“I shall explain tonight!” Cefwyn said. “But things are as well as they can be. Thank the gods for your meeting us. We’re in good order, with you here, Your Grace! See me when first you’ve set your tents!” And Cefwyn told Umanon the numbers and place of his camp as well, after which Umanon rode off to his assigned place in the order, and to claim his personal baggage.
The day had worn hard on Cefwyn. He had started the day as he had started yesterday, riding strongly, but now despite the good news of a moment ago, he seemed to Tristen to be clinging to his courage and to his composure even at Danvy’s sedate walk. Danvy had given a couple of quick steps as horses came up to him, and Cefwyn had corrected that, but at a price.
“Not far,” Tristen said to him, the only encouragement he could offer, for if there was one road in the world he knew it was this one and if there was one thing he could now sense like his own bonfire in this night, it was Althalen.
It was deepest dusk when they came to their projected camp, in that area of the road respecting Althalen’s perimeter and across the road from any accidental encroachment on what Cefwyn called the cursed precinct.
Tristen was very glad, himself, to get down. The wagons were yet to come and the least essential ones, with the units of horse that guarded them, would be arriving long into the night.
“Set the unit standards with their units,” Cefwyn called out, pointed warning against any such carryings-on as yesterday night. “Bid everyone keep their standards in good order. From this place on, there is danger of the enemy at any hour!”
Ninévrisé had not gotten off her horse, and Tristen walked over to see if she needed help; so did Cefwyn, at the same time. “My lady?” Cefwyn said.
“My father’s grave is here,” she said. “I wish to ride just to the edge of the ruin, my lord, to stay only for a moment, if I can do it without endangering the camp. But I feel—I wish to, my lord.”
Tristen stood by, having been ready to offer Ninévrisé a hand down.
He knew that Cefwyn did not want to grant such a request, and that Cefwyn out of his willingness to please Ninévrisé would get back on Danvy and take a guard and go, though he was in pain. He would not send Ninévrisé only with an escort.
“I shall go with you,” Cefwyn said, with never a protest.
“My lord,” Tristen said. “My lord King, this is a place where I can see things others may not, and defend against things others cannot. I can take Uwen and my guards.”
Cefwyn looked at him, seemed to consider, and let weariness and gratitude touch his face. “Half yours,” he said. “Six of the Dragon Guard.
We’ve tents to raise. —And be careful. In this matter, I trust you as no other, but for the gods’ own sake, for the gods’ sake and on your oath to me, be careful.”
“Yes, sir.” He went to get Petelly and gave orders to Uwen, glad that Cefwyn had been reasonable—but most of all feeling now in his heart, as clearly as he saw the sun sinking, that Ninévrisé’s request was both urgent and advised.
He mounted up and by that time Uwen had collected the men Cefwyn lent him. They crossed the road, on which a seemingly endless line of riders and men afoot stretched on out of sight, and they entered the meadow on the other side, riding up through a screen of trees to another grassy stretch, farther and farther then, out of sight of their camp, and up into the area where they had met Uwen that dreadful night, in the rain, and with Caswyddian’s forces behind them.
Uwen grew anxious. So did the men with them. And perhaps, Tristen thought, he should be apprehensive himself, as he saw streaks of wind run through the grass, and one little one, following a thinner, very erratic course. He knew the child, saw her frolic without seeing her at all.
Ninévrisé said, “Something is there.”
“It is,” he said. “But don’t look too closely. She doesn’t like to be caught, Uwen, it’s the witch of Emwy’s child. She’s a little girl. I’m glad to see her. Her name is Seddiwy.” “That old woman?”
“I don’t think the child died when Emwy burned. I think she might have died a long time ago. I don’t know why I think so, except the Emwy villagers are here, too, and they’re not so friendly, or so happy as she is.
—But they won’t harm us. She’s stronger than she seems.”
“Gods,” Uwen muttered, as four distinct marks flattened the grass ahead of them, leading where they had to go. “Is it those streaks in the grass?”
“Yes, those.”
“M’lord, I do hope you know where we’re going.”
The light was leaving them very fast, now, and none of the men looked confident—they were very tired, they had been two days now on the
road, and they might, except for this venture, be sitting at the fires and drinking wine with their friends and waiting for their suppers; but on
Cefwyn’s orders they came, and fingered amulets more than weapons.
Petelly snorted and twitched his head up as the little spirit darted beneath him—and then right under a guardsman’s horse. It shied straight up, and the man, most anxious of their company, fought hard to hold it from bolting.
“Behave!” Tristen said sternly, and that stopped.
They were coming among saplings that had been all broken off halfway up their trunks. Rocks lay shattered in the grass.
Then one of the Dragon Guards reined aside from something lying in the grass, and said, not quite steadily, “Here’s a dead man, Lord Warden.”
“Caswyddian’s men,” Ninévrisé said calmly enough, though her voice was higher than its wont. “Are we in danger, Lord Tristen? Might their spirits harm us?”
It was to ask. But—”No, I don’t think so. The Emwy folk seem to hold this place to themselves.”
They came up that long, difficult ridge, where two men had fallen. The rains had not quite washed away the scars they had made on that climb.
They reached that place that overlooked the ruin, and it stretched very far under the cover of trees and brush and meadows. Despite the chill of the winds below, the air on this exposed ridge was quite still, even comfortable. There was a sense of peace here that had not existed before, tempting one who had the power to look in that different way—to stop and cast a look in this fading last moment of the light.
Ninévrisé said, in a shaken voice, “Father? Father, is that you?”
Then a change in that other Place caught Tristen’s attention, as certainly a presence would: and in that instant’s glance he saw pale blue, and soft gold. He risked a second look and saw the Lines of the ruin, the lines on the earth that had grown fainter and fainter in the hour of the Regent’s death now spreading out brightly far and wide. Brighter and brighter they shone in the dusk as the world’s light faded, until they blazed brightly into inner vision. Other lines glowed where those lines touched, and those touched other lines in their turn, like fire through tinder, blue and pale gold, each form in interlocking order, as far as the eye could make out, one square overlaying the other—all through the grass, and the thickets.
It was the old man’s handiwork, he thought, astonished and reassured.
Late as it was, the earth was still pouring out light. Shadows flowed along the walls, but respected the lines of those walls now. The men about him glowed like so many stars to his eyes; and then his worldly vision said it was not the men, but the amulets they wore, the blessed things, the things invested with their protection against harm—as Emuin’s amulet glowed on his own chest, in the midst of the light that was himself.
That glow seemed the old man’s doing, too—yet none of the men with them, not even Uwen, seemed to see all that had happened. Only Lady Ninévrisé gazed astonished over the land.
“Your father’s work!” he said. “Do you see, my lady? He is not lost!”