Fire Dragon - Katharine Kerr [124]
“So we meet in the flesh at last!” Dallandra said. “It's good to see you.”
“And it gladdens my heart to see you!” Niffa glanced around, then let go Dallandra's hands and lowered her voice. “And for many a reason more than my own. There's been such a fear on me, this past few days.”
“No doubt! Here, you'll want to welcome your brother home. We'll be camping on the commons. Will you be able to join us there later?”
“I can, truly. And I will. Have no fear of that.”
Laughing and talking, a small crowd of family and friends swept Jahdo down to the lakeshore, where Chief Speaker Admi stood waiting to offer them the use of the council barge. Niffa stayed close to her father, whose sheer size cleared a path through the well-wishers onto the pier and then the barge itself. While the rest of her family came aboard, Niffa found a spot to stand in the bow. The sun was beginning to set, and the mists on the water turned gold, so that when the barge pushed off, they seemed to be gliding into the heart of a fire. Niffa leaned against the railing and wondered why it was suddenly so hard to breathe. For a moment she thought she saw real fire, flames leaping and crackling as the town burned, so vivid that she nearly cried out. She turned the sound into a cough and leaned over the rail to look at the water and hide her face.
Already, she realized, she was beginning to understand how the witchroad would take her farther and farther away from life in Cerr Cawnen. She knew things hidden to her kin and fellow citizens, and she'd learned them by hidden means. Even her joy in her brother's return was blunted simply because she'd known for months that he was safe. She turned round again and watched Jahdo, leaning into their father's embrace. His great adventure had ended. For that moment she envied him.
The barge crept up to its pier on Citadel, disgorged its passengers, then cast off again, heading back to town. On the sandy lakeshore the crowd sorted itself out. As much as friends and neighbors wanted to hear about Jahdo's travels, the less selfish among them pointed out, loudly, that he and his family would be wanting some time to themselves.
“Come later,” Lael called out. “Let's all have a bit of dinner, and then we'll hear what my lad has to say for himself.”
On a tide of agreement the family started their long trudge up to the granary, Jahdo between his mother and father, Kiel and Niffa bringing up the rear.
“Here, now,” Kiel said softly. “Who be that woman? The one with the silver hair. And how be it that you know her?”
“You have sharp eyes.”
“Sharp mayhap but not as strange as hers. Ye gods, they do look like a cat's!”
“So they do. Uh well, I know not how to tell you, nor Mam either, but things be on the move for me.”
“Indeed?” Kiel hesitated, then shrugged. “No doubt I'll be hearing more than I wish to, and too soon at that.”
In the last of the sunset they all hurried up the little alley to their door and climbed into the big room behind the granary. Lael left the door wide open for the light and went to the hearth to lay a fire. Dera stood smiling at her three children.
“We're all here,” she said. “At last. All of us be home.”
Niffa winced. Though Dera seemed not to notice, Kiel raised one pale eyebrow. Niffa refused to answer. Now that the moment was upon her, she realized that she'd given no thought of how she was going to tell her mother that her daughter was about to leave her hearth.
“The weasels!” Jahdo sang out. “There be a need on me to greet them.”
Jahdo dashed into the other room, where the three children had always slept and