The Singers of Nevya (20 page)

Cathrin touched her mate’s hand. “Mkel. Be sure Nikei agrees the Singer is healed.”

Theo turned back to her. “I will miss seeing your face at the center table every day.” To Mkel he said, “If you know of a traveling party, Magister, I would be glad of the work.”

“You will always be welcome here,” Mkel said. “You have our gratitude.”

“Thank you,” said Theo. “But if I don’t get back to work soon, I’ll have no new stories for Cathrin when I see her next.”

Cathrin laughed. Mkel said, “Just let Maestro Nikei examine your wound, Singer, to set Cathrin’s mind at ease. Traveling parties are frequent here, as you have seen. I will recommend you to one.”

“Thank you.”

“You may wish to know, also,” Mkel added, “that the Magistral Committee has ruled on the disposition of those involved in the attack on the Cantrix and the Magister of Bariken.” Mkel leaned one elbow on the table as if too weary to sit upright. “Trude and Rhia,” he said heavily, “were exposed in Forgotten Pass, a day’s ride north of Lamdon. It was done three days ago. It must all be over now.”

Theo nodded grim acknowledgment. Life on the Continent required fierce and swift justice. It was a brutal punishment, one that had been used as long as Nevyans could remember. In this case, Theo thought, being left to the elements, deliberately abandoned to the cold, was no less cruel a fate than the one the two women had planned for Sira.

“Has Cantrix Sira been told?” he asked.

“No,” Mkel said. “That will be my next task.”

There was nothing further to say about it. Theo bowed and left them, and made his way through the long tables to find a seat. He looked around at the now-familiar faces of the House members and wished he didn’t have to strike out into the mountains with strangers once again. Isbel caught his eye and waved. He winked at her, enjoying her dimples as she giggled. Her classmates clustered around her, all except Sira. Once again, the young Cantrix was absent.

Theo finished his breakfast of fresh yeast bread and sliced fruit, then hurried to catch up with Isbel as she left the great room. She saw him following, and slowed her pace. Her auburn head just reached his shoulder as they walked on together.

“I hear you will be leaving us,” she said, with a pout of regret.

“By the Six Stars, word travels around here as fast as a
caeru
can run!”

Isbel laughed, a merry chime that fell sweetly on the ear. Theo had to resist an urge to stroke her head as if she were a little girl. How he would miss the beautiful voices of these young Singers!

They walked on to where their paths diverged, while Theo wondered how to ask about Sira. At the turning of the hall, Isbel looked up at him. “I do not know where she is,” she said, startling Theo. “I was not prying,” she added, “but you are sending rather clearly.”

Theo shook his head in helpless amusement, wishing he had Isbel’s control. Then he wondered if she heard that, too. If she did, she kept it to herself. She put her hand lightly on his arm. “None of us knows where she is,” she said. “It is kind of you to be concerned for her.”

“Someone must know!” Theo exclaimed.

“Magister Mkel asked me,” Isbel said, “and I assume he has asked others. If one of the students knew, we would all know. I fear she has found a way to leave.”

“You can’t mean . . . leave Conservatory?”

She dropped her hand and sighed. “Yes. And she cut her hair.”

“I saw that, but . . . surely she didn’t go alone!”

Isbel tilted her head. “Go where?”

The hall cleared of people as they talked, leaving them alone. Theo ran his hand over his own hair, freshly shorn by a Housewoman in the kitchens only the evening before.

“When I get ready to travel, I always cut my hair,” he said. “The women itinerants all wear their hair short. Long hair is too hard to care for.”

Isbel’s eyes widened in alarm. “But would she—could she—do that?”

“Would she? I think so!” He spread his hands. “Could she? I don’t know. Unfortunately, there’s more to an itinerant’s work than singing up
quiru
.”

“She said I was not to call her Cantrix.” Isbel’s eyes filled with ready tears. “She has always been independent. But she is more dear to me than anyone in the world.”

“It’s my fault,” Theo said miserably. “I refused to help her. I thought that would be and end to it.” He rubbed his forehead in frustration. “I never thought she would go alone!”

“Singer, we must tell Magister Mkel.”

“But what can he do?”

“He can find out who has left the House. I cannot believe she would want to be out in the mountains by herself again.”

Back they went to the great room, but they found it empty. Isbel led Theo up to the Magister’s apartment, where they were admitted by Cathrin. The Magister looked grave as Theo explained his last conversation with Sira.

Isbel broke in. “We must stop her!”

“I do not know how we can do that,” Mkel said. “We cannot force her into a Cantoris.”

“But she is in danger!” Isbel’s voice rose.

Theo lifted his hand. “Isbel, I’ll go after her. I promise.”

Isbel fell silent, but her lips trembled, and she put her fingers over them.

“Do you know of anyone who has left in the last day, Magister?” Theo asked. Half of his mind hurried ahead, already dealing with the details of a hasty departure.

“I will ask the stableman,” Mkel said. He looked suddenly aged, lines of care etching ever more deeply into his face. Cathrin hovered behind him. “This has been a bad business from beginning to end. I wish I had listened to Lu. She was against Sira’s assignment from the first.”

Theo stood. “I must take the blame for this.” Mkel shook his head, but Theo said, “She asked me to tell her all about an itinerant’s work, and I refused. I should have come to you.”

“We could only have argued with her. She has a right to her own decisions.”

“She’s as stubborn as last winter’s icicles, that’s certain. But I will find her.”

Cathrin said, “We must hire the Singer to go after her, Mkel. She can’t know what it is she’s doing.” She gave Theo a pleading look. “At least bring her back so we can talk to her.”

“I will try,” he said. He hoped Mkel and Isbel would not catch his thought that it was a big Continent on which to find one girl, Gifted or not. His task looked enormous.

It took most of one day to prepare to leave, which Theo estimated put Sira two days ahead of him. Erc, the stableman, had dispatched two
hruss
the previous day, one for Sira, and one for an itinerant without a traveling party, an old Singer named Lorn who had told no one his destination. Theo could only guess at the direction they had taken.

Mkel, Nikei, and Isbel gathered to bid him farewell. It made him smile to see them grouped on the steps, as if he were a Cantor, to receive full ceremonies whenever he made a move. He stopped smiling when he saw the concern on their faces.

“Good luck, Singer,” Magister Mkel said. “We thank you.”

“Stay well,” Maestro Nikei added.

“I hope you can find her,” Isbel added.

Theo bowed. “I hope so, too. And you must try not to worry, Isbel. You have your Cantoris to think of.”

She inclined her head, and the sun gleamed red on her hair. “So I do,” she said. She would be Cantrix at Amric in a few short weeks.

Theo lifted his hand in farewell, and lifted his reins. Isbel watched him with her hands clasped under her chin. He winked at her, and received a small smile in answer. He was disappointed not to see her dimples.

They had decided the place to start would be Lamdon. Itinerants were required to register there. Mkel gave him a written message for Cantrix Sharn, which Theo had carefully stowed in his saddlepack, and which begged Sharn to persuade Sira to return to Conservatory. Theo doubted it would make a difference to Sira. But it would affect his reception at Lamdon.

He rode away from Conservatory alone, into the silence of the snowy mountains. Not much like a Cantor now, he reflected. No Cantor or Cantrix rides alone on the Continent.

He hoped that was true of Sira. Surely she would have this itinerant, whoever he was. Theo wished he could be sure where they had gone.

Lamdon was eight days’ ride away. They would be lonely days, cold and worrisome ones. Theo only hoped Sira would not have already gone when he arrived.

He rounded the curve of the courtyard, and the walls of Conservatory disappeared behind the irontrees, leaving only its great roof visible. He looked back once, regretfully. In his head he heard the faint echo of Isbel sending,
Goodbye, Singer
.

Theo shook his head ruefully. He liked Isbel too well to be envious. But I would sing up a thousand
quiru
, he thought, to learn that skill.

Chapter Eighteen

Sira sat cross-legged across the campfire from Lorn, wondering how old he was. He seemed ancient to her, especially to be living the strenuous life of an itinerant. He had insisted on doing the
quiru
himself, and it wavered and faltered distressingly around them and their
hruss
. Last night she had wakened to find it almost dissipated. She had refreshed it with her own
filla
while Lorn slept on, unaware.

There had been no choice of traveling company. Lorn had been the only itinerant she could find who was not consulting with Magister Mkel or the Housekeeper about his departure, and now she understood why. Who would hire such a person?

It would only be a few days’ ride to Lamdon, she told herself. There she would declare herself an itinerant, and try to find an apprenticeship with someone else. It should not be hard to avoid Cantrix Sharn, if she came into the House through the stables, and attracted no attention to herself. She had hoped to learn something about the work beyond
quiru
duties, but two days with the old itinerant Singer had made her doubt his ability to teach her anything.

Lorn reached forward with his gnarled hand and stirred up the remnants of the fire. “Not so easy, starting a fire with flint and stone, is it?” he said. Even his voice seemed old and frail. She wondered if he could sing anymore.

“I will try it again tomorrow,” she said. “I need to learn.”

“You’ll get it,” he said, and gave a wheezy laugh. “You’ll learn to cook, too, or be awfully hungry. Hot food is important in the mountains.”

Sira said nothing. Lorn’s cooking had not been an inspiration, though she knew he was right about hot meals. Stars winked through the shaky
quiru
, and she decided to get into her bedfurs early, since she would certainly be up redoing the
quiru
before the night had passed. She thought that Cantors must not be the only Gifted ones in short supply, if this man was able to eke out a living as an itinerant Singer.

A long, wailing cry sounded through the hills, making Sira sit bolt upright. Lorn laughed again. “Don’t worry. Just a
ferrel
hunting in the dark. The fire keeps them away from us. We’ll build it up a little.” He dropped some softwood on it, and it blazed higher.

Sira lay back down, but her skin prickled uneasily. The comforts of her room at Conservatory seemed very far off. She tried not to remember Theo’s warnings. I am free, she told herself. I choose my own way.

She was glad she had not heard the
ferrel
cry when she had been alone in Ogre Pass.

She did not sleep until long after Lorn was snoring in his bedfurs. She renewed the
quiru
once he was asleep, and felt better seeing it strong above their campsite. The
ferrel
screamed again, making the
hruss
stamp and Sira shiver, but the fire burned steadily. She fell asleep at last under her warm furs, grateful not to be alone, even if Lorn was not an ideal companion.

The next day snow began to fall as the road led higher into the Mariks. Lorn said they would take the upper mountain route, going through Windy Pass to save several days, rather than travel east to the wider and more clement Ogre Pass. The softwood trees thinned out as they climbed, leaving only the huge ironwood trees and their network of thick, shallow suckers crisscrossing the trail. Lorn assured Sira they would be at the top of the pass before dark.

When night fell and the trail they followed had not yet opened into the narrow fissure that was Windy Pass, Sira began to suspect that Lorn had made a mistake. He was silent, and she did not ask, but she felt tension all around her.

She still could not start the fire by herself, try as she might. When it died out a third time, Lorn did it for her once again, but with none of the teasing there of the night before.

The next morning, Sira saddled her
hruss
without help. It groaned as if in pain as she drew up the cinch. Sira loosened it, thinking it must be too tight.

Lorn looked over at her, shaking his head. “You want to tighten that up. Pay no attention to the
hruss
. It thinks it wants the cinch loose, but it won’t like that saddle ending up under its belly.” He snickered. “And you’ll have a faceful of snow!”

Sira turned back to the saddle and saw that now the cinch hung loosely from the beast’s rib cage. As soon as she put her hand to it, the
hruss
took a deep breath and swelled out its ribs, tightening the cinch again. Sira laughed, and poked it gently in the belly. When it relaxed, the cinch swung free.

This time Sira pulled it firmly, then waited until the
hruss
had taken several breaths, to make sure the cinch was snug. She patted the animal, and went to get her saddlepack.

She had tried to cook breakfast, too. Her reward had been a bowlful of scorched grain. Lorn took a taste and frowned, eating cold dried meat with his tea instead. Sira, defiantly, ate every bite of her concoction. Now she could feel its weight in her stomach as she pulled herself up into her saddle.

When Lorn led the way out of their campsite, and turned into what seemed to be a road, Sira’s sense of direction was offended. It didn’t feel right to her, but she had made so many mistakes in their two days together that she hesitated to challenge the old man’s choice. They rode for several hours in an increasingly heavy snowfall that obscured the trees and obliterated the outlines of the road.