Our King gestured to Duck that he was to hold his tongue. Then he leaned to me further, and said, “Name me his secret names.”
“They’re secret,” I said. By this time I was horrified, but it was like the rapids at the end of the lake. I had gone too far to stop.
“Come here and name them in my ear,” said our King.
I am ashamed when I weave this, but I did so. I went up to our King—he smelled of sweat and horse and, just a little, of cloves—and I whispered, “He is called Adon and Amil and Oreth.” That is how I wronged the One. But I went on and wronged him further because when the King asked me, I told him the One’s fire was on our island and that Robin was there, unwell, too. And I described which our island was, in spite of the way Hern and Duck looked at me.
Our King sat back and puckered his face toward Jay and the others nearest him. “Well, what do you think?”
“There’s quite a nest of Heathen over there,” one of them said. “It looks like the perfect trap to me.”
“I know,” our King agreed. “But let’s say curiosity killed the King. Or that somebody slipped up in Shelling last autumn. Jay—Oh, I forgot. Can you manage one-handed?”
“Provided the remaining hand’s tied behind my back” was Jay’s reply.
“Good,” said the King. “Tie your hand up, take ten men and the best boat—and the elder boy, I think—and let him show you the place. Bring back anything you find there.”
“I’m glad you said me,” Hern said. He spoke very rudely because he was angry with me. “I’d have had to ask you to send me if you hadn’t. I’m head of the family, and it has to be me who takes the One out of the fire.”
“Oddly enough, I thought of that,” our King said to him. “And I thought the other two could stay as hostages for your good faith. Move, Jay!”
My punishment was that I never saw the One taken out of the fire. The King’s camp was right on the other side of the Rivermouth from our island. Duck and I had to wait two hours for Jay to cross and come back. We sat on a sandbank watching the King’s men bustling in the camp. Their tents are good, in many color, but the people are few—not more than fifty, all men. It ought to have seemed more warlike than the poor huts of Kars Adon, because there were no women, no rubbish heaps, and no children but Duck and me, but it did not, and never does. It is more as if our King were traveling for a holiday.
While we waited, Duck was so angry with me that he only spoke once. “Did Kankredin’s coat say how we can get Gull back?” he said.
“No,” I said. “It said Gull was coming to him. The net is to catch Gull, and he’s waiting for him before he conquers the country. And it can’t be wrong to tell our own King about the One.”
“If he thinks Gull’s still on his way,” Duck said, “then I was right, and Tanamil isn’t one of his mages. And you know we’re not supposed to talk about the One to anybody.” And he said nothing else.
At last there was a great shout that the boat was coming. Everyone, our King included, went running through the hills of sand to the shore. We ran with them. We were part of the crowd jostling on the shingle, and we helped to pull the boat out of the falling waves. It was large and high. Jay appeared head and shoulders above the gunwale.
“Well?” said the King.
“Everything as described,” said Jay. “This is the list—start unloading. Three cats.” Sweetheart, Rusty, and Ratchet were dropped down beside our King. They were ruffled and not pleased. Our King looked at them in amusement. “Ten blankets,” said Jay, and these were dropped on the shore, too. “Two sacks, containing cheese, dried fish, and onions mostly.” The sacks followed our blankets. “And,” said Jay, “one sick young lady.”
I thought they were going to drop Robin on the shore, too. In fact, they lowered her very carefully, and Hern climbed down to make sure she was safe. They had wrapped her in Jay’s rugcoat. She was worse again. She says it was the shock of Jay’s coming, on top of worry about us. I put a blanket round her as she shivered on the pebbles, and she cried because Duck and I were still alive.
“And?” said our King, holding out his hand to Jay. “Nothing else?”
“With her,” Jay said, nodding down at Robin.
It seemed that Hern had no sooner taken the One from his fire than he gave him into Robin’s hands. Robin would let nobody near him. I could not think why Hern had done this, until Hern said, “Come and see,” and beckoned Duck over, too.
Robin unwrapped her hand from the great folds of Jay’s rugcoat and showed us the One clasped in it. He was gold. He shone all over with a mild orange luster and seemed to be made of metal. Hern and Robin could understand it no more than we could. Hern said he had found the One shining even more brightly in the ashes of the fire. He had dulled a little in the air since. And, Hern says, there was such naked greed on the faces of Jay and the others that he gave the One to Robin, instinctively as it were, to keep him safe. How he thinks poor Robin would be able to keep the One if somebody twisted her wrist, I do not know. She has Gull to keep, too, wrapped in her own rugcoat, and no one knows of him but us four.
Up to this moment Robin has most valiantly fulfilled Hern’s trust. She wrapped the One away when the King came up and refused to let him be seen. A faint pink came into her pale face at having to treat our King so, but she was firm.
“He is not to be bandied about and looked at by everyone,” she said.
“If you all came into my tent and looked at him over supper?” our King suggested. “I could set up a hearth to make him feel more at home.”
Our King was being very polite now, bu
t Robin looked at him severely. She is not used to people making jests all the time, the way our King does. But she agreed.
Our King insisted on a polite and lavish supper. It was a trial to Duck and me, though not to Hern. Hern likes eating and does not care about manners. It was a trial to Robin, too, because she was not really well enough, but I was glad she was there. People believe Robin. When she said we were not Heathens, our King assured her it had been an unfortunate mistake.
“May I see the One now?” he asked when we had eaten fish and meat. There was a pause then, before they brought in chickens, eggs, and sweetmeats. No wonder our King is chubby.