The Spirit Stone - Katharine Kerr [7]
Courtesy demanded that Branna sit quietly until the tieryn gave her the parcel, but curiosity trounced courtesy. Despite her aunt’s dark looks, she got up and ran around the table to snatch the parcel out of Maelaber’s hands.
‘My thanks,’ she said with a grin. ‘I’ll just take these upstairs.’
Branna avoided looking Galla’s way as she dashed for the staircase, but she did notice Neb scowling at her—but not for her lack of good manners, she was sure. As the tieryn’s scribe, he was going to have to stay at his lord’s side until Cadryc gave him leave to go. His curiosity would have to wait.
Up in their chamber, she laid the parcel onto the bed, then flung open the shutters over the window to let in the sunlight. A few slashes with her table dagger disposed of the thongs. She unwound the cloth to find two leather-bound books and a scrap of pale leather bearing a note from Dallandra.
‘These belonged to Jill and Nevyn,’ the note read. ‘They should therefore belong to you. Study them well while the army’s gone, especially the larger one. Someday you’ll need to carry all this lore in your memory.’
Branna laid the note down and pulled the larger book free of the wrap to lay it right onto the bed, despite the smell of ancient damp from its dark leather binding. It was far too large for her to hold, taller than her forearm was long. When she opened it, the smell of mouldy parchment made her sneeze. She wiped her nose on her sleeve, then saw, written on the first leaf, Nevyn’s name. With that sight memory flooded back. She could see the old man opening the book and pointing to a diagram of concentric circles marked by words that, in the memory, she couldn’t yet read.
Jill never learned her letters until she was grown, Branna thought. Nevyn taught her. Tears blurred her sight, sudden hot tears that shocked her as they spilled. If only Nevyn were alive now, with his vast knowledge, if only he were here—but of course, he was there, opening the door to the chamber, in fact, though he was now as young and ignorant and as nearly powerless as she.
‘What’s wrong?’ Neb said. ‘Ye gods, that thing stinks!’
‘It does.’ Branna pulled a handkerchief from her kirtle. ‘It’s made me sneeze, and my poor eyes!’
While she wiped her face and blew her nose, he turned a few pages of the book. He frowned a little, mouthed a few words, then suddenly smiled.
‘I remember this,’ he said. ‘Do you?’
‘I do. You told me once you’d owned it since you were a very young man.’
Neb looked up, his lips half-parted in shock.
‘I mean,’ Branna said hastily, ‘Nevyn told Jill that.’
‘I figured that. It just always surprises me, how much you remember.’
‘Me too. What’s this second one?’
The smaller book turned out to contain healing lore, first a treatise on the humours, then a vast compendium, page after page of herbs, roots, symptoms, and treatments, and finally some instructions for simple chirurgery. The handwriting wavered, each letter spiky and oddly large.
‘Jill’s writing,’ Neb said abruptly. ‘I do remember a few things, here and there. She learned late, you see, and so her hand’s somewhat childish.’
‘I feel like there’s four people in this chamber. Do you feel that, too?’
‘In a way.’ Neb glanced over his shoulder as if he expected to see Jill and Nevyn standing behind them. ‘It creeps my flesh.’
Branna closed the book of medicines and walked over to the window. Outside lay the familiar view of her uncle’s dun wall and the green fields beyond. She’d half-expected to see a different prospect, though the details had escaped her memory. Somewhere I’ve never been, she thought, not as me, anyway. Did I know the silver dragon when I was there? Ever since she’d seen Rori fly past Cengarn, the silver wyrm had never been far from her mind.
‘What were Prince Dar’s messages?’ she said.
‘Um? Jill, what did you say?’
Neb was reading a page in the larger book. He was leaning over to