I remember this particularly. It was in the first part of the year after the shortest day, and there was a hard frost that night. It was the only frost that winter. I was cold. Right in the middle of the night I woke up out of a dream, freezing. In my dream my father was somewhere in the distance, trying to tell me something. “Wake up, Tanaqui,” he said, “and listen carefully.” But that was all he said, because I did wake up. It took hours to get back to sleep. I had to get in beside Robin in the end, I was so cold.
From what Uncle Kestrel said, I think that was the night my father died. It is hard to be sure, but I think so. I do not want to weave of this.
Before that came the terrible illness. Almost everyone in Shelling got it, and some of the smaller children died. The River smelt very bad. Even Hern admitted that this disease might have come from the River. It was much warmer than it should be for the time of year, and the River was very low and stagnant – a queer light greenish colour – and we could not get the smell out of our house. Robin burnt cloves on the edge of the hearth to hide it. We all had the disease, but not badly. When we were better, Robin and I went round to see if Aunt Zara was ill too. We had not seen her in her garden for days.
She was ill, but she would not let us into her house. “Keep away from me!” she screamed through the door. “I’m not having either of you near me!”
Robin was very patient, because Aunt Zara was ill. “Now, Aunt, don’t be so silly,” she said. “Why won’t you let us in?”
“Just look at yourselves!” screamed my aunt.
Robin and I stared at one another in great surprise. Robin had been very particular about our appearance, partly because she has grown fussy now she is old and partly to please Aunt Zara, who is even fussier. We both had our new winter rugcoats on, with bands of scarlet saying Fight for the King, which I had woven to remind us of the King’s messengers. The rest was a pattern of good browns and blue, which suit us both. My head was still sore from Robin’s combing, so I knew my hair was neat and not the usual white bush. Robin’s hair is silkier than mine, though just as curly. She had striven with it and put it into neat plaits, like a yellow rope on each shoulder. We could not see what was wrong with us.
While we looked, my aunt kept screaming. “I’m not going to have anything to do with you! I disown you! You’re none of my flesh and blood!”
“Aunt Zara,” Robin said, reasonably, “our father is your brother.”
“I hate him too!” screamed my aunt. “He brought you down on us! I’m not having the rest of Shelling saying it’s my fault. Get away from my house!”
I saw Robin’s face go red, then white. Her chin was a hard shape. “Come along, Tanaqui,” she said. “We’ll go back home.” And she went, with me trotting to keep up. I looked at her as I trotted, expecting her to be crying, but she was not. She did not speak about Aunt Zara again. I spoke, but only a little, when Hern asked me what had happened.
“She’s a selfish old hag anyway,” Hern said.
Aunt Zara recovered from the sickness, but she never came near us, and we did not go near her.
It was a long winter. The spring floods were late in coming. We were longing for them, to wash away the smell from the River. I was longing for them in a special way. After my dream I was very anxious for my father, but I hid my worry in a new fancy: that he would come home in floodtime, before the One had to go in his fire, and everything would be all right. Instead no floods came, but at last men began to come back to Shelling from the wars. That was a time I do not want to tell about. Only half came back who had set out, weary and thin. My father and Gull were not among them, and no one would speak to us. Everyone looked at us grimly.
“What are we supposed to have done now?” Hern demanded.
UNCLE KESTREL CAME home among the last. He came to our house first, leading Gull. We were frightened when we looked at them. None of us could behave as if we were glad, though Robin tried. Uncle Kestrel had turned into a real old man. His head nodded and his hands shook, and his face was covered with scraggly white bristle. Gull was inches taller. I knew it must be Gull because of his fair hair and the rugcoat I had woven for him last autumn, though that was shiny with grease and almost in rags, but I would not have known him otherwise.
“Be easy on him,” Uncle Kestrel said when Robin threw her arms round Gull. Gull hardly moved. “He’s had a bad time. It was the Heathens in the Black Mountains did it. We were all in the siege there, and the slaughter.”
Gull did not show he had heard. His face was empty. Robin led him to a seat, where he sat and stared. Duck, Hern and I stood in a row looking at him. Only Robin remembered to ask Uncle Kestrel to come in. She bustled about for cake and drinks, and dug the three of us in our backs to make us help her. Duck fetched the cups. I pulled myself together and got out our best plum preserves, but my face kept turning to Gull, sitting staring, and then to Uncle Kestrel, so old. Hern just stood there staring at Gull as hard as Gull stared into space.
Uncle Kestrel is a very direct person. “Well,” he said as soon as he was sitting down, “your father’s dead, I’m afraid. Out on the plains, a long way from here.”
We were all expecting that. None of us, not even Robin, cried. We just went pale and slow, and sat down without wanting to eat to hear what Uncle Kestrel had to tell.
Uncle Kestrel was glad of the good food. He beamed at Robin and ate a great deal. Whatever war had done to Gull, Uncle Kestrel came out of it completely natural. In the most natural way he broke off a big lump of cake, put it in Gull’s hand, and closed Gull’s fingers round it. “Here you are. Eat it, boy.” Gull obediently ate the cake without looking at it – without looking at anything. “You’ll find you have to do that,” Uncle Kestrel explained to us. “He’ll drink the same way. Now, to the sad news.”
He told us how Father had died of wounds in the middle of winter, a long way off. I think, from the way he said it, that my father had dragged himself along pretending to be well for Gull’s sake, because Gull had needed looking after even then. The fighting had been terrible. Our people were not used to it, and few of them had real weapons. The Heathen had good weapons, spears, and bows that could send an iron bolt through two men at once. “Besides being trained from their cradles to fight like devils,” Uncle Kestrel said. “And they have enchanters in their midst, who conquer us with spells. They can draw the strength from you like sucking an egg.”
Hern stared. “Piffle.”
“You haven’t seen them, lad,” said Uncle Kestrel. “I have. You know them by their long coats. They’ve set their spells on the very River himself, knowing him to be our strength and our lifeblood. Take a look outside, if you don’t believe me. Have you ever known him that colour and smelling like he does?”
“No,” Hern admitted.
“So, by fair means and foul,” Uncle Kestrel said, “the Heathen have beaten us. They’ve brought their women and their children, and they mean to stay. The land is full of them. Our King is in hiding, bless him.”
“What will we all do?” Duck asked in an awed whisper.
“Run
