King Kardan stood on top of the burial mound, a fresh-cut rowan twig and his dagger in his hands. The last time he had stood like this, ready to swear an oath to the massive, black-bearded king who waited at the foot of the mound, his wife had been under his feet but all his children had been alive. Now both his sons were buried here, and he did not know if his daughter still lived beneath the sun.
He slowly slit the twig lengthwise, letting its red sap run out on his palm, then touched the dagger point to his finger. He squeezed out a drop of blood and closed his fist, mixing it with the rowan sap. From here he could see the headland above the harbor, but he was too far away to hear the sounds of his ship being readied for sea.
“I swear on rowan and steel,” he said loudly and clearly, “that I have not harmed in any way Valmar Hadros’s son, that I have not ordered any harm done to him or had word of any. If I lie, may the lords of death take me living into the depths of Hel.” The wind whirled his words and carried them far away.
When he descended from the mound, making his way carefully down the steep incline, King Hadros slapped him unexpectedly on the back. “I believe you, Kardan. You swore to me truly ten years ago, when you swore you would pay the tribute faithfully and raise no open or hidden revolt against me.”
Kardan nodded, resenting the deliberate reminder that for ten years he had been a tributary king. “If we do not find Valmar,” he said stiffly, “even though I did not harm him, I shall of course pay you compensation. He was here in my castle under my protection.”
Hadros rested a hand on his shoulder, and his eyes flashed from beneath heavy eyebrows. “I shall take no compensation for my oldest son. If he is safe, well and good. If he is dead, his killer shall pay the blood-guilt with his own blood.”
He still had his hand on Kardan’s shoulder, either in fellowship or as a veiled threat, as they started slowly back toward the castle. “Now,” he said, “tell me more of what your daughter said of Valmar’s disappearance.”
“ You do not believe such stories?” asked Kardan in surprise. “All she said was that he had left with a Wanderer, one who had often been seen on Graytop over the years-where in fact no Wanderer has ever been seen. I know some of your beliefs and practices are different north of the channel, but even you cannot believe that the lords of voima ever appear in the flesh to mortals.”
“I would not have believed it a short time ago,” the other king said very quietly, “but Roric went to their land and returned again.”
Sensing a gap in Hadros’s confidence, Kardan asked quickly, “Who is this Roric, anyway? Where did he come from? And what assurance can you give me that he has not kidnapped my daughter at your orders?”
Kardan expected the other king to reply heatedly, but when he answered it was still in that ominously quiet tone. “Roric is my foster-son, raised in my court; he was found at the castle gates as a baby. If he has kidnapped Karin it was certainly not at my orders! You should know I do not war on women.”
He took his hand from Kardan’s shoulder to pull a ring from the pouch at his belt. “I gave him this when he reached manhood and we swore our oaths to each other. I ordered him, just the other day, to forget Karin, not to come here. He threw his ring at my feet, defied me, and came anyway.” Hadros chuckled grimly. “Maybe the only reason I did not run him through on the spot is because I would have done the same at his age.”
“You must know him well,” said Kardan, hearing the desperation in his own voice and scarcely caring. The two kings had stopped walking to face each other. “What will Roric do to her? You have, what is it, another two or three sons besides Valmar? Karin was all I had left.”
Hadros smiled, suddenly and surprisingly. “You fear the lad will hurt her? Not very likely.” He turned to walk again; there was a slight limp in his gait. “Roric first asked, it must be two months ago now, for my permission to woo her. I refused it, of course. But she told me she intends to marry him-he must have spoken to her anyway.” He watched Kardan’s face as he spoke, and smiled again, although with tight lips. “She never said anything to you about that, eh?”
“No.” Kardan looked straight ahead as they walked. They were almost back to the castle now. Karin intending to marry Roric! If he had appeared suddenly last night, he must be the unexpected assailant whom his guards had almost said was a wight, and she must have decided at once to go with him. But why had she said nothing to him?
“You don’t like it that she didn’t tell you?” asked Hadros, in a tone of commiserating fellowship that seemed intended to drive home that he knew Karin far better than her own father did.
Kardan did not answer. The other king seemed willing to forget that they had once been sworn enemies, but he himself was not yet ready to become friends with the man who had defeated him ten years ago and who must now, somehow, be behind the disappearance of his daughter.
“Well, Kardan, I think there are things neither Valmar nor Roric has told me either.” Hadros shook his head. “By this time, I had expected-as had you-to be watching my sons and my young warriors reach manhood, with all the energy and courage I had twenty-five years ago, and all the wisdom I could give them now. It has not worked out quite as I hoped, but we may have to make the best of what we have. I fear you and I are too old, my friend, to start over.”
Inside, Kardan left Hadros seated in the hall with an ale horn while he went to change out of his ceremonial clothing. He was furious both with the king and with Karin, as well as with Roric, this foundling who had grown up to be one of Hadros’s warriors. How could she have deceived him like this, living here with her father in her own home, back in the kingdom she would someday rule as sovereign queen, saying nothing about the man she apparently hoped to marry?
“Why had you not fitted out your ship this spring?” Hadros demanded as he rejoined him. “If it had been in the water we could have followed them. Such a good ship is a shame to leave under the tarpaulins when the ice is off the channel! When I saw all you had ready were those little skiffs, I knew we could never catch my ship.”
“I was too busy preparing for the All-Gemot,” said Kardan testily, seating himself on the bench beside Hadros. He did not add what Hadros must surely remember, even if he feigned to forget, that he had had a longship in the water this spring, the ship which his eldest son and Queen Arane’s heir had broken against the Cauldron Rocks. “Unlike some kings I could mention,” he added, “I do not need a ship to go to war or raiding in the southlands every summer.”
“Most kings do not anymore,” agreed Hadros, looking at his ale.
“And I knew that if my ship was ready for sea, some young hothead among the retinues of the Fifty Kings might decide to steal it. At least it is still here, unlike yours!”
He also did not mention that ever since the end of the war sailing had made him queasy, so that several springs in the last ten years he had not fitted out a ship at all. Since that last desperate dash into the harbor and flight to within his walls, when Hadros had fired his ships and rounded up all the tenants who had not been able to retreat into the castle and threatened them with the sword, when his warriors had stood ready to put the torch to Kardan’s fields, and a quick inventory of the food inside the castle told them they could not feed everyone now there for more than a few weeks, he had not liked being out on the channel.
“But tell me,” Kardan said with a new thought, “who could have commanded your ship from my harbor? Would your seamen obey Roric in the assumption that he acted at your orders? Or would he have had to hold a knife to the captain’s throat?”
Hadros looked up sharply. “They might obey him and they might not. I had not told anyone I was furious with the lad, but since we did not keep our voices down some may have guessed.” He gave a grim smile. “You had not guessed yourself, before I told you, that I came here furious with him?”
“No.” This was something to consider later. “Would they sail wherever he said?”
“If he tried to take the ship by violence,” said Hadros darkly, “my seamen will have killed him by now. If they sailed with him willingly, it would only have been back to my kingdom. And the raven I sent this morning will mean there’s a welcome waiting for him.” His lips came back from his teeth in what looked very little like a smile.
“And Valmar?”
“Valmar my seamen would obey, taking him wherever he wanted to go. And,” Hadros added after a short pause, “probably your daughter as well.”
“Karin?” asked Kardan in amazement. “She would never steal your ship.”
“She is an active and determined lass,” said Hadros. “She may be your daughter, but for the last ten years she has been living with me. ” He looked at Kardan from under his eyebrows, seeming amused. “Where do you think they have gone? And are all three together, or only two, and which two?”
Kardan rose briskly, wanting to reestablish some authority in his own castle. “It will take all day for them to finish the caulking. Come with me, and we will consult the Mirror-seer.”
King Hadros, as he hoped, had not consulted a Seer in a great many years, if ever-he tried to appear knowledgeable, but Kardan thought he could sense both unease and a curiosity even beyond wondering what they might hear. As they rode up to the Mirror-seer’s lake, Kardan explained the use of mirrors of voima to see the reflection of a reality far beyond the little valley. He let the slightest patronizing note slip occasionally into his voice.
But he had no chance to show off the wisdom and abilities of his Seer. The little round man was not in his cottage. He did not answer their knock, either the first quiet rap or repeated hammering.
The two kings stood hesitating on the dock before the closed door. Small waves broke against the shore, making the lake’s reflection of the surrounding forest and mountains break and shiver. “No more use than a Weaver,” said Hadros thoughtfully. “I presume he would still refuse to come to the door if you threatened to burn his house with him in it?”
Kardan glanced at him quickly, hoping he was not serious, then looked away, fearing he was.
“Or maybe he’s just gone out for a stroll,” suggested Hadros. He put his shoulder to the door and pushed. The wood around the lock was dry and weather-worn and cracked under his weight.
The door swung back with a creak. “What should he have in here?” asked Hadros, peering into the darkness.
Kardan looked too, but there was nothing to see. The little cottage was empty: not even a fishing rod. The only sign the Seer had ever lived here were his two mirrors on a shelf on the far wall.
Hadros tapped his foot on the dock. “Anything else worth seeing, Kardan, as long as you’ve brought me up here?”
Kardan took a deep breath, not wanting to admit how startled he was by the Seer’s disappearance. “You can see Graytop from here,” he said, pointing, “where Karin tried to tell me she saw a Wanderer.”
“She did not tell me about any Wanderer,” said Hadros. “Probably knew too well what I would answer to that! Even though,” with less certainty, “I cannot doubt her as easily as I once would have. But,” with certainty again and a sideways glance at Kardan, “I do know she and Valmar visited this Seer during the All-Gemot. Perhaps something they asked of him has made him retreat now. That was the night,” with a slight emphasis, “those two young people passed the entire night together.”
Kardan could feel the heat rising up his neck to his cheeks and ears. “For that insult I ought to kill you,” he said between his teeth, fumbling his sword loose and thinking that he should still have agility on his side even if not mass.
But Hadros darted out a hand and took him by the wrist, pinning him with his sword half-drawn. “No insult, my friend,” he said, smiling as though he enjoyed this. “Just a simple statement of fact. All my men saw Valmar and Karin return together in the early morning.”
He gestured placatingly with his other hand. “But just because young people are sometimes foolish need not mean wisdom cannot still prevail. No one will say that Valmar made her his by the strong hand! I was planning to come see you shortly anyway, to make an offer for her. Karin deserves a fine bride-price.”
Kardan, who had been struggling unsuccessfully against Hadros’s grip, went still. He did not want to believe it, except that it explained too well her strange moods since the end of the All-Gemot. This too she had kept from him. And she must have spent the night willingly with Valmar, or she would not have asked to keep the boy with her.
He closed his eyes briefly as Hadros released his wrist. “A marriage between your heir and my heiress would unite our kingdoms in friendship,” he heard himself saying. “But no! If she told you she would marry Roric-”
“Then she has changed her mind. You and I have both known maids to change their thinking, have we not, my friend?” with a nudge and a broad wink. “Either she now has changed her mind again and gone off with Roric in my ship, or she has fled with Valmar to get away from him. And,” and now he suddenly became absolutely serious, “Roric had better not have touched my son.”
“I know where she has gone if not to your kingdom,” said Kardan suddenly into the following silence. “We do not need the Mirror-seer to tell us. And we can follow her in one of my skiffs while they finish caulking and soaking the ship, because she should still be on this side of the channel, not too many miles away. Whoever Karin is with, she may have fled to the court of Queen Arane.”
Queen Arane, delicate in white silk, looked up in surprise as the two kings, their boots loud, crossed the black and white chequered stone floor of her hall. They had come straight up from the harbor, still wearing their salt-stained cloaks, and in this gracious court Kardan suddenly felt as large and coarse and out of place as the man next to him.
But the queen smiled pleasantly and summoned a page with a wave of one hand to set out a bench for them. They settled themselves slowly, Kardan wondering how best to demand his daughter, whom he had expected to see here beside her.
“King Hadros, King Kardan,” Arane said, looking from one to the other with a pretty smile. “You must want some ale after a thirsty day. Or would you like wine, Kardan? I know that you, Hadros, prefer the ale of my maids’ brewing. My days here so dull that I am happy for any company, but your particular company would be welcome to anyone! And would you care to join me for dinner?”
Hadros cut her off, leaning forward on the bench with his eyebrows bristling. “We have known each too long for such formalities, Arane. We seek the Princess Karin.”
The queen’s shoulders gave a slight jerk; Kardan, watching her closely, thought it surprise rather than guilt. “But I have not seen her since the All-Gemot!” she protested, lifting delicate hands. “I thought she was back home in your kingdom now, Kardan. Why should she come here?”
“I think she trusts you,” he answered slowly, still watching her reaction. “She has either been kidnapped or eloped, either with Valmar, Hadros’s heir, or with Hadros’s foster-son Roric.”
Arane started to frown at the mention of Roric but covered it up with a tinkling laugh. “And you think that she and the man she is with, either willingly or unwillingly, would have fled here? Come, both of you must know there is no room at my court for women who cannot make up their own minds!”
Kardan and Hadros glanced at each other. Now that they had set it out baldly, Kardan thought, it did rather sound as though either Karin herself or the two kings were very confused.
“I can assure your two majesties that she has never set foot in my kingdom,” said the queen confidently. “If she has been kidnapped you will of course need to rescue her, as she is a strong-minded woman who will be a good queen someday. We must plan together how to find her. Let me insist you first join me in dinner, as it will soon be the hour. My page will show you to the bath house.”
The stones in the bath house were already hot. The obliging page brought them towels and clean clothes, a little too big for Kardan, a little too small for Hadros, with deep creases as though they had come from the bottom of a chest.
They stripped, steamed, and scrubbed off the grime, taking turns with the bundle of birch twigs. Kardan thought that the queen seemed much more interested in pleasantries and intrigue than in giving them answers, and, in spite of his earlier certainty, she really did not appear to have Karin with her. Somehow, he did not know how, Arane had taken the initiative away from them.
She kept the initiative all through dinner, serving them from the platter with her own hands, bringing out a honey-colored wine for Kardan, telling them amusing stories of little incidents at her court. Kardan noticed that she never once mentioned her nephew, the prince who had drowned at the same time as his own son.
“So you can assure us,” said King Hadros at last, in much better humor than he had been in two hours before, “that you have no idea where the princess or my son have gone?”
“No idea at all,” she said, her blue eyes wide and innocent. “You can ask anyone at my court, and they will all give you the same answer.”
“What is our next alternative then, Hadros?” asked Kardan. “Back to your kingdom?”
“Faster and more likely than spending any more time sailing up and down this side of the channel.”
“This is fascinating,” said the queen, leaning her elbows on the table to look at them, “a princess running away with her true love, but you are not sure who that true love might be.” For a second, Kardan thought she knew more than she had said, but it was too late to try to learn it from her. “And even a sense in it of the lords of voima! This is the sort of tale I love to hear.”
“It’s not a tale,” said Hadros brusquely. “This is real.”
“ Everything becomes a tale once it has happened,” said Queen Arane, still smiling. She looked from one to the other with a calculating expression. “You are both widowers, and have been for some time. My request therefore may sound the slightest bit scandalous, but with the two of you there to watch each other, scandal should not be a concern.”
“What do you mean?” asked Kardan dubiously, fearing he knew.
She smiled even more widely. “When you cross the channel again to search for the Princess Karin, I shall accompany you.”