The commander too had heard the rumor and, like the constable, felt dubious. "You're Macurdy?" he said. "What can I do for you?"
"I'm riding to Duinarog to see Lord and Lady Cyncaidh, and I'd like an escort. I have an unusual mount, and without an escort we might cause disturbances in the city."
"Disturbances?"
"Come out on the porch. You'll see what I mean."
Frowning, the commander followed him. Stepping out the door, he looked around, and opened his mouth to speak. Macurdy anticipated him. "Vulkan," he called, "let the commander see you."
And there he stood, more than half a ton of wild boar. Seemingly half of it head and shoulders, ten percent tusks. Gawping, the commander turned to Macurdy. "Good God!" he said. "I never quite believed in them. And saddled! Is he sapient, as the tales claim?"
Macurdy didn't know the word, but guessed its meaning. "He's smarter than me, and a lot better magician."
‹Macurdy, do not undervalue yourself,› the deep voice said, allowing the ylf to perceive it. ‹Accomplishment is incontrovertible evidence of intellect and character, and you have accomplished marvels, both in Yuulith and on Farside.›
Macurdy grinned at the ylf. "On Farside there's a saying: a man's best friend is his dog. I've got a hog. Or he's got me. Actually, it's a free and open friendship; neither of us owns the other one. But I get more good out of it than he does." He laughed. "If he ever finds out how one-sided this is…"
Fifteen minutes later, Vulkan was jogging up the highway with Macurdy on his back and a trooper on each side. A courier had galloped off ahead, to inform Lord Cyncaidh of Macurdy's coming, and his estimated time of arrival.
Chief Counselor Raien Cyncaidh had a splendidly appointed office in the imperial palace. The palace was a complex of buildings, only one of them the imperial residence. The others housed the empire's central administrative and judicial functions, and the assemblies of the three estates. Five or six mornings a week, eight months a year, Lord Cyncaidh arrived there by 8 A.M. But his personal residence was less than a mile away, and more often than not he returned there at midday, for lunch with his wife. Bringing a pile of reports to read and annotate in the afternoon, relatively free of the interruptions that beset him at his office.
Relatively free. The police courier, after going first to Lord Cyncaidh's palace office, arrived at his residence shortly before 1 P.M. The courier was a genuinely young ylf-of mixed blood, actually. Pink-cheeked, brown-eyed, with raven hair and no sign of beard, only his rounded ears showed the extent of his partly human ancestry.
He delivered his message, not omitting Vulkan, then added: "If your lordship approves, he'll be brought here as soon as he arrives at the palace."
"Of course. What time might we expect him?"
"I'd guess sometime about two, your lordship."
"Hmm. I take it the boar is, um, well-behaved?"
"Seems to be, your lordship. If he really is a boar. He might be a wizard wearing a spell; in his way, he speaks as well as anyone. Seems to be physical though, flesh and blood. At any rate he carries Marshal Macurdy easily enough, and the marshal is a large man."
The courier left his lordship with that informational lump, and Cyncaidh called his butler. "Talrie," he said, "we'll have guests for supper, and probably for the night. A man riding on a giant boar. A boar who speaks, I might add." He gave Talrie a moment to grasp and accept the statement. "Prepare a stall for it in the coach house, with clean straw and, um, whatever you think such a creature might like to eat. They may be here as soon as two o'clock."
"Very well, your lordship. Do you anticipate the horses being upset by him?"
"I think not. They're being escorted by mounted police. Apparently the creature is compatible with horses."
Talrie left, to give appropriate orders to the housekeeper, cook, and stableboy. Cyncaidh strode upstairs to inform Varia. Opening her study door, he paused. She sat in her wicker reading chair, facing away from him, no doubt with a book in her hands. What, he wondered to himself, has Macurdy come here for? His business is surely with her, not me.
She'd heard the door, and after marking her place, got to her feet, turning. Graceful, always graceful, he told himself. She was dressed for summer, in sheer green over a gauzy white underdress, setting off her vividly red hair. Her feet were bare-a private quirk of hers. Like her arms and face, they were lightly tanned and perfectly formed. Physically she was more beautiful even than Mariil, he thought. And mentally, spiritually? Equally beautiful, but different. Cyncaidh, he told himself, you've been blessed all your life. And hoped that blessing wasn't in danger.
"Hello, love," she said smiling. "What brings you to my lair?"
It was difficult to hide his feelings from her. She was exceptionally perceptive of auras, when she paid attention. "Guess who's coming to supper," he said.
Her eyebrows rose. "I have no idea." She eyed him quizzically, then grinned despite the discomfort revealed by his aura. "Someone you feel uncomfortable with," she suggested. "Not Quaie the younger. Not that uncomfortable. Someone you-like but feel uncomfortable with." She grinned again. Her fists were on her hips now, challenging. "Who?"
In spite of himself he smiled. "Curtis Macurdy," he answered. "The Lion of Farside, if you'd rather."
Her smile disappeared. She stepped to a chair that faced him, and sat down. "Curtis? Really?"
"And his saddle mount. I'm sure you recall the name of his warhorse."
She frowned, puzzled. "Hog. He named it after a horse of Will's. Why?"
"Now he's riding a different sort of hog."
"Different?"
"He stopped at the police post south of the city. At the Riverton Road crossing." He paused. "Riding a giant boar. An actual giant boar, with a saddle."
She stared, then laughter bubbled out of her. "Curtis? Good God! Whatever became of my quiet, homespun farmboy with literal hayseeds in his hair?" Her husband's solemn, even lugubrious expression stilled her mirth. Getting up, she stepped over to him and took his hands. "Its been nearly twenty years since we saw him last. My decision hasn't changed, and it will not." I wept all that out of my system after he left, she added inwardly, out of my system and out of your sight. I chose you because of the love we had-we have-and for little Ceonigh. And now there's Rorie as well.
There was more to it that she wasn't looking at. With Raien she had security and stability. After her ordeal at the Cloister, security was important. And Curtis had changed, even eighteen years ago. Anyone changed over time, but to become the Lion of Farside…? And perhaps hardest to confront, she could not go back to life on the farm, even if he could. Not farm life as she remembered it.
She would, she knew, love Curtis Macurdy till the day she died. And Cyncaidh for just as long. But Cyncaidh she knew, from nineteen years of familiarity and sharing, from love and admiration. She couldn't imagine leaving him and their sons.
Macurdy and Vulkan arrived shortly after two. Vulkan's bulk and hooves were ill-suited to the carpets and hardwood floors of the Cyncaidh residence. (At the palace at Teklapori, the floors were mainly of granite, with rugs largely restricted to the royal apartment and guest rooms.) So Talrie ensconced him in the carriage house, with a peck of corn and some cabbages. "A fat turkey has been obtained and is being plucked for you," Talrie added. "It will be brought out directly, unless you'd prefer it roasted. That would take quite some time."
Vulkan told him he preferred it raw. And that meanwhile a brief wallow in the fish pool would be welcome. In the residence, Macurdy met with the Cyncaidhs for only a few minutes. The last time he'd met Varia, the circumstances had been utterly different than he'd expected. He'd been thrown completely off-stride, his reaction unsure and tentative. This time he knew her circumstances. What he somehow wasn't prepared for was how beautiful she would seem to him; she took his breath away. Liiset was beautiful, and they were clone sisters, but Varia's loveliness put her somehow in a class of her own.