My father’s recovery was agonizingly slow. In the first week that followed the burials, he was almost completely unresponsive to me. I went daily to his bedside, to speak to him and report what was going on, but he looked away from me. After several experiences of moving to try to meet his gaze and having him simply turn his head away, I gave up. I stood at the foot of his bed each morning and each evening and gave him a report of all I’d done, as well as presenting the problems that awaited me on the morrow. Each time, I stood quietly when I finished speaking and waited for a response. Silence was always his reply. I tried to take it in stride and keep on functioning. The terrible tragedy that had befallen our family had ended, I felt, our battle of wills. There were more immediate things to worry about than why I was fat or if I would ever be a soldier.
Nita fared better with my father than I did. She took his meals to him, persuaded him to shave and bathe, and eventually moved him back into his own chambers. In retrospect, I believe he was suffering not just from his grief but also from a mild form of the plague. In later years, I would come to find that most people seldom fell victim to severe bouts of the plague twice, but that some sufferers would catch a milder form and then endure recurrent bouts in the years that followed.
Whatever the cause, my father was incapacitated for a month, and despite my own burden of grief, the tasks of running the estate fell upon me. What a whirlwind of work that time was. Everything demanded my attention at once, and I had few resources at first to apply to them. The servants had not fled far. Some had gone to neighboring landowners, who had either taken them in or afforded them refuge in rudimentary shelters on the outskirts of their holdings. Others had been living rough. They trickled back, shamefaced, a few each day, until we had about three-quarters of our former staff. What had become of the rest of them, death or simply that they had abandoned us, I was never to know.
I wrote to Dr. Amicas about my experience, for I knew he was still gathering all information he could on the disease. I speculated that the people scattering had perhaps cut down on the spread of the disease, but also that the swifter deaths we had experienced were due to the sick being left without caretakers. I could not tell if that had led to a lower percentage of deaths, and added that I did not suggest it as a routine response to the disease, as it seemed likely to me that if the servants had had other towns to flee to the chance of spreading the plague to large population centers would have been much greater.
It was not just people that I had to care for. At the same time, there were cattle, sheep, pigs, and chickens to be thought of. Most of our livestock had done well enough foraging, thanks to Sergeant Duril’s foresight in turning them loose, but some of our crops had suffered from their attentions. Every creature had to be gathered up and restored to its proper pen or paddock.
Yaril was foremost in my thoughts in those harried days. I longed to ride to Lord Poronte’s manor myself to see what had become of Cecile and my dear little sister, but I dared not leave my father. In the end, I dispatched Sergeant Duril as soon as he could ride. He took a messenger bird with him, and before the day was out, it returned with a green band on its leg to let me know my sister was alive.
The worst news came from beyond Franner’s Bend. Cayton’s Horse and Doril’s Foot were dead to a man. Two days past the Bend, they had begun to sicken. The officers had ordered a halt and set up an encampment. It became their graveyard. Franner’s Bend had been too deep in its own troubles to lend them any aid, and other travelers fled when they saw the yellow banners that warned of sickness in the camp. By the time anyone came to their aid, there was no one left to save. The commander had died at his field desk, a neat tally of his men’s death in his soldier son journal under his elbow. They’d managed to bury some of their dead; the rest of the bodies were burned in a funeral pyre. “If Gettys was hoping for more manpower this summer, well, they’ll have to do without it,” Duril observed grimly. “It looks like the King’s Road won’t be pushed forward much this year.”
I pitied them, but my heart was more beset with my own problems. True to my worries, the Landing had been devastated by the plague. As soon as I could, I ventured a visit there, and found a state of chaos. Many had died, and the town council had let the rabble take it over. There had been looting, and violence against the people suspected of bringing the plague to town. Entire families had perished, and in that dire situation, even good men had resorted to pilfering food, blankets, and valuables from the houses of the dead. I was at first at a loss as to what to do to restore order.
Sergeant Duril, who had become my de facto adviser, shrugged and suggested, “In hard times, folks are comforted by what they’re used to. Doesn’t matter if it’s porridge for breakfast or the same prayer each night. More than half that town was soldiers at one time or another. Put them back under military command until they remember how to run their own lives.”
I decided he was right. I told him to choose his men. That afternoon, we crossed to the Landing with Duril at my side and his men behind him. We rode our horses into the center of town. There, in as commanding a manner as I could muster, I called what was left of the town council to order in front of me in the street. In no uncertain terms, I told them my father had empowered Duril to select a dozen men he judged trustworthy to represent order. I told them that under my father’s authority, he would be using that patrol to impose martial law on the town, setting a curfew, boarding up unoccupied houses, commandeering and rationing supplies, and pressing a number of the more troublesome young men into service as gravediggers. Duril supplied the muscle; I kept the records, for I promised them that when the dust settled, people who cooperated would be reimbursed for whatever necessary supplies were seized. Despite my ungainly body, I did my best to strike a martial posture and suggest an authority that was mostly imaginary. I was a presence. I implied that Duril would report to me, and I would report to my father. This was true. What they didn’t know was that my father continued to stare at the wall silently while I made my reports.
It worked. It took only ten days of such tactics before the townspeople recovered their sense of lawfulness, and proved ready to resume running their own affairs. I let the surviving members of the town council know that they could report to me, and that if necessary, I would have Sergeant Duril and his patrol enforce whatever rules they thought needed for the town’s recovery. I took a great deal of satisfaction from that. I knew that the idea had been Duril’s and that he had supplied most of the discipline at the lowest level. But I had conducted myself as an officer and a gentleman, and it had worked. I was proud of myself, and imagined that when my father came back to himself, he would share that pride and sense of accomplishment.
That was but one of the tasks that busied me from morning to night, and every day there were dozens of others that scarcely seem worth mentioning, but demanded my immediate attention and a solution. I had thought I knew a great deal about the running of the manor. Only when the cistern went dry did I recall that keeping it full required several men, a wagon, a team of horses, and water casks filled from the river to replenish it on a weekly basis. Dozens of young fruit trees in the orchard had gone unwatered during the plague, but I swiftly restored boys to that task, and was able to save more than half of what my father had planted that year. Fences the cattle had broken down had to be mended.
To me fell the grim task of notifying friends and family of our losses. I wrote to my uncle, to Epiny and Spink, and to other relatives, and sent messages also to neighboring farms and holdings. I wrote to the head of Vanze’s order, telling him what had befallen our family and enclosing a personal letter to Vanze. I received in response a starchy response that Vanze was in meditation and isolation for a month, and that the news would be given to him when he returned. I sighed for my little brother, and then the other demands on my time claimed me. A brief letter from Dr. Amicas arrived, offering his condolences and suggesting strongly that I have any bedding and hangings in plague chambers burned, for fear that they might hold contagion. After I had carried out his order, I looked at my mother’s stripped room and my heart misgave me. The smell of death lingered elsewhere in the house, so I ordered a thorough cleaning of every room.
Although most of our servants and hired folk had wandered back to us, certain key people had disappeared, and it fell to me to decide who would take on those tasks. Some of our people had suffered through the plague, and though they were recovering, they were scarcely ready to take up the full burdens of their usual chores. Impulsively, I moved Nita up to be the head of our housekeeping, and quickly discovered that although she was loyal and intelligent, it did not make her adept at making everything function smoothly. But I did not know how to demote her without insulting her, nor who I could put in her place if I did. So we limped along under her haphazard supervision.
I found my father’s ledger books and his keys and did the best that I could to keep records up to date and to spend only what we needed. It was not easy, and I often wondered how he, a soldier, had so effortlessly managed all this business of being a noble. I had never imagined that it required so much accounting, let alone such a plethora of managing people. Daily I prayed to the good god that my father would recover and take these burdens from my shoulders.
Two weeks after I had buried my dead, I decided that the household was close enough to normalcy that I would fetch my sister Yaril home from the Poronte manor. I ordered up the carriage, and made the same trip that only a few months ago had taken us to my brother’s wedding. Now I went to visit his widow. I wore my best clothing, the suit that my mother had made for me for Rosse’s wedding. It was now uncomfortably tight on me.
The plague had passed the Poronte estates by. It was strange to see an aspect of normality when I arrived. Men were working in the fields, cattle grazed peacefully, and the liveried servant who opened the door smiled a gracious welcome. Even so, when I entered the chambers that had been so full of flowers and music at my last visit, I found them decked for mourning. Cecile’s parents came to meet me in their parlor. I formally thanked Lord and Lady Poronte for taking in my sister. They replied awkwardly that it was the least they could do for Yaril at such a dreadful time.
I had expected to bring both Cecile and Yaril home with me. But Cecile’s mother begged me to allow her daughter to stay until the greatest blackness of her grief had passed. She said that the shock of passing from the joys of being newly wed to the horrors of disease and widowhood had been too much for Cecile’s gentle spirit. She had been bedridden for days after she arrived there, and even now only rose for a few hours each day. She needed time, her mother said, time to recover and find her way into her sad new life. I wondered uneasily if they intended to let Cecile return at all. It was Cecile’s duty to return to her husband’s home and take up the management of it, but I did not have the heart to demand that. Instead I said that when my father was better, they could all take counsel together to decide what was best.
I was disappointed that Yaril had not come to greet me, but Cecile’s mother told me they had asked her to wait in the garden until “things were settled.” With the matter of Cecile decided, they released me to find her. When I saw Yaril walking alone on the sandy path between the meticulously tended herb knots, my heart went out to her. She looked so small and so young in her deep blue mourning dress. “Yaril?” I said softly, prepared to discover that she was still disgusted with me.
At my voice, she whirled about. There were dark circles under her eyes and she had lost flesh, but even so her face lit up and she ran toward me. I wanted to catch her up and whirl her about as I used to do when she was much younger. Instead she crashed into me and then clung to the front of my shirt with both hands, rather like a little squirrel trying to climb the trunk of a massive tree. I hugged her awkwardly, and for a moment we didn’t speak at all. I stroked her hair and patted her back, and after a moment, she lifted a tearstained face to me. “Elisi didn’t die, did she? That was a mistake, wasn’t it?”
“Oh, Yaril,” I said, and that was all I needed to say. She put her face against my chest again, her fists tightened on my shirt, and her shoulders heaved. After an endless time, she said, “We’re all alone now, Nevare. Just you and me.”
“We still have father,” I pointed out to her. “And Vanze.”
Her voice was full of bitterness. “Vanze belongs to the priests now. Our family gave him away. I never had Father. You did, for a time, while you were a good little soldier boy. But now you are worthless to him. You have even less value than I do. No, Nevare. We are alone. And I’m sorry for how I treated you. I’m sorry. It just seemed that Carsina and Remwar would not like me if I sided with you. And so I abandoned you, my own brother. And then, at home, if anyone said one good thing about you, Father became furious. He and Mother fought so much about that…she’s gone. They’ll never fight about anything again.”
I wanted to tell her that somehow we would find a way through the difficulties we now faced. I knew that someday we would again have a life that seemed normal and routine, even boring. Boredom sounded so attractive to me now. I tried to imagine a day when a dozen problems didn’t confront me and sorrow did not weight my every breath. I could not conceive of it.
“Come,” I finally said with a sigh. “Let’s go home.” I took her small hand in mine and led her to say our farewells to the Porontes.
Our lives did resume. Young as she was, Yaril still knew more about the internal workings of the household than I did, and proved to be effective at undertaking dire reforms when needed. She removed Nita as head of housekeeping by deftly putting her in sole charge of my father’s well-being, and replaced her with a woman who had been a maid with the family for years and knew what was required to run the household. I suspected that she also took the private opportunity to reward those servants who had befriended her over the years and rebuke those who had treated her as insignificant within the family. I let her do as she saw fit. I was only too happy to allow Yaril to assume responsibility for the household, for not only did she make things run more smoothly, but also it kept her from dwelling on all we had lost.
Yaril grasped that a return to schedules would be best for us. She immediately reinstated regular meal served at the table, and assumed the role of leading Sixday worship for the women. I followed her example guiltily; I had not even considered assuming that responsibility, and our worship had become a very slipshod observation of the forms. I realized how important it was for us to offer thanks to the good god for our survival when I heard the women and men of our household let loose the tears they had restrained until then. Ceremony and form, I reminded myself, gave shape and meaning to our lives. I resolved never to forget that again.
As for the meals, Yaril’s insistence on a return to normality there was a delight to me. It seemed like years since I’d had the pleasure of sitting down to a carefully planned meal in which the flavors and textures complemented each other. My deprivation had schooled me to a far more sophisticated appreciation of food than I’d ever had before. Having realized that even foods as simple as bread and water could be enjoyed, well-prepared food now nearly paralyzed me with delight. A sauce could send shivers up my spine. A contrast in flavors in a simple salad could plunge me into a sudden, rapt reverie. Unless I concentrated on keeping pace with Yaril, a meal could take me three times as long to consume as it did her. Sometimes I would look up from my soup to find her regarding me with a mixture of amusement and worry. At such moments, I felt ashamed of letting my senses carry me into a world of my own. Yaril and I were in this predicament together, and it was up to us to create an ongoing life for ourselves.
There were times when it felt like an elaborate pretense. Each evening, I escorted her into dinner. I would seat Yaril at the table and then move to my accustomed place. Around us, the empty chairs gaped at us. I felt as if we had returned to our days of tea parties in the garden, when Yaril and Elisi had always pretended to be great ladies and welcomed me solemnly to their gatherings. Could this really be all that was left of my family? After dinner, when we would seek refuge in the music room, Elisi’s harp stood silent and watching us. In the parlor, my mother’s chair was empty. There seemed no room where the absent did not outnumber the living people.
Then, one evening, Yaril instituted a change. I was shocked when our soup was a cream one, a type my father had always despised. Yaril eliminated the fish course, something she had always dreaded. When we rose from our meal, she announced calmly that we would be having our coffee in the garden. When I followed her there, I noted with approval that she had had a net pavilion erected to frustrate the mosquitoes that the little glass lamps would attract. Within the pavilion was a table with only two chairs. A flower arrangement and a deck of cards and a pot of markers were already set out for us. As I stared, a servant brought the coffee service out to us on a small side table. Yaril smiled at my astonishment. “Shall we play?” she asked me.
And for the first time since the plague had passed us, we shared a pastime, and made wagers and even laughed a bit.
And so the days passed, one after another. I controlled the estate and Yaril ran the household. I realized how completely Yaril had stepped into my mother’s position when she informed me one night over dinner that she had sent for a seamstress and that tomorrow I was to be measured for new clothing. I didn’t know what to say for a moment. I blushed hot. Every garment I had was stretched and strained at the seams. It was not a trivial matter for me; in some places I was chafed raw, and yet it had happened so gradually that I had not taken any steps to correct it.
She shook her head at my humiliation. “Nevare, you have no idea how uncomfortable you look. Just looking at how your clothing binds you distresses me. You can’t walk around looking like that in front of the hired men, let alone when company comes. We have to do something about it. That’s all there is to it.”
I looked at my plate in front of me. I had just eaten a large meal, but not outrageously large. Still, stupidly, I said, “I’ve been putting it off. New clothing, I mean. I keep hoping I’ll regain my shape and be able to fit into my old garments again.” And the words that I had intended as an excuse were, I suddenly recognized, the absolute truth. I was still waiting for something that would restore me to the way I had been. A miracle was required, and I suddenly knew I was not going to get one.
“I am glad that you intend that,” my sister said quietly. “And if you would try harder to do so, I’d be ever so proud of you. Not that I think you, well, not that I think you eat like a pig. I see you each day, Nevare. You work hard. And I don’t see you eating gluttonously. Well…that is, your meals are generous, but Mother always said that you boys would eat more than we women did, and even more so when you were working. But, of course, you should strive to regain your physique.
“But in the meantime,” she went on very seriously, “you must look presentable. So. Please come to the sewing room tomorrow at ten o’clock.”
And that was that. My new suits were all in the deep blues and blacks of mourning, but that was only fitting. It was such a relief to put on a shirt that didn’t strain at the collar and would reach around my belly to button. Of my own volition, I sent for the cobbler from the Landing, and had myself fitted for new shoes and a pair of boots. Having clothing that fit made me look much better. The fabric straining across my ample flesh had made me look fatter.
I did not enjoy the work of running the manor, but there was satisfaction in doing it well. I sketched out the plans for new ferry landings and entrusted them to men capable of following them. I worked hard, ate well, and slept deeply at night. There was meaning in my life once more, and the companionship of my sister. For a time, I was content, and did not think beyond having the hay cut and stacked, and deciding how many pigs should be slaughtered for the winter’s bacon.
When the ferry landings were completed, I made a trip across, to be sure they functioned as I had intended. I was well pleased, for my design had eliminated the muddy track that had once led down to the boats and my new floating dock facilitated the loading and unloading of the vessels. Once on the town side, I decided to visit the council. I found the Landing running smoothly and beginning to recover its prosperity and hope for the future. The keenest pleasure of that evening came when the council members thanked me for my intervention and commended Sergeant Duril for doing an excellent job in a difficult situation. The old sergeant, who often accompanied me on my rounds, blushed like a boy. The impromptu meeting turned into a meal together at the largest inn in Burvelle Landing, simply called the Landing Inn. The meal stretched into an evening of drinking, at which a number of townsfolk and several of Duril’s patrol joined us as the night progressed.
We drank too much, of course. For me it was the first time to unleash my restraint and talk, as a man among men, about all that had befallen both manor and town. As the hours trickled by, both jackets and tongues were loosened. It was not the first time I had ever been drunk, but it certainly became the drunkest I had ever been. Perhaps the company of relative strangers was what made it so easy. The talk wandered from the plague and the aftermath to talk of beautiful women, and drinking, and easy women, and my academy experience and gambling and fickle women and true women. My rotundity was the object of not only curiosity but also jesting, some of it pointed but most of it good-natured. I had had enough to drink that none of it seemed too important. To the ones who seemed intent on needling me, I responded with what seemed at the time acid wit and endless good nature. Everyone laughed with me. For that night my fate did not seem so hard. It almost seemed that I received double credit for having stepped in and restored order to the town, for not only had I done it while being young but I’d done it while being fat. We drank until long past midnight, and I only set down my mug when Sergeant Duril was tipsily insisting that we had to return to the manor for the night. Arms about each other, we left the last tavern, and grandly commandeered the ferry for an unscheduled crossing to our side of the river. We had a long walk home from the ferry landing, and by the time we reached the manor, I felt nearly sober. Such was not the case for Duril, and I actually put the good sergeant into his bed before retiring to my own. He awoke the next morning with a terrible hangover, but to my amazement, I slept well, and when I rose I seemed none the worse for wear.
After that, at least once a week I would go into town to speak with the council and to have a few beers at one of the taverns afterward. It was very pleasant to socialize, and though I didn’t patronize the tavern whores, it was flattering to be the subject of their flirtatious attentions. I might have been more tempted to indulge myself except that Sergeant Duril inevitably accompanied me, and the habit of behaving myself in his presence was still strong.
At the manor, things were much quieter. Yaril refused all invitations sent to us. Looking back on it, I realize now that we isolated ourselves, retreating into a world we could control. Eventually, there was a letter from Vanze, but his grief seemed almost abstract, as he saw it through the focus of religion and philosophy. Yaril was angry and hurt when she read it, but I think I understood his reaction. He’d been born to be a priest, and a priest’s business was to find the good god’s will and wisdom in everything. If he could apply it to what had befallen our family and take comfort from it, then I would not begrudge it to him.
The most annoying piece of correspondence I received was an arrogant note from Caulder Stiet’s uncle, addressed to my father, blithely informing us that he and Caulder would be visiting us in the spring. He was confident that we would be glad to welcome them as houseguests and looked forward to studying the geology of Widevale. As he did not think their blooded saddle horses would be appropriate for cross-country terrain, he would be obliged to borrow some rougher mounts for their expedition. The man’s assumptions grated on me, and I fired off a letter that mentioned our family losses and implied that plague was rampant in our area. I suggested he should find another location for his holiday. My missive was courteous, but barely so.
My father received letters from my Uncle Sefert. I longed to read them, but they were addressed only to my father and I had them taken directly up to him. If he replied, I never saw the outgoing posts.
There was another long letter from Spink and Epiny, written in her hand. Her condolences on my losses were heartfelt. The rest of her note was full of news, incredibly good news that filled me with jealousy and frustration. My uncle had decided that Spink deserved a second chance at his career as a soldier son. Epiny did not write that her father was trying to buy a better life for her, but I was certain that was the case. My uncle had been impressed with the devotion Spink had shown in nursing Epiny through her illness and so he had purchased a commission for Spink. It was not an excellent one; it was with the Farleyton regiment, currently stationed on the border at Gettys. Spink and Epiny would travel there by wagon, and once there, Spink would become Second Lieutenant Kester. They had been warned that he would most likely be assigned to Supply, but Epiny was already certain that his commander would immediately recognize Spink’s potential and soon transfer him to interesting tasks.
Her letter was one long dither about packing, what to take, what to leave, how she must learn to behave as an officer’s wife, how overjoyed Spink was, and yet he felt humbly indebted to her father, and her worry that in his drive to impress his superiors Spink might jeopardize his recovered health. She confided to me that she was convinced now of the healing properties of Bitter Springs, and had spent a good portion of their savings on blue glass bottles and stoppers, for she intended to take a gross of dosages of spring water with her. The folk of Gettys suffered much from the plague and she was most anxious to see if the bottled water could relieve or perhaps prevent the disease. She went on for pages on what she hoped their quarters would be like and whether there would be other young wives to socialize with, and perhaps families so that when the good god finally blessed her with pregnancy she would be around women experienced in births and babies.
I tried to smile over her pages, but all I could think was that Spink had been given a second chance, one that I would have given my eyeteeth for. For the very first time, it occurred to me that I could take money from my father’s account and do the same for myself. The dishonorable temptation lasted only for one sharp moment, and yet envy would nag at me for days afterward.
Spink’s part of the letter was more restrained than Epiny’s. Farleyton had once been a crack regiment, renowned for their valor in numerous campaigns. Since they’d been posted to Gettys, their star had dimmed substantially. Rumor said that numerous desertions and dereliction of duty had tarnished the regiment’s reputation. Still, he was glad to accept his commission there. “Beggars can’t be choosers,” he wrote me. “I always dreamed that I’d join a regiment where I could rise swiftly. Farleyton’s Horse may well be it. Wish me luck and say a prayer for me.”
I did both, and tried to do them without an envious heart.
Every evening, Yaril had a place set for my father at the dinner table, always in the hope (or dread) that he might deign to join us. As the harvest progressed, my father improved but still kept to his room. When I tapped at his door each day and then entered, I usually found him sitting in a chair by the window, staring out over his lands. He still refused to look at me, and I still persisted in giving him my daily reports. Once he had confined me to my room to try to break me; now he confined himself to his room, but I felt his intention was the same. I felt that his grief over his losses had been consumed by his anger at his fate.
He did not treat Yaril so coldly. Her lot was harder. When she first returned to Widevale, she had gone to see him, and he had burst into tears at the sight of her, safe and healthy. But his tears of joy at receiving the daughter who was left to him soon turned to tears of anguish over all he had lost. She sat with him daily, and daily he would recount his misery and despair. All he had striven for his entire life had been snatched away from him. She would emerge from her sessions with him pale and drained. Sometimes, she told me, he would rant against fate; at other times, he bade her pray with him, that the good god might show him a path through his misfortune.
My father’s life had come to a dead end. His heir was gone, his soldier son a failure, his wife dead, his elder daughter gone. His game board had been swept clean of all powerful pieces, leaving him only pawns to manipulate. He agonized over who would inherit his estate, and endlessly dreaded a lonely dotage. He considered petitioning the king to allow him to move Vanze up from priest son to heir. But he was too much of a traditionalist to relish that idea. The next day would find him declaring that he would look among my cousins for a likely heir, a young man he could bring to Widevale and raise as a fit heir.
In between such ranting, he would fashion various fates for Yaril. His only daughter was precious to him now, he told her, for whoever wed her would be his sole ally. He would find an heir son for her, perhaps even an old noble’s son. Then the next night he would tearfully say she was all he had left, and that he could never allow her to wed for she must look after him in his failing years.
One evening after a late game of cards she confided to me that she was weary to death of those discussions. I shrugged my shoulders. “Well, in all rightness, Cecile still has a duty to our family. She should come back here, and take the burden of running the household off your shoulders.”
Yaril looked at me as if I were mad. “You aren’t serious?”
“She is Rosse’s widow. We made a bride-gift to her family. She is a Burvelle now.”
“Well, she can just be a Burvelle in her mother’s house! Prissy, primpy Cecile in charge of my life and our home? Afraid-of-her-shadow Cecile, always wanting to chop off some poor bird’s head so her scary old gods won’t do something awful to her? It was bad enough when Mother was alive to keep her in check. But to have her put over me, in my own home? No. No, Nevare. Leave her where she is, and good riddance.”
I’d had no idea that Yaril had felt such animosity toward Cecile. I’m afraid it amused me. I grinned as I said, “So. I see now why Carsina was chosen for me; she was someone you are already friends with. Less potential for fireworks in the family.”
I had meant it as a jest, but it was the first time Carsina’s name had been mentioned between us. Yaril narrowed her eyes at me. “That bitch!” she said with great feeling.
I was shocked. “Carsina? I thought you were friends.”
She scowled. “As did I. I thought keeping her friendship was the most important thing in the world, more important than my brother, even. I turned my back on you, to commiserate with her about how you had embarrassed her at Rosse’s wedding. I supported her in insisting that your marriage agreement be dissolved. I was so shallow, Nevare. But she served me as I deserved. No sooner was her family free of their commitment to you than she set her sights on Remwar! She knew how I felt about him! She knew that he had promised me that he’d ask his father to talk to our father as soon as he could get him into a good mood! But the last I heard, he was finding every excuse to visit her family as often as he could.”
My mind had snagged on her earlier words. I scarcely noticed what she said about Remwar. “Our marriage agreement is dissolved? How long ago did that happen?”
She looked at me with sudden pity. “Didn’t Father speak to you about it? He told the family at dinner one night, soon after Rosse’s wedding. He was stiff with fury, but said he could not blame them. He’d said you’d eaten yourself out of a career and a marriage…Oh, Nevare, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to speak of it that way. I just wish that, well, that you’d never let yourself go this way. Why did you do it? The cavalla was what you wanted more than anything else.”
“I didn’t do it.” I looked at her. We sat in the netted darkness of our pavilion. The oil lamp on the table made a small orb of light around us. A light breeze carried the scent of the night-blooming flowers in the garden and the greener smell of the pond. It suddenly seemed that we two were alone in the whole wide world, and perhaps we were. I began talking, and found myself telling my little sister the entire tale. She listened in rapt wonder, her eyes wide, and when I reached the moment where I stepped off the cliff’s edge at Dewara’s urging, she shivered and reached across the table to take my hand.
By the time I finished the account, she had moved to sit close beside me as if I were telling ghost stories. She heard of my dual days at the academy, about Epiny’s séance and her concerns for me, and of Dark Evening and the Specks’ Dust Dance. I told her of my final battle with Tree Woman, and how the Spindle had stopped dancing and even how I had found Dewara and how he had died. She listened with rapt attention. In the silence that followed, as frogs and crickets creaked and peeped, she took a breath. “Are you making this up, Nevare?” she asked me. “Are you teasing me?”
“Yaril, I swear I am not,” I said with great feeling. “As I have said, so it has been. The changes in my body are not my fault, and I do not believe there is anything I can do to change myself back, unless I resort to seeking out a magic user. And so far, that has availed me little.”
Her reaction completely surprised me. “I must meet our Cousin Epiny! She sounds amazing. May I write to her?”
“I’m sure she’d be delighted to hear from you,” I said weakly. “I’ll give you her address tonight.”
Yaril seemed much more entranced with Epiny’s role and adventurous spirit than with what had befallen me. Yet it comforted me that she had completely become my ally again. I think that Yaril and I could have gone on like that indefinitely. I could have immersed myself in the running of the estate and forgotten my military ambitions. Yaril was both competent and content in her position. We had not forgotten our sorrows and loss, but we were healing, we two.
But one night, without warning, my father descended to join us at dinner. He came alone, pushing open the heavy wooden door to the dining room and clinging to it as he tottered in. For all the weakness that showed in his bearing, he had still prepared for this moment. He was immaculately dressed and shaved, with his hair carefully combed. Strange that it was only when he entered the dining room, properly attired for the evening meal, that I suddenly saw that the plague had aged him. He was thinner than he had been and his hair had gone grayer. As he approached the table, Yaril and I were as guiltily silent as children caught in mischief. He dragged out his chair at the head of the table, scraping it across the polished floor with obvious effort, and then seated himself at the place that Yaril had always had set for him.
Yaril was the first to recover. She took up the small bell beside her plate. “Father! I’m so glad to see you well enough to join us. Shall I ring for soup for you?”
He had been staring at me in a flat, ominous way. Now he turned his gaze on her. “That is what one usually does when one comes to table. One eats. Yes, dear daughter, by all means, send for some soup for the old, useless man.”
Yaril’s mouth hung open. The color drained from her face. Then she took an audible breath and rang her bell. When the servant came in, she said calmly, “My father has come down to dinner. Please find him a soup to begin with; he will not enjoy the cream one.”
The man bobbed a bow to her. “I have a beef stock simmering.”
“That would be fine. Thank you.”
My father was silent through this interchange, and held his peace until the door had swung shut behind the serving man. Then he glared at us. “Well. Isn’t this a pretty picture? Playing lord and lady of the manor, are we?”
I kept my cowardly mouth shut. Yaril didn’t. Color came back to her face as two spots of pink on her cheeks. “We have done our best to go on, Father, yes. Does that offend you? We thought that you would be pleased that we had kept the estate operating and the household functioning during your convalescence.”
“While the cat’s away, the mice will play,” he replied heavily. As if he had said something of great import, he nodded around the table, surveying us and then each of the empty chairs in turn. Then he pierced me with a stare. “I know more than you think I do, Nevare, you great fat slug. Do you think I’ve lain idle in my bed up there, day after day, while you trotted about playing the great man, giving orders, writing notes on my money, and changing things without my permission? No. I have not! I’ve been out and about, in the wee hours of the dawn when sleep runs away from an old man such as I. A few of the servants retain their loyalty to me. They’ve told me all your mischief. I’ve seen your fancy ferry docks. And I’ve marked how you put your mother and my heir and your older sister in the ground, right next to the common servants! I’ve seen your little party tent in the garden. I know what you’ve been up to, and I see the path that you’re trying to lead Yaril down.
“The city corrupted you. I sent them an honest soldier son, well schooled and ready to serve the king. And what do they send back to me? A swine, bursting out of his uniform, corrupt to the spine! I had the bad conduct reports from Colonel Stiet. He saw you as a coward and a sneak. Fool that I was, I was outraged that he could suggest such a thing.” He shook his head. “Colonel Stiet was right. The city tempted you and you fell. Stuffing your body with food. Fornicating with savages. Eschewing the role that the good god had given you. And why? I could not fathom why. I had raised you well. I had believed that you’d set your heart on the same lofty goals I had for you. But now I know. I’ve had plenty of time to puzzle it out, lying in my bed and staring at the wall. The corruption runs deep, doesn’t it, Nevare? Corruption, greed, and jealousy.
“You saw those desperate nobles flaunt the will of the good god. When their heirs died, they raised their soldier sons to that position. You became jealous of Rosse, jealous of your brother and his place. You wanted to be the heir! So you made yourself unfit to soldier, came home, and waited, hoping for just such a disaster as befell us. And now you think you will dump his body in the ground and rise up to take his place. Don’t you? Don’t you?”
His diatribe took my breath away. I looked at Yaril to see what she thought. Her face was white with shock. Another mistake.
“See how deep the corruption runs! Your father asks you a question, and instead of replying honestly, you secretly confer with each other. How long have you plotted against me, Nevare? For months? Or for years? How deep have you pulled Yaril into your schemes?”
“He’s mad,” I said softly. I honestly believed that he was. Yaril’s eyes widened and she shook her head, a wordless warning. I should have bowed my head and apologized to my father. Instead, I met his eyes. They were fairly bulging from his head with outrage.
“I loved Rosse, Father. I have never plotted against you. I have never wanted any future save the one that the good god decreed, to be your soldier son. All I have done since Rosse’s death, I have done as a placeholder, a steward of estates that will never belong to me. Is that not the duty of a soldier son, Father, as you taught it to me? That in times of disaster, he comes home from serving the king to protect his father’s or his brother’s holdings? I have made no claim of ownership or authority. All that I ordered, I did in your name. If you review the ledgers and speak to your overseers, you will find that I have run the estate exactly according to the example you set me.”
A servant, silent as a ghost, flowed into the room, set a bowl of steaming soup before my father, and drifted out again. The silence held until the door swung shut behind him. Then I spoke again before my father could.
“As for the graves of Mother and Rosse and Elisi…yes. It is as you say. If you had given me other orders, I would have done differently, according to your will. I did seek you out, I did speak to you, but you did not reply. And so I buried them simply. I did not think to separate them from the humble folk who had served them so well in life. That I buried them quickly was not lack of respect but necessity. Their bodies were…Father, I had to bury them immediately. By the time Duril freed me from my locked room, they were…well, you were there. You know.” I glanced at Yaril, imploring her silence. I had kept from her that her mother’s body had lain unburied for days, decomposing into her bedding. She did not need to hear that Elisi had died reaching for water, unattended by family or servant. It was hard enough for me to know those things. I would not inflict them on my sister. I looked at him evenly, waiting for him to admit that what I said was true.
He stared flatly back at me. “I was ill. You didn’t say a word to me about the graves. I trusted you, Nevare. I trusted you to do what was right.”
“I did my best, Father! The servants had fled. Those who remained were weak or still sick. I did my best to step up and take command of the situation.”
“You wrapped them in blankets and tumbled them into their graves. You didn’t even trouble with coffins. You gave your mother’s body to the worms, as if she were some pauper found in the gutter. You held no prayers, you made no offerings. They don’t even have stones to mark them!
“You shoved them in the earth to be forgotten. And then you and your sister proceeded to enjoy yourselves, to take for yourselves what had belonged to your betters.”
I glanced at Yaril. I had heard her gasp for breath several times as my father painted his ugly images into her mind. She was shaking. Anger flooded me at what he was doing to her. “Trusted me? Trusted me? You left me locked in my room to starve! I went days without food or water, and no one gave a thought to me. If Sergeant Duril hadn’t come looking for my body, I’d be dead, too. Would that have pleased you?”
He looked back at me, his eyes as flat as a fish’s. Then he turned to Yaril and said, “He’s lying. He’s obviously lying. Does he look to you as if he has been starved? He’s trying to turn you against me, Yaril. He wants you to agree with him, to say I’m mad. Then he could petition the king to take control of the estate. And then he’d find a way to have himself declared heir.”
Yaril had bunched her napkin up in her hands. With both hands, she held it up before her mouth. She was shaking as if we’d doused her with cold water. I could barely understand her words. “Stop this. Stop!” She sounded as if she couldn’t catch her breath. “I don’t know anything. I don’t want anything except for this to stop. Stop fighting!” She leapt up from her chair, took two steps toward the door, and then collapsed, weeping, on the floor. I was shocked. She had seemed so strong, so recovered of late. I had not guessed how close she was to breaking. She tried to rise as I stood up. When she could not stand, she tried futilely to escape by crawling toward the door.
I hurried to her. Awkwardly, I went down on one knee and then, with an effort, raised us both. She trembled in my grasp, and sobs shook her with each breath she took. Her eyes were closed. Her hands still gripped her napkin convulsively. My arm around her shoulders held her upright. I spoke flatly. “I am taking my sister to her room. She is overcome. You have judged me wrongly, Father, and judged Yaril even more unjustly. We have been nothing but loyal and devoted to our family throughout the hardship. We are all you have left. Why do you want to turn us against each other?”
We were nearly at the dining room door when he let fly his last volley of barbed words.
“I know why you want her good favor, Nevare. I know why you coddle the sister you earlier ignored. You know that the man she marries may very well be your last refuge when you are old and need a shelter for your fat and doddering years. You know you won’t find it with me, don’t you? Because I disown you. I know everything you’ve done, every disgraceful deed: posturing about my Landing, pretending to be a proper soldier, giving orders, and swaggering about. Do you think I haven’t heard of your drunken carousing in my Landing? I know how you shamed my name there, drinking with peasants and whores! You ruined my dreams for you! You are nothing to me. Nothing! Nothing!”
At his words, Yaril broke free from my grasp. She fled from the room. I turned to face him. I drew myself up tall and straight and met his gaze. “As you command me, sir,” I said coldly. Deliberately, I saluted him.
It threw him into frenzy. “You great sack of blubber! How dare you salute me! You’ll never be a soldier. You’ll never be anything. You’re nothing! Nothing! I take back my name from you! I take back from you your right to say you’re my son.”
His words should have horrified me and frozen me with terror. Instead I was flooded with a sensation that was now becoming too familiar. The magic roiled in my blood and rejoiced as it spoke. “Take it all back and welcome to it, old man. It has been years since I belonged to you. Take care of yourself. I won’t be around to do that anymore. I’ve a destiny to fulfill, and it isn’t here.”
I cannot explain the sense of destiny I felt when I said those words. I felt power shimmer all around me. No task was beyond my ability to do. There was no anger in my voice. I stated my thoughts calmly, and when I looked at the gaunt old man at the head of the table, he was suddenly no longer my father. He was thin and querulous and entirely bereft of authority over me. All this time, I’d thought I’d needed him. But the opposite was true. He’d needed me to fulfill his dreams, and when I had grown fat, I’d taken that from him. I didn’t need him. I had a life of my own, and it called to me.
As I turned to leave the room, he lifted his soup bowl and banged it on the table at me, like a thwarted child. “Get out of my house! Get out! Get out!”
He was still shouting those words, over and over, when I let the door close behind me. Yaril was standing frozen outside the dining room, her hands knotted into fists and curled against her chest. She looked as if she could not breathe. “Come with me,” I said, and when she did not move, I stooped and lifted her bodily. She whimpered like a baby and curled up in my arms. It was awkward to carry her because of my own bulk, but at least I did not lack for strength. Her weight was nothing to me as I bore her up the stairs and to her room. I managed to get the door open, and only bumped her head lightly on the door frame as I carried her in. I set her down on her bed. She curled into a tighter ball there, and sobbed harder than ever.
I looked around the room. I pulled her dainty white-painted chair out from her secretary, and then knew it would never hold my weight. Gingerly, I sat down on the foot of her bed. It creaked in response. “Yaril. Yaril? Listen to me. You and I know what is true. We have done nothing shameful. We have both done the best we could, while that hateful old man huddled in his bed and did nothing. He has no right to rebuke us. None at all.”
She only sobbed harder. I didn’t know what to do. Just an hour ago, she had been a strong young woman defying disaster with spirit and courage. Had that all been a show for me? It horrified me that my father could so quickly reduce her to a shambles. It was a double horror that he would do so. I recalled my earlier skepticism when my Cousin Epiny had told me that a woman’s life was very different from my own, that in many ways she was a valuable asset to be bartered off to the highest bidder. I had scoffed at her, but tonight, witnessing the horrible power my father had over Yaril, I had a glimmer of understanding. I sighed and helplessly patted my sister’s shoulder until she had sobbed herself out.
Eventually, she quieted. My belly betrayed me by growling softly. For an instant I thought of the lovely dinner we had abandoned: prairie fowl with an onion stuffing was to have been the main course. Vindictively, I hoped my father would choke on it. My belly growled again, more loudly, and to my surprise, Yaril gave a stifled laugh. Her shoulder muscles relaxed, she gave a great sigh, and sat up on the bed next to me. “He’s a vile man.” She spoke the accusation hopelessly.
“He’s our father,” I said reflexively. I wondered if he was that to me anymore. Probably not.
“He’s our father,” she said, accepting the correction. “And he’s a vile man and still I love him, and long to have his regard and approval. Can you understand that, Nevare?”
“I can. Because I feel much the same way about him.”
“Oh, I don’t think so. Not like I have.” She pushed her hair back from her wet face. I offered her my handkerchief. She took it and matter-of-factly dried her face. As she gave it back to me, she shook her head wearily. “I’ve always been the ‘extra’ daughter, Nevare. Always striving for any crumb of approval I could win from him. When he turned on you, I joined him. Some part of me even felt glad that you had finally done something disgraceful and fallen out of his favor. Because your failure gave me a better chance with Father. There. Now you know what a coward and a weakling I am.”
A year ago, her words would have shocked me. Now I understood them. “I always took his favor for granted,” I admitted. “Not that I didn’t work hard to be exactly what he expected me to be. I did. And I worried, often, that he was secretly disappointed in me. But for all that, I still always believed he loved me. I never thought that he would—” And to my horror, my throat closed up on my words. Yaril’s distress had distracted me. Now the impact of my father disowning me hit me like a musket ball. I wanted to run back down the stairs, fall on my knees before him, and implore him to change his mind.
Yaril looked at me as if she heard my thoughts. “He’ll never change his mind. He’s too proud. He’ll stand by what he’s said, even when he knows it’s stupid and wrong. He’s broken it all, for all of us. What are we going to do, Nevare? Whatever are we going to do?”
The words came to me slowly and fell from my lips like stones. “I’ll have to leave. There is nothing else I can do.” I swallowed past a sudden lump in my throat. Other words came out before I even thought to say them. “I should have left a long time ago, and then none of this would have happened. When I first found out I was dismissed from the academy, I should have run away east. To the forest, where I belong.”
“What?” Yaril demanded, distraught.
“I meant the frontier. Where I could make a new life for myself.” But that wasn’t what I had meant at all. Like a shadow unfurling, for a moment my Speck self had seized my tongue and spoken to her. I could not imagine a worse time for him to assert his presence. A fresh wave of misery washed over me as I tried to comprehend the full disaster of my father turning me out.
Yaril made it worse. “I have to go with you, Nevare. No matter where you go. You can’t leave me here. You can’t. I’ll die.”
“Don’t say that! You know I can’t take you with me. I don’t even know where I’m going or what I’m going to do. I can’t take you into a situation like that.” As I said the words, I knew what I had to do. I must obey the good god’s will. I had to enlist as a soldier. Franner’s Bend was the closest military post. I could start there, and build a new life. I instantly rejected that idea. I would go as far away from my father as I could and build a new life where if I failed or disgraced myself, only I would bear the shame.
“If you leave me, I’ll die, Nevare. Or I’ll go mad. Don’t go off and leave me alone with that crazy, vile man.”
The first thought that came to me was that she had to stay, because otherwise our father would be left all alone. Despite all, I thought that too cruel to consider. “He isn’t himself,” I said instead. “Grief has turned his mind. In time, he may recover. And when he does, he will need you.”
“Perhaps after he has driven me as mad as he is? Nevare, try to imagine what my life will be here. I will have no one to turn to. No one.”
I sought my mind for something to offer her, some shelter or friendship that could sustain her. Carsina came to mind, and then I remembered their falling-out over Remwar. Our family had other friends and neighbors. True, ever since the plague, there had been little socializing. The news we had received from other households was sparse and often somber. But once the rains of fall and the snows of winter were past and the roads were good again, surely people would resume their old patterns of visits and invitations. In the meantime…well, at least she would be safe. I said as much.
“Safe. Safe to be belittled and ordered about every day. Safe to be married off to some man Father chooses, who will belittle and order me about in his home. You have a peculiar idea of safe, Nevare. The safest I’ve ever been has been since you brought me home from the Porontes and put me in charge of the household. Nevare, other than my grief, these have been the best days of my life. Oh, I know how shallow that sounds!” she cried out before I could reply to her strange remark. “But please, try to understand. For once I felt like I could relax and be myself. I could request meals of food that I enjoyed, and move the furniture as suited me and not be required each evening to give an accounting of what I had accomplished each day. And as a result, I actually did things that I thought needed doing, without fearing that they would not be approved. My life became more than matching buttons on my frock or learning a new piece of music.”
I didn’t know what to say to her. Words came out of my mouth. “This is a journey I must make. Whatever I need to make this journey will be provided to me.” I felt my blood roil in me as I spoke. I shook it off. This was between my sister and me. It had nothing to do with the Tree Woman’s curse. I tried to think of some way to comfort Yaril. I said the worst possible thing I could have said. “I’ll send for you. When I’ve made a place for myself, I’ll send for you. I promise.”
“Will it be long?” she instantly demanded, and then, in the next breath, “I won’t be able to stand it here alone. What if he marries me off before you send for me? Then I’ll be trapped forever. Where are you going? How are you going to manage on your own? Where are we going to live?”
My heart sank. “I don’t know. I don’t have answers to any of your questions. But I promise that I’ll send for you as soon as I have any sort of a situation. And if you are unhappy with where you are, no matter where you are, you’ll still come to me. I promise. Keep in touch with Epiny. I’ll be able to find you through her, when the time comes. I’ll send for you, Yaril.”
Yaril followed me to my room. She looked around it, at the bare walls, the simple desk, and my scant possessions. Her eyes lingered on the broken hasp that dangled still from my ripped door. “He did keep you here and starve you,” she said quietly.
“Yes. He did.” And our admission of that suddenly made it easier for me to leave.
I had little to pack. The only clothes that still fit me were the ones Yaril had had made for me. I took my cadet cloak, for I knew the autumn rains and winds were not far away. I packed a basic medical kit of bandages, healing salts, and salve, and a fine needle and silk thread for stitching wounds. I hoped I’d never have to use it. I took my beautiful soldier son journal because I could not bear to leave it. It was hard to leave my schoolbooks behind and admit that a fine education was no longer part of my future.
I did not sleep that night. At dawn, I rose. I washed myself, shaved, and combed my hair. I dressed in the clothing that fitted me best, and made sure my boots were well blacked. When I went to get my sword and pistol, I discovered my father’s final blow against me. They were gone. I stood a moment, staring at the empty spot on the wall where they were usually racked with the other weapons of the household. Very briefly, I considered taking Rosse’s weapons. Then I hardened myself against such a base temptation. I would give my father no excuse to label me thief as well as failure. He was driving me out of the family unarmed. Very well.
I walked quietly down the hallway and entered my mother’s room. I had intended to make a sort of final farewell. The stripped bed and bare windows made the room skeletal and cold. Little remained of the woman who had raised me. There were a few pots of her cosmetics at her dressing station, and her heavy silver-backed brush with its matching comb beside it. I walked to her dressing table, thinking to find a few strands of her hair to take with me. Instead, I caught my reflection in her mirror. I froze, staring at a man I didn’t recognize.
I’d been carrying my mental image of who I’d always been. I’d been remembering that I had a sculpted face, high cheekbones, and short blond hair. I remembered a tall man who stood erect, with delineated muscles in his arms and chest. When I thought of myself, despite knowing I’d gotten fat, I still pictured myself that way. That man was gone.
My cheekbones and jaw were lost in the softness of my rounded face. I’d begun a double chin. I stood as straight as I could and vainly attempted to suck in my gut. It availed me nothing. My belly was a bulging sack. My shoulders were rounded with fat, my neck lost in them. My arms looked shorter, pushed away from my sides. My longer hair looked lank and greasy. I had dressed in my best, hoping to look like a cavalla trooper as I rode away. Instead, I finally saw myself as others did. I was fatter than ever. The extra flesh was like a badly fitting garment that I’d slung on over my real body. I could grab handfuls of flesh on my ribs, on my thighs, and even on my chest. The features of my face were sinking in doughy flesh. I turned from that nightmare image and walked sharply from my mother’s room, closing the door firmly behind me.
I was not surprised to find Yaril waiting for me at the bottom of the stairs. I managed a smile for her. She had packed food for me, a generous packet. I thanked her and hugged her one last time. She leaned against my belly to reach me for a kiss on my cheek. I felt my body as a wall around me that held my loved ones at a distance. Fort Nevare.
“Don’t you forget your promise!” she hissed fiercely in my ear. “Don’t abandon me here, thinking that I’ll be safe. Send for me as soon as you are settled anywhere, no matter how rough. I’ll come.”
I bade her farewell at the door, and turned away from the house where I had grown up.
In the stables, I saddled Sirlofty and loaded my possessions into my saddle panniers. When I led him out of the stables, Sergeant Duril was waiting to say good-bye. The old soldier looked grim and tired. He already knew that I’d been disowned. Very little of what happened in any noble family remained private for long. I shook his hand.
He wished me well. “Write to me,” he said, his voice going husky. “I know, I can’t read, but if you write to me, I’ll find someone who can read it to me. Let me know what happens to you, lad. Don’t leave me wondering.”
I promised him I would. I mounted, levering my weight up onto my saddle with difficulty. Sirlofty shifted under me as if startled by the load. My buttocks settled onto my saddle in a new and disconcerting way. I took a breath. I hadn’t ridden in quite a while, but I’d soon be back in condition. The next few days would be uncomfortable, but I’d survive. As I rode away, I glanced back at the windows of my former home. Yaril was framed in hers, watching me ride away. She lifted her hand in farewell. I waved in response.
There was a twitch of the curtains in my father’s room. That was all. When I reached the end of the drive and looked back a final time, I saw a croaker bird lift from the chimney pot. He circled my old home once, and then flew off ahead of me. He seemed an ill omen to follow, but follow I did.