Chapter 3.6

#

Remembering the story, I also remembered sitting at Master Meiltung’s feet with the other Bards-in-training, learning the stories I would tell to the children of the world. Stories learned to no avail – I would never teach them. I threw the memory away into the fog and hurried over an arching bridge to the main keep. There was cold water beneath my cloak, and I wanted to be near a fire. As if any fire could melt the ice around my heart.

I entered one of the upper hallways, a long passage lined by portraits of stern and somber Guerneys, all looking down at me over large, sharply hooked noses. It held a multitude of other treasures: covered chairs, engraved chests, and locked showcases containing books, Christian icons, and pieces of Lord Guerney’s famed knife collection. A chambermaid moved up the hall, carefully dusting as she went.

I recognized her.

Ten years earlier, in the warmth of the kitchen after the big meal, the servants would gather and listen to our music. She was always there, a maiden not many years older than myself, and she seemed to favor my tunes over Sharps. Once, even, she sat in my lap and dared me to play. I did, if badly, and everyone laughed. It was all light and innocent, but even then she rose up quickly when her soldier walked into the room.

Days of laughter and pretty maids.

I touched her shoulder, wondering if she remembered those days as fondly. But when she turned to me, with a face older but still sweet, she dropped her eyes and bowed her head.

"Yes, me lord?"

I touched her chin to tilt her head up, so that she would look me in the face.

"Oh no, my Lord." She stepped back from my reach, but watched me cautiously. Her hand rested on her swollen abdomen. "Ay beg ye let me go. Ay’m a wife and a mother."

I gestured to my face.

She quickly shook her head, and backed away further.

I was forgotten then, my memory lost with my voice. I had ceased to exist, and even my songs belonged to another.

Chapter 3.5

#

Before there was land, sky, and sea, there was ice, mist, and milk. Some of the ice broke away and floated to the surface of the milk, and upon it lay the Master of Paths and Earth Mother, two halves of the same whole. Looking upon each other, and seeing that each was only a half but together they were a whole, the Master of Paths and the Earth Mother lay down with each other and were joined together. That is why men and women seek each other.

In the days that followed the Earth Mother became aware that she carried the joining within her, and so she gathered together all the ice to make a land for her children to live in. She warmed the ice with her body, and caused plants to grow upon it, and then she filled the plants with bright flowers. Every spring the Earth Mother remembers that she did this, and brings out green plants and bright flowers where the snow and ice has been.

Looking down on this land, the Master of Paths was so moved that he began to cry. As each shimmering drop fell, it became a god and flew into the Earth Mother’s world. But these gods were not of the Earth Mother, and did not belong in her world, and were rejected. They cried out to their father, the Master of Paths, who told them that if they joined themselves to the Earth Mother’s world, they would be her children, too. So the gods went forth and joined themselves to her rocks and waters, her plants and her fires, and thus made themselves complete. This is why gods are found where they are, bound to streams and groves, mountains and grassy plains, and sometimes burning as a bonfire.

The Master of Paths caught two of the fire gods, Snir the Greater and Snar the Lesser, and set them high above the Earth Mother’s land There they wander restlessly, treading the same path day after day, warming the land and giving it light. Then, so that Snir and Snar should not be lonely, he caught up two god-sized handfuls of Silver-eyed and threw them into the sky. It is their eyes that shine at night.

When the Earth Mother’s time came, she made a bed on the land, and lay down. She spread her thighs and sang, and the birth waters came out in a rush and made the sea. Then from her womb spilled every animal of the earth, from fish to bird. Each child went to a place of the land and claimed it as its own. That is why certain creatures are found one place, but not another, and why the sea tastes of salt.

At the very last, the first man and the first woman climbed from her womb. They looked upon each other, and saw that each was only half of the same whole. They went to the grass of the new world, and there celebrated the creation of the world. And that is why, to this day, men and women lie together in joy and celebration.

Chapter 3.4

#

After I dressed, I practiced on my harp, moving from scales to a tune I had never played within the walls of Songless. Sharp had reminded me of it, and my fingers stumbled as I taught them long forgotten strains, but before the morning was over I had it slipping easily into the air. With no words to voice the story, I could only weave the tale of a hunstman and his swan lover with notes.

I finished, put away my harp, and rose to leave the room. Stiff from the chill and from kneeling so long, I needed to walk, to explore the castle, to have some time alone.

Charles fell into step behind me.

I tried to pretend he was not there, and for a time he kept his silence.

I wandered through the keep, then through the garrison in the outer curtain wall. I passed servants and soldiers, a few of whom I recognized but whose gaze slid smoothly away from my face. I walked through the armory, where Charles looked longingly at the practice floor, but I shook my head and climbed to the parapets. There I looked over the wall, and saw that the whole of the Dragon’s Mouth Mountains draped in fog. Only the nearest slope could be seen, its scrubby trees and flinty boulders fading into the mist like ghosts.

"Seems like we’re cut off from the rest of the world," Charles said, leaning on the wall beside me.

"This castle is hanging onto the rock, but the rock is floating in a big pond of nothingness. This is the way the world began, isn’t it? A monster dragging itself from a lake of milk?"

Something like that, I thought as I nodded to the knight. Though Master Meiltung would have groaned at such a simplistic retelling.

Chapter 3.3

With the introduction of Elise, things start to spice up -- but it takes Gerard a bit to get the message.

#

Morning intruded on my eyes like an unwelcome guest. The soldiers were already awake and active, polishing their weapons and oiling their leather armor. I rolled over and pulled the blanket over my head.

The door creaked open. "Mornin’," I heard a woman say.

"Morning," chorused the soldiers. Ison added, "Is that breakfast?"

"Aye."

I peeked out to see the serving maid from the night before, with a wooden tray in her hands.

"Ay’ve got bread and sausages, all stolen from his lordship’s table. An’ a couple of pies."

Charles took the tray, which held a small feast for the four of us. He sampled a sausage. "Good."

"The best a’ my hands." She looked at me. "And Ay’m willing to give you anything you want."

I pulled the covers back over my head.

Ison then whistled, and I peeked back out to see that the maid had lifted her skirts to step over the pieces scattered across the floor. She bent over the bed, drew the covers down to my waist, and whispered loudly, "Anythin’."

Ison whistled again, and Charles widened his eyes.

"Don’t you want to see what I have for you in my skirt?"

I swallowed. Hard.

She drew out a piece of slate from her apron, and a hunk of chalk. She marked a word on it, then showed it to me. "See? I’ve learned to write my name."

Elise, it read. I took the slate from her hands and wrote, Gerard.

She puzzled over it long enough that I realized that I would not be writing her any notes. Finally
Charles looked over her shoulder, mouthed the word, then said, "That’s his name. Gerard."

She smiled at me. "Ah, you understand. Now, if you want anything..."

I took the slate from her hands and drew a rough sketch of a washbasin and a towel.

"That’s all you want?"

I nodded, then wished I hadn’t. Too much wine the night before.

"As ye wish, my good Gerard." She smiled regretfully. "I’ll bring some hot water straightaway."
After she left, Ison sat down on the edge of the bed. "Forgive my forwardness, you being my master and all, but ah see ye’ve been with the Silent Monks too long. That thar’s a woman, and women are for, well – ah’ll see to it that you have a time and a place tonight."

I growled at him.

He winked back, knowing full well I could not command him to stop.