The Protector's War (71 page)

Dun Juniper, Willamette Valley, Oregon

May 31st, 2007 AD—Change Year Nine

S
o, what's this Sir Nigel like?
Eilir asked.

She looked around one last time to check that everything was in place. The sun was setting to her right, westward; the sky there bright towards the Coast Range, while the snow peaks of the High Cascades on her left were touched with a last touch of crimson, and a first few stars bloomed in the purple above. Birds sang towards evening, under the murmur of voices and the eternal sough of the forests above.

From what Mom writes, he's quite a man,
she went on.
Sam thinks so too of course. It's enough to turn me against him, almost.

“I only saw him for a few minutes. He's nice enough, for an old guy, I suppose…sort of like Théoden, if you know what I mean,” Astrid replied.

Decrepit, senile and playing sub to a bearded top in a dress?
Eilir signed, and dodged a revengeful elbow.

Most of Dun Juniper was gathered to greet the Mackenzie and her guests, and to celebrate victory. For some like Judy Barstow grief was uppermost, but since the Change people had learned death wasn't something that happened invisibly to old people in hospitals. Most were happy, and the walls were a blaze of flower wreaths as colorful as the gardens at the foot of the plateau beneath a bright blue sky scattered with white cloud. Even the meadows beyond seemed to celebrate, their green grass lavish with scarlet foxglove, white daisies, purple lupine and trembling sheets of blue camas flower; the year's colts ran up and down the fences and hedges, kicking up their heels at the excitement and noise. Eilir and Astrid stood before the closed gates with Chuck Barstow and a few others; the rest lined the walls, or stood beside the road, or waited inside. Astrid had a wreath of crimson penstemon in her hair; Eilir had her Scots bonnet on, with raven feathers in the clasp, but some of the flowers in the brooch that held her plaid.

How come you didn't stay over at Larsdalen?
Eilir went on.
Not that I don't appreciate the company, but you have those horses you were working on.

The approaching column turned from toy-tiny to human-sized as it rode westward down the winding gravel road through the benchland and towards the Dun. Her mother was there, and Sam Aylward, and three figures who must be the Englishmen, and an escort that included Rowan and Cynthia Carson. They were just close enough to hear Juniper Mackenzie throw back her head and laugh.

Astrid went on: “What, don't you want help keeping an eye on the Little Girl from Udun?”

She's improved,
Eilir signed.
Rudi's been showing her around and she's not sulking nearly as much.

“Yeah…but Larsdalen is getting too crowded to stand,” Astrid said. “Especially the big house. You know, with Signe's kids and Luanne's kids and Pam's two—euuu, at Dad's age!—and the staff and
their
kids and all. It'll be dull with the visitors gone…I've been thinking again we should find a place of our own, you know, a base for the Dunedain. Somewhere strategic, with good hunting and not too many people. Mithrilwood, for preference.”

Yeah, I love it here at Dun Juniper, but there are times it drives me crazy the way Larsdalen does for you,
Eilir agreed in Sign.
I sort of get nostalgic about the way it was
here
before the Change, just Mom and me and the dogs, even though I hardly remember it, really. Mithrilwood sort of reminds me of that.

“Of course, it'll be a bit crowded anywhere, when we're not camping out,” Astrid said with a certain resignation. You had to live behind walls with strong friends at hand, if you wanted to live at all; solitude meant deadly danger. “But not
as
crowded. And not as many kids, running all over the place and yelling and messing things up.”

“Wait till you've got some of your own,” Dennis Martin said; he was there in peaceful kilt and plaid and flat bonnet, but he carried his great ax, and leaned on the helve.

Astrid shuddered and rolled her eyes at his remark, but stayed silent.

What's with the chopper, Unc' Dennie?
Eilir signed.

Chuck's weaponry was part of his role, but Dennis Martin Mackenzie usually didn't carry steel unless he was away from home, and a battle-ax was a lot less handy than a short sword anyway.

“It's to hit Princess Legolamb here with, the minute she starts in with that ‘He's just like Barliman Butterbur' stuff again,” he said. “To hit her hard. With the sharp side. Many times. Brannigan, OK, you can call him goddamned Tom Benzadril and his wife is Hashberry, but leave me out.”

Astrid ignored him, except for a slight elevation of her straight nose and a sniff; Eilir snickered. The cavalcade was closer now. Some of them dismounted at the foot of the rise and came up the rise leading their horses, others riding slowly behind them; a few of the strangers looked up sharply as the Lambeg drums and bagpipes sounded from the gate towers. Eilir waved to her mother, feeling her face blossom in a smile and a load of worry lift. Chuck and Judy Barstow went forward with the welcoming-cup in its long silver-mounted horn; her mother gave each a brief sympathetic hug before she Invoked the God and Goddess and poured their libation. Eilir expected her to turn to them once more after that, but Juniper Mackenzie was laughing again, talking to the older man in the suit of plate-armor. Behind him…

Oh, wow, this one's pretty!
Eilir signed discreetly.

Alleyne Loring was whipcord elegance in his leather-and-wool riding clothes, a smile lighting his face as he swung down from the tall black horse and looked around with his left hand on the hilt of his longsword, and a peacock-feather curling in the band of his broad-brimmed hat; the animal rested its head on his shoulder, and he stroked its nose absently. Medium tall, broad in the shoulders, narrow-hipped, moving like a cat…then he removed the hat and bowed to the images on the Dun Juniper gateway, shoulder-length golden hair swaying as he did, and politely poured out a few drops before he emptied the horn of the last small mouthful of wine.

Eilir glanced sharply aside at Astrid. Her
anamchara
was standing before the gateway, motionless, sighing. The expression on her face…

Oh, wait a minute,
Eilir thought.
The first time you
ever
show any interest, and it's one who looks like young Lugh come again? It's not fair!

Astrid murmured aloud, but from the way her lips moved was probably not really aware of it: “…for he was young, and he was king, the lord of a fell people…”

Alleyne Loring's eyebrows went up as he took in Astrid Larsson's tall elegant figure. Then he saw the details of white tree and stars on the black leather of her tunic, and his smile widened into a boyish grin.

“Elen síla lumen' omentielvo,”
he said.

You couldn't be Astrid Larsson's
anamchara
for near ten years and not know that tongue; besides, those were Eilir's favorite books, too, even if she kept a stricter grasp on the boundaries between fantasy and the common everyday world.

He'd said:
A star shines on the hour of our meeting.
But even though she could lipread Elvish, there was no Sign equivalent. Eilir felt her own lips compress in annoyance.

He went on, upending the empty horn:
“Sí man i yulma nin equantuva?”

Astrid laughed in delight and clapped her hands together: “That's a special-occasion cup, but there's plenty to eat and drink waiting in the Hall, and I'll be glad to get you a refill.”

This is not
fair! Eilir thought.
This is
my
home and you're the one who gets to talk to him about it. This is just not
right!

The young man noticed her and signed—slowly and clumsily:
I'm sorry; I don't know much of this language.

Eilrir made herself smile and returned a greeting.
Not fair or right
at all
!

“You've come a long way,” Astrid went on, as they all turned and fell into step into the interior of Dun Juniper. “You and your father and your friend.”

Behind them the outer gates closed for sunset with a slow soft
boom
that shuddered through the feet, and then the inner leaves. Lantern light blossomed within—from windows, from larger glass-and-metal lamps on the towers and from the ridgepoles of the log homes that lined the inside of the walls, and bright from the windows of the Hall. That turned the carving and color of beam and pillar into a fantasy of shadow and brightness, crimson and gold and green; the timbers of the eaves continued up above the peak of the roof, and the spirals on them curled deasil and widdershins, gilded by the last rays of the sun. The carved totem-heads at the ends of the rafters loomed over their heads—wolf and bear, coyote and raven and more.

Alleyne checked a pace as the great building loomed up; his huge companion shaped a whistle.

“Well, there's a sight, and no mistake,” the bigger man said.

“Like the hall of Meduseld,” Alleyne said quietly.

“Just so!” Astrid replied.

Hey!
My
house!
My
mom's Hall!
Eilir thought.
That's where
I
live!

“We haven't seen anyone from overseas since the Change, much less from England! You'll have a lot to tell us!” Astrid continued enthusiastically.

“Sí vanwa ná, Rómello vanwa…
England,” he said, laughing again; his teeth were very white. Eilir's nostrils flared; he had a very pleasant masculine scent, clean and hard beneath the usual odors of horse and leather and woodsmoke.

Another figure moved. Eilir started; she'd noticed the man—it was hard not to, since he was six-seven and broad in proportion—but only out of the corner of her eye. He waited until she was looking straight at him before speaking, which was a courtesy she appreciated.

“Nattering on in Elvish again, is he?” he said; it was probably the sort of voice that felt like a bass rumble under your fingertips, if you touched his chest or throat while he spoke. “Bad habit of his…John Hordle's my name.”

You do Sign?
Eilir asked; the lipreading was a bit more of a strain than usual, given his accent.

Little bit. Want more.

Juniper was looking over her shoulder. Eilir started forward with the others, still feeling a slow burn as she stared at Astrid's back.

I'm your
anamchara,
not the designated sidekick!

They led their mounts over to the stables and spent a minute tending to them; she saw without surprise that Alleyne Loring knew his way around horses with an easy competence. In fact he moved so gracefully that—

John Hordle leapt backward, his mouth open in what must have been a shout of alarm. Eilir grounded her pitchfork with a wince and privately thanked the Lady that he'd been wearing a mail shirt; otherwise something rather nasty might have happened.

Astrid looked at her in astonishment:
Where were
you,
anamchara?
she signed.

Deep thought,
Eilir replied, flushing and racking the long two-tined hayfork.
Sorry. Apologize for me, would you?

Alleyne smiled, and after a moment so did John Hordle.

 

“That's my mom,” Rudi Mackenzie said proudly; the Chief of the Mackenzies winked at him as she rode by and he waved enthusiastically.

“Well, yeah,” Mathilda Arminger said, deliberately unimpressed. “I saw her when she attacked my train, you know.”

There was the trace of a sulk still in her voice; Rudi ignored it; it was only natural to miss her family, when she couldn't go home. Then she went on: “Who's the guy in the funny armor?”

“That's the real English baron,” Rudi said proudly. “He and my mom rescued
Lord Bear
.”

“Oh,
him,
” Mathilda said, sticking her hands in her pockets; she was wearing a Clan-style kilt, though in a plain gray guest-weave rather than the Mackenzie tartan, and a baggy sweater.

“Don't be a grouch,” Rudi said. “Want to go and see if we can get something in the kitchens? I'm starving and it's a while until dinner.”

“OK,” Mathilda said. “But why can't you just
tell
them to give you something?”