Into the West, page 10
“I still can’t believe that they just accepted us as their real parents so easily,” he marveled, as he sat down to a decidedly cold and congealed mess of stew and a soggy bread bowl. But that was no matter, not for a magician. A little concentration, and the brief sensation that energy was draining from him—because it was—and the food looked exactly as it had when Isla had gotten it from the common kitchen.
It was a simple, easy spell for magicians to use, and had a lot of practical applications, even if it couldn’t be used on anything still alive. Most mages just saved it to reheat a hot drink or renew their food, though he had used it several times to put a thrown shoe temporarily back on a horse, or mend a girth strap for long enough to get back home.
“We weren’t exactly absent from their lives,” Isla pointed out. “Where Hakkon mostly was. Every time we saw them, we were kind, with gentle authority, and we didn’t ignore them or act as if they were a bother. I’m not gifted with Mind-magic, but I can imagine it’s possible that they used to fantasize that we actually were their parents, which would make the revelation more like a dream come true than a shock.”
“Have they ever said anything to you about it?” he asked, spooning up hot stew before the bread bowl turned soggy for a second time. It wasn’t as good as Sai’s stew, but it was quite palatable, and hunger made it taste even better.
“Not yet,” Isla said, pouring him a second cup of clover tea after he had quickly downed the first. “I must say that Delia is taking to being sent on with the scouts better than I feared.” She frowned a little. “This is harder on her than it is on us. We’ve spent our entire lives in the service of the Plan, and we knew what we were getting into. She—didn’t.” Isla sighed. “The life of a young woman of noble birth doesn’t prepare you for this kind of life.”
“True. And she hasn’t complained at all, even though I very much doubt she had any idea at all what she was getting herself into.” Stew gone, he took a big bite of the chewy, gravy-soaked bread. “I was prepared to send her back to Merrin and bribe him with horses to set her up in his household, perhaps as lady-in-waiting to his wife. I’d have done it if she looked in the least unhappy, but she seems to be doing just fine.”
“Oh, she would have been traumatized by your stinging rejection, no doubt. She certainly seemed cheerful enough to me when she turned up this afternoon asking for advice on what to take with her. Do you think she might have an interest in Ivar now?” Isla asked, as he finished his meal.
He laughed. “No, nothing like that. But I do think she’s been bored. The only things she’s had to do around here are menial tasks anyone could manage, and I think she sees this as a chance to make her own adventure, maybe even make her own mark on our landless Barony.”
“Hmm. Well, why not?” Isla put everything away, wiped off the table with a rag and a drop of vinegar, cleaned his spoon and handed it back to him, and waved him toward the back of the boat. “Your audience awaits, Lord Baron.”
He chuckled, rose, and went all the way to the stern of the barge, where all three boys were crowded onto one bed, leaving a conspicuous place for him to sit. He took the hint and sat down, putting his arms around all of them.
“Well now, what kind of story would you like to hear?” he asked.
“Tell us ’bout de Empwess,” Jon said, sticking a finger in his mouth. “I wike de Empwess. I want a pig like her when I grows up.”
He knew very well they did not mean the late Emperor’s wife.
“I can do that,” he agreed. “So, let me tell you about the time that the Squire’s rival in piggery decided that he was going to turn the Empress loose. Have I told you that one yet?”
All three shaggy little heads shook vehemently, and all three boys leaned forward to catch every word. It’s a good thing no one from the Emperor ever got a good look at them, because there would have been no doubt at all who their father was. They look just like me.
“Now, this is actually about the current Empress’s grandmother,” he began. “And I had not yet been sent to the Capital. I was staying with the Squire because my father had Imperial visitors, and he thought it best to give the impression that I was so unimportant to him that he’d shoo me off to stay with a pig farmer.”
“The Squire’s not just a pig farmer!” Hakkon said with emphatic indignation.
“Well, we know that, but the Emperor’s spies and flunkies didn’t,” Kordas told them, and went on with the story, doing his best to make it funny and light, through the moment when they saw the Squire’s rival running for his life with the angry Empress in surprisingly hot pursuit, right up to the conclusion where they finally found the Empress sedately making her way back to her luxurious sty with one trews-leg dangling from her mouth. This, of course, made the boys squeal with laughter. When they calmed down, he asked them about their day, listening attentively as they each took turns narrating what they had done in great detail.
He probably would not have believed it if someone had told him before all this happened that he would not only listen to little boys natter on about every single stick they had picked up, and every single errand they had run, he would welcome listening to it.
But he did. And he loved every minute of it.
Father used to do this, he remembered. As long as he was sure there was no one spying on us. The memory made him feel warm inside, and not for the first time, he wished that his father had lived to see this day. Not just because the people of the Duchy had finally escaped the claws of the Empire, but because he would have been able to smother his grandchildren in unfettered and open love as he had not been able to do for Kordas.
Not that he doubted how much his father had loved him, and he had certainly loved the old Duke right back. But it had all been choked by the need to make it look as if the Duke thought nothing of his heir . . . and in fact, there had been deceptive ploys on everyone’s part to make it seem as if the old Duke just might cut his own son out in favor of Hakkon.
Heh. I just realized that Hakkon is a better actor than I ever considered. He pulled that off—and then he pulled off the ruse that he and Isla were having a torrid affair when I was in the Capital.
When the boys had finished telling him about their archery lessons, their words had started to slur, and it was clear their eyes were getting heavy. He kissed all three of them and said, “I am going to go help your Mama with making lists. But do you know you can practice things like archery just by thinking about them?”
All three of them perked up. “You can?” replied Restil.
“Absolutely. You need to lie quietly, and think, very carefully, and very slowly, about every action you need to take to shoot an arrow. Picture yourself putting the arrow to the string. Picture yourself drawing the arrow back to your ear. Remember how it feels to hold that bow firm, and the arrow loose in your fingers—not holding it, remember. You pull the string, not the arrow. The arrow should just float between your forefinger and middle finger. Picture the target. Then picture yourself loosing the bowstring, and see it hitting the center ring.” That would keep them quiet and busy until they fell asleep.
And it had the added benefit of being true. The more you practiced something mentally, the better you got at it. From practice, to second nature, to first nature.
They all scrambled into their nightclothes and then into bed. There was no evening entertainment tonight, nor would there be—well, for a while. Tonight everyone was considering what they were going to need close at hand for a journey through the winter, and trying to remember where those things were all packed. And tomorrow the scouts would go through, getting a head start on the rest of the migration.
He slid the door between their roomlet and the rest of the barge closed, and, with a sigh, joined Isla on their bed. He felt absolutely exhausted, but then, he felt that way every day. There was just too much to do, and not enough time to pack it all into, especially as the days got shorter and shorter. He knew that he was going to lie in bed staring into the darkness, trying to think of what he might have missed, rather than getting the sleep he needed.
Isla was already in her nightgear—not the lovely, delicate shifts she used to wear to bed, but soft lambswool tunic and leggings—and was already in bed, though not asleep. Thinking longingly of the hot baths he used to enjoy regularly, he did his evening “spot-wash” and pulled on an identical set of nightclothes, as she pulled the blankets aside for him to crawl into. With a flick of a finger, he extinguished the mage-light in the ceiling, but alas, he could still hear the boys talking sleepily to each other.
“You’re going to lie there staring at the ceiling trying to figure out how you can be three people at the same time, aren’t you?” Isla asked in a low murmur. She put her arms around his shoulders and pulled his head down to her chest, like he was a child. That actually made him relax a little.
“You know me too well,” he replied into the darkness.
“It’s not all on your back, you know,” she said, with just a touch of remonstrance. Then he felt her shrug. “But you wouldn’t be the man your father raised, the good man I married, if you didn’t carry on as if it was.”
“It will get better,” he told her, though that, of course, was much more of a wish than a promise. “I have to do a lot now, but once everything is in order and we are on the move, I can take time to rest.”
“So—never, you mean,” she snorted. He loved that about her. She never held back with him. “I could almost be grateful for that bastard who hurt the Doll. He made things come to a head to the point that we were able to shed the bad apples, the uncertain, and the wavering before it was too late and they became a drag on us.”
“Most of them, anyway,” he agreed. “I’m sure there are enough people in the group that there are a few bad apples left.”
“I’ll have a long talk with Rose,” she said, as she rested her head atop his. “I think the Dolls can help there. First, they can always tell when someone is lying, and second, they are far more observant than anyone but the mages and you and I give them credit for. I mean, I hate to say I am going to set them to spy on everyone, but in essence, I think we have to. When we know there are problems brewing, we might be able to do something about them before they are more than a faint irritation.”
“I should think most of them would have gotten quite clever about spotting trouble and avoiding it,” he said after a moment. “Given the courtiers, I’d be more surprised to discover that some of them weren’t abusing helpless creatures than that some of them were.”
“I think the part I like best about your speech was telling people that we were not some kind of conquering army,” she continued. “Hopefully that will make them all think twice before antagonizing anyone.”
“We’d be stupid to act like a conquering army,” he pointed out. “Oh, I suppose if we find ourselves going through lands with a population like this one, we could take over a village, maybe two—which would leave us surrounded by enemies who know the land better than we do and can take the time to pick us off a few at a time at very little risk to themselves. All they’d have to do would be to concentrate on the few fighters we have, and after that, it’d be us that would be in danger. But it’s the right thing to do anyway. We’re not the Empire, and we’re not conquerors. Our passage has to be light on the land, and we need to find a vacant place and make it ours.”
“It would be nice if someone invited us to stay,” she sighed wistfully.
“It would be nice, and we’ll certainly do that if it happens, but I am not counting on it. It’s probably wise if we assume people we encounter are going to be hostile when they see this many people on their river. Nevertheless, we are not going to take anything that is not offered freely, and we are not going to places where we are not invited.” He forced himself to relax; after all, Isla was not in disagreement with him, though he was sure she wished, and strongly, that he’d made the decision to remain here.
“I think we need to add one thing more,” she said thoughtfully. “I think we need to look for ways to help those we encounter, even if they are hostile or wary. Kindness is never wasted, and it might come back to us.”
“And this is why I married you, wise woman,” he said, and then cocked an ear toward the rear of the barge. “Is that silence I hear?”
“I believe it is,” she responded, her lips against his neck.
In the barge Delia would share with Alberdina and the former Imperial officer, there was no space for sitting and eating, just lots of storage, the kitchen in the first room, the chamber-pot closet and a basin and ewer, and four beds in the rear. There were much smaller windows in the rear than in the usual living-barges, little round things with hinges that allowed them to be opened to let in air and clamped down tight to keep the cold out. The glass was particularly thick and bubbly; it was hard to see through it. And the beds were stacked, one atop the other, in a frame with a rope ladder attached to reach the top ones. There was little space between the beds, nor between the top one and the roof, but at least each bed had two of those round windows. The lower bunk on the right already had blankets, pillows, and a fur sleeping sack in it; she guessed that one would be Alberdina’s. The other three had just the sleeping sacks.
Delia considered grabbing the other bottom bed, but—At least I know Alberdina, and I don’t fancy sleeping above or below anyone I don’t know. This was silly, and in her heart she knew it, but nevertheless she threw her blankets and pillow up onto that top bed, pulled open the little cupboards that were everywhere a cupboard could be until she found empty ones, and stored her clothing and personal items in a couple. It appeared that the bottom-bed sleepers were expected to use the cupboards beneath their beds, and the top-bed sleepers were expected to use the cupboards built into the rear of the barge in such a way that they covered parts of the beds.
In fact it’s . . . not so bad, she thought after some reflection. It would give the illusion of privacy if you put your pillow behind that cupboard. And one of the windows was right there, so you could have wind on your face in summer. In fact, if I can figure out how to rig a curtain, I’ll have actual privacy.
With her belongings put away, she went looking for someone to tell her what to do.
The first person she found as she poked her head out of the door to the barge was Jonaton. It normally wasn’t hard to spot Jonaton; he didn’t wear mere robes, he wore Robes of Splendor—silk, velvet, wool plush, embroidered, beaded, and so flamboyant that a male firebird might have thought them “a bit too much.” Today, however, it was only his lantern jaw and tousled, mousy-brown hair that let her pick him out from the clot of mages bent over a crude table, gesturing at something. Today, he looked like—well, everyone else. Baggy brown wool breeches it would be easy to layer more things under, tough leather boots to the knee, a knitted woolen tunic that was a little lighter in color than the breeches, and a long scarf wrapped around his neck knitted out of bits and scraps of yarn of every color, though mostly white, black, gray, and brown.
As she closed the door to the barge behind her, he straightened, looking satisfied, and turned away from the group, who continued their animated conversation. She waved at him, and he spotted her, and came strolling insouciantly over to the barge.
“Jonaton, I hardly recognized you,” she teased. He raised an elegantly groomed eyebrow.
“I wear what’s needed for the job,” he said. “I just wear it better than anyone else here. So, petal, I understand you are coming with us?”
“The Baron and Sai seemed to think it was a good idea, so I said yes,” she admitted. Obviously, she didn’t want to let it slip that the main reason she was coming was so that she didn’t have to mind the three boys.
“It’s not a bad idea,” he agreed, pulling on his chin. “But you need to remember, once we are on the other side of the Gate, there’s no changing your mind and wanting to go back.”
She glowered at him. “When have I ever acted like that?”
He shrugged. “Alberdina can use the help. And I can think of a lot of ways that your Gift would be useful.” Just then a flock of wild ducks came into view, flying from the marsh to the lake. They had to be wild, because all the domestic ducks had one wing with the flight feathers clipped to keep them from joining the wild ones. This didn’t stop the wild ones from trying to join them, and bully them away from their rations of grain. Jonaton narrowed his eyes, grabbed her shoulders, and pointed at the ducks. “Quick! Pull one down!”
Startled, she didn’t think, she just did it.
The duck vanished from the sky. It reappeared with a strangled quack at her feet. Jonaton pounced on it before it could recover and snapped its neck. Then, with the duck under one arm and his free hand on her elbow, he hauled her along to another group—she recognized Hakkon, Ivar, and Sai, but didn’t know the woman or the two young men with her.
“Look at this!” he crowed as soon as he was within earshot, holding the limp duck aloft by its neck.
Everyone turned to look. “It’s a duck,” said Sai. “Not that it’s not welcome to go in the stew, but it’s a duck.”
“It’s a duck that Delia pulled out of the sky!” Jonaton corrected.
Well, that got everyone’s interest, and she suddenly found herself the focus of all eyes.
“That . . . is going to be incredibly useful,” Hakkon mused. “Incredibly useful. Hunting without wasting arrows? I have—” He stopped himself before he said anything more. “Incredibly useful.”
I wonder if he was going to say he changed his mind about having me on the trip? Well, it didn’t matter what he had thought before. It was clear he was quite happy about her being among the scouts now. “I can probably get fish too if I can see them,” she pointed out, feeling rather more enthusiastic because of the way the rest of them were reacting. She felt a little sorry for the poor duck, but moons out here making the most of every bit of food that came to hand had made her a lot less sentimental and very much less squeamish about such things.
