• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 802 0

in the grasslands, away from the noise and bustle of the alardan, she would think of the Guardians, particularly of Elessario, whom she badly missed. She would wonder, too, if she’d love Loddlaen more if only he were a daughter instead of a son, but she knew that the real trouble lay between her and Aderyn. They should have both been young when their son was born, should have treasured him and squabbled over his upbringing and loved each other the more for it. No doubt they would have had another child, maybe two, even, over the course of years. Now, all that was denied them, and she was dragging herself through a world turned flat and sour by her memories of the splendor of life in another, easier world. She felt, too, like a person who’s been forced to leave the campfire halfway through one of the bard’s best tales and never gets to hear the ending: what did Evandar have in mind for his people? More and more, in fact, she found herself remembering Evandar, particularly the way he’d told her to come back if she should be unhappy. He knew, she would think, he knew that this would happen to me.

On the day before the alardan was to break up, Aderyn arranged for Banamario and her man to leave their alar and join his and Dallandra’s. Knowing that Loddlaen would be fed and loved more than she could feed and love him seemed to settle the question in Dallandra’s mind. That evening, when she stopped into the wet nurse’s tent to kiss Loddlaen goodbye, she felt a stab of guilt at how easy it was to leave him behind, her round little baby with the solemn eyes and the perennial smell of sour milk hanging about him, but as soon as she walked free of the camp, the guilt disappeared—indeed, she never truly thought of Loddlaen again after that day. She went about five miles west until she found a stand of hazel trees, growing thick and tangled at a place where three streams came together to form a proper river. She’d known them once as rivulets, two hundred years ago and long before the hazels had grown there, but year after year of rain and runoff had deepened them down.

Among the hazels Evandar was waiting, leaning against a tree and whistling a heart-piercing melody. She found that she wasn’t even surprised that he would know and come to meet her. It was so good to see him again that she also realized, with a twist of her heart, that she was beginning to fall in love with him.

“You’re certain you want to come back?” he said.

“I am. It’s so odd. I hate being a mother, but it’s made me ready to be a midwife. I’m assuming, anyway, that some of you will have the courage to take up your birthright.”

“Elessario at least, and maybe some of the other young ones.” All at once he laughed. “That’s a fine jest, take up your birthright. It took me a moment to understand. You know, I’m feeling solemn, and that’s something I’ve never really done before.”

Side by side they walked into the opalescent mist, where the flat road stretched out, waiting for them, between the dark hills and the fair mountains. When she raised her hand to her throat, she found the amethyst figurine hanging from its golden chain.

“And what of you, Evandar? Won’t you pass into my world once and for all, when the time comes?”

“How could I, knowing what I know, having what I have?”

“If you don’t, you’ll lose your daughter.”

He stopped walking and glared at her like a sulky child.

“I can be as underhanded as you if I have to be,” she said, grinning. “But think of this. If you went first, Elessario would follow you. She loves you even more than you love her. Just think: you could save her by saving yourself.”

“You wretched trickster!” But he laughed with a toss of his head. “Let me tell you something, Dalla. I know now what missing someone means, and how bitter a thing it is. Do you know why?”

“I think I do, actually. But what of Alshandra?”

“She’s left me. She’s gone farther in.”

“Farther in?”

“It’s not a good thing. But I’ll explain later.”

When he kissed her, the mist closed around them, and the road changed itself to sunny meadow, bright with flowers.

At that