Work Text:
When the harvest time came, there was little to harvest. The fields of Ide had been devastated by the war. The farmers had gone late and hobbling to their planting.
Yet the wheat, scarce and bedraggled as it was, still had to be brought in before the cold rains. The village held the fields in common, and so everyone came together to scythe and sheaf in the appointed month.
Ross worked alongside his father. They were a good team as they swung their blades together and brought the wheat low.
It was, perhaps, not very different from swinging an axe.
During the harvest, Ross sometimes felt as if he did nothing but scythe the wheat, tie the sheaves, and sleep, and that, too, was a familiar feeling. Harvest time was harvest time, the same as ever -- despite the burned-out houses in the village, despite the fresh graves next to the village temple, despite the limping farmers.
In the mornings, Ross rose before his father. He brought up clean water from the well. He revived the hearth fire. He started boiling the morning’s oatmeal.
It was always dark when Ross went out to the well. By the time the battered little oats-pot was bubbling above the fire, morning light always glowed behind the brown paper that covered up the broken windows of the common room.
It was not a lot of light -- but it was enough for Ross to read a battered and much-folded letter that he kept in the inner pocket of his coat.
Dear Brother,
That felt funny to write. I’ve never called anyone brother before! But you were very insistent the last time we saw each other. So: hello, big brother! I hope you are doing well!
The general has made me his secretary. I’m not sure how well I am doing at being a secretary, but the general says that I have a clear hand and a good grasp of spelling, and that is all that matters. I am trying to do my best!
He says we will go soon and meet my mother
We have received word that there has been some kind of earthquake in the south. Next week, the general is traveling down there to oversee the rebuilding, and he says that he will bring me with him as his aide. I suppose he really needs someone to help him make lists and keep track of supplies!
I hope everything is going well in Ide, big brother! Have you finished rebuilding the village temple? Is your father’s knee doing better? Please write back!
Sincerely,
Amelia
On some mornings, Ross would carefully read the letter, studying every sturdy loop and reliable line, although he could have probably recited its contents from memory.
Then he would hear his father beginning to stir and wake, and he would carefully fold the letter back up and slide it into the inner pocket of his coat, and he would spoon out two hearty helpings of hot oatmeal.
Then his father would come out, and they would eat and talk, and then they would go out together for another day of the harvest -- same as it ever was, exhausting and familiar, the annual act of securing the well-being of the village against the winter that was to come.
***
A year passed, and the harvest came again.
Amelia stood next to the barricades and narrowly watched the passing farmers and their carts of carrots and potatoes. Last week, an assassin had managed to move past the encampment’s guards and get within ten paces of General Duessel. Now Amelia saw a threat in every new wheelbarrow.
The general had never been in serious danger, of course. Amelia had been there, shoving back the man and tumbling with him to the ground and hammering against him with her fists until the rest of Duessel’s men had pulled her off and taken the screaming man into custody.
“What would I do without you, Amelia?” the general had murmured, unperturbed, as Amelia brushed the dirt off her knees.
And Amelia had thought, for the first time, What would he do without me?
Now Amelia paced the edges of their encampment and peered suspiciously at every unfamiliar face as she waited for the next threat to appear.
A year had passed since the southern earthquake, and the lands of Grado were still devastated and shattered. A year ago, Amelia would not have guessed that the general’s encampment would become a semi-permanent settlement, nor that it would be surrounded by a countless sea of tents where the earthquake’s refugees still lived.
She had imagined that the general and his men would spend all their time laying new brick to raise up the fallen buildings. She had not suspected how their time would actually be spent: organizing the daily grain allotments to the refugees, enforcing the mandatory “contribution” from the surviving farmers and their fields, digging latrines to slow the regular outbreaks of cholera and typhoid fever, judging the various complaints and crimes that the refugees brought before the general, and worrying -- now that the autumn had arrived -- how to get everyone through yet another winter.
General Duessel and his men were doing everything they could for the people here. And yet, somehow, the people did not see that. They grumbled about their forced contributions. They complained that he was doing too little too slowly. Some even whispered -- under their breaths -- that he had been responsible for the madness of Prince Lyon and the defeat of Grado during the war. Hadn’t he defected? Hadn’t he betrayed his vows? Had the earthquake merely been a punishment for his sins?
Amelia crossed her arms as she watched the line of farmers move forward. The first winter here had been hard. She suspected the coming winter would be harder.
A flicker on the edge of her vision made her look up, and she saw the distant shape of a wyvern spiraling down.
She left the barricades and reached the packed-earth clearing just as Cormag and Genarog touched down. Cormag unbuckled himself from his harness and swung down, while Genarog looked inquisitively at the small paddock of cattle that were huddled nervously nearby.
“Don’t believe him,” Cormag said as he tossed his reins to the wyvern master who came running out. “We just ate, and we’ll be leaving soon, so no need to feed him.”
Then he looked up and saw Amelia waiting by the gate. “Oh, good. You can take over from me as courier.” He began to root around in the leather satchel at his side. “How are things going, loyal squire? I think you’ve grown by two inches since the last time I saw you.”
“Maybe,” Amelia said, a little shyly. “Do you want me to go and let the general know you’re here?”
“Sorry,” Cormag said absently, pulling out a bundle of letters. “I have to make it to the southern fort by nightfall, and I should get started right away. As long as I can trust you to give these to the general, my mission here is done.”
“Oh,” Amelia said, accepting the bundle. “He will be sorry not to see you.”
Cormag paused. “We will have time enough to see one another later,” he said. “But in the meantime… I have a letter for you too, loyal squire.”
“Oh!” Amelia squeaked, and Cormag smiled.
“I trust it will be happy news,” he said. “Remember to give Duessel the other letters. And now I must be off! Until we meet again, loyal squire!” And he was jogging back to Genarog, who gave one last longing look at the cows before allowing Cormag aboard and taking wing again.
Amelia watched them go as the wind from Genarog’s wings ruffled her hair, and then she dutifully turned and began walking in the direction of the general’s tent.
But impatience got the best of her, and as she walked, she stripped open the seal of the letter addressed to her and began to read:
Dear Amelia,
I misplaced one of Master Saleh’s magic books, and so he locked the library door and says I must recopy a chapter from the History of Caer Pelyn as punishment before I can come out. But that task is far too meadokre medeocre boring for someone of my resplendent talents. So instead I will spend this time writing you a letter and wait for Myrrh to come and let me out at lunchtime.
How are you? How is Grado? Is Duessel still making you learn cursive? Is Duessel still training you in the spear? In your last letter, you seemed surprised that Duessel takes such an interest in you -- is this genuine surprise or are you faining feigning nayavatay naeavaete ignorance, my dear? It is obvious that Duessel plans for you to be his protajay disciple. I predict that he will let you take over more and more of his affairs. After all, he has no heirs, correct? And you seem most indespensable necessary to him.
Have you gone to see your mother yet?
Here in Caer Pelyn, I continue to excel at every task that Master Saleh puts before me. I feel that my triumphs should, in fact, outweigh the loss of one or two little books. Any day now, I shall stand on the same footing as Master Saleh, with the same skills and the same strength. Then I suppose that I will need to find my own disciple! In the meantime, maybe I will practice on Myrrh.
Now I shall seal this up for the next time a wyvern rider stops by Caer Pelyn. Write back soon, my dear.
Love,
Ewan
p.s. Myrrh rescued me for lunch but told me that she is not interested in being my future disciple, so the search continues. Would you like to learn magic, my dear?
“Amelia?”
Amelia looked up and realized that she had reached the general’s tent. Duessel stood before her with an inquisitive look on his face.
She held up the bundle of letters. “Cormag came, sir. Brought these.”
“Ah,” Duessel said in a tone of resignation. “More demands from the provinces, I suspect.”
“Where are your guards, sir?” Amelia asked, looking around.
“Gave them the night off. They’re short-staffed right now in the barracks, and they have the men working double shifts. I didn’t think there was any reason to waste their time with watching me in the middle of the camp.”
Amelia gave him a reproving look, and he threw up his hands. “I am safe as houses, Amelia. Really. Give me those letters. I’ll put them on my desk. They can wait until tomorrow.”
“No, no,” Amelia heard herself saying. “Better done now than delayed, sir. I’ll go fetch my ink and parchment. We’ll answer them tonight.”
Duessel made an expression that suggested he wanted to object, but instead he shrugged and said, “As you will, Amelia. Let us hear what the provinces want from us.”
“Very good, sir,” Amelia said, and as she followed him, she thought, As so long as I am writing, I can also keep an eye on you, sir. Someone needs to, after all.
***
A year passed, and the harvest came again.
In the fall, Dara’s kitchen was filled with the women of Caer Pelyn as they dealt with the results of the local harvest by boiling jams and baking pies and simmering soups. Dara did very little of this labor herself. Instead, she sat in a rocking chair by the fire and “supervised” by issuing instructions and corrections to the various long-suffering cooks.
So it had ever been, for as long as Ewan had lived in Dara’s long and strange house, with its winding staircases to nowhere and its rooms which always had one more door than you remembered. Every autumn arrived with the smell of roasting apples and the sight of the steam-filled kitchen and the sound of Dara reprimanding someone who was letting her jelly boil too hot.
Sometimes Ewan would sneak a slice of cake or a hot biscuit from the middle of the chaos, but the various cooks kept a watchful eye for him and would rap his hand with their wooden spoons if they caught him prowling in the kitchen. Thus he would often send Myrrh to conduct thefts in his stead, because the village women still held the Great Dragon in too much awe to rap her on the hand.
Unfortunately, Myrrh was not always pliable in this regard.
“No,” she said on one particular morning. She was carefully brushing little licks of green paint on a drawing of a medicinal herb. Saleh had gotten her a new set of watercolors, and Myrrh was painstakingly adding color to a faded botanical text from the last century.
“Come on,” Ewan said. “I’m starving.”
“I saw you eat three helpings of sausage this morning.”
“I’m growing,” Ewan said plaintively, which was true. He had shot up over the summer, his knobby wrists thrusting out of his sleeves almost overnight and the top of his head suddenly banging against the edge of doorways.
He felt hungry all the time. The women in Dara’s kitchen were not sympathetic.
Neither was Myrrh. “It will be lunchtime soon.”
“Bah,” Ewan said, and he left her to her watercolors.
He wandered through the house as he wondered the best way to cadge a sticky bun from the women in Dara’s kitchen. Eventually, he found himself in the library.
Saleh had left him a task, two or three days ago, to look up a particular reference to lightning bugs in a particular book. This task was complicated by the disorder of Saleh’s library: half of the books were heaped in piles or shelved spine-first or tucked under a table leg in order to stop it from wobbling. Ewan had never been able to discern any organizing principle at work in the library, although Saleh seemed to know how to locate any book at any time. He always noticed if Ewan rearranged or reshelved anything.
Ewan absently began to rearrange and reshelve. He had long assumed that Saleh set him to these lightning-bug-finding tasks in order to teach Ewan the secret structure of his library. However, as of late, he was beginning to nurse a dark suspicion that Saleh gave Ewan these tasks merely to keep Ewan busy and out of trouble.
As he moved books, Ewan absently flipped through them, on the dim hope that he might alight on a page titled LIGHTNING BUGS.
He found no lightning bugs.
He did, however, find a slim book bound in a strangely greasy kind of leather, and when he opened it, the title page read SECRET PRACTICES OF THE DARK ARTS.
Ewan began reading.
He kept reading, so engrossed that he missed the bell for lunch, so focused that he did not notice Saleh standing over him until his master gently coughed.
Ewan gave a start and scrambled up. “Master! I, uh, I--”
Saleh was looking at the greasy book still in Ewan’s hand. “Ah. Is that Secret Practices?”
Ewan flushed. “Ah, yes, maybe, I was just putting it back, I just looked at it for a second--”
Saleh shrugged. “You should read it. It makes some interesting points.”
Ewan stiffened. “I am certain that it wouldn’t be useful for our practice of magic, master.”
“I don’t find it particularly useful, myself,” Saleh said. “But in order to reject something as unsuitable, first you must know something about it.” His gaze wandered past Ewan as he glanced around the library. “And perhaps I have been too narrowly focused in your instruction. Perhaps it is time for you to learn something about the other branches of the supernatural.”
“No, no,” Ewan said, hastily shoving the book on the nearest shelf. “I still have so much to learn from you. I have barely mastered the outer forms of Valega!”
Saleh’s gaze returned to Ewan. “Well. This is true.” He cleared his throat. “In any event, lunch is ready. Myrrh has been looking for you. And I have also been looking for you. Not because of lunch, but because a peddler brought a pack of letters for us, and one of them is addressed to you.”
Ewan glanced down at the sealed letter that Saleh handed him. The writing on the outside of the letter was quavering and tentative and clearly written by someone who rarely held a quill in their hand.
“Lunch, Ewan?”
“I’ll be there in a minute,” Ewan said as he cracked open the seal. “Tell them not to wait for me.”
“As you wish,” Saleh said. “But don’t delay too long, or there won’t be anything left.”
Ewan nodded, but he was already focused on reading the letter in his hand.
Dear Ewan,
Hello. There is not much to report from Ide. The cooper’s family are building another extension on their house, because their eldest daughter is pregnant again. The wainwright has bought a second gelding. The widow next door brought us a wheel of cheese from her goats last week.
The wheat is coming in strong. We expect a good harvest this year. This is a relief. The last few years have been hard, and we have had to borrow grain from the king to survive. It will be better when we can support ourselves again, as we did before the war.
I do not understand what you meant by “sophistry” in your last letter. Did you misspelled “sophisticated”? I do not understand why my plan to stay in Ide is sophisticated, though. It seems very simple to me. There is still work to be done rebuilding Ide. And my father needs me here.
I hope all is well in Caer Pelyn.
Sincerely,
Ross
***
A year passed, and the harvest came again.
The people of Ide had rebuilt their houses and replanted their fields. Grass grew over the cemetery graves.
There was glass in the windows of Garcia’s house again.
And as the days grew shorter and colder, Ross found himself rising before dawn every morning to boil oatmeal and prepare for a long day of swinging a scythe.
“We’re almost at an end,” Garcia said as they walked together toward the fields.
“You said that yesterday,” Ross pointed out.
“Yes,” Garcia said, unabashed. “Was true yesterday. Is even truer today.”
Ross snorted.
“You’ll see,” his father said. “We’ll finish clearing the last field tonight.”
“We’ll see,” Ross said. In the distance, he could see the pale square of the last wheat field, and the dark dots of their neighbors moving among the grain.
His father laughed. “You’ll see.”
And somehow, his father was right -- they did finish the last field that day, even though it seemed like an insurmountable task to Ross right up until the middle of the afternoon, and somehow they were tying together the final sheaves and heaving them on the cart just as the light began to purple into dusk.
“That’s that, then,” Garcia said with satisfaction. “And tomorrow we’ll feast.”
“Aye,” Ross said, stretching back one arm tiredly. “Or sleep. Sleep is good.”
“What? Sleep? When I was your age, I could spend a week in the fields without needing sleep, and then dance all night at the harvest festival. Sleep, he says!”
Even so, as soon as they got home, Garcia immediately fell asleep. Ross could hear his resonant snores through the wall separating them.
In contrast, Ross lay awake, staring sightlessly at the dark ceiling overhead.
He was thinking of a letter he had received a week ago, a letter that now sat folded inside a small chest at the foot of his bed. In the chest were also several false-starts of a reply from Ross; each one trailed off into a smear of ink after a line or two.
Despite his restlessness, Ross did not bother to light a candle and retrieve the letter. He remembered what it said, and he ran through its lines in his head as he lay in bed.
Dearest Ross,
The inhabitants of Caer Pelyn long to hear the latest installment of the saga of the cooper’s goose. Does this foul fowl still terrorize the countryside? Has the smith’s wife finally fulfilled her threat of wringing the feathered terror’s neck? You must let us know. Myrrh has become so invested in this epic that she has trouble sleeping at night.
(Myrrh is reading this over my shoulder and would like it to be known that I am exxagerating exaggerating “to be funny.”)
Other than our breathless wait for your next missive, Caer Pelyn remains Caer Pelyn. Dara continues her reign of terror over the jam-making women of the village. Myrrh has taken up oil painting. My master continues to induct me into the inner rites of sacred magics although I struggle to match him and is training me in the finer details of meditation and reaching out to the life spirits which is surprisingly difficult and so I learn more and more every day. Sometimes my master jokes that perhaps I should have apprenticed myself to a dark mage instead, that perhaps my talents truly lie in that direction. And then we laugh and laugh.
Myrrh has left to see if supper is ready. I should finish this up before she returns.
I remain unconvinced that you really and truly wish to remain in Ide -- geese or no geese, it seems a remarkably small venue for someone who has traveled the world and seen the kinds of things that you have seen. Surely your father does not want you to bury yourself there for all eternity. He had his own adventures as a young man; surely he wants the same for you? You should visit me us here at Caer Pelyn. You should go visit the lovely Amelia. Anyone! Anywhere! Just get out of Ide! You’ve paid your debts and been a filial son, but you do not have the heart of a farmer. It is clear from your letters. Your letters are so superficially cheerful and so deeply unhappy.
There is nothing worse than trying to force yourself into a shape that does not truly fit you no matter how much you may want that particular life.
I hear Myrrh shouting that there’s a wyvern in the front yard, so good-bye, god bless, write back soon.
Yours,
Ewan
Ross did not know how to answer.
Or rather, he knows how he wants to answer: I am not the only one trying to force myself into a shape, Ewan.
But every time he sits down to write that out, his quill trails off into an inky blotch on the page.
At some point, he must have slept, dipping into a dreamless blink, and then he was opening his eyes again and sitting up in bed, because even though it was still dark, he knew it was morning, and he knew that he must go fetch a clean pail of water for the morning oatmeal.
Later that day, Ross and his father and the rest of the village went down to the commons in the front of the temple. It was the end of the harvest, and that meant, by tradition, it was a day of celebration and feasting. Trestle tables had been laid out. There were pies and cakes and the pig that the miller’s family had spent the whole night roasting. There were casks of beer and cider.
There was, fortunately, no sign of the goose that had spent several weeks terrorizing the smith’s wife.
“Ah, the feasting at the end almost makes the whole harvest worthwhile,” his father said.
“Mmm,” Ross said, shading his eyes. Everyone in Ide had come to celebrate the end of the harvest, and he recognized all his neighbors and cousins, but he had noticed an unfamiliar cluster of people next to the temple priest at the high table. “Is that…?”
His father uttered a startled oath. “They might have sent word that they were coming!”
At the high table, next to the flustered local priest, sat the king of Renais and his lady sister. Behind them, the royal guardsmen were standing at a discreet distance, although a few were carefully watching the village men who were opening up the barrels of ale.
King Ephraim smiled when he saw Ross and Garcia approach. “Look, Eirika, our valiant companions from days past.”
Lady Eirika looked up. “Sir Garcia! And your son! The spitting image of you!”
Garcia clapped Ross on the back. “Aye, luckily he takes after his mother in brains. Your Majesty, Your Highness, to what do we owe this honor?”
“We were riding nearby and heard that Ide had brought in the last of her harvest,” Ephraim said. “And we felt that it had been far too long since we have drank from the village cup at a harvest festival.”
“We do not come empty-handed,” Eirika said, dimpling. “Behold, our offering for the shared festivities: another companion from days long past.”
And Ross followed her pointing finger with his gaze and saw a tall woman step out of the temple’s entrance, her blonde hair still wet from the font inside.
“Amelia?”
Amelia looked up at the sound of her name. “Ross! Sir Garcia!”
“What...what brings you to Ide?” Ross asked, a little idiotically, as she approached them.
“Ah,” Amelia said, glancing at Ephraim and Eirika. “I was sent by General Duessel to arrange a new shipment of supplies from Renais under mutually beneficial terms.”
“The lady Amelia,” Ephraim said, drawling out her name slightly, “is now a Grado diplomat.”
“It is an effective stratagem of Duessel’s,” Eirika said, smiling. “I do not believe that we were capable of bargaining too harshly with this particular representative.”
Amelia flushed slightly. “I merely carried out my commission. I am supposed to return to Grado tomorrow, but His Majesty suggested that, since some time still remained, I might desire to come with them to Ide.” She smiled at Ross. “It is good to finally see the place I have heard so much about.”
Ross was aware of his father exchanging significant glances with Ephraim and Eirika, and he felt the tips of his ears become hot. “Well. Well! I should...give you the grand tour, then.”
“Certainly,” Amelia said. She inclined her head in the direction of Ephraim and Eirika. “With your leave?”
“Certainly,” Ephraim said. “And in the meantime, I will do my best to persuade Sir Garcia to return to the fold and become a knight of Renais once again.”
Garcia laughed a little hollowly. “An old conversation between us, Your Majesty.”
“An evergreen one,” Ephraim said crisply as Ross drew Amelia away. “A conversation that never bores me in the slightest, Garcia.”
Ross dutifully took Amelia to see what few sights there were to see in Ide: the mill pond, the smith’s forge, the fancy latticework on the cooper’s storm shutters.
He felt clumsy and thick-tongued next to Amelia, who seemed so elegant, so well-spoken, so--
“It’s very nice,” Amelia said.
Ross rubbed the back of his neck. “I know it’s not that fancy--”
“No,” Amelia said before he could continue. “It is very nice. It looks...so lovely, so pleasant, so peaceful.” She sighed, and Ross looked at her in surprise. “I wish that we could have made such progress after the war in Grado.”
“But you’re rebuilding,” Ross said.
“Oh, yes,” Amelia said. “Endlessly rebuilding. With no end in sight.” She glanced back at the feasting area and the distant figures seated there. “We are very fortunate that Renais has agreed to extend more aid. I’m not sure-- Well. We are one bad harvest away from open revolt, I think.”
“Is it still so bad?”
“This agreement with Renais was important,” Amelia said, her mouth downturned. “Possible it is the only reason that we will survive the winter. I’m glad...I’m glad I didn’t mess it up. It was so important that I’m not sure why the general sent me to oversee it.”
“Who better?” Ross asked, and Amelia blinked at him in surprise. “The king knows and trusts you, after all. And Duessel knows and trusts you as well. You know what Grado needs. You know what Renais is likely to bend on, and what they won’t negotiate. Who better than you, Amelia?”
She flushed slightly. “Ah. You have a high opinion of my capabilities. But to be frank...I wish that Duessel had sent another in my stead. Cormag would have done just as well. I do not like leaving the general, even to carry out this important task. He has so few people watching his back. Protecting him from threats.”
“I think that General Duessel watches his own back,” Ross said dryly. “From what I know of the general, he’s equal to nearly any danger.”
Amelia shrugged. “Even so. He’s too important for Grado to lose. The country really will fall apart if something happens to him.” She smiled. “But in any event, I was overruled, so here I am. And it is good to see you, big brother. You and your Ide.”
“Of course, little sister,” Ross said, even though Amelia had grown tall, even though she now stood at eye-level with him. “You’re always welcome here.”
They started walking back to the feast on the trestle tables. There was the distant sound of the village musicians setting up their instruments.
“There will be dancing,” Ross said. “Will you dance, Amelia?”
“Of course,” Amelia said with delight. “Ah, this place seems like a little paradise. You are so blessed to be living here.”
“Yes,” Ross said automatically, but even as he did, he pushed away at the thought. In truth, he did not feel blessed to be living in Ide. He felt...nothing about living in Ide. It was the place he lived, and so it was his responsibility to see it thrive and prosper, but it had no claim on his emotions. It stirred no passions. It was an obligation, nothing more, and he uncomplainingly carried that obligation because his father had taught him such responsibility.
And Ross was nothing if not a loyal son.
But then he thought of the crumbling Grado that Amelia had described in her letters, and he kept his mouth shut. He was ungrateful, he knew. Compared to many places, Ide was a blessing.
“I shall come back one day,” Amelia was saying lightly. “When things in Grado are better, and I have more liberty to come and go.”
“Of course,” Ross said, but even as he said that, he thought, She will never leave her general again.
The thought stung, to his surprise. He probed at it while Amelia continued to chatter happily about Ide’s peace and serenity.
Ross was still turning the thought over in his head as they approached the trestle tables. His father was talking to one of the royal guardsmen, and Ross thought of how similar they looked standing next to one another. This was the other side of his father: not the careful parent, not the reliable scyther of wheat, not the snoring presence on the other side of the wall, but a knight who still remembered the stance and the expression and the voice of it all.
He would go back to it, if he could, Ross thought -- a thought that he had thought many times before.
But now, for the first time, he thought -- with the same dull ache, like a tooth loose in its socket -- But he won’t. He’ll never leave me again.
As long as I’m here in Ide.
The village musicians were beginning to pluck on their instruments with enthusiasm, and Amelia touched Ross on the shoulder.
“A dance, brother?”
He smiled at her. “Of course, sister.”
***
A year passed, and the harvest came again.
“Amelia? I didn’t expect you back until tomorrow.”
Amelia looked up from the packet of papers she was examining under candlelight. “Sir. I persuaded Cormag to bring me back a day early.” She gestured at the papers. “There remains so much to be done about the upcoming relocation. I didn’t want to delay any of the work.”
“Mmm,” Duessel said, frowning down at her. They were in the building that served as Duessel’s headquarters. Normally, it was a hive of hurrying clerks and reporting soldiers and visiting dignitaries -- but it was two hours after midnight, and Amelia was the only person in the common area.
She brushed a strand of blonde hair out of her face and did her best to smile up at the general. “It’s arranging all the requisitions, sir. Time-consuming.”
“Of course,” Duessel said. “How was your trip? How is your mother?”
“The trip was fine,” Amelia said vaguely as she pulled out a sheet from the bottom of a pile in front of her. “But while you’re here, sir, could you take a look at this request by the southern knights, sir? They want more grain but we just sent them a shipment last month.”
Duessel took the sheet and glanced over it. “I see. Are we unable to supply them?”
“Technically, no, at this precise moment,” Amelia said. “But every year, the eastern fort sends us their supply request three weeks late, and they always need more grain for trading with the sea raiders. So if we supply the south now, we will be short when the east finally submits their overdue request in a week or so.”
“Surely that is the east’s problem,” Duessel said dryly. “If they are late to the party, they will not get any cake. The local farmers can only produce so much grain for us every fall.”
“The eastern fort won’t see it that way in the spring when the sea raiders appear and our men are unable to trade with them. Then the raiders really will raid.”
“I have long felt that perhaps we have become too comfortable being friendly with the sea raiders,” Duessel said musingly. He held up a forestalling hand when Amelia huffed indignantly. “Yes, yes, I know how you feel. Let me consider it. We’ll discuss it in the morning. In the meantime, Amelia, leave off this work. You just got back. Go sleep. You can tackle this work tomorrow.”
“There will be new piles of work tomorrow,” Amelia said.
“Then the new clerk can take care of them,” Duessel said. “You know, what’s-his-name. The one with the squint.”
“He is so slow,” Amelia said. “And I have to check his work for errors afterwards.”
“He is getting faster and better every day,” Duessel said. “I regret to tell you, Amelia, that you must learn how to delegate. You can no longer oversee each and every little cog in our operation here. There are too many balls in the air. You must share the load with others.”
“It’s too important--” Amelia started to say, and Duessel sighed.
“Yes, certainly,” he said. “But it will all still wait until tomorrow, I promise. Go to sleep, Amelia, This is an order from your commanding officer.”
Amelia wrinkled her nose rebelliously, but she reluctantly stood and snuffed out the candle on the desk. “Very well, sir. But I shall be back, bright and early, tomorrow!”
“I have no doubt,” Duessel said wearily. “Oh, before I forget. There was a delegation from the capital that stopped by two days ago. Master Knoll and another man. They wanted to see you.”
“Me? Why? Are they still here?”
“I don’t know, and no,” Duessel said. “But they will be returning soon, I think. They went out to investigate one of the old ruins to the north, but they should return soon.”
“What does Master Knoll want with me?”
“I don’t know,” Duessel said with a smile. “But perhaps he has heard what an able aide-de-camp I have, and he hopes to steal you away.”
Amelia thought of the solemn, pale mage in dark robes that she had known only very slightly during the war. “Huh. I wonder what paperwork a wizard goes through?”
“Maybe you will find out,” Duessel said. “And another thing. Here. They brought the post when they came through. There was a letter for you. Now. Go sleep.”
“Yes, sir,” she said, accepting the sealed letter from him. “And you too, sir.”
He laughed. “As you command, Amelia.”
Amelia returned to her lodgings, where she lit a candle and cracked open the letter.
It read:
Dear Sister,
I hope this letter finds you well.
I write to tell you that any letters sent to Ide will not find me there. I am leaving. I do not exactly know where I am headed, but if I settle anywhere for a length of time, I will write to let you know my new address.
If you need to contact me in the meantime, you may write to my father, who now lives in the royal barracks of Renais. He has rejoined His Majesty’s guard.
You may be surprised that both my father and I have left Ide. It was not an easy decision for either of us. But neither was it an especially difficult one. We have seen my mother’s town rebuilt, safe and whole; we have seen my home restored and made new. But once that was done, what remained for us in Ide?
My father urged me to join the knights of Renais. I considered it. Perhaps it would have raised my status Perhaps you and I But it was clearly my father’s dream, not mine. I am not yet ready to bind myself to a vow -- but I also wanted to let my father return to his vow, the unspoken hope of his heart of becoming a royal knight again. And it became clear that, so long as I remained in Ide, he would deny himself this dream and continue to serve as my father.
So I am leaving Ide to seek my fortune elsewhere, which frees my father to return to the king’s service. It is a bittersweet thing. We are sad to be leaving one another -- but it is no bad thing for a son to leave the nest, and my father knows that.
I know you liked Ide. One day, I hope that we I will go back. Maybe I will raise my own sons there. But that day is far in the future.
I hope that we will see each other again, one day.
Love,
Ross Your Brother
Amelia slept badly that night, and when she finally woke for the last time, she knew it was still too early to present herself in the general’s headquarters and resume her relentless progress through paperwork.
Instead, she prowled around the edge of the general settlement. Over the years they had been here, the barricades had become fences and then walls. The tents had been replaced with sturdy one- and two-room buildings. The refugees beyond the walls now lived in wooden houses of their own -- frail things, but considerably sturdier than the cloth shelters that had originally sprung up in the aftermath of the earthquake.
Of late, Duessel and his aides no longer talked about resettling the refugees, dismantling the encampment, and returning to the capital. Soon, Amelia suspected, they would begin to build in stone and mortar.
She was standing on a hill by the north gate when she saw two riders approaching in the distance, and she remembered that Duessel had said that a strange group from the capital had wanted to see her.
She made her way down to the gate and reached it at the same time that the riders did from the opposite side.
One of the riders climbing down from his horse was dressed in distinctive black robes, and Amelia did not even need to see the man’s face to recognize the dark mage Knoll, even though she had barely seen him in the years since the war.
But the other man -- young and thin and tall -- who swung down from his saddle, who threw his arms wide when he saw her standing there, who had hair so blazing red--
“Amelia, my dear!”
Amelia blinked at him in confusion. And then, suddenly, incredulously, “...Ewan?”
And then his arms were around her, and he was embracing her tightly, his chin against her hair, his shoulder against her cheek, and Amelia was thinking, When did he get so tall?
The last time she had seen him, he had been a full head shorter than her.
The last time she had seen him, his voice had been high and fluting -- but now, when he spoke, his voice was a deep rumble against the top of her head.
“I am glad you came before we had to leave again, my dear. Master Knoll has been so impatient.”
“Indeed,” Knoll said in his dry and quiet voice from behind him. “But I am glad to see that, despite our hurry, you still accomplished your desired reunion.”
“But what are you doing here?” Amelia asked in confusion as Ewan finally released her and stepped back.
“We came to examine one of the ruins,” Ewan said. His voice was amused, but a strange expression crossed his face. “According to Master Knoll, it has been giving off strange energies recently.”
“Yes, yes,” Amelia said distractedly, “but what are you doing here, Ewan?”
For a second, she saw him hesitate, and then he said, “Master Saleh has grown weary of me and wanted to get me out of his hair for a week, so he has sent me to aid Master Knoll. I am afraid I have been a dreadful burden on Master Knoll. When it comes to dark magics, I’m totally helpless.”
“That has not been my impression,” Knoll said in a tone of sedated bemusement. “But I must go make my report to the general, Ewan, and then we must return in haste to the capital. I will return for you in one hour.” He nodded politely to Amelia, and then he headed in the direction of Duessel’s headquarters.
“Such...such hurry!” Amelia said. “You’ve come such a long way for such a short visit.”
“It is most unfortunate,” Ewan said. “But come! We have an hour! Is there anything to eat in this bustling settlement, my dear? I am starved.”
She took him to the mess hall, where they both received porridge and brown bread, and then she took him up to the little bluff on the side of the settlement -- one of the few places here where one could sit and talk in some degree of privacy.
“This is hardly the unceasing service to the general that I expected, given your letters, my dear,” he said as he seated himself next to her on the ground and carefully balanced the metal bowl of porridge on his knee.
“Occasionally I am given permission to eat breakfast,” Amelia said, rolling her eyes.
Ewan gave her a warm smile as he sank the corner of his bread into his porridge and lifted it to his mouth. “Thank you for squandering your precious free time on me, my dear.”
Amelia shrugged. “I am glad to see you. Although I do not entirely understand why you are here. Are you now apprenticed to Master Knoll?”
Ewan flinched. “Perish the thought. I am still a student under Master Saleh. I have merely been sent to Knoll to...assist him.”
Amelia frowned. “But--”
“It’s really quite boring,” Ewan said. “But enough about me! How are you, my dear?”
“Fine,” Amelia said. “Same as ever.”
“Mmm,” Ewan said. “And how is your mother?”
Amelia paused. “Fine.”
“You’ve been to see her recently?”
“Yesterday,” Amelia said quietly. “I just got back.”
Ewan gave her a long look. “How is her memory these days?”
“Oh,” Amelia said slowly. “Good. Fine. We came on one of her good days, they said. She remembered who I was. She doesn’t always remember me.”
Ewan, silently chewing, watched her.
“But she seems content,” Amelia said with a sigh. “She is safe and secure there, and they take good care of her. I can ask for nothing more than that.”
“Ah,” Ewan said. “Yes, it is good that she has trustworthy caretakers.”
“Yes,” Amelia said. “I am glad that...they can shoulder the burden. That I have so little responsibility for her. But perhaps that makes me an ungrateful daughter? Perhaps I should be doing...more?”
“Nonsense,” Ewan said. “You are an exemplary daughter. You are too eager to carry burdens that do not belong to you.”
Amelia made a face.
“No, no, don’t dispute it, my dear. You think that you can fix the world’s problems, and you run yourself ragged trying to perfect everything. But you can not solve everything. Some problems must be merely endured.” Ewan put a hard, heavy emphasis on the last word.
Amelia looked at him. “Ewan. What happened at the ruins?”
Ewan plucked a blade of grass and began to shred it. “Oh. Master Knoll wanted me to summon a spirit to assess the site. Not something I had ever done before.”
He stripped the grass into thinner and thinner threads. “I told him that I wouldn’t be able to do it, that I wasn’t good at that kind of thing. But Knoll insisted. So I did it.”
A long pause.
“Was it...hard?” Amelia asked.
“No,” Ewan said. “It was easy. It was the easiest thing I’ve ever done in my life. Knoll said he’d never seen anyone do it better.” His voice sounded funny, but even so, it took Amelia a moment to realize that he was crying. “Knoll said I was a natural.”
Amelia blinked. And then she reached out and wrapped her arms around Ewan, and Ewan pressed his head against her shoulder and wept.
“That isn’t the life that I wanted,” he mumbled. “I know exactly the life that I want, and it isn’t that.”
“It will be all right,” Amelia said, rubbing the back of his quivering shoulder blades in little circles. “Shhh, everything will be all right.”
And instinctively, she thought How can I fix this problem -- even though, as Ewan’s warm tears ran down her neck, she suspected that it was a problem beyond her abilities to solve.
***
A year passed, and the harvest came again.
Dear Ewan,
PLEASE DON’T BE MAD AT ME.
I know you said you wanted to be left alone, but EVERYONE IS WORRIED ABOUT YOU.
EVEN YOUR SISTER.
We have all tried to give you space, but it’s TIME TO COME BACK TO THE WORLD.
Especially because it is going to start snowing soon in the mountains of Caer Pelyn.
DON’T IGNORE THIS LETTER.
Sincerely,
Amelia
Naturally, Ewan ignored the letter, which had been left for him on the flat rock which served, by unspoken consensus, as the place where Myrrh left him food and clean socks and the occasional pen-and-ink-wash sketch.
However, a week later, Ewan was less successful at ignoring the arrival of the latest offering at the flat rock: a stocky bearded man carrying an axe and a heavy leather pack.
At Ewan’s approach, the other man rose from his seated position. “They told me down at the village that you were living up here now. By yourself.”
“Yeah,” Ewan said.
“They said you weren’t doing too well these days.”
Ewan thought about this statement for a moment. “I’m doing as well as I can do,” he said at last. “It’s been a long time, Ross.”
“Yeah,” Ross said.
“Did they ask you come? Did they ask you to bring me back down to Dara’s house?”
“No,” Ross said. “I wanted to see you. That’s why I came.”
“Oh,” Ewan said.
“And also your sister found me. And she told me to come see you.”
“Oh,” Ewan said.
“And then Amelia wrote to me,” Ross admitted.
“Oh,” Ewan said.
“And I went to Dara’s house, and they told me you were up here, in the woods, living by yourself like a hermit.”
“Oh,” Ewan said. “Did they send any food with you?”
“I have a loaf of bread and three jars of jam in my pack,” Ross said. “There was a bunch of women in Dara’s kitchen, and they kept pressing jars of jam on me.”
“All right, then,” Ewan said vaguely. “You can come.” He gestured at him. “Come on, I’ll show you my...spacious abode.”
It was, admittedly, a cave.
“Very nice,” Ross said, unconvincingly.
“It suffices,” Ewan said. “This is where I...meditate. Without distractions. On the road to enlightenment. Valega, you understand.”
“Huh,” Ross said. He had seated himself on a large rock and was bringing out the loaf of bread and three little pots of jam. From his belt, he unhooked a small knife.
“Sometimes I meditate under waterfalls. Sometimes I climb trees.”
“And this is the kind of thing you...have to do? To meditate?” Ross tore off a corner of the loaf and began spreading strawberry jam on it.
Watching this operation closely, Ewan said, “Well, to achieve a superior form of consciousness, it’s necessary, of course.”
When Ross handed him the jammy bread, Ewan tried to be insouciant about taking it, but instead he found himself cramming the whole thing in his mouth and chewing desperately.
He had not had jam in more than a month. It tasted incredible.
“And so this is the sort of thing that...Master Saleh does?”
Ewan paused in his chewing, and then he swallowed. “Well, not anymore. Once you master the art of understanding nature, you don’t have to be close to nature any more to achieve it.”
“Hmm,” Ross said, spreading jam on a new chunk of bread. “Master Saleh seems puzzled about why you’re up here.”
“Master Saleh does not think that I can do it,” Ewan said grimly. “Master Saleh doubts me.”
“Hmm,” Ross said again.
“You know,” Ewan said. “You know what they think I am.”
“What do they think you are?”
“A mage inclined to the dark rites,” Ewan said. “But I’m not. I’m not! All of my sympathies lie toward nature, and life, and light.”
“Hmm.”
“But you already knew that. You already know why they sent me to Grado last year.”
“Tethys may have mentioned it,” Ross said.
“Ah.”
“And Amelia.”
“Of course.”
“And Saleh, an hour ago, when I saw him.”
Ewan said nothing, but he savagely accepted a new hunk of bread from Ross and chewed it with ferocity.
“Nobody is going to make you be a dark mage,” Ross said evenly. “They just want you to come home. To the place with a roof and hot meals.”
“They don’t believe in me,” Ewan muttered. “So I have to prove them wrong.”
“How long have you been trying to prove them wrong?”
Ewan regarded him narrowly. “I do not allow myself to be burdened by such petty tasks as tracking the days.”
“The way I’ve heard it, you’ve been up here for nearly two months.”
Ewan rose suddenly. “If you say so. I must now go meditate. I’m sorry you came so far for so little, but please do not disturb me.”
And with that, he stalked away and disappeared into the forest undergrowth.
Hours later, when he returned from his meditations, he did not expect to find Ross still there -- and yet there was Ross, patiently waiting.
Ross had rigged up a little fire, and there was a metal pot of something bubbling over it. The smell reached Ewan almost as soon as the sight did, and his stomach rumbled in response.
“You’re still here,” he said.
“Yes,” Ross said mildly.
Past him, Ewan could see the mouth of his little cave, where Ross had rolled out his own sleeping bag next to the ragged quilt that served as Ewan’s bedding.
“You’re staying,” Ewan said.
“Yes,” Ross said. “You’re in good time. The soup is nearly ready.”
Ewan regarded him narrowly. He wanted to say something cutting, something that would send Ross packing -- but instead, he heard himself say, “What’s in the soup?”
“All sorts of good things,” Ross said. “Taters and carrots and jerky.”
“You brought all that up here with you?”
“The women in Dara’s kitchen had a lot of stuff,” Ross said. “And they were very insistent that I take it. They think you’re starving up here.” His eyes flicked up the length of Ewan’s long, thin frame. “I’m not sure that they’re wrong.”
“Hmph,” Ewan said. “Maybe I am fed by the wild creatures of nature. Maybe the birds bring me berries. Maybe the boars show me where the mushrooms grow. Maybe I have grown so close to the numinous world--”
Ross was looking at him with an expression of naked incredulity.
“Maybe Myrrh brings me things,” Ewan admitted. “But I’m almost there. I’m almost in touch with the essence of the forest.”
“Sure,” Ross said. “But even so, I think Master Saleh sits down every night to a hot meal cooked in a kitchen, you know.”
Ewan sniffed.
“Here, I think it’s ready,” Ross said, poking at the interior of his soup pot with a long fork. “Come on, let’s eat.”
He spooned out a helping for Ewan in a battered metal bowl, which Ewan accepted grudgingly as he seated himself next to Ross on the rock.
Ewan blew on the surface until the soup no longer steamed visibly, and then he tilted the edge against his mouth to take a long drink.
He swallowed. “Hey. This isn’t bad.”
“Thank you,” Ross said.
“When did you learn how to cook?”
Ross shrugged. “I was in charge of the kitchen when I lived with my father, so I had a lot of practice. And then, on the road, I’ve had to feed myself more often than not. Practice makes perfect.”
Ewan took another long swallow. “So you’ve been on the road. The last letter I got from you said you were in Frelia.”
“Aye,” Ross said. “I was there for a while. I heard there was a teacher there, a man who ran a school and trained fighters. So I went looking for him.”
When Ross did not continue, Ewan gave him an exasperated look. “And? Did you find him, my dear?”
“No,” Ross said. “He left Frelia a year or two ago. His neighbors told me that he’d gone to sea.”
“And so what next? Are you giving up?”
“No,” Ross said. “Just been thinking if I want to go to sea myself or not.”
Ewan laughed. “Boy, when you left Ide, you really left Ide.”
Ross gave him a curious glance. “Did I? Ide is still there. I can always go back. It’s waiting for me.”
“Hmm,” Ewan said. “...can I have some more soup?”
“Of course,” Ross said. “I’m glad you like it.”
“I do. If you ever get tired of searching for new fighting styles, you can always hang up your axe and open up a kitchen.”
To Ewan’s surprise, Ross flushed slightly at these words. “I-- That is nice of you to say, Ewan. When I have a family, I hope I can cook for them.”
And Ewan thought, for some reason, of the myriad women in Dara’s kitchen each fall -- women he had often thought about as they boiled their preserves and baked their pies, an eternal repetition that arrived each autumn, as regular as clockwork -- but for the first time, he thought of them as optimistic and hopeful as they made meals for an uncertain and wintry future.
He had never really thought of cooking before as an act of love.
That night, Ross and Ewan lay side-by-side: Ross in his sleeping back, Ewan burrowed into his stolen quilt.
Both were silent. Neither were sleeping.
“I suppose,” Ewan said, staring at the dark cave roof overhead, “you think I’m making a fool of myself.”
Ross said nothing.
“I know what Master Saleh thinks,” Ewan continued. “He thinks that I should...listen to my strengths. That I should abandon my fruitless attempts to learn from him, and instead apprentice myself to another branch of magic. To the black arts.”
For a moment, he listened to the sound of Ross’ steady breathing.
“But I don’t want that, Ross. I don’t want to peer into the future. I don’t want to summon demons in circles of salt. I don’t want to study the monstrous and the strange. I just want...what Master Saleh has. I want to listen to the trees. I want to breathe with the dawn. I want a little house with a terrible library and a kitchen where people are always coming and going.”
“Yes,” Ross said. “I understand.”
“But I guess it doesn’t matter what I want. We can’t always have the things that we want.”
“No,” Ross said. “Not always.”
“I’ve always loved autumn,” Ewan said suddenly. “The changing colors of the leaves. The changing weather. I used to think that I loved it because it was so cozy. But maybe I always had it wrong. Maybe I loved it because it was the season of dying things. Decay. The long slide in the nightfall of winter.”
“It doesn’t have to be all or nothing,” Ross said.
Ewan turned his head to regard him. “What?”
“You can love things for all kinds of reasons,” Ross said. “The cozy and the decay.”
Ewan frowned at him.
“And just because you learn something about the other branches of magic, it doesn’t mean that you’ve shut the door on Master Saleh’s school. He doesn’t want to kick you out. He just wants you to...open yourself up.”
“But once I start on the path…”
“It’s not an all or nothing thing, Ewan. You can go out, and then after a while, you can return. That took me a long time to realize. That’s why I couldn’t bring myself to leave Ide for so long. But then I realized that Ide will always be there, waiting for me. We rebuilt it, and now it’s strong and stable, and when I’ve finished what I need to do in the world, I know I can go back to it.”
“It’s different for me,” Ewan said.
“It’s not,” Ross said. “It’s exactly the same. You wrote me all those letters commanding me to go out in the world, remember? Well, the same goes for you. You’ve learned what you need to learn from Saleh, and now it’s time to go out in the world and learn other things.”
“It will change me,” Ewan said. “It will change me irrevocably.”
Ross started to laugh. “Will it? I find that hard to believe, Ewan. What are you going to do, start digging up corpses from the cemetery? Train a raven to be your familiar?”
“It’s not funny.”
“You have the strongest personality that I know of, Ewan. I can’t imagine that learning how to draw some pentagrams is going to make a real dent on you.”
“Easy for you to say.”
“It is easy to say,” Ross said, his giggles tapering off, “because I know you, Ewan. Maybe better than you know yourself. You’re afraid of losing your home in Caer Pelyn, but I promise you, it will still be here when you return. I have seen the women in Dara’s kitchen, after all. They will not let anything happen to it.”
“But what does the world have to offer me?” Ewan said faintly. “What does the world have that Caer Pelyn does not?”
There was a long pause, and when Ross finally spoke, his voice was low and soft. “Well, it has me. And it has Amelia.”
***
A year passed, and the harvest came again.
“We can’t delay departure any longer, milady,” the captain said. “Tis already late in the season, and every day makes it more likely that the sea raiders will hit us.”
I hope they do hit us, Amelia thought, since it will make my job of finding them to sign new treaties much easier.
But she did not say this. Instead, soothingly, she said, “Captain, just an hour more, I’m sure my bodyguards will be here soon.”
The captain frowned but nodded, and Amelia leaned against railing of the ship as she peered intently at the docks.
In her coat pocket sat two folded letters.
One read:
Darling Amelia,
Your letter came as a surprise. Not, of course, the part where you want me to travel with you as you attempt to make contact with the sea raiders and negotiate new treaties between them and Grado. This merely shows good sense on your part, as I am a very accomplished mage and traveling with me will merely add to your prestige and renown among the sea raiders.
No, I am surprised that you are willing to leave Grado in the first place in order to embark on a long and uncertain sea voyage. How will the great general function without you? How will your various inept clerks survive in your absence?? Aren’t you afraid that, upon your return, you will find that nothing remains of Grado but a smoking crater in the earth???
Naturally, I am delighted that you have slipped from your bureaucratic yoke (even though your current mission also extends the stability and glory of the great nation of Grado, blah blah blah). And I will of course do everything in my power to aid you. You say that you are sailing on the last day of the harvest moon. Expect me by then, my dear.
You are kind to worry whether or not I would wish to leave Caer Pelyn. I think that they can survive without me for a few months. And besides, I have been talking with Master Saleh, and he and I have been discussing some new innovations, some new ways to fuse various old traditions -- and I think a long sea voyage is just the thing to give me some time and some space to work out some theories I have been mulling over.
While I am gone, I have given Myrrh strict instructions to raid the pantry and reorder the library, but I am afraid she only listens to me with half an ear sometimes.
Anyway, long story short: your troubles are soon to be at an end, because I am on my way, dear one.
Love,
Ewan
In contrast, the other letter simply read:
Dear Sister,
Of course I will come.
Love,
Your Brother
As Amelia refolded the letters and returned them to her pocket, she found the captain back at her elbow.
“Is that…?” he said, and she followed his gaze.
On the docks stood two men. One of them was stocky and bearded. The other was tall and thin and had flamingly red hair.
“There they are,” Amelia said in a tone of satisfaction.
The captain gave them a dubious glance. “Those two? Those two are your bodyguards?”
“Indeed,” Amelia said. “The best in the business. A most fearsome duo.” She leaned against the railing of the ship and began to wave at them. “Could you bring them aboard, captain? We haven’t a second to waste!”