“Every lady’s dream!” Moril sighed. “An earl in red silk!”
“With eyelashes,” said Mitt. “Don’t forget the eyelashes. All bat and flutter, this dream lover!”
Moril giggled. “Now he’s gone off to write a poem about you.”
“No, he hasn’t. Even he’s not that much of a wimp,” Maewen said.
“He is writing a poem, you know,” Moril said. “He’s dictating it to his scribe. The poor man’s got real trouble, trying to write it down on horseback.”
Maewen refused to look, so she had no idea whether this was true or just Moril’s idea of a joke. Besides, it grew dark then, too dark for poems—or so she hoped. They stopped again, and ate and drank, and then went on. After that Mitt and Moril were too tired to tease her. They just rode.
Eventually, far into the night, Navis consulted Luthan and the Dropwater armsmaster and decided they could afford a longer stop. Everyone saw to horses, ate food they did not feel like, and fell down and slept for three hours. Then Navis had them all up and on their way again.
“Flaming Ammet!” Mitt groaned. “Is this necessary?”
“Yes,” said Navis. “We have to be in a goo
d defensive position before the Earl of Hannart arrives.”
“Because of Ynen?” Mitt yawned.
“Not entirely,” said Navis. “You and I have necks we need to save, too.”
Mitt puzzled about this as he yawningly mounted Luthan’s mare among all the blue-brown shadows of other people mounting, too. It seemed tremendous cheek for him and Navis to use the Earl of Dropwater’s hearth-people just to save their necks. Noreth was the excuse, of course. But somehow he did not think this quite accounted for Navis’s urgency. Navis had something else in mind which Mitt was too sleepy to work out.
Dawn came as their small army set off again, whiteness pouring down the sky and blueness rising from the ground to meet it. Then the blueness was ripped open to the left by a dazzling bar of orange. In seconds, the grass was green again and the riders turned from brown shadows to solid, colored shapes.
There were more solid shapes advancing down the green road to meet them. The orange dawn flashed on gold braid and threw turning glints from steel and leather. It was a smaller group than theirs, but everyone in it was orderly and very well armed.
“It looks as if Earl Keril got here first,” Maewen said.
“No,” Mitt said, squinting up his eyes to look. “That’s not Hannart colors, it’s—Flaming Ammet! It’s Alk! What’s he doing here?”
19
Alk was riding an enormous horse. Mitt knew it well. It was about the only one in Aberath which was up to Alk’s weight. By the horse and the hugeness Alk was unmistakable, as he gestured to the rest of his party to halt and rode out ahead of them alone. Though Mitt knew Alk would be wearing his own special armor under his pale leather clothes, he still thought this was very brave—or very foolish—of Alk. Luthan’s people had guns and crossbows. They might be tired, but after the way Navis had worked them, they were jumpy as cats.
“Nobody fire!” Navis called sharply. Fifty weapons were up.
Luthan came awake with a jump. “That’s right, Navis. Hold fire, everyone. We’ve no quarrel with Aberath.”
Speak for yourself! Mitt thought nervously as Alk came to a ponderous halt halfway between the two bands.
“Good morning,” Alk called. “I need to speak to some of you. Here’s my list: Navis Haddsson, Alhammitt Alhammittsson, Hestefan the Singer, Tanamoril Clennensson, and a lady known as Noreth Onesdaughter, if she’s with you. I’d be grateful if they all came out here and the rest of you went back a bit. I need to talk to them in private.”
They exchanged mystified looks. Mitt and Moril had been yawning. Maewen’s eyes had been nearly shut. But they were all suddenly wide awake. “I suppose we should see what he wants,” Navis said. “We are four to one.”
“That doesn’t count with Alk,” Mitt said. “I’ve seen him throw a horse.”
Navis bowed politely to Luthan. “We’ll try not to keep you waiting long,” he said. Luthan gave him a polite, bewildered nod. Navis edged his mare out of the throng, and the other three followed him.
Alk looked them over as they approached. Mitt had never seen him look so glum and grim. “Where’s Hestefan the Singer?”
“Following behind,” said Navis. “His mule couldn’t keep up. Are you likely to detain us long, my lord?”
“My lord.” Alk rubbed his chin. It rasped. Behind him Mitt could see a cluster of faces he knew well from Aberath. All of them had a weary, fed-up look, and none of them greeted him. “My lord?” Alk repeated. “Now, I reckon you’re at least as much of a lord as I am, Navis Haddsson. My reading is that when you call people that, you don’t mean any respect at all. So don’t call me that. As for how long we’ll be, this’ll take as long as it takes. You all gave me the slip once, when I’d nearly caught you up at Dropthwaite, and forced me to get ahead of you. I’ve been hanging around for you, up and down the green roads, for a day and a half now, so now you can just wait for me, Navis Haddsson. That reminds me—” Alk’s glum manner vanished. He turned to Mitt. “This is something you’ll appreciate, Mitt. I’d been in Aberath such years that I’d forgotten what these green roads were like. Lovely level runs, you get on them—bends beautifully cambered, not a sharp curve among them—and never a steep gradient anywhere! It would only take a little tinkering and filling in, and I could lay tracks and run my steam engines all over the North!”
Maewen had been watching Navis look as put down as she had ever seen him, but this snatched her attention back. So that was why there were no green roads in her day! They were all railways! “So that’s—” she began, and stopped herself.