Gran’s place was still home: he was grateful for that. And it smelled right, and it was warm and comfortable, but he didn’t fit into it the way he had before he’d been to Guelessar; and he knew he brought troubles as well as help from outside. He didn’t know what might happen next, but the moment he was happiest, when everything had been the way he wanted—everything started going askew; and the moment he trusted what was what, things changed. That alone had been dependable, ever since he had ridden off to live among Guelenfolk.
Deep in his heart he found not only pain for that fact, but anger. That dismayed him. Gran had taught him most of all not to let anger put down roots—because, she had said, those roots found things; and perhaps they already had. They had dug down into his loneliness, into boyhood lessons with the Bryalt priests, who detested him, and his living with Gran, who he had early discovered wasn’t his real grandmother; and waiting for a father who wanted him to be what he was not, and finding a brother who wanted to be his friend but couldn’t be simply his friend, not considering his position, and the fact that a Guelen king would find it hard to have an Amefin brother. He discovered he had lived in narrow bounds all his life, sheltered from this, ignorant of that; and now, when he’d just gotten out into the world, he’d skidded right back down into Gran’s place, a burden to Gran.
The more he thought of it, the deeper those roots dug.
Add in the humiliation of going to his father in cobwebby, oil-soaked clothes, when he’d tried for the first time to use what he’d learned from Gran. Everyone assumed he had the Gift. Gran had always hinted he did. And the very moment he tried to use just the edge of what people accused him of having, everything tumbled into ruin, and all his good luck vanished.
Wasn’t that a warning, for a wizard or a witch, when luck turned, when like a tool breaking, it cut the hand that held it? Gran had always talked about Luck, and how it flowed, and how there were winds of the world that didn’t move the grass, but that might move a king, ever so subtly. A witch or a wizard had to feel that movement: that was part of using the Gift.
The winds were certainly blowing against his going back to Guelessar now, and had been, from the moment he had waked in that dream—that false dream, as it happened, or at least that greatly exaggerated dream of fire and ruin. He’d thrown over everything, everything good he’d had, and here he’d ridden in and found Gran up and about and Paisi taking care of everything just as he ought.
So what had he done next? He’d thrown over the safety he’d reached, again, out of restlessness he couldn’t reason with, a fear of soldiers who meant him no possible harm, and probably—yes, out of embarrassment, pure embarrassment in turning up back at Gran’s house, in failure. Embarrassment, too, before his mother, sitting smug in her tower, pleased at having him back again… oh, she had won, had she not?
He’d gotten just the least bit prideful in his fine clothes and with his fine horse that he couldn’t ride; he’d sat down at table with the king and his legitimate brother, and this morning he’d found himself back at a dusty hearthside sipping soup from a cracked bowl, back on Gran’s charity again, and giving her nothing to help her old age, nothing to deserve Paisi’s helping him, or sharing his gran with him—Gran owed him nothing, except Lord Tristen had settled him on her house and asked her to take care of him.
Well, when a man needed things or looked for a direction to take, he went to his proper lord, did he not? And if his Lord Crissand was Gran’s lord, still he wasn’t the only lord, nor was he the lord who had laid down the conditions of his life and told the king of Ylesuin to take care of him and not to drown him at birth.
Therewas where his life had begun. There was where, if it had gone wrong, there was one who might set him right again and tell him plainly what to do.
In simplest fact, when he and Feiny had fought, and the horse had turned about, he had felt as if he were facing into a contrary and bitter wind, and the only relief was west, west and south and away from the farm. Maybe even Feiny had felt it. The horse had stopped fighting the course he set.
Prison like his mother’s? Was that his fate, when he grew to be a man? Maybe it would not be so close a prison, but certain Guelenfolk would be happier to have him locked away and forgotten, if only on a farm in Amefel—but he feared that would not be enough for them.
And would they ever have remembered him if his father hadn’t brought him to Guelemara, under his own roof?
Entanglements, Gran had taught him—entanglements worked a certain magic… for good or for ill, and he was entangled with everyone in the world he could possibly love, and those people he could love had entangled themselves with powers that reached down into those very stones Gran said to avoid.
A wind began to blow out of the north, so that he had to snug his cloak about him and tuck it under a knee.
Winter and the weather weren’t obliged to agree with his choice of directions.
But he had known that before he started.
ii
IDRYS DARKENED THE DOORWAY. CEFWYN SPIED THE LORD COMMANDER FAR across the audience hall when he was at assizes. A scroll was in Idrys’ hand, sealed and official, and if it weren’t important, Idrys would not be in the doorway looking at him.
Cefwyn signaled with a move of his head. Idrys walked in, gave the requisite little bow, and came up the side of the room, past farmers and merchants wanting justice, past a felon caught in thievery—the second offense—and passed him the message, a parchment still cold from the weather outside.
Crissand’s personal seal, the Sun with its rays, on red wax, and bound up with red ribbon. Cefwyn cracked the chilled seal and unrolled the tight-furled bit of parchment, more border than message.
Crissand Duke of Amefel to His Majesty the king of Ylesuin, Greetings.
Your men came to me requesting sustenance and aid to a certain woman, the caretaker of your ward, and accordingly I sent inquiry to her, with gifts of food and drink from the Bryalt fathers, and also medicines.
Damn, Cefwyn thought. By the tenor of it, it was his first message to which this letter replied. What had the courier done, stopped for holiday?
But it went on:
My men found the woman with her grandson, Paisi, who was caring for her. He had come by horse, which Your Majesty may know. I accordingly sent more grain, beyond that I had already sent, and prepared to send a message to Your Majesty. However other messengers arrived before this letter was sent, advising me to expect your ward, who would have arrived likewise by horse, and requesting me to ascertain his welfare.
More to the point. Thank the gods. Then:
Accordingly I sent men with the men of the Dragon Guard to visit the house in question and was informed that your ward indeed arrived safely, but to my great distress, I must report that he has quitted the premises alone and ridden west, toward Mama Wood. He expressed to the woman and her son that he wishes to consult Lord Tristen. I have sent Earl Ameidan with a number of men to attempt to find him, but, given the delays in reporting, have little hope of doing so before he passes into Marna, where they will not follow. I have instructed my men to use no force nor lay hands on him at any meeting, not knowing whether he may travel at Your Majesty’s urging, or at Lord Tristen’s, and deeming it unlikely he might confide the nature of such a mission to others. I am left in confusion as to your ward’s intent and instruction, and hope that I have not failed Your Majesty in energy on the one hand or in prudence on the other.
My men will await your reply.