One might have thought the Dulcé‘s cuts and bruises magically vanished when I asked if he felt well enough to prepare a meal for us. While Baglos busied himself with my pots and poked about in the garden, the meadow, and the larder dug into the hillside, Jacopo and I hauled water to my neglected garden.
“Does Emil Gasso still have extra horses?” I asked as we splattered the contents of our pails onto the dry soil.
Jacopo had relaxed a bit, now he was busy with something not smacking of sorcery. “He does. Old buzzard figures he’d best get gold for ‘em soon or the king’ll have them for the war.”
“If we’re to get these two out of here in good order, they’re going to need another mount. Maybe two. I’m not sure if Baglos’s horse is reliable.” I was not yet willing to tell Jaco that I was planning to accompany them. My plan was still too flimsy to expose to the daylight.
“Gasso’s got at least three good mounts, so it shouldn’t be a problem.”
“Would he lend them? It would take far more than I have to buy even one.”
“Not likely. Emil Gasso is as penny-pinching as a body can be, so he’ll not let the beasts out of his sight without the coins in his purse.”
Baglos interrupted, asking for salt, so I went to show him, while Jacopo finished watering the garden. There wasn’t room in the cottage for all of us to eat, so I had Jacopo help me move the table outside, and then sent him to drag Paulo from his nap in the woodpile while I fetched D’Natheil.
The Prince was no longer behind the cottage or anywhere that I could see, so I walked over to the copse where the horses were tethered. He was kneeling by the spring, frantically scrubbing at his hands. Curious at his odd frenzy, I held back and watched. After drying his hands on his breeches, he wrapped his arms about his face and head and bent over until his elbows almost touched his knees, releasing a quiet groan of such heart-tearing misery, such private and profound despair, it seemed to swallow the last light of the sun. Disdain and condemnation died on my tongue. Any man in such pain was suffering more than any reproach of mine could cause him. And so I retreated. Even if I had cared to ease him, I had no remedies for that kind of wounding.
Not long after I had returned to the cottage, D’Natheil came striding across the meadow, haughty and composed, displaying no remnant of the emotion I had glimpsed at the spring. I motioned him to the table, where Paulo leaned on his elbows yawning and a frowning Jacopo tapped his knife idly on his empty bowl. The sky had deepened to a rich blue, and I set out candles that flamed against the evening like two new stars. An odd company we made: a peasant sailor, a village urchin, a disgraced duchess, a diminutive cook, and a mute, half-mad prince. I sacrificed the flask of wine that I kept for emergencies, shared it out, and when Baglos set his fine-smelling dish on the table, I raised my cup to the company. “J’edai en j’sameil. To life and beauty everlasting!” I said the words first in the archaic language of the J’Ettanne and then in Leiran.
D’Natheil’s eyebrows lifted slightly as he raised his cup and tipped his head in gracious acknowledgment. The season had changed yet again.
Baglos’s mouth fell open, and he almost dropped his cup. “The Avonar feasting wish! Where have you learned those words, woman? And spoken in the most ancient tongue of the Dar’Nethi! Has D’Natheil—How could he have taught them to you?”
“He hasn’t. It’s my story, Baglos, and I’ll tell you some of it, but right now we feast on your magic. What incredible thing have you done with my bits and pieces?”
Whatever the shortcomings of the little Dulcé, they did not include his cooking. Thin slices of ham were rolled up around a savory filling made of bread and nuts and onions. Tart monkberries from the hillside were sweetened with honey and made into a sauce to go over it. To top it all he brought out apples, baked in the coals with butter and honey. Hard to believe they were the hard early apples that were always so tasteless. None of us could get enough. From what conversation went on during the meal, one might think we were all as mute as D’Natheil. Paulo came near bursting with unbridled ecstasy when we gave him the last bites, as well as the pot to scrape.
Jacopo left for Dunfarrie soon after we were done. He bowed politely to Baglos, but granted D’Natheil only a disapproving stare, his terror of sorcery momentarily superceded by disgust at the Prince’s unmanly behavior. The pleased Dulcé returned the formality. D’Natheil ignored him. Jacopo set out across the moonlit meadow, stopping to wave just before disappearing into the trees.
“That ranks among the finest meals I’ve ever eaten, Baglos,” I said as we cleaned up the mess, “including those at the tables of kings and nobles. Any great house in Leire would make your fortune were you to agree to manage its kitchen.”
“Please excuse me,” said Baglos, as he wiped the pots and stacked them neatly by the hearth, stood on a chair to hang the net bag of onions in the rafters and set the small tin of salt on my shelf. “But I have great curiosity. What woman who lives… excuse me… as you do, has ever dined with kings and nobles? And how is it possible that you know the ancient language of the Dar’Nethi?”
While the moon rose above the eastern horizon and a dry breeze nipped at the candle flames, I perched on the table and told the Dulcé and D’Natheil something of myself and something of the J’Ettanne and something of how I had come to live as I did. Not so very much. Only that the descendants of J’Ettanne knew nothing of these things Baglos had told us, that they had been exterminated, and that it was possible my own husband, a Healer, and my son, a newborn infant, had been the last of them.
Baglos was in shock at my story, exclaiming his horror even as he translated it for the Prince. “The Exiles all dead… and their gifts outlawed. Burned alive… slaughtered at birth… Vasrin guide our steps from this place. I think the Lords of Zhev’Na have already won!”
“You see why I believe you’ve been sent to me? It’s possible there’s no other soul in the Four Realms who even knows the name J’Ettanne.”
“That seems indisputable.”
“And you see why D’Natheil must do no magic where anyone can see? Make sure he understands that. Our law is absolute.”
“Much is now explained. Will you not tell us more, woman? About J’Ettanne’s people, about their life in this land? Why did they no longer come to the Bridge?”
“I told you, they had no lore of a Bridge or of a kingdom such as yours. I’ve no answers that can help you. As for their life—it doesn’t matter anymore.” The past was done. Karon and the J’Ettanne were dead. Dwelling on their stories would not repair that. I hated speaking of them.
When Baglos told D’Natheil all of this, the Prince indicated that he remembered my teaching. He displayed no fear, of course. Bullies never believe they’ll experience the kind of wickedness they parcel out. He retrieved his birchwood—now a slender chip the size of his palm—sat himself in the light spilling from the cottage doorway, and began carving on it with the tip of his silver dagger. Once I felt the slightest stirring in the air, a faint sigh that was not the cooling breeze, and I looked over to see him running his fingers over the blade of his knife. I wondered if he was invoking some enchantment, but I wasn’t about to ask.
Baglos and Paulo moved the table back into the cottage. Paulo mumbled something about seeing to the horses and strolled into the night with his hands in his pockets. The boy would not consider taking Thunder down to Dunfarrie. The sheriff had told him to ride the horse as far as Jonah’s cottage, and Paulo was unwilling to jeopardize his privilege by straying one finger’s breadth from the instruction. A fine meal, responsibility for Rowan’s horse, mysterious princes, and talk of sorcery—Paulo had likely never had such a day in his thirteen years.
A short while later, as I dumped out the water we had used to clean the dishes, D’Natheil suddenly jumped to his feet, dropping his woodcarving into the dirt. Grabbing my pail and throwing it aside, he shoved me toward the doorway of the cottage, and then, with vehemently expressive hands, demanded to know where Paulo was. Just like him not to notice anyone else until he wanted something for himself.