The Hollow Hills - Mary Stewart [63]
"All the better," I said. "No one will come looking in a place like this for the son of the King of Britain. Go in now and play your part, while I hold the horses."
He pushed aside the curtain and went in. I helped Branwen dismount, and settled her on one of the benches beside the door. The baby woke, and began to whimper, but almost immediately Ralf came out again, followed by a big, burly man and a boy. The man must be Brand himself; he had been a fighting man and still bore himself like one, and I saw the puckered seam of an old wound across the back of one hand.
He hesitated, uncertain how to greet me. I said quickly: "You'll be the innkeeper? I'm Emrys the singer, who was to bring your wife's niece along with us, with the baby. You're expecting us, I believe?"
He cleared his throat. "Indeed, indeed. You're most welcome. My wife's been looking for you this week past." He saw the boy staring, and added sharply: "What are you waiting for? Take the horses round the back."
The boy darted to obey. Brand, ducking his head at me and indicating the door of the inn with a gesture that was half invitation, half salute, said: "Come in, come in. Supper's cooking." Then, doubtfully, "It's mighty rough company we get here, but maybe -- "
"I'm used to rough company," I said tranquilly, and preceded him through the door.
This was not a time of year for much coming and going on the roads, so the place was not crowded. There were some half-dozen men, dimly seen in a room lit only by one tallow candle and the light from the peat fire. The talk hushed as we went in, and I saw the looks at the harp I carried, and the whisper that went round. Nobody spared a glance for the girl carrying the baby. Brand said, a shade too quickly; "On through there. That far door, behind the fire." Then the door shut behind us, and there in the back room stood Moravik, fists on her hips, waiting to greet us.
Like everyone else whom one has not seen since childhood, she had shrunk. When I had last seen her I had been a boy of twelve, and tall for my age. Even then she had seemed much bigger than I was, a creature of bulk and commanding voice, surrounded by the aura of authority and infallible decisions left over from the nursery. Now she came no higher than my collar-bone, but she still had the bulk and the voice, and -- I was to find -- the authority. Though I had turned out to be the favoured son of the High King of all Britain, I was still, obviously, the wayward small boy from her first nursery.
Her first words were characteristic. "And a fine time of night to come, with the gates just shutting! You could have been out in that forest all night, and a precious lot there'd have been left of you by morning, what with the wolves, and worse, that lives out there. And damp, too, I shouldn't wonder -- sweet saints and stars preserve us, look at your cloak! Get it off this minute, and come to the fire. There's a good supper cooking, special for you. I remember all the things you like, and I never thought to see you sitting at my table again, young Merlin, not after that night when the place burned down round you, and there was nothing to be found of you in the morning but a few burned bones in your room." Then suddenly she came forward with a rush and had hold of me. There were tears on her face. "Eh, Merlin, little Merlin, but it's good to see you again."
"And you, Moravik." I embraced her. "I swear you must have got younger every year since you left Maridunum. And now you're putting me in your debt again, you and your good man here. I'll not forget it, and neither will the King. Now, this is Ralf, my companion, and this" -- drawing the girl forward -- "is Branwen, with the child."
"Eh, the baby! The good Goddess save us all! What with seeing you, Merlin, I'd forgotten all about him! Come near the fire, girl, don't stand there in the draught. Come to the fire, and let me see him...Eh, the lamb, the bonny lamb..."
Brand touched my arm, grinning. "And now, what with seeing