Kushiel's Mercy - Jacqueline Carey [207]
Bixenta had brought clean attire for Sidonie, too. The dress had a fitted black bodice embroidered with elaborate needlework and a two-tiered skirt of white and crimson below. After I’d applied fresh salve and clean bandages that Rachel had given us, I helped Sidonie don the dress. It smelled of cedar, as though it had been carefully preserved in a clothes-press.
We ventured out of the bathing-room to find Bixenta waiting. She pressed her hands together, raising them to her lips when we emerged. Her large dark eyes were bright with tears.
“Etxekoandere.” Sidonie hesitated, then framed a halting question in the Euskerri tongue, augmented with many gestures. It seemed she’d put her time in the library of Amílcar to better use than I’d reckoned. Bixenta replied in a torrent of Euskerri, her hands flying and gesticulating.
They communicated as women do, better than men. Bixenta pointed between the two of us, raising her brows and clasping her hands.
“I think it was her wedding dress,” Sidonie said to me in a soft voice. “She reckoned it was the only finery that would suit the occasion. I’m not sure whether those are her husband’s clothes or her son’s that you’re wearing. If I understand rightly, she’s lost both.”
“Will you tell her I’m grateful?” I asked.
She nodded and did. Bixenta merely shook her head and urged us into the kitchen, where she fed us an ample meal of stewed red beans and spicy sausage.
That evening there was a celebration in the town square. As in the City of Elua, the square was dominated by a large oak tree. Paskal explained to us that the Euskerri reckoned any agreements made beneath the oak tree to be sacred and binding.
Tonight, though, there were no politics or debate, only music, song, and dance, fierce in expressing joy and sorrow alike. We watched while our hosts pressed cup after cup of strong cider on us. Some of the instruments seemed ancient and strange: high-pitched horns made from the horns of oxen, thick staves used to beat out a complex rhythm that echoed from the sides of the valley. One could well imagine that the Euskerri had been here from time out of mind, honing their arts long before Blessed Elua wandered the earth.
As the sun was beginning to set, a group of Euskerri men performed the final dance of the evening: a sword dance accompanied by flute and drum. The men faced one another in a double line, moving in deliberate, complex steps. Their blades glinted as they maneuvered them, periodically bringing them together with a loud, metallic clash. The lowering sun stained their white shirts with ruddy light.
The dance ended with a final flourish, clash, and shout at the precise moment the sun’s lower rim touched the western edge of the mountains lining the valley. The drums and flutes fell silent. Everyone turned as one toward the west, touching their brows and breasts in a salute to the dying sun.
It gave me a shiver, even as Sidonie and I followed suit. There were traditions in Terre d’Ange older than Blessed Elua, such as the arrival of the Sun Prince on the Longest Night.
This was a living embodiment of a very, very ancient faith.
And then the celebration was over. Along with Paskal, Sidonie and I returned to the guest-house where Bixenta had laid the beds in our chambers with linens smelling of soap and a hot iron’s touch. It had been an arduous journey, a long night, and a fierce battle, and it was a blessed relief to lie in a warm, clean bed, feeling the silken warmth of Sidonie’s bare skin against mine.
I meant to tell her, but I was asleep before I could get the words out.
Sixty-One
On the morrow Euskerri from all across the mountains began pouring into Roncal.
I was surprised at how quickly the news had travelled. Paskal explained to us that the beating-staves used at the previous night’s celebration had carried word as far as two leagues. Dozens of