Blood Ties (42 page)

“You too. All of you.”

Mabry tried to smile. “Don’t worry. We’ll be ready.”

Ash nodded. “Keep your guard up, then.”

Then Martine came out, and Elva followed with tears streaking down her face. Martine’s face was set, as he had seen it during the attack at her house, when she held the white knife to the young man’s throat. He knew her better now, and it was a face that was holding back fear and sorrow.

There was kissing all round, and then they simply turned and walked away.

As they picked their way down the slushy path, Ash felt worse than when he had left his parents behind to go to Doronit’s. This time he was leaving people who valued him, who had a place for him.
But only for the winter,
he reminded himself.
It was only ever just for the winter.
It wasn’t where he really belonged.

But the winter’s contentment had given him a new standard to measure life against. He wouldn’t be satisfied, ever, until he could create a home as warm, and a life that meant as much.

“Oh, gods,” he said aloud, thinking of what might lie ahead. “Why us?”

Martine glanced sideways at him. “Shagged if I know.” She grinned at his surprise. “Look on the bright side, lad. We’ve full packs, a long road and a reason to walk it. What more do Travelers need?”

He smiled back, reluctantly, and settled his pack more comfortably on his back. She was right, they had a long way to go.

Bramble

B
RAMBLE’S HORSES
were already loaded in Eel’s big boat and were very glad to see her. They almost knocked her down, butting her side with their heads, nickering in her face, moving closer to her, even Trine. Eel waited patiently for them to settle down, smiling so hard his eyes almost disappeared into their laugh lines.

“They missed their
sisgara,
” he said. “Their herd leader. They were lost and lone without you.”

“I was a bit lost and lone without them,” Bramble confessed, absurdly uplifted by their greeting.

She rubbed their noses, clouted Trine on the shoulder when she tried to step on Eel’s foot, felt herself surrounded by the familiar warmth and horse smells. She was no longer traveling alone in a strange land.

They came to bind her eyes again and she asked for just a moment to take in the dawn breaking over the Lake. The sky was streaked with clouds, which picked up every color imaginable: green and rose and gold, magenta and heliotrope and violet. All were reflected in the still water. It was a kaleidoscope of color, changing rapidly as the sun rose and the sky settled into duck egg blue, the pale clear blue of winter. Bramble took a great breath as though she could inhale the colors.

“All right,” she said.

She closed her eyes and was blindfolded, then settled back against the side of the boat and listened again to the Lake.

They poled out slowly from the narrow channels, leaving the myriad noises of the village behind until there was nothing to be heard but the calls of birds and the rustle of the reeds and the lap of the Lake water. It chuckled against the prow, happy, but also urgent, as though it were pressing them to hurry. Whether Eel heard it like that she didn’t know, but when they came to a larger channel, he picked up the pace and they were now moving much faster than they had the day before.

After some time, he came to unbind her eyes and give her water and cheese and bread. He shared the food with her, sitting cross-legged on the deck. They had drawn up in a small cove surrounded by willows and, standing farther back, elms. The willows had dropped almost all their thin yellow leaves, the elms were already winter bare. There was an autumn scent, of moss and drying earth, just perceptible over the pitch-tar smell of the boat. As they ate, Eel’s men put out two gangplanks and led the horses, scrambling, onto the shore.

“We have taken you to the northern side, but a long way west of the town. There is a road, farther up, that you can join to take you to the Golden Valley, and from there over the Quiet Pass into the Last Domain, where you will find the Well of Secrets.”

Bramble nodded. “Thank you.” She wondered if she should tell him about the dream.

“Remember though,” Eel went on, “the road is in the Cliff Domain — Thegan’s son’s Domain, the one Thegan ruled before he married the Lady Sorn. You must be wary.”

Bramble went cold. She had hoped to cross the Lake as close as possible to Baluchston, which would have kept her out of Cliff Domain.

“He’s going to come at you from both sides,” she said.

“Yes. But do not worry. It has happened before, with men as greedy and blood hungry as he, and we are still here. We will always be here. We are the Lake’s children and She cares for us, the way She cares for you.”

She was surprised, and showed it.

“You think She does not care for you?” Eel asked, laughing. “Then ask yourself, how can you spend a night with open windows and come out the next morning without a single mosquito bite? She’s never done that much for me!”

Bramble looked at her arms, and was astonished that it hadn’t occurred to her before. Not
one
bite. Even though, as she and Salamander had poled toward her house, she had heard the insistent whine of the mosquitoes everywhere.

She opened her mouth, but didn’t know what to say.

“I am honored,” she managed finally.

Eel smiled at her again, and patted her shoulder. She suddenly felt very young and silly. It wasn’t unpleasant.

“Then you will understand and forgive her,” he said. “She takes only what she needs.”

“What do you mean?” she asked, but he smiled and shook his head and gestured to her to follow the horses.

She looked at him for a moment, annoyed that he wouldn’t explain, then followed the horses ashore. They came to nose into her shoulder, Trine shoving the others aside to get closer to her. She spent a few moments saddling up and securing their packs, trying not to think of the journeys she had taken with the roan. The hot ball of grief and guilt was never far away, but it could be lived with. She took a deep breath, pushing the memories aside, and decided to ride Trine again. This new affection should be nurtured.

As she was preparing to mount up, and wondering what to say to Eel, Salamander appeared from between the bare willow withes.

“Hallo!” he said cheerfully. “Are you ready?”

She looked at Eel.

“He will show you to the road.” He looked at Salamander sternly. “Don’t get yourself killed and don’t fall in love with any drylander.”

The men in the boat laughed.

Salamander sighed. “Uncle, I will try to avoid both.”

“Good!” Eel smacked him between the shoulder blades in a gesture of affection and farewell, then turned to Bramble.

“Take care of him. My sister will use my guts as her fishing lines if he gets hurt.”

“Oh, I think he can take care of himself,” Bramble said drily. Salamander shot her a look of gratitude. “Goodbye. Thank you.”

“No,” Eel said. “Our thanks are to you for risking so much to bring us our warning.” He bowed, formally, his hat in his hand. “The gods go with you.”

“Blessings be on you and yours,” Bramble replied.

She turned and led the horses off, Salamander by her side.

“I hate goodbyes,” Salamander said happily. “This is the way.”

He led her along a slender path she might easily have missed on her own, through an arch of bare elm branches. Dry leaves crunched under their feet and a cool breeze lifted off the Lake, as though to bid them farewell. As they walked through the arch, she felt a shiver, some kind of anticipation. Was it fear? she wondered. She ducked her head to avoid a low bough and when her head came up she almost bit her tongue off in surprise.

The elms around them were in leaf: bright yellow-green new spring leaves. The sun was higher in a sky patched with cloud, the air was rich with the heady, full smell of the earth after fresh spring rain. The breeze was warm, now, and looking back she could see that the level of the Lake was much higher, just as she had seen in her dream the night before.

Salamander turned to smile at her uneasily, half apologetic, half scared. “It’s only a little bit of time She has taken,” he said placatingly. “Just a few months.”

Her breath was coming as fast as though she had been running.
Then you will understand and forgive her,
Eel had said. This was what he had meant.
She takes only what she needs.
Bramble breathed in slowly, willing her heart to slow. She grinned suddenly. It answered her questions about whether the dream had been true. She felt again the rush of adrenaline and excitement from the dream.
Magic.
She’d never experienced real magic before, just the presence of the gods, which was part of her blood and bone. No, it couldn’t be magic — that was something humans did. To move two people and three horses through time was power of another kind.

Salamander regarded her anxiously.

“You’ve lost your time, too,” she said.

Salamander seemed pleased not to be shouted at. He smiled, immediately relaxed. “Oh, I volunteered,” he said. “Who minds missing winter? The road is this way.”

He led her up a winding path and she followed, the horses completely unperturbed by the sudden shift to spring, although their nostrils were wide, drinking in the full, living scent.

She looked over her shoulder at the Lake, expecting something, anything, a sign, an omen . . . But there was just the flickering of sun on the ripples and an empty cove that had last seen a boat in late autumn. Bramble turned in her saddle and stared resolutely ahead. Why had the Lake needed Bramble to be here, now? Right at this time. What was so special about
now?

Nothing, it seemed, for the moment. Salamander led her down a winding path, through thickets of willow and alder. There were streams crisscrossing their track, bubbling with snowmelt and forcing them to turn aside several times before they found safe places to ford. All the streams looked alike, all the clumps of willow seemed the same. She would not have found the way by herself.

After a couple of hours they emerged onto pastureland where cows were grazing. These were a different breed from the Lake cattle, big bony black-and-white animals, and only a couple had calves. It must be very early spring. The land was dead flat and the sky was wide above them. It was as though they had been picked up and put down somewhere a world away.

“The road’s over that way,” Salamander said, pointing north. “Follow it east and take the first turning to the north. That’ll lead you up to Golden Valley. It’s a bit longer, but it’ll keep you off the main track.”

“Thanks. I hope you get back safely.”

Salamander grinned. “Who’d want to hurt me?” He darted in and kissed her on the cheek before she realized what he was doing. “Had to do it,” he said. “Couldn’t resist.”

Bramble’s laugh made Trine toss her head at the end of her leading string, blowing loudly through her nose.

“Exactly,” Bramble said. “Couldn’t have put it better myself.”

She unclipped the leading string and jumped up onto Trine’s back. “Wind at your back,” she said.

“Smooth water,” Salamander replied, then turned and slipped into the cover of the willows.

Bramble rode away and had to resist the urge to turn around and wave at him like a child saying “bye-bye.” But she rode away with a smile.

It was good to be on horseback again. She found the road easily, just a double cart track through the short grass, and followed it without meeting anything more alarming than cows. When it branched, she took the overgrown northern track, which led toward the foothills nearby.

She calculated that she had two days’ riding to get to Golden Valley. She would be safe there. Golden Valley lay between Cliff Domain and Far North Domain. It was terrible country for farming but it bred wonderful horses, with stamina and bone and heart. In the past, the two Domains had fought over the valley so often that trade from the far north, from the Last Domain and the Northern Mountains Domain, had almost stopped. About thirty years ago, just after he’d come into his inheritance, the previous warlord of the Last Domain had brokered a peace, and his son, Arvid, now safeguarded that peace. The Golden Valley was now a “free valley,” as Carlion and Turvite were free towns. It belonged to no one and was governed by a council elected by its inhabitants. It was neutral territory and Thegan — and his son — could not touch her there.

The track wound higher into the foothills. Bramble felt lighthearted. The spring sun, the clear sky, the clarity of the hill air combined to buoy her spirits. She was across the Lake, had delivered her message, and was on her way again. The Well of Secrets would keep until she got to the Last Domain, and Oakmere. She whistled as she rode and talked to the horses, to Trine especially.

Her good mood lasted until dusk. They had climbed well into the foothills, and the mountains soared above them. She was looking for a place to camp for the night when she heard the howl of wolves.

Early spring,
she realized immediately, as the horses whickered in fright and Cam reared up and tried to bolt, reverting in an instant to the flighty animal she’d been when Bramble first took her in. Bramble tussled with her and with the other two, talking to them, and regretting, for the first time, not putting a bit on Trine. They shuffled and twisted a good way down the path before she got them under control.
Early spring
. It would have been a long, hungry winter, and the baby calves and kids had not yet arrived.
No easy prey except us.

She looked around frantically. There was no shelter here on the bare hillside. She would have to ride on, to a cave, a niche in the rocks, anything where the horses could have their backs protected while they used their front hooves to defend themselves. But it was getting dark, and the footing underneath was growing more and more treacherous. She clicked her tongue at the horses at the same moment the wolves’ howl came again, and she had to hold them in hard to stop them galloping off down the uneven track.

“There now, just a little faster, that’s it, you’re all right, no need to worry, just pick up the pace a little, that’s all,” she crooned, calming them and herself at the same time.

She had the wolf skin around her shoulders and wondered if that was a good omen or a bad one.
Gods, aid your daughter,
she prayed, but there was no sense of the gods at all up here on the bare hillside.

They went on as fast as she dared through the darkening night until the track curved around a ridge of fissured granite. There were gaps in the rock as though someone had sliced a knife down a cake. She dismounted and led the horses up the hillside, slippery with loose rock, until she found a gap that was big enough for the three of them. It wasn’t big enough for her as well, but if she had to, she resolved, she could lie across their backs . . . She tried not to think about sliding off the horses backward, in the dark, onto cold rock, to be trampled by thrashing, panicked hooves. The wolves might not come.
And spring will follow autumn next year,
she thought.
Of course they’ll come.

There was no wood up here to start a fire. She gave the horses a small drink of water, but not too much, then grabbed some of the oats from a saddlebag and fed them quickly. They’d need the energy if they had to run. She drank some water and ate the dried apricots and flat bread that Eel had given her. That seemed a long time ago. She laughed softly, and the horses shifted in response. It was a long time ago. Months. She settled down to wait, knife in hand. It was the same knife she had slit the wolf’s throat with, back in Wooding. It didn’t look very big.