Crown of Renewal (Legend of Paksenarrion) (71 page)

The grange door opened with a scrape and splash. Gird’s Cow turned and walked into the grange, with Arianya beside it. Inside the grange, the smell of cow was strong enough to notice but not unpleasant. The cow walked up to Marshal Pelis first. He put out a hand, and the cow wrapped its tongue around it, a double swipe. His brows went up.

“Well. Gird’s Cow indeed.”

Then it licked every one of the mages, child and adult both, and walked up to the platform. It put one hoof on the platform and then—a little clumsily—lurched up onto it. It stood there a long moment, then let out a sonorous
Mooooah!
And vanished. The flower garland dropped onto the platform.

Within the glass, reports came back that the Hoor had risen to bank-full and flowed clear as glass. Every well in town was full or overflowing, every trash heap or muck pile had been washed away, and the only building whose roof had collapsed (though many had leaked) was the one in which the mage-hunters had gathered. The field where the mock battle took place every year was a sodden mess of knee-deep mud, so a much smaller fair replaced it, with competitions for individual skills instead. Arianya spent the next two days handing out prizes for Best Lacework, Best Cherry Pie, Fastest Leg Turner, and the like. The accused mages, child and adult, participated without comment … it was as if people forgot that they knew mage from nonmage.

As the cavalcade rode away from Hoorlow back to Fin Panir, it was clear that the rain had not been local … all the land they rode over had been refreshed. New-sprouted grass and flowers out of season grew on every side; the trees no longer looked dusty and tattered but full and healthy. In all the vills and towns, the people had the same look as those in Hoorlow: free for a time from anxieties and sorrow, anger and hatred. Here and there, people told of seeing a dun cow appearing immediately after the rain, a cow that swiped people with a rough tongue, mostly those who had been deep in sorrow about something.

Fin Panir itself had been drenched with the same healing rain. The Company of Gird’s Cow, who had been struggling to carve a wooden cow, had been stunned to see their incomplete carving come alive. “The right color, even!” Salis said. “We was all workin’ on it, y’know, and then come the rain, and we couldn’t even stand upright, let alone see anything … and when it stopped, there was Gird’s Cow, the real one, just like I imagined it.”

Arianya had a momentary vision of Gird’s Herd, an infinite number of identical dun cows, and pushed it down. “What did it do?” she asked.

“Walked up to me and gave me a lick of that rough tongue like I’ve never had before,” he said, grinning. “Like a big dog, only the tongue’s that rough, you know. Bein’ slapped with a bit o’ coarse
sackin’. But I knew what it meant. Hugged that cow’s neck, and it gave me another one on the shoulder. We walked ’er around the city, then back up here, and she’s in the meadow now, sleek as you please.”

“She’s still here?”

“What! You don’t think I’d send Gird’s Cow away, do you?”

“No, but …” She explained about the many sightings of Gird’s Cow, including the cow that had licked her in front of the grange in Hoorlow.

“Well.” Salis scratched his head. “Well, I dunno about that. Maybe Gird has all the cows he wants now, or maybe the cow … just is where she needs to be, wherever that is.”

With Dorrin and most of the magelords gone, Chaya settled into its usual summer routine. The handful of remaining magelords adopted modern dress and Common tongue. High Marshal Seklis left. A courier came from the Sea-Prince, reporting that Dorrin had been taken safely aboard a trader known to the Sea-Prince and should reach Aarenis—Barrandowea-Stormlord willing—well before the end of the trading season. Kieri already knew from the King’s Squires who had escorted her what ship she had taken, but the Sea-Prince also sent a chart of the probable route. Kieri sent back a note of thanks.

Kieri expected the western elves to return to their elvenhome after the magelords were out of Kolobia, but they didn’t.

“Your queen is our king’s granddaughter,” Caernith said. “Your children are his great-grandchildren—”

“But only half-elf,” Kieri said. “From what the Lady said, Dameroth fathered many half-elven children.”

“In different times. Your queen is the only one of Dameroth’s children alive in this time. And the only one who ever came to such prominence; married a half-elven ruler and thus had children also half-elven, carrying the elvenhome gift from both parents. He wants to know how they get on.”

“He could visit,” Arian said a bit tartly. Kieri glanced at her. Tilla had a handful of Arian’s hair. She reached up and patiently unhooked
the tiny fingers. “I wonder if I was as active at this age. I see others born within the same fiveday who are not yet sitting up so strongly. Tell me, Caernith, are elven babies faster to learn skills than human babies? I’d have thought, with such long lives and a longer pregnancy, they’d be slower.”

Caernith smiled, a surprisingly sweet smile. “They learn many things faster, milady. These two in particular; I suspect it’s having elven blood on both sides. You’ve noticed their babbling often sounds like singing.”

“Yes, I have,” Arian said. “And my mother said I started singing very young.”

“They will learn speech early and then sing in earnest. It would be well to have musicians play here every day or so to educate their ear. And they may be on their feet, though still a little unsteady, well before they’re a year old. Elven children are not babies long—they grow and learn quickly for the first two years, outstripping human children. Later, however, they will seem to stay the same for a long time—an elf child of thirty winters may be no more than chest-high on an adult and far from adult in other ways. They need more years to learn elven lore and history, you see.”

“And half-elves?” Kieri asked.

“Their pattern is more like the human but faster in the early years. You, lord king, began standing at just half a year and speaking words perhaps three tendays later, according to the elves who knew you then. When you were lost, you had both elven speech and human, as if a much older child, though not excessively tall. And you, my lady, were much the same. These two—” Caernith reached out to ruffle Falki’s hair. “These two bid fair to exceed either of you. I will be surprised if by the end of the next quarter-year they are not on their feet and speaking.”

Though Kieri still had many duties as king and lord of his elvenhome, he and Arian found time to play with their children. And on Midsummer, when he went to the King’s Grove to sing the sun into harmony, he presented his children to the Old One in the bone-house as well.

Paran Oathkeeper, the Tribe rejoices in the birth of your children. Put their hands on my head
.

Kieri put each of the children’s hands on the old skull for a moment.

We know them. They are ours. Bring them again when they can stand on their own
.

Regular news from Tsaia reported continued unrest in Fintha, often spilling over the border, but no more iynisin attacks. King Mikeli had decided to recall Arcolin from Aarenis, in light of Arcolin’s report, to undertake a stronger defense of Tsaia’s border with Fintha. In Aarenis, Arcolin had reported to Mikeli that the danger was less: the Kostandanyan troops had held off Immer’s in Fallo, and Cortes Cilwan had been retaken. Arcolin’s letter to Kieri mentioned Count Vladi’s warning, along with the circumstances:

Ganlin of Kostandan, Mikeli wrote, was going to marry Rothlin Mahieran, but not until she had finished her training at Falk’s Hall. That surprised Kieri; he’d been sure she would marry sooner.

The Kostandanyan ambassador explained: “They wanted a Girdish woman at first, but with more Girdish troubles, Royal Council thought better Falkian knight. Our king has no care either way, just wants Ganlin married to good rank.”

So the summer wore on, drier than most but yielding good crops of the summer grains. Kieri’s days were full, dawn to dusk, but nothing
seemed as perilous as the year before. Arcolin came back to Tsaia well before Autumn Court, having negotiated with Foss Council to bring along one cohort of the Company. He sent Kieri a fuller account of the state of Aarenis, including a new rumor that Alured had died on a voyage to the pirate base at Whiteskull.

As Caernith predicted, the twins grew and learned rapidly, their first infant sounds quickly coming to resemble near-speech, and musical speech at that. The elves of Kieri’s elvenhome seemed almost as fascinated by the babies as he and Arian, but they were not alone. Kieri’s human subjects also came to see them, bringing gifts. By the Autumn Evener they were both standing, even lurching from one parent to another, not quite walking. Both could say a few words clearly enough to be understood.

Though Kieri wondered where Dorrin was and whether she had completed her task and about the future of Aarenis and whether a new ruler like Alured would rise to menace everyone again, the twins’ progress distracted him again and again. What would they do next? When would they speak whole sentences?

Then, in one tremendous downpour, the rains returned and continued for three days. The usually placid river near Chaya rose above its banks, flooding the water meadows. Every well in Chaya overflowed.

“She did it,” Arian said as they stood by the windows watching rain stream down.

“We don’t know that for certain,” Kieri said. “We’ve had dry years and wet years before.”

“The taig says this is different.”

Arian was right; he could feel that himself. Late as it was in the year, the rose garden burst into early-summer bloom. In the Royal Ride, wildflowers spangled the grass even as the rain continued. Then it vanished, leaving a blue sky and bright sun. The little river’s floodwaters went down with unnatural speed, leaving it bank-full of clear water. Days later, a courier arrived from Tsaia to report the same rain there, everywhere it seemed.

“Will she come back?” Arian asked.

“If she lived through whatever she did … maybe.”

Winter came with its usual snows, and in the spring the new growth returned. The twins were not just walking but running, busy, curious, and endlessly chattering. Tilla’s red hair had continued curly; Falki’s dark hair now waved a little. The first ships into the river port brought word that Alured’s domain had fragmented. The Immer ports formed their own alliance, based on the Guild League, and one of Alured’s captains ruled in Cortes Immer, apparently with no ambitions to extend his realm. Lûn and Rotengre were free cities again, though Rotengre retained a bad reputation.