The Gold Falcon - Katharine Kerr [81]
“But what about the silver light?” he said aloud. “The kind you called down for the ceremony. That must have been dweomer.”
“It be no such thing but a gift from the goddess. She be the one who did teach us how to draw down the light from her world.”
“Well, but now that you know how, couldn’t you teach someone else?”
“Speak not such foolish things! Without her blessing there would be no light.”
“So you pray and the light appears, is that right?”
“We do pray using the right words to beseech her and do prepare our hands to receive it. There be somewhat of a trick to it.”
“Ah, so you are causing the light—”
“Not by my own power, you dolt! It does come from her, the power and the light both. I would die, truly, before I’d let filthy dweomer stain my heart and soul.”
A sudden rush of anger took him by surprise—how dare she scorn the dweomer this way! She spoke with such exasperated certainty that he realized he’d never be able to change her mind.
“I understand now,” he said, instead of trying, “my thanks.”
It was late that night before Dallandra heard from Salamander. He’d had to wait until Rocca had left the camp before he dared to stare into the fire. Even if he appeared to be merely thinking, or so Salamander told her, Rocca would have taken notice and asked him why he seemed so preoccupied.
“She’s my spiritual guide now,” Salamander said. “I’m supposed to tell her everything.”
“Whatever for?” Dallandra said. “Alshandra seems to have turned into an awfully nosy sort of goddess. But it is safe for you to contact me now, isn’t it?”
“Yes, Rocca had to go into the forest alone. We novices aren’t allowed to watch the priestess praying her special prayers.” He went on to tell her of his day’s traveling, but like the gerthddyn he was, saved the most dramatic touch for the last. “This is all getting a bit fraught. I just found out that they kill anyone who knows dweomer.”
“I’m not surprised,” Dallandra said. “Most human priests are jealous of the dweomer. Look at the Gel da’Thae, and how seriously they take their religion. Horsekin believers are bound to be even more fervent about this new one.”
“That’s a good word for it, all right. Fervent, ardent, inflamed, and perhaps even rabid. And yet Rocca’s such a happy soul, at root, always laughing and smiling.”
“Of course she is. She thinks she has the remedy for every trouble in the world. Who wouldn’t be happy, then?”
“A very good point, O princess of powers perilous. Speaking of which, here she comes.”
The link between them snapped as he broke it. Dallandra sat thinking for a moment, remembering a human woman named Raena, who some forty years past had made herself into a mortal enemy despite Dallandra’s efforts to help her. She was devoted to her goddess, too, Dalla thought. I wonder. Rocca seemed far too happy to be that bitter, twisted soul reborn. Until she saw Rocca—if she ever did—she had no way of knowing. With a shrug she got up and went to find Calonderiel.
Mosquitos, gnats, and other night insects hovered around her in the humid air no matter how hard she swatted and swore at them. Summer in the Westlands had its difficulties. Now, with the festival over, the camp had dwindled to the prince’s alar, a scatter of tents upon ground worn to bare dirt by the presence of so many feet. Some hundred yards away from hers stood Dar’s gaudy tent. Beyond it, she could see to the meadows and the alar’s horses, grazing the scant grass while some of the young men rode on guard.
Dallandra found Cal and his son, Maelaber, kneeling on the ground in front of the prince’s tent and dicing in the elven way. Each had a handful of brightly colored wood chips in various shapes. In turn each shook his handful, then strewed it onto the tanned deerskin lying between them. Although Maelaber’s mother had ostensibly been human, Lady Rhodda had had some elven blood in her veins, and Maelaber looked more like one of the Westfolk than he did a Deverry man. His dark blue eyes appeared human if much larger than usual, but his ears curled in the elven manner.
From inside the tent came