The Spellcoats (24 page)

Now the fat is in the fire! Now I see why Tanamil so hates to be bound. I should not have disobeyed Mother. But at least the main fault this time is Duck's, not mine. I will tell it in order.

We were very happy, sitting in the evening sun from the open River door. I had a feeling Mother could be with us like that. I brought my weaving up-to-date and then turned to sewing up my first rugcoat and clipping the ends. Tanamil came over to look at it.

“What made me think I could teach you anything?” he said.

I was very pleased, but I said, “You told me two very useful things,” and I showed him the band of expressive weaving at the back, where we went to Kankredin.

“I was there with you,” he said. “I knew you would need me; he was almost too strong for me, too. It was lucky he sat down and that you repeat his spellgown broken here. Did you realize it would have made another bond on us?” I had not realized. It is a frightening thought. He told me that he had left when Kankredin said we could go, knowing Duck could take us through the net; it was Tanamil who brought us through it the first time, of course. Robin had told him never to come near us again. The quarrel had been far worse than I had known. I think it was good of him to help us at all, though he says he was thinking so hard of us all, and Robin particularly, that it is a wonder there is anything growing on the banks of streams anywhere.

Then he said, “I was as bad as Amil over Cenblith, but I hope I shan't need to expiate my folly the same way.”

“By being bound, you mean?” I said.

“No,” he said. “By fire. When it was almost too late, he found how to cheat the woman who cheated him and made her promise to put him in a fire every year. Every fire reduces his bonds by a fraction until they can be broken.”

He looked so sad, saying this, that it came to me that it must hurt the One to be in the fire. I had not seen that before. And we put him in the fire so happily. “Did you know the One is golden now?” I asked Tanamil.

“Yes,” he said. He picked up my rugcoat and looked at it. “That means his bonds can be broken,” he said.

“What are you telling me?” I said. You have to ask the Undying clear questions. They do not tell you things properly.

Tanamil put the thick folds of my weaving back on my knee. “We call this a spellcoat,” he said. “I think you should take it to the rising of the River. But I am not certain. You are making a thing here which is beyond anything I know. I dare not risk spoiling it by—”

Here came the disaster. The King came in with Jay, to pay his evening visit to the One. His pouched eyes twinkled merrily at Robin. “My dear young lady! Looking better at last! Restored to health and considerable beauty, isn't she? And how is my golden gentleman?”

Tanamil was standing against my loom, but the King did not see him, nor did Jay. Hern, Duck, and I made faces of astonishment at one another. Robin was too busy with the King to look at anything. She said the One was safe and she was feeling better today.

“Good! We shall be able to move on again,” said our King. He circled the room, passing in front of Tanamil without knowing it, and seemed arrested at the sight of my rugcoat. “My dear fluffyhead, this is beautiful! Now I see the purpose of all your industry. I call it truly delicate, my dear!” He took the rugcoat off my knee. My hands went out to stop him, but he whisked it out of my reach. I thought Tanamil might have stopped him. But Tanamil stood as if his hands were strapped to his sides. The King held the rugcoat against himself. It was far too big for him. As I said, he is a small, plump man. But his eyes twinkled delightedly at Robin. “Your sister has made a royal coat for our betrothal, my dear. When shall our wedding be?”

When I think of all our faces, I could almost laugh—though it is no laughing matter. We were all horrified, but Duck was worse even than Tanamil. He stared at the King as if he was a monster and backed away into a corner. As for Jay, he was worse even than Duck. He staggered, as though the King had hit him, and glared at me. I see now that he thought the coat was for him.

“But, Majesty,” I said, “the coat's too big!”

“We can turn up a hem or so,” the King said, “at the bottom and round the sleeves. I must admit, fluffyhead, that either you miscalculated or you were thinking of another man.” The sideways twinkle he gave Jay made no doubt about who he thought the man was. He bowed to me. “Thank you for my coat. I shall salute my bride-to-be.” He took Robin's hand and kissed it. He can be very courtly when he pleases.

Robin dragged her hand away. She looked ill again. “I haven't agreed yet, Majesty.”

“Nonsense,” he said. “This coat is agreement. Shall we marry tomorrow? The headman in Shelling can do the business.”

Robin looked desperately at Hern. Hern said, in a cracking voice, “Majesty, we object to Zwitt. You'll have to find another headman to marry you.” Hern says this is the law. He says he was lucky to remember it because his mind was spinning.

“Well, frankly, I don't care for Zwitt either,” the King said, readily enough. “We note your objection, brother-to-be. We'll use the next headman we find. I'll go and give orders to pack up and leave. Sleep well, my young lady.” He bundled my coat under his arm and took it away. Jay went with him, looking as if someone had hit him in the face.

He left us in uproar. Robin was in tears, with Tanamil embracing her. I found I was making the noise old women use at funerals. All my work misused and gone. Just as I had understood its nature and how to use it. Hern was demanding why Tanamil had not stopped the King.

“I'm bound!” Tanamil cried out. “I'm bound, I tell you! I have to do what the King wants.”

“Do you mean you can't marry Robin now?” Duck asked. He was very shaken.

“Not unless the King changes his mind,” said Tanamil. I think he was near to tears, too. Robin put her face in her hands and wept that he was not to leave her, ever.

Duck stared at them guiltily. “I'm sorry,” he said. “I told the King about Jay last night. He cheated. He promised me he wouldn't let Jay marry Robin.”

“And he hasn't,” said Hern. “Don't you know better than to trust the King, you stupid little—”

“Don't
fight
!” said Robin. “We've all we need without that!”

4

The King is luckily not very passionate over Robin. His main wish is to move on. I am weaving this amid the bustle of clearing up to go. The King visits Robin frequently, to remind her she is to be Queen, I think. You would think it would make her ill again, but Tanamil is with her, and she gets better every day. The King is unable to see Tanamil, but he has no illusions about Robin's feelings. He has detailed ten men to watch us night and day.

“Not Jay, I'm afraid,” he said to me. “He's not a man I trust in affairs of the heart. But my bride must have a proper bodyguard, fluffyhead.”

The bodyguards watch by five and five. Robin has no chance of getting away. Hern says we must stay with her. All I have been able to do is to insist that the One wants us to travel by River. It was not easy. The King has shown a desire to overrule the One. “A King is awfully exposed by water,” he says. “We shall be a big slow target for every Heathen crossbow. Are you quite sure our golden friend really wants us to?”

“Yes,” I said.

So the King has taken all the boats from Shelling. Zwitt stands scowling at us across the River, but I think it serves him right.

Tanamil has recovered his spirits again. In spite of our worries, we are flooded with his joy and pleasantness, which makes me feel very strange sometimes. I could not think why Tanamil was so cheerful until he came to me and said, “This second coat you're weaving—does it describe the first coat?” I said it did. He smiled and said, “Then I think it may be used instead.” I can see he has set his hopes on this. If this coat has power to unbind the One—and it might, since it holds my understanding—then Tanamil will be unbound as well, and he can marry Robin whatever the King says. The difficulty is that the King will marry Robin as soon as he finds another headman.

Sometimes I think Tanamil lacks hardness. I would move against the King if I could, bound or not. But then I think of the way his arms seemed pinned to his sides when the King took my rugcoat away. I think Cenblith did her work well.

Robin has given me the One. She has Gull and the Young One, and Duck has Mother. We have moved a day's journey up the River, beyond the great marshes.

We went in thirty small boats, watched by all Shelling standing on the bank. We were in the marsh most of today. The King's men shot ducks there, which they are cooking for supper. Everyone is scratching because of the mosquitoes. We nearly lost the King in the marsh—a thing I would have been glad to do at any other time, but not when Hern was in the King's boat. Our boat is large and slow, because it carries the bodyguards, and we lost sight of all the rest. It is not surprising. The pools and channels of the marsh change every year with the floods, and the whole is hung with slight blue mist. There are warm springs underneath, which make the mist and cause flowers of all kinds to riot and tangle at this time of year. Every so often the mist and flowers part to show a smoky blue mere. Each time we searched the bleary water for signs of the other boats, but there was nothing but the jump and scuttle of wild creatures.

One such mere was covered with silver birds. When our boat broke through the rushes, they rose into the haze on bent wings. I cried out in fear. “Seagulls! Mages in disguise! Shoot them!” The bodyguards looked at me in consternation.

Tanamil smiled and stood up. He was sitting unseen with Robin. It is as if their troubles have increased their love. They cling together. When he stood up, the seagulls flocked to him and flew calling round his head, while the eyes of the bodyguards rolled sideways, and they muttered of spirits.

“They're only gulls,” said Tanamil, and he sat down. The birds flew away. “There are storms at sea. They talk of great waves.”

I felt foolish. After all, this could be a sign from the One that Gull will be restored to us. But now that I am sitting weaving on the bank, removed from the peace Tanamil brings, I think the gulls were telling of Kankredin's anger. I am very glad that we are moving at last.

I have had no chance to weave for three days. At least Robin is not Queen yet, for which it seems we must thank the Heathens.

That morning after the marshes we were woken by numbers of people hurrying along the bank among our tents. The cats hid in my blankets because the people had dogs with them. I sat up and stared through the tent flap at the confusion among the willow trees. There were children and donkeys, men and dogs, and everyone waving lights and shouting. The King had come out with his face creased and crumpled with sleep. But even with the King asking them, the people would not stop or answer clearly. We gathered that Heathens were coming up behind. They shouted that the whole countryside was in flight and fled on.