The Dame

PART TWO

The woman has shaken me to my core, has taken my expectations and twisted them into unrecognizable knots.

I am not unused to such unsettling realizations of the true nature of the powers of Honce. From Father Jerak and the brothers of Chapel Pryd to that horrid Prydae who so disfigured Garibond, my father, I came to understand that many of the qualities that put a man in power in the first place seemed also to disqualify him from properly tending the flock in practice. So much had this axiom become a mantra for me that I was hardly surprised by the idiocy of Prince Yeslnik, who is truly an exaggerated collection of every flaw I had ever seen in those who had attained power. Yeslnik, so much a caricature, did not surprise me in the least and did not shake me (other than to make me shake my head in resignation).

I had known minor exceptions, of course-Brother Reandu comes to mind, and even Brother Bathelais had moments of great decency. But truly, Yeslnik the liar, the fool, the pretend hero, the hapless lover (judging from his wife’s desperation), and, ultimately, the coward, embodied the extremes of my expectations of a laird. How appropriate, it seemed, that he who would stand above the lairds would be even more the fool than they.

But now I have come to know Dame Gwydre. I hardly know how to speak to her, to view her; I have to admit that she frightens me. I don’t believe her to be secretly sinister and conniving. Quite the opposite! The idea that there is no underlying deception and selfish intent about the woman is a notion foreign, one that mocks me in my certitude and endless petulance.

Nay, she doesn’t frighten me, except that she makes me afraid that she will shame me. For if this perception of goodness I believe of Gwydre is indeed the truth of Gwydre, then who am I? No hero, certainly.

When the snow fell deep this cold winter in Vanguard, the people of Pellinor struggled to retrieve enough wood to keep warm. With the drifts piled high, the forest was not safe for individuals or small groups to venture. So Gwydre, as she has apparently done many times before, held a grand ball in Castle Pellinor, with all invited. All! Every person about the town of Pellinor. And with the great celebration came a feast that lasted for days. And during that time, at Gwydre’s behest, Dawson and her soldiers ventured often into the forest and retrieved piles of wood for the folk of Pellinor to take with them as they at last departed the castle.

And Gwydre ate with them and danced with them and led them in song. I looked upon her and wished that she were not so atypical a laird, that all the people of Honce, of all the world indeed, could be so blessed to live under the care of such a ruler.

She shames the callous heart of the Highwayman. She frightens me because she did something to me. Dame Gwydre made me, at long last and against all expectation, hope.

Hope. She made me hope. She made me believe that the world could change. But hope is not as easy an emotion as is surrender. For that is what I have done, Dame Gwydre has shown me to my great discomfort. When the Stork became the Highwayman, the Stork surrendered.

I care not for the war in the south, so I declare. I cared not for Gwydre’s war, so I declared. I fought only because of Gwydre’s deception and blackmail. Beyond Cadayle and Callen and my own needs, I declared myself removed, uncaring, not responsible.

She shames me, and the hope I feel when I look upon her scares me.

Who would I be had I been raised in Pellinor instead of Pryd? I doubt that the Highwayman would exist, and that is a notion that bothers me profoundly. But how might that persona of the Highwayman have grown in such a climate as Pellinor? Would Father Premujon have treated me as the brothers in Chapel Pryd treated the Stork? Would Gwydre have allowed it?

No. Not up here. Up here, even the relationship between Castle Pellinor and Chapel Pellinor is a very different one than that I experienced in Pryd Town. Back home, the brothers were terrified of the laird and would not go against him even when they knew he was wrong. But here Premujon and Gwydre are friends, and she supports him in his work most of all when his work is benefiting the people, the common folk. Both Gwydre and Premujon act as if they serve the folk and not as if the people were put here as pawns for their pleasure.

Perhaps it is the harsh climate of Vanguard and the simple pragmatism the difficult environment demands. Up here, the folk stand as one, or die alone. Would the common folk suffer the selfishness so typical in the southern lairds and nobles? Would they sit idly by, freezing and dying, while their leaders of castle and chapel hoarded the winter supplies?

I doubt they would… but as I reflect on this matter, I realize that I am applying a pragmatism to my observations of character that is unfair to Dame Gwydre. I so clearly see her heart in the way she dances in a snowstorm or sings to the people of Pellinor.

She would be a good leader of good heart wherever her holding. And had he grown among the pines of Pellinor, the Highwayman would not exist.

And Garibond Womak would still be alive. Alive and friend to Bran Dynard and Sen Wi.

So it is not Gwydre I fear in the end but the hope she lights in my heart and soul, in the way she forces me to feel responsibility beyond the boundaries of my own needs.

Had I known the light that is Gwydre before, I wonder what I might have answered when she came to me with no threat or deception and asked me, for no reason other than the good of the folk of Vanguard, to go north and do battle with Ancient Badden.

She has shaken my beliefs to the core. -BRANSEN GARIBOND