A movement caught Calwyn’s eye. One of the sisters was sitting in a chair beside the hearth, half-hidden in the shadows. The woman leaned forward, and Calwyn saw her broad face suddenly lit with firelight. She was holding a small knife, and her lap was filled with potatoes. ‘Don’t be afraid,’ she said, in a dry voice. ‘I can’t chase after you.’
‘Lia?’
Lia was one of the most senior and respected priestesses, the Guardian of the House of Mothers, a revered midwife and milk-healer.Why was she hiding away here in a dark corner of the kitchens?
‘Calwyn.’ Lia’s knife scraped, a potato fell into the bucket at her feet. ‘Tamen knows someone breached the Wall tonight. She has turned the dwellings upside-down hunting for the intruder. She’s ordered everyone out to search.’
Calwyn let out her breath. ‘But once she knows it’s only me – ’ Lia stared at her sharply. ‘Once she knows it’s
you
, she won’t rest until she’s fed you to the Goddess. You and your Outlander must find a place to hide.’
‘My Outlander?’ It took Calwyn a moment to realise who she was talking about. ‘Darrow isn’t with me.’
Lia gestured with her chin. ‘And who are they, if not Outlanders?’
Trout and Mica had crept out of their hiding-place. ‘We heard voices,’ said Trout. ‘We thought – is everything all right?’
‘All right?’ Lia gave a bitter laugh. ‘Nothing has been right in Antaris since the sorcerer came.’
‘I told you two to wait for me!’ said Calwyn angrily, but Mica had pushed closer to Lia.
‘The sorcerer? You mean Samis?’
‘The Merithuran, yes. He came to steal our chantments, but instead he stole our health, and our contentment. And now he’s taken spring from us, too.’
Calwyn frowned. ‘What do you mean?’
‘After he left, our sisters began to fall ill with the snow-sickness. It’s a disease that afflicts chanters, only chanters. First the skin turns pale, then all feeling in the limbs fades away. Then the gift of chantment disappears. After that, death follows swiftly. There is no cure.’
Calwyn swallowed. ‘The bodies in theWall – they had the sickness?’
‘You’ve seen them, then?’ Lia’s face set like a mask, and the little knife scraped and scraped against the potato’s flesh. ‘That was Tamen’s work. She believes that putting the sick ones into theWall will prevent infection; that the ice will stop the disease from spreading. She believes that some must be sacrificed, for the sake of us all. And it must be said, many of the sisters think she’s right.’
‘What about Marna?’ cried Calwyn. ‘I can’t believe Marna agreed to anything so monstrous!’
Lia gave Calwyn a swift, burning look. ‘Marna is not our High Priestess any more. Tamen is High Priestess now.’
‘Marna is…Marna is dead?’ Calwyn whispered. She groped behind her for the bench, to hold up her shaky legs; she felt sick and hollow. Suddenly she knew that Marna was the real reason she had come back to Antaris: not the sisters, or the bees, or the orchard, or the singing in the great hall. Somewhere inside her, a last candle-flame of hope snuffed out.
‘Oh, Cal,’ murmured Mica.
Lia said, ‘Everyone in Antaris lives in fear.The sick are too frightened to ask Ursca for help, in case Tamen puts them in theWall. So the illness spreads.’
‘Why don’t
you
stop her?’ cried Calwyn. Rage swelled inside her, filling the hollow place. ‘How can you just sit there so calmly, peeling potatoes?’
‘I have no choice.’ Lia’s voice was calm, but her dark eyes burned into Calwyn’s. ‘I broke my back the night the sorcerer came. I have not walked since.’
The night the sorcerer came…Calwyn remembered the terrible clash in the courtyard: all the sisters and their magic of ice-call, and Darrow with his songs of ironcraft, against Samis and his chantments of iron and seeming. Samis had made the priestesses believe they were crawling with snakes and spiders, and in the confusion, one of the sisters had fallen from the gallery. ‘It was
you
who fell!’ Calwyn cried. ‘I’m …I’m sorry…’ ‘Don’t waste your pity on me,’ said Lia crisply. ‘Save it for Rina, and Athala, and Damyr, and the others Tamen put into theWall.’
‘Damyr?’ Calwyn had been apprenticed to Damyr, the old beekeeper. It was she who had taught Calwyn the songs of the bees, never knowing that they were the long-lost chantments of the Power of Beasts. Calwyn would have liked to tell Damyr that.
A sudden noise made them all turn. From the shadowed doorway, a tall figure glided into the kitchen. A deep, grating voice said, ‘Calwyn. I might have known it was you.’ Tamen’s dark eyes glittered, and her hair was coiled on top of her head, as Marna’s had been.
Calwyn swallowed, but she stood her ground. ‘Tamen,’ she said, her voice matching in harshness. There was no love between the two women, and Calwyn knew that she could never bring herself to call Tamen
Lady Mother
.
Tamen stared atTrout and Mica with icy contempt. ‘I see you have not learned your lesson. How dare you bring Outlanders here a second time? Haven’t you caused enough harm already?’
‘These are my friends!’ Calwyn’s temper flared, as it had always flared at Tamen’s rebukes. ‘And how can you blame
me
for what’s been happening here? You are –
abominable
! Shutting our sisters inside theWall!’
‘Our sisters sacrificed themselves willingly,’ saidTamen in a low voice.
‘You liar! Athala was drugged with bitterthorn, I tasted it on her lips! She was still alive when you put her into the ice!’
Tamen stared at her. ‘You touched Athala’s body?’
‘It’s not forbidden to touch the dead.’
Tamen gave a short, bitter laugh. ‘Not forbidden, no. Nor is it forbidden to dive down the well, nor to leap from the western tower. But it will kill you all the same.’
‘What’s she sayin, what’s she mean?’ cried Mica, turning pale.
Lia said, in her dry voice, ‘The snow-sickness is spread from skin to skin, chanter to chanter. If Calwyn has touched her – ’ ‘If Calwyn has touched her, she will reap a fitting punishment for what she’s done,’ said Tamen. ‘It was she who helped the Outlander Darrow, when she should have left him to die by the Wall, as the Goddess intended. And Darrow brought the Merithuran sorcerer after him, who has cursed Antaris with the plague, and this endless winter.’
‘Samis was a powerful sorcerer, and he has done great damage here,’ said Calwyn, with a glance at Lia. ‘But the plague, the winter? I can’t believe even
he
could do all that.’
‘I know what I know! How dare you question me!’Tamen’s voice trembled with passion. ‘How dare you show your face here? Get out of my sight, get back to the Outlands where you belong, and take
them
with you!’
Calwyn tried not to quail before Tamen’s fury. Something flashed into her mind that Marna had told her long ago:
Tamen
is afraid of you. She knows that your gift is stronger than her own.
Calwyn was no longer a chanter. But Tamen did not know that.
Calwyn drew herself up tall. But when she spoke, though she tried to sound calm and steely, her voice shook like that of a frightened little girl’s. ‘I won’t leave.This is my home, and these are my friends.’
‘For shame, Tamen,’ said Lia, and Calwyn caught a glimpse of her quiet authority. ‘This is our sworn sister. She and her friends have journeyed far. They need food, and rest, and shelter.’
Tamen turned on her. ‘I will give them nothing!’ she hissed. She swung back to Calwyn. ‘This is not your home.You are no Daughter of Taris. You are an Outlander, by birth and by blood.We should have cast you out years ago. But no matter – what was left undone then may be done now!’ Tamen raised her hand, and her sleeve fell back. Despite herself, Calwyn shuddered with fear.
Tamen’s lips parted, and she began to sing. Trout gave a strangled cry, which was abruptly cut off. ‘Tamen,
no
!’ cried Lia.
Calwyn whirled around. Trout’s face was frosted with a mask of ice. He clawed frantically at his nose and mouth, sealed by the thickening ice. Instinctively, Calwyn opened her mouth to counter the chantment. Then she remembered. She was helpless.
Quick as a heartbeat, Mica pulled out the Clarion.There was no time to be careful, to measure her breath, and Mica was angry. She blew a ringing call, and flames roared through the kitchens.The long table and benches blazed, and the fire in the hearth flared up over the mantel. Lia screamed, and so did Tamen as flames licked her long robes. Calwyn sprang forward, tore off her own heavy cloak, and threw it around Lia. ‘Go! Go!’ Lia cried, batting at her burning robes. The room was choked with heat and smoke, andTrout’s face was wet with melted ice.
As Tamen sang a rapid chantment to damp the flames, Calwyn dragged Trout and Mica outside. Their clothes and packs were smouldering too, though thick wool and leather and rabbit-skins burned less readily than Tamen and Lia’s robes. Calwyn pulled her friends down beside her into the deep snow of the courtyard. As soon as the sparks were quenched, she stared about wildly for a place to run. The western tower? It was the most inhospitable corner of the Dwellings, and her favourite bolt-hole when she was a novice. Black smoke rolled from the kitchens; soon Tamen would call for help.
‘This way!’ Calwyn cried, but before they’d stumbled twenty paces, a dumpy figure darted out in front of them.
‘Dear child! Praise the Goddess!’
Calwyn almost groaned aloud. The very last thing she needed now was to be detained by Ursca. But the infirmarian had seized her arm. ‘Come. Hurry now!’ When it was necessary, Ursca could move as briskly as anyone, and she propelled Calwyn and Mica across the courtyard, through a narrow doorway into a dark corridor. ‘You’ll be safe with me. Come along!’ This last remark was addressed to Trout, who stumbled along behind them. ‘Oh, dear,’ Ursca sighed under her breath. ‘A young man!’
Calwyn’s sharp hearing caught the sound of voices and close by. The searchers Tamen had sent to find the intruders were returning to the Dwellings. Ursca halted at the end of the corridor, and put her finger to her lips until the voices had passed.
‘We can’t stay here!’ Calwyn whispered. This passage led from the House of Elders to the Middle House and served as a storage space for spare linen, broken looms, and boxes of candles. It was seldom used, but hardly a safe hiding-place. Trout brushed a cobweb from his shoulder and peered about nervously.
Ursca shook her head to silence Calwyn, then eased open the door. ‘The way’s clear. Calwyn dear, you know the old barn beyond the duck ponds?’
‘The one that was struck by lightning? But the roof ’s gone!’
‘Only half gone, dear, only half gone, and it’s been searched already. Quickly now! Sing a chantment to fill our footsteps.’
‘But I – ’
Ursca was already hurrying over the snow, beckoning them to follow.
‘I’ll do it, Cal,’ whispered Mica. At once she sang a high, eerie chantment of the winds that blew soft snow into the gashes of shadow that marked their tracks. Calwyn tried to feel grateful to Mica, but a pebble of resentment lodged in her throat.
Past the apple-shed and the New Barn, the little group darted from shadow to shadow. Behind them, one window after another lit up, golden dots in the darkness of the Dwellings.
The Lightning Barn stood on the far side of the ponds. The blackened scar on its roof was clearly visible, and one wall was gone, exposing the raw beams and the hayloft. There was a sudden whirr of feathers and a rush of wind above their heads. Trout yelped, and Ursca gave him an exasperated look. ‘It’s only a white owl, young man – it won’t hurt you!’
‘Ursca, we can’t – ’ began Calwyn. Trying to shelter inside the empty shell of the barn would be almost as bad as camping in the open, especially now she’d lost her cloak. But Ursca tutted, and shepherded them along.
‘This way, dears. You too, young man. Go on, up the ladder, into the hayloft. There you are, you see? Snug as a burrower’s den!’
Calwyn clambered up the ladder and was surprised to find a cosy space, walled with bales of hay. There was a gap above the hay bales where the icy wind still whistled through, and the hay-lined room smelled of must and damp. A single candle-lamp faintly lit the loft, and a tiny stove sent out a fitful warmth. Mica shrugged off the heavy pack and sank to the floor, utterly exhausted.
‘This isn’t so bad,’ said Trout. ‘Once we fill in that gap –
’ Ursca clucked. ‘That’s as high as I could reach, young man! We’re not all as tall as dear Calwyn!’
But Calwyn wasn’t listening. ‘Marna! Oh, Marna!’ She flung herself down beside the blanket-wrapped bundle that lay in one corner protected from the draught.
‘Careful, dear.’ Ursca drew her away. ‘Our Lady Mother is sleeping. Don’t disturb her. And you know, of course, you mustn’t touch her skin.’
Calwyn couldn’t tear her gaze from the small, frail figure of the old woman, wrapped in layers of quilts and blankets. The long, silver-topped staff of the High Priestess lay on the floor at her side. ‘But Lia told me – ’ She stopped. No, Lia had not said that Marna was dead.
‘Safer to let you think the worst, dear. I told Tamen that Marna had died and been buried, mayTaris forgive me, a turn of the moons ago.’
‘What did she say?’
‘Do you know, I think she was relieved? Yes, I think even Tamen, bold as she is, would have been unwilling to close our Lady Mother into theWall, when it came to it. She was glad to have the decision taken from her.’ Ursca sighed. ‘Only Lia and Gilly and I know the truth.’
‘Gilly?’ Calwyn remembered Gilly as an empty-headed, silly young novice, more interested in flirting with the village boys than in chantment or her duties to the Goddess.
Ursca smiled sadly. ‘Gilly has changed. These dark days have changed us all.’ She leaned over Marna and smoothed her blankets. ‘Our poor Lady Mother was weakened by the battle with the Merithuran – you remember, dear. She was ill for a long time after that. She was just beginning to recover when she caught the snow-sickness. How it happened, I don’t know. I nursed her myself. I have wondered whether Tamen… ’ Ursca’s voice faltered.
‘
Tamen
?’
‘Only Tamen and I tended her, you see. Someone who was already ill must have touched Marna’s skin, it’s the only way to pass on the snow-sickness. And certainly that never happened while I watched over her. So Tamen must have permitted – or perhaps even
forced
– But there, I mustn’t speak evil where I don’t know the truth.’ Ursca looked around, her manner suddenly brisk and efficient. ‘Calwyn, dear, would you sing a chantment to melt the snow in those buckets?’