The Riddle - Alison Croggon [193]
Maerad’s heart burst with a wild joy, and she bounded toward him, wanting to embrace him, to say she was sorry, to cry, to shake him for making her suffer for so long, all those tears, all that grief and regret, when he hadn’t died at all. He leaped backward with a sharp cry, drawing his sword, and Maerad, on the point of running into the blade, had to swerve violently sideways, and tumbled onto the paving stones.
I do not wish to harm you, said Cadvan. His voice was still gentle. You need not kill me for food.
Maerad picked herself up, shocked at his reaction, and belatedly remembered that she was a wolf. To Cadvan it would have seemed that she was attacking him.
She sat down on her haunches and took a deep breath. It was easier this time. She focused deep within herself, sinking through layer after layer until she found the point of transformation. Be Maerad, she thought. Be me.
Next came the moment of awful pain, the feeling of being thrown into a fire, and then Maerad was sitting on the ground in front of Cadvan, looking up into his astonished face, her eyes shining with tears.
“I suppose,” said Cadvan after a long silence, “that you would still like some stew?”
Maerad laughed. She threw her pack on the ground, scrambled to her feet, and flung her arms around him. He rocked back on his heels as they embraced for a long moment, and in that embrace much was healed: long weeks of loneliness and grief, endurance and suffering. Maerad had never been so purely happy.
At last they stood apart and studied each other’s faces.
“I thought you were dead,” said Maerad. “Why aren’t you dead?”
“I’ll tell you after you’ve eaten,” Cadvan answered. “You’re almost as thin as when we first met.”
“And what are you doing here?”
“I was waiting for you, of course. I had no idea that you would turn up as a wolf. I should have guessed that Maerad the Unpredictable would not choose something conventional. I hope you will forgive my discourtesy. It was merely a misunderstanding.”
Maerad’s mouth twitched, and she bowed. “I might forgive you, if the stew tastes as good as it smells. And if your explanations are sufficiently entertaining.”
“I doubt they’ll measure up to yours.” Then Cadvan saw her left hand, and looked stricken. “Maerad! Your hand . . .”
Maerad felt obscurely ashamed, and hid it awkwardly in her cloak. “I’ll probably not play again,” she mumbled. “It doesn’t matter. . . .” But Cadvan took her maimed hand in his, and gently traced the terrible scars where her fingers had been shorn away, saying nothing. His face looked immeasurably sad.
“Maerad,” he said at last. “I have had much time to think over the past weeks. I am sorry for my unkindness, before we lost each other. I have rued it often and deeply, and often I have wished I could tell you so, and feared that I would never be able to.”
“I’ve regretted many things as well,” said Maerad quietly. “But look! We’re alive.”
Cadvan smiled, and his stern face lightened with sudden joy. “We are,” he said. “That you are here seems a miracle beyond hope.”
“And Cadvan, I’ve found the Treesong. Or half of it. It was on my lyre all the time.”
Cadvan gave her a long look, his eyes dark. “That is great news,” he said soberly. “But I should have been as glad to see you if you had not found it.”
At first, Maerad wondered why Cadvan was not more joyous at her news, but then she remembered how she had accused him of using her as a tool of the Light. The memory hurt, and she could think of no words to assuage it.
“You have paid a great price for that knowledge,” said Cadvan gently. He stroked her maimed hand once more and let it go. “We have much to tell each other. But even the best stories go better after eating.”
“Yes,” said Maerad. “But I must speak to Darsor first.” She walked up to the great black horse and put her arms around his neck. He nuzzled her shoulder.
Welcome, Maerad, he said. It was the first time that Darsor had ever said