On the walls, frescoes of rose gardens gave the small chamber illusory depth. Distant birds flew in the painted skies. While they discussed the two strangers, resting in a chamber just down the corridor, Nalla kept combing her silvery-pale hair. It tumbled in waves about her slender shoulders and down her back, so different from Hwilli’s own fine, limp hair that would have hung in ugly tendrils, or so Hwilli felt, had she worn hers free like Nalla did.
‘Could Master Jantalaber tell you anything more?’ Nalla said.
‘He thought perhaps they belonged to some northern tribe. With the Meradan on the move like this, their lands might have been attacked, too, and their tribe might have fled south.’ Hwilli shrugged uneasily. ‘If that’s true, there must be thousands of Meradan out there. It makes my flesh crawl, thinking that.’
‘Mine too.’ Nalla looked down at the carved bone comb in her hand. Her fingers clenched tight around it. ‘I wonder sometimes what’s going to happen to us. I truly do.’
Hwilli turned and looked out of the small window, set into the frescoes at the chamber’s end, that looked out to the actual sky. She could just see the tops of the fortress’s towers, gleaming in moonlight. We’ll be safe here, she thought. Won’t we? Nalla shuddered, as if she were wondering the same. She resumed combing her hair, then paused, and with a quick frown shoved the comb into the pouch hanging from her belt.
‘Anyway,’ Hwilli said, ‘the master’s going to ask the Guardians for help. He thinks the crystals Evandar gave him might allow us to talk to the men, since they transfer thoughts and images. But he doesn’t know how they could actually translate our speech.’
‘No one’s ever sure how Evandar does anything.’
‘That’s very true. And Evandar might not help with this, either. So I suppose there’s nothing we can do but wait and see.’
‘That’s the Guardians for you.’ Nalla slid off the stool and walked to the door. ‘Are you coming to the refectory? The men will be waiting on table tonight in the great hall, so it’ll be just us women.’
‘Good. I don’t want to sit in the hall with the prince and his warriors.’ Hwilli got up to join her. ‘All they talk about is the war.’
‘What else is there to talk about?’
‘You have a point, unfortunately. The master did say he was going to consult with the prince about the strangers. He was thinking that the prince might want send out a squadron to find the tribe they came from and see if they’d join the People.’
‘Ah, to be allies, you mean.’ Nalla frowned, considering something. ‘I wonder where Evandar found them, though. They could have been up on the Roof of the World, for all we know.’
‘Quite so. I’ll wager that the prince realizes that. I doubt if he’ll want to risk losing any of his men on a scouting expedition. The Guardians never seem to grasp the idea of distance.’
‘That, alas, is very true. Or the idea of time, either.’ Nalla abruptly shuddered with a little shake of her head.
‘What?’
‘I don’t know, maybe an omen, maybe not. There’s so much to be frightened of, these days.’
‘Well, that’s true.’
Yet Hwilli assumed that some long wisp of the cloud that covered future events had touched her. Nalla’s marked for the dweomer, Hwilli thought, while I’m only here to learn herbs and the like. Master Jantalaber had made it clear to her from the beginning, that only the People could use dweomer, never the humble village folk that they treated like children at best and slaves at worst. As she and Nalla walked down the long corridor to the special dining area set aside for the healers in the fortress, Hwilli fought her endless battle between gratitude and envy.
Once they were sitting in the refectory with food spread on the table in front of them, gratitude won a temporary victory. Hwilli reminded herself, as she generally did, that she’d been lucky to be chosen to study with a master healer, to live here in the fortress and have plenty to eat. She’d been born and raised in huts that always smelled of the manure and mud that filled in the chinks in the walls. Her parents had worked so hard that their backs were permanently bent and aching. Her father had died, feverish and half-starved, long before he’d grown old. Her own life, even though brief compared to the spans allotted to the People, would be comfortable and respected because of her knowledge. But so brief, she thought. Still so brief.
Envy rose like bile in her throat. While the other women ate, chatting and laughing, she crumbled a bit of bread between her fingers and watched them. Despite their cat-like eyes and furled ears, they were beautiful, young and beautiful, and they would still be lovely hundreds of years on, when she’d been dead and forgotten for those same hundreds of years.
‘Hwilli!’ Nalla said. ‘Try some of this roast partridge.’ She leaned over and placed a choice slice onto Hwilli’s plate. ‘It’s awfully good.’
‘My thanks.’ Hwilli managed to smile. ‘I was just thinking.’
‘About that handsome stranger?’ Nalla said. ‘And he is handsome, or he will be after a bath. His brother’s good-looking, too. Now, don’t deny it.’
‘Oh yes, I suppose they are. For men of my kind.’
‘Well.’ Nalla paused for a grin. ‘If you shut your eyes, you could ignore their ears.’
When the other women laughed, Hwilli decided that hatred tasted like sour wine. She gathered a few bitter remarks, but when she looked Nalla’s way, Nalla rolled her eyes with a shrug toward the laughter, and Hwilli kept the remarks to herself.
Caswallinos, or so he’d often told his apprentice, had also realized that distance and time meant nothing to Evandar, but much to the elder druid’s surprise and Galerinos’s relief, the river did lie where that supposed god had told them. As they came down from the hills they could see the gleam of water far ahead, winding through a grassy plain scattered with huge boulders and dotted with the occasional copse. Laughter and cheers rippled up and down the line of wagons. The horses and cows raised their heads and sniffed the air, then walked a little faster.
As they hurried across the plain, Galerinos noticed several long and oddly straight lines of small stones. The savages had laid them out, he assumed, though the landscape made him think of old tales about the giants of olden times and their furious wars. Perhaps the Devetii had wandered into an armoury of sorts, with rocks laid ready for some battle that had never occurred.
Just at sunset they reached the river. The Devetian line of march spread out along its banks to allow their weary horses to drink. After them came the cattle and sheep. Only when the animals had drunk their fill, and the mud had had time to settle, did the humans wade into the river to drink and to collect the precious water in amphorae and waterskins. As priests, Galerinos and his master received their share first. After they slaked their thirst, they stood by their wagon and looked out across the stone-studded plain.
‘This is a very strange place,’ Caswallinos remarked.
‘It certainly is, your holiness! All those rocks! Do you know why they’re here?’
‘The Wildfolk told me that a big sheet of ice crawled down from the north. When it melted, it dropped them.’ Caswallinos shook his head sadly. ‘The Wildfolk lack wits as we know
