An Empty Steading
The Enemy has many captains, and they vie with each other to work his will. No doubt he prefers it so, for if they are busy with each other they do not seek to unseat him. It is ever thus with the greedy, be they small or large, weak or powerful.
—Caelgor the Fair
Windbreath never fades upon the Taurain’s expanse, no matter the season. We were lucky to be upon the cusp of spring, for the snow was packed and a thin scattering of fine granules rode the back of moving air. The ground was still frozen, not yet deep sucking mud, and there was welcome additional forage for our mounts under the white shell. Added to the Elder seidhr of care, it was enough for survival.
The first settlement was a collection of shadows upon the southron horizon long before we reached it. Arneior straightened in the saddle, her mount sensing the change and all but prancing despite weariness; my heart lifted with a strangling leap almost as uncomfortable as the Jewel’s sharp burning weight.
Two black blots—Elak and Karas—preceded us, drawing toward what I realized had to be buildings before vanishing into the middle-distant haze. For a long time the settlement stayed where it was no matter how the Elder horses jogtrotted, then suddenly the wooden bulks separated from a billow of driven ice-flakes, looming larger with every approaching step.
Greathall, outlying halls, stables, pens, smaller houses—all in the customary pattern, though their backs were turned to the North and they used a great deal of turf instead of timber. Still, wood had been brought from the outskirts of Dorael’s great forest and the Mistwood itself, and the building’s shapes were blessedly mortal. If not for some minor differences in construction it might have been one of Dun Rithell’s neighbors, and a mingled edge of pain and wonder pierced deep when we passed through an unguarded opening in the palisade. The twinge was only matched by another when we trotted between drifts fetched up against other structures and saw the greathall with its stone steps rising out of wind-thrown snow.
Yet I could not feel much joy, even though ’twas a relief to be out of the incessant onslaught of tiny icy pellets. For the place was deserted.
Doors were largely unlocked, yet all shut tight. The houses were empty and had suffered some small damage from winter’s gnawing. The snow was not cleared, there were no pigs in the sheds, no hounds milling about and belling in excitement over visitors. No flocks huddled in the barns, nor in the well-fenced paddocks. No children gawped, no women peered from the doors or from under mantle-hoods, and no warriors held the palisade. I suspected even the granaries were empty. It was eerie, and the only sound was a banging from a pair of shutters upon a smaller westron hall loosened by some recent storm.
Still, it was shelter, and the light was failing. The greathall’s stables were empty, clean, and still held fodder, albeit frozen. As soon as my slippers touched ground and I inhaled the faint fading scent of mortal steeds trapped in the building, my knees nearly gave.
“Ekfar’s people must have gone to Dorael,” Eol said, handing his reins to Efain. “I would have thought him too stubborn.”
“If Lady Gelveig left, he would follow. Stubborn he is, but not foolish.”Efain actually smiled; the Northerners seemed greatly relieved. “And he prizes his wife, as he should.”
“I do not like this,” Arn murmured, steadying me. “Not even a granary feline left, it feels like.”
“At least we will not have to camp in a ravine.” I looked up—the hayloft was precisely where it should be, and after so long spent in the Wild or Elder houses, it was a joy to see mortal carpentry again. “Maybe we can sleep there, and pretend to be hiding from Albeig.”
The thought of our housekeeper cheered me immensely; had this been our home she would be busy with the work of arranging guest-greeting, fretting over the proper mulling of the welcome cup, and sending servants in every direction for this or that. One who can organize a greathall is held in high honor, for woe betide you if winter arrives and she is unhappy. My mother relied upon Albeig’s wit and work almost as much as her own hands.
I could picture travelers being greeted at home, but not what might happen were Arneior and I to reappear. I could not even imagine my mother’s embrace, nor Astrid’s likely bursting into relieved, joyous tears. What would Bjorn do, if we ever saw each other again? Or my father—Eril was ever gruff and forbearing, keeping any joy under a screen of fierce rectitude, and I could not compass how he would react to his eldest daughter’s return.
The greathall, though well-constructed, reeked of damp and neglect. Even a single inhabitant may save a place from complete ruin, but buildings wholly abandoned begin to fray in short order. Upon the dais was a high table—made of stone, and hauled to this place by what feat I could not tell—and upon that, a thin board with carven falling-runes lay, gathering dust and whispering its tale into the dark.
Read by the cold blue glow of an Elder lantern, the mystery was revealed. Some short while ago a very large raven had appeared at bruise-dark twilight, winging hard from the north and settling upon the roof of Lord Ekfar’s hall. And, as befit such a creature, it had spoken.
Taeron Goldspear hath fallen, it croaked in the Old Tongue. The Enemy is moving. Flee, or prepare for war.
Thrice it repeated this message, then it took wing again with a sound like the whirling winds which sometimes race across the Taurain in spring or late summer, shaped like spinning children’s toys but full of horrendous power. Wherever those swift-racing storms touch the earth with a fingertip all is harrowed, and even their fringes cause great harm.
When I heard of that, I wondered what seidhr Northerners work to turn aside such things, and to this day I do not know.
The letter stated the raven flew south afterward, perhaps for Dorael. If it gave the same message at settlements along the way, Ekfar’s people could not guess. But Lady Gelveig who had written the warning added that their House, being Faithful, had caused their entire folk, old and young, ill and hale, to set forth along with whatever supplies, kine, swine, horse, and hound could be moved.
I did not blame them. Had such a thing occurred at Dun Rithell, the elders and all with seidhr would have been called to hasty conference. Frestis and I would have been asked to divine, but such clear sign from the gods themselves—for those giant birds are sacred to Odynn, and even their smaller kin oft carry his vision or intent among mortals—could be ignored only by fools.
The hue and cry must have been considerable. It spoke well of the lady, and of her lord, that they had organized their flight so thoroughly. There was very little left behind; the greathall was tidy, but horribly empty. The tables were bare, benches and chairs placed just so, the floors swept clean even of sand or sweet rushes, the hearths cold.
Some slender stores were left—dried manure-pats and scrub enough for a fire, at least, and a single barrel of ale. We made camp in the greathall, the hearth looking very glad indeed to hold a blaze again, and the Northerners spoke of other settlements between here and the great forest’s edge. Who was likely to leave, who would stay, who might send merely their children and elderly with a few warriors’ guard… they named many I had never heard of, and normally my ears would have worked until they tingled, storing away such details as a lord’s daughter must to aid in future negotiation.
Instead, I settled near the fire, watching my shieldmaid as she drank warm ale with every evidence of enjoyment. Winter-skinny coneys were put to roasting, some hard cheese left in a cellar was found, and a few jars of preserved stuffs added to what was a virtual feast.
The Elder were merry as well, though they left the mortal provender to their Secondborn friends. And I could not stomach it; strangely, even the good healthful aroma of roast meat made me lightheaded. A double measure of springwine did not induce the deep rolling nausea, at least, and I tried not to watch longingly as the marrowbones were cracked and Arn sighed with pleasure.
The Northerners even sang a few songs while the Taurain’s breath mouthed the corners of the hall. Apparently Gelad was polishing a few verses about rowing in my shieldmaid’s honor, which caused great—and very respectful—mirth. Minnowsharp in the prow was she, the refrain went, and kept calling tai-yo! Tai-yo! She kept calling tai-yo!
Of the fall of Laeliquaende they did not sing.
Daerith was called upon for at least half a saga. He chose a song I had not heard before, of the creation of rabbits, and Lokji—who the Elder call by a different name—spear-marrying one of their princesses. It tread close to the ribald, but I could not help smiling and even Arn laughed at the last few lines.
Normally ’tis a volva’s delight to partake in such things, but I could not have crafted even a couplet, let alone a song. The burning in my chest, only slightly quenched by springwine, turned and sawed.
My shieldmaid and I bedded down in a servants’ closet near to the hall, with an Elder lantern to keep us company. It was slightly damp but a great and welcome change from outside, and I thought perhaps I could finally find some rest.
I managed a half-doze for a long while, listening to the sounds of a wooden building on a cold night and Arn’s soft breathing in my ear. Sleep would not come, despite the comfort of her arm over my waist.
I did not mean to attempt seidhr. But ’tis natural as breathing for one with the weirding, and besides… I am not quite certain it was entirely of my own will.
A white bird glimmered in the dark, winging northward. The pull was strong; once I ceased to resist I barely felt the burning. In fact, the heat amid my ribs was proof against deep chill. Snow undulated below, the Taurain’s expanse swanfeather-soft. Seen from above the pattern of cracks from storm runoff became clear, as well as the hidden groves of silverbark birch and shiverwood, their naked limbs hung with ice partly melted every noon, refreezing at night—though not for much longer.
The land dropped away into a vast misty cauldron, and from above I saw the lights over the Glass’s ice-chasms.
What are you doing? A soft, secret voice whispered in my invisible ear. You fled with such haste and effort, why return?
I did not know. By all rights I should have been flying hard south and east, hoping to at least glimpse my home before I was called back into my aching, feverish physical shell. But the urging drew me on, and its source was not the horrified fascination of smoke and fire to the north but a wordless impulse from the gleam cupped amid a hollowboned chestcage, granting strength to stretching, long-pinion’d wings.
Fear brushed me, soft as feathers drawn along bare skin. I veered westward, balanced between the northern call and the draw of my left-behind body. Between the two I veered upon a thread-thin edge, and below me shadows gathered. Freezing mist receded in long fingers, and the land was now snowbound but flat as the grass-plain could never be. No hillock, no valley, no ravine, nothing but soft featurelessness. The first blot upon the landscape looked like a skeletal, begging hand, and I realized I had dropped—no longer moving at hawk-height, but skimming-treetop like a hunting crow.
The thin bony shape wheeling below was a blasted tree. Others recurred sometimes, reaching from soft grey like a shadow. I realized the wind was full of tiny flakes as well, but they were not snow. Nor were they ice.
Ash, the inner voice whispered. But it is so cold here; what is burning?
I was afraid I would see Laeliquaende afire still, but what spun under my bird-belly next were ruins of riven stone and blackened timber, deep grey drifts clinging in every hollow. A terrible cataclysm had come over this place; the shape of the buildings was not quite Elder nor that of my people, but somewhere between.
The darkness upon my right was very close, and along with it a low hateful sound. Agonized groaning or cries of pain, rage or terrible cutting mirth? I could not tell. Lurid bright flickers were fires cracking through the ash, burning though denied any fuel, not the tiny starlike points I had seen from the Glass but much closer. They hissed continuously, and I dropped lower still. Fatigue beat alongside a steadily mounting pain in my chest.
Where am I going? For there was some purpose here. The call was too loud to be otherwise. A tower reared in the distance, its wholeness a shock amid such desolation. It was a graceful spire, and at its top a yellowish glitter blinked lazily. There was a pattern to its stutter, but one I could not decipher for I was moving too swiftly now.
Too late I realized the trap, and my wings beat soft-frantic as a pigeon in an osier cage, strapped to a wicker tower and waiting for the fire. The tower loomed closer, and others reared below it—more Elder than mortal construction, but still familiar enough.
Behold, another voice whispered, and I knew I had heard it before in a forgotten dream.This was Naras, lost in a single night of flame and lamentation. Now it is home only to darkness, and to beasts.
I strained to break away, an egg of fire cracking in my chest. The flame raced through me, wingtip to claw, beak to tail, every vein suddenly full of burning. My gaze was torn from the yellow light at the tower’s top, and I tumbled through darkness and keening wind, my mouth full of hot copper…
… before thumping into my own heavy, painful body, every muscle rigid, staring at the shadowed ceiling of an abandoned closet. The Elder lantern set upon the floor brightened, and Arn muttered in her sleep, her arm tightening. My mouth was open, but I could not scream—I could barely breathe, drawing in shallow sips of air that tasted of desertion and fire’s cold leavings in a dirty hearth.
I lay choking and paralyzed for a near-eternity before the thing in my chest shifted. It did not hurt me less, but at least I could fill my lungs. Hot tears trickled down to my temples, sinking into my hair. My braids were deeply awry, and sharp edges dug into my scalp.
Two of the larger red coral beads had split, and their broken bits were what I felt.
Not only that, but my hair was heavily frosted with ash.