My name was called from behind. I knew the voice and involuntarily shivered. I turned and saw Ezzard striding toward me, his black cloak wrapped tightly round his tall lean frame. I waited for him to come up, telling myself I was no longer a child to be frightened by the Seer. His Spirits did not venture out of the Seance Hall, and anyway I had done nothing to offend them.
But he was a man who in himself inspired awe. Taller even than my father, he had a craggy face with a beaked nose and black bushy eyebrows. His eyes were set deep and close together and were cold and blue. His skin was very white, as though he spent all his time in darkness and not just the hours when he was communing with the Spirits. In the summer when the light was stronger he wore spectacles that were darkly tinted; even without these there seemed a strange blankness, an emptiness, in his look.
He said: “Where are you bound, boy?”
I did not care for being addressed as “boy,” and even though it was the Seer I answered a little stiffly. But his eyes, staring into mine, made me drop my gaze.
He said: “You respect the Spirits?”
“Yes, sire.”
“There are some, of your age, who do not—who mock foolishly.”
I said: “I have seen the Spirits and heard them.”
He nodded. “Remember that. Remember another thing: that the Spirits take care of those who show them proper reverence. The fools who mock at last are mocked. And they are fools all along.”
“Yes, sire.”
He raised his hand in the blessing, though as Ezzard gave it it was almost menacing.
“Away to your skating, then. Make the most of it. It will be your last of the winter.”
I did not need to seek a meaning to that riddle. The Spirits foretold the weather to him. The thaw was coming and by tomorrow the ice would be too weak to bear. I was flattered that he should have told me this, as though I were one of the Prince’s messengers. I nodded and turned to go. As I did his hand grasped my shoulder.
“Perhaps your last indeed.”
I shivered again. One skated until one became a man, and one was not a man until fifteen. There were times when the Spirits prophesied a death.
But he was smiling, his face improbably drawn into a grin.
“Go your way, Luke. The Spirits go with you.”
• • •
I found Martin and we took our skates to the river. In the morning he had been busy with duties; his mother was a widow and too poor to afford even a single polymuf servant. We skated for a couple of hours and by the end of that time one could tell the change that was taking place: the wind had swung from north to west and there was mildness in it. I told him of Ezzard’s words as we walked back. He said:
“He is right often enough. But how?”
“Through the Spirits. How else?”
“But how?”
Martin was not even as tall as I, and slim with it. He had a girl’s skin, delicate, almost transparent, and his brown eyes were big like a girl’s. We had become friends when I rescued him from other boys who were tormenting him. The biggest of them was someone I very much disliked, and it was more through this than through a desire to help Martin that I had taken him on and given him a beating. It was only later that I grew to like Martin. His mind was curious, odd in its way of thinking, restless and speculative. Sometimes absurdly so. I said:
“The Spirits know the future as they know the past. And they tell Ezzard because he is the Seer. There is nothing difficult about it.”
He did not answer, and we did not pursue the matter because there was a horseman riding toward us, along Burnt Lane. I recognized horse and rider. My father called:
“Greetings, son! I was told you were down at the river and I came out to meet you.”
His lips laughed between the fair beard and curling yellow moustache. He would not have done this for a trivial reason. My heart leaped, but I said as evenly as I could:
“What news, sir?”
“Young Grant is ill. A fever. He will not fight on Thursday. You have his place in the Contest.”
I stared at him. He leaned down and swept me onto his saddlebow, and I did not resent it. We rode homeward, Martin running beside us.
And I thought of what Ezzard had said. A Young Captain was called a man, though not fifteen. I would not skate next winter with the boys, but serve the Prince as apprentice warrior. There had been two prophecies after all.
TWO
THE YOUNG CAPTAINS
WE HAD A DAY TO prepare for the Contest and it rained almost continually. It was a cold drizzle to start with, soaking and depressing, and after a couple of hours of slithering and sliding and falling on the practice field Edmund called his team together and rode them off. Henry and Gregory followed suit. To have continued after the Prince’s son had stopped would have been to risk being mocked at for too great keenness, and I think in any case they were glad enough to head for home.
I brought my own team off the field but set a slow pace along the road to the city, and by the time we reached the fork at the Elder Pond the others, galloping toward a change of clothes, hot drinks and warm fires, were out of sight. At the pond I called them to take the left fork, away from the city. They halted in confusion. I reined in and rode slowly back.
Laurie, who was the best man I had, said:
“Why left?”
I waited, letting them look at me, for some moments before replying. I said:
“Listen. I am your Captain. We are the weakest team in the Contest. Do you know the odds they are offering in the alehouses against our winning? Fifty to one, and I have heard that some have offered a hundred without finding takers.”
They stared at me, drenched and miserable, the flanks of their horses steaming. An unprepossessing lot even without being bedraggled and spotted with mud.
The number of each team in the Contest was fixed at four, apart from the Junior Captain. It would have been fairer if selection had been by lot but the test was as much as anything for leadership and a leader chooses his men. Or is chosen by them. Of those who, being of the age and yet not of noble family, could take part, most naturally would have preferred to follow the Prince’s son. Not for the honor only, of course: he was favored to win and the winning team, to match their Captain’s jeweled sword, drew gold coins as a reward. The teams coming second and third obtained silver and bronze, while that which was first eliminated got nothing but the mob’s derision for its pains.
Because of this I had been left with, for the most part, those already rejected by the other leaders. Martin, of course, had volunteered at once. He was not a good horseman and was a poorer swordsman but at least I knew he would fight hard for me. And there was some consolation, too, as far as the rest were concerned, in thinking that they were willing to take part with so little prospect of victory or reward. Even if lacking in skill they were eager for the fight.
I said: “They believe we are certain to lose. But nothing is certain, neither victory nor defeat. Skill counts for much, but so does preparation and hard work. The others have gone home. Soon they will be stabling their horses and taking things easy. We may be weaker in some respects but we can be stronger in endurance. We are not going back to the city but to a quiet place where we can train undisturbed and unobserved. You are wet and tired. So am I. We cannot get wetter and if we get more tired we shall sleep the better tonight and be more refreshed for tomorrow. Laurie!”