‘You two must have an affinity for joining. Usually a feat such as that takes much liquor from the Harpies.’ Ki dragged herself to her feet, stumbled after Lars who was talking as he walked. ‘I wonder,’ he said, ‘if you two were ever completely parted after the Rite.’
‘The others have gone.’
‘You have been gone yourself for more than a little while. I thought you both had gone forever. Nils has taken the others away for meditation, fasting, and purification. Only we outcasts are left.’
‘We.’ Ki felt the word gingerly.
Lars wrinkled his mouth at the word. It turned into a small, tired smile. Rufus met them, took his mother from Lars’s arms. They hurried to the house. Ki, forgotten now, came slowly behind them. She was drained of all strength. She felt she could drop down onto the dew-wet grass and sleep eternally. Yet within her there leapt up a sudden spark, an alertness. She was awake. She felt a sudden urge to explore every part of her mind, as she might feel her body for broken limbs after a bad fall. She was complete again, once more in full control. No will ruled her but her own. The indecision that had plagued her for the last few months, the feeling of numbness, was fled. Cora. Ki mouthed the word silently. Ki had not realized it. She wondered if Cora had, if she had used it. Too late to worry about it now. She stumbled to the barn, to her wagon, to her cuddy, and into her bed. Sleep seized her.
Kurt had not dared to enter the cuddy. Instead, he had banged loudly on the door of it, communicating his urgency with his frenzied battering. Ki stumbled across the cuddy to slide the door open. His face was white in the light of the candle he bore.
‘Grandma wants you. She says you must come now.’
He would have scuttled away, candle and all, if Ki had not seized him by the shoulder. He shrank from her touch, and Ki realized with an ache what a strange and menacing spirit she must seem to him. Even now, when he was an outcast as she was, still he flinched from her touch. She did not release him. She would not let him be afraid of her any longer.
‘Don’t go too fast,’ she whispered hoarsely. ‘I’ll fall in the dark.’
He turned wide eyes up to her. Then he guided her out of the barn and across the dark yard.
Ki was nearly to the door of the house before the reality of the night seized her. She had slept the whole day away. The big house was unnaturally quiet. She entered the common room, to find it, too, in semi-darkness. Its great hearth fire had burnt out.
‘They haven’t come back,’ Kurt murmured as she looked about in surprise. Ki squeezed his shoulder gently, meaning to reassure and comfort him. He nearly dropped the candle.
Cora’s room was lit with tall white tapers. Death candles, Ki thought. Cora’s gaunt hands were claws on the bedding. Her hair was awry, her lips still too dark. But her eyes opened as Ki came in. They were still bright, bird-black. The body might fail, but not the mind. She gestured at her sons feebly as they stood, one to either side of her bed.
‘Rufus. To the field and fetch Ki’s team. Quickly.’ Her voice was a cracked whisper, but full of command. ‘Lars. Take Kurt. Open the barn, and help make the wagon ready for the team. Use no lights! And watch that Sigurd! He’s still as fractious as when he was a colt. Keep silent!’
Rufus went, but Lars lingered, eyes full of worry.
‘Mother, you are ill yet, and weak. Cannot this wait? Do you cast Ki out in the dark of night? She was sister to us, and daughter to you …’
‘Fool!’ Cora broke in. She gasped for a breath, and her color became worse. ‘I have barely enough strength for what I must do, and you wish to complicate it with talk. Long before you discovered her worth, I loved and valued Ki. And though she may not recognize it, no one’s love has been truer through these days. Go, Lars. Take Kurt. My words are not for your ears.’
They went reluctantly. Ki and Cora listened for the scuff of their footsteps to fade. Cora drew together her strength. Ki moved closer to the bedside and picked up one of Cora’s hands. Cold, still.
‘No time,’ Cora sighed, pulling her fingers free of Ki’s. ‘You must leave tonight and travel swiftly. Get over the mountains. I have heard the Harpies don’t go there. Soon they will know who killed the mother, who dropped the torch in the nest. The male will demand revenge. Neither Harpy nor Human in the valley will deny it to him. You will be hunted. You have so little time to escape.’
‘How will they know?’ Ki pressed.
‘As I finally knew.’ Cora coughed without energy. ‘They, too, know without knowing. It was why I could not make them accept you. I hid it from myself, refused to see what you had shown me. I told myself those wild images were what you might do if I did not keep you here, safe, beside me. But the real knowledge was there, closing me off from the Harpies. I will make no reconciliation with them. If I did, I would be your betrayer. I could not hide the knowledge from them. Their minds are strong, stronger than Nils’s. No one keeps secrets from the Harpies. Ki, if I know, there are others that know. I was closest to you that night. I receive the strongest images. But Marna was there, and Holland, and little Edward. In all innocence, they will condemn you to death when next they offer tribute to the Harpies. There is no way to stop it from happening.’
Cora paused, giving Ki time to sort the sense from her breathless words. She took each breath with effort, released each with a sigh.
‘After I leave,’ Ki asked reluctantly, ‘what will happen here?’
‘You mean with the Harpies?’ Cora asked. ‘I do not think they will be harsh with us. They will demand greater tribute. They will make no reprisals, I think. They would not harm Rufus, or Lars, or I, for then who would remain to tend the lands that grow the cattle? Reprisals they reserve for those who leave, or those who speak openly against them. Such as Sven. Such as my brother.’
Ki reeled with the impact of Cora’s words. ‘Haftor knows that?’ she asked incredulously.
‘He was there,’ Cora replied with an effort. ‘Just a boy at the time. Turned his mind for a while – he didn’t speak for the longest time – but I brought him back from it. It has given him a strangeness. And when you came, with your tidings, well, there’s the knowledge in him somewhere, trying to get out. I hope it never does.’
‘So do I,’ breathed Ki. She leaned down, put her arms about Cora.
‘I shall miss the strength I took from you,’ Cora admitted softly. Gently, she pushed Ki away. ‘In the cupboard,’ she said awkwardly.
‘What?’
‘The money, for Sven’s lands. You must take it.’
Ki straightened, looked down on Cora bemusedly. Then she crossed to the cupboard and opened it. The colt-hide sack was heavy. It clinked. Ki turned back to Cora.
‘I accept your money for the lands, Cora. You have paid me for it honorably. In the past I have refused the love you offered me, Cora. Now I take it, too, with thanks. And you, in return, must accept mine.’ Ki raised the bag, kissed it ceremoniously. She dropped it on the foot of Cora’s bed. She smiled at the foolishness of the situation. Cora’s bird-bright eyes were wet. Ki nodded her head to her and left the room.
Her goodbyes to Lars and Refus were short and uncomfortable. There was too much to say. It could not be cut to fit into words. Eyes said much that tongues could not form. Rufus hugged her shyly, but Lars’s embrace was fierce and hard to break from. Ki scrambled onto the seat of her wagon, refusing to see how Lars wept. She slapped the reins hard on the grays’ backs. The night received Ki and closed behind her. When she looked back, not a light showed in the home that had been Sven’s.
The road was silent about her, no lights showing in the smaller cottages that she passed. But as her team came abreast of Marna’s, a small figure darted in front of it, holding aloft a flickering candle dim as a firefly. Ki