Chapter Text
Cadvan wound his way back through the corridors under a cloud of thoughtfulness. He bypassed Maerad’s rooms and went straight for his own, picking up a few things scattered about, before slipping out onto the patio. The sun was still fairly low in the sky, but the sea laid out before him glittered dazzlingly, speckled with brightly-painted fishing boats and the odd miniscule pleasure dipper. Cadvan took in the view but did not pause, treading straight towards Maerad’s patio door. A slight fluttering motion in the corner of his eye stopped him, and he turned towards the large balcony which arced between their two doors. There, sitting rather penitently at their little table out on the patio, was Maerad. The movement that had caught his eye had come from her – she had crossed one leg over the other and shifted a little in her chair, her shoulders slumping slightly to one side as they often did. He could identify Maerad from an anonymous line-up of hundreds by the shift of her shoulders alone. Without realising, Cadvan’s furrowed brow smoothed, and a smile tipped the corners of his lips. As commanded, Maerad had changed into fresh clothes – today, a rather becoming purple tunic with wide, elbow-length sleeves and a body that buttoned at either side. It was a Thoroldian style of tunic worn widely about the Island by men and women alike, to be worn layered or alone to suit the weather. Beneath the tunic, where the draping tail of the upper garment folded away over Maerad’s crossed knees, a pair legs clad in sea-blue trousers poked out, matching the long sleeves of her under-shirt. With her native garb and her black hair, bound in a damp plait down her back, she looked the very image of a true Thoroldian – in all but one aspect. Pulled firmly atop her head was an immense, floppy, straw-woven hat which cast the entirety of her head and shoulders into shadow. A precaution many Thoroldians took in the height of the summer months, but few bothered with now, in the autumn. Cadvan approached her, unnoticed, and tugged at the broad rim of the hat teasingly.
“What’s this?” he quipped. Maerad turned her face to him, the big hat flopping about with each tiny movement, and scrunched her nose up at him.
“It’s bright out,” Maerad said, a little defiantly. The effect was entirely marred by her own guilty look. She turned her head down again, retreating once more under the shade of her hat. Cadvan settled into the seat opposite her. It was bright out, although Cadvan suspected he was currently a little less sensitive to the light than Maerad. No weak, watery pre-winter light today, not on Thorold. If it weren’t for the slight chill in the air, it would be easy to imagine this a calm spring morning.
“Nerili has agreed to postpone your lesson. You will go to her rooms this evening at six, take your lesson, then I will join you both there for what will no doubt be a delicious, lively dinner.”
No response from Maerad. She kept fiddling with a button on her tunic, eyes fixed on her bouncing foot. The distant rush of the waves filled the space between them with gentle, comforting noise.
“Have you eaten?” Cadvan asked after a pause, glancing again at Maerad. At just the mention of food, Maerad squirmed, one hand rubbing her stomach. She looked as if she had just tasted something bitter.
“No,” was all she answered, frowning. Cadvan let out a bark of laughter, to which Maerad’s frown deepened.
“I hope you had plenty of fun last night,” Cadvan grinned “to make your suffering this morning worth it.”
“Oh, yes,” Maerad responded a little more energetically “I went to the tavern with Kabeka and Honas and, well, you know the ones.”
“I’m glad you’re making friends.” Cadvan smiled indulgently “Which tavern did you make rich with your endless wine orders? The Copper Mermaid, yes?”
“I. . . well, we. . . erm. . .” Maerad’s frown returned “I can’t really remember.”
“So it was that kind of evening,” Cadvan laughed, leaning forwards with glee “very well, what else did the wild girl from across the sea get up to last night? Dancing through the streets under the moonlight? Swimming in street-fountains? Is there any wine left in Busk this morn?”
Maerad shifted, his teasing making her uncomfortable for some reason. In fact, this morning, it seemed everything Cadvan did or said made her uncomfortable. Ever since he had woken her up that morning, fuzzy-headed and unsteady, she had hardly been able to look him in the eye. She couldn’t think of any reason at all for this sudden disquiet.
Cadvan watched Maerad, expecting some rejoinder or perhaps an ecstatic account of her evening’s activities. On the few occasions that she went out without him, Maerad usually enjoyed telling him of what she had done and who she had seen and what she had discovered the next day. He could see as clearly as if he felt it himself the shining, fresh joy it was to her to be able to laugh and dance and joke with contemporaries – friends – of her own age. But no come-back, no laughter-filled story, came.
“Maerad?” concern crept into Cadvan’s voice. His eyes were fixed keenly on her. She was worrying her lip with her teeth, looking out at the sea, a hand still resting on her rolling stomach.
“I can’t. . .” she murmured “I can’t remember much. But there’s something. . .” Maerad trailed off. An image had flitted through her mind, dreamlike. Two hands clasped together, bathed in blue-silver light, seen as if from a short distance. One person’s thumb rubbed gentle circles onto the back of the other hand, their fingers softly entwined. Such a strange, inconspicuous memory, yet it seemed so important. Maerad cast her mind back to the rest of the evening, trying to remember; the warm, flickering light in the tavern; Achilos going to fill her glass and spilling the wine onto the table; spinning, spinning, spinning, never-ending, breathless spinning; hands clasped about her shoulders, damp and sweaty, and hot breath fanning over her face. But they were all so blurry, so distorted, and seemed to slip away as soon as she conjured them. Yet these hands clutched to one another, glowing pale, was clear as a drawn picture in Maerad’s mind. Just those two hands. Why? Who did they belong to?
“Did something happen?” Cadvan asked calmly. His eyes were sharp. He had his suspicions about certain parts of her history – things she had not voiced but which he guessed at anyway. Maerad shook her head, as if shaking something from her ears.
“Yes.” she murmured “No. I’m not. . . I think so. But not something bad. Something. . .” again, Maerad’s words failed her. Something beautiful. And Cadvan, seeing something in her eyes, relaxed.
“Well,” he said, “then you must brace yourself now for something bad.” And he bent down, retrieving the small stack of books he had brought from his room and slamming them onto the table. Maerad flinched. “Your morning lessons.”
“I’m to read these?” Maerad peered at the books then, her old curiosity overcoming her declining nausea, grabbed one of them. It was a green-bound book on ancient runes and languages, the raised gold lettering on the spine shining in the sun. From the index, she found she was familiar with some of the contents but far from all.
“No,” he said “I shall read these. Aloud, to you. And you will translate what I say back to me.”
Maerad slumped. “A test?”
“Yes, a test.”
“But what about the runic languages.”
“We’ll cover those later. For now, we’ll focus on Golondian, Old Erekba and Ancient Zarzhi. That should keep us occupied until the midday meal.”
Maerad still frowned at the mention of food, but did not clutch at her stomach as she had before. A good sign.
“What of modern languages?” she asked, “Surely it would be useful for me to speak tongues still widely used around Edil-Amarandh?”
“Certainly,” Cadvan nodded “and, if you were a normal Bard and we had the full luxury of time, you would learn the most common languages of Edil-Amarandh as a matter of course – Suderainian, for example, which I imagine is being drummed into young Hem’s brain as we speak.”
“Hem?” As always, Maerad’s attention perked just a little keener when her brother was mentioned “Hem will be learning Suderainian?”
“I should think so,” Cadvan said “they teach in Suderainian at the School of Turbansk. He’ll have to pick it up quickly if he wants to learn.” At Maerad’s alarmed look, Cadvan was quick to reassure. “Don’t fret! Saliman will help him, and before you know it, he’ll be as firm-worded to the people to Turbansk as he is to the people of Annar.”
Maerad snorted. It was hard to choose whether that was a good thing or not. Nonetheless, the thought of Hem learning these wonderful things without her – off at another School on the far side of Edil-Amarandh, so far from her, experiencing things she could not – filled her with a cruel mix of emotions. Pride. Jealousy. Longing. Protectiveness. Love. The sea blurred before her eyes. A tear trickled from her eye. How she missed him.
“By rights, he should also be learning Pilanel,” Cadvan continued, as if he did not notice Maerad’s upset “you both should.”
“The Pilanel have their own tongue?”
“Naturally! The root of their civilisation stems from far further back than we can possibly hope to track. Certainly, further back than the first settlers on this side of the Osidh Elanor. Many of the ancient languages you are currently learning stem from somewhere in the vast ice-planes of Zmarkan.”
“Pilanel,” Maerad murmured to herself “do you know any Pilanel?”
“Some,” Cadvan nodded, which Maerad took to mean he was well-versed in it.
“Would you teach me?”
“No.”
Maerad slumped. She opened her mouth to object.
“You are learning ancient languages and runes,” Cadvan said firmly, tapping the waiting book pile pointedly “not modern spoken tongues. The Ancient ways will be more likely to serve you in your current quest to discover and decipher the Treesong. For the sake of practicality, it is sufficient that you speak Annaeran and The Speech.”
And with that, Cadvan held out his hand expectantly. Maerad, knowing objection was futile, slammed the great, green-bound book shut and passed it awkwardly to him. She thought about what Cadvan said, about how Hem, and thus she, too, ought to have been taught Pilanel. Would their father have taught them from infancy? Had he held them in his arms as babies and cooed to them in his own mother tongue, speaking Pilanel endearments that neither of his children would remember? Would she and Hem have grown up speaking any number of languages, knowing any number of things, just as a matter of course? As their birth-right?
The weight of the book lifted from Maerad’s hands; another weight replaced it. Cadvan had grasped her hand, now empty, with his own. Startled, Maerad lifted her gaze to meet his for the first time that morning. He was looking across the table at her with a soft, understanding expression. Unexpected. Another tear dribbled down her cheek. She averted her eyes, looking instead at their hands, laid together on the strange wrought-metal surface of the table. Cadvan’s larger hand covered hers entirely, pale, long-fingered, and battered. Strong. His thumb rubbed soothing circles into the back of her palm.
A memory flashed through Maerad’s mind. With a hiss, she snatched her hand away. Cadvan stared. A shocked, almost horrified, expression had crossed her face. Cadvan was so taken aback by her reaction that he could think of nothing to say. Their relationship was far from physical, but they neither of them were missish about exchanging the odd reassuring touch. Maerad had never flinched away before.
“Shall we get on?” Maerad said quickly, once more looking everywhere but at Cadvan.
After only slight hesitation, Cadvan drew back into his chair, reopened the book, and the lesson commenced. After a while, Maerad also relaxed in her chair. Cadvan did not attempt any other gesture of affection, physical or verbal. His mind whirred. He sensed that for some reason, on this one occasion, he had crossed some line he had not known was there. He did not know why, and did not ask. If she wished to tell him, she would. But that did not keep some part of him wondering and, secretly – so secretly even he did not acknowledge it – being hurt by her withdrawal.
For Maerad’s part, her action had been instinctive, enacted without conscious thought, and understood it no more by her than it was by Cadvan. She wondered over it throughout their lesson and the remainder of the day to no avail. At no point did it occur to her to link Cadvan’s innocent gesture and her one clear memory from the night before. The two moments existed entirely separately within her, and would remain so until another moonlit night many, many months into the future, when Cadvan’s hand would clasp hers in a way so very similar yet so very, very different. . .