Crossroads and Other Tales of Valdemar v(-101 Read online

He might have spoken or she might have asked questions, but the Healer arrived just then. She took in the scene with an all too sharp eye, shooed Merris out, and took both Heralds in hand.

  Merris would have argued, but she had tutors waiting—and an extra hour’s worth of exercises in correct etiquette at banquets for being so drastically late. The exercises were deadly dull, but there was no getting out of them. There was a bargain, as she never failed to remember. This was her part of it.

  It was two wildly frustrating days before Merris could escape the stranglehold of duty and discipline. The Heralds were still in the Keep—she was able to determine that much.

  The old one, Isak, was very ill. Something to do with his heart, she gathered. The Healer was doing her best. The young Herald never left his elder’s side except for a daily visit to the Companions.

  All this, Merris learned from obliging servants. Even with the flurry around her birthday, Heralds were a great excitement.

  Merris’ tutors seemed determined to keep her from ever going near them again. Mistress Patrizia insisted that she be fitted for a trunkful of entirely new and to her mind completely unnecessary gowns, which took untold hours. When she was not strangling in folds of silk and brocade, Master Thellen had her memorizing endless lists of names and dates and places from one of his beloved and deadly dull chronicles, none of which had anything perceptible to do with either Darkwall or Forgotten Keep.

  She came terribly close to asking him questions she should never even think about asking. “Is it true the last Lady but three used to take a monthly bath in infants’ blood? Are there really creatures of darkness in the caves below the Keep? Why has there always been a Lady but never a Lord, and how is it that she never marries but always adopts an heir?” Not to mention, “Why did she choose me? There are four Keeps between hers and ours, all of which have surplus daughters. What do I have that those ladies don’t?”

  But she kept her questions bottled up inside as she always had, because her mother had told her to trust her instincts, and instinct told her not to speak of such things. On the surface it was all ordinary, dull, dry facts and ancient history, and so many gowns she would need an entire train of pack mules to carry them all.

  Late the second day, as Merris dressed for dinner, Mistress Patrizia entered without knocking as she always did, and dismissed the maid. Merris looked at her in what she hoped was innocent surprise. “Mistress! What a pleasure to see you at this hour. Will you be joining us for dinner?”

  “That would not be proper,” Mistress Patrizia said. She was a tall, thin, forbidding person at the best of times. Tonight she was ramrod-stiff. “I have a gift for you from our Lady.”

  Merris’ brows went up. Such gifts were not uncommon, but usually it was a messenger from Darkwall who delivered them. As far as she knew, no such messenger had come.

  As if in answer to her unspoken question, Mistress Patrizia said, “I have kept this at our Lady’s behest. It is a small thing, but she values it. She would be most pleased if you would wear it.”

  She raised her hands. There was a small wooden box in them, such as jewels were kept in.

  Merris took it slowly and opened it with fingers that for some reason wanted to tremble. She had had gifts like this before, but only on birthdays.

  It was a pendant on a silver chain, a drop of dark amber in a spiral of silver. It felt warm in her hand and strangely alive, and the flecks in it seemed almost to move, swirling slowly around one another inside their prison of waxy stone.

  It was a beautiful thing, but strange. The other gifts had been much more mundane: a book, a gown, a tutor. This made Merris’ skin prickle.

  She made herself smile and be as polite as she had been trained to be, speaking words of thanks that she was not at all sure she meant. Mistress Patrizia watched her with peculiar fixity. She was supposed to wear the thing, that was clear.

  She let Mistress Patrizia fasten the chain around her neck, trying hard not to shudder when the stone touched her skin. She resolved to get rid of it as soon as she was out of sight.

  She had a moment of breathless fear that Mistress Patrizia would decide to go to dinner after all, but she was much too proper a servant. Merris stopped in the passageway to the dining hall, fumbling with the clasp. Her hands were shaking and the clasp was stiff. It would not come off.

  She almost gave up and let it be, but her peculiar revulsion was growing stronger rather than weaker. She gritted her teeth and pulled hard. The chain broke. She thrust the stone into the pocket of her sleeve, where a lady might keep small and discreetly useful items.

  Amber was as light almost as air, but this weighed her down out of all proportion to its size. Merris stopped thinking and acted. She turned aside to the garderobe and let the thing fall out of her sleeve into the odorous darkness. If and when she was asked, she could answer honestly that she had lost the pendant.

  She took a deep breath, barely even gagging on the effluvium of the privy, and went to dinner with a lighter heart.

  After dinner, at last, Merris had an hour to herself. Her maids were still at their own dinner, and her tutors were wherever they disappeared to when their duty to their Lady was done. She shed her voluminous skirts in favor of much more practical ones. With no one to stop her, she ventured out of her rooms.

  It was a bright night, warm and moonlit. The garden her mother had made, that her father had kept up in Beatrice’s memory, was in full and fragrant bloom. Merris went on past it to the stables.

  Companions had somewhat different needs than horses, according to the stories, but Forgotten Keep’s stables seemed to suit them well enough. Their stall doors were open so that they could come and go, and they were well bedded in clean straw, with full mangers and fresh water drawn from the Keep’s deep clear well.

  The younger Herald was perched on a stool between the two stalls, cleaning bridles. They were ordinary bridles, belonging to the Keep’s horses; not the lovely, bitless ones ornamented with silver bells that she had seen on the Companions. Merris squatted beside him and reached for one of the many scraps of leather that he had spread around him, and started working soap into it with her fingers.

  He stared at her as if he did not know what to make of her. A long white head came between them, followed by a massive white body.

  Companions were not nearly as ethereal in person as they were in legend. They were broad-boned, heavy-set creatures with substantial heads . . . and silver hooves and clear blue eyes and manes and tails like white silk. Merris looked up at that deceptively horselike face and sighed.

  “Selena says,” said the Herald, “that no, our life is not for you—but what you have ahead of you is just as remarkable.”

  “I know that,” Merris said—a little sadly, because even in Forgotten Keep, a girl could dream of being Chosen. She reached up. The Companion lowered a soft nose into her palm and blew warm breath on it.

  “She also says,” the Herald said, “that you don’t have much time. Whatever you do, don’t wear the pendant.”

  Merris felt her eyes go round. There were all too many questions she could ask, but most of them were too foolish to bother with. She said, “Tell her I dropped it down the garderobe.”

  “Things of that nature have a way of not staying dropped.”

  Merris wondered if that was the Herald speaking, or the Companion speaking through him. Not that it mattered particularly. “What are you really here for?” she asked.

  She peered around the Companion’s head. The Herald lifted his shoulders in a shrug. “Isak took sick on the road. Your Keep was the closest place that was likely to have a Healer.”

  He was telling the truth, as far as it went. Merris could tell. Still, she said, “I don’t believe in accidents.”

  “Neither do I,” the Herald said. “Is it true what they say? You’re heir to Darkwall?”

  She nodded.

  He frowned. “You’re nothing like what I would expect.”

  “What, pretentious? Fu
ll of myself? Too far above it all to sit in a stable aisle, cleaning bridles?”

  He laughed, then flushed. “Well, that. And . . . well. Darkwall.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  He shook his head. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said it.”

  “No,” said Merris. “Tell me what you mean.”

  His head shook again. The Companion pawed, then butted him, knocking him off his stool. He lay in the aisle and glared. “I can’t say that!”

  The Companion shook its—her—mane and snorted wetly, not quite into his face.

  He shoved her head aside and scrambled to his feet, still glaring. “Selena says,” he said, biting off the words, “that I should say, ‘You don’t look like something that would rule Darkwall. You’re too, well, clean.’ ”

  “And that means?”

  “I’m not even sure what it means,” he said angrily, but his anger did not seem to be directed at Merris. “It’s rumors, that’s all. Stories and a few poorly rhymed ballads. Darkwall isn’t just called that because it’s built on a black cliff. It has a bad reputation.”

  “Why?” Merris demanded. “What do you know?”

  “If the heir to Darkwall doesn’t know it,” he said, “maybe there’s nothing to know.”

  She wanted to pick him up and shake him, but he was standing up and she was sitting on the floor, and he was a fair bit bigger than she was. She let her glare do it for her. “Suppose there’s something I haven’t been told, and a reason why. Tell me.”

  “I told you, it’s just rumors. That the Lady is a socreress. That she keeps herself young with the blood of children, and rules a domain of magical creatures as well as humans.”

  “I’ve heard those rumors,” Merris said. “I’ve also met the Lady. She’s not particularly young, and she’s been aging as she should.”

  “Do you like her?”

  That was a most peculiar question. It was also peculiarly perceptive. Merris answered it honestly. “No. No, I don’t. I don’t like any of the tutors she’s sent either. They’re all so cold. All duty, no humanity.”

  “That’s not like you at all,” he said. Then he flushed again. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—well, I did. But I shouldn’t have. I have serious deficiencies in tact and diplomacy.”

  He sounded as if he was quoting someone—probably one of his teachers. Merris reflected that unlike her tutors, he was very likable indeed. She was thinking she could trust him.

  Thoughts she had not been daring to think, and realizations she had not wanted to come to, were coming together in Merris’ head. She pulled herself up, staggering on knees that were suddenly weak.

  The Companion’s shoulder was there, offering support. Over the broad back and arched neck, she met the Herald’s eyes.

  “I’m nothing like the place I’m supposed to take charge of,” she said. “So tell me, why did she choose me? Why not someone who fits her better?”

  Coryn shook his head. He did not know. Or—did not want to?

  The Companion’s neck bent around. The blue eye was very keen. It saw everything she wanted it to see, and everything else, too.

  “There are no accidents,” Merris said. “Please tell me you didn’t half-kill a Herald just to provide an excuse.”

  The white head shook from side to side. Some things, the Companion seemed to be saying, were beyond even her powers—even if she had wanted any such thing.

  “I have to go,” Merris said. She was running away, of course, but it was all too much. She needed to be alone.

  She did not pause to see if Coryn tried to stop her. The Companion did not, and that was what mattered.

  Merris lay in her bed, staring at the ceiling. Her maids snored in ragged harmony. The moon was setting. Its light reminded her of the shimmer of a Companion’s coat.

  One reason why Darkwall’s Lady might have gone so far afield in search of an heir was because the farther from her Keep she went, the less likely it would be that people would have heard the stories. The Keeps kept to themselves. When they made alliances, they did so circumspectly. People in this country were not given to idle gossip.

  Maybe Darkwall fostered that. If sorcery existed, and if the Lady practiced it, what better way to protect herself than by creating a buffer all around her of domains that asked no questions and shared no tales? Even Heralds seldom came here, as if something kept them from noticing this country existed.

  Merris drew into a knot. Her stomach felt sick. This was the wildest speculation, based on practically nothing at all. She was afraid, that was all, because in less than a month she would have to leave everything she had ever known. She was inventing stories and imagining horrors.

  But the pit of her stomach did not believe that. Deep down, where her instincts were, she believed the stories.

  Then why did the Lady want her? What did Merris have that Darkwall could use?

  Youth, of course. Fertility, maybe. Maybe her innocence was meant to lighten a dark place and make a cold heart warm again.

  Somehow Merris found it hard to believe that. What did sorcery want with innocence?

  Blood of children.

  Merris sat up so fast her head spun. The moon was almost down. Its last glimmer caught the box on her bedside table: a small wooden box, very plain, such as jewels were stored in.

  She had not put it there.

  One of the servants must have found it and, ever helpful, put it where she could see it. It was only a box, simply made and fit for use. It must be empty. She had dropped its contents down the garderobe.

  Something was in it. Something that made her skin creep.

  She got up suddenly, picked up the box in a fold of her nightgown and flung it out the window. It was a profoundly childish and possibly dangerous thing to do, but she did not care. Let the garden keep it. She did not want it anywhere near her.

  In the morning the heir of Darkwall announced that she would retreat for a while to the shrine of Astera. She had a great task ahead of her, and considerable responsibility. She felt a need to invoke the Goddess’ guidance.

  “I’ll be back before my birthday,” she promised her father.

  Lord Bertrand was quite old now and growing frail, but his mind was as clear as ever. He nodded. “Of course,” he said. “Of course you need a little time to reflect. These are great changes which you face, and you are young.”

  He did not make her promise to honor the bargain. That would have insulted them both. He met her eyes and nodded, understanding more than maybe she herself did.

  With his blessing on her head, she left within the hour. One of her maids rode with her, and a pair of guards. She was gone before either of her tutors could have missed her.

  It was not terribly far to the shrine—half a day’s easy ride in late-spring sunlight—and the road was well maintained if not much traveled. Merris found her fears receding as she left the bulk of the Keep behind. In their place was a growing conviction. This was the right thing to do.

  Tonight the moon was almost full, riding high over the guesthouse of the shrine. Astera’s priestesses had finished their night office some time before. The purity of their voices still shivered in Merris’ skin.

  Merris’ maid Gerda was a sound sleeper. Merris had chosen her for it. The guards had not been allowed within the walls of the shrine; they had had to camp outside in a place reserved for their kind. It overlooked the main road but not, she had taken care to observe, a track that wound away through the woods.

  She had to go on foot—there was no discreet way to liberate her horse from the stable. She regretted that, but some things could not be helped. Dressed in the plainest clothes and the most sensible shoes she had been able to find, with a small pack and a full water bottle, she slipped out into the moonlight.

  Her heart was beating faster than her brisk pace might have called for, and her hands were cold. She had put fear aside, but that did not mean she was calm. No one in the world knew what she was doing. This was a very dan
gerous thing to do—but she had to do it. There was no choice.

  Past the first turn in the track, out of sight of the shrine, the moonlight grew suddenly, blindingly bright. Merris stopped, shading her eyes against the dazzle.

  It faded as suddenly as it had swelled, distilling into a white horse-body and the dark shape of a rider. Merris looked at them in a kind of despair. “I’m not trying to run out on the bargain,” she said.

  “It looks as if you’re running toward it,” said Coryn.

  He was not wearing Whites. His Companion’s gear was dark and plain—an ordinary saddle and a leather halter with reins buckled to the side rings. The Herald must have raided the tack room in the Keep.

  There was still no mistaking what his mount was, but Merris had to give him credit for trying. “I won’t let you take me back,” she said. “This is something I have to do.”

  “I know,” Coryn said. “Selena knows, too. We won’t stop you—but we won’t let you go alone either.”

  Merris was ashamed to admit how deep her relief was. It made her voice sharper and her words more cutting. “What, you can’t wait out your Internship before you get yourself killed in the line of duty?”

  “Maybe you’re right,” Coryn said. “Maybe you’re not. Either way, you should have someone at your back.”

  “Why? Have you Gifts that can help? Can you transport me there instantly? Read the Lady’s mind? Blast the Keep into rubble?”

  His cheeks were bright red. “I’m nothing either special or spectacular as Heralds go, and the gods know I’m not highborn. But I am a Herald. The King’s authority rides with me. If this bargain is unholy or unsanctioned, there are things I can do to put a stop to it.”

  “Yes,” she said nastily. “You can die for being too stupidly brave to stay away.”

  He took a deep breath and squared his shoulders. “Maybe so. And maybe my death will count for something. We’re going with you.”

  She hissed in frustration. If she pushed past, he only had to follow. He had a mount and she had none. He could gallop ahead and be there hours before her.