have to let the goats rest a day, or they’ll stop giving milk,’ Wargal said, ‘Is that safe, Wise One?’
‘Oh, I think so. But you’d best travel a long way north before you find a place to settle down.’
‘We intend to. We were hoping you’d come with us.’
‘I will for a while, but my destiny lies in the west, and I have to go where my magic tells me.’
After three more days of slow straggling marching, the luck of Wargal’s tribe turned for the better. One afternoon they crested a high hill to see huts of their own kind spread out along a stream, prosperous fields, and pastures full of goats. When they came up to the village, the folk ran to meet them. There were only seven huts in the village, but land enough for many families. After a hasty tribal council, their headman, Ufel, told Wargal that he and his folk were welcome to settle there if they chose.
‘The more of us the better,’ Ufel said. ‘Our young men are learning a thing or two from the cursed Blue Eyes. Someday we’ll fight and keep our lands.’
Wargal tossed back his head and howled a war-cry.
Their journey over, the refugees camped that night along the streambank. The villagers brought food and settled in for talks to get to know their new neighbours. At Ufel the headman’s fire, Wargal and Aderyn drank thin beer from wooden cups.
‘I take it your folk have lived here for some time,’ Aderyn said. ‘May you always live in peace.’
‘So I hope. We have a powerful god in our valley, and so far he’s protected us. If you’d like I’ll show you his tree on the morrow.’
‘My thanks, I would.’ Aderyn had a cautious sip of the beer and found it suitably weak. ‘I don’t suppose any of the Blue Eyes live near you?’
‘They don’t. And I pray that our god will always keep them away. Very few folk of any kind come through here – one of the People, every now and then, that’s all.’
‘The who?’
‘The People. The Blue Eyes call them the Westfolk, but their own name for themselves is the People. We don’t see many of them any more. When I was a little child, they brought their horses through every now and then, but not recently. Probably the demon-spawn Blue Eyes have tried to enslave them, too, but I’m willing to bet that they found it a very hard job.’
‘From what I’ve heard, the Eldidd men have some kind of trade with them – iron goods for horses.’
‘Iron goods? The idiot Blue Eyes give the People iron?’ Ufel rose and paced a few steps away from the fire. Trouble and twice-trouble over that, then!’
‘What? I don’t understand. The Westfolk seem to want the iron, and …’
‘I can’t explain. For a Blue Eye you’re a good man, but telling you would be breaking geis.’
‘Never would I ask you to do such thing. I’ll say no more about it.’
On the morrow Aderyn rose before dawn and slipped away before the village was truly awake to spare everyone a sad farewell. He followed an ancient trail that wound through the barren pine-stubbed mountains without seeing a soul, either good or bad, until he rejoined the road. Even though the fields were ploughed and ready for the autumn planting, and orchards stood along the road, the houses were few and far between, and villages rare, unlike in Deverry. As he came closer to the river El, the real spine of the country, the houses grew thicker, clustering in proper villages. Finally, after six days on the road, he reached Elrydd, a proper town where he found an inn, not a cheap place, but it was clean, with fresh straw on the tavern room floor.
Aderyn paid over a few of his precious coins for the lodging, then stowed his gear in a wedge-shaped chamber on the upper storey. The innkeep, Wenlyn, served a generous dinner of thick beef stew and fresh bread, topped off with apple slices in honey. He also knew of the Westfolk.
‘A strange tongue they speak, break your jaw it would. A jolly sort of folk, good with a jest, but when they come through here, they don’t stay at my inn. Don’t trust ’em, I don’t. They steal, I’m cursed sure of it, and lie all the time. Can’t trust people who won’t stay put in proper villages. Why are they always riding on if they don’t have somewhat to hide, eh?’ Wenlyn paused to refill Aderyn’s tankard. ‘And they’ve got no honour around women. Why, there’s a lass in our very own town who’s got a bastard to one of them.’
‘Now here, plenty of Eldidd men sire bastards, too. Don’t judge the whole herd by one horse.’
‘Easy enough to say, good sir, and doubtless wise. But there’s just somewhat about these lads. The lasses go for them like cats do for catmint, I swear it. Makes a man nervous, it does, wondering what the lasses see in a bunch of foreigners. Huh. Women have got no sense, and that’s all there is to that.’
Aderyn smiled in bare politeness while Wenlyn sucked his teeth and sighed for the folly of lasses.
‘Tell me, good sir,’ Aderyn said at last, ‘If I ride straight west on the king’s road, will I eventually meet up with some of these folk?’
‘Oh, no doubt, but what do you want to do that for? If you do, be cursed careful of your mule and horse. They might take a fancy to them, like. But as to where, let’s think – never been there myself – but Cernmeton, that region, that’s where our merchants go to trade.’
‘My thanks. I’ll be leaving on the morrow, then. I’ve just got a fancy to take a look at these folk.’
Wenlyn stared at him as if he were daft, then left Aderyn to finish his meal in peace. As he sopped up the last of his stew with a bit of bread, Aderyn was wondering at himself. He felt something calling him west, and he knew he’d better hurry.
Out on the grasslands the seasons change more slowly than they do in the mountains. At about the time when Aderyn was seeing omens of autumn up in the Eldidd hills, far to the west the golden sunlight still lay hazy on the seemingly endless expanse of green. When the alar rode past a small copse of alders clustered around a spring, the trees stood motionless and dusty in the windless heat, as if summer would linger there forever. Dallandra turned in her saddle and looked at Nananna, riding beside her on a golden gelding with a white mane and tail. The elder elven woman seemed exhausted, her face as pale as parchment under her crown of white braids, her wrinkled lids drooping over her violet eyes.
‘Do you want to rest at the spring, Wise One?’
‘No need, child. I can wait till we reach the stream.’
‘If you’re sure-’
‘Now don’t fuss over me! I may be old, but I still have the wit to tell you if I need to rest.’
Riding straight in the saddle for all her five hundred years, Nananna slapped her horse with the reins and pulled a little ahead. With her second sight, Dallandra could see the energy pouring around her, great silver streams and pulses in her aura, almost too much power for her frail body to bear. Soon Nananna would have to die. Every day Dallandra’s heart ached at the thought of losing her mistress in the craft of magic, but there was no denying the truth.
Their companions followed automatically as they rode on. Earlier that morning, their alar had hurried ahead with the flocks and herds and left them a small escort
