They went swiftly to the dark cupboard and sorted through the cloths kept there. There were four banners—Gael had only remembered three—one in a cloth cover, to protect its gold and silver thread. The last, brown and silver, was the banner for Krail that Murrin had had from Yorath Duaring, at the first muster of the Westlings. Gael and Jehane folded them beneath their cloaks, tying the laces around their necks.
Shivorn Maddoc gave instructions:
“Go and pay your respects to the good folk from Rift Kyrie. Send Matilda to help me here. Then speak in private to Mistress Murrin, if you can.”
In the bright room, the new Mistress Murrin and her women had all covered their heads with scarves. The Balbank women were arrayed by the narrow windows now, looking down into the gardens and pointing into the grounds of their new domain. The two kedran were greeted by a fresh-faced young woman, the niece, Rieva, from Rift Kyrie, and by the good Matilda. They whispered together while the women at the windows talked aloud and laughed.
“I’ll go to help your mother, Captain,” said Matilda.
“Oh Goddess,” said young Rieva. “Balbank must be a strange place. Do you see those head scarves? I thought they wore them for mourning—but no, it is their law and custom. They must cover their heads because they are women—lest the men who see them are defiled.”
“Say rather that
King’s Bank
is a strange place,” sighed Gael. “These are the customs of the Kingdom of Lien!”
She approached the women at the window and the new Lady of Ardven House, Mistress Murrin, turned to confront her. She was a handsome blond woman, about forty years old, and her manner was indeed very strange. She took a harsh, high tone with Gael from the first, but had little tricks of a prescribed modesty: covering her mouth when she spoke, plucking the scarf across her face and over her hair, even covering the tips of her fingers with her sleeves.
“Mistress Murrin,” said Gael. “May I ask what funeral services are planned for my comrade, Captain Murrin?”
“We could bring her forth, kedran,” came the reply. “If you wanted her. Ask that healing woman who attended her.”
“The healer is Shivorn Maddoc of the Holywell, my mother,” said Gael. “Our family have served Ardven House for generations. In the last years we have cared for Emeris Murrin, who is well-beloved in Coombe.”
“What do you seek?” the blond woman asked coldly. “Some kind of reward or payment for your services?”
“By the Goddess, no!” said Gael, raising her voice. “I seek respect for a member of your family, your husband’s kin, even if you
do
worship the Lame God! Even if you have been enslaved by this life hatred that rules in the Kingdom of Lien! Remember, you are not in Lien now!”
“You defile my house!” snapped Mistress Murrin, dropping her hands from her face. “With your foul kedran dress and your bold speech and your vile magic! I am only a humble Altwyf of Balbank, but I know how you would fare in King’s Bank!”
“You are not in King’s Bank now,” said Gael grimly, a little regretting her outburst. “But if you do not wish to bring your kin to burial with the honors she has earned, I will arrange that officers of Coombe will come and take Emeris Murrin for her funeral rites. Your husband will be informed.”
She went down the stairs, leaving the Mistress of Ardven whispering angrily with her women. Rieva—the poor girl was this woman’s cousin by marriage now—went with Matilda to assist Shivorn Maddoc; Jehane and Gael went quickly out of the house. The front doors were wide open and the hallway was empty except for one house servant, who pointed to the open door, to bid them get out. After they went, the doors were shut and bolted.
The word of Murrin’s passing had been given, and those who kept vigil were drifting away. Gael could not tell who the hecklers were who had jeered at the name Maddoc, and at the
Wanderer.
There were Bress and Shim standing by the cart, which had been brought from the stable along with Captain Vey’s horse. Now Bran the dog came down from the cart and ran to greet her.
“Where is Tomas?” she asked.
“In the house,” said Bress. “He went to parley with Oweyn Murrin.”
There was a long trestle table set up in the courtyard by the Coombe wives; it was usual for food and drink to be brought
and also sent out of the house, but this had not been done today. She and Jehane went and helped themselves to barley water in a stone cooler and trout-fish pasties.
“Will Tomas get sense from these people?” asked Jehane.
“Of course,” said Gael shortly. “For one thing he’s a man, not a defiled creature in kedran dress, and for another, he was born in Lien—his father was a known scribe there.”
They waited for about another quarter hour. Then the doors were opened, and Tomas appeared with Oweyn, as friendly as you please. The two men shook hands. Murrin’s companions and his young son spoke farewell to Tomas. The party returned indoors, possibly to avoid the sight of Tomas driving off in the company of two kedran. Jehane unthreaded the banner for Coombe and gave it to Gael.
“It might rest with our old comrade,” she said.
The windows of the great house flashed in the lowering sun as the cart trundled down the track toward Cresset Burn.
Tomas laid his hand on Gael’s arm. His face was tired, drawn. “That was difficult,” he said. “They were barely creatures of reason. I could hardly keep them to the point.” Gael saw then the hard line he must have walked, trying to see Emeris Murrin honored, and she laid her hand over his, some of her hard feelings passing.
There was a short silence between them, and then Tomas asked her:
“Did you mark the man who stood behind Ardven’s master, just as I came to you from the hall?”
Gael had barely seen the man—tall, strong, she guessed an officer—so only shook her head.
“That was Merrin Treyes,” Tomas said. “Aldman Murrin arrived in Coombe well supported. Treyes is his captain.” He gave Gael a steady look. “It is Treyes who makes the trouble for Cullain Raille.”
“Why should he do such a thing? What could be his business in Coombe?” Gael twisted in her seat to look, but the front of the house was already out of sight.
“I can hardly guess,” Tomas said. “Treyes is an Aldman, like the others, but the name is from a Lienish family. This said—his manners are more of old Lien than new. He has been courting young Bethne at Long Burn Farm. His manner, out of uniform, would seem to hold great charm for her.”
Another turn in the road, and the stone circle, the Maidens, hove into view. Jehane dug in her heels and cantered her horse joyously out onto the verge.
Gael sighed, turned her hand into Tomas’s, and for a moment closed her eyes. She hoped this Merrin Treyes would not be a frequent guest at the Long Burn while she and Tomas remained in residence.
Emeris Murrin was buried two days later. A throng of people came to see her laid to rest. Her grave was on the top of the hill behind Holywell House, the home of the Maddocs. There it was, the same hillside where Gael and her father had ploughed and coaxed a living out of the hard soil. It had shared in Coombe’s blessing and was more fertile and pleasant in these days. Druda Strawn and Master Rhodd, the innkeeper, together with half a dozen sturdy helpers, had called for the wooden sarg at the gates of Ardven House, and it was carried in procession on one of the roads round the hill. Gael and her mother brought holy water from the sacred spring. Others were buried here on the western side of the hill. Maddocs of old time and the children of Shivorn Maddoc who had not lived. So the Druda offered prayers, and everyone sang a farewell chant. Captain Murrin was left to look down upon her family mansion. There were tables set up in the courtyard of the Maddocs’s house for a good funeral feast, but Gael had no stomach for it. She was still distressed by the experience at Ardven with the new folk; she took the chance to slip away once the baked meats were served.
Down in the grotto, in her old secret hiding place, she had placed the banners of Emeris Murrin. She had not had a chance to carry them home to the Long Burn to search for the mysterious message her old comrade had spoken of on her deathbed; now she simply gathered them up in a willow basket and carried them back up to the wake. She bade farewell to all the guests as soon as it was possible and mounted up outside in the
roadway, upon Ebony. Tomas had Valko, his good roan; Bran the dog accepted a last tidbit and came trotting along behind.
Tomas tried to cheer her, and this clear day, halfway through the Applemoon, the month of plenty, worked its own magic. The farmed hills about Coombe were unusually empty and quiet, with many of the folk up at Murrin’s funeral.
“A puzzle,” said Tomas, who enjoyed puzzles. “Whose path crossed that of the
Wanderer
and of Emeris Murrin, so that a message was left with her?”
They rode over the second bridge and looked at the standing stones, and Gael was struck by a sudden misgiving.
“I think Taran has sent me a clue—”
“Give it to me then, sweetheart!”
She only shook her head, kicked Ebony’s side, quickening the pace to a canter on the approach to the farm.
The Long Burn had no guests—Mev Arun and the others had lingered on at the wake. They were welcomed in by the steward and the housekeeper, Bethne. In the large parlor, Gael spread out the banners on a table—there were no hidden signs in the banner for the Westlings or the banners from Eriu and Athron.
“No,” said Tomas, “it must be this splendid thing woven for the fighting women of Palmur.” They gently removed the cotton cover and spread out the banner—a kind of gonfalon with two peaked ends—upon the table. There was a small raised place near a tree with silver fruit, and on the underside Gael found a folded parchment. It was as she had thought, and she knew that it must have a sad meaning.
“It is from Lord Luran,” she said.
The Eilif lord wrote in a fine antique straightletter:
Gael Maddoc, I am alone in Tulach. It is finished But this need not be a time of mourning, for more of our folk have passed safely over the waters than we had reason to hope. My Mother, Ethain of Clonagh, sends her greetings. We have agreed to give you a certain stewardship as a return for all your work on our behalf, and particularly your last service to us in Eildon. We know now that you are indeed THE WANDERER, an envoy for the people of Hylor as well as for its rulers among the dark folk. I will send this letter by messenger to Captain Emeris Murrin of Ardven
House, who will keep it safe for you until you are free to claim it. Then I must speak with you. Accept a blessing:
Luran of Clonagh
Gael passed the letter to Tomas. She leaned her elbows on the table and put her hands to her face, blinking away tears. Once again, she seemed to feel the soft wind that had touched her as she stood upon the hilltop overlooking the Palace Fortress of King Gol, the Eilif lords and ladies all about her.
“Dear heart,” said Tomas. “Do not weep!”
“I will speak with him,” she said. “This was news which must come!”
Gael sat alone, looking out on the fields in the room where Culain Raillie had once kept Taran’s Kelch hidden in a chest. She thumbed the magic slip of cedarwood, and Luran looked out at her.
When they had exchanged greetings, he said:
“Ylmiane has departed,” he said. “Sir Hugh has gone with my mother to the Pendark lands, where he will pass a little time with the Lyreth Lords, the Children of the Sea. The others—they, too, have passed beyond Eriu, and this without fading. For this, we must give you thanks. You carried the golden thread,” he told her, and she knew he meant the bracelet she had worn for the Shee into Eildon. “That greatly soothed their journey.”
“So soon?” Gael asked.
“If you had not indeed been the
Wanderer
, our time would not have been called,” Luran admitted. “True, it came sooner than even we had expected, but that should have not been a surprise to anyone. But I bid you to be happy in your mind: for we were fading swiftly. If you had not come when you did, if the thread had not followed you across the waters, there would not have been many left to await the coming of a fresh hope.”
Gael put her hand over the gold band upon her arm. For the first time, it felt warm from the heat of her own flesh. Some magic, some spell had departed from it as the last Lord of the Shee had spoken; beyond that, the gold seemed of itself suddenly heavy, a weight of loneliness upon her. Yet she managed to not speak aloud her sadness. The Shee had used her neatly: she had not understood, in this last venture, how closely the
Shee’s tasks had paralleled the course of those she had taken on in this dark world, seeking the answer of the “Lost Prince.”
She had her part-answers of Eildon, of Lien, and of the “Lost Prince” himself—but by the same token, she had also finished her service to the light ones, and this unknowing. It was almost more than she could bear, for the passing of beauty can never be anything but painful.
They spoke for a time of Captain Murrin, and Luran sent a final greeting to Druda Strawn.
“What will you have me do, lord?” asked Gael.