Magic Casement

1

“Why doesn’t something happen?” Inos demanded in an urgent whisper.

“Why should anything happen?” Aunt Kade replied.

Inos ground her teeth quietly, glaring hatred at her embroidery. They were sitting in the Willow Grove at Kinvale with many other ladies of quality, all sewing or crocheting or merely chatting in the heavy sunshine. It was afternoon in late summer and nothing was happening. Nothing, it seemed, ever happened at Kinvale. Nothing was supposed to—that was the whole idea.

“Besides,” her aunt continued placidly, “something did happen last night. You lost a brooch.”

That was a devastating and unwelcome truth, and an unusually pointed reproof from Aunt Kade. Inos was being as difficult as possible, but her pleasure at having punctured her aunt’s maddeningly constant good humor was spoiled in this instance by the reminder of her own stupidity. Losing a dearly loved heirloom did not compare with painting one tooth black and smiling excessively at dinner.

Embroidery was too intricate for Aunt Kade’s eyes. She was knitting some useless garment that would undoubtedly be given away to a servant as soon as it was finished. The process was important, the result was not. Inos was making a horrible mess of stitching a nosegay pattern on the corner of a linen kerchief and suffering acute agonies of frustration and boredom. She had been at Kinvale for a month. She would be there for nine or ten more months yet and nothing ever happened.

Except a few things she had made happen, of course.

She could concede that Kinvale was beautiful, a very great estate set in rolling hills, lush and rich as she had never imagined a land could be. It lay northeast of Pamdo Gulf, near the great port of Shaldokan—of which she had seen nothing at all—but far enough from the sea that it had never been pillaged by jotunn raiders, even during the worst periods of disorder in the past when the Impire had been weak. She had seen little of the smaller manors and hamlets nearby, but enough to know that they were old and settled and dull. The nearby town of Kinford she had visited briefly, and it was also old, prosperous, and apparently dull. The huge, sprawling ducal estate was old, luxurious, and driving her crazy.

The Willow Grove, where she was presently enduring a particularly acute boredom, was picturesque to a fault, flanking a lake that was itself resplendent with water lilies and graceful swans, set about with sculptures and little marble pavilions. Beyond the lake lay the park, where myriad servants tidied up the droppings of small deer and carved the boxwood trees into fantastic and amusing shapes. For someone who had seen exactly six trees in her life, Inos had tired of trees surprisingly quickly—they did not do anything. She had been impressed by the green hills, the farms, and the vineyards, but she had glimpsed all those only at a distance. Young ladies of quality were not encouraged to go mucking around in farmyards, and she had been swiftly intercepted on her one attempt to go exploring in that direction.

She passed her mornings now in lessons—dancing, elocution, and lute playing. In the afternoons she would sit and sew and talk with Aunt Kade and other matrons. In the evenings there was dancing or listening to music and then bedtime. And that was all. She had been allowed to go riding a few times with other wellborn maidens, but their path had been restricted to a cinder circle through the park, the horses had been ancient hacks, and their riders no more interesting—well-educated virgins whose brains had been wrapped up in embroidery and tucked away in some safe drawer at birth. Inos was permitted to read books, provided she did not overdo it. She might stroll on the terrace, so long as she did not leave Aunt Kade’s sight or talk to strange men. She could also sit and grind her teeth at needlework and wonder what would happen if one evening she were to tear off all her clothes and turn cartwheels across the ballroom floor.

Amid the splendor and wealth she was miserably homesick for barren, shabby old Krasnegar. Amid nobility and personages of the highest breeding, she longed for the company of Father and Lin and Ido. Even dull old Rap would do.

She was not supposed to be out of Aunt Kade’s sight unless some other old… gentlewoman… had been designated her keeper for a short while. It was humiliating! Did they think she was some sort of wanton? That she could not be trusted? Of course she was trusted, Aunt Kade would explain patiently. It was appearances that mattered. Climbing out casements, sliding down banisters…

Materializing in dignified silence, a young footman offered a tray of sweetmeats to Aunt Kade, who declined, and then to Inos.

“Thanks, Urni.” She pointed to one of the yummy little cakes. “That one! Did Alopa bake these?”

The tray wobbled dangerously. Scarlet flowed out of his high, tight collar, rising all the way to his powdered hair. “M-m-ma’am?”

“Just wondering.” Inos flashed him a benign but triumphant smile. “I thought maybe it was her baking that you were after in the little pantry two nights ago?”

Urni almost dropped her chosen cake from his tongs. The tray swayed again in his other hand, and he swallowed hard. “No, ma’am. I mean… No, ma’am.”

She chuckled quietly and said no more, letting him beat a speedy retreat. Off duty, he was rather fun, was young Urni—or so the chambermaids reported.

As Inos was about to pop the first morsel of cake in her mouth, Aunt Kade sighed heavily. “You really should not speak to the domestics like that, dear.”

“Oh?” Inos laid down her fork in case she was tempted to throw it. “It upsets you that all these old crones will see me failing to live up to their mummified standards of nose-in-the-air snootiness?. You would prefer me to behave like a marble statue? Exactly what harm is there in treating a man like a human being?”

Kade finished the row and turned the knitting. “None,” she told it. “Treat him like a human being by all means.”

“I don’t believe I understand that remark.”

“You were not treating him like a human being. You were treating him like a tethered bear.”

“I…” Inos fell silent, mouth open.

“They can’t fight back, my dear. They, at least, would certainly prefer marble statues.” Kade’s eyes had never strayed from her knitting, but now she added, “And here comes the duke.”

Inos looked up. Duke Angilki had emerged onto the terrace with a companion. That, Inos decided bitterly, probably qualified as an excitement. She had expected that a man who had buried two wives might be a monster, but she was now certain that they had died of boredom. Angilki was quite the dullest man she had ever met. He was tall and portly, with a flabby red face and a pendulous lower lip—the face of an overgrown, slow-witted child. He was utterly dominated by his fearsome mother, the dowager duchess, and his only interest seemed to be interior decorating.

He was extending Kinvale in all directions, but the architecture was incidental. Neither the building activity nor the final purpose mattered. It was style that counted, and the process itself. So the duke spent his days with artists and artisans in blissful contemplation of plans, sketches, and swatches. His artistic taste was impeccable, his results impressive. Kinvale was beautiful. But what good was it, Inos would demand of her aunt when they were alone, if it doesn’t do anything?

At least she no longer need worry that Duke Angilki would force her to marry him so that he might become king of Krasnegar. Krasnegar would appeal to Angilki much less even than Kinvale appealed to Inos, and the duke himself had no visible interest in women. Had she been a roll of chintz, now, or a sample of wallpaper, then she might have caught his eye and brought a flush to his cheek.

A conspiratorial twitter from the ladies announced that the duke and his friend were advancing toward them over the lawn… probably coming to ask his mother if he could take a bath, Inos decided, but a quick glance around showed that the dowager duchess was not present. And the companion was a man. That was unusual. Houseguests came and went by the dozen at Kinvale—friends and relatives to the farthest degree—and they were almost all female.

Where were all the men? Possibly some were off soldiering somewhere, and perhaps others had soldiered at some time in the past and failed to recover from the experience. The few men who did show up at the banquets and balls were almost all much too old to be of interest and all basically dull, as well. Their profession seemed to be the elegant doing of nothing, their only recreation the slaughtering of birds or animals. A few of them had admitted to having useful occupations like overseeing estates. One or two had even let slip the fact that they engaged in trade. There had been travelers pass through, and soldiers and Imperial officials and priests. But were there no young, interesting men in the Impire?

Lately Inos had begun to perceive Kinvale as a zoo, a game farm, where the womenfolk were confined while the men stayed away and ran the world. This insight depressed her greatly. Already the ship road to Krasnegar would be closing down for winter and she had all those dreary months to look forward to before it opened again.

Now Duke Angilki had reached the edge of the grove of ladies and was making introductions. He was beautifully dressed, of course, his bulging doublet gleaming white and his hose bright scarlet. His cloak was a rich bottle green with a narrow ermine trim—probably much too hot for this time of year, Inos thought, but the heavy material would disguise his stoutness better than a lighter fabric. He had an excellent tailor. He moved on to the next small cluster of ladies, and she caught her first good look at his companion.

Mmm! Not bad at all!

The stranger was a comparatively young man, a rarity. Inos had met almost no men of her own age at Kinvale. Apparently males still in their acne and Adam’s apple metamorphosis were kept out of the sight of genteel company, and now she thought she might even settle for early twenties. This one would do for a start. He was as tall as the duke, dark and slim, and his deep-blue doublet and white hose outshone even the duke’s tailoring. He was wearing no cloak, which was daring of him—it emphasized his youth. He moved with grace. Yes! A little older than she would normally have preferred, but… not… bad… at… all.

“Don’t stare, dear,” Aunt Kade muttered, holding her knitting at arm’s length and screwing up her eyes. “They’re coming as fast as they can.”

“What! I mean, beg pardon?”

“It would appear that they’re heading toward us,” Aunt Kade told her needles. “But of course they must pay their respects to the others first.”

“That’s what they call a young man, isn’t it? I think we used to have some of those around Krasnegar.”

“Sarcasm is not ladylike,” Aunt Kade said mildly. “Try not to drool over him too much. He was at the ball last night.”

“I didn’t see him!”

“He noticed you.” Aunt Kade’s smile registered satisfaction.

Angrily Inos pretended to concentrate on her embroidery. Mention of the previous night reminded her yet again of the tragedy—she had lost her mother’s ruby brooch. She could not forgive herself for being so careless. She was certain that it had still been there when she retired to bed and that she had unpinned it and laid it on her dressing table. Yet that was obviously impossible, because there had been no brooch there in the morning. Of course the door of their suite had been bolted—Aunt Kade always insisted on that. They had even considered burglary as an explanation, but had been forced to discard it. A team of circus cats could not have reached their windows. Of all the heirlooms that her father had given her, her mother’s ruby brooch had been the most precious to her, and now she had been so unthinkably careless and stupid and ungrateful and—

The duke! She bounced up hurriedly from her chair.

“Sir Andor,” Duke Angilki explained. “Princess Kadolan of Krasnegar.”

The young man bowed over Aunt Kade’s hand. Yes, very nice indeed! He was an imp, of course—and how Inos longed now for the sight of a tall, blond jotunn just to break the monotony—but he was not short and he was not swarthy. His hair was black, but his skin showed a gleaming, healthy tan, a smooth complexion with just a hint of blue chin to save the perfectly regular features from any hint of femininity. Handsome! Then he straightened and turned to her and she saw smiling dark eyes and perfect white teeth. Handsome did not do justice.

“And Princess Inosolan,” said her portly host, “may I present to your Highness my friend Sir Andor? Sir Andor, this is Princess Kadolan’s niece.”

“I shall always remember this day,” Sir Andor said, “when all my standards of beauty and grace had to be discarded as inadequate, when all other ladies faded in my sight, when my highest dreams and aspirations were suddenly made worthless by my first glimpse of feminine perfection in the divine form of the Princess Inosolan.”

He stooped to touch his lips to her hand. Inos was still trying to think of some equally outrageous reply when their eyes met again and she saw that he was laughing. She was so surprised that she did not hear what she said, but apparently it was satisfactory.

“You have just arrived at Kinvale then, Sir Andor?” Aunt Kade inquired.

“Two days ago, ma’am.”

“I have been trying to persuade him to spend some time with us,” the duke huffed, “but he insists that he must rush off.”

“A month at the most!” Andor said. “I have most urgent responsibilities to call me away, although I know already that my heart will never leave. Even the presence of such celestial beauty is insufficient . .”

Inos resumed her seat as the flowery phrases were tossed around, the duke and Aunt Kade apparently serious, while she was quite certain this young Andor was treating it all as ludicrous nonsense and offering to share the joke with her. It was a wonderful surprise to discover that she was not the only sane person in the world. Then the duke made some excuses and moved off, pausing to dispense more greetings. A miasma of disapproval arose from the company in general—obviously the sensational young Andor had been brought out especially to meet Inos, and that was being regarded as sneaky favoritism.

Aunt Kade took the hint and asked him if he would care to sit. He did so, studying her with an expression of wonder.

“Of course that is your portrait in the gallery,” he said. “I noticed it at once. It quite puts all the other so-called beauties to shame, and yet it does not do you justice.”

Aunt Kade preened. “It was painted many years ago.”

“But a silver setting enhances the finest gems, and nothing else has changed. Your coloring…”

Inos had heard some outrageous flattery sessions in the previous month, but nothing that could have touched the performance that followed. With quick, deft strokes, like a skilled fishwife filleting, Andor reduced Aunt Kade to simpering blushes. Compliments so excessive could not possibly be intended seriously, yet that did not stop them being effective in the hands of an expert.

Then he turned his attention to Inos. She wondered what heights of hypocrisy he would scale now, but the cynical twinkle was back in his eye again, and he surprised her once more. “But you, ma’am… on reconsideration, I find your appearance most displeasing.”

Inos had been preparing a small smile of ladylike modesty; taken unaware, she stammered. Aunt Kade opened her mouth to protest, then closed it.

“To come so close to perfection,” Andor said, putting his head on one side and pretending to study her, “and then fail to achieve it is a sin against all art. It offends one’s sensibilities. A much lesser beauty that confined itself within its own limitations would not impart this aura of failure, of excessive ambition unrealized.” He leaned back to consider her further. “What is required, I think… yes… what is really needed… is a touch of fire. Then we should see divinity!”

He held out a hand with Inos' brooch on the palm.

Speechless with astonishment, Inos examined the brooch. Aunt Kade expressed pleasure and demanded an explanation.

“A most curious tale!” Andor said solemnly. “Just after dawn this morning I was putting a hunter over a few jumps, over on the far side of the park there, when I saw a bird fly overhead with something shiny…”

Had he told it with a straight face, Inos thought, she would certainly have believed him, but every time Aunt Kade’s eyes left his face he gleamed a secret grin at Inos and she found she was sliding closer and closer to an attack of giggles.

“I believe you can even see the very tree in which the jackdaws have their nest,” he said, rising and peering over the lake. “Yes, there.” He pointed and of course Inos had to rise to see where he was pointing. “No, farther to the left . .” He led her around one of the willows.

In a few moments, still trying to see the tree with the jackdaws' nest, Inos found that she was out of earshot of Aunt Kade.

Still pointing, Andor said, “Doesn’t this place make you want to puke?”

“Oh, yes!” Inos peered along his arm for the benefit of the many disapproving watchers and said, “Raving mad. Is there really a jackdaw tree?”

“Gods, no! I found your brooch on the rug last night. The pin was loose. I had it repaired. Do you like riding?” He was looking back and forth from her to the horizon and she was nodding as if he were pointing out landmarks, leading her eye to the mythical jackdaws. “Fishing? Boating? Archery? Right!”

He led her back to her chair and gave Aunt Kade a disapproving frown. “Your niece tells me she has not yet seen the water caves!”

What water caves?

“Well, we have only recently arrived at Kinvale,” Aunt Kade protested.

“But this is the best time of year to see them, when the river is low. Don’t you agree?”

He skillfully cornered Aunt Kade into conceding that she had visited the water caves in her youth. Thus she could hardly object when Andor announced that he would organize a party of some young ladies and gentlemen to view the water caves. He went on to discuss the annual salmon run, when the rivers were red from bank to bank with fish as large as sheep, to grape tramping in the vineyards, to the giant sequoias, to treasure hunts, to royal tennis, to hayrides and waterfalls and boating expeditions with picnic lunches, to bathing in the natural hot springs, to falconry and fly fishing, to a dozen other entrancing possibilities. There was no suggestion that any of these ventures would involve less than a dozen people and he tossed out the names of very respectable companions, evidently being on terms of friendship with almost everyone at Kinvale and most of the surrounding countryside as well. It was a staggering presentation and it left Inos' head whirling.

“Of course my niece is kept very busy with her music lessons.”

“But my time here is so short!” Andor lamented. “Surely a week or two’s delay in her musical career would not prejudice her future irreparably? The water caves will take a couple of days' preparation, but tomorrow…”

Eventually some of the other ladies decided that he had been monopolized too long, and he was delicately removed to make conversation elsewhere. Inos sighed deeply and smiled down at her neglected embroidery.

Suddenly Kinvale no longer seemed quite so much of a prison. If that stunning young Andor man was going to deliver on a fraction of what he had promised in the way of entertainment, Kinvale was going to be fun. There had been no one in Krasnegar who could even approach him for charm. Or looks. There was an excitement about him that Inos had never met, or even known existed.

She realized that the silence was becoming too expressive. “What a… pleasant person.”

“It is nice to see something well done,” Aunt Kade agreed complacently.

Inos wondered what exactly that remark implied. “Perhaps something is going to happen at last!”

“Perhaps, dear.” Aunt Kade held her knitting away from her again and squinted at it. “But it’s my job to see that it doesn’t.”

2

The moon was a silver boat floating above the sunset as a sodden punt drifted down the river, bearing Inos and Andor… and some others.

“You did not scream, Highness.” Andor’s eyes twinkled like the first stars wakening in the east. “All the other ladies screamed.”

“Did you wish me to scream, sir?”

“Of course! We brutish men gain savage pleasure from hearing you ladies scream.”

“I must ask my aunt to arrange for me to take screaming lessons.”

“Do so! And what did you think of the water caves?”

“They are ugly and dull. They cannot be viewed without getting soaked to the skin.”

“This is true, ma’am.”

“Which is why my aunt declined to come.”

“And several other aunts.”

“Do you think we can go back there—often?”

He laughed, leaning on his pole, bright eyes and white teeth gleaming in the dusk. “I think the water caves only work once. But there are other possibilities.”

The moon was a giant pumpkin, flooding the midnight world with golden light, as the revelers in the hay wain returned from the berry pickers' ball…

The moon was a thin grin in the east as the astonished occupants of Kinvale were awakened at dawn by the strains of a small private orchestra performing on the terrace below their windows, being conducted by Sir Andor in a serenade to honor the birthday of Princess Inosolan…

There was no moon as Andor led Inos out on the balcony. The heavy drapes closed behind them, muffling the tuneful sounds of the ballroom. Stars had been poured liberally across the deep black sky, but there was a taste of fall in the wind, and the air was cool on her flushed skin.

Very gently Andor slid his hands around her and turned her to face him. At once her heart began dancing far faster than all those prancing couples they had just left.

“Inos…”

He paused. She wondered if he would dare try to kiss her, and how she would react. It was rare indeed for the two of them to have a moment alone, but she sensed that this was for more than idle chat. How long until Aunt Kade tracked them down? Then she noticed the concern in his face.

“Andor?”

He seemed to be having trouble finding words, and that was rare indeed for him. Suddenly he broke away from her and pounded his fist on the balustrade. “I should never have come here!”

“What? But—”

“Inos… your Highness, I… I told you the first time we met! I said then that I could not stay long. A month, I said. I have been here five weeks.”

How her heart stopped dancing. Indeed it seemed to stop altogether. “You are leaving?”

He spread his palms on the marble and stared out over the dark-shrouded trees. “I must! It tears me to ribbons, but I must leave. I have given my word.”

Happiness cracked, shattered, crashed down in a million shards like breaking ice. And a brainless little princess could find nothing better to say than: “When?”

“Now! At once! My horse is to be ready at midnight. I have stolen every minute I could. I must be in Shaldokan by dawn.”

Inos took several deep breaths and forced herself to consider the matter rationally. She was only a child, after all. Andor was a man of the world—charming, learned, cultivated, experienced…

“There is an elderly friend…” Andor paused.

“Please! The details do not concern me.”

It had been inevitable. She should have known. She had known, but she had not admitted it to herself. While visiting friends, as the gentry of the Impire so often did, Andor had taken pity on a lonely youngster. He had amused himself by passing the time in her company. It had been light entertainment for him. He probably did not even realize that for her it had been life itself, that he had saved her sanity in the boredom of Kinvale, that he had shown her what life was really for, that if she lived to be a hundred—

“Yes, they do concern you. To this man I owe a great debt. He is frail and he needs make a long journey. I promised to escort him, and the time is come.”

After all, Inos should be grateful that she had enjoyed five whole weeks of such a man’s company. The fact that the rest of her life was going to be a barren desert…

Andor turned to her again. He took her in his arms again. “But I swear to you, my darling, that I will return! I vow by the Powers and by the Gods that only my solemn word already pledged would drag me from you now.”

Her heart went mad. Darling?

“I have asked you for no commitment.” His voice was taut, his manner intense. “And I ask none now. I beg you only to believe two things—that nothing in this world but honor itself would drag me from your side, and that nothing save death will keep me from returning as fast as I am able.”

“Andor… Oh, Andor! There is danger?”

He laughed, as if to dismiss such childish fancies. He paused. Then he sighed. “Yes! There may be danger. I could deceive most women, but you would see through my lies if I denied it. And I owe you the truth. If this task were something—anything at all!—that I could delegate to others, my love, then I would never hesitate. But there is some risk.”

Oh, Andor! Danger? And had he said LOVE?

“I will return! And when I do return, my most adored princess, then I shall kneel and beg you to accept my service—” He pulled her against him, and the whole world seemed to whirl away into nothing. There was only Andor, Andor’s so-powerful arms clutching her tighter than she had ever been held, Andor’s superb male body hard against her, as she had often dreamed that one day it might be, Andor looking down at her with starlight shining in his big dark eyes—eyes that should be full of joy, and instead were haunted by the agony of parting.

“My service,” he repeated softly. “My life. I came to Kinvale to while away a few days until I must go to aid an old family friend. You lost a brooch; I returned it and lost my heart. Even that first day, I knew. You are like no other woman I have ever met. If you want a knight to slay your foes, then my arm is at your command, and my blood is yours to spill. If you want a stableboy, then I will be your stableboy. Kennelmaster, poet, boatman… I will be for you whatsoever you want, your Most Wonderful Highness, Forever. And if, once in a while, you might condescend to smile in my direction, then that would be all the recompense my soul would ever seek.”

She could not answer. It was unbelievable. She had not dared to hope. She raised her lips to be kissed—

Light flamed across the balcony as Aunt Kade pushed aside the drape. “Inos, my dear, they need another couple for the quadrille.”

3

Summer aged gracefully.

As the first blush of fall was tastefully tinting the leaves at Kinvale, the legions of winter marched in triumph into the hills of Krasnegar. Like a defeated army in retreat, the workers fell back on the shore cottages, there to regroup and make a last defiant stand. The hilltops were white, the skies dark, and even the salt tide pools showed ice in the mornings. Wild-winged geese, wiser than men, fled southward overhead, honking sad warnings.

Now the nights were as long as the days. The causeway could be crossed in darkness only if the moon was full and the clouds scanty, but one tide in two did not give enough work time to clear the backlog. Every year these last two weeks were critical. In some years the moon was helpful; in others it was not. The wagons splashed out onto the causeway as soon as the tide ebbed, and the last crossing was made in the teeth of the flow. Often on the island side they did not waste time climbing to the castle—urgent hands threw out their loads on the dock and sent them back for another. Men and horses worked and rested, the wagons themselves rolled unceasingly, and when the tide was high they brought their cargoes to the landward end of the causeway and went back at once for more. The piles were still growing larger instead of smaller.

To the ephemeral settlement by the shore cottages came the herdboy Rap, driving in the charges the herders had guarded jealously all summer so that they might die now. He arrived just after sunset. Flakes of snow drifted aimless in the air—a warning from the God of Winter, but not yet a serious assault.

Rap fastened the corral gate, threw his tack on the heap, and headed off through the gathering darkness in search of food. He was bone-weary and grubby inside his furs, and he had a gratifying stubble on his lip, but his most urgent problem was hunger.

The shingle beach was an inferno of controlled confusion. Here the excess cattle were being slaughtered and butchered, their flesh salted into casks, bones boiled, hides cleaned and bundled for later curing. Blood and entrails were being collected and made into sausage. It was only here and at this time that fresh meat was freely available to the common folk of Krasnegar, and his mouth watered at the thought of it.

The flickering flames of the driftwood fires danced sideways below the wind, throwing unearthly glows on the high stacks of hides and peat and hay. Curls of snowflakes swirled over the hard dark ground, seeking sheltered places in the shadows to make small drifts. The wind brought smoke—tainted first with delicious cooking odors and then with the unbearable stench of the abbatoir. It brought the sound of cattle bellowing in the corrals and the rush of waves on the shingle. Men and woman hurried by, swathed in the anonymity of fur, stooped and huddled against the cold like bulky misshapen bears.

As he picked his way between the grotesque mountains of produce, Rap wondered how many wagonloads they represented. He wondered also how many days were left before the road would close. But those were Foronod’s problems, not his. The king’s factor must be a literate man, so however Rap might serve the crown of Krasnegar in his coming manhood, it would not be in the post of factor. He found the grub line and joined on the end, noting that most of the men and women there looked just as listless and filthy as he did.

“Hi, Rap! You’ve grown!” the woman in front of him said.

Her name was Ufio, Verantor’s wife, and she was pretty. Rap grinned and said he was sorry, he hadn’t meant to, and how was the baby. It seemed weeks since he had even seen a woman, let alone had a chance to talk with one.

Men he knew arrived and exchanged greetings; old friends, people he had not seen in months. They told him he had grown.

The line grew shorter before him, longer behind. He shivered and he shifted from one aching leg to the other. He pondered what task he might be given next. He was very much in between now: too old for the best of the kids' jobs, not old enough to be trusted with men’s. Whatever it was, he would do his best. That had been another of his mother’s principles.

Then he was trudging off over the shingle bearing a mug of something hot and a platter heaped with steaming beef. Seeking shelter from the cold, he edged into one of the cottages. It was packed like a fish barrel. The single bench was crammed with people, and the floor also was covered with bodies, eating or talking or snoring. The air was as thick as whale oil, reeking of men and food, but at least he was out of the wind. One lamp guttered on a littered table in the center. He found a space, sank down on the ground, and prepared to gorge.

“You’ve grown!” a man behind him said.

Rap peered, shifting his head to let light fall on the face.

“Lin? You’ve got a new voice!”

“About time, too!” Lin spoke with deep satisfaction.

“How’s the arm?” Rap asked, with his mouth full.

Lin looked down at his arm in surprise, as if he had already forgotten his summer accident. “Fine.”

Rap gestured with his head toward the door. “The work?” he mumbled, still eating.

Lin shrugged. “They say it’ll be all right if the weather holds.” At sunset the sky to the north had been blacker than the castle walls, but neither of them mentioned that. A wagon rumbled by outside, making the dirt floor throb.

“What’s the news?” Rap asked. “I’ve been stuck up in the hills like a boulder all summer.”

“Not much,” Lin squeaked. He scowled at Rap’s chuckle and managed to find his lower register again. He listed a few births and marriages and deaths. “They say . .” His voice sank to a husky whisper. “They say the king is not well.”

Rap frowned and chewed at a rib and wondered about Inos, far away in Kinvale. She would not know, of course, so she would not be worried. But what happened if the king died when she was not here to succeed him? The thought of young Inos suddenly being elevated to queen was staggering. Still, being unwell did not necessarily lead to dying.

Then, feeling bearish, as if he would never need to eat again and could cheerfully sleep from now until spring, Rap added his platter and tankard to a nearby pile. He wiped his greasy mouth with the back of his hand. Lin had found room to stretch out and was already into the droopy-eyelid stage. Probably he ought to do the same, Rap thought. There would be work enough in the morning and all the others in the cottage had been here longer than he had, so they should be called first.

A tall man stooped through the door and stood for a moment. He pushed back his hood and silence fell at the sight of the silver hair. His face was gaunt and pale as driftwood, with blue shadows under the eyes and a white stubble that was almost a beard—the factor. From the way he stood, he might have been inspecting his workers, or perhaps he was letting the troops inspect him, their leader. He was their symbol of defiance against the coming onslaught, his obvious exhaustion both a challenge and a comfort.

All eyes not closed by sleep fastened on his.

“Any wagon drivers in here?” Foronod demanded.

Rap scrambled to his feet as a voice from across the room said, “Yes, sir.”

It was Ollo, and he was the best. Rap was already sitting down again as Foronod nodded to Ollo, but he did acknowledge Rap with a faint smile that probably meant next year. The two men departed and the cottage sank back into weary apathy again.

“He said drivers, not sailors,” Lin muttered sleepily.

“Was it you who started that garbage?”

“No, it was you.” Lin rolled over and put his head on one arm.

Pity about Ollo… Rap very much wanted to drive a wagon again. Once was not enough. He could hardly sit at the drivers' table when he’d only run a team once, and never up the hill, only down.

The bodies around him had shifted and penned him in. He had no room to stretch out. He was too weary to go look for somewhere else. He leaned his arms on his knees and yawned. They were not going to start breaking in new drivers at this point in the year, not in the final sprint.

His head dropped forward and jerked him awake again. It was good to have more company—he had grown very tired of the same few herder faces. He wondered what Inos was doing. He told himself not to be foolish. He thought of the castle and the stablehands' quarters and the men and boys and girls he would meet again. Only one would be missing.

His head fell over once more, waking him again. He would have to find somewhere to stretch out… unless he could lie on his side and stay curled up…

Someone shook his shoulder. “Rap? You’re wanted.”

He sat up, confused and muzzy, uncertain where he was, then scrambled to his feet and lumbered after his guide, stumbling over bodies to the door. The air outside hit him like a bucketful of ice water; he gasped and pulled up his hood. The world was filled with streaming snow, a yellow glare in the light from the cottage. He hurried into the darkness after a rapidly disappearing back. The snow settled in his eyes and on his eyelashes and began plastering his parka.

He was led to a group planted around one of the fires, which was shooting flashes of light between their legs. The circle opened to admit him and he looked around the humped, anonymous figures, most holding hands out toward the blaze. A cauldron bubbled there, and steamed. Shivering and blinking, Rap recognized the tall Foronod at the far side and waited to hear why he was needed.

“Rap?” The factor was staring at him. They all were. “Could you follow the trail in this? On a horse?”

Rap turned and looked out into the night—nothing! Nothing at all. The snow had turned the night black, not white. He’d seen guiding done in other years—men with lanterns leading a wagon—but tonight a lantern would show nothing but endless snow rushing past. The air was solid with it, streaming insanely southward. Without a lantern there was nothing to be seen at all. Nothing!

Scared now, he turned back to face Foronod. “On foot, maybe.”

Foronod shook his head. “Too late. Tide’s coming.”

So that was it? Rap wanted to be a driver, or a man-at-arms. They wanted a sorcerer, a seer. A freak. A damnable freak! He’d pulled that fool stunt with the wagon, and now they thought he could work miracles. Once could be denied. Twice would be proof. And what they were asking him to do was much more than driving through water. In this weather a man would barely see the ground from horseback. His mother, they thought, had been a seer, so he must be. He opened his mouth to say “Why me?” and what he said was “Why?”

The factor’s head jerked and the pale blur of his face inside his hood seemed to stiffen. “Answer the question!”

Rap hesitated. He couldn’t answer the question. “I…why?”

“Boy!”

“I’m sorry, sir… I need to know. I don’t know why. I mean I don’t know why why…” Rap stuttered into unhappy silence.

“We need a guide.”

And again Rap’s mouth demanded “Why?” before he could stop it. He did not know why why was important, but it felt as if it should be.

The menacing silence was broken when a snow-dappled man standing next the factor said, “Tell him! If you’re going to trust him, then trust him!”

Rap did not know the voice and what little he could see of the face was unfamiliar. Foronod glanced at the intruder. “What do you know about it? Who the Evil are you, anyway?”

“I’m from the south,” the voice said. It was a gentleman’s voice. “A visitor. But I’ve met seers before. You must give him your trust or he can’t help you.”

Foronod shrugged grumpily and looked back at Rap. “All right. I’m scared that this is the big one. It may not be—it’s very early. But we have three loads of beef we absolutely must get across.”

Despite the bone-cracking chill of the wind, Rap’s head was still so clogged with sleep and weariness that it seemed to be running on one foot. The big one was the storm that closed the causeway for the winter, and it would blow for days. Slabs of sea ice and snowdrifts caked by frozen spray plugged the road—men and animals could cross afterward, but not wagons. He knew what three loads of salted beef meant, or he could guess. It would buy much time in the spring if the town was starving. Any risk was worth taking if this was the big one.

If it was not, then losing a wagon would cripple the supply train. That might be almost as bad—they needed every one. He might even lose all three if he trapped them in the path of the tide, and that would be catastrophe for Krasnegar. Foronod must be frantic if he was willing to take the gamble and trust the town to a boy—to a seer.

Trust him? Rap started to shiver.

A harder gust struck and the men staggered and leaned into it. Snow hissed in the fire and steamed.

Rap turned again and looked at the night. A lantern would be little help in this, hard enough even for the drivers to follow, useless to see where a horse was going. They were asking him if he could ride across with his eyes shut. He tried to remember that strange feeling when he’d brought the wagon through the water. There had been something there, something unusual, unwholesome. He did not want to admit he was a freak, but there had been something. Foronod must be desperate.

Trust yourself! Rap squared his shoulders. “I’ll try.”

“You and two to flank you?”

He hesitated and then nodded.

“Jua,” the factor said. “And… Binik. Go—”

“No,” Rap said. That did not feel right. “I want Lin. And…” He did not know why he wanted Lin, except that Lin had survived this sort of madness before, so he would not argue. And one other? He surprised himself as much as he surprised everyone else. He pointed at the stranger. “Him!”

Foronod growled and demanded, “Why him?”

The stranger said quietly, “Trust him!”

“You ever been across the causeway, master?”

“No.” The stranger sounded insanely unruffled. “That may be why he wants me. My ideas won’t interfere with his.”

Rap wondered if he merely wanted someone who believed in seers. He did not think he believed—not in himself as a seer. But there had been something.

Foronod shrugged. “Go ahead. It’s your neck, stranger. You’ve got an hour at the most, lad.”

“Lin’s sleeping where I was,” Rap said to the man who had brought him. “Bring him to the horses.” To Foronod: “Sir, I’ll need lanterns.” Then he nodded at the stranger. “Come and get a horse.”

He blundered off into the dark without waiting for any replies. He had never given orders to grown men before. Trust yourself! If you don’t, who will?

The stranger’s hand settled on Rap’s shoulder. The darkness was that thick.

The best thing Rap could do now was walk into an offal pit and break his leg. Then they would know, wouldn’t they? This was a test: find the corral. If he could not find that, then he could not find the causeway. He tried to remember where all the piles of hay and peat were, but he had not come this way when he arrived. He put a hand up to shield his eyes from the snow, but he could still see nothing.

He stopped.

Obstacle?

“What’s wrong?” the stranger asked at his ear.

Rap reached out his right hand and touched hay. He shivered and changed direction. “This way.” It worked at arm’s length, then. Or had he just felt the wind eddying around the stack?

He found the corral, but he could have been following the smell, or the noise. He leaned over the rail and he could barely make out the big shapes steaming and champing in the murk. “Mustard? Dancer! Walrus!”

“How about Swimmer and Diver?” the stranger said with a laugh.

“Sir, please don’t talk to me.” Why not? What was Rap doing? His head was starting to throb. Mustard edged through the other horses toward him. Walrus, he knew, was cowering over on the far side. But he did not know how he knew that.

By the time Lin and others arrived with lanterns, Rap had extracted the three unhappy horses. They were all old, all likely destined to follow the cattle into the abattoir with their stringy old meat reserved for emergency supplies, but they were calm and solid. Docility was what he needed, not fire.

Then everything happened very quickly and he found himself at the head of the procession, holding on his shoulder a stick with a lantern swinging on it. Lin and the stranger sat their mounts on either side of him, also holding lanterns. Another flickered and winked on the lead wagon close behind them. What the lights showed mostly was racing snow.

Foronod was looking up at him, his face an ivory mask of anxiety almost as white as the snow-crusted fur that framed it. “Ready. The Gods be with you, lad.”

Rap did not answer, because he did not know what to say, nor trust himself to say it. He raised and lowered his light as a signal, then held it out in front. He urged Mustard forward. The horse was shivering, but more with fear than cold, so Rap stroked his neck and muttered consolation… How had he known that? He gritted his teeth in anger at this unwelcome power, these uncanny abilities that seemed to be sprouting in his mind, as uninvited as the hairs that grew now on his body.

His lantern showed little more than a cloud of streaking white and a tiny vague patch of ground around his horse. The snow was coating the shingle, even deadening the sound of the hooves and the rumble of the wagons. He had no qualms over this first stretch—he could hear the waves off to his right, so all he need do was keep the snow coming from that direction, also, caking ever deeper on that side of his horse and his parka. This way he was leading the wagons along the beach and there was no danger.

Eventually he must make a turn, No sooner had he started to think about that than he felt urgency—now! So soon? He wavered in his mind and the urgency grew. He turned Mustard slightly, edging Walrus and the stranger over until they were facing into the wind. The muffled wagon noise followed them. The shingle rose, then sank again, and the snow lay thicker. Another slight ridge, then blackness—water.

“You two wait here!” he said, yelling against the storm. Then he forced a reluctant and ill-named Mustard forward, into the water. There were no waves, so it was the lagoon, but had he blundered into the deep part? The sound of the wagons had stopped behind him and all he could hear was waves, somewhere. A few creepy minutes of splashing ended and he saw the vague lightness of snow again below his horse’s feet. So far, so good. He began to breathe more easily. He had found the ford.

He turned around and through the black fog he could just barely detect the lights he had left behind. He waved his lantern up and down, and they began advancing to meet him. Mustard was a little happier standing with the wind on his tail, but he was shivering violently.

Now Rap must find the end of the causeway. He left the others to follow at the wagons' creaking pace and pushed forward alone into the blizzard. Snow covered his face and dribbled down his neck. His headache was getting worse. It was hard to keep Mustard moving. The lights were growing faint behind him… he must not lose his followers. More important, though, he must find that causeway before the wagons rumbled down to the water’s edge in the wrong place. Turning them would be bad enough; backing them up if they got between rocks might be close to impossible. He strained his memory to recall the exact direction and adjusted it for the way he thought the wind was coming… and he was too far to the right. How did he know that? He hesitated, then trusted his instinct and not his memory.

In a few moments Mustard’s hoof struck rock. That was it! He’d done it again.

He was a seer and his flesh crawled at the thought. He cringed.

Why me?

Now things ought to be simple for a while, and he became aware that his body was knotted with the strain, running sweat inside his shirt.

Lin and the stranger reached their places on either side of him and they could follow the edges of the made road—the snow had not buried it yet. He kept position between them. The wagons followed the three bright blurs.

Seer. One who sees. But he did not see, he just knew. He gained knowledge without using his senses—hateful! Then he remembered the minstrel’s strange belief that the horses had not been able to hear him that day. Could he speak without using his voice, at least to horses? He tried a silent word of comfort to Mustard and thought he felt it received. Imagination? Hateful! Detestable! Freak! He had not tried calling the mares away from Firedragon since that day with the minstrel and now he knew why—he had been afraid of what he might learn about himself.

They had crossed Tallow Rocks already. Waves were splashing against the side of the road, sending up salt spray. There was no snow on the ground anymore, and the lanterns' faint glow was an uncertain reflection. Black ice—the deadliest stuff to try to walk a horse on, or drive a wagon. It was Lin and the stranger who were bearing the load now. Rap half expected one or other of them to vanish without warning, plunging off the edge into darkness and quick, cold death.

Walrus started to panic and slither. Stop that! Rap thought, and Walrus stopped. Coincidence.

They crawled along, and the waves were throwing water over the road, running off in glinting black sheets. Better than ice. This was the main causeway and the tide would be over it now. Not so deep as last time, but much rougher. This was important… think of famine.

“Lin!” he snapped. “Watch where you’re going!” They were coming into the turn.

“I can’t see, Rap.” It was a boy’s sob. Lin’s voice had changed back under the strain.

“I can’t, either,” the stranger said calmly.

Rap muttered a silent prayer to any God who might be listening. He was all knotted up again now. This was it. “Close in a bit and follow me, then.”

He advanced alone, feeling by some means he did not understand that the others were near behind. He forced old Mustard down the center of the wave-swept causeway. It must be the exact center, else either Lin or the stranger would slide off. They must be sweating with the strain of staying out to the sides, resisting the temptation to creep in directly behind Rap himself, but the wagon drivers had to know where the road was, how much was safe.

The center! Stay in the center. He did not try to think what the causeway would look like underwater this time. It would be utterly black down there. He groped somehow for its weight, its mass, its hard solid edges in the cold water surging around it.

Stay in the center!

He heard and felt the first team beginning to panic and he sent reassuring thoughts back to them; realized that he had been doing the same to Mustard and Walrus and Dancer for some time. His head was bursting, as if someone had pushed fingers down inside and was trying to pull it apart. This was important! There might be famine in the spring—babies dying, children starving. The water was not deep. The waves were rolling up over the causeway and pouring off again. It would be easy to see the edges if there was light, but all he had to look at was flying snow, a bright cloud around his lantern, and he could not even see the spray splashed up by his horse’s feet.

The waves grew deeper.

The second bend… He shouted a warning to his companions, knew that they were safely far from those deadly edges, checked the wagon also behind him without looking round, kept talking to the horses in his mind.

He opened his eyes and wondered how long he’d had them shut.

Shallower…

Then the waves were not flowing all the way across. He was coming up on Big Island. Big Damp and Little Damp were still ahead, but the worst was over.

The rest was a blur.

He stood on the dock road, clutching reins and weeping. Lin and the stranger were beside him, he knew, in a mob of shivering, trembling horses and shouting people… and some idiot was holding up a lantern and Rap wished to all the Gods that they’d take the damn thing away. Men were running down from the town, coming to help, asking questions, disbelieving the answers. There were tears pouring down his face and he was shaking with sobs. Shameful, but he could not stop. He was shivering more violently than the horses and he could hear himself weeping—having some sort of stupid fit, but the drivers were coming to him and pumping his free hand and thumping his back and he wanted them to stop and go away. He would not listen to what they were saying.

Someone took Mustard’s reins from him. An arm was laid over his shoulders and at last that damned lantern was taken away and there was darkness.

“Let’s get the man to bed!” a voice said angrily. “He’s beat, can’t you see?”

Not a man, sir, just a weak, sniveling boy.

Then came blessed relief, as that so-comforting arm was holding him, leading him away from the crowd and the voices and the faces, taking him away. Vaguely he knew that it was the stranger, the man from the Impire, and that stranger had done a fair job himself that night.

“Thank you, sir,” Rap mumbled.

“You don’t need to call me 'sir,’ “the voice said.

“I don’t know your name.”

“My name is Andor,” said the stranger, “but after what I’ve seen tonight, Master Rap, I’d be very proud if you would just call me 'friend.'”