And she had run away!
"But aren't ye being tough on the poor girl? " Bradwarden remarked.
"She should not be here," Roger replied. "Or at least, she should not be planning to stay. There is too much to do, and time will work against us if we do not act."
"Against us?" the centaur echoed doubtfully. "I'm not seem' Roger Lockless doin' much work in Palmaris. I'm not seein' Roger Lockless doin' much work at all!" He ended with a laugh, a great belly laugh; but Roger, too perplexed by these revelations concerning his feelings, didn't join in.
"Ah, but ye're bein' too hard on her," Bradwarden explained.
"The opportunity-"
"And what good might she be doin' if her heart's not in it? " Bradwarden promptly interrupted, and his voice grew more grim then, and more serious. "Ye lost a friend, and so ye're stingin', and wantin' to put a meanin' to it," the centaur explained. "And so ye should be, and so should we all. But Pony's lost more than a friend."
"I loved Elbryan," Roger started to protest, but Bradwarden was laughing at the absurdity of the statement, and Roger couldn't honestly disagree. Comparing his relationship with Elbryan to the one the ranger shared with Pony was indeed absurd.
"She's needin' time to heal," the centaur said after a bit. "She's needin' time for rememberin' who she is and why she is, and for findin' a reason to keep on fightin'."
"How long?" Roger asked. "It's been a year."
"A torn heart can take a sight longer than a year," Bradwarden said quietly, solemnly, his voice filled with obvious sympathy for his dear friend Pony. "Ye give her the time, and it might be that she'll go back and begin the fight anew."
"Might be?"
"And might not be," the centaur said plainly. "Ye can't be tellin' someone else what fights they're wantin' to pick, and ye can't be arguin' the worth o' fightin' to one who's not seein' it." "And if she chooses not to continue?" Roger asked. "What value, then, of Elbryan's death?"
"Ask yerself," the centaur replied. "Ye're so quick to be makin' it Pony's fight, and easy enough for ye, sittin' up here in the Timberlands. Where's Roger, then? I'm askin'. He's lettin' his friend go cold in the ground, and not doin' a thing to bring a value to Elbryan's death."
"I was not offered the barony or the abbey."
"Ye weren't lookin' for the offer," Bradwarden said. "Ye could've ridden the last fight to some power, if ye so chose."
"I came north with you," Roger protested, "to bury Elbryan."
"And ye could've been back in Palmaris before the summer was half finished," Bradwarden scolded. "Are ye mad at Pony, boy? Are ye really? Or is it yerself that's botherin' yerself?"
Roger started to answer, but stopped short and stood staring out at the forest, wondering, wondering.
"Pony's needin' a friend now, and needin' us to let her do all that she's needin' to do without our judgin' her," Bradwarden remarked sternly. "Ye think ye can do that? "
Roger looked him right in the eye, considered the question carefully and honestly, then nodded.
A chill wind came up that evening, and Pony honestly wasn't sure if it was a natural thing or a consequence of this cold place. In either case, how fitting it seemed to her as she stood before the two cairns in the grove north of Dundalis, a place that would have left her cold on the hottest of bright summer days.
She only glanced at the older of the graves, the resting place of Mather Wyndon, Elbryan's uncle and the first Wyndon ranger. She couldn't help but picture the body under those stones, disturbed first by Elbryan on that dark night when he had earned Tempest, the elven sword, and then again more recently by Bradwarden and Roger, when they reinterred the weapon beside its original owner.
And Pony couldn't help but picture Elbryan, and the mere thought of her love lying cold in the ground nearly buckled her knees. He was there, under those rocks, with Hawkwing, the magnificent bow Belli'mar Juraviel's father, Joycenevial, had crafted for him during his years of training with the Touel'alfar. He was there, with eyes unseeing and a mouth that could not draw breath. He, who had so often warmed her in his gentle but strong embrace, was there, alone and cold, and there was nothing, nothing that she could do about it.
All of her young life had been marred by loss. First her family and friends-all of them save Elbryan-had been murdered by goblins and giants. Then her companions at Pireth Tuime-men and women she hadn't considered friends but with whom she had forged a working relationshiphad been slaughtered by the attacking powries. Then the Chilichunks, who had shown her only love, had perished in the dungeons of St.-Mere-Abelle.
Then Paulson, Cric, and Chipmunk and Tuntun and Avelyn, dear Avelyn, all lost on the road to Mount Aida. And her child, torn from her womb by the demon Markwart. And finally-in an act that had saved her life, surely-she had lost Elbryan, her lover, her best friend, the man she had intended to grow old beside.
It didn't get easier, these confrontations with death. Far from hardening her heart to future losses, each death seemed to amplify those that came before.
She pictured them now, all of them, from Elbryan to Avelyn to her father, walking past her as if in a dream, moving close in front of her but never seeing her or hearing her plaintive calls. Walking, walking away from her forever.
She reached out and tried to grab Elbryan, but he was an insubstantial thing, a formed mist and nothing more, and her hand passed right through him. He was an image, a memory, something lost.
Pony blinked open her eyes and didn't even try to hold back the tears that rolled down her cheeks.
Chapter 18
I hadn't thought we'd be seein' our home again so soon," Liam O'Blythe remarked to Prince Midalis as they trotted their mounts at the lead of a long column making its way through the muggy air of the Vanguard forest. They had gone north with Bruinhelde and his clan only to be met by barbarian scouts reporting that southern Alpinador was clear of monsters, that not a sign of any goblins or powries had been seen in many, many weeks. And so, with Bruinhelde's approval and a knowing wink and a nod from Andacanavar, the men of Vanguard had turned about, heading back to their homes to erase the scars of the demon war.
Andacanavar had come back to the south, as well, though he had taken a roundabout route and they hadn't seen him in a couple of days. With Midalis' blessing, the ranger had decided to haunt the region of Vanguard for the rest of the summer, to learn what he could about his southern neighbors in the hopes that he could further bridge the chasm between the two peoples. The ranger had also elicited from Midalis the Prince's promise that, when he returned home in the autumn, Midalis would accompany him.
There remained the not so little matter of the blood-brothering.
"Pireth Vanguard!" the point scout called back.
"Well, she is still standing, then," Midalis remarked. A few moments later, rounding a bend and cresting a rise in the trail, Liam and Midalis came in sight of the fortress, its towers stark against the heavy gray sky hanging over the Gulf of Corona behind it.
Before they entered the fortress, the pair noted that a trader was in port, but it wasn't until Midalis saw Warder Presso running toward him that he realized something unusual was going on. The battle-weary Prince was relieved indeed to learn the Warder's news, to learn that nothing sinister had happened in the days since their departure.
Still, a monk visiting from Palmaris, come to take Abbot Agronguerre back to St.-Mere-Abelle, was no small matter; and though he was tired and hot and dirty, Prince Midalis decided that he should go straight to St. Belfbur to meet the man. Liam, of course, willingly followed; and the two were joined by Captain Al'u'met, who was riding Warder Presso's own fine horse. On the trails to the abbey, Al'u'met told of the happenings in Palmaris yet again; and as they nodded, hanging on every word, both the Prince and his adviser came to understand why Midalis' brother, the King, had not responded to their request for soldiers.