She scowled at me. “You say ‘my people’ when you speak of them. But I have told you. You are no longer of those ones. We have taken you and you belong to The People, now.” She cocked her head and stared deep into my eyes. I felt she looked inside me and out the other side, as it were, to some other eyes I did not know I had. “What is it, son of a soldier? Do you begin to wake to both worlds? That is not good. Not yet should you do that.” She set her hand fondly on the top of my head.
It was a comforting touch that dispelled all anxiety. Some worry I had felt had slipped away from me. All would be well.
She lifted both her hands to her face and hair. She smoothed them over her head as if to ease the anxiety I knew she felt. Then she looked at me through her plump fingers. “You still have not spoken of your magic, soldier’s son. At the moment it was given to you, it began to work through you. What have you done for us? The magic chose you. I felt it take you. All know that once the magic of the god touches a man, he does his task. You were to turn the intruders back and make those who are here leave. What did you do?”
“I do not understand what you are asking me.”
Both her question and my response were as familiar to me as my evening prayers, learned at my mother’s knee. She tried again to explain. “You would have done something. Some action of yours is supposed to begin the magic that you will finish when you are a great man. Telling me will not stop the magic. It will only ease my fears. Please. Just tell me. Put my mind at ease, so I may tell the forest that the beginning of the end of waiting has begun. The guardians cannot dance much longer. They weary. They die. And when they all die, there will no longer be a wall. It will fall, and nothing will remain to hold the intruders at bay. They will walk freely under the trees, cutting and burning. You know what they will do. We have seen it.”
We were nearly to the waterfall. I longed to see it. I tried to see it through the forest, but the trees leaned together, blocking my view. “I do not understand your words.”
She sighed, like wind in the trees. “If such a thing could be, I would say the magic chose poorly. I would say that one of The People would have known better how to use the given gift.” She shrugged, lifting the soft roundness of her shoulders and then letting them fall. “I will have to do what is within my power to do. I do not do it lightly. My time for doing things should be past. This should be only my time for being. But I fear you cannot turn them back by your self. My strength is needed, still.” She sighed and then she brushed her fat hands together. Dust, fine brown dust, fell from the surfaces of her palms as they passed one another. “I have thought of a thing, and now I have decided I will do it. I will send one of the old magics to you. With it, we can harvest from the intruders some of what they are. No knife is sharper than a man’s own turned against him. Perhaps it will give us more time to discover what it is you have done to help us.” She lifted her hand and waved it oddly at me. I sensed immense power in the simple gesture. “When the magic finds you, it will signal you. So. Then it will begin. Do not struggle against it.”
I felt a terrible fear. She stared at me, the colour of her eyes going darker in disapproval. “You should go now. Stop thinking about these things.”
I awoke with a start to deep darkness, and the sounds of rain beating on the roof above me and the stentorian breathing of my fellows around me. The rags of my dreams hung about my mind. I touched them and tried to pull them together, but they went to threads in my fingers. I felt dread unlike the fear I might feel from a nightmare. This was the dread of something real, something I could not recall. The wind gusted, and the rain suddenly pattered harder and swifter against roof and windowpane. It lulled, then gusted again. I listened to that, sleepless, until morning, and then rose wearily to face another day.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Cousin Epiny
I don’t know how Gord staggered through his classes the next day. As I feared, I earned punishment exercises for my incomplete maths assignment. My spirits were low. When I heard the rumour that Cadet Lieutenant Tiber had been found disgustingly drunk and was not to be suspended but simply expelled from the Academy for conduct unbecoming an officer, my misery was complete. I suspected his punishment was undeserved, but had no real proof to offer on his behalf. I still wondered if I should not take my suspicions to Dr Amicas, and wondered, too, if my reluctance to do so was cowardice or pragmatism.
The news of Tiber’s disgrace eclipsed all curiosity about what had befallen Gord. I was a bit disillusioned with my roommates, for most of them accepted unquestioningly the tale that he had taken all those bruises tumbling down the library steps. He had developed a fine black eye from his ‘fall’ and limped as we marched to and from our classes, yet seemed quietly pleased about something. I decided I didn’t understand him at all.
I was feeling bleak and downhearted when I returned to Carneston House at noon, and found an unexpected missive from my uncle. In it, he mentioned the upcoming days of freedom, and assured me that he would come to get me on Fiveday evening so I would not have to spend my time in the dormitory. Spink, to his credit, tried to look happy for me when I shared the news with him, though we both knew it condemned him to remaining behind alone there.
“I need the study time,” he declared. “And I know you’ll enjoy yourself there. Don’t worry about me. Bring me back some of those cinnamon cakes your little cousin baked for you last time, and have a good time.”
Nate and Kort had also received letters. To their dismay, they found that the plans had been changed. They would spend the night at Nate’s great-aunt in Old Thares. Their sisters and sweethearts would be housed in Kort’s uncle’s home. The evening tryst the four had secretly planned was abruptly doomed, and Nate’s younger sister was soundly denounced as a tattletale.
We completed our afternoon classes, and then hurried back to our barracks to pack. As we were climbing the stairs up to our room, Gord actually passed me on the steps. By the time I reached the study room, he was coming out the door with his previously packed bag slung over his shoulder. A broad grin dominated his fat and swollen face.
“What are you so chipper about?” I demanded.
He shrugged. “I’ll see my parents over the break. My father has come to town for the Council meeting. And I always enjoy staying with my uncle. And Cilima will be visiting there as well. She lives only a few miles from my uncle’s house.”
“Who is Cilima?” I demanded, and all around me, the other cadets paused to hear the answer.
“My fiancée,” Gord asserted, and suddenly blushed a deep red. There was some scepticism and mockery, but he quietly produced a miniature of a raven-haired girl with large black eyes. Her beauty stunned me, and when Trist archly asked if she know the fate that awaited her, Gord replied with dignity that her affection and belief in him were the keystone to his persevering through difficult times. Again, I was struck by the realization that there seemed to be more to Gord than any of us had imagined. He was the first of us to leave, and the others followed soon after, for they had all packed the night before.
Spink followed me to our room and watched woefully as I packed, and then bravely accompanied me down to the drive to await my uncle’s carriage. He stood beside me, talking as we waited. Other carriages and conveyances were coming and going, bearing off cadets. I could tell he was eaten up with envy that I would escape the Academy routine for a full two days, but he was covering it well, saying only that I should enjoy food cooked for the pleasure of eating it rather than the convenience of feeding.