“As the woodsman who sets snares cannot always know what he may catch,” the great god Kernios said to the wise man, “so, too, the scholar may find that his questions have brought him unforeseen and dangerous answers.”
1. A Wyvern Hunt
THE NARROWING WAY:
Under stone there is earth
Under earth there are stars; under stars, shadow
Under shadow are all the things that are known.
The belling of the hounds was already growing faint in the hollows behind them when he finally pulled up. His horse was restive, anxious to return to the hunt, but Barrick Eddon yanked hard on the reins to keep the mare dancing in place. His always-pale face seemed almost translucent with weariness, his eyes fever-bright. “Go on,” he told his sister. “You can still catch them.”
Briony shook her head. “I’m not leaving you by yourself. Rest if you need to, then we’ll go on together.” He scowled as only a boy of fifteen years can scowl, the expression of a scholar among idiots, a noble among mud- footed peasants. “I don’t need to rest, strawhead. I just don’t want the bother.”
“You are a dreadful liar,” she told her brother gently. Twins, they were bound to each other in ways as close as lovers’ ways.
“And no one can kill a dragon with a spear, anyway. How did the men at the Shadowline outpost let it past?”
“Perhaps it crossed over at night and they didn’t see it. It isn’t a dragon, anyway, it’s a wyvern—much smaller. Shaso says you can kill one with just a good clop on the head.”
“What do either you or Shaso know about wyverns?” Barrick demanded. “They don’t come trotting across the hills every day. They’re not bloody cows.”
Briony thought it a bad sign that he was rubbing his crippled arm without even trying to hide it from her. He looked more bloodless than usual, blue under the eyes, his flesh so thin he sometimes looked almost hollow. She feared he had been walking in his sleep again and the thought made her shudder. She had lived in Southmarch Castle all her life, but still did not like passing through any of its mazy, echoing halls after dark.
She forced a smile. “No they’re not cows, silly, but the master of the hunt asked Chaven before we set out, remember? And Shaso says we had one in Grandfather Ustin s day—it killed three sheep at a steading in Landsend.”
“Three whole sheep? Heavens, what a monster!”
The crying of the hounds rose in pitch, and now both horses began to take fretful little steps. Someone winded a horn, the moan almost smothered by the intervening trees.
“They’ve seen something,” She felt a sudden pang. “Oh, mercy of Zoria! What if that thing hurts the dogs?' Barrick shook his head in disgust, then brushed a damp curl of dark red hair out of his eyes. “The dogs?' But Briony was truly frightened for them—she had raised two of the hounds, Rack and Dado, from puppyhood, and in some ways they were more real to this king’s daughter than most people. “Oh, come, Barrick, please! I’ll ride slowly, but I won’t leave you here.”
His mocking smile vanished. “Even with only one hand on the reins, I can outride you any hour.” “Then do it!” she laughed, spurring down the slope. She was doing her best to poke him out of his fury, but she knew that cold blank mask too well only time and perhaps the excitement of the chase would breathe life back into it.
Briony looked back up the hillside and was relieved to see that Barrick was following, a thin shadow atop the gray horse, dressed as though he were in mourning. But her twin dressed that way every day.
“Are you hurt?”
It was a very small man with graying hair who stood up from the yellowing grass, his head no higher than the belly-strap of her saddle—a Funderling of middle age, with short but well-muscled legs and arms. He doffed his shapeless felt hat and made a little bow. “Quite well, my lady. Kind of you to ask.”
“I didn’t see you…”
“Not many do, Mistress.” He smiled. “And I should also…”
Barrick rattled past with hardly a look at his sister or her almost-victim. Despite his best efforts he was favoring the arm and his seat was dangerously bad. Briony scrambled back onto Snow, making a muddle of her riding skirt.
“Forgive me,” she said to the little man, then bent low over Snow’s neck and spurred after her brother.
The Funderling helped his wife to her feet. “I was going to introduce you to the princess.”
“Don’t be daft.” She brushed burrs out of her thick skirt. “We’re just lucky that horse of hers didn’t crush us into pudding.”
“Still, it might be your only chance to meet one of the royal family.” He shook his head in mock-sadness. “Our last opportunity to better ourselves, Opal.”
She squinted, refusing to smile. “Better for us would mean enough coppers to buy new boots for you, Chert, and a nice winter shawl for me. Then we could go to meetings without looking like beggars’ children.”
“It’s been a long time since we’ve looked like children of any sort, my old darling.” He plucked another burr out of her gray-streaked hair.
“And it will be a longer time yet until I have my new shawl if we don’t get on with ourselves.” But she was the one who lingered, looking almost wistfully along the trampled track through the long grass. “Was that really the princess? Where do you suppose they were going in such a hurry?”
“Following the hunt. Didn’t you hear the horns?
She sniffed, recovering herself. “I don’t pay heed to any of that, and if you’re wise, neither will you. Don’t meddle with the big folk without need and don’t draw their attention, as my father always said. No good will come of it. Now let’s get on with our work, old man. I don’t want to be wandering around near the edge of Shadowline when darkness comes.”
Chert Blue Quartz shook his head, serious again. “Nor do I, my love.”
The harriers and sight hounds seemed reluctant to enter the stand of trees, although their hesitation did not make them any quieter. The clamor was atrocious, but even the keenest of the hunters seemed content to wait a short distance up the hill until the dogs had driven their quarry out into the open.
The lure of the hunt for most had little to do with the quarry anyway, even so unusual a prize as this. At least two dozen lords and ladies and many times that number of their servitors swarmed along the hillside, the gentlefolk laughing and talking and admiring (or pretending to admire) each others’ horses and clothes, with soldiers and servants plodding along behind or driving oxcarts stacked high with food and drink and tableware and even the folded pavilions in which the company had earlier taken their morning meal. Many of the squires led spare horses, since it was not unusual during a particularly exciting hunt for one of the mounts to collapse with a broken
