knew nothing of us. By sheer chance, Enoch heard them deliberating about which troupe it could be.”
“Y
ou want to accept it?” I asked.
“I do. It is too good an opportunity to miss.”
“You will have to present the whole thing to guildmerge,” I said.
Gevan nodded and reached for a slice of pie.
As soon as the main part of the feast had been consumed and we had moved on to little preserved-berry pies and lemon tarts, a good number of empaths vanished into the barn.
“What is happening now?” Bruna demanded.
“We are about to see a performance,” Alad told her. “Each guild has an offering for this moon fair, a sort of gift. There are displays from the Teknoguild, and—”
A bell clanged, and Miky and Angina emerged from the barn wearing billowing violet cloaks over their clothes. They bowed in unison; then Miky spoke in a clear, strong voice. “Our moon-fair offering is not a story of things that truly happened but a created story under which slumbers a deeper truth than can be told with mere facts.”
The twins bowed again, and Angina withdrew to one side to sit on a small stool set against the barn wall. He was joined by several other empath musicians, and some moments passed while they set themselves up with stools and tuned their various instruments. Then there was complete silence.
Still standing, Miky nodded her head slightly. Nothing happened, or so it seemed, but one of the musicians had begun to play very, very softly. The other musicians joined in, swelling the sound, and at last Miky sang.
The strength and purity of her tone caught my breath, and then I sensed Angina begin to empathise his sister’s music, enhancing and projecting the emotional tones in her voice so that they thrummed in your heart as well as your ears. I was so entranced that I scarcely noticed three black-clad coercers slip from the barn to stand behind Miky.
The twins had written the song based on Dameon’s retelling of a Beforetime story, but it had been much developed and elaborated since the last time I had heard it. I was trying to pick out the initial tune from the rest when all at once, a beautiful young woman clad in a lavish white dress, all sewn over with tiny pearls, appeared on the grassy stretch between Miky and the audience.
There was a loud gasp, for of course she was a coerced illusion. Ordinarily, I disliked any sort of tampering with my perceptions, and I could easily have blocked the vision, but I was riveted. With her mass of fiery red hair all wound through with pearls and roses and hanging to her slender waist, and her bright blue eyes, the woman reminded me inescapably of Dragon as she might grow to look in womanhood.
“Incredible!” Alad muttered beside me.
The emotions being empathised became more complex, and I realized that I was feeling the princess’s boredom with the privilege and selfishness of court life. I experienced in song and empathy her concern for all the poor of the kingdom who would never have a full belly, let alone a pearl-encrusted gown.
Next I felt the young woman’s fear as a wicked Beforetime scientist appeared, boasting to the court of his machines and abilities. Everyone laughed and praised him except the princess, who feared what would come of his dark manipulations. Inevitably, the Beforetime scientist went too far. Driven mad by his lust for power and angered by her reproaches, he ended up cursing the princess to sleep forever. As she fell, the court wailed in horror. But a woman with shining silver hair rose up and announced herself to be a futureteller. She promised that the princess would not sleep forever, but only until one came who knew the secret of healing her.
Weeping servants lay the princess on a carved golden bed studded with jewels, and surrounded by a bed of roses. As years passed, the roses grew up over her in a bower, and then a room, and then a castle of flowers with thick thorns, as dark as claws.
Then the story shifted to a prince, and I cried out in delight, for whose face should the prince wear but Dameon’s! Blind Prince Dameon sat on his balcony, listening to a bard sing all we had just heard of a princess asleep these hundred years.
That night, the prince dreamed that the sleeping beauty was calling to him, singing in a beautiful voice. The sweetness in it caught his soul and bound it. In the morning, he set out, determined the sleeping princess would be his bondmate. With him was his faithful companion, a horse that would be his eyes.
He heard more of the story from innkeepers and jacks as they traveled toward the dark forest of thorns. Numerous princes had tried over the years to reach the princess, but neither they alone, nor the entire armies some of them mustered, had succeeded in hacking their way through the forest to the princess. Many died painfully, for the thorns were poisonous and sharper than daggers. One king had tried to set the thorns ablaze in a rage, though he might well have burned the princess, too. But the forest only smoldered, giving off a poisonous smoke that had killed the king and his men at arms.
Prince Dameon was disheartened, for the more he heard, the more he wondered how one blind man could go where an army could not. When he reached the impenetrable thorn forest, he fell silent, for though he could not see it, he felt the heaviness of its shadow looming over him, and he understood that it had its own sentient life. He took out his dagger but did not wield it.
He sat beneath the thorns to think, using the knife to peel an apple. His horse trembled beside him, begging him to come away, but Prince Dameon bade the horse wait for him at a stream they had passed. The prince loved his companion too dearly to risk him as well.
When he was alone, he stood and turned to address the brooding presence of the thorn forest. “Are you not there to protect her from all the wrong princes who came before?”
The forest did not answer, but he felt it listening.
“If so, then how did you know they were wrong for her?” Miky sang blind Prince Dameon’s words to the forest. “The stories tell that they came with swords and knives and tried to fight their way through you to her. They saw you as a barrier to their desire, and they were ready to destroy you to get what they wanted. They did not try to understand you.”
The forest was still silent, but it seemed to the prince that its suppressed fury had quieted.
“You are here to protect her,” the prince repeated, “but maybe you are part of her as well. For are not the thorns as natural to the bush as is the lovely rose? Maybe you must be courted, forest, just as she would be, and maybe you must be allowed to say no to me, for does your princess’s heart not have a choice to wake or no?”
All at once, a bird sang a long peal of music.
The prince realized this was the same tune sung by the princess in his dream. He took a simple reed pipe from his vest and played back the tune. Then he embroidered it, adding his own depth and dimensions. Beneath and above the loveliness of the princess’s melody, he wove the song of his own yearnings. There was a great rustling as if the entire forest sighed, then utter stillness.
The prince ceased to play and stood wondering. Then a scent arose about him sweeter than a thousand blossoms. Slowly, he walked forward, without even lifting his hands to defend his face from the thorns. But rather than thorns, blossoms caressed his cheeks and hair. He felt the forest sigh again, and he lifted the pipe to his lips and began to play. The scent of roses became so powerful as to make him drunk, yet he played and walked slowly, allowing the forest to lead him this way and that, into its deepest heart.
Only when he stepped into the open did he cease to play. Almost he ceased to breathe, for he sensed that he was near to the princess of his dreams. He walked forward, now with his hands outstretched so that he should not strike her bed. As he touched the edge of it, smothered in roses, he heard her soft breath, and it brought him to her face. Laying aside the pipe, he touched her hair and cheeks, her eyelashes and lips, marveling at their delicate beauty and softness, and at the sweetness that flowed from her as surely as the scent from the roses.
Then, because he could not help himself, he kissed her.
The princess opened her blue eyes and spoke to him. “This gentle tune I dreamed of all through my long sleep,” she whispered. “Play on, my love.”
 
; The vision of Prince Dameon bending over the red-haired princess faded, and I realized I was weeping. I was not alone. Even Bruna and the other Sadorians were scrubbing at their cheeks.
“By the goddess, how to render a song worthy of such a performance!” Jakoby exclaimed huskily over the applause.
“That was beautiful, truly,” Bruna said. “But it is just a story. The thorns of the real world would not be turned aside by a song.”
“Not th’ song of one man, mebbe, even if he were a prince. But mebbe a song sung by many in harmony could blunt th’ thorns if that were its desire,” Maryon said. “Unfortunately, most of th’ world sings a song of hatred an’ violence.” She rose and walked away into the orchard.
“What is the matter with her?” Bruna demanded.
“Those who see visions are not as others,” Harad said respectfully.
Bruna shrugged in dismissal and turned back to finish her tart.
Gradually, people began to rise and move about. Cramped from sitting so long, I rose, too, and strolled over to where the various competitive guild games were beginning. Organized and judged by my own guild, they were the farseekers’ contribution to the day. Ceirwan was too busy to do more than wave. I watched for a time, noting with approval that the emphasis of the games was on the demonstration of hard-won skills rather than competition. These were followed by a series of games designed to amuse and entertain. They were successful, judging by the laughter of the watchers, but the empaths’ performance had left my emotions oddly raw, and before long, I drifted away.
In the center of a ring of blossom-laden trees in the orchard, each guild had set up a display of the handicrafts they had amassed during the wintertime. Of course, everything was bartered rather than exchanged for coin. Any item left over at the end of the day would be sold by the magi when they were on tour, and this would allow us to increase Obernewtyn’s supply of coin. I noticed Rosamunde and Valda, who were standing on the other side of the stalls talking earnestly. I turned away to give them privacy and found myself looking at Freya and Ceirwan, who walked by holding hands, entirely absorbed in each other.