"What did she say?" he asked Melathys. "I couldn't catch it."
"She said, 'Bless me, young sir, and accept my blessing in return.'"
*
He lay on his bed in the upper room, watching the elastic reflections widening, merging and closing among the roof poles. Melathys sat beside him, holding his good hand in both her own. He was tired out and feverish again, shivering and numb-cold. There was nothing left remarkable in the world. All was empty and cold, stretching away to the horizon and the blank sky.
"Hope you didn't find our singing out of keeping, sir," said Tan-Rion. "The priestess said it would be all to the good if we could manage a song, but the job was to think of something suitable that the lads could sing. They all know 'The Tears,' of course."
Kelderek found some words of thanks and praise, and after a little the officer, seeing that he was exhausted, took his leave. Presently Radu came, wrapped in a cloak from throat to ankles, and sat for a time opposite Melathys.
"They say my father's on his way," he said. "I'd hoped he might be here before this. If only he'd known, he'd have wished to be on the shore this afternoon."
Kelderek smiled and nodded like an old man, only partly taking in what he said. But indeed Radu said little, sitting silent for long minutes and once biting on his hand to still the chattering of his teeth. Kelderek slipped into a half-doze and woke to hear him answering Melathys.
"--but they'll be all right, I think." And then, after a pause, "Shouter's ill, you know--quite badly, they say."
"Shouter?" asked Melathys, puzzled.
"Is he?" said Kelderek. "But I saw him on the shore."
"Yes, I dare say he thought he'd better be there at all costs--not that it makes any difference-but he's in a bad way this evening. I believe it's fear as much as anything. He's terrified: partly of the other children, but partly of the villagers as well. They know who he is--or who he was--and they won't do anything for him. He's lying by himself in a shed, but I think he'd run away if he could."
"Who's Shouter?" asked Melathys again.
"Will they kill him?" said Kelderek. Radu did not answer at once and he pressed him. "What do you want to do with him?"
"No one's actually said anything; but what would be the good of killing him?"
"Is that really what you feel--after all you've suffered?"
"It's what I feel I ought to feel, anyway." He was silent again for some time and then said, "No one's going to kill you. Tan-Rion told me."
"I'll--I'll come and talk to Shouter," said Kelderek, groping to get up. "Where is the shed?"
"Lie down, my love," said Melathys. "I'll go. Since no one tells me about him, I must see this Shouter for myself--or hear him."
57 Elleroth Dinner Party
WHEN HE WOKE, his Yeldashay soldier was sitting nearby mending a piece of leather in the fading light. Seeing Kelderek awake, he grinned and nodded, but said nothing. Kelderek slept again and was next wakened by Melathys lying down beside him.
"If I don't lie down I'll fall down. I'll be off to bed soon, but it means so much to be alone with you again for a little. How are you?"
"Empty--desolate. Lord Shardik--I can't take it in." He broke off, but then said, "You did well today. The Tuginda herself could have done no better."
"Yes, she could: and she would have. But what happened was ordained."
"Ordained?"
"So I believe. I haven't told you something else the Tuginda said to me before I left Zeray. I asked her whether, if I found you, I should give you any message from her, and she said, 'He's troubled because of what he did years ago, at moonset on the road to Gelt. He hasn't been able to ask forgiveness, although he wants it. Tell him I forgive him freely.' And then she said, 'I'm guilty too--guilty of pride and stupidity.' I asked, 'How, saiyett? How could you be?' 'Why,' she said, 'you know, as I do, what we have been taught and what we have taught to others. We were taught that God would reveal the truth of Shardik through two chosen Vessels, a man and a woman, and that He would break those Vessels to fragments and Himself fashion them again to His purpose. I had supposed, in my stupid pride, that the woman was myself, and often I have thought that I was indeed suffering that breaking. I was wrong. It was not I, my dear girl,' she said to me. 'It was not I but another woman that He chose to be broken and whom He has now fashioned again.'"
Melathys was crying and he put his arm around her, unable to speak for the shock of surprise that filled him. Yet he was in no doubt and, as perception began to come upon him of all that her words imported, he felt like one looking out toward an unknown country half-hidden in the twilight and mist of early morning. Presently she said,
"We have to return to the Tuginda. She will need a message sent to Quiso and help with preparing for her journey. And Ankray--something must be done for him. But that wretched boy out there--"
"He's a murderer."
"I know. Do you want to kill him?"
"No."
"It's easier for me to pity him--I wasn't there. But he was a slave like the rest of them, wasn't he? I suppose he has no one at all?"
"I think we may find there are several like that. It's the unloved and deserted who get sold as slaves, you know."
"I should know."
"So should I. God forgive me! O God, forgive me!"
She checked him with a finger held to his lips. "Fashioned again to His purpose. I believe I'm at last beginning to see."
They could hear Dirion climbing the ladder. Melathys got up, bent over him and kissed his lips. Still holding her hand, he said,
"Then what are we to do?"
"Oh, Kelderek! My darling Kelderek, how many more times? It will be shown us, shown us, shown us what we are to do!"
Next day his wounds were once more inflamed and painful. He was feverish and kept to his bed, but the following morning felt well enough to sit looking out over the river in the sunlight while he soaked his arm in warm water with herbs. The herbal smell mingled with wood smoke from Dirion's fire, and some children below played and scuffled over their task of spreading nets to dry on the shore. Melathys had just finished binding his arm and tying a sling for it when suddenly they heard cheering break out some distance away on the edge of the village. There are as many kinds of cheering as of children's weeping; the sound tells plainly enough whether the cause be deep or shallow, great or small. These were not ironical cheers of derision, nor yet of sport nor of acclamation for a comrade or hero, but deep, sustained cries of joy, expressive of some long-held hope attained and relief conferred. They looked at each other, and Melathys went to the head of the ladder and called down to Dirion. The cheering was spreading through the village and they could hear feet running and men's voices shouting excitedly in Yeldashay. Melathys went down and he heard her calling to someone farther off. Noise and excitement were blazing round the house like a fire and he had almost determined to try to go down himself when she returned, climbing the ladder as lightly as a squirrel. She took his good hand and, kneeling on the floor beside him, looked up into his face.
"Elleroth's here," she said, "and the news is that the war's over: but I don't know what that means any more than you."