Rachel Starr Thomson

“Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me. If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me. Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee.”

Psalm 139:7-12

Throughout history, people who came to disbelieve in gods or spirits they had once venerated have literally torn down their idols… defaced the “images of the gods”… cut themselves loose from the relics of the past.

Today, many people in our postmodern world would like to escape the God of the Bible.

But how can we?

We could perhaps burn all of the Bibles in the world, remove every trace of Scriptural influence from Western speech and thought, and rewrite history.

But then there would be relationships. Father and son. Husband and wife. These things which so eloquently speak of Him. Still, this too we could destroy. We could blur gender lines. We could cheapen marriage. We could turn parents and children against each other.

We would walk outside, free of God in our homes, and be confronted with seas and stars and trees and wind and glorious nature.

Easy enough to deal with. We can level it. Poison it. Pollute it.

But then, having killed our life source to get away from its Creator, we might accidentally look in a mirror. And behind the guilty, sin-marred expression that looks back at us, there is a soul. An eternal spirit. A spark of imagination; the power of reason; the power to create or destroy.

We are the greatest evidence of God. No matter how we unravel ourselves, we can’t be rid of Him.

If I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.

Inescapable God.

Snow.

Snow swirled down into his dreams.

A tower, tall and grey in a greyer sky. Doves flying all around it. And something else—dark red and sinuous, vining up the tower. No, not a vine—its scaled body moved. Taerith stood at the base and looked up, but the snow swirled down and marred his vision. Doves’ wings, snowflakes, blinding him; he strained to see… the red thing moved. He drew his sword. The hilt was cold and covered with dried blood. Black in the world of white and grey. His fingers cleaved to it.

“Wake up.”

The voice was Kardas’s, low and spoken near his ear. Taerith was awake in an instant, blinking away the snowflakes. The snowfall was gentle: big flakes, falling softly. They made a shining halo around the moon and mixed with the smoke of the campfire.

“What is it?” Taerith asked, reaching beneath his cloak for his sword. His arm was stiff. His whole shoulder and neck ached when he moved. He ignored the pain.

“Something is wrong,” Kardas said. He had been only half-roused, propped up on his hands, when he called Taerith awake. Now he rose slowly, eyes sweeping the camp. Taerith turned his head and searched the night likewise. Nothing. There was nothing. No smell, no sound. Only one of the soldiers, standing sentry near the fire, silently watching the snow fall.

A flicker of movement beyond the dying firelight. Both men saw it at once. Taerith scrambled to his feet. Something leaped out of the darkness: a flash of grey, and the sentry went down with a scream of pain and fear. Kardas was already running, Taerith on his heels. The thing snarled, snapped; the sentry cried out again. The soldiers awakened, swearing and reaching for their swords.

Another movement, another flash of grey—to the left this time, only feet away from Taerith. Another cry. This time the creature was met with a sword, and it jumped back. Into the firelight, where they could see it.

Wolf. The snow fell across its grey pelt and gleaming black eyes; the snow made it something unreal. It was huge, as big as a pony. Huge and hungry. The snow couldn’t obscure the way the creature’s ribs protruded.

Taerith stood half-crouched, circling, wary. The wolf watched him. It could smell the blood still in the men’s clothes and on their weapons. The smell drove it, crazed it.

The wolf lunged. Taerith leaped aside, narrowly missing the animal’s teeth as they snapped at his arm. It turned, growling deep within its throat. The fire behind it flared as the scuffle with the other wolf knocked kindling onto the flames. Taerith looked up for a split second. In the next the wolf was on him.

He could feel its teeth in his shoulder as its weight bore him to the ground. Pain stabbed through his arm. Teeth clenched, he jammed his hand beneath the wolf’s jaw and pushed with all his strength, trying to keep it away from his throat. The wolf tightened its grip on his shoulder and he cried out. For a moment there was nothing in the world but shadows: moving, rushing all around him, through the snow and the flaring firelight.

The wolf let go and howled, jerking its head away. Blood ran into Taerith’s face and spilled over his hand, warm and thick. The wolf twisted itself, trying to fight its new assailant. It was no good. A seizure of pain took it and it flipped its hindquarters away, howling again.

Taerith fought the black spots that obscured his vision. He gritted his teeth against the pain, placing a bloody hand over his shoulder. He could feel something in his hand. His fingers hurt. His whole first ached. He looked down and the shape of the sword took form in his eyes. He was still clutching its hilt.

A hand clapped down on his good shoulder, and Kardas was before him, kneeling. “Are you all right?” he asked. He was spattered with blood. The snowflakes stuck to it before they began to melt. Taerith nodded, and groaned as pain flooded through his shoulder and arm again.

Beyond Kardas, a new form took shape in the darkness. A great mound of fur and bone—the wolf lay dead. Over it stood a man with his hand still on his sword hilt, its blade thrust fast through the creature’s heart.

The man raised his head and looked at Taerith. Snow swirled around the dark hair and beard. It was Borden.

* * *

Lilia ran her finger along the gilt edges of the book before letting it fall open in her hand. The pages rustled down, revealing carefully-drawn sketches of a pine forest and its fauna, two owls and a fox. Each creature was carefully labeled with delicate, sweeping strokes. Lilia smiled as she read the lines in the central columns. Already the words were familiar to her; like a scent that brought pleasant memories. She had read them every night before falling asleep. The author’s matter-of-fact assertions had a poetry of their own; his descriptions of the woodlands were stirringly familiar. Lilia had only ever known the world through the pages of books, and so the only world she was comfortable in was one tinged ever so faintly with the smell of ink.

Her stomach lurched as she reached for a cup of water beside the bed. She gave up and laid back against her pillows, closing her eyes. Her hand sought out her belly and rested there, her fingers cold but gentle against the roiling discomfort within.

Her door opened and she looked up to speak to Mirian, but it was not Mirian.

Her husband stood in the door.

Lilia drew herself up, pulling the sheets closer with one hand and smoothing them down with the other. “Welcome,” she said softly.

He looked around him as though he was in some foreign place, testing the air. The look on his face indicated that he didn’t like what met his senses. He came closer, more awkward in his approach than Mirian had ever been, because he wanted to look like the master of his new surroundings and succeeded only in looking like a stranger in them.

Lilia relaxed a little when he came close enough to smell. There were only traces of ale in his scent; he wasn’t drunk.

He looked down at her and cleared his throat, lifting his eyes again before saying anything. He looked up, around, at the bare stone walls and the window with its partially drawn purple curtains; the white bed and the wooden chest with dresses draped over it.

“It’s not much of a room,” he said.

“It suits me,” Lilia answered.

He cleared his throat again and waved his hand at her. He didn’t meet her eyes as he spoke. “You bearing up well?”

“Well enough,” she answered. “Thank you.” She looked away from him—he wasn’t looking back anyway—at the empty seat beside her bed. “Will you sit down?” she asked.

He looked at the chair for a moment and then shook his head. “No,” he muttered. “No. I came to see…” He cut himself off. “I won’t be needing you for a while,” he said. “Take care of yourself. That child is all I have.”

He turned and left the room, slamming the door behind him.

Lilia looked back at the book in her hands. The sketches blurred. She blinked and they came back: fine lines, beautiful dark branches. She stared at them for a few minutes without comprehending and then closed the book, slowly.

She brought both her hands to her midsection and smiled down at them. “You see, little one? Papa loves you,” she whispered. “You’re all either of us has.”

* * *

Borden watched, arms folded across his chest, as Emmet went to work on Taerith’s shoulder with needle and thread. Taerith was ashen-faced. His cheek, shoulders, and torso were spattered with blood—the wolf’s and his own. He held a stick in both hands and tightened his grip on it as Emmet worked.

“You’re very strong,” Borden commented.

Taerith looked up at him, his dark hair in sweaty curls across his face. His jaw was clenched, his eyes slightly glazed, but he focused on Borden. The crown prince looked on him with approval and sympathy. “I have seen worse,” Borden said. “It will heal quickly. But that’s not where your strength lies—in tolerating pain. It lies in tolerating fear.”

Taerith opened his mouth with calculated effort. “I have no fear,” he said.

“Why not?” Borden asked. “Every man is afraid of something.”

Taerith shook his head and said nothing. He breathed in sharply through his nose, and Emmet grunted. “A few more minutes, lad,” he said.

“To stare into a wolf’s mouth and not be undone is an impressive feat,” Borden said. He unfolded his arms and began to turn away. “I am glad to have you with us.”

Taerith found Borden forty minutes later, sitting by the fire.

“To kill a wolf and save a man’s life is also impressive,” Taerith said. “I am in your debt.”

Borden looked up and half-snorted. “Don’t be indebted to me, boy,” he said. “The wolf was a threat to all of us.”

Taerith smiled. “But I am the only one who was in its teeth when you killed it.”

“True enough,” Borden said, standing. He regarded the shirt Taerith had donned. It wasn’t much protection against the wind, but he imagined the weight of a cloak would tear uncomfortably at the newly-sewn wounds. “Even so,” he said. “You owe me nothing. You do not want to owe me.”

He turned away. The land lay stretched out before him, a light snow over it. The sun had risen on a cold day. The clouds were low and ominous like veins of ice in a still-water sky. It looked familiar—all of it. So familiar. He wondered how long it would be till they faced the wild men again. Somehow they needed to find them in greater numbers, great enough that to defeat them would send all the barbarians a message instead of just punishing a few renegades. If only they would gather together and fight like an army of men instead of roaming like carrion crows.

Familiar.

It had been so many years since the day Corran had first lost control of its northern border, yet as Borden looked out over the frozen plain it seemed that he could still see them—the small army his father had amassed to repel the barbarians, the contingent Hosten had sent to help them. He could see the slaughtered bodies lying in the frost the morning after their last fight. The sounds of the camp behind him became the echo of hoofbeats, the jingle of tack and the shouts of men—his own shouts—as they came upon their companions.

The wind was cold in Borden’s face, but he did not turn away. Memory gripped him. There—a dark patch on the earth. Dark with the stain of blood. His father had lain there. He had taken him up in his own arms, pulled him close, trying to feel warmth—breath—something.

The wind had been even colder that day. It had whipped at his hair and stung his face and his eyes as he raised them to his brother, astride his horse, as Annar rode up and looked down on them.

Whatever he had shouted that day, the wind had carried it away. He couldn’t remember the words. All he could remember was the raw pain in his throat as he ripped the words from his throat and flung them at Annar; as pain and grief rose up and choked him.

He could remember Annar’s words, shouted down through the wind.

“This is not my fault.”

“My lord?” Taerith’s voice cut into his memories, cutting them off. Borden jerked his gaze from the empty field and riveted his eyes on Taerith.

“Pardon me,” Taerith asked. “But… are you injured in some way?”

Borden made no answer.

“You’re shaking,” Taerith said, his voice apologetic.

He was. Borden looked down at his own hands and saw the way he shook. He folded his arms, tucking his hands close to his body. It did not help. The shaking came from within. From the memories.

“It’s nothing,” Borden said. “It’s the cold. Go… find Kardas. Prepare to go home.”

Taerith bent his head, as though the wind had blocked his hearing and he did not trust the words that had come from Borden’s mouth. “Sir?” he asked.

“You’re not fit to fight until you’ve healed up,” Borden said. “You can’t do it riding with us. Kardas will see you home before he rejoins us.”

His eyes wandered back to the field even as he spoke. Emotion was heaving within him; rising up to harshen his words and make his voice gruff. He stiffened himself, willing the shaking to cease. It was still there: the past, laying before him in the field where no other could see it.

It had been Annar’s fault—the bloody result of Annar’s strategic blunder. And that very night Borden and a coterie of priests had crowned him king. Nothing in life was so vile as the atmosphere in the battle tent the night they set the crown on Annar’s head… the atmosphere that still poisoned the air three days later when the new king signed his kingdom into the bondage of tribute to Hosten, so that the neighbouring boar would protect Corran while Annar went home in his father’s stead to drink and feast upon the throne, pretending that the threat in the north had been dealt with.

Borden turned and looked at the little camp his men had erected. A few tents, sleeping rolls spread on the ground, horses staked around the perimeter. The wind blew the dull green pennants of the camp wildly. The ground was blood-stained near the black remains of the night’s fire. A wolf howled somewhere far off, and the wind carried the sound into the camp.

“Such an inheritance you left me, brother,” Borden said. He bowed his head in his bitterness. It hurt to send Taerith away. There were so few men without him.

And the wild men would not stay hidden in the ravines forever.

* * *

His wine-coloured cloak billowed around him as the priest walked down the mid-street of the village. Early morning light cast a pallor on the dust of the road. Children and dogs scattered away from his coming, both eyeing him with distrust. He noted their retreat with approval. They were thin. Dogs and children both. Thin and haggard and begrimed with want.

He walked out of the town, up the sloping road toward the forest. A muscle in his face twitched as he passed beneath the evergreen branches. A wind blew in them, moving the branches behind him as though something walked on his heels. A sudden disturbance above jerked his eyes upward. A crow took to flight, a thin branch bobbing behind it, its sweeping black wings leaving the pine needles aquiver.

A half-hidden path led off the road and down a steep slope, toward the stink of standing water, leaves still rotting in its half-frozen depths. A shallow bog lay before him, but he skirted it and ducked into the opening of a cave.

He stepped into the darkness, ignoring the few torches that leaned against the cave wall just inside the entrance. The opening led sharply down, plunging into stillness and an utter lack of light. He walked down, not even steadying himself against the wall. The darkness soothed him. The wind did not disturb him here. Nothing dared follow Meronane into his den.

Without warning the floor leveled out and the close walls disappeared. The ground beneath his feet was hard-packed dirt. The cavern smelled: a wet, musty, rotting smell, not unmixed with the old drying smell of blood. Meronane followed a familiar rut to the center of the cavern. He did not have to bump into the chair to know it was there, though the darkness was too deep for any eye’s adjustment, and he turned and sank into it, resting his elbows on its wooden arms while he folded his hands before him and waited.

Half an hour passed.

Above, a light was struck. A torch flared to life. Its sound reached the cavern. Meronane looked up.

Footsteps in the tunnel. Two men. They entered the cavern, their faces masked, a single torch between them. It flickered on the cavern ceiling and danced shadows on the walls, catching the red stripes that marked the surface with jagged lines. The men took their places against the wall without a word.

Again, they waited. Again, the sound of striking flint made its way into the depths of the cave. A light appeared, bobbing through the darkness. One, two, three men this time. Again, they took their places. Silence.

It went on for an hour. Meronane waited, his fingers laced, his eyes lifted to the tunnel exit. He did move or speak a word till every man had arrived. Eighteen in all.

At last Meronane stood. He was a tall man, powerfully built and broad. His cloak fell across his shoulders as he stood, encasing him. He lifted his hands. A long knife, encased in a wine-red leather sheath, was in them. He pulled the sheath away slowly, revealing its sharp edge and curving beauty. Twelve torches flickered in the hands of their carriers, reflecting in the blade.

“It is time,” Meronane said.

The spy who had lately spent much time in the castle and brought word to Meronane that Borden had taken himself and his men away cleared his throat. He was a small dark man, nothing much to look at, but possessed of unusual favour with the priest.

“You have said that we should wait,” he said. “The people hunger now, but soon they will hunger more. Will they willingly hail you as king while they still have corn in their cribs?”

“Yes,” Meronane said. His eyes were fixed on the blade, held still before his face. “Deus has sent me dreams. We must move now, for the demon Borden will soon return.”

“So quickly?” one of the men asked. “He has only just left.”

Meronane turned slowly and regarded the man. “And what god has given you wisdom?” he asked. The man bowed his head and did not answer. Meronane turned back to face forward. He straightened the knife so that it pointed up, and he followed its point with his eyes and raised them to the stony ceiling.

“The devil is delivered into our hands,” he said.

“Sweet Somethings is a family affair—in the beginning, fudge making was the hobby of one of our ten daughters. At the time, our family was traveling with another product to craft and trade shows around the country, and she decided to try her hand at peddling a particularly good fudge recipe she liked to make. We decided to give it a try, so in March of 2003, we set up shop at our first show with only three flavors of fudge and a lot of fresh cut flowers. We did pretty well, and our imaginations immediately went into overdrive.”

Four years ago, my family started Sweet Somethings, a traveling chocolate company that has been a financial staple for us ever since. The above words were written by my sister Becky on the Web site she recently designed for us.

My father has ever been an entrepreneur. He is what Debi Pearl calls “a Visionary.” In fact, when I first read her “Three Kinds of Men” chapter in No Greater Joy’s monthly newsletter, I ran into our kitchen (where Mom and three of the older girls were busy preparing fudge for an upcoming trade show) to read it out loud. We laughed so hard that fudge production ground to a momentary halt. Surely, we thought, Debi had been following us all these years and taking notes. Dad’s visionary nature has driven our family into many ventures with varying levels of stability, normality, and success.

If you’re starting a family business of your own, here are some of the pros you can look forward to:

1. Time together. Sweet Somethings has meant long hours working–and joking, talking, even complaining–in the kitchen. It’s meant hours in the van, packed in amidst boxes of fudge, collapsible tables and fake flowers for decoration, swigging Coke from a two-liter bottle and seeing the world together. It’s meant long work days that are a treasure-trove of memories now. The family that works together spends time together–and in a world where it’s increasingly hard to do so, that is high praise for a family business.

2. Experience! Families are ever in search of ways to give their children experiences that will benefit them in life. Business is an excellent way to do this. In a business that involves sales, as ours does, our kids have had umpteen opportunities to interact with people from all walks of life, to learn graciousness and salesmanship, to get over their shy tendencies, to work with money, to make chocolate (an invaluable skill, I assure you) and to see the world. Business brings us all face to face with reality in a way that few other things do.

3. Hardship. Yes, this is a good thing. We’re not talking desperate privation here, just a good working knowledge of life when it isn’t comfortable. I’m extremely grateful for the presence of some hardship in my life. Its salt has heightened the flavour of everything else.

4. Personal growth. This ties into each area above, but I want to highlight it here. Sweet Somethings has developed confidence in the shyest of us; savviness in the dreamiest of us; persistence in those of us most likely to quit. We have learned to sacrifice for each other and to work together as a team.

Our chocolate company has been reasonably successful, so it’s helped us financially. Greater than the financial benefits, though, have been the rewards reaped in family solidarity. As you launch your own family business, keep these things before you.

* * *

Wild tales of the Thomsons’ adventures in trade shows shall be shared in the unnamed book-to-be-published next year, an entertaining collection of stories and essays that examine life in a big, homeschooled family. Subscribe or check back at this blog for updates!

* * *

Coming soon: “Family Business: Cons to Beware.”

… is up. Heather of Sprittibee has done a marvelous job. Says she:

“So, what’s a carnival?” you ask. A carnival is a place where bloggers of a like-mind or a similar group can showcase their most important, funny, interesting, or otherwise groovy posts so that YOU will go seek them out and read them. Each link is a teaser to lead you on your merry way through the internet to the blog where it originated.

As usual, there’s a fine collection of reading material… and all interspersed with pictures and lessons on Heather’s favourite pollen-collectors. Enjoy!

This post presents the flipside to a previous one, entitled “Thou Shalt Not: The Staggering Importance of ‘No’“

Parents must tell their children “no.” To say ourselves nay sets us apart from every rabid coyote in the world. It makes us human.

Equally important, equally stunningly important, is “yes.” If no makes us human, yes makes us like God.

Witness God’s first recorded words: “And the earth was without form and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light.” From God’s “let there be”–His first, incredible yes–we have come. Our earth has come. The heavens have come. “Yes” is creative power: it is all possibility, all adventure, all life.

The power to say yes is an oft-overlooked part of parenting. I am not a parent, and I see how this principle applies to every relationship in life. We all, sometimes, exercise this power in the lives of others. Yes, come in. Yes, talk with me. Yes, I’ll hire you. Yes, I’ll help you. Yes.

Still, it is parents who speak the first and most important yes’s in the lives of their children. If most of us have done anything unusual or wonderful in our lives, chances are it was the yes of our parents that got the ball rolling. I wish I could help everyone see how amazing this is, what creative power we have in shaping lives. I wish we all understood the explosive joy, the growth, the energy latent in this word.

Don’t misunderstand. I am not at all saying that you should say yes to everything. That’s why parents are so important. They’re older than their children; they have a bigger picture. Theirs is a yes of discernment. But when they give it, it opens such doors.

My brother wants to build a house when he’s nineteen. (He’s almost fifteen right now.) Maybe that goal will change. But we think it a worthy goal. A goal fit for a young man. If he works for it, he’ll develop work habits and character and skills. Someday it will help him provide for a family. My parents have heard this goal, and they have said “yes.” They’ll help him however they can. Perhaps he can apprentice somewhere; perhaps he can get onto a construction crew in a couple of years. Right now he’s got a paper route, so Mom and Dad encourage him to work hard at it, to be diligent and responsible no matter the weather or his feelings at the time, and even though on the surface Pennysavers don’t have much to do with houses, the character he builds now will be there when he’s nineteen. Attaining this yes means a lot of no’s in the meantime–no, you can’t quit; no, you can’t be lazy; no, you can’t allow yourself to be distracted. But as long as he knows where he’s going, he’ll take the no’s for the stepping stones they are.

“Yes” can mean so many things. It can mean the formation of relationships that will impact generations. It can mean the difference between daydreaming and pursuit. The difference between excuses and passion. The difference between a life of fear and a life of adventure.

I don’t know why we withhold “yes” sometimes. It’s not always because we’ve discerned that yes would be a bad thing. Sometimes we do it because we’re skeptical, or lazy, or just plain negative, or irritated over something. But it’s such an important thing to say, especially if you have influence in someone’s life. A life without “yes” will never be lived. Don’t be the one who withholds it.

It’s spring. Go outside and feel the sun and think “Let there be light.”

Do something incredible today.

Say “yes.”

Develop a theme park around his books. No, I’m not kidding. Yes, it is called “Dickens World.”

P.S. The title of this post is sheeeeer sarcasm.

My cousin Carolyn has a major ballet exam coming up in May–on my birthday, as it happens–and yesterday we put our heads together to write a quick bio for the program.

Well. ‘Twasn’t your usual bio. Homeschooled all her life, Carolyn just hasn’t done the things they want to see. No started-ballet-at-the-age-of-two, no acceptance into a company, no awards or scholarships. Does this sound familiar at all? We homeschool grads often sound like ne’er do wells when we try to list our achievements. Nope, no honour roll, no scholarships… didn’t go to school, actually. No, I don’t have a degree. Applied to Harvard? No, I haven’t. Leader of the Drama Club, class president, Chess Club champ, high school quarterback… ummm, no. Sorry. And you want to know about my what? My love life? You mean the journal I’ve been keeping since I was seventeen with thoughts on becoming a better wife and the regular breakfasts I take with my dad to discuss courtship? (That’s not what they meant.)

“So,” I asked Carolyn, “what have you done with your life?”

She’s done what a lot of us homeschool grads have done.

She’s stayed at home. She’s studied things she’s passionate about. She’s been involved in the raising of seven younger siblings. She’s read hundreds–nay, thousands–of books. She’s translated Psalms into Elvish. She’s baked like a madwoman. She’s fallen deeply in love with God. She’s witnessed. She’s choreographed and directed church musicals, performed with Christian singers at festivals, churches, and benefit concerts. She’s run her own studio since she was fourteen, starting with teaching her siblings. She became a registered teacher with the Royal Academy of Dance at the age of nineteen. She’s crossed Canada five times. She’s lived.

We’re in the same boat. I have few world-approved laurels to show for it, but I have lived more in my twenty-four years than I think some people ever do.

The temptation is strong to feel like a failure if we don’t meet the world’s expectations, but it’s a feeling that we need to shred. Frankly, as long as we live for God we will never win the world’s full applause. Measure not your life–or your children’s lives–in SAT scores and resumes. Measure it, instead, in the fulness with which you have walked God’s path for you. Measure it in relationships, in family, in joy, in passion, in true learning.

At its heart, homeschooling is about going back to the basics so we can thrive the way God meant us to thrive. Don’t succumb to the temptation to shuck the basics now that you’re through your “school years.” Keep focused. Keep living.

And write a bio you’ll be happy to lay at God’s feet.

Annar paced. The servants kept out of his way. He fretted—Borden galled him every day, but he was necessary. He had always been necessary. Once or twice in the week since Borden had gone, Annar’s wife tried to comfort him. He sent her away and ceased calling for her. Rarely was he allowed so much luxury to be sullen, and he wished to take it.

“What is this swill you give me?” he asked, looking up from his plate to the face of his steward. Master Grey’s face was a carefully arranged mask.

“There is nothing better, my king,” he said. “The servants eat—”

“How dare you tell me what my servants eat?” Annar shouted. “I am the king! You will do better than this.”

Master Grey nodded. He summoned a lesser servant with a flick of his fingers, and the man came and took Annar’s plate away. “As you say, my lord,” Grey answered.

Mirian was in the kitchen when Grey and the flustered servant entered it.

The cook nearly exploded at the sight of the returned dish. “It’s not good enough,” Grey said.

“And what am I do to about that?” the cook asked. “You show me a better bird, and I’ll cook it—he should be grateful he’s eating fowl; the rest of us—”

“I know what the rest of you are eating,” Master Grey said. “Salt it. Dress it up a little differently. Just so he doesn’t recognize it when we take it back.”

Master Grey caught sight of Mirian, preparing a tray.

“How is the queen?” he asked.

“Holding little down,” Mirian answered.

“No surprise,” the cook said.

“At least she’s trying to eat,” Mirian said. Her voice was low. Grey regarded her for a moment, aware that her eyes were on her work so she did not see him. Something had changed in her—it was barely perceptible, but the change was there. The image of Mirian carrying her royal charge through the servant’s quarters and up the stairs came back to him, and the steward found that a smile tugged at his weary mouth.

Mirian picked up her tray and left the kitchen, her skirts swishing her around her. She walked with such a purposeful stride—such an air of command, as though she intended to get the breakfast down Lilia and keep it there. Not for the first time, Grey wondered how the slave girl had become what she was. The henpecking of his wife had not crippled her—the near-imbecility of the girl’s mother had not been passed on. The old family is in her still, Grey thought. He blinked and looked away, to the platter the cook was thrusting under his nose. The same anemic chicken, dressed in a thick sauce made of stewed prunes.

“It will do,” he said.

Mirian pushed her way into Lilia’s chamber, laying the tray down beside the wakened queen and crossing to the window to dash the curtains open. It was a clear day: blue and sun-filled, and Lilia smiled in the rays that suddenly poured over her.

“I can’t eat,” she told Mirian. “Just let me drink in the sun.”

Mirian almost picked up the spoon she’d brought with Lilia’s porridge, but she thought better of it and tapped her fingers on the tray instead. She’d seated herself beside Lilia now, and she looked toward the open window and squinted in the sun.

“It’s stronger outside,” she said. “I went out early this morning—it’s a good light the sun gives today.”

“It would be lovely not to be confined,” Lilia said.

Mirian turned and looked at her queen. She frowned. “Why are you?” she asked.

“What?” Lilia asked.

“Can you walk?” Mirian asked.

Lilia hesitated a moment. “If my stomach will stay still, yes,” she said.

“Then let us go out,” Mirian said.

Lilia smiled and looked away. “You tease me,” she said. “Annar hasn’t called.” Her smile faded a moment. “I don’t know whether to wish he would.”

“I wasn’t talking about Annar,” Mirian said. “Walking from this room to his chambers is not ‘out.’”

“What do you mean then?” Lilia asked.

“Out!” Mirian exclaimed. She pointed to the window. “Out there, out with the sun.”

Lilia looked at her, a half-puzzled frown on her face. “I don’t—” she said, “I don’t go out.”

Mirian cleared her throat. “In all your life—” she began.

“I’ve always lived in a tower,” Lilia said.

Mirian stopped. The words sank in slowly. “When you were a child?” she asked.

“My father wouldn’t let me out,” Lilia said. “Perhaps he was afraid I would run away.”

“Would you?” Mirian asked.

Lilia shook her head, smiling as she often did now, with her sweet, slow smile. “No,” she said. “I would have been afraid to.”

“Well,” Mirian said, clearing her throat again, “you may not go out. But I do. Will you go with me?”

“If you’ll show me the way,” Lilia answered.

* * *

An hour later the two slipped out the gates. Mirian knew the servants on the wall better than they did; she knew exactly when their eyes would be turned away from any activity, so they left the castle without suspicion. Both women wore heavy cloaks; Lilia’s hands were gloved and her feet well covered. Mirian wore the usual rags tied around her feet; her fingers were free and cold. Still, the air felt good—exhilarating—free. The fields greeted them, snow striping the old brown furrows under a brilliant blue sky. A few hardy ravens still picked at the cold ground, looking not for worms but for the last remaining chaff. Beyond the fields, the woods rose up dark and distant. The wind blew from them, carrying the scent of cedar and snow with it.

Lilia walked slowly forward. She turned and smiled at Mirian, a smile that touched her grey eyes and made a child of her. “It’s beautiful,” she said.

“It is no castle,” Mirian agreed. “That is why I like it. In the spring and summer it is green and alive, and you can watch the hunters returning from the forest. In the fall there is harvest to be brought in. These fields are better to us than stone and towers could be.”

They walked side by side a little while, into the fields. The air was cold enough to make their faces tingle, but the wind when it blew was not harsh, and the sky overhead was blue enough to make them forget the cold.

“I am surprised you have never run away,” Lilia said, suddenly.

Mirian lowered her eyes. “You forget that slaves do not have rights no matter how far they run,” she said. “They would hunt me down and make me regret it.”

“Do you fear that?” Lilia asked. “I am surprised.”

Mirian looked at her companion. “No,” she said. “I don’t fear it. I stay here because—this is home.”

“But you have no family,” Lilia said. “No ties to keep you here.”

Mirian looked away. They stood in silence until Lilia began to grow worried; then Mirian turned back to her and said, “Come this way. I want to show you something.”

* * *

The gnarled branches of the tree striped the ground with shadows. Lilia stepped gingerly over its roots, steadying herself with one hand on its great trunk. Mirian had already found her place; she leaned back into the tree’s embrace and closed her eyes. The wind blew up again; spicing the air evergreen; chilling the shadows. Lilia waited.

When Mirian opened her eyes again, they were clear and calm. “This is the tie that keeps me here,” Mirian said. “My family is buried—here.” She pointed to a spot under the branches of the tree, then to another. “And here—there—my father is there, and my brothers are here.”

She stepped away from the ridges that had protected her, moving to a place some five feet from the tree. There was nothing to mark the ground; no stone or wooden stave, but Mirian was precisely sure of it. She looked down at the ground beneath her feet.

“My mother is here,” she said. Something caught in her voice as she spoke. She cleared her throat, shaking her head, but did not raise her eyes.

“I’m sorry,” Lilia said.

Mirian looked up. Her eyes had clouded over. She smiled and brushed a tear away with the back of her hand. “They are not good ties, perhaps,” she said. “They are all dead. But I have no one living, not anywhere. So this tree is the best I can do.”

Lilia moved forward, carefully navigating the tangle of roots, and laid her hand on Mirian’s arm. They regarded each other a long time, eyes speaking understanding.

“I am glad you did not run away,” Lilia said.

Mirian nodded: an awkward, hasty nod. Abruptly she raised her hand to cover Lilia’s.

“I have not been glad,” Mirian whispered. “I have never been glad of anything.”

Lilia smiled. “I understand,” she said.

* * *

There was blood on the wind. Taerith could smell it. It made the horses snort and shake their heads.

Kardas’s eyes were narrowed. “The tribesmen are close,” he said.

Taerith regarded his companion silently. He had wondered about Kardas—about the half-mistrust with which the others sometimes regarded him; about whatever it was that simmered under the surface of his face. He had wondered, until he had seen one of the raiders. They had caught the man at night while he raided a sheep cote, but his two companions got away.

He could have been Kardas’s brother.

“Loyalty lies where there is true debt, not only where blood is shared,” Kardas had answered to Taerith’s question. Taerith asked no more.

The road wound its way through scrub and open fields. The thick forest lay behind them. In the rise and fall of the rocky terrain there were many places for men to hide and many places for a horse to twist its leg and fall. The land made Taerith uneasy. He rode with a frown, listening. Nothing met his ears but the clop of hooves, yet the smell—sharp and cloying—was unmistakable.

He dismounted suddenly. He left the road, stepping slowly and lightly over the frostbitten ground. A line of boulders rose up to meet him. The first had a natural ledge in its side; he stepped up and peered over. His heart beat faster. What had looked from the road like shadows from the boulders was in fact a ravine, plunging some seven feet down. Directly below him he could make out the shape of an animal carcass—the source of the smell.

He turned his head west, eyes following the ravine as it paralleled the road. It only took him a minute to see them. At least six men, long dark hair bound in braids, huddled in a knot of bare skin and animal furs where the ravine widened. Borden had just reached the point in the row directly opposite them.

As Taerith watched, one of the men crawled above the others. The knife clenched between the man’s teeth told Taerith all he needed to know. He ran forward, across the tops of the boulders, and shouted, “In the ravine!”

Borden’s horse neighed as he jerked back on the reins, stopping the line. His sword was already in his hand as he pointed toward Taerith and shouted “There!” His men turned their heads, forgetting their confusion in shouts as the first of the tribesmen emerged from the ravine. Tridian notched an arrow and let it fly. It missed the barbarian but got another in the shoulder as he climbed out behind the first.

Taerith was nearly above the huddle of wild men when something hit him from behind. The force of it pushed him forward, and his heart beat wildly as he fought to keep his balance. He turned his head and looked back down the ravine: straight down through the gloom to the shaft of an arrow pointed directly at him. He threw himself away, hitting the ground as the arrow whizzed over his head. He scrambled up and ran toward Kardas and the other men, who were even now engaging the barbarians hand-to-hand. He had seen enough. There were others in the ravine, coming from behind, enough to even out the odds.

His arm came up, sword in hand, blocking a spear-thrust as one of the wild men turned to meet him in the field before he reached the road. The man roared and pulled out his sword. He swung it; Taerith ducked. The man was unbalanced by his swing. Taerith buffeted him on the side with the flat of his sword, and his adversary fell, gasping for breath. Taerith left him on the ground and sprinted to the road.

Kardas had finished off two men and was facing another. Taerith sheathed his sword as he ran and leaped onto the man’s back, one arm over the barbarian’s eyes and the other around his neck. Kardas dealt him a blow to the knees, and while he staggered, Taerith jumped off his back and shoved him off the road. He rolled down the rocky incline.

Borden’s war cry broke over the sounds of the scuffle, and his soldiers joined him: whooping, calling, yelling, grunting, they drove the barbarians off the road and back toward the ravine. Taerith ran up through the ranks, fighting to reach Borden.

“There are others!” he yelled, pointing back in the direction where had seen them. Borden caught Taerith’s eye from his perch atop his horse, and nodded. He spurred his horse forward, driving the barbarians backwards until they tripped over the boulders and toppled back into the ravine. With his horse’s forelegs standing atop the boulders, Borden blew his battle horn and pointed energetically toward the hidden barbarians. His men caught his meaning. Arrows, rocks, knives rained down. The hidden tribesmen had waited too long to emerge. They were beaten before they could react.

Borden and his men returned to the road, laughing and wiping away dirt and blood. Borden spit from atop his horse and looked down at Taerith.

“Good man,” he said. “You gave us the advantage.”

He rode off. Taerith stayed in the road, watching his leader ride away. The others remounted and followed him. Taerith still stood, as the bodies of horses and men jogged away on either side of him.

Kardas approached, the reins of two horses in his hand. He looked at Taerith a long moment.

“How many men did you kill?” he asked.

Taerith looked away. His shoulder was bleeding. A minor cut; he hadn’t noticed it before. He touched it and brought his fingertips away black and red with dirt and blood.

“How many?” Kardas asked.

“I don’t know,” Taerith answered.

“You can’t fight a bloodless war,” Kardas told him. He handed Taerith his reins. “Look at yourself. You kill or they’ll kill you.”

Taerith mounted. The others had drawn ahead of them. They’d have to catch up. The field was eerily quiet. The wet-rust smell of blood was stronger than ever. The ravine became visible as they rode farther on, the boulders clearing away and making the gash in the ground plain.

“Why didn’t they come out?” Taerith asked suddenly. “They could have evened it out. Given their fellows a better chance at victory.”

“The other tribesmen?” Kardas asked.

“Yes.”

“They don’t think like that,” Kardas said. “It’s every man for himself. They weren’t ready to emerge, so they didn’t.”

Overhead, a hawk keened. Taerith watched it as it circled above the field, drawn by the smell. He wondered what it could see, down in the ravine.

He fingered his sword hilt. It was slick with sweat and blood. Whose, he didn’t know. The answer to Kardas’s question was plain enough to him: he had not, with own hands, killed a single man.

Shades of Braedoch tugged at his heart. Taerith the fisherman, tending his river nets in the green glade. Taerith the thinker, never one to act rashly. The hawk called out again.

Taerith raised his eyes and whispered, “Deus with wings, let me see what You see.”

Henry Cate, founder of the Carnival of Homeschooling, has posted this week’s edition. The theme is taxes–a topic which, while not exactly near and dear to my heart, has been much under my nose lately.

Mirian waited with her back to the cold stone wall outside Lilia’s room. She started each time someone came in or out, servants bearing jugs of steaming water, rags, and strong-smelling broth. At last they all trooped out again, single-file through the narrow passage to the stairs. Mistress Grey came last of all, iron keyring in hand.

“To think of you,” she snapped. “Tending her every hour and never even noticing. I don’t know whether to call you blind or stupid.”

“Call me both, then, and be done with it,” Mirian answered. She held out her hand, and Mistress Grey placed the key to Lilia’s room in it.

“Mind my instructions,” she said. “And for God’s sake ask for help if you need it.”

Mirian closed her fingers over the key. “Yes, ma’am.”

Mistress Grey gave her a sharp look. Mirian did not react to it, and Mistress Grey turned to go. When the last footstep had died away on the stairs, Mirian gingerly pushed open the door.

Lilia looked up from the bed. Mirian moved automatically to the window, then thought better of it and left the curtains alone. She turned abruptly to Lilia.

“When will the baby come?” she asked.

“Late in the summer, Mistress Grey tells me,” said Lilia.

Mirian nodded. She reached into her skirt pocket and drew out the book Joachim had given Lilia in the hall before the feast. She held it out as though she expected Lilia to come take it, then stepped across the room and laid it on the table next to the bed.

“I was afraid that the king would destroy it, so I… I went and found it first,” Mirian said.

A slow, solemn smile turned up the corners of Lilia’s mouth. “Thank you,” she said. “And for carrying me here… thank you.”

Mirian turned deep red. “Who told you about that?” she asked.

“Mistress Grey.”

Mirian turned away. “It was my job.

Lilia laughed—a clear, bell-like laugh that rippled in the pool of Mirian’s embarrassment. “Not just any lady’s maid could have carried me up all those stairs,” she said.

Mirian wheeled around and snapped, “Oh yes, they could. You weight about as much as a gnat.”

The words struck them both as so ludicrous that each saw the other swallow a laugh. Lilia’s expression grew solemn again.

“I heard Mistress Grey chastise you in the hall.”

Embarrassment again. Mirian flopped into the chair next to Lilia’s bed and folded her arms, eyes cast down and brow stormy.

“She shouldn’t have,” Lilia continued. “I told her not to.”

The thought of Lilia giving orders to Mistress Grey hardly registered with Mirian. Her guilt suddenly welled over.

“I deserved it,” she said. “To watch you growing weak and ill and not recognize that you were with child… I’m a fool.”

“I didn’t recognize it myself,” Lilia said.

Mirian looked up at her, startled. “What did you think you were, dying?” she asked.

“Yes,” Lilia answered. She chuckled a little and rested her hand on her still-slender belly. “And all the time there was life growing in me.”

Mirian hardly heard the last comment. She turned and faced Lilia, leaning forward, her voice low and intense.

“You thought you were dying?” she repeated.

Suddenly there were tears in Lilia’s eyes, but she smiled through them. “Yes,” she said.

Mirian’s voice was thick as she spoke, as though she needed to choke something down but couldn’t. “People only die of broken hearts when they give up,” Mirian said. “You’re not that weak.”

“How do you know my heart is broken?” Lilia asked.

Mirian’s own eyes were instantly awash with tears, but they stayed there, shining in her eyes, refusing to fall. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I should have helped you.”

“Even though slaves don’t talk with queens?” Lilia asked. She reached out suddenly, and took Mirian’s hands and pulled them toward her, sitting up and leaning forward as she did. “I know I’m only a queen,” she said. “But if you’ll speak with me… and touch me sometimes like this… smile… I’d be so grateful.”

Mirian’s fingers tightened around Lilia’s small white hands until she thought she’d crush them, and she forced herself to loosen her grip. She stood abruptly. Lilia still held her hands, like a pleading child. She turned her grey eyes up.

“Grateful,” she repeated, “and Deus himself will bless you for it.”
Mirian nodded, and somehow through her tears she smiled. “You should sleep,” Mirian said.

“You’ve been too weak. Rest now.”

Lilia released her hands and laid back, closing her eyes with a hint of a smile on her face. Mirian stood watching her until the young queen fell asleep.

She turned away at last and moved to the window. Brown fields stretched out to the borders of the forest. North. Vaguely she knew that trouble would come from the north. Hosten had promised it.

The tears through which she saw it all condensed suddenly and traced damp trails down her face. She could still feel Lilia’s weight in her arms; the small hands clinging to hers. An image had burned itself in her mind and it rose before her now: she saw herself, carrying the queen away from the hall. But the image blurred, even as her chest began to heave with emotions she resolutely shoved down; she saw others, carrying another woman, a dead woman, away… her mother.

For an instant she was a little girl watching again. A tiny sob burst from her. She clamped her mouth shut, clenched her fists, turned from the window as if she expected to face an enemy. No one was there but Lilia, still sleeping. She turned back, leaning on the stone of the window.

Someone was riding across the fields toward the castle. Two men, riding like the devil was on their tail. From the height of the castle she couldn’t see the way their horses frothed, but in her mind’s eye she could.

* * *

The watchmen knew them at once and ordered the gates opened. They didn’t slow up until they were nearly there; then they pulled their horses to a high-stepping, nervous walk, and rode into the courtyard. Borden had already been called. He strode up to the first rider and said,

“What news?”

The man was covered in dirt and grime. He wiped his forehead and answered, “There’s been a raid at Esktown. Crops are gone; a lot of people… gone.”

“It’s too soon,” Borden said. “Hosten only called his men off yesterday. Esktown is too far south.”

“We caught two of them still in the town. We brought their weapons back; you can see for yourself. It’s northerners.”

Borden cursed. “The swine. He must have called his men away from the border weeks ago. He knew Annar would give him a reason to do it.”

He turned his back on the messengers and ran the figures in his mind. How many miles of borderland… what number of barbarians beyond it… how far they would likely come for plunder. He cursed again.

He turned back to the messengers. Others of his men had gathered in the courtyard. They stood watching him, silent and grim, arms folded. Above them the sky was grey and clouded; snow was coming in earnest.

“Gather what you need,” he said.

“Sir?” Emmet asked.

“We’re going north. All of us. When they attack again we’ll be there to meet them. Hosten thinks we aren’t strong enough to defend ourselves. Prove him wrong, and I’ll stand with you.”

The men nodded. They turned away, all except a few who waited. Emmet approached Borden and clapped a hand on his shoulder. Borden nodded, and Emmet stepped back and headed for the stables.

Kardas remained, looking up at his leader through smoky eyes.

“I believe in your loyalty,” Borden said.

Kardas nodded. There was no trace of light in his face, nothing but deeply-meant conviction.
“You have no cause to fear it,” he said.

“Taerith?” Borden called, looking toward the last remaining man in the courtyard. Taerith approached quietly, waiting until Kardas had disappeared into the soldiers’ quarters before he spoke. “Is it wise to take all the men away?” he asked.

“We need every one,” Borden said. “The greater show of force we can give the marauders, the better. Once we’ve beaten them soundly once or twice we can send some of the men home. The northerners are deadly, but they’re primitive, and they don’t act as a group.”

“There are home threats,” Taerith said.

“There’s nothing else to do,” Borden said. He had nearly raised his voice, and immediately he looked apologetic. “I’m sorry, Taerith.” He fixed his dark eyes on the young man. “Can you kill a man?” he asked.

“If I must,” Taerith said.

Borden nodded. “I believe you. I want you to fight beside Kardas.”

Taerith raised an eyebrow. “To spy on him?” he asked.

“No, to fight with him,” Borden repeated. “I told him I trusted his loyalty, and I meant it. The others may not. Best he fights beside a man he can trust.”

“Yes, sir,” Taerith said. He bent his head. Borden couldn’t account for the sorrow in Taerith’s face, or the conflict he saw there.

“Work it out, whatever it is,” he said. “We need you with us entirely, not with half your heart left here.”

Taerith smiled an odd, crooked smile. “That is a hard request,” he said. “I am not even all here. Pieces of my heart are strewn in more places than you know.”

Borden’s voice was softened as he issued his final order. “Pack up, poet. We leave tonight.”
“My lord?” Taerith asked as Borden began to walk away.

“Yes?” the prince asked, turning.

“What has happened to the priest?”

“The poison-tongued prophet?” Borden asked. Taerith nodded.

“He is the safest possible place,” Borden answered. “Look down.”

* * *

There was a dungeon beneath the castle. It was both dank and chill, though not cold enough to keep out the vermin. Taerith could hear them skittering away in the darkness as he descended the staircase: a long, steep descent that seemed to have been carved from stone and yellow mud. Guards sat at the bottom of the stairs, playing dice beneath the glare of torches. They looked up, startled, at Taerith’s approach.

“I want to see the priest,” he said.

One of the guards pointed down a rectangular corridor with his knife. “Down there,” he said.
The corridor was black as pitch, and Taerith ducked his head as he entered it. He reached out and touched one of the walls; sticky cobwebs met his fingers. The corridor—more of a tunnel really—stank. Of what, he wasn’t sure.

Toward its end, the corridor suddenly widened and led off into two different directions. Faint light glimmered from the left, and the rustle of straw indicated that someone had moved.

“Joachim?” Taerith called.

“I’m here,” the priest’s voice came back.

Taerith took the left path four steps, and a cell began to take shape in the gloom. Iron bars separated it from the corridor. Joachim was sitting within, leaning against the wall on the opposite side. Taerith could just make out the form of him, robed and hooded. The cell was squarish and roughly formed, with clay and rock walls that swept far higher than the dungeon level. High above, nearly at the ceiling, brick-sized apertures let in a little light and air.
Taerith reached into his shirt and pulled out something long and thin and wrapped in a rag, which he tossed through the bars. It landed near Joachim’s feet. The priest leaned over and picked it up. “Thank you,” he said.

“It’s not much,” Taerith said.

Joachim untied the thin cloth that covered it, and pulled out a piece of iron that had been shaped to a point. He looked up, and in the measly light Taerith thought he saw a twinkle in the priest’s eye.

“Thank you,” he said. “There’s so much clay in these walls, this will serve me very nicely.”

“I thought you might keep the dates with it,” Taerith said. “Or write hymns in the wall.”

“Or prophecies,” Joachim said, his voice at once deep and laughing—at himself, Taerith thought.

“Why did you do it?” Taerith asked. “You knew it would send you here—and bring us trouble.”

“Has it brought you trouble?” Joachim asked. “I’m sorry for that.”

“You didn’t answer my question,” Taerith said.

“I did it because Deus sent me,” Joachim said.

“So you said.”

“And you, boy? Deus touched you, too. I saw that in you.”

“I thought Deus had sent me here,” Taerith said. “To help protect… Lilia. But I’m leaving now. Borden calls us to the borders, and I pledged to serve under him. I’m not sure what to do.”

Joachim shifted in the darkness, shuffling the damp straw beneath him. He held up the iron pen, studying it in the dank light. “What do you know about Deus, Taerith?”

Taerith was quiet a long moment. “That he has wings,” he said.

“Then,” Joachim said, “like the eagle, He sees more than you do. Trust that He will not stop watching over you and over Lilia. Go, fulfill your pledges, and don’t fear. That is my advice. There is little purpose in fear.”

From above, the sound of horses neighing drifted into the cell. Taerith looked up. “We leave tonight,” he said. “Be well, friend.”

“And you,” Joachim responded. “I will pray for you.”

Taerith was quiet again. He began to turn away, then stopped and said, “Pray for us all.”

* * *

Taerith joined the soldiers in the courtyard. The snow was beginning to fall, swirling down on a light wind that promised to freeze the night and make their ride an arduous one. He had wrapped his feet in cloth before booting them, and his cloak was wrapped around his shoulders and fastened with a thin iron clasp. The wind blew in his hair, chilling his ears. He twined the reins of his horse around his fingers as he watched the others mount.

Borden shouted an order, and Taerith mounted. The horse surged forward with its fellows; with a rush and pounding of hooves, they were away.

From the shadows, a man watched them go.

He smiled to himself. When the courtyard had been empty five minutes he walked into the center of it, then turned and looked up at the high, narrow windows of Annar’s feasting hall. “The time has come,” the man said. He cast his eyes up further, to the tower where the queen—the queen, with Annar’s heir forming in her—slept. His smile was frozen, and it eroded like ice under the night wind.

Wrapping his cloak around himself, he left the courtyard and the castle behind him. The few servants who patrolled the walls, slack and unpracticed compared to Borden’s now-absent guards, did not even see him go. Down the road he wandered, till he reached an inn in the nearest village.

The man entered the dining hall, moving through the smoke and dim lighting toward a corner where sat a man in a wine-coloured cloak.

“Greetings, Father Meronane,” he said.

Meronane looked up at him, his eyes flickering in greeting. He said nothing.

The man’s voice dropped nearly to a whisper as he took the seat opposite the priest. “Borden has removed his men,” he said. “They go north to combat the barbarians, who have already attacked at Esktown. And there is more—the queen is with child.”

Meronane nodded. “The devil has spawned,” he said. His voice was deep, solemn like a funeral bell. He stood, his tall form blocking out the lights that smouldered on the wall behind him. “We will give the people time,” he said. “The barbarians will slaughter Borden’s men even as the villagers starve. Hunger will teach them to regard their deliverers.”

In another corner of the room someone was singing—a girl, a server in the tavern, who carried only scant fare to her customers and mockingly spilled out her words in explanation. Meronane smiled at the sound. The words were indistinct through the dull tavern clamour, but he had heard them sung often enough in the town.

Curse the king, curse the queen, let the harvest run away.

Annar had given them the people’s backing. Hosten had given them opportunity. The priest’s band would show themselves strong when the time came to attack the castle. But it was Meronane himself who would put an end to the king’s line—forever.