The Naming (8 page)

^V

THROUGH
 
THE
 
MOUNTAINS

THEY did not stop to wash or rest, nor even to eat. Maerad averted her eyes from the pile of corpses at the bottom of the hill. "We should burn them," said Cadvan. "But we haven't time. Our only chance is to keep moving."

Maerad had never felt so tired. The only thing stronger than her exhaustion was her desire to get as far away as possible from that deathly place. They walked steadily on, and she tried to ignore her aching head, smarting from the wound the wer had dealt her, and to concentrate just on keeping moving. She had no idea of a destination. She was beginning to think that Cadvan was made of wire; he betrayed little sign of weariness, while for Maerad walking was becoming a torment without end. Slowly, painfully, they approached a spur of the mountain range and rounded it. As they did, it was as if the land came back to life again. Birds were singing their morning challenges in the low bushes around them, or flickering from branch to branch; and the grasses seemed to tremble with the hidden activities of small animals. An insidious pressure that Maerad hadn't noticed until now lifted off her breast. A little farther on, a small stream bubbled down the side of a high ridge and collected in a pool bordered by smooth, flat stones. To Maerad's unutterable relief, Cadvan stopped.

"We're out of the Landrost," he said. "The peak no longer overlooks our path. He can do nothing more to us." He knelt over the pool, splashing water over his head and washing his hands: dried blood and ash swirled out into the water and disappeared. Maerad slumped on the grass nearby, unable for the moment to do anything. It was only three hours after sunrise, but she felt she had lived a whole lifetime since the day before. She was beyond sleep; despite the tiredness of her limbs, her mind was preternaturally alert. For a time she simply listened to the music of the birds and the brook, sounds that entered into her like a balm. By then Cadvan was getting food out of his pack, and she realized with a start how hungry she was.

"We haven't lost all courtesies, at least not yet," said Cadvan, glancing up at her. "You must wash first."

Maerad knelt on the stones and washed the muck off her face and hands. The water was cold and clear. She pulled some dried grasses and, moving with a sudden violent disgust, scrubbed herself as hard as she could, dabbing uselessly at her clothes, which were stiff with filth. Then they sat and ate, Cadvan sniffing the air. Clouds were forming in the east, high dark clouds mounting in the distance. "A storm is coming," he said. "Which perhaps will help us. We need to cover our tracks. More eyes than the Landrost's will be wondering what it was that resisted the wers last night, and perhaps will be tracking us. We're still at least four days from any hope of help, and that's if all goes well."

"I don't know how much farther I can go," said Maerad. Her hands were trembling.

"Nor do I, Maerad. Will has carried us this far. But I too need rest, and that badly. It would be some joke to win through all these perils, only to drop dead of exhaustion within sight of haven."

They munched in silence for a time.
I
fought the wers, and I wasn't afraid,
Maerad thought with a kind of grim gladness.
Perhaps now he'll stop treating me like a child.
Images of the battle flickered randomly through her head, and she saw again the one that had caught fire, the one who had transformed into something like a man, and shuddered.
I killed him.
The statement struck her like fear. She had slaughtered hens and rabbits for the table, thinking nothing of it, and once she had wanted to kill a man, had felt the action stirring in her soul, a black, implacable rage; but never before had she murdered anyone.
It was kill or be killed,
a voice said.
What good would it have done to stand back and let him hack you down?
He
had no doubts. . . .
She knew that was true, but the knowledge didn't stop a disquiet in her heart, a feeling that, no matter the justification, killing was wrong, that the act had somehow wounded her. Shaking her head to rid herself of her thoughts, she stretched and yawned.

"How I wish there were something else to eat!" she said. Cadvan looked up and smiled.

"Yes, traveling food serves its purpose, but it palls quickly"

"A roast bird, with roots. And baked apples stuffed with berries and nuts."

"Mushrooms!" said Cadvan unexpectedly. "Slow fried in butter. I can almost smell them!" He passed her his bottle of herbed water. "Drink some of this. Not too much; my supplies are running low."

"What is it?" asked Maerad, as she drank.

"Medhyl," said Cadvan. "It heals tiredness. It can't erase it, alas, but it helps. Bards brew it for just such times as these."

"Do we have to keep going now?"

"I think we should rest but briefly. Soon we will have to find shelter. Look at those clouds! It will be a savage storm, I think. We shan't get much farther today. There are caves around here, although we must be careful of what lives in them!"

Presently he gathered up his pack; they crossed the stream and moved on southward, Cadvan scanning the mountainsides closely as they went. Maerad was conscious of the storm at their back; each time she turned, the clouds were closer and darker, quickening with little tongues of lightning, and she began to
hear thunder. The light dimmed as the clouds ate up the sun.

Cadvan halted and pointed to a scarcely visible hole above a ridge, about twenty feet over their heads. "There!" he said. "Quick, follow me." They scrabbled up the steep incline and then, warning Maerad back, Cadvan drew his sword and walked into the cave, bending over because the roof was so low. It was dry, and the floor was sandy. The cave drove in about a dozen feet and then turned sharply. Cadvan cautiously followed it and saw that the cave petered out about ten feet farther in. He emerged where Maerad stood waiting. "It's perfect," he said. "Although something lives there; there are bones. It will be a little annoyed, I fear, to find us here, but I think it is no evil thing. We can light no fire, but at least we will not be wet."

They had found the cave in the nick of time. Even as they entered, a huge clap of thunder broke over their heads, heralding the storm's first heavy drops. Inside, it smelled fusty and close. Maerad sat on the sandy floor where the cave bent, so she could still see its mouth, a circle of light already veiled with rain. "You should lie down," she said. "I'll keep watch. I promise not to fall asleep."

To her surprise, Cadvan did not demur. "Use your listening," he said. "You know how. And wake me if you hear or see anything strange. Anything. I don't mind if it's a false alarm." Then, with the disconcerting swiftness she had witnessed before, Cadvan lay down and seemed to fall asleep instantly.

Maerad sat with her hands clasped around her knees, her cloak wrapped tightly around her for warmth, and listened to the rain and thunder. The sound was oddly comforting, even sitting in a cold cave in the middle of wild mountains. For a time she studied Cadvan's sleeping face, which glimmered palely in the semidarkness under his tangle of dark hair. He had told her he was already old, at least according to normal reckonings, but he by no means looked it. There was, nevertheless, a
sternness to his mouth, a hint of grief or suffering long mastered, which suggested that he was not misleading her; his face held traces of long experience. And yet sometimes, and particularly now, in the vulnerability of sleep, he seemed much younger, barely older than she was. She knew already he was a brave swordsman; the toughest of the Thane's men could not match his quickness or skill, and his endurance astonished her. She had seen last night how he faced down fear and danger. Yet he had not once boasted of his prowess and seemed rather to dismiss it, counting singing and lore the greater skills. She had never met anyone like him, and all the events of the past few days hadn't erased her initial astonishment. Perhaps she would get used to him in time. He trusted her a little now. Perhaps, even, they could be friends. And what had he said that morning? "You did well...."

Her mind flinched away from the memory of the battle the night before, and she remembered that she was supposed to be watching. It was a fierce storm: the rain was so heavy it now made a gray, impenetrable wall at the mouth of the cave, lit every now and then by a flash of sheet lightning. The wind howled and lashed the sides of the mountain, occasionally drowned by enormous rumbles and claps of thunder. She felt very glad they were not out in it; by comparison the cave felt safe, even cozy. She watched, and saw and heard nothing, and after a few hours, when weariness began to roll over her, she woke Cadvan and curled up to sleep on the cave floor, as luxuriously as if she bedded down in feathers.

She woke groggily to the sound of Cadvan speaking. The cave was now dark, and she blinked and stretched, peering through the shadows. What she saw made her sit up abruptly and back close to the wall, clutching her cloak.

Cadvan was face-to-face with an enormous beast. All she
could see was the dark shape of it: a monstrous bulk blocking out the light with a long tail slowly lashing, and with it a sharp stink, like nothing so much as a cat. It stretched its nose forward to Cadvan and responded to his words with rumblings deep in its throat. Maerad sat as still as she could. Cadvan gestured in Maerad's direction, speaking as he did so, and gave Maerad a cautioning look. The beast padded forward and sniffed her. She blanched, but submitted to the investigation without protest, although the long, curved teeth and the beast's breath—the hot, pungent breath of a carnivore—made her heart race. She appeared to pass inspection, and the beast turned back to Cadvan and made some more rumblings, which sounded to Maerad a little as if it were laughing at her. It then turned around in circles, padding out a bed for itself, and lay down. Cadvan turned to Maerad, smiling.

"Well done," he said. "It is no easy thing to wake up unexpectedly in the company of a mountain lion, and things might have gone ill if you had panicked. He has decided you are harmless, and will permit us to stay here the night. He assures us he will not eat us and says you wouldn't make much of a meal, anyway."

"Oh," said Maerad breathlessly. "How nice of him."

"He has also told me a few useful things, which if you had had your wits about you, you might also have heard. He has news of our battle with the wers, and claims to be honored to host such warriors. He has been hunting and the land is disturbed. All the beasts are fearful, and he likes not this wind. He says it is not safe for us to travel as we are, southward down the east of the Annova, and has offered us safe passage through the mountains. It will be a shortcut for us, and will throw whatever follows us off our trail."

"Safe passage?" said Maerad dubiously. "And we can trust him?"

"Yes," Cadvan said. "As much as we can trust anything. It is much more than I hoped for."

Maerad had no choice but to defer to Cadvan's judgment— and it was true, the beast hadn't eaten her. Yet. She remembered Gilman's hounds and felt a little less uneasy.

"What did you mean, that I could have heard his news, as well?" she asked, after a short silence.

"When are you going to wake up?" said Cadvan impatiently. "Yes, there are things that you must learn. But there are other things that sleep inside you already, as part of your Gift, your inheritance. One of them is the ability to understand the speech of beasts."

"Me?"

"Yes, girl, do you have ears of cloth?"

Maerad felt a new kind of fear stirring within her, a fear of herself, and it pricked her anger. She spoke low, afraid of waking the beast, but with a dark fury.

"That's witchspeak," she said. "You never told me anything like that. It's not true!"

Cadvan didn't react to her anger. "Maerad, the worst thing you can do is deny your own powers," he said. "If you have been kept ignorant, that is not your fault. You no longer have that excuse."

Maerad felt too alarmed to argue with him, and turned sullenly to the cave wall. It was ridiculous for Cadvan to speak of her in this way. She was just what she was, a girl, lately a slave, and yes, she could play the lyre, but... Cadvan was quite mistaken.

She took a deep breath and glanced over to the mountain lion. It lay curled up, its nose to its tail, just like a cat on a hearth, taking no notice of either of them. The storm had passed, but still the rain fell steadily outside the cave, a friendly sound, she thought. Night was falling, and she realized she was hungry.

"We're not going anywhere now, anyway," she said.

"No," said Cadvan. "So I might as well have a look at that wer scratch."

He searched the wound on her forehead with expert, gentle fingers, and Maerad struggled not to flinch. "A bruise, and some tearing, but no poison," he said. "You'll have a headache for a couple of days, I'm afraid. I can't fix that up here. But there'll be no scar to speak of. You got off lightly." He pressed his hand hard over her forehead, and some of the pain lifted; he then anointed the wound with a sweet-smelling balm from a tiny jar he drew from his pack.

"We should eat, and then rest while we can," said Cadvan. "We need keep no watch: the mountain lion will guard his own cave, even in sleep."

Maerad nodded. In truth, her bones still ached with weariness, and underneath she felt the aftershock from the fight of the night before, a trembling deep in her whole body. More rest would be welcome.

The next morning Maerad was so stiff with cold she could hardly move; she felt as if she were bruised all over. The day was overcast and drear, and a dim, pale light filtered into the cave, which now seemed inhospitable and comfortless. She turned over with a groan. Cadvan still slept, so she sat up cautiously, looking for the mountain lion. It was nowhere to be seen.

So much for our guide,
she thought.
What now?

She crawled to the mouth of the cave and looked out. She could see down over the knees of the mountains to the plains, but the forest was hidden in mist or rain. The very world seem drained of color. She was sitting disconsolately, watching the clouds and trying to rub some life into her arms and legs, when Cadvan joined her.

"Breakfast?" he said cheerily.