Gwenhwyfar_ The White Spirit - Mercedes Lackey [5]
“Did so!”
“Couldn’t have,” Gynath said smugly. “I tucked them under the featherbed on your side. You’re a liar, and that just proves you’re a changeling. I knew it! The Fair Folk took the real baby and left you in her place! No wonder you’re a little horror!”
“Am not!” Little Gwen said, furiously. “And she stole the covers! Ow!”
This last punctuated the thump on the head her older—and much larger—sister gave her.
“Give over,” Gynath repeated. “Go to sleep, or I’ll tip you out and you can lie on the floor with the dogs all night.”
“I’m lying with bitches now,” Little Gwen muttered, and Gynath thumped her again for her pains, and, at last, she subsided.
Gwen turned on her side, her back to her sisters, and stared at the place where the curtains met. Stealthily—because if Little Gwen knew what she was doing there would be whining about letting the draft in—she parted the curtains with a finger and peered across the room at the light visible through the gaps between the door and doorframe, straining her ears to make out something besides the indecipherable muttering of voices. She had wanted to hear more too, but not about Anna Morgause.
She wanted to hear about magic and the Power. Hearing about or watching someone working magic always gave her a shivery good feeling. She couldn’t wait until she came into her own Power.
She wondered what it would be. Some, like Eleri, could do just about anything in reason. Some were just healers, some could command the weather, or see into the past or the future.
She wanted to be able to do it all, though. Well, who wouldn’t? And she wanted something else. She wanted to be a chariot-driver, and a warrior. There had to be a way to keep the Power and still wield Cold Iron. Sometimes she felt torn in two, wanting both those things—
But there was no doubt, no doubt at all, that when she came into her Gift, she would be sent to the Ladies. The doubt came about whether the King would be willing, no matter what he said, for a daughter to take up weapons. There were not many warrior-women, and most girls who tried the life soon gave it up.
That wasn’t the only reason she strained to listen to the talk at the hearth. Besides hearing about magic, she wanted to hear about this new queen with the same name as her.
She wondered what life was like, for this slender, fair young woman. Did her father have a castle like this one? Clearly, if she was a good archer, he let her train with the warriors. Oh, how Gwen wanted to do that, too—
Well, maybe. She would have to be careful that the Power didn’t desert her because she handled Cold Iron too much. But there had to be a way! That Gwenhwyfar had done it!
But if there isn’t . . . which do I want? To be a warrior, or to have the Power?
Did she have sisters? Probably not, and probably not brothers either, if she had been on the walls, shooting arrows at her father’s enemies. Brothers were funny about things like that. Gwen had overheard plenty of fights when some of the boys tried to keep their sisters from training with the warriors and the like. No, from the sound of it, she was an only child . . .
Oh yes, Gwen remembered now. Something about the blood being thin and only the one daughter in the line. So there it was.
Gwen envied her. It must be wonderful, to be an only child. No having to share everything. No big sisters who thumped your head nor horrible little teases of younger sisters. She’d have gotten the best of everything; only children got spoiled, everyone knew that. And now, to be marrying the High King, to be his equal in all things . . . she would have her own court; everyone knew that the power of the land went through the queen as well as the king. She was trained by the Ladies, so she would probably be the one in charge of all things having to do with the Power, subject to the Merlin, of course. She would have her own horses to ride and not have to share one elderly pony with three sisters.
And, oh, the clothing. Probably enough to fill chests and chests. She would have new clothing, not things that had been cut