The world stood breathless around me as that cart slowly came up the hill. I had time to absorb every detail. Epiny wore a proper hat, but it had been donned hastily, unless it was the fashion now to wear it nearly sliding off one side of her head. Her hair had come unbundled and half spilled down her back. One of the wheels on the cart was wobbling so badly that I immediately resolved she could not go back to Gettys in that conveyance until we had secured it. But mostly I just stared at Epiny’s face.
As she drew nearer, I could see high spots of bright color on her cheeks. She was thin, but not as thin as the last time I’d glimpsed her in my dream. I could see her mouth moving as she spoke to the baby in her basket, and then suddenly I couldn’t stand it any longer. I began to run down the hill toward her shouting, “Epiny! Epiny!”
Epiny tried to pull in the horse, but my headlong rush toward it alarmed the poor old creature. Instead of stopping, he veered to one side, taking the cart off the track and into the deep grass. There the wobbly wheels refused to go any farther, and that more than Epiny’s tugging on the reins brought him to a halt. I reached the side of the cart in time to catch Epiny as she leapt from the seat into my arms. I hugged her tight and whirled her around, beyond joy at seeing her again. Her own arms went tight around my neck. Nothing had ever felt so healing as that simple expression of pure affection. Other than our kinship, Epiny had never had any reason to love me or to make the sacrifices and take the risks for me that she had. In so many ways, I’d brought pain and suffering into her life. But her honest embrace assured me that she still cared for me, despite how I’d damaged her. Her capacity for love humbled me. Kesey had reined in his mount and was watching us in consternation. Epiny, as ever, never stopped talking even as I spun her around.
“I knew you would come back! Even when I couldn’t feel you anymore, I knew you weren’t dead, and I told Spink so. Oh, that frightened me so, when I woke one morning and could not feel the magic at all. I tried to explain it to Spink, that I knew you’d said good-bye to us. Right away, he said I’d have to accept that you’d probably died. Have a little faith in him, I told him. No one kills a Burvelle that easily! Oh, Nevare, I am so glad to see you, to touch you, to know you are really back. Oh, now, put me down, put me down, you must meet your new little—what would she be, your second cousin? Oh, but that sounds silly, she is much too small to be anyone’s second cousin, and I have already been calling you Uncle Nevare to her, so that is what you shall remain. Set me down right now! I want you to hold Solina! She’s never met you yet, and listen, she’s crying!”
I think those words finally brought me to my senses. I was so joyous at seeing my cousin alive and well after all the anxious days and nights away, it seemed intolerable that anyone should be crying, let alone her own precious baby. I set her down, and she staggered a few steps dizzily, laughing wildly all the while, and then caught hold of the cart’s side and hauled herself up to take the baby from the basket. The child was so layered in blankets and wraps that Epiny looked as if she were opening a present. I held on to the edge of the cart and watched, enchanted.
Kesey spoke behind me. “Nevare?” He spoke the word incredulously.
Reflexively, I glanced back at him. Our eyes met and I had no lies or explanations to offer him. For a long moment, we stared at each other. Then his eyes brimmed with tears even as his grin showed all the teeth he did and did not have. “It is you. Oh, by the good god, Nevare, it is you. But you ain’t fat no more! Still, I shoulda knowed you, even dressed in those drapes. Nevare!”
He fell on me and hugged me hard. The warmth and relief in his voice were so genuine that I could do nothing save hug him back. “Why didn’t you say it was you?” he demanded huskily. “Why didn’t you say it was you, ’stead of coming to the door like a beggar? Did you think I wouldn’t have helped you?”
“I didn’t think you would believe me. I didn’t think that anyone would believe me.”
“Well, I probably wouldn’t have, if the Lieutenant hadn’t told me so, way last spring. Everyone said that you’d been—that you’d died. But I’d had that dream, and then the Lieutenant came to ask me about it, and I suppose I got a little teary, saying I thought that dream was your way of saying good-bye and no hard feelings. Only he asked me if your sword was on the floor when I woke up, and I said, yes, it was, and that was when he told me the truth.” He gave me a friendly shake and pounded me on the back for emphasis. “Only acourse it didn’t sound nothing like the truth, sounded like the second wildest tale I’d ever heard. But the more I thought on it, the more it made a weird sense, and when I talked to Ebrooks about it all, he broke down and blubbered about seeing you killed, and said that he hadn’t stopped them and he was so ashamed. He said he was the one who hauled your body off and buried it safe in a secret place. Only when I pushed him on it, he couldn’t remember where he’d buried you. Couldn’t remember where he’d got the shovel, couldn’t remember digging the hole. So that was when he and I put it all together, all the bits, and decided that you hadn’t done none of what you were accused of, and that you weren’t dead, either. ’Course, it was all pretty strange, thinking of you having Speck magic or whatever. Being rescued by Specks with magic.”
“Lieutenant Kester told you I was alive,” I said stupidly. This was as stunning to me as my reappearance was to him.
“I told him to!” Epiny announced proudly. She was holding her baby against her shoulder and beaming at me as she spoke. “I told him it would be cruel to leave your two friends believing that you were dead and that they’d contributed to your death. And I reminded him how angry I was, and still am, that you left me in the dark for so long. They deserved the truth. And they’ve kept your secret.”
“Well, it wasn’t a hard secret to keep,” Kesey said, finally releasing me. He dragged his cuff unashamedly across his streaming eyes. “The state you left the town in, no one wanted to even mention your name, let alone talk about how you’d died. If you wanted to shame those fellows for how they were going to do you, you sure did it. Most of them slunk around the town like whipped dogs for months. And I think it was their own guilty consciences that made them tell wild tales about seeing you come back as a Speck warrior during that sneak attack last winter! I told them I didn’t believe a word of it. And, by the good god, don’t I wish I could take you to town and parade you around now and say, ‘See, I told you so! He couldn’t a done it. He’s been off living in the woods on roots and berries and getting skinny as a rail!’ Why, you look like a kid, Nevare! That’s what taking off all that fat done for you.”
“Yes,” I agreed with him. The wash of shame that flooded through me nearly sickened me. I wanted to confess to the old soldier that I had been at the “sneak attack,” that I had been seen. But then I would have had to try to explain to him that it hadn’t really been me, at least not the me that stood before him now. It all suddenly seemed too complicated. The homecoming joy that I’d felt drained away. What had I been thinking, coming back here at all? There was no way I could fit myself back into this life. There were too many contradictions, secrets, and lies.
I found myself looking bleakly at Epiny. I gave her a clenched-teeth smile, resolved that I would say nothing to her of my realization. But I think she sensed my chain of thought, for she held her baby out to me and said, “Hold her. Look at her. Isn’t she beautiful? Everything does work itself out, Nevare, if we just give it enough time. Don’t be in too big of a rush to give up. All will come well in time.”
I gingerly accepted the armful of baby and looked down into her face, and in truth she struck me as an absolutely ordinary baby, one without much hair. She was so bundled up against the mild spring day that all I could see was her face and her hands. “Hello, there,” I said.
Solina looked at me, her brown eyes very wide. Then her lower lip quivered, and suddenly she began to wail. Her tiny fists flailed at the air.
“Take her back, take her back! I don’t know what to do!” I said in a panic, and held her out to Epiny, who received her with a laugh.
“It’s only because she doesn’t know you yet and your voice is so deep. Give her time. Once she gets to know you, I’ll teach you how to comfort her when she cries. After that, you can hold her as much as you like. I promise!” The last two words she spoke to the baby in such a reassuring voice that the child gave a final hiccup and quieted with a sigh.
I rather thought that I’d already held Solina as much as I’d like to, but I was wise enough not to say that aloud. “She’s absolutely amazing,” I said truthfully. “I’m sure her father agrees with me. But where is Spink? Is he coming?”
“He wasn’t home when Trooper Kesey arrived, but once I’d read the message, I knew I had to come right away. Captain Thayer had called Spink in to discuss something or other. The man can’t seem to let each officer do his own job. He’s always oversupervising everyone or demanding that all the officers convene so he can lecture them. So I couldn’t very well run and fetch him, but I’ve left a note for him on the table. I left Kara watching the smaller children while her mother did the shopping. She’s very good with them, and Sem has become quite responsible, too, for his age. And Amzil will be back home soon, so it should be all right. I didn’t say anything about you to the children; I wanted to be sure of you before I told them you had returned. Oh, Nevare, they are going to be so happy! That book you gave them? I’ve read it to them until it’s falling apart. And you would be so pleased to hear how well Kara has her letters and numbers, and even Sem is picking them up! He competes with his sister in everything. You’ll be so proud of that boy when you see him! Amzil and I cut down old uniforms to make proper trousers and jackets for him; now don’t think we’ve dressed him like a little trooper. That would be awful! I remember how horrid that was for Caulder Stiet, always dressed like a little man long before he was one. But he just loves to be dressed like Spink. And Amzil’s skills at sewing and tailoring never cease to amaze me. I’ve told her she should try to open a little dress shop; there isn’t one in Gettys, you know. She says the other women wouldn’t do business with her. I told her that once one or two started, and the others saw her work, they’d have to come to her or risk being seen as dowdy. I just know she could succeed at it if only we had the money to get her started. And Kara is so quick to learn! She’s already sewn her first sampler. Wait until you—”
I set two fingers gently to Epiny’s lips. “Let’s go the rest of the way up the hill and go inside, shall we? Perhaps Kesey has some coffee we could share while we talk. There is so much I want to hear.”
And so many decisions for me to make.
Epiny walked up the hill beside me while Kesey drove the cart and his saddle horse trailed behind. Epiny snorted with exasperation at the top of the hill when I insisted on examining the wheels and axles of the cart. I sent them ahead of me into the cabin, asking Kesey to put on some fresh coffee for all of us. I think they both knew that what I was actually doing was taking a moment to think. When at last I entered, Epiny was enthroned in my big old chair. Little Solina was propped in her lap, looking all around with very wide eyes. The aroma of fresh coffee had already begun to fill the small room.
“You can probably drive it safely back, as long as you go slowly and someone accompanies you in case of mishaps. I don’t want you and the baby stranded on the road next to a broken-down cart.”
“But of course you’ll come with me! I don’t even know why we’ve stopped to have coffee. Not that it isn’t pleasant to be invited in, Trooper Kesey. But of course you will come home with me, Nevare. That’s why I borrowed the cart. I thought that you would ride—”
“Epiny,” I interrupted. “Nothing is decided. Do you forget that I’m a man convicted of murder, among other crimes?”
“But no one will recognize you! Kesey didn’t, and he knew you far better than most and—”
“And in any case, how could I go back to Gettys dressed like this, let alone to an officer’s house? What would people think of you, bringing a man dressed like a savage into your home?”
“Oh, it could be managed, Nevare! You worry too much about what other people would think! You are too cautious! You need simply to come back to town and take your life back. How long must Amzil wait for you?”
“Amzil? The Dead Town whore?” Kesey put in incredulously. “She’s sweet on Nevare?” He’d taken the steaming pot of coffee off the fire. As he set it down on the table, he said, “Looks like you done a lot of tidying up while I was gone.”
“Amzil is not and never was a whore,” Epiny said indignantly as I simultaneously said, “I just thought it was the least I could do after you helped a complete stranger.”
“And it sure needed doing; I’m no housekeeper, I know that. And pardon if I spoke out of turn, ma’am, or said something wrong. It’s only what I’ve always heard about her. And the good god knows she’s got a brand-new reputation in Gettys since last winter. She stares at the troopers like she could bring the wrath of the old gods down on them with a snap of her fingers. And makes them sharp little remarks all the time. Hasn’t won her any friends.”
“If you knew what she went through—” Epiny began.
I cut through her stream of words with the truth. “The night everyone thought I was murdered by that mob? Amzil was there. Some of the men were going to rape her because she was my friend. To hurt me by making me watch, and afterward, to kill her in front of me. And the Captain wasn’t going to do a thing to stop them. It was ugly, Kesey. I managed to protect her, but it’s not a thing a woman could forget. Or forgive.”
“I heard somewhat of that,” he said shortly. “The regiment isn’t what it was, once. Men get ground down for so long, some of them just go bad. Cavalla used to be a notch better than common soldiers, but, well…It’s not like anyone is proud of that night, Nevare, least of all Captain Thayer. There was a Sixday service, not long ago, when he talked all about how wrong a man can be when he trusts a woman. Says even the sweetest woman in the world can be a deceiver and a temptress, and when men believe them, they can be led to commit the worst of crimes. He said he knew that no woman could be trusted, not even your own wife. Everyone knew he was talking about that night. Shocked every one of us there—well, not me, ’cause I ain’t been to Sixday services in a long time, but to them that was—when he broke down and sobbed about it. Cut him to the bone, I guess, that she’d lied to him. Though he never said about what. Then he said it was a lesson to us all to live upright lives and not trust our hearts to anyone but the good god. And—” Kesey suddenly looked uncomfortable. “He said something ’bout how it was lucky you’d committed other crimes that made you deserve your fate.” He abruptly stopped speaking.
“Really lucky,” I said sourly. “Otherwise he and his men would have murdered an innocent man.”
Kesey just looked at me.
“Kesey, I am an innocent man. Innocent of that, anyway. I didn’t do any of the things I was accused of. Not one.”
He nodded gravely and put three cups on the table. Two were tin but one was of thick crockery. He poured the steaming coffee slowly, trying not to stir the grounds from the bottom, and spoke without looking up at me. “That’s what the Lieutenant told me, when he come up here about my dream. And Ebrooks and me, we talked it over, and even before then we thought it was damned peculiar—Oh, pardon my language, ma’am.”
“Damned peculiar,” Epiny agreed wryly, making Kesey blush. She took up her crockery mug of hot coffee and sipped at it gingerly. As she put it down on the table, she asked me matter-of-factly, “So what will you do? I think you stand a fair chance of clearing yourself if you came back and decided to do so.”
“Oh, Epiny, it’s so much more complicated than that. You know it is. A fair chance of clearing myself means there’s also a fair chance I’ll dance at the end of the rope, unless they flog me to death first. Even if I clear myself in Gettys, how do I explain to anyone how I slipped away from that mob: do you think that anyone would think me innocent if I told them I’d done it with Speck magic?”
“They wouldn’t like it at all,” Kesey chimed in. “Soldiers don’t like to think anyone can fool them, and Nevare fooled them all. And let them live with a lot of guilt for a long time, to boot. And most of them still figure that Nevare, uh, you know, with the Captain’s dead wife. Some of the fellows speculate that if she lied, maybe she was a temptress, too, and—”
“Kesey!” I said sharply.
The old soldier abruptly closed his mouth and nodded. “Right,” he said. He picked up his tin cup of coffee, wincing a bit, for the coffee had warmed the metal. “I’m thinking that perhaps you’d like to speak to Miz Kester in private. And seeing as how you’re her cousin and all, if I heard that right, ain’t a thing improper about that. So I might take this cup of coffee and go outside and sit for a bit.”
“Oh, we mustn’t drive you out of your own home,” Epiny decided firmly. “Nevare and I can sit outside.” And so saying, she rose. With her baby in one arm, she took my arm with her free hand and guided us out of the door. I barely had time to get my cup of coffee. She seemed content to let her own remain on the table.
The day seemed bright after the dimness of the cabin. We walked over to the cart and she sat down on its open tail. The horse shifted doubtfully in his harness. “Well,” she said, and then, as if it were the most important thing, she observed, “That was the most dreadful coffee I’ve ever tasted. How can you drink it?”
“I’ve been hungry enough lately to eat or drink anything that’s offered to me.” I took a mouthful. She was right about the coffee, but I swallowed it anyway and tried to keep my face under control.
She laughed sympathetically. “My poor cousin. When you come home with me tonight, I’ll do my best to remedy that. Between Amzil and me, we put some fair meals on the table. We are not as hungry as we have been, thank the good god. The supply wagons have come through at last, so there is plenty of plain food, bread and porridge and such. And the little gardens behind the houses have started to give up a bit of fresh vegetable now and then. But for a time there, I was certainly hungry enough to eat whatever was offered to me. Oh, I’ve chattered like a squirrel long enough. Tell me how you come to be here? What happened to you? How was that you and not you, that horrible night—”
I shook my head. “I’ll tell it all when both you and Spink can hear it.” In truth, I wanted to put off that reckoning a little while. Surely my cousin would no longer look at me so fondly once she had heard of my part in the raid. “Instead, you must finish telling me what has been going on here. You were starving?”
She nodded. Her eyes grew larger and her face paled. “The Speck raid destroyed all the food stored in the warehouses. People were left with only what they’d had in their homes, and the men in the barracks had even less. They salvaged what meat they could from the horses that had died in the fires, and tore apart the burned wreckage looking for anything, half a sack of flour or a scorched bag of grain. Anything. A few people had chickens that they were wintering over, but with their feed gone or eaten by people, there was no sense in holding back. So we ate all the chickens, what milk goats there were, the hogs—it was terrible, Nevare. It was like we were eating our hopes for the future. There is still hardly any livestock left in town, and half our troops are afoot. Those last weeks, there was next to nothing. I soaked out a molasses keg and then gave the children warmed molasses water. We had no hope at all.”
Despite the gravity of the tale, I had to grin. “And then Sergeant Duril arrived,” I filled in.
She cocked her head, a trifle surprised perhaps. “That he did. To save the day. I don’t know how that old man got through; the sides of his cart were muddy and his horses were next to dead. Oh, it was like a blessing from heaven to see that cartload of goods: flour, sugar, beans, peas, molasses, oil—everything we’d been longing for. I felt as rich as a queen when he knocked on my door and said, ‘Miz Epiny Kester? Your family has sent you some help!’
“But it wasn’t five minutes before every woman in town was standing in the street outside my house, staring at that food. Some of their little children were weeping and begging for a taste, and some were too starved to even do that. And Spink came out and sent them all home to get bowls and cups, so we could measure out shares for all, as far as it would go. I can’t tell you how I hated him, for all of half a moment! There we were, with our own little baby down to skin and bones, and he was giving our food away! But I knew he was right. How would I ever have faced any of them, if I had kept plenty of food for my own and let their children go empty?”
“Not to mention that they might have turned on you and simply taken it all, if shares hadn’t been freely offered.”
Epiny sighed. “Nevare, I never cease to be amazed at the darkness of your thoughts! How can you bear to think such evil things about people?”
“I think my life experience has had something to do with it.”
“Oh, such a sour outlook! But that isn’t what happened at all. We shared what we had, and just as we were down to thinking of making soup from the flour sack, the supply wagons came.”
A worry came to me. “What did you tell Duril when he was here? About me, I mean.”
She looked at me sadly. “Nevare, what do you think I told him? What did I owe a good man like that, who has risked all for us? I told him the truth.”
I lowered my eyes before her disapproval.
“Why did you think I would do anything else?” She scolded me. “He told me that he knew something of what had happened to you already, and that he was with you the night you confronted Dewara. He may not be an educated man, Nevare, and perhaps being a sergeant was the highest he ever rose in his life, but he has a lot of wisdom and common sense. It wasn’t easy for him to hear. But at the end of it, he nodded, and said he hoped you were still alive and might come home to give some comfort to your father. But even if you never came back, he said, ‘I won’t never think badly of him. I did my task the best I could, taught him all I knew about soldiering. If he sticks to that, he shouldn’t do too badly.’”
I had to ask the next question. “Did you tell him about the raid on Gettys? Does he know about my part in it?”
“Nevare, I don’t fully understand your part in it, so I could scarcely tell him. I was so drugged with laudanum, I can barely remember that night. I think I’m glad of that. You’ve said it wasn’t really you. I believe that. Why shouldn’t I believe that?”
I looked at my feet. “Perhaps because I’ve deceived you before.”
“Yes, you have,” she freely admitted. “And it still rankles. But I think we need to move past it, at least for today. You’ve had a very hard time, Nevare, but now you are home. And perhaps you have had nothing but bad news and hard times and sad tidings for too long. So. Let me share some good news with you.” Her smile suddenly widened. “Have you any idea how your family’s fortune has changed of late?”
“I’ve a hint of it. There was a gold strike near my father’s holdings.”
“Yes, but it’s so much more than that. I had a letter from your sister just a few days ago. Would you like to read it yourself, or shall I just tell you?”
“Do you have it with you?” I longed to touch paper my sister had touched, to see words written in her hand.
“I’m afraid I was a bit more flustered than that when I packed up my baby and ran out of my house! If I’d been thinking, I’d have brought it and a picnic basket! Do you want to wait until you finally visit my home?”
She was baiting me again. I shook my head with a smile and said, “Just tell me how Yaril fares.”
“Well, your sister has been absolutely brilliant for one so young. She said there was a day in your father’s study when he was not feeling well. And when she went to him, she herself nearly fainted. But as she fell, she saw you standing over her. She said that you showed her a place and told her that was where an important rock came from. As soon as Sergeant Duril returned, she made him take her out riding. From what she says, it was quite a trip, requiring them to camp overnight twice! But she found the place and it was the Sergeant who recognized the rocks for what they were: gold ore. I’ve no idea how he knew that’s what it was, but he did. And she was clever enough to know that it wasn’t on your father’s holdings, and that if she told others about it, there would be no gain to your family, just a wild rush of greedy people trying to get what they could. So they spoke not a word to anyone. She sent the samples to the Queen quietly, suggesting that as all the lands there are the Crown’s, the monarchs would wish to know the value of what was there before unscrupulous men began to secretly mine it or they unknowingly gave it away in a land grant.” She grinned at me. “You’ll never guess who her courier was.”
I knew. I’d told Yaril she could trust him. “Sergeant Duril,” I said confidently.
She laughed delightedly. “No. You are not even close. Though the sergeant is a dear, dear man, and if ever I needed a trusty courier or a tutor for my son or someone to look after my holdings, I would definitely consider him a good choice.”
“Who, then?” I demanded impatiently.
She picked up her baby, kissed the little girl with a flourish, and then announced to me, “Caulder Stiet. There. What do you think of that?”
For a moment my mouth hung open. Then I replied darkly, “I fear she has played right into his hands.”
“Then you would be mistaken,” Epiny told me snippily. “For it was a conspiracy between the two of them, to get the samples to the Queen without letting Caulder’s uncle know that they had obtained them.”
“What?”
“Yaril saw it as a chance for them to build something, for themselves, perhaps together, perhaps not. They are both, she wrote, tired of being pawns in their elders’ games. Caulder is quite certain he wishes to marry her, but she has honestly told him that she is uncertain and does not wish to be married for many years yet. Still, they are friends enough to conspire. She and Caulder feigned a monstrous quarrel, with shrieking and broken crockery! You know, from the way she writes of it, I think she enjoyed it! She mentions she smashed enough cups from the old china that her father will have to let her buy a whole new set now.”
“That sounds like Yaril,” I admitted with reluctant admiration. I knew those cups. She had always hated the dogwood-blossom pattern.
“Well, it was enough of a to-do that your father finally ordered both of them to leave his house. And so of course, off they went, back to Old Thares, with Caulder taking the rocks in his baggage. He had quite a time getting them to Her Majesty, but he prevailed, and guess what? For service to the Crown, the Crown has issued another grant of land to your father, more than doubling his holdings, and adjacent land to Caulder Stiet himself, to be held in trust for him by his father, his real father, until Caulder reaches his majority. It’s almost like the Crown forcing him to take Caulder back as his son. No title for Caulder, more’s the pity, but he will at least join the landed gentry when he comes of age.”
“How nice for him,” I said dryly. The news of my father’s holdings increasing was good news, for it made Yaril an even more desirable bride. She would have better choices than Caulder Stiet, I hoped. The idea of the Stiet family having a holding adjacent to Widevale appealed to me far less.
“Oh, you sound so sour and old, Nevare! But let me finish.” The baby fussed again and she spent a moment hushing her. “The gold strike, once the King announced it, has completely changed Widevale. Yaril wrote pages and pages about it. The King has sent in his engineers and they have designed and built housing for the workers, and they are setting up the mining and the refining and all of those things right in the area of the find. In time, there will be a large town there, if not a city. And Burvelle’s Landing is the closest river port, and the nearest inn and shops and all of that! So it has absolutely boomed with population. Yaril writes that it has tripled in size, and of course the taxes and landing fees from the Landing all go into your father’s coffers, so the family wealth is suddenly quite spectacular. In fact, your part of the family is so wealthy that even my beloved mother suddenly finds her husband’s brother quite respectable and worthy of a visit. When Yaril wrote, my father had arrived and had just spent the day with your father, and Yaril said your father was up and walking about with a cane and almost acting like his old self. He planned to take his brother out on horseback the next day to look over the new land grant, and he hadn’t been on a horse for months! And Yaril and my sister, Purissa, find each other’s company very agreeable! Yaril is very excited that my mother has even hinted at taking her back to Old Thares for a season, so that she may be properly presented to society. I suspect that my mother will attempt to find her a better marriage offer than Caulder Stiet, but somehow I think that your little sister is more than capable of dealing with Lady Burvelle. I suspect that, if anything, Yaril will make a better match, but it will be someone of her own choosing. So what could be better?”
Her mention of her mother triggered another concern of mine. I tried not to sound accusing as I said, “You sent my soldier-son journal to your father, didn’t you?”
She paused, then faced me squarely. “I did. It seemed wisest to me then. I didn’t think Yaril was old enough to deal with the very frank things you’d written in it.” Here, despite all her aplomb, she flushed slightly. “And I feared that your father might destroy it. I believed there was too much valuable information in it to allow that to happen to it. So I sent it to my father, with a request that he leave it sealed. He is an honorable man, Nevare. I knew that he would respect my wishes, and I never, ever thought that my mother, of all people, would be interested in a soldier-son’s journal. I’m so sorry.”
“I have only a hazy idea of why you should be sorry,” I said gently. “But I’d like to know what became of it after she read it.” Whatever had become of it, I told myself that it was all my own fault for creating such a betraying diary. The magic had made me do it, I thought fiercely, trying to free myself from guilt on that score. And abruptly I realized the other half of that truth. “Let us understand one thing, Epiny,” I told her. “The magic was what spurred me to write that journal in such a way. It acted on me to create it, and it also acted on me to leave it behind when I fled. I suspect that you, too, were but its instrument when you sent it to Old Thares to fall into your mother’s hands. Whatever she has done with it is what the magic wished her to do. The magic is a powerful force, like a river. We can build our levees and dams, but when the river grows strong with rain and snowmelt, it breaks all the man-made barriers aside and flows in its rightful bed. And that is what it has done to us, and that odd current has carried it to your mother’s hands.”
I took a deep breath and tried to sound calm as I asked, “Do you know what she has done with it?”
She bit her lip. The baby snuggled against her seemed to sense her mother’s sudden worry, for she gave a squeaky cry and then was still again. “I know she wanted to take it to the Queen. My father was furious at the suggestion. I do not think he would read it after I asked him not to, but he would know something of what was in it. My mother would see to that. And he, he would not be pleased, Nevare, by the things she would surely tell him. He said that she did not seem to understand that anything she did that brought shame on the Burvelles of the East would reflect just as badly on our branch of the family. He says she is so accustomed to thinking of herself as superior to his family that she does not perceive that we would be painted with the same brush!”
Her voice had been rising and rising as her anger increased. Now little Solina stirred, lifted her head, and began to wail stridently. “Hush, dear, hush. Mama isn’t angry with you.” She gave me an apologetic sideways glance. “She is getting hungry. Soon I will have to feed her.”
“Must you start back to town then?” I asked stupidly.
For a long instant, she just stared at me and then I said, “Oh. Well, I’m certain that Kesey would be happy to offer you the privacy of his cabin for that.”
I gave her my hand to help her down from the cart. As we walked to the cabin, she said, “Sometimes I try to imagine my mother taking care of me as I take care of Solina. It’s hard. There were always maids and nannies and wet nurses when I was small. But I cannot imagine her carrying me and birthing me and not loving me as I love Solina. So sometimes I speak ill of her, but even when I do, I know that I love her. Isn’t that peculiar, Nevare? She is vain and arrogant, and well, more clever than intelligent. She does things I don’t admire at all. And still I love her. Do you think I’m weak or foolish?”
My mouth twisted in a smile. “Do you think I’m weak or foolish for still loving my father?”
“Not at all.” She smiled sadly. “It is so strange, Nevare. Yaril writes that your father now speaks as if he deliberately sent you off to be a soldier, and that soon you will come home ‘covered in glory.’ She says that there are just parts of the past that he doesn’t accept anymore. He no longer asks for your mother or the other children. But he persists in believing that you will be his noble soldier son and gain renown.” She sighed. “He is not unlike my mother in that regard. Did you know she has forgiven me for marrying Spink? She even sent me a letter.”
“She did? Epiny, that’s wonderful!”
She smiled wryly. “It was full of questions about the success of Lady Kester’s water business and the baths that are to be built there. She wanted to know if there would be special accommodations ‘for family.’”
She laughed aloud at the thought of her proud mother claiming Lady Kester as “family” and then, at my puzzled expression, exclaimed, “Oh, I haven’t had time to tell you about that, have I? Dr. Amicas took seriously what we told him. He made a long trek to Bitter Springs and took back casks of the water to study. No one knows why, but it does seem to prevent or lessen plague outbreaks. And as Spink and I can both attest, it does wonders for the survivors. He tested it first on the Academy cadets, the ones who had suffered ill health since the plague outbreak. When they showed signs of recovery, he ordered more water be sent, and recalled many of the cadets who had been sent home as invalids. The recoveries have been amazing.”
I thought of Trist and the others and looked at her wordlessly.
“What are you thinking?” she asked me, worried by my silence.
I sighed. “I’m happy for those who will now recover and regain their lives. But I have to confess, I’m thinking about fellows who won’t. Nate, for instance. Trent and Caleb. Oron.”
“Think, too, of those who won’t die because of it,” she counseled me solemnly. Then she grinned rather impishly and added, “And you might say that you rejoice in the change in the Kester family fortune. The demand for the water is incredible; people are using it as a tonic for all sorts of ills now, and several very wealthy families have made the trek to visit the spring itself and bathe in it. Lady Kester has hired workmen to build a spa there, with separate baths for ladies and gentlemen, and a hotel. Oh, it will be rustic at first, but the letter from Spink’s sister says that will be part of the charm. She complains that they never have enough bottles for the water, and that they must find a new supplier for them. And she also says that, thanks to the water, she has an offer for her hand. You may know him? He’s a friend of Spink’s. Rory Hart, soldier son of Lord and Lady Hart of Roundhills?”
“Rory? From the Academy? But he never got sick from the plague at all.”
“Perhaps not, but his younger brothers did. And his mother took them to Bitter Springs, where they recovered, and she met Spink’s family and pronounced them delightful. She says that Spink’s sister Gera is exactly the practical sort of girl that Rory needs to settle him down and keep him in order.”
“I don’t know who to feel sorry for, Rory or Gera,” I said, and Epiny cuffed me lightly.
“Neither one. Spink says he actually thinks they will be well suited to each other, when they meet.”
I shook my head, unwilling to imagine a girl who could settle Rory down and keep him in order. I wondered if she carried a club with her at all times. To Epiny I said, “It is almost frightening how fast everything seems to have changed. The world has gone on without me while I was away. I wonder how I will find a place in it again.” At that moment, it did not seem impossible that I should do just that.
“You are as much at fault as anyone for these changes. Without you, how many of them would have come about?” She halted, then added reassuringly, “And some parts of the world have not changed that much. Some parts still wait for you.” She smiled teasingly.
I quickly changed the subject. “You have told me all about my family and your parents and Spink’s family, but not mentioned a word about Spink and yourself. From what Kesey tells me, the regiment has been divided, and only a company of it remains here. What does Spink think of that?”
Her smile faded a bit, but determination came into her eyes. “It is not the best post he might have. He knew that when he accepted the commission. But Spink says we will make the best of it. With the depletion of officers here in Gettys, he sees an opportunity to rise in the ranks. There are rumors that we will soon receive new troops to bring us up to strength. Or that perhaps the rest of the regiment will be called back to the Midlands and some other regiment replace us here. It’s uncertain right now. Spink says that the King has much on his mind, with the gold discovery and a new treaty with the Landsingers. There has not been a formal decision to abandon the road, though Spink thinks that is what it will come to. Spink has told me that this is the lot of a soldier, regardless of his rank. Often he simply has to remain where he is and await new commands.” She gave a small sigh. “I confess, I would love to be almost anywhere else but here. Even without the magic soaking us with fear or despair, Gettys is a gloomy, primitive place. Sometimes it is hard to read the letters that come; it does seem as if everyone else’s lives have gone on, but I am trapped here, with the same work and worries, day after day.”
“The lot of a cavalla wife,” I said quietly.
“Yes,” she replied briskly. She took a breath and squared her shoulders. “And that is what I took upon myself when I married Spink. I know that. And I intend to make the best of it.”
She hesitated at the door to the cabin, and then turned to me, blushing prettily. “Would you—that is, could you ask Kesey to join you outside so that I could be alone with my baby for a time?”
“Of course,” I assured her.
Kesey surprised me by quickly deducing that Epiny needed to be alone to nurse her child. I didn’t have to spell it out for him, and he even made the excuse that we needed to fetch more water as I’d emptied the cask with all my “scrubbing round.” We each took a bucket as we left the cabin.
“So,” Kesey asked me curiously. “What are you going to do? You going to go into town with the Lieutenant’s wife?”
“Not now. Not like this.” I gestured down at my bizarre garb.
Kesey sniffed thoughtfully. “Your old stuff is still around, but it’s not going to fit you. One of my shirts might fit you. But not the trousers. Funny. You’re a lot taller than I thought. You seemed shorter when you were fat.”
“Taller and younger. Not a bad trade,” I said, and we both laughed. Then a silence fell between us, a silence filled with nothing to say and too much to say.
“Thank you,” I said at last.
“For a shirt? No need to thank me. It probably won’t even be all that clean.”
“No, thank you for everything. For thinking well of me when most people didn’t. For being willing to make me a part of the regiment.”
He made another deprecatory noise. “Wonder if we even are a regiment anymore, the way we’re getting spread out.”
“It’s like you told me before, Kesey. When things are down for a regiment is when the real soldiers hold their heads up and try harder.”
“Does that mean you’re going to come back to soldiering? Clear your name and put your uniform back on?”
“I’d like to,” I said, and my own words surprised me.
“Well then, I think—” he began, but at the same moment, we both turned toward the road that wound up the hill to the cemetery. A horse was coming, ridden hard, the rider low on his back, urging more speed out of him. We both recognized the rider at the same time. “I think Lieutenant Kester is mighty glad to hear that you’re back!” Kesey observed with a grin.
I had to smile, too, and then I went to meet Spink. I watched him come, an excellent rider on a mediocre mount. He was small and slight as ever, still looking more boy than man. When he drew in his horse just a few feet away from me, I was surprised. “A moustache? Epiny didn’t warn me to expect a moustache.” It looked good on him, but I wasn’t about to concede that to him without some mocking first.
He did not smile at my jest. He took a breath. “Nevare. I am so glad to see you.” He drew in another deep breath. “Amzil has been arrested. For murder.”