A Hero's Tale (36 page)

"I must also convince them to accept the friendship of their enemies," I said. "I asked the northerners' go-between to join us."

"Good," said Maara. "That will be a start."

"She knows I've taken credit for the defeat of the northern tribes."

"I wondered how long we could keep that secret."

I laughed. "Hard to keep it secret when you shout it to the world."

"What will you tell her?" Maara asked.

"The truth," I said.

"Bear in mind that she may be more than an interpreter. Last night she spoke as much for herself as for the northern chieftains."

I heard Sparrow's voice outside the tent. Unable this time to get past my guard, she shouted her indignant protest. Maara lifted the tent flap and told the men to let her through.

"Your friends are waiting for you," Sparrow said, "but before we go, I need to tell you what I've done." She glanced at Maara. "I found our swiftest messenger and sent him back to Merin's house."

Sparrow turned back to me. "I would have consulted you, but in all the commotion I couldn't get anywhere near you, and I thought we should send word back as soon as possible."

"What message did you send?" Maara asked her.

"The news that you both have been found alive and well and will soon be coming home."

"That's all?"

"Not quite." Sparrow grinned at me. "I'm afraid I may have laid it on a little thick. I told him to say that Tamras is coming home at the head of a great army, that she has defeated her nemesis, Vintel, and sent her into exile, that she has also defeated our enemies, the northern tribes, and allied herself and Merin's house to the peoples of the northern wilderness."

"Sparrow will soon rival Finn as a conjuror of legends," said Maara.

Around the council fire I found my friends. First to catch my eye was Taia's copper-colored hair. Beside her Kenit sat, and next to him was Laris with two of Merin's captains, people who, unlike the others, had always been friendly to Maara and me. It was fitting that they would now be rewarded.

When they saw me, they all stood up and gathered around me. I embraced each one and told them how glad I was to see them. I meant every word. For the first time since I left Merin's house, I was with my own.

We sat down around the council fire, all but Sparrow, who stood on her tiptoes and craned her neck, looking for someone.

"Who's missing?" I asked her.

I thought it might be Donal she was looking for.

"Maybe she got lost," said Sparrow. "I'll go find her."

And off she went.

I turned to Kenit. "Is Donal here?"

Kenit shook his head. "He took a slight wound in a skirmish with a raiding party. He would have come with the army anyway, but I told him someone had to mind the baby."

I was glad to hear Kenit speak of his child. I had hesitated to ask after him. This past winter was his first, and winter is not kind to children.

"How is your son?" I asked him.

"He is well," said Kenit. "Well and strong."

"I am very glad to hear it."

Taia turned to face me. "Are you going to tell us what you've been doing all this time?"

"I hardly know where to start," I replied.

A voice behind me said, "Start with why these northerners have been such a trouble to us. Was it you who put them up to it?"

I knew her by her voice before I turned around.

"Fodla!"

Sparrow was with her. It was Fodla she'd been looking for.

"Aren't you going to ask an old woman to sit down?"

Instead I stood up. "What old woman? I see no old woman here."

Fodla couldn't keep herself from smiling, and while her guard was down, I embraced her. She soon had her guard back up again. She shrugged me off and went to take a seat across the fire from me.

There were now nine of us from Merin's house gathered around the council fire. It was an auspicious number.

Taia again urged me to recount my adventures, but I said we were still waiting for one more, so they passed the time by telling me a little of what had happened in Merin's land since I left it. While the last harvest wasn't the bounty we were used to, there had been enough to last the winter, though they all had to pull their belts a little tighter. This year looked to be much better.

The northerners must have had another meager harvest. The raids began while snow still lay on the ground, and Vintel asked Merin's allies to send help before the usual time. Beset by troubles of their own, they were slow to fulfill their obligation. Then our scouts reported the gathering of the northern army. This news was enough to frighten Merin's allies into sending every warrior they could spare. Merin's house was their bulwark in the north. If Merin was defeated, their own houses would be the next to fall.

Bru stopped by the council fire long enough to be introduced to everyone. I invited him to join us, but he didn't stay. He had things to do, he said, and besides he couldn't understand a word of our peculiar tongue.

The young king too came by, but before long he excused himself, as his wounds were troubling him. The healer who had tended him left with Elen's army, and he had no healer of his own. He looked a little feverish.

"Is there a healer among you?" I asked Sparrow.

She nodded. "Shall I take him to her?"

Without waiting for my answer, she got to her feet and held out her arm to him, to help him up.

"Let the healer know that she is tending a king," I said to Sparrow.

"A king," she echoed.

It was a word seldom heard in Merin's house, except in stories.

At last the northerners' go-between arrived. She begged my pardon for her lateness, saying that she'd had matters to talk over with the northern chieftains. I invited her to take a place part way round the circle from me, so that we could each have a clear view of the other. Because I trusted Maara's intuition that she was more than she appeared to be, I offered her the opportunity to reveal herself.

"Will your chieftains join us or will you speak on their behalf?" I asked.

"I will speak on my own behalf," she replied. "War is their business. Peace is my business."

Another good sign.

"Then it's time we knew your name," I said.

"I am called Ru."

I turned to the others. "Ru speaks for the northern tribes."

Fodla bristled. "Let her speak somewhere else then. There's nothing she might say that I care to hear."

"Fodla," I said, as gently as I could, "I hope I can prevail upon you to change your mind. I think she has much to say that it would be well for us to listen to, but tonight I asked her to join us to hear with all of you the story of how the northern army was defeated."

Fodla glared at me. I refused to glare back at her. I held her eyes until she looked away. Though at home she was an elder, here on the battlefield she was a warrior, and I was her commander.

Sparrow returned in time to witness our silent battle.

"Is Fodla making trouble already?" she said as she sat down.

"Fodla is concerned that we not make the same mistake again that we made last time," I said. "I share her concern, and I'm counting on her to help me learn to do things differently."

Fodla's angry scowl relaxed a little.

"So," said Ru. "They say you defeated us though you were nowhere near the battlefield. How do you explain this mystery?"

Maara put her hand on my arm. "Begin at the beginning," she said. "Let Ru hear it all. Begin with the night Vintel drove us out of Merin's house."

Bear with me," I said to Ru, "while I tell my friends why I disappeared from Merin's house and what happened to me while I've been away."

"It promises to be a fascinating tale," she said.

I turned back to the others. "As you know, it was half a year ago, not long before the first snowfall."

Was it only half a year? It felt like another lifetime.

"Late one night, my sister Tamar brought us a message, given to her by someone she didn't know. She said Laris had returned and was waiting for Maara by the river. It was a lie. It was Vintel who sent the message, and when Maara left the house, Vintel's warriors took her prisoner."

"I don't understand," said Kenit. "Why would Vintel do such a thing? I know she wasn't fond of Maara, but that seems a bit much even for Vintel."

"Vintel wanted to be rid of both of us," I told him. "You must have heard the rumors that Merin intended to name me her heir. Once that happened, Vintel knew there would be no place for her in Merin's house."

"But that makes her actions even more difficult to understand," he said. "That she would kill a stranger I can well believe, but how could she dare to murder the Lady's heir?"

The image came into my mind of Vintel's face as I had seen it then, lit by a flare of firelight. At the time I called that look the pain of wounded love. It was Vintel's pain that had driven her that night, or she would never have done anything so foolish. And that secret pain belonged only to Vintel.

"Have you never known Vintel to do something without thinking?" I said.

Kenit chuckled, and I went on with my story before anyone else could question the reason for Vintel's treachery.

"When Maara failed to return, I went downstairs to look for her. Vintel was waiting for me. She dragged me into the armory and told me that if I would promise to leave Merin's house, she would let Maara go to Laris. I had no choice but to agree. To explain my absence, Vintel told Merin my mother had died."

Fodla made a growling noise in her throat. "Damn near killed the woman with that lie," she said.

"That's why Sparrow sent Tamar to bring my mother to her."

Fodla nodded her approval.

"Sparrow found me locked in the armory. When I told her what Vintel had done, she let me out, and I followed Vintel's warriors north."

"How did you know where they had gone?" asked Laris.

"If they were taking Maara south to you," I replied, "I knew she would be safe enough. But if, as I suspected, Vintel meant to kill her, where else would they go?"

Laris understood my reasoning.

"I soon found their trail, " I said. "I followed it for quite a distance, until I had the misfortune to turn a corner and stumble suddenly into the midst of Vintel's warriors."

Maara stirred beside me. She knew what I was about to say, and I half expected her to stop me, but she kept her silence.

"I killed their captain, and no one else had the heart to challenge my bow. Maara disarmed them and sent them back to Merin's house with their dead comrade."

"We heard nothing of the death of one of Vintel's captains," said Fodla.

"Sparrow tells me that Vintel buried her secretly," I replied. "She was afraid that if people knew of it, they would discover what she had done. But she cannot now accuse me of the murder."

"It was not murder," Maara said.

I turned to face her. "Why did we run away then?"

"Who would have believed us?"

"Harrumph," said Fodla. "Did you doubt that Merin and the council would have seen justice done?"

Fodla's words had an edge, as if she thought us cowardly because we ran away. I reminded myself that it was just Fodla's way of speaking, and I decided not to take offense, but Maara took offense on my behalf.

"Perhaps you have forgotten Vintel's power," Maara said. "She would have told the council the same thing she told Sparrow, that she only intended to drive me out of Merin's house, that she meant no harm to Tamras. She would have insisted that Tamras killed her warrior unprovoked. She would have demanded blood for blood, and with or without the consent of Merin and the council, she would have taken it."

Fodla chose not to argue with her.

Maara nudged me. "Go on," she said.

"Vintel's warriors were afraid of Vintel's anger. They told her they had killed us both. If we had known that Vintel believed us dead, we might have stayed close to home and tried to send word to our friends. Instead, fearing pursuit, we traveled far into the north. When the snow began to fall, we sought refuge in the forest, where we could forage for food and shelter among the trees."

"You spent the winter in a forest?" Sparrow asked. She poked me in the ribs. "You don't look like you wanted for enough to eat."

"We had plenty," I assured her. "We fished the streams and set snares for small game. Because I had the bow, from time to time we enjoyed a feast of venison."

I had already decided, and Maara had agreed with me, that we would tell no one about the forest people. Their survival depended on their invisibility. Besides, said Maara, no one would believe us anyway.

"It's a wonder you didn't freeze to death," said Sparrow.

"We found shelter in a hollow tree."

Fodla snorted. "How could there be room for two people in a hollow tree? Did you sleep standing up?"

"They are ancient forests in the north," Maara told her. "The trees there are immense, larger even than the trees in your own oak grove. We had room enough."

I was glad for the darkness. It hid the blush that warmed my cheeks. The smile in Maara's voice told me that she too was remembering what we had shared in that hollow tree.

"All winter we thought over what we should do," I said. "In the end we agreed we had no choice but to come home. Perhaps Vintel's power had grown weaker. Perhaps her adversaries had grown stronger. We decided to trust to fortune and our friends."

"You did not then have an army at your back?" asked Fodla. She was more curious now than belligerent.

"We did not," said Maara. "We would have come back alone, if we hadn't been captured by a raiding party of the northern tribes."

Ru had been gazing into the fire, only half listening to the recounting of events that did not concern her. When she heard Maara mention the northern tribes, she looked up and said, "Do you know who it was that took you?"

"I didn't think to ask their names," said Maara.

"Where did this happen?"

"We were traveling with a caravan of traders. We set out in boats, down a stream that we hoped would take us into the river that flows through Merin's land. A band of your warriors stopped us, and the traders gave them one of the boats with all its goods to obtain safe passage for the others. It was our boat."