“Yet the gnomes would say you return fair exchange, duties of worship, for such apparent gifts, or the gods take vengeance. That’s their explanation for what’s gone wrong with our people. Impiety, failure to return proper service, and the gods punish by withholding the gifts.”
“And what do you say?”
Arranha sighed, “I say that my people have erred, by being ungenerous. We value free gifts, even if we misinterpreted your people’s offer of food. Perhaps free gifts are dangerous for gnomes; for humans I think they are necessary. But with the loss of powers came fear, so our people grasp more, and give less, than they did. This hurts you, and you, in turn, will hurt them. That cycle has no end, unless you wish it—unless you declare an end, someday, and forgive the rest of the injury.”
Gird felt his forehead knot. “What has that to do with justice?”
Arranha smiled at him, serene once more. “You will find out, Gird, when it is time.”
Gird felt unaccountably grumpy at that, as if he were a child being told to ignore adult concerns for now. He was, after all, a grown man—widowed—the father of grown children. Arranha seemed to read this on his face. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to confuse you. You are no child; I know that. But I do not know myself exactly why the god sent me to you, or you to me. I was as surprised as you, when you stumbled onto me in that ditch. The god wants something from both of us—”
“Not your god!” Gird said.
“Then yours. Believe me or not, as you will, but I have been a priest, a true priest, and I know: your god has shaped your life to some purpose, and I am now part of that purpose. I think—I believe—that some part of that is helping you learn how to shape the future beyond the coming war. Whoever leads your people needs to know more than soldiering.”
Gird ducked his head. Of course he had thought about it, wondered if the gods had drawn him toward the leadership that now seemed certain. But it did not do to question them too closely, to bring yourself to their notice. The old man was strange, too strange; he wished he’d never found him. And yet—something about him attracted, as the warmth of a fire in cold attracted. Certainly he knew that they must plan for something beyond war; it was what had bothered him since Norwalk.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I just don’t know.”
“But you will,” Arranha said softly. “You will know because you must know, and you will teach others.”
Suddenly this solemnity in a tattered shelter in snowy woods, this serious discussion of legalities and philosophies, struck Gird as ridiculous. He snorted. “Aye—I can see now: the great gods who could choose you or anyone else will choose a peasant who can hardly read—a serf and son of a serf, who is better with cows than people—to teach a whole people about law. That’s wisdom.”
Arranha leaned forward. “Do not mock them, Gird. If they have chosen you—and I think they have, and you suspect it, beneath that banter—they will make you what they need. Better clay that can be shaped to their will, and then fired, than broken shards of earlier firings.”
The laughter had gone, fleeing down the hollow corridors of his mind a nameless fear. “I am not mocking,” Gird said. “I was wishing for miracles.”
“Those, too, you may have. For now, you have me: no miracle, but an Aarean with some small magicks.”
“Which once I would have called miracles,” said Gird, sighing. “Well, Arranha, you may be right. But at the moment I cannot stay awake.” The old man chuckled, released his light, and Gird fell asleep in the glow of the banked coals of their fire.
The next morning was colder, but brighter, as the clouds began to break and a thin sunlight poked through them. Gird and Arranha dismantled the shelter; Gird gathered more wood to replace what they’d used, and tucked it into the corners of the walls. Arranha watched as Gird tried to scatter snow over the wattle sections, now laid flat again. Gird wondered if the face he wore now was truly his own, healed of the injuries, or a face maintained by magic (how?) to fool him. And how was the barton at Burry going to react to this man? He could not lie to them, and pretend Arranha was other than he was.
“Do you ever wonder how our magicks work?” asked Arranha when they had started along the trail.
Gird, who was ahead, swinging his arms to warm up, shook his head. “I never saw any, until I met you. Not save the healer’s hands that some have, to take away the pain and lay it aside.”
“Your people have that?” Arranha’s voice had sharpened.
“Some of them. Not many.” The cold air speared into his lungs; he had to talk in short gasps, and wished Arranha would ask no more. But he could feel the pressure of Arranha’s curiosity at his back, as if it were a stinging fly between his shoulders.
“You’ve seen it yourself?”
“Felt it m’self. Take the pain of a headache, or a blow. Lay it aside, on something doesn’t feel pain, like a rock.” He blew out a great cloud of steam, trying for rings. It was good luck to blow rings, the holy circle. “Most of ’em use herbs, for fevers. Singing charms, for demons, if they have the parrion—” He stopped, aware of the intensity of Arranha’s interest. Had he said more than he should?
“Singing charms—” murmured Arranha. “Esea’s light, what we’ve missed! What’s a parrion, Gird?”
“Parrion’s a girl’s—” Well, how could he explain? “It’s—what a mother gives—or an aunt—family things. My mother, she had a parrion of weaving. Certain patterns were hers, and the loom—but it’s not like giving someone a cow. The steading—the family—knows a girl’s ability. Her parrion is that, plus what the women give her. I don’t know all of it; men don’t have parrions, exactly.”
“So that’s it! Gird, in the old chronicles, my people record that yours used to have a group of elders in each—steading, is it?—and mentioned parrion. But it’s not recorded what that was.”
Gird nodded, on surer ground now. “Three elders, there were. One was of the hunters, one of the growers, and one of the crafters. The hunter was a man, the crafter a woman, and the grower might be either.”
“And the crafters were weavers? Potters?”
“Toolmakers, builders, anything we made. Of course all know something of it—anyone can build a wall.” Even as he said it, Gird wondered. Anyone could build a wall if someone good at building walls gave directions. Some walls were better than others.
“Hmm. Did women make weapons?”
“Of course. Why shouldn’t they?”
Arranha crunched along several strides before answering. “Among our people, it’s thought bad luck to let women make weapons. Their blood shed during the making could weaken the weapon’s hunger for blood, make it weak.”
Gird stopped short and turned; Arranha nearly crashed into him. “Blood weaken? You mean you don’t blood your hearths, or your foundations?” From the shocked expression on Arranha’s face, they did not. Gird’s mind whirled. These lords were even stranger than he’d thought. To take food without giving meant strength, but bloodshed meant weakness: another refusal to give, he thought that was. Yet they had magical power to heal themselves—why should they be afraid to give blood where it was needed? And what would this mean in a war? He was not about to explain the power of giving blood to this alien priest. But Arranha was quick, he had seen it for himself. His eyes widened even more, and his mouth fell open.
“It’s—the giving again. Esea! I would never have thought of that. The food giver is stronger—the blood giver is stronger—and that’s why our people found women ruling your steadings. And that’s why your people follow Alyanya: the Lady gives harvest—food—and blood. I—am—amazed.” He shook his head, like someone recovering from a hard blow. Then, softly. “And I see that you can never accept our laws. If you are to have your own, you will have to forge them from your own beliefs.”