He’s gone, thought Clovermead numbly. She fished her sword from the muddy bottom with one hand, then carried Mullein to the side of the pond. Fetterlock, Sergeant Algere, and the Yellowjackets rode back to rejoin her, swords still drawn in case the bear-priests should return. Mullein shrank from them and pressed herself against Clovermead. “Don’t be scared,” said Clovermead, but the girl only babbled in Tansyard. Clovermead turned to Fetterlock. “Tell her not to be afraid,” she said. I’ll never see Sorrel again.
Fetterlock sheathed his sword and knelt, his knee squelching in the mud. He spoke softly, and after a while Mullein said a few words to him, loosened her hold on Clovermead, and reached out to him. He lifted her to the bank.
“I could use a hand up too,” said Clovermead. He’s gone. She couldn’t stop thinking that. He’s gone, he’s gone, the words hammered at her.
“At your service, Demoiselle,” said Fetterlock. He reached down, grasped Clovermead’s outstretched hand, and pulled her out of the pond in one smooth motion. She was light as a feather in his grasp. He gazed, distracted, at the spot in the Moors where the bear-priests had disappeared. “Lucifer Snuff,” he whispered.
“Yes,” said Clovermead—and the name drove Sorrel from her thoughts for a moment. “You know him?”
“He has been on the Steppes before,” said Fetterlock. “You are acquainted with him too?” Clovermead nodded. “He is not a friend of mine, Demoiselle, so remove that suspicious look from your face. Where did Sorrel go?”
Away from me forever. “This is Sorrel’s sister, Mullein,” said Clovermead. “The woman the bear-priests caught is his mother, Roan. They must have survived all these years in the Barleymill mines, after the Cyan Cross Horde was destroyed.” Fetterlock gazed at Mullein in wonder. “Sorrel went to rescue his mother from the bear-priests. They’re going to kill her when they bring her back to Barleymill.”
Fetterlock glanced at Clovermead. “Did you give him permission to go, Demoiselle?”
“Yes,” said Clovermead. “She’s his mother.” I’ll never hear his voice again. I’ll never hear what happened to that red fox. Oh, Lady, I’ve lost Sorrel, who teases me, who tells me stories, who can’t ever stop loving the Steppes. My friend. Her eyes were hot, and she spoke tonelessly. “We can’t leave Mullein here in the Moors or take her back to Chandlefort, so we’ll bring her with us to the White Star Horde.”
“That is good,” said Fetterlock. “She can stay with the Horde until her brother returns. There are many women who would be glad to take her into their tents.”
“I didn’t say I’d leave her there,” said Clovermead. “Sorrel asked me to take care of her. He didn’t say to dump her with the first people I met.”
“We are her own kind. She should stay with us, Demoiselle.”
“She’s your kind, is she?” Clovermead could see Sorrel in her mind’s eye as clear as ever, his brown eyes still looking at her with icy revulsion. She wanted so much to moan out loud, and now her guts were churning. “Then why’d you leave her for seven years in Barleymill? Seems to me you’d have tried to help her if you cared that much.”
Fetterlock’s cheeks flamed red. “That is not a just accusation, Demoiselle.”
“I don’t care.” Clovermead took a deep breath. “Sorrel is a subject of Lady Cindertallow, and Mullein is his sister. That means she’s a Chandleforter. If anyone in the White Star Horde lays a hand on her, I’ll take it as kidnapping and fight.”
Fetterlock looked down at Mullein. She stood between the two of them and stared up uncomprehendingly. “Let us continue this discussion later,” he said. “I will inform the Horde Chief’s wife. Perhaps she can persuade you otherwise.”
“I doubt it,” said Clovermead fiercely. She put a protective hand on Mullein’s shoulder. The little girl flinched, then let herself relax into Clovermead’s grip. “I won’t fail Sorrel again.”
“The Horde Chief’s wife is quite persuasive,” Fetterlock said, with an ironic smile. “And do consider whether your friend would have preferred to have his sister stay with you or with other Tansyards. But we can argue that matter again later. Let us get to our horses and ride. Now that the bear-priests know we are here, we are vulnerable to an ambush. I would like to get to the Steppes as quickly as possible.”
Mullein spoke a sentence in Tansyard. Fetterlock looked puzzled for a moment, then he burst into sudden laughter. “She wants to know why you have straw for hair. She says it must be very itchy.”
“It does not look like straw!” said Clovermead. She touched her hair, and was reassured to find it hadn’t suddenly become rough and dry. “Tell her my hair is just hair, but yellow.”
“Iore-le ne imali ta peluwa, siu Mullein,” said Fetterlock. “Iore amon ea, neo la.”
“Peluwa ea,” said Mullein. “Peluwa, peluwa, peluwa!” A faint smile drifted onto her face for a moment.
“Let me guess,” said Clovermead. “Peluwa means ‘straw.’” Fetterlock nodded, and Clovermead couldn’t help smiling herself. For the first time she let herself look the little girl full in the face. She was thin and short, with terribly large eyes, and when she gazed up at Clovermead it was just like Clovermead was looking at a young Sorrel. Her face was wonderfully familiar and Clovermead never wanted to part from her. She held out her hand, and Mullein put her tiny fingers in Clovermead’s. “I’ll just have to convince you otherwise, Mullein. Come with me. We’re going to go riding.”
Oh, Lady, I’ve lost Sorrel. She was hard-pressed not to weep.
Clovermead told Sergeant Algere and the other Yellowjackets quickly about Sorrel’s departure, and then they all rode eastward through the Moors in a steady, drenching rain. The mist was thicker than ever, and Fetterlock led them slowly and single file through the highest, roughest land, where there was least chance of slipping into the mud and the ponds. Mullein rode in front of Clovermead, huddled up next to her to stay dry. She looked around with wondering eyes, and gaped at the dank Moorland. Sometimes she spoke half to Clovermead and half to herself in incomprehensible Tansyard. Other times she would stare at nothing at all and shiver, frozen by something more than the chill of the rain.
They stopped at midday beneath a copse of sodden beeches that provided a feather of protection from the downpour, for a cold lunch of biscuits and beef jerky. “I’ll have to tell Mother that Sorrel ran off,” Clovermead said quietly to Mullein as they ate. “I allowed him to go after your mother, but he’s a Yellowjacket in her service, and, really, Mother will say that he’s deserted. If he comes back to Chandlefort, she’ll have to punish him.”
“I’ll ask her to be merciful,” said Sergeant Algere. Clovermead started, and Algere ducked his head. “Begging your pardon, Demoiselle, I didn’t mean to surprise you, or to eavesdrop. I’d come to tell you the rain got into one of the saddlebags and dampened our food, so we may need to ration our meals out in the Steppes, and I overheard you talking to the girl. Sorrel does need to be punished, for all he’s your friend. We can’t let troopers ride off whenever they feel like it. But he’s a good lad. He’s a swaggerer, even for a Yellowjacket. When I sprained my ankle once, he was the one who thought to come to my wife to help do the chores I couldn’t. I’ll tell Milady that, when he comes back.”
“Thank you, Algere,” said Clovermead. “That’s kind of you.” The Sergeant nodded uncomfortably, saluted, and hurried away from her. Clovermead stared southward, where the Tansyard had disappeared. “But he won’t be back. He’ll never return.” She wanted to run after Sorrel, more than ever, and her hands had already turned to paws before she caught herself. She forced them back into hands. She looked down at Mullein, still eating industriously, and she sighed. “I don’t even care that we’re never going to kiss, or anything. It’s losing my friend that hurts.” Mullein ignored the meaningless words, concentrating on wolfing down her food, and Clovermead couldn’t help but laugh a little. “All right, I’ll eat too. No point in being lonely and hungry.” She stuffed another piece of jerky into her mouth, and made herself chew and swallow.
The rain lightened as they rode that afternoon, and the mist lifted. Here the ponds widened to enormous lakes separated by thin causeways of land. Far away, in the middle of one lake, Clovermead saw a Harrowman village of ramshackle huts huddled on poles and roofed with a shiny mixture of pitch and straw. A few expressionless Harrowmen in canoes watched them pass. The Yellowjackets kept their hands close to their swords.
Midafternoon two Harrowmen suddenly appeared before them as the group rode along the neck between two ponds. The two men were short, scrawny figures wrapped in slick furs, with drawn knives in their hands. Clovermead heard splashing, and she saw canoes with more figures in them appear in the ponds to either side of her. The rowers’ hands were on their oars, but they also had knives. She heard footsteps scampering behind her.
Clovermead brought Auroche to a halt. I guess I’m our leader, she thought to herself. I’d better speak. “What do you want?” she called out. Her voice wavered through the gusting wind. She held tight to Mullein with her left hand.
“Tolls, rider,” said one man in front of her. His face was pale and his hair stringy and nearly white. His eyes were pink. “Harrowman land here. You must pay us to pass.” He spoke the common tongue with a scratchily sibilant accent, like a saw sliding on silk.
Clovermead fumbled in her purse, drew out two silver shillings, and tossed them to the pale man. He caught them expertly in his hand and pocketed them. “There’s your toll,” she said. “Let us pass.”
The pale man smiled. “Tolls are higher than that this year, rider.”
“Not too high, I trust,” said Fetterlock. He rode up to Clovermead’s side, and his hand was also resting on his sword. Sergeant Algere and Corporal Naquaire followed close behind him. “Make the tolls too extortionate, and travelers will not return. Is it not better to have many silver pieces over the years than a few now?”
The pale man shrugged. “Perhaps I will not be here to collect the silver pieces when you return, Tansyard. Fortune spins her wheel and who knows what the future will bring? I would rather take advantage of the present.” He grinned. “The toll is your horse, lady rider. Your pack and your purse, too. Get down, lady, give them to us, and your party can pass. We don’t want to hurt you.”
“It would be a pity to have to burn your village,” said Fetterlock calmly. He pointed back toward the tumbledown huts they had passed earlier. “Surely you want a soft bed to come home to at night?”
The pale man’s short and bandy-legged companion guffawed. “Not our village,” he giggled. “We don’t care.”
Clovermead lifted her right arm high, so every Harrowman could see it, and let it grow. Soon it was a bear’s paw—thick and long, with long claws. She smiled at the pale man. “I believe you are mistaken, sir. I have paid the proper toll.”
Mullein moaned in fear, and pulled away from Clovermead so fast that Clovermead had to grab her to keep her from falling off the horse. Fetterlock rapped out quick words to her in Tansyard, so that Mullein stayed on Auroche, but she turned to stare at Clovermead with eyes made enormous by sudden terror. Sergeant Algere trembled a little, and Corporal Naquaire made the sign of the crescent, but Fetterlock shivered and was hard-pressed to keep himself by Clovermead’s side. The pale man murmured something to his fellows, and their canoes began to back away from Clovermead. He bowed, sheathed his knife, and stepped off the path. His companion scuttled by his side.
“I beg your pardon, mistress. We mean no harm to emissaries of the Bear.” The Harrowman fumbled in his shirt and took out a piece of obsidian carved in the shape of a bear’s tooth. “We honor your lord, mistress. Pass on, pass on.”
Clovermead opened her mouth to say she wasn’t one of Lord Ursus’ followers, but Fetterlock hissed at her in warning. Clovermead nodded, and rode past the bowing Harrowmen. The Yellowjackets rode slowly after her, their swords bared. She went on for another minute, then looked back. The Harrowmen had disappeared from sight.
“Are they allied with Lord Ursus too?” she asked.
“They fear him,” said Fetterlock. “They won’t get in his way if he sends an army through the Moors. But I do not think they will impede our armies either.” He looked at Clovermead’s arm, grown human again, and he could not help but shudder. “I find it hard to believe . . .” He trailed off.
“That I’m not a servant of Lord Ursus?” Clovermead felt very much like growling at Fetterlock, but Mullein was still staring at her with terrified eyes, still sitting as far away from Clovermead as she could get on Auroche’s back. Clovermead swallowed her anger so as not to frighten the girl any more. “Believe what you like. I don’t care.” Coldly she set Auroche riding onward into the Moors.
Mullein’s terror faded, and she nestled back against Clovermead. But Clovermead could feel her heart still racing, pit-pat, pit-pat, pit-pat, and it beat even faster when Clovermead tried to speak comforting words to her. After a while Clovermead gave up, and they rode on in silence.
That night Clovermead and the Tansyards set up one campfire, while the Yellowjackets sat around another. Sergeant Algere came to consult with Clovermead and Fetterlock for a few minutes about their route the next day, then went back to rejoin his troopers. Tonight old Golion and young Habick were sword-dancing for their comrades: The blades whirled around their legs as Golion jumped precisely and Habick enthusiastically capered. Quinch and Sark whistled their approval, Lewth and Dunnock clapped for an encore, and even scowling Corporal Naquaire allowed himself to smile.
Mullein began to speak, and Clovermead turned away from the dancing Yellowjackets. The little girl asked Fetterlock a series of questions in Tansyard. He answered her in a low voice touched with sadness and sometimes with laughter. Then Mullein looked again at Clovermead. She was still suspicious, but she slowly reached out her hand toward Clovermead’s and pulled it toward her. “Gora le ea,” she said to Fetterlock. “Mi’ita le seboyara coa vi goru.”
“She would like you to turn into a bear again,” said Fetterlock. “But please do it gently, Demoiselle. She is very frightened of bears.”
Clovermead let the fur sprout from the back of her hand. Mullein gasped as the hairs poked against her palm, then she hesitantly ran her fingers along Clovermead’s long golden fur. Clovermead let her hand grow into a paw once more, and made her claws lengthen. She kept still while Mullein touched every inch of her paw from wrist to claw-tips. Mullein looked up at Clovermead and Clovermead let a wave of fur flow up her arm, across her body, and down her other arm. Then the fur faded back into flesh.
“Tell her I’m a friend of her brother,” Clovermead said to Fetterlock, never moving her eyes from Mullein. “Tell her that I would never hurt her, and that I will fight to keep her safe from her enemies.” Fetterlock nodded and spoke in Tansyard. Mullein stared at Clovermead a while more, then smiled tremulously and spoke to Fetterlock.
“She says she will trust you,” said Fetterlock. He smiled. “She says she knows now that your hair isn’t straw, but fur.”
Clovermead laughed. “So it is,” she said. She ruffled Mullein’s hair fondly, and Mullein smiled, her fear gone.
Mullein ate ravenously, and while she bolted down her food, Clovermead tried to learn some Tansyard words from Fetterlock. She had picked up a number of Tansyard phrases from Sorrel over the years, but not enough to do more than make Mullein giggle at her confused attempts to talk in the Steppe tongue. The lesson wasn’t terribly successful, and after dinner Mullein set herself to learning common tongue instead.
“Tebeyu,” she said, pointing at the fire.
“Fire,” said Clovermead. Then, following Mullein’s finger, she said, “Tinder. Kindling. Cheese. Beef stew. Buttons. Those are buttons too!”
“Tinda, kindeleen, chis, bif estu, bottenes, thowis ara bottenestu!” said Mullein, laughing. Now she pointed at Clovermead’s hand.
“Hand,” said Clovermead. She wiggled her fingers. “Fingers.” Then, cautiously, she turned her hand back into a paw. “Paw. Claws.”
“Gora,” said Mullein. “Kamu po ta seboyara vi goru? Gorai perenjiu heva Ursus.” She stared intently at Clovermead.
“What was that?” Clovermead asked Fetterlock. “Something about Ursus?”
“Gora is ‘bear,’” said Fetterlock. “She said, ‘How can you turn into a bear? Bears are the servants of Ursus.’”
“Tell her I’m not a servant of Lord Ursus,” said Clovermead. She looked Mullein full in the face as she spoke. “Tell her that Our Lady gave my father the ability to turn into a bear as a gift, and gave the same power to all his descendants. Tell her we were given that gift so we could free every bear from Ursus’ slavery.”
Fetterlock spoke, and then Mullein spoke back to him. “She says, ‘We are slaves too, in the mines. Will you come and free us as well?’”
The spiked whip lashed into Boulderbash. Clovermead felt tears glitter in her eyes. “Tell her I’ve made too many promises already.” She hastily wiped her eyes. “No, don’t say that. Tell her we’re fighting Ursus, and that if Our Lady blesses us, sooner or later everyone will be free from him.” Fetterlock spoke, and Mullein sighed. She looked exactly the way Sorrel did whenever he was feeling cast down, and Clovermead’s heart wrenched in her again. “Tell her she looks very much like her brother.”
Mullein became more animated. “She says her mother had told her of Sorrel, in the mines. She said he was very sweet, and that he was dead, like all the other men of the Cyan Cross Horde. Is her father alive too? Are her other brothers?”
Clovermead shook her head. “Just Sorrel.” Mullein nodded, awfully solemn, with an expression too old for her years. Clovermead hesitated. “Does she know how she and her mother escaped from Barleymill?” Fetterlock relayed the question.
Mullein looked around at the darkness, and Clovermead followed her gaze. Old Golion had grown tired, and now brawny Bergander had taken his place in the sword dance. He was as oddly dainty in his dancing as he was delicate in his lute-playing. Beyond their two campfires was an immense night. Mullein hunched close to the fire and spoke in a low voice. “She was in the tunnels digging ore with the rest of the women and children when the Shaman-Mother started to sing,” said Fetterlock. “A dark cloud covered the torches, and she couldn’t see. Then she heard the Shaman-Mother singing inside her head, and she could see in a strange light. Mullein’s shackles came loose, and so did her mother’s. They started to walk, and the Shaman-Mother sang directions to them until they came out of the mines. The guards couldn’t see them. The cloud hid them until they were past the walls of Barleymill, and then it thinned and went away, and so did the Shaman-Mother’s voice. Then Mullein saw things she had never seen before, and her mother said they were grass and streams and trees and birds—” Fetterlock could not help but sob deep in his chest. “But her mother made her start to walk at once. They fled through the night and they slept when the sun came out. Sometimes they walked side by side, and sometimes her mother carried her in her arms. They dug for roots, and her mother caught fish in the streams with her bare hands. After a while her mother started to look behind her, and said she was sure there were bear-priests coming to catch them and bring them back to the mines. They left the grasslands and went into the Moors. Then the bear-priests caught up with them, but her mother tossed her away, and said to trust her brother Sorrel and never to come back to the mines, to kill herself before she let the bear-priests capture her. And then Sorrel left her to go after their mother, and he said to trust the straw-haired girl, she would keep her safe.” Mullein fell quiet, and tears were rolling down Fetterlock’s cheeks. “Oh, Lady, she had never seen grass.”
“I won’t let the bear-priests catch you,” said Clovermead. And she knew she’d given her word too often before, but she said, “I promise you that.” Somewhere Boulderbash was laughing bitterly at Clovermead, but Clovermead couldn’t help it. “In Our Lady’s name. Tell her that, Fetterlock.” Fetterlock spoke in Tansyard, and Mullein smiled. Then she yawned and lay down by the fire. In moments she was asleep.
The next day Clovermead and Mullein rode together again in a morning far warmer than the day before. Blustery gusts still blew against Clovermead, but she was no longer chilled to the bone. The grass beneath Auroche’s feet was still damp, but he was able to make far better time. Mullein looked around her with interest and enjoyment, gasped at every bird that rose from the reeds, and laughed when she saw a muskrat waddle into a pond. She pointed at everything she saw, and Clovermead told her the words in common tongue. In a few hours Mullein had memorized the words for bird, tree, pond, ride, swim, fly, and everything else Clovermead could show her in the Moors.
Mullein saw a sparrow hop from a thorn tree branch to the ground and she cried out in delight. “Sparoa!” she cried. “Sparoa fly. Sparrow fly,” she said more carefully. She laughed. “Mullein ride horoos.”
“Mullein rides horse,” Clovermead agreed. “Clovermead rides horse. Horse gets tired, wants grass. Fortunately, we’ll be in the Steppes soon, where there’s all the grass Auroche could ever dream of.” Mullein stared at her in puzzlement. “Let’s go back to language lessons. I wonder how long it will take you to learn adjectives and adverbs.”
That afternoon they rode uphill through land that grew lusher and dryer by the mile. The ponds grew smaller, the earth grew deeper and darker, and the grass turned from dun to bright, pale green. All along the track lavender and yellow crocuses joined snowdrops in bloom, and green leaves exuberantly burst forth from poplar trees. A herd of red deer bolted away from the Yellowjackets. The wind blew steadily from the south in a cloudless day. The scent of grass was strong around them.
“It is lovely,” said Clovermead to herself. “Sorrel wasn’t exaggerating. Mullein, do you suppose it’s like this all over the Steppes?”
“Steppes?” said Mullein, pointing at the green grass. Clovermead nodded. “Steppes piretty!”
“Steppes very pretty,” said Clovermead. “Father would love how green they are. Mother would say Chandlefort is prettier, but she’d still be impressed at how far the grass stretches. I wish Sorrel were here to show them to us.” Her heart ached again.
Toward evening they emerged onto the true Steppes. They had come high enough that the air was thinner and chillier than it had been in the Moors or the Whetstone Valley. Now they ran on fertile soil. Clovermead judged it with a shepherd’s eye: It would make good grazing land for sheep. The Steppes ran on and on, rolling slightly, but flat as far as she could see. The eye got swallowed up in their immensity.
“You could plunk down a dozen Chandleforts here, Demoiselle, and lose track of them all,” said Habick, awed. He was riding to Clovermead’s left. “I thought the Salt Heath was big, but it’s just a patch of sand next to this. Do you know how far this grass goes on?”
“Four thousand miles, Sorrel once said. You travel for two years, and it gets drier and colder as you head east, and after a while it turns into a desert with just a few scraggly villages around the odd oasis. Beyond that there are mountains, and beyond that is the Sublime Royaume, where the farmers train insects to make their clothes and magicians bring clay soldiers to life to guard their cities.” Clovermead’s eyes gleamed. “I’d love to see what it looks like.”
Habick went very pale underneath his freckles. “You aren’t going to take us that way, Demoiselle? I’m already too far from Chandlefort.”
“Don’t you worry!” said Clovermead. “This isn’t a pleasure jaunt. I’m afraid I’m not getting to the Royaume anytime soon.” She laughed, a little sadly, and then lapsed into silence.
Mullein ate another huge dinner that night, then promptly fell asleep. Fetterlock looked at her sadly, and he muttered in Tansyard.
“What’s worrying you?” asked Clovermead.
“Regret,” said Fetterlock. “I suddenly worry that I made a wrong decision once.”
“I know I have,” said Clovermead. “After I make a mistake, I tell myself I’ll make better decisions the next time, but somehow I keep on blundering. Sometimes I just make a fool of myself. Sometimes I hurt other people, and when I say ‘Sorry’ afterward, it doesn’t make up for what I’ve done. If you have only one decision to regret, you’re doing well.”
“It was a very important one,” said Fetterlock. “People died.”
Once Lord Ursus had possessed Clovermead. With one voice they had ordered bears and bear-priests to attack the soldiers of Low Branding and the Yellowjackets. Clovermead had urged them on to more slaughter, and there had been blood everywhere, spattering the snow. The scar on Clovermead’s arm and her missing tooth both ached. They were mementos of the time she had let Lord Ursus possess her; mementos of the evil she had done with him.
“I’ve made mistakes like that too,” said Clovermead in a low voice. She glanced up at huge Fetterlock. “Do you want to tell me what you did? I won’t be nosy if you’d rather be quiet, but if you want to talk, I’d be glad to listen.”
“Perhaps I would,” said Fetterlock. He looked again at Mullein, and a tear rolled down his cheek. “Oh, Lady, she has never seen the grass. And I am to blame.”
“You?” asked Clovermead, startled.
“In part,” said Fetterlock. “Enough.” He began to speak.