The Silver Mage - Katharine Kerr [34]
When Hwilli returned to the sickroom, she found Gerontos sitting up. His color looked normal; his forehead felt cool; the skin on his thigh above the cast looked normal as well.
“You’re doing as well as we can expect,” she said through the crystals. “The Rhwmanes smashed the bone, I’m afraid, and there are chips.”
Gerontos blinked at her, then spoke to his brother. Rhodorix laughed and took the black crystal from him.
“The Rhwmanes aren’t the white savages,” Rhodorix said. “Our homeland’s across the great ocean. The Rhwmanes conquered it, so we left with Evandar’s help. We wanted to be free, you see, not their subjects.”
“I do see,” Hwilli said. “Now.”
Rhodorix grinned at her. He had an open, engaging smile that made her feel pleasantly warm. His dark blue eyes, so different than the ice-blue common to her people, intrigued her. She liked the way he moved, too, with the muscular grace of a wolf or a stallion. One of my own kind, she thought. It’s a relief, to see a man of my own kind after living here so long.
“So,” Hwilli said, “your homeland lies to the west, then?”
“Well—” He hesitated, and his eyes narrowed in puzzlement. “It must. Except, when we left, we sailed west, you see, toward the setting sun. But then when we arrived at the harbor up north, we were sailing east, toward the rising sun.”
“That doesn’t make any sense.”
“I know. That’s why I’m puzzled.” He frowned at the floor for a long moment, then dismissed the problem with a shrug and looked up. “But here we are.”
“Indeed. I didn’t know there was a harbor up north.”
“I think it was north. The way everything changes direction around here, who knows?”
They shared a laugh.
“The white savages,” he continued, “had some villages near the harbor, anyway. What do you call them?”
“Meradan.”
“Very well. Meradan it is.”
Hwilli was tempted to linger, chatting with him, for a while more, but the master had asked her to return to the herbroom when she’d finished with her patient.
“I’ll be coming back often,” Hwilli said, “to keep an eye on your brother’s progress. But if he shows the least sign of fever, call for a servant and have them come tell me immediately.”
“I will. A thousand thanks.”
When she walked to the door of the chamber, Rhodorix hurried to join her out in the corridor. She waited for him to speak, but he merely smiled, studying her face, then held out the white crystal. She took it.
“Um,” she said, “is there something you want to ask me?”
“A great many things, but since we’ve just met, it would be rude of me.” He winked at her. “May you have a pleasant evening, fair one.”
Hwilli felt her face burning from a blush. She handed back the crystal, turned on her heel, and strode away as fast as she could whilst still retaining her dignity. Yet she had to admit to herself how deeply his teasing had pleased her.
Later it occurred to her that she should tell Master Jantalaber about the actual meaning of the name Rhwmanes. To her surprise she realized that she disliked the idea of doing so, even though she knew that the master would find the information interesting and even, perhaps, important. She decided to keep it as her secret, a scrap of knowledge that the ever-so-learned People didn’t know and wouldn’t know if she never told them, something that she shared with Rhodorix alone.
In the morning Rhodorix went with Andariel to examine the herd of forty-two horses, mostly roans and grays, which they kept in a paddock behind the fortress, all of them captured in the various battles with the white savages. Some had been wounded; they trembled at the approach of the two-legged beings. Others came right up to the fence to nose the men’s tunics in the hope of a bit of extra food. All of them showed good breeding with their long legs and deep chests.
Two white cows with rusty-red ears stood against the back fence. Rhodorix had never seen that particular