Simon did. Camaris was a good handspan taller than he, which was interesting. Simon had become accustomed to being taller than nearly everyone.
“You are holding it like a club. Spread your hands, thus.” The knight’s long hands enfolded Simon’s own. His fingers were dry and hard, as rough as if Camaris had spent his life working the soil or building stone walls. Abruptly, by his touch, Simon realized the enormity of the old knight’s experience, understood him as far more than just a legend made flesh or an aged man full of useful lore. He could feel the countless years of hard, painstaking work, the unnumberable and largely unwanted contests of arms that this man had suffered to become the mightiest knight of his age—and all the time, Simon sensed, enjoying none of it any more than a kind-hearted priest forced to denounce an ignorant sinner.
“Now feel it as you lift,” said Camaris. “Feel how the strength comes from your legs. No, you are off your balance.” He pushed Simon’s feet closer together. “Why does a tower not fall? Because it is centered over its foundation.”
Soon he had Jeremias working, too, and working hard.
The afternoon sun seemed to move swiftly through the sky; the breeze turned icy as evening approached. As the old man put them through their rigorous paces, a certain gleam—chill, but nevertheless bright—came to his eye.
Evening had descended by the time that Camaris finally turned them loose; the bowl of the valley was filled with campfires. This day’s work to bring everyone across the river would enable the prince’s company to leave with the first light in the morning. Now the people of new Gadrinsett were laying out their temporary camps, eating belated suppers, or wandering aimlessly in the deepening dark. A mood of stillness and anticipation hung over the valley, as real as the twilight. It was a little like the Between World, Simon thought—the place before Heaven.
But it’s also the place before Hell, Simon thought. We’re not just traveling—we’re going to war … and maybe worse.
He and Jeremias walked silently, flushed with exertion, the sweat on their faces rapidly growing cold. Simon had a soreness in his muscles that was pleasant now, but experience told him that it would be less pleasant tomorrow, especially after a day on horseback. He was suddenly reminded of something.
“Jeremias, did you see to Homefinder?”
The young man looked at him in irritation. “Certainly. I said I would, didn’t I?”
“Well, I think I’m going to go have a look at her anyway.”
“Don’t you trust me?” Jeremias asked.
“Of course I do,” Simon said hastily. “It’s nothing to do with you, truly. What Sir Camaris said about a knight and his horse just … just made me think about Homefinder.” He was also feeling an urge to be on his own for a little while: other things Camaris had said needed to be thought about as well. “You understand, don’t you?”
“I suppose so.” Jeremias scowled, but didn’t seem too upset. “I’m going to go and find something to eat, myself.”
“Meet me at Isgrimnur’s fire later. I think Sangfugol is going to sing some songs.”
Jeremias continued on toward the busiest part of the camp and the tent that he, Simon, and Binabik had erected that morning. Simon peeled off, heading for the hillslope where the horses were tethered.
The evening sky was a misty violet and the stars had not yet appeared. As Simon picked his way across the slushy meadowland in growing darkness, he found himself wishing for a little moonlight. Once he slipped and fell, cursing loudly as he wiped the mud off his hands onto his breeches, which were muddy and damp enough after the long hours of swording. His boots had already become thoroughly soaked.
A figure coming toward him through murk turned out to be Freosel, returning from seeing to his own horse as well as to Josua’s Vinyafod. In this way, if no other, Freosel had taken Deornoth’s place in the prince’s life, and he seemed to fulfill the role admirably. The Falshireman had told Simon once that he came from a smithying family—something that Simon, looking at the broad-shouldered Freosel, could readily believe.
“Greetings, Sir Seoman,” he said. “See you didn’t bring torch either. If you don’t be too long, y’may not need it.” He squinted upward, gauging the fast-diminishing light. “But have a care—there be a great mud pit half a hundred steps behind me.”
“I already found one of those,” Simon laughed, gesturing to his mud-clotted boots.
Freosel looked at Simon’s feet appraisingly. “Come by my tent and I’ll give you grease for ’em. Won’t do to have that leather crack. Or be you comin’ to hear the harper sing?”
“I think so.”
“Then I’ll bring it with.” Freosel gave him a courtly nod before walking on. “Mind that mud pit!” he called back over his shoulder.
Simon kept his eyes open and managed to make his way without incident around a patch of sucking slime that was indeed a larger brother of the one with which he had already made acquaintance. He could hear the gentle whickering of the horses as he approached. They were tethered on the hillside, a dark line against the dim sky.
Homefinder was where Jeremias had said he had left her, staked to a longish rope not far from the twisted black form of a spreading oak. Simon cupped the horse’s nose in his hand and felt her warm breath, then laid his head on her neck and rubbed her shoulder. The horse scent was thick and somehow reassuring.
“You’re my horse,” he said quietly. Homefinder flicked an ear. “My horse.”
Jeremias had draped her with a heavy blanket—a gift to Simon from Gutrun and Vorzheva, one which had been his own cover until the horses were moved from their warm stables in Sesuad’ra’s caves. Simon made sure that it had been tied in place well but not too tightly. As he turned from his inspection, he saw a pale shape flitting through the darkness before him, passing through the scatter of horses. Simon felt his heart jump within his chest.
Norns?
“Wh-who’s that?” he called. He forced his voice lower and shouted again. “Who’s there? Come out!” He let his hand fall to his side, realizing after a moment that he carried no weapon but his Qanuc knife, not even the wooden practice sword.
“Simon?”
“Miriamele? Princess?” He took a few steps forward. She was peering around at him from behind one of the horses, as if she had been hiding. As he moved closer, she moved out. There was nothing unusual in her dress, a pale gown and a dark cloak, but she had an oddly defiant look on her face.
“Are you well?” he asked, then cursed himself for the stupid question. He was surprised to see her out here by herself and couldn’t think of anything to say. Another time, he supposed, when it would have better to say nothing than to speak and prove himself a mooncalf.
But why did she look so guilty?
“I am, thank you.” She looked past his shoulders on either side as if trying to decide whether Simon was alone. “I was out seeing my horse.” She indicated an undifferentiated mass of shadowy shapes farther down the hill. “He’s one of those we took from … from the Nabbanai nobleman I told you about.”
“You startled me,” Simon said, and laughed. “I thought you were a ghost or … or one of our enemies.”
“I am not an enemy,” Miriamele said with a little of her usual lightness. “I’m not a ghost either, so far as I can tell.”
“That’s good to know. Are you finished?”
“Finished … with what?” Miriamele looked at him with a strange intensity.
“Seeing to your horse. I thought you might …” He paused and started again. She seemed very uncomfortable. He wondered if he had done something to offend her. Offering her the White Arrow as a gift, perhaps. The whole thing seemed dreamlike now. That had been a very odd afternoon.
Simon started again. “Sangfugol and a few others are going to play and sing tonight. At Duke Isgrimnur’s tent.” He pointed down the hillside to the rings of glowing fires. “Are you going to come and listen?”
Miriamele appeared to hesitate. “I’ll come,?
?? she said at last. “Yes, that would be nice.” She smiled briefly. “As long as Isgrimnur doesn’t sing.”
There was something not quite right in her tone, but Simon laughed at the joke anyway, as much from nervousness as anything else. “That will depend on whether any of Fengbald’s wine is left over, I’d guess.”
“Fengbald.” Miriamele made a noise of disgust. “And to think that my father would have married me to that … that pig. …”
To distract her, Simon said: “He’s going to sing a Jack Mundwode tune—Sangfugol is, I mean. He promised me he would. I think he’s going to sing the one about the Bishop’s Wagons.” He took her arm almost without thinking, then had a moment of apprehension. What was he doing, grabbing her like that? Would she be insulted?
Instead, Miriamele seemed almost not to notice. “Yes, that would be very nice,” she said. “It would be good to spend a night singing by the fire.”
Simon was puzzled again, since something like that had been going on most nights somewhere in New Gadrinsett, and even more frequently of late, when people had been gathered for the Raed. But he said nothing, deciding just to enjoy the feeling of her slender, strong arm beneath his.
“It will be a very good time,” he said, and led her down the hillside toward the beckoning campfires.
After midnight, when the mists had finally fallen away and the moon was high in the sky, bright as a silver coin, there was a stir of movement on the hilltop that the prince and his company had so recently abandoned.
A trio of shapes, dark forms almost completely invisible despite the moonlight, stood near one of the standing stones at the outermost edge of the hilltop and looked down at the valley below. Most of the fires had burned low, but still a perimeter of flickering flames lay around the encampment; a few dim figures could be seen moving in the reddish light.
The Talons of Utuk’ku watched the camp for a long, long time, still as owls. At last, and without a word spoken between them, they turned away and walked silently through the high grasses, back toward the center of the hill. The pale bulk of Sesuad’ra’s ruined stone buildings lay before them like the teeth in a crone’s mouth.
The Norn Queen’s servants had traveled far in a short time. They could afford to wait for another night, a night that would doubtless come soon, when the great, shambling company beneath them was not quite so vigilant.
The three shadows slipped noiselessly into the building the mortals called the Observatory, and stood for a long time looking up through the cracked dome at the newly emergent stars. Then they sat together on the stones. One of them began very quietly to sing; what floated within the crumbling chamber was a tune bloodless and sharp as splintered bone.
Although the sound did not even make an echo in the Observatory, and certainly could not have been heard across the windy hilltop, some sleepers in the valley below still moaned in their sleep. Those sensitive enough to feel the song’s touch—and Simon was one of them—dreamed of ice, and of things broken and lost, and of nests of twining serpents hidden in old wells.
26
A Gift for the Queen
The prince’s company, a slow-moving procession of carts and animals and straggling walkers, left the valley and edged out onto the plains, following the snaking course of the Stefflod south. The fray-edged army took close to a week to reach the place where the river joined with its larger cousin, the Ymstrecca.
It was a homecoming of sorts, for they made camp in the hill-sheltered valley that had once been the site of the first squatter town, Gadrinsett. Many of those who laid down their bed rolls and scavenged for firewood in the desolation of their former home wondered if they had gained anything by leaving this place to throw in their lot with Josua and his rebels. There was a little mutinous whispering—but only a little. Too many remembered the courage with which Josua and others had stood against the High King’s men.
It could have been a more bitter homecoming: the weather was mild, and much of the snow that had once blanketed this part of the grasslands had again melted away. Still, the wind raced through the shallow gulleys and bent the few small trees as it flattened the long grass, and the campfires jigged and capered: the magical winter had abated somewhat, but it was still nearly Decander on the open plains of the Thrithings.
The prince announced that the great company would rest there three nights while he and his advisers decided what route would best serve them. His subjects, if they could be called by such a name, seized eagerly at the days of rest. Even the short journey from Sesuad’ra had been difficult for the wounded and infirm, who were many, and for those with young children. Some passed rumors that Josua had reconsidered, that he would rebuild New Gadrinsett here on the site of its predecessor. Although the more serious-minded tried to point out the foolishness of leaving a protected high place for an unprotected low one, and the fact that whatever else he might be, Prince Josua was no fool, enough of the homeless army found the idea a hopeful one that the rumors proved impossible to quell.
“We can’t stay here long, Josua,” Isgrimnur said. “Every day we remain will add another score of folk that won’t follow us when we go.”
Josua was scrutinizing a tattered, sun-faded map. The ragged prize had once belonged to the late Helfgrim, New Gadrinsett’s onetime Lord Mayor, who had become, along with his martyred daughters, a sort of patron saint of the squatters. “We will not stay long,” the prince said. “But if we bring these folk to the grasslands, away from the river, we must be sure of finding water. The weather is changing in ways none of us can foretell. It is quite possible we will suddenly be without rain.”
Isgrimnur made a noise of frustration and looked to Freosel for support, but the young Falshireman, still unreconciled to Nabban as a destination, only stared back defiantly. They could have followed the Ymstrecca all the way west to Erkynland, his expression said clearly. “Josua,” the duke began, “finding water will not trouble us. The animals can get theirs from dew if need be, and we can fill a mountain of water bags from the rivers before we leave them—there are dozens of new streams just sprung up from snowmelt, for that matter. Food is more likely to be a problem.”
“And that is not solved either,” Josua pointed out. “But I don’t see that our choice of routes will help us much with that. We can pick our track to bring us near the lakes—I just don’t know how much I trust Helfgrim’s map. …”
“I had never … never realized how hard it is to feed this many people.” Strangyeard had been reading quietly from one of the translations Binabik had made of Ookequk’s scrolls. “How do armies manage?”
“They either drain their king’s purse dry, like sand from a sackhole,” Geloë said grimly, “or they simply eat everything around them as they pass through, like marching ants.” She stood up from where she had squatted by the archivist. “There are many things growing here that we can use to feed people, Josua—many herbs and flowers and even grasses that will make sustaining meals, although some who have only lived in cities might find them strange.”
“‘Strange becomes homely when people are hungry,’” Isgrimnur quoted. “Don’t remember who said it, but it’s true, sure enough. Listen to Geloë we’ll make do. What we need is haste. The longer we stay in any place, the sooner we do what she said, eat the place up like ants. We’ll do better if we keep moving.”
“We have not halted just so I can think about things, Isgrimnur,” the prince said a little coldly. “It is too much to expect an entire city, which is what we are, to get up and walk to Nabban in one march. The first week was a hard one. Let us give them a little time to grow used to it.”
The Duke of Elvritshalla tugged at his beard. “I didn’t mean … I know, Josua. But from now on, we need to move quickly, as I said. Let those who are slow catch up when we do finally stop. They won’t be the fighters, anyway.”
Josua pursed his lips. “Are they any the less God’s children because they cannot wield a sword for us?”
Isgrimnur shook his head. Th
e prince was in one of those moods. “That’s not what I mean, Josua, and you know it. I’m just saying that this is an army, not a religious procession with the lector walking at the back. We can start whatever we have to do without waiting for every last soul who pulls up lame, or every horse that throws a shoe.”
Josua turned to Camaris, who sat quietly by the small fire, staring intently at the smoke rising up to the hole in the tent roof. “What do you think, Sir Camaris? You have been on more marches than any of us, except perhaps for Isgrimnur. Is he right?”
The old man slowly turned his gaze away from the flickering fire. “I think that what Duke Isgrimnur says is just, yes. We owe it to the people as a whole to do what we have set out to do, and even more than that, we owe it to our good Lord, who has heard our promises. And we would be presumptuous to try to do God’s work by holding the hand of every foot-weary traveler.” He paused for a moment. “However, we also wish—nay, need—the people to join us. People do not join a hurrying, furtive band, they join a triumphant army.” He looked around the tent, his eyes calm and clear. “We should go as swiftly as we can while still maintaining our company in good order. We should send riders out, not just to search what lies before us, but to be our heralds as well, to call to the people: ‘The prince is coming!’” For a moment it seemed he might say more, but his expression grew distant and he fell silent.
Josua smiled. “You should have been an escritor, Sir Camaris. You are as subtle as my old teachers, the Usirean brothers. I have only one disagreement with you.” He pivoted slightly to include the others in the tent. “We are going to Nabban. Our criers will shout: ‘Camaris has come back! Sir Camaris has returned to lead his people!’” He laughed. “‘And Josua is with him.’”