She arranged herself so modestly on her side of the bed that he knew what she meant him to endure, although perhaps it did not seem like endurance to her. But he must do what would please her if he meant to teach her to trust him—and to love him. Wincing, he lay down stiffly on his back and closed his eyes.
Her breathing slowed, gentled, and she slept. He ached too much to sleep, yet he dared not toss and turn. He dared not rise from the bed to pace, for fear of waking her. If he woke her, so close beside him, and she opened her eyes to see him there, limbs brushing, fingers caught in unwitting embrace, lips touching—
Madness lay that way, thinking on in this fashion. He did not know what to do, could not do anything but breathe, in and out, in and out. A plank creaked in the next chamber. Mice skittered in the walls, and he could almost taste the patience of a spider which, having spun out its final filament in one upper corner of the chamber, settled down to wait for its first victim. He had forgotten about the bread. Now, cooling, its mellow scent permeated the room and tickled his nose. Tallia shifted on the bed, murmuring in her sleep. Her fingers brushed his.
He could not bear it.
He slid off the bed and lay down on the floor. The hard wood gave him more welcome than the luxurious softness of the feather bed, and here, with his head pillowed on his arms, he finally fell into an exhausted sleep.
He arrived back at Rikin fjord first of all the sons of Bloodheart—those who survived Gent—and Rikin’s OldMother welcomed him without surprise.
“Fifth Son of the Fifth Litter.” An OldMother never forgets the smell of each individual blind, seeking pupa that bursts from her nests. But she will stand aside once the battle is joined, as all OldMothers do. She does not care which of her sons leads Rikin’s warband now that Bloodheart is dead, only that the strongest among them succeeds. Yet the WiseMothers know that the greatest strength lies in wisdom.
Now he waits in the shield of the Lightfell Waterfall whose ice-cold water pours down the jagged cliff face into the deep blue waters of the fjord, where stillness triumphs over movement. He waits, watching six ships round the far point and close in on the beach. Beyond them in the deepest central waters a tail flips, slaps, vanishes. The merfolk are out; they have the magic to smell blood not yet spilled, and now they gather, waiting to feed. Eighteen ships have so far returned from Gent and the southlands. Tonight when the midnight sun sinks to her low ebb, OldMother will begin the dance.
Has he built enough traps? Are his preparations adequate?
That is the weakness of his brothers: They think strength and ferocity are everything. He knows better.
He tucks the little wooden chest that he dug out from the base of the fall tight under his elbow and slips out from the ledge. Water sprays him and slides off his skin to fall onto moss and moist rock as he picks his way up the ladder rocks to the top of the cliff. There the priest waits, anxious. He wails out loud when he sees the box.
“I would have found it eventually,” Fifth Son says, but not because he wishes to gloat. He merely states the truth. Gloating is a waste of time. He does not open the little casket. He doesn’t need to. They both know what lies inside, nestled in spells and downy feathers. “You have grown lazy, old one. Your magic cannot triumph over cunning.”
“What do you want?” wails the priest. “Do you want the power of illusion, that Bloodheart stole from me? Your heart hidden in the fjall to protect you from death in battle?”
“My heart will stay where it is. Nor do I want your illusions. I want immunity.”
“From death?” squeaks the priest.
“From your magic. And from the magic of the Soft Ones. For myself and the army I mean to build. Once I have that, I can do the rest.”
“Impossible!” says the priest emphatically.
“For you working alone, perhaps.” The priests keep their arcane studies a mystery even from the OldMothers, such as they can. “But there are others like you. In concert, you can surely work a magic that has a practical use. And once I triumph, you can share in the booty.”
The priest laughs, a reedy sound like wind caught in stones. “Why would you think I and those like me want booty? What good does it do us?”
“Then what do you and those like you want?”
The old priest leans forward. Hands trembling, he reaches for the casket, but Fifth Son merely draws it away. He does not fear the priest; his magics seem mostly show, but he knows that a keener mind could wreak havoc with them.
He does not trust magic.
“Freedom from the OldMothers,” whispers the priest hoarsely.
Fifth Son lets out a breath, satisfied and surprised by this confession. The jewels drilled into his teeth glint in the sun as he bares his teeth. “I can give you that. After you and those like you have given me what I need.”
“But how am I to convince them?”
“That problem is yours to solve.”
He leaves the old priest behind then, and runs ahead. The priest will search, of course, and use his magic to call to his hidden heart. But there are other magics that know the power of concealment. Before he goes to the OldMother’s hall to assemble with the others, he takes the chest to the homesteads of his human slaves and there he gives it into the care of Ursuline, she who has made herself OldMother among the Soft Ones. She has assured him that the circle-god has magic fully as strong as that of the RockChildren’s priests—this will prove the test of her god’s magic. And in any case, no RockChild will imagine that he might entrust a mere weak slave with something so powerful and precious.
She is curious but not foolhardy. She takes the casket from him and without attempting to look inside—for he has told her what it contains—confines it within the blanket-covered box that she calls the holy Hearth of their god. Then she places withered herbs, a cracked jug, and a crude carved circle on the altar and sings a spell over it, what she calls a psalm.
“Our bargain?” she asks boldly. She is no longer afraid of him, because she has seen that when he kills, he kills quickly, and she does not fear death. He admires that in her. Like the WiseMothers, she understands inexorable fate.
“Our bargain,” he replies. She wants a token. The Soft Ones are ever like that, needing things to carry with them, objects to touch, in order to keep their word. He traces the wooden circle that hangs at his chest, his gift from Alain Henrisson. “I swear on my bond with the one who gifted me with my freedom that I will give you what you ask for if you keep this chest safe until I need it. Do that, and I will keep my bargain—as long as I become chieftain. Otherwise I will be dead, and you will be as well.”
She chuckles, but he knows enough about the Soft Ones to see this laughter does not insult him but is instead a compliment. “You are different than the others. God give Their blessing to the merciful and the just. They will guide you to success.”
“So you hope,” he agrees.
He leaves her hovel, whistles in his dogs, and heads down the long valley to OldMother’s compound. The path runs silent before and behind him; only a few slaves mewl and whine in their pens, dumb beasts shut away until the great events of the next hand of days have played out their course. His slaves, unconfined, are at their work—or hidden in certain places according to his plan. He has entrusted them with a great deal, but they know that if he does not succeed, they will die at the hands of the victor.
OldMother’s drone rises up, a low rumble that lies as close along the steep valleys of Rikin as the blanket of spruce and pine and the mixed thickets of heather and fern; her song makes the lichen quicken and grow on rock faces, a pattern readable only by the SwiftDaughters. He strolls out onto the dancing ground of beaten earth alone but for his dogs.
His brothers howl with derision when they see him.
“WeakBrother, do you mean to be the first one to bare your throat?”
“Coward! Where were you when the fighting came to Gent?”
“What treasures did you give to Bloodheart, tongueless one?”
br /> So they howl, taunting him. Their warbands cluster in packs, each pack striving to be the loudest—as if loudness denotes strength. He has ordered his soldiers to remain silent, and they do so. He, too, remains silent as OldMother slides the knife of decision out of the pouch in her thigh and raises it to point at the fiery heart of the sun, now riding low along the southern range. With a slashing motion, she brings their noise, and her drone, to a sudden end.
Six of Bloodheart’s sons come forward into the center of the dancing ground, and when he steps forward last of all, there are seven. All the other RockChildren have chosen not to contend but instead to bare their throats to the victor. No doubt those who choose submission are showing wisdom in knowing just how weak they are.
The seven who will contend turn their backs to each other, and kneel. SwiftDaughters glide forward over the dirt and form the net of story, hands linked, gold and silver and copper and tin and iron hair gleaming as they begin to sway, humming.
Silence except for that low humming permeates the clearing. Even the dogs do not bark. Distantly, he can almost hear the WiseMothers hearing that silence as speech, turning their attention to this mortal instant.
Do they know how momentous this day will be? That one day the SwiftDaughters will weave it into their song of history? Or do they laugh at his ambition?
Soon he will find out.
The heavy tread of OldMother shudders the ground beneath his knees. She alone judges the worthiness of the contestants. The SwiftDaughters part to let her bulk through. He, with his brothers, bows his head.
She makes a slow circle. Suddenly, there comes a grunt, the sharp copper taint of blood, and a thud as one of Bloodheart’s sons topples over. His blood soaks into the soil of the dancing ground. Dogs growl, and a few bark and are hushed, or killed.
He feels the knife of decision brush his head, his throat, and linger at the girdle of shimmering gold he wears at his hips: the girdle woven of the hair of a Hakonin SwiftDaughter.
Then it moves away. Six sons remain.
The SwiftDaughters rock back and forth, foot to foot, and begin the long chant, the history of Rikin’s tribe. It will take three days to tell, and when they are done, only one of Bloodheart’s sons will stand on the blood-soaked ground and claim victory.
The circle parts. He leaps up, knowing better than to be caught by one of the other five and forced into a brute fight: they all outweigh him, they are bigger, brawnier, and stronger.
But he has strength of a different kind.
With the dogs and the warriors yammering and howling and barking behind, he races up toward the fjall where the first of his traps lies waiting.
Alain woke to frenzied barking, the Eika dogs going crazy—
Only it wasn’t the Eika dogs. Rage barked at his door, scratching insistently, and he heard the others howling and barking from Lavastine’s chambers as if they had gone mad.
He scrambled to throw his tunic on over his shift. Without bothering with hose he flung open the door. Tallia called out behind him, but he ran on, to Lavastine’s chambers.
The servants parted before him. They had not dared come too close. One had been bitten, and his arm wept blood. Alain waded into a seething whirlpool of hounds, all of them tearing around the chamber like a dog chasing its tail; only old Terror stood, legs up on the embrasure of the window, growling menacingly. Alain stuck his head out the window, but he saw only worried servingmen and a few curious onlookers who had paused to stare at the commotion. Wind stirred the flowering bushes just outside. A rodent—or an unseen bird—rustled in the leaves, and Fear, Sorrow, and Rage bolted out of the chamber and raced around the long building. People scattered from their path.
“Peace!” Alain cried, leaning out of the window, as they skittered to a halt on the other side. They sniffed in the bushes. “Sit.” They sat, but they still growled softly at wind and leaves. Behind him, in the chamber, the barking settled and ceased, and the silence that weighed down made his ears ring. He turned to see Lavastine sitting on the bed, half clothed, examining Ardent’s paw. She whimpered as he spread the pads and examined the flesh with a frown.
Alain crossed to him at once and knelt beside him, then set a hand on Ardent’s flank. Her nose was dry and her breathing came in a labored pant.
“Bitten,” said Lavastine, “but I know not by what.”
Alain sat on the bed to examine her paw. She nipped at him weakly when he probed at the flesh, but she trusted him too well to bite him. At first he felt only how hot her paw was; a swelling bubble grew between the pad of two toes. Finally he found the wound, two tiny red punctures.
“Was she bitten by a snake?”
Lavastine rose and went to speak to a servant, who quickly left. “We’ll speak with the stablemaster.” The count paced over to the window and stood there, silent, with a hand resting on Terror’s great head.
Alain swung a leg over Ardent to pin her down, cut the pad of her paw with his knife, and sucked out what of the poison he could, if indeed she had been bitten by something poisonous, then spat it out onto the floor. Her blood had a sour, metallic taste, and it clotted at once, did not even bleed—only seeped from the cut. He offered her water in a basin, but she would not drink.
Lavastine returned from the window and signed to a servant to help him dress. Another left to get Alain’s clothing. Then Lavastine sat down beside Alain on the bed. He considered Ardent, stroked her head while she lay shuddering and panting hoarsely, not moving otherwise.
“It is time we returned to Lavas,” he said, “since we have what we came for. I will ask my cleric to name a day propitious for a long journey, and on that day we will take our leave of the king and ride west.”
“Father.” Alain stuttered to a halt. His blush certainly had as much heat as the infection on poor Ardent’s paw. He glanced up to see the servants busy at their tasks, pouring water to wash in, sweeping the steps outside. “I didn’t—we didn’t—” He could not continue, and yet he could not lie to his father.
Lavastine raised a pale eyebrow. “She has just come from the convent. She might still feel some hesitation.” Terror padded over from the window and sat stiffly beside the count, on guard. “Still,” he continued, “the practical thing for a woman is to get herself with child as quickly as possible so that she has an heir.”
Even thinking of Tallia lying pale and fragile on the bed beside him made Alain flush, and he felt all over again the ache of last night. “But it would be—” He dropped his voice to a whisper because he could not bear for anyone else, even the servants, to hear. “—a lie to exchange morning gifts.”
Lavastine massaged Ardent’s foot. He wore his most intent look as he focused on the hound’s paw. “Perhaps. But I lied to you about my intentions, at the battle at Gent. I had to, knowing you could see the Eika prince in your dreams and that he could, perhaps, see yours. Others envy us what we have gained here. If they believe that the marriage has gone unconsummated, some may even begin to whisper that it is invalid, even though a biscop blessed your union and the king himself gave his consent. We cannot afford to give them a weapon to strike against us.” All but one of the servingmen had retreated from the chamber, responsive as always to Lavastine’s moods. He glanced at the one man remaining, gave a brief nod as at a job well done, and turned to look directly at Alain. “Therefore, exchange morning gifts. She is a woman, and even if she is timid now, women above all things want heirs for their lands and titles.”
Alain wasn’t so sure, but he nodded obediently, and as if his nod had summoned her, there came a swell of voices outside the door, and then Tallia entered the chamber, stopped short, and cowered back against the wall away from the hounds.
Lavastine stood but not before glancing at Alain as if to say: “And so here she is.”
Alain’s servingman came in behind her, and Tallia covered her eyes with a corner of her shawl as Alain, settling Ardent comfortably on the bed, stood to dress. When he was decently clothed, he coaxed her
over to sit on the bed beside Ardent. Once she saw that the huge hound was too weak to snap at her, she gingerly sat down, clinging to Alain’s hand.
She trusted him. That much he had won from her.
Lavastine smiled slightly and, with hands clasped behind his back, nodded to his servants to fetch the morning gift which Alain would present to his bride. Alain waited nervously, half on fire from the innocent clasp of Tallia’s hand in his, half terrified that she would find inappropriate the gift he had himself commissioned. It was not his place as the one of lesser rank to attempt to outdo her gift to him. He could not in any case, since Henry had already settled rich estates on Lavas as part of the dower. But neither could the heir to the count of Lavas permit himself to appear like a pauper before the assembled nobles of the king’s progress.
Many people had gathered outside to witness the morning gifts. When the king arrived, Alain coaxed Tallia to her feet, and they went outside to greet him.
What raucous and lewd comments greeted their appearance Alain tried not to hear. Tallia had pulled her shawl almost over her face, and she huddled against him, which only made people laugh and call out the louder, seeing it as a sign of the very transaction that had not taken place last night.
Henry was generous with his disgraced sister Sabella’s lands: together with the estates marked as part of Tallia’s dowry yesterday, the full extent of the gift in lands made as the marriage settlement doubled the size of the Lavas Holdings. Lavastine had a thin smile on his face, the closest he came to outright glee. Henry gestured, and his stewards brought two chests forward: silks, a magnificent fur-lined cape, silver plate and gold cups, handsome vestments for the Lavas clergy, rich clothing for Tallia and Alain, and brass dog collars embossed with springing roes and sportive hounds.
The crowd murmured in appreciation for Henry’s generosity.
Lavastine had known better than to attempt to outdo a king. His own servants brought forward chests filled with good cloth suitable for a noblewoman of royal lineage to clothe her servants in, silver-and-gold vessels for her to present to her clerics, and handsomely carved small chests that contained enough coins to grace an army of beggars. Last, Alain himself gave her the tiny ivory reliquary inlaid with jewels that he had commissioned. Unlocked by a delicate silver key, it contained dust from the shawl worn by the holy discipla, St. Johanna the Doubter, together with a perfect jeweled replica of a rose.