A Time of Exile - Katharine Kerr [75]
“I asked Nevyn that, and he said he doubted it, just because the Guardians seem so odd and arbitrary and, well, so dangerous.”
“Well, then, maybe they’re meant to come after us.”
“But that’s the Wildfolk’s Wyrd, to grow under our care and become truly conscious. What I wonder is why the Guardians always appear as elves and ape elven ways. I don’t trust them, Dalla, and I wish you wouldn’t go off alone to meet them.”
“But if I don’t, how are we going to find out anything about them?”
“Couldn’t we just ask the Forest Folk when we ride east in the spring?”
“The only thing the Forest Folk ever say about the Guardians is that they’re gods.”
Dallandra suddenly realized that Aderyn’s warning was irritating her. How dare he tell me what to do! she thought. But she knew that in truth the Guardians were so fascinating that she simply didn’t want to give them up. That very afternoon she left all iron behind, took her favorite mare, and rode out to the grasslands. Not far from the winter camp was a place where three rivulets came together to form a stream, and according to the “children’s tales” the joining of three streams always marked a spot favored by the Guardians. In the spirit of testing a theory Dallandra rode straight there. She saw the horse first, a white gelding with rusty-red ears, then its rider, dismounted and lounging in the soft grass on the other side of the water-joining from her. When she rode up and dismounted, he got to his feet and held out his hand. In the cold winter sun his impossibly yellow hair seemed to glow with a light of its own.
“Come sit with me, little sister.” His voice was as soft as the sounding of a harp.
“Oh, I think I’ll stay on my side of the water, thank you. After all, sir, I don’t even know your name.”
He tossed his head back and laughed.
“Now that’s one up for you! You can call me Evandar.”
“I don’t want a name I can call you. I want your true name.”
“Another one up for you! What if I told you it was Kerun?”
“I’d say you were lying, because that’s the name of a Round-ear god.”
“And you score the third point. If I tell you my true name, will you tell me yours?”
“That depends. Will you tell the others my name, even though I won’t know theirs?”
“My woman’s name is Alshandra, my daughter’s is Elessario, and I actually and truly am Evandar. It was going to be a jest, you see, to tell you my true name and have you think it false, and in your thinking it false it would have had no power, though power it should have had, and so it all would have been satisfying, somehow. For a jest, that is.”
If he had been elven, he would have been daft, she decided, but since he was his own kind, who knew if he were daft or sane? A bargain, though, was a bargain.
“My name is Dallandra.”
“A pretty name it is. Now come join me on my side of the stream, because I’ve told you my name.”
“No, because I’ve given you my name in return.”
He laughed with another toss of his head.
“You are truly splendid.” Like a wink of light off silver, he disappeared, then reappeared standing beside her on her side of the water. “So I shall come to you instead. May I have a kiss for crossing the water?”
“No, because I’ve already done you the favor you asked me. I’ve found out about the iron.”
Although he listened gravely, his paintpot blue eyes all solemn thought, she wondered if he truly understood her explanation, simply because it seemed so abstract.
“Well,” he said finally, “I’ve never seen one of these lodestones, but I’ll wager it would only pain me if I did. Thank you, Dallandra. You’re clever as well as beautiful.”
His smile was so warm, his eyes so intense, that she automatically took a long step back. His smile vanished into a genuine melancholy.
“Do I displease you so much?” he said.
“Not at all. It’s just you strike me as a dangerous man, and I wouldn’t care to cross Alshandra’s jealousy, either.”
“More than clever—wise!” He grinned, revealing sharp-pointed teeth. “We never mean to hurt you people, you know. In fact, we’ve tried to help you more often than not. Well, most of us try to