The Riddle - Alison Croggon [114]
But now Dorn was speaking. “If Maerad speaks true, as you say, then she is not Annaren after all.” He swept his gaze from her feet to the crown of her head, doubt clear in his face. “She should be Pilani, although she does not look as if a drop of Pilani blood runs in her veins. For that is also what the songs say, that one of our blood is the Chosen.”
“My father was Pilanel.” Maerad shut her eyes, suddenly overwhelmed; how was she to explain her whole life to these people? “He married Milana of Pellinor, the First Bard of that School, and they had two children — my brother, Hem, I mean Cai, and me. My father was killed when Pellinor was sacked, when we were small children.”
“What was your father’s name?” asked Dorn.
“I don’t know his full name.” Why, thought Maerad, had I never thought to ask? Since she had been given a full name, she had always carried her mother’s. “I know his usename was Dorn, but Mirka told me it is a common name among the Pilanel. I don’t know where he came from, or anything about him. My brother, Hem, looks like him; he is dark skinned, like you. But people tell me I look like my mother.” She met Dorn’s eyes. “I know very little about my family; I was taken as a slave after Pellinor fell, and until this spring I didn’t even know I was a Bard.”
There was a long silence. The four Pilanel seemed to be deep in separate contemplations, and Maerad sat still, trying to be patient. At last, Sirkana stirred, and glanced over to her companions. Maerad saw Dorn nod very slightly, as if Sirkana had asked him something. Sirkana then turned to Maerad and gazed at her for a moment, searching her face. Then her eyes became unfocused, as if she saw something very far away.
“I knew your father,” she said. “And we both knew the Chosen was to be born to him. It was a curse; even then he knew it would kill him.”
“And his name was Dorn?” asked Maerad, her voice very small. She had hardly known her father, and it seemed somehow unfair that Sirkana had. She wondered suddenly why Cadvan had not told her more about her father’s family; surely he would have known? It would be just like him not to tell me, she thought.
“Yes. Dorn à Triberi.” Sirkana breathed in hard, as if staving off pain. “He was my twin brother. He left me a long time ago, seeking the Schooling of the Annaren Bards. Missing him was a pain worse than I thought I could endure; I thought my heart would split in two. His death was a great grief to me. Well, then, you are my brother’s daughter. Do you not see why I knew you were the Chosen?”
Maerad shook her head, trying to clear it. This was very unexpected; she had thought that perhaps she would have had to explain her story, in order to find help, and had braced herself to be as persuasive as possible, but she had not thought to be recognized as soon as she entered Murask, and most certainly didn’t expect to find such close family. Sirkana, then, was her aunt, her father’s sister.
She studied Sirkana curiously, summoning her few, fugitive memories of her father. She remembered him whirling her around while she laughed and laughed, and a faint, spicy perfume, but she couldn’t make those memories match the stern woman who stood before her. But when she looked, she realized that Sirkana did remind her of Hem; there was something about the shape of her eyes, her nose, the line of her jaw. Maerad suddenly wished that Hem was with her now; perhaps it would not be so strange for him.
“How did you and — my father know that the One would be born to him?”
Sirkana fixed her dark eyes on Maerad’s face.