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By Root 740 0

lonely; being alone was a relief. She didn’t think about the incident in the Gwalhain Pass. The terrible dreams she had suffered at Mirka’s, in which she endlessly relived the moment of Cadvan’s death, had stopped; she was too tired, after walking all day, to dream about anything. She felt empty and dry, as if she would never feel anything again. She concerned herself with the trivial details of each day: making sure each evening that her feet were properly massaged with balm to prevent blisters, eating enough food to keep her going, and keeping alert for any sign of danger. She watched carefully for strange shifts in the wind or weather, which might signal the arrival of a frost creature or stormdog. But the sky remained clear and blue.

Doing these banal tasks inevitably reminded her of Cadvan. She realized, with a poignancy that pierced even her numbed emotions, that if he hadn’t taught her these rudimentary skills, she wouldn’t have had a hope of surviving alone in the wild. And this induced other anxieties: even though she was traveling as fast as she could to Murask, she dreaded arriving there. What would she do when she did? Whenever she had met strangers before, Cadvan had been there, to introduce her, or to deal with any difficulties that might have arisen.

Maerad reflected bitterly that she knew very little of people; for most of her life, her world had been so small, the space of Gilman’s Cot, and since then she had learned only of Bards. She couldn’t speak the Pilanel language, although Mirka had said there were many Pilanel with the Gift, and being travelers, perhaps most of them spoke some Annaren. Should she just walk in and ask for help? Should she explain who she was or what she was doing, or should she dissemble? She knew nothing of the Pilanel people; even Hem would have been better prepared than she was. She was no good at the disguising charm, which, in any case, wouldn’t give her the Pilanel language. She was sure that Cadvan could have passed himself off as a Pilanel if he had wanted to, as sure as she was that she couldn’t; he most certainly spoke the language. And Cadvan knew the north well, probably better than any other in Annar — he had traveled its length just before he met her. Maerad had only the faintest memory of the maps she had perused at Gahal’s house, and the maps of Zmarkan had been rather empty anyway. There had been no mention that she could recall of the Wise Kindred, or of where such people might live.

She went on, in truth, because she couldn’t think of anything else to do. Becoming a Bard had invested her life with a meaning it had never possessed before; now that meaning had shriveled and vanished, poisoned by her own foolish vanity. Perhaps the only way to restore that meaning was to stay true to her promises to Cadvan, to Nelac, to Nerili, to all those who had shown faith in her, and whom she felt she had so dismally failed.

When the puzzle of her Elemental nature raised itself, she simply put it aside as something she couldn’t solve. She didn’t understand her closeness to Ardina: why the Elemental queen called her “daughter” as if she were much closer kin than merely a distant descendant. She didn’t know why she had powers that other Bards did not. She didn’t understand why she was considered to be so significant — the Fire Lily, the Foretold, the One — and how that matched her feeling that she was, in truth, utterly insignificant, a tiny human being toiling along in the immense world, alone and powerless, of no more importance than any other, and of much less worth than most. Mirka, she reflected, for all her madness and grief, had made a kind of peace with herself. In her unrest and doubt, Maerad envied Mirka; all she knew of peace was the deadness in her heart.

Mirka had told her that Murask was a week to ten days’ walk away from the mountains. Maerad kept careful count of the days, watching the slender moon waxing each night, and after seven days began to look around for signs of the settlement. The Arkiadera stretched away before and behind her, the huge range of