I watched a while longer, still shivering, then went inside with Hedwig and the women to prepare for the boisterous carousing to follow. Whether things had just gotten better or worse, I could not have said.
Chapter Forty-Five
It was passing strange to see Joscelin attendant on Gunter in full Cassiline regalia; his mended grey garments, the vambraces on his forearms, daggers at his belt and sword at his back. Allowed a measure of freedom, he resumed the practice of his morning exercises, flowing through the intricate series of movements that formed the basis of the Brotherhood’s fighting style.
The Skaldi beheld this oddity with a mix of awe and scorn. Their own combat skills were straightforward and efficient, reliant on might-of-arms, sheer ferocity and the fact that most Skaldi warriors are taught to wield a blade from the time they can lift one.
Their attitude toward Joscelin’s discipline was consistent with their feelings toward Terre d’Ange as a whole, and I will admit, it is something I never quite fathomed. It was a strange commingling of derision and yearning, contempt and envy, and I mused upon these things while the steading began to prepare for its journey to the Allthing, for my survival depended largely on my ability to comprehend the Skaldi nature.
Would that I’d had a map in those days, to mark our place in the steading, and the meeting-place decreed by Waldemar Selig. Delaunay had taught me to read maps, of course, and I daresay I could do so as well as any general, but I had no skill to chart my way by the stars, as navigators do. I knew only that we were close to one of the Great Passes through the Camaeline Range, and that we would ride east to the Allthing; seven days' ride, Gunter said, or perhaps eight.
That I would accompany them, he took as a matter of course, although he had still said nothing to me of being a gift for Waldemar Selig. Twenty thanes would go with him to represent the steading, and Hedwig and three others, to speak for the women. They had not the say of the men, but there was an old tale-there is always an old tale, among the Skaldi-of how Brunhild the Doughty wrestled Hobart Longspear and took him two falls out of three, to win the right for women to speak at the Allthing. I suspected Gunter was minded to travel without them, but even he was wary of Hedwig’s wrath. I do not know if she wrestled, but of a surety she wielded a mean ladle, and had no compunctions about raising knots on the skull of any man to oppose her.
As for Joscelin, it was simply assumed that he, too, would make the journey, as Gunter’s body-servant. Gunter Arnlaugson had a fondness for the trappings of power, and it made him strut not a little to have the Cassiline attendant, with his deft bow and D’Angeline elegance.
So we made ready to go, and I had my first taste of Skaldic augury. An old man, the priest of Odhinn, was fetched to the great hall, and led the steading in procession to a stand of winter-barren oak, their sacred grove. He spread a cloak of stainless white wool upon the snow, and mumbled over bits of rune-carved rods, casting them upon the garment. Three times he did this, then proclaimed in a loud voice that the omens were favorable.
Gunter’s thanes cheered at the announcement, banging their short spears on their shields. I, shivering as always in the Skaldic cold, prayed silently to Blessed Elua for protection, and to Naamah, and Kushiel, whose sign I bore. A raven lighted near me on one of the leafless branches, ruffling its feathers and cocking one round, black eye at me. At first it gave me fear, then I remembered that when Elua wandered through the Skaldic hinterlands, the ravens and wolves were his friends, and it heartened me somewhat.
A false spring thaw had broken the ice upon the stream, and we would take our leave in the morning. Much of the remaining day was spent in final preparations, in which I had little part, save to watch the bustle and bundle of it all. Gunter, a seasoned campaigner, had the prudence to retire early, taking me with him. I thought he would leave me be that night, to be all the fresher in the morning, but he tumbled me instead with a soldier’s vigorous efficiency, spending himself with a heroic shout and rolling off me to snore within minutes.
I’d taught him better than that, of course, but he had determined in his naively crafty way that it didn’t matter with a slave when he was minded to have his simple pleasures; and of a surety, it mattered naught with me, dart-stricken and cursed. I lay awake in the darkness, throbbing with the aftermath of a pleasure I despised, and wondered what the coming fortnight would bring.
We arose with the dawn and made ready to leave. He came beaming into the bed-room with a bundle of woolen undergarments and fur wrappings, a gift for me against the cold. To my surprise, he even knelt to wrap the leggings on himself, showing me how to lace the leather thongs to keep them secure. When he was done, he did not rise immediately, but lifted my skirts and thrust his head beneath them, parting my thighs to bestow a kiss upon my pearl of Naamah, as I had taught him.
"I will not ever forget you," he said gruffly, smoothing my skirts in place and looking upward. "Maybe your gods have cursed you, but Gunter Arnlaugson counts it a blessing, eh?"
The last thing I ever expected of him was tenderness; but lest it undo me, Melisande’s diamond glinted at his throat, reminding me of things I had rather forget. I put my hands on his head and kissed him, thanking him for the gift of clothing.
It seemed it was enough. He rose, pleased, and went about his business, seeing to the equipage of the horses.
Well, that is that, I thought. He means to do it.
The journey to the Allthing took a full eight days, and if it was not the hardest thing I have ever endured, I thought it was at the time. I had a horse of my own to ride, for Gunter was mindful of our mounts, and I spent interminable hours hunched in the saddle in my woolens and furs, the reins slack, trusting to my sturdy mount to follow the others. A cold snap followed the false spring, and the snow, softened by warmth, hardened with a brittle crust that made riding slow and bit at the horses' legs. When we made camp at night, the Skaldi tended their mounts first, rubbing their legs down with a salve made of bear-grease.
Our camp was made with rude tents of cured hide that afforded some protection against the cold. Although he made no move to touch me, Gunter kept me with him, and I am not ashamed to say that I huddled against him at night for warmth. We survived on a fare of pottage and dried strips of meat, of which I grew heartily tired.
The lands through which we rode were splendid, though I was hardly minded to appreciate them. The Skaldi seemed not to mind the cold as I did, singing as they rode, breath frosty on the chill air. Hedwig’s cheeks were rosy with cold, her eyes sparkling like a girl’s.
Even Joscelin fared better than I did; I should have guessed it, for Siovale is mountainous, and he was born to it. Like most men, he was happier in action than stillness. Someone had given him a bearskin cloak and he seemed warm enough in it, riding with high-spirited élan. They say there is Bodhistani blood in the torrid lineage of Jasmine House, and I thought of my mother for the first time in many years, wondering as I shivered if this aversion to the cold came through her.
On the eighth day, we reached the meeting-place. It was set in a great bowl of a valley, ringed about with forested mountains, with a lake at the bottom, around which the camp was arrayed.
This, I understood, was Waldemar Selig’s steading, which he had inherited through birth and right of arms, and built into greatness. Indeed, though still crude by our standards, the great hall was thrice the size of Gunter’s, and there were two outbuildings near as big. And all around the lake, throughout the whole of the basin, were pitched encampments, bustling with the activity of varying Skaldi tribemen.