Maewen was still surprised by this when they stopped for the night. The road had plunged them back into the heart of the mountains again, through narrow places full of pine trees, then out again into a sort of crossroads in the green ways. It was a large, lumpy meadow among the crags with quite a number of way-stones round the edge. They camped in a flat space among the lumps. People obviously used it regularly. There was a fireplace, a surprisingly clean latrine pit, and sort of caves scraped in some of the humps for sleeping in.
“Where is this?” Mitt asked while Moril was lighting a fire with the bag of coal the miners had given them.
Wend answered, but he spoke to Maewen as if Mitt was just a servitor. “This is Orilsway, lady.” Orilsway! Maewen thought. But I went through this in the train. It was a town! “It is the northern crossway,” Wend explained, pointing to the various waystones. “That leads to Aberath, and that to central parts, with Hannart at the end. Southeasterly, you may go by Ansdale and Loviath, to Gardale and beyond, but I take it, lady, we’ll be wanting the way down the end there that goes south to Dropwater.”
Maewen looked up at Wend’s serious face. Always serious. Why can’t he unbend a little? she thought irritably. “I’m considering,” she said. “I’ll tell you which way in the morning.”
Supper was fresh bread, curd cheese, and pickled cherries. Mitt loved pickled cherries. It was not a thing he had met in the South. But Navis spit his first and only one into the fire. “I take it the cherry crop was large in Kredindale,” he said. “They should have left it for the birds. Hestefan, tell us about the Adon’s gifts.”
Hestefan looked up from the other side of the fire. “These are well known to everyone in the North,” he said.
“But not to me,” said Navis. “Or Mitt.”
Mitt threw a handful of cherry stones on the fire. “Speak for yourself, Navis. They’re supposed to be the things Manaliabrid gave the Adon in her dowry. There’s a sword and a cup and a ring, and the Countess has got the ring in that old collection of hers, back in Aberath.”
“And the cup’s in the One’s chapel at the Lawschool in Gardale,” Moril said. “I saw it when I went to see my sister.”
“The sword is in Dropthwaite,” said Wend. “It is well hidden, but I have seen it.”
“And would they answer to the true Queen?” Navis asked Hestefan. “Tankol seemed to think they would, and he’s the sort of practical man I’m inclined to believe.”
Hestefan had been looking from one to the other, for all the world, Maewen thought, like a schoolmaster who had come prepared to teach and found his class knew all the answers. He had reminded her of a schoolmaster ever since she first saw him—Dr. Loviath, who taught her physics last year, that’s who he was like! He said, in exactly Dr. Loviath’s repressive way, “There are various kinds of hearsay about the gifts—nothing I have seen myself and nothing anyone is known to have proved.”
Mitt, who thought Hestefan was a right stick, took up another handful of cherries and said, “Alk told me the ring always fits the right one’s finger. He says it fits the Countess, and not him, because she’s descended from the Adon. Mind you, it’s a small ring. And you should see the size of Alk’s fingers!”
“So that is not proven,” Hestefan said, frowning. “Singers are bound only to tell the truth. I can say nothing more.”
Moril seemed puzzled. “Yes, but we can tell what people say,” he said. “And I know they say that only the Adon’s true heir can draw the sword.”
“I can say nothing more,” Hestefan repeated.
Maewen tried to smooth things over by asking, “Can you tell me something I’ve always wondered? Was the Adon of the Undying?”
It did not work. Hestefan stared at her rather as he had stared before, when she told him to come out of his dream. Then he said grudgingly, “I think not, though he was of their blood. He died twice, you know.”
Chalk up two more of us who don’t get on, Maewen thought. Hestefan and me. Thoroughly disgruntled, she got up and went to sit on top of a hump some distance away, where she watched the last of the light fading from the highest peaks. The sky was still silvery, but the mountains were bluer and bluer. Over the other way the campfire made it seem quite dark. What was the matter with her? Why should it bother her that nobody in the group got on? She was only a fraud and a substitute, who was in danger of making history go in circles after this afternoon.
That seemed to be it. This afternoon she had done something which really would affect history, and because of that, whether it was impossible or not, she wanted this mad venture of Noreth’s to succeed. She wanted to take it and make it work. Maybe, when the time came, she would not tamely hand over to Amil the Great. That would be changing history indeed—if only she could think how to do it.
“You dealt very shrewdly with those miners,” the deep echoing voice remarked in her ear. “My advice has not been wasted on you.”
Maewen jumped and looked round carefully. For as far as she could see in the gloaming, she was alone on her damp green hillock. She could see Navis, Hestefan, and Wend over in the orange light of the fire. Besides, she knew their voices now, and it was none of those three who had spoken. Moril’s voice was still a husky treble, and Mitt’s tended to crack and rumble. It was that ghost again. Ghosts cannot hurt one, but Maewen did not like the bluish wafts of mist that were gathering in the spaces between the hummocks. She got up casually and started to go back to the fire.
“Now you must acquire the Adon’s gifts,” the voice said, still at her ear. She walked faster, but it was still at her ear, sending deep, deep vibrations through her. “Find the Adon’s gifts. They will prove your claim. They will also give your followers a purpose, and your search will confuse the earls.”
This was exactly the idea that Maewen had been fumbling for in her own mind. Perhaps this voice was part of her mind. That made it worse. “I’ll consider it,” she said, and fled.
By the fire everyone seemed to be getting up and settling for the night. But there was no sign of Moril. Moril was the one Maewen wanted. She needed some more magic from that cwidder. She thought she heard it, twanging gently, beyond one of the hummocks to the right. She swerved and ran that way, over a hump and down the other side, where she very nearly trod on Mitt, sitting rath
er as she had been sitting herself.
Mitt sprang up with a hoarse squawk. Maewen yelled.
“Thank you very much!” Mitt said. “That’s all I need for a perfect day!”
“Is anything the matter?” Navis called from the fireside.
“Nothing,” Mitt called back. “Just saddlesore. Vinegar!” he said disgustedly to Maewen. “He made me sit in vinegar. Maybe I’d be worse without it, but it doesn’t do your temper any good, I can tell you! And then you come charging over this mound. What’s up? You seem a bit off from yesterday.”