He'd eaten the sausage in triumph when he'd gained the safety of the trees without being seen from the keep and he'd licked the grease from his fingers exactly the way that Nurse Jany always told him not to. At dusk there'd been only water sucked up from the stream to quiet the first rumbling of hunger. At sunrise, he'd left the stream for the easier walking under the pines. At mid-morning, with a sharp ache behind his belt, he'd tried to eat a handful of red berries he'd found in a clearing, hanging plump and thick next to pretty purple flowers, but they'd tasted so bitter he'd spit them out without swallowing and continued to spit for some time.
Now his stomach hurt, and he wondered why his papa was so far away.
Thunder boomed directly overhead and Gerek froze.
A few moments later, he was drenched to the skin as the huge trees bent and swayed like saplings. Nearly solid sheets of water poured through the holes in the canopy. Whimpering, his back pressed hard against a sticky trunk, Gerek lost himself in the fury of the storm. The wind howled like the demons Nurse Jany said still lived in the mountains, and even stuffing his fingers in his ears couldn't keep out their shrieking. When a branch as big around as he was crashed to the ground in a deafening cascade of smaller twigs, he panicked and ran.
Pushed in front of a wind strong enough at times to lift both child and sword from the ground, Gerek scrambled blindly forward, screaming for his father. Oblivious to welts and scratches, he plunged out from under the pines into an area of younger trees and thicker underbrush. The sword caught again.
Sobbing in near hysteria, Gerek yanked on the belt, his only remaining coherent thought that he had to get the sword to his papa. Jammed in a tangle of poplar suckers, the sword refused to move. He threw his weight against the leather. A sudden, violent gust of wind added its strength to his. The sword flew free. Gerek tumbled backward and lost his grip.
Coughing and sputtering, he fought his way back to his feet and looked frantically around him. The rain made it nearly impossible to see. He took two jerky steps forward and clutched frantically at a sapling for support as the sodden earth slid out from under his feet and down into a deep, steep-sided ravine.
Another gust of wind blew the curtain of rain aside just long enough for him to see that the sword lay, half covered in mud, on a ledge a little way down from where he stood.
He had to get the sword to his papa.
Rubbing the water from his eyes, he crouched, still holding the sapling, and stretched out his other arm. The rain pounded against it and his fingers dug into the ground a handbreadth short.
Gerek set his jaw, panic pushed aside by determination. Releasing his anchor, he inched forward. His fingers touched the scabbard, then his hand wrapped around it.
Unfortunately, the sword weighed much more than the child could lift one-handed. It began to slide. Blinking away rain and scowling furiously, Gerek refused to let go. His free hand flailed for the sapling, couldn't reach it, and dug into the earth instead.
The handful he held fell with him.
Wind and rain and the roar of water below drowned out his cries.
"Pjerin, I have to sit." With one hand pressed tight against the curve of her belly, Annice lowered herself to a rock still damp from the recent rain.
"But we just sat out the storm."
"I know." She let the lead rope slide through slack fingers and the mule dropped her head to graze.
Something in her voice pulled Pjerin to her side. He dropped the mare's reins, knowing she wouldn't wander, and peered anxious down at Annice. "Are you all right?"
"I don't know." An attempted smile didn't quite reached her face. "It hurts."
"What hurts? The baby?"
"I think so."
He stared at her in disbelief. "You think so?"
"Well, I've never…" The stiff set to her shoulders suddenly relaxed. "It stopped."
"What stopped!"
"Every now and then, it… that is, this," she tapped the curve gently, "gets all hard, kind of tightens from the top down."
"So it's happened before?"
Annice nodded. "But it never hurt before."
Pjerin felt a sudden line of sweat bead down the center of his back. "You're not… I mean… you couldn't be…"
"I'm not due until Second Quarter Festival and that's…" She stopped and looked up at him, eyes wide. "That's soon, Pjerin. I didn't realize it was so soon. What are we going to do?"
He dropped to one knee beside her, ignoring the wet that began to immediately soak through his breeches. "The moon was almost full last night; remember how it looked before the clouds came down?" When she nodded, he continued, his voice low and soothing although under the calm facade his heart slammed against his ribs. "That means we're got a little better than fourteen days to Second Quarter Festival. All we've got to do is get to the keep. There's a midwife in the village. A good one. She'll see that everything goes all right."
Annice reached out and brushed a strand of damp hair back off his face. "But they think you're a traitor at the keep. You condemned yourself in front of them under Command."
"So if you've got time, you'll put me back under Command and we'll tell them what really happened. And if you don't," he captured her hand with both of his, slipping his wounded arm out of the sling, "they'll lock me in a room for a few days until you're well enough to straighten things out. But, Annice, whatever they think of me, won't affect how they treat either you or my child."
"My child," she corrected automatically. Then, realizing that was the response he'd expected, smiled. Leaning forward, she kissed him softly on the forehead. "Thank you."
"Just don't have that baby while I'm the only one around to deal with it." Although he spoke lightly, he'd never meant anything more.
"I'll do my best." The last word came out like a small explosion and they both stared at the billowing folds of shift and overdress.
"Was that a foot?" Pjerin asked, awed.
Less awed by what had become a frequent occurrence whenever she stopped walking, Annice nodded. "Both feet." The tiny body rolled and kicked and, teeth clenched, she pushed herself up on Pjerin's good shoulder. "On second thought, I'm ready to have it now."
Pjerin stood as well, tucking his arm back into the triangle of cloth that theoretically held it immobile. "It can't be far to the keep."
Annice snorted and pulled Milena forward. "It had better not be."
Late that afternoon when they were watering the animals, Pjerin peered upstream. "I know where we are," he announced triumphantly. "That ravine widens out the farther you go into it and there're caves cut into the sides. When I was thirteen, my father led a hunting party down it to kill a bear."
Leaning on the mule's warm flank, Annice looked disgusted. "Why didn't he just leave it alone?"
"It had already been wounded," Pjerin explained, "probably in a fight with another male, and it was hanging around the valley attacking the livestock. People started to worry about losing children, so Father went after it." Bending, he slurped water up off his cupped palm. "If I can find the cave, we'll sleep warm and dry tonight."
"If it isn't already occupied."
He grinned at her, spirits lifted by familiarity. "Bards think too highly of themselves to share?"
"Bards think too highly of themselves to be eaten," she told him.
They'd just reached the edge of the ravine where raw dirt walls, too steep for any but the most tenacious plants, marked the depth the water had risen in the past when, all at once, Annice stopped.
"Pjerin!"
He turned so quickly he stumbled and nearly fell. "Is it happening again?"
"What? No, it's the kigh!" She stared at the ground. "I've never seen them so… Here!" She thrust the lead rope into his hands, carefully lowered herself into a squat, and Sang a question.