It happened with an ease that amazed her, somewhere in the back of her mind. She'd wanted to write songs, she'd had them living in the back of her mind for so long, and yet she'd never more than half-believed that she was going to get them to come out. It was a marvel, a wonder, and she would have liked to try the tune over a second and third time. But the Ghost was still waiting, and she dared not stop.
Hours passed, longer than she had ever played without stopping before. Gradually the non-stop playing began to take its toll, as she had known would happen. Her upper bow-arm ached, then cramped; then her fingering hand got a cramp along the outside edge. The spot below her chin in her collarbone felt as if she was driving a spike into her neck.
Then her fingering arm burned and cramped, and her back started to hurt, spreading agony down her spine into her legs. She fiddled with tears of pain in her eyes, while her fingers somehow produced rollicking dance music completely divorced from the reality of her aching limbs.
Her fingers were numb; she was grateful for that, for she was entirely certain that there were blisters forming on her fingertips under the calluses, and that if she ever stopped, she'd feel them.
Finally, she played 'Fields of Barley,' and knew a moment of complete panic as her mind went blank. There was nothing there to play. She'd played everything she knew, and she somehow had the feeling that the Ghost wouldn't be amused by repeating music.
And there was no sign of dawn. She was going to die after all.
But her fingers were wiser than she was, for they moved on their own, and from beneath them came the wild, sad, wailing notes of the laments that the Gypsy Nightingale had played for her. . . .
Now, for the first time, the Ghost stirred and spoke, and she opened her eyes in startlement.
'More-' it breathed. 'More-'
Rune closed her eyes again, and played every note she remembered, and some she hadn't known she'd remembered. And the air warmed about her, losing its chill; her arms slowly grew lighter, the aches flowed out of them, until she felt as fresh as she'd been when first she started this. Free from pain, she gave herself up to the music, playing in a kind of trance in which there was nothing but the music.
At last she came as far as she could. There was no music left, her own, or anyone else's. She played the last sobbing notes of the Gypsy song Nightingale had told her was a lament for her own long-lost home, holding them out as long as she could.
But they flowed out and away, and finally, ended.
She opened her eyes.
The first rays of dawn lightened the horizon, bringing a flush of pink to the silver-blue sky. The stars had already faded in the east and were winking out overhead, and somewhere off in the distance, a cock crowed and a chorus of birdcalls drifted across the hills.
There was nothing standing before her now. The Ghost was gone-but he had left something behind.
Where he had stood, where there had once been a heap of leaves, there was now a pile of shining silver coins. More than enough to pay for that second instrument, the lessons for it, and part of her keep while she mastered it.
As she stared at the money in utter disbelief, a whisper came from around her, like a breath of the cool dawn wind coming up off the hills.
'Go, child. Take your reward, and go. And do not look back.' A laugh, a kindly one this time. 'You deserved gold, but you would never have convinced anyone you came by it honestly.'
Then, nothing, but the bird song.
She put her fiddle away first, with hands that shook with exhaustion, but were otherwise unmarred, by blisters or any other sign of the abuse she'd heaped on them.
Then, and only then, did she gather up the coins, one at a time, each one of them proving to be solid, and as real as her own hand. One handful; then two-so many she finally had to tear off the tail of her shift for a makeshift pouch. Coins so old and worn they had no writing left, and only a vague suggestion of a face. Coins from places she'd never heard of. Coins with non-human faces on them, and coins minted by the Sire's own treasury. More money than she had ever seen in her life.
And all of it hers.
She stopped at the stream at the foot of the hill, the place that traditionally marked the spot where the Ghost's power ended. She couldn't help but stop; she was exhausted and exhilarated, and her legs wouldn't hold her anymore. She sank down beside the stream and splashed cold water in her face, feeling as if she would laugh, cry, or both in the next instant.
The money in a makeshift pouch cut from the tail of her shift weighed heavily at her belt, and lightly in her heart.
Freedom. That was what the Ghost had given her-and from its final words, she knew that the spirit had been well aware of the gift it had granted.
Go and don't look back. . . .
It had given her freedom, but only if she chose to grasp it-if she did go, and didn't look back, leaving everything behind. Her mother, Jib, the tavern . . .
Could she do that? It had taken a certain kind of courage to dare the Ghost, but it would take another, colder kind of emotion to abandon everything and everyone she'd always known. No matter what they had done to her, could she leave them for the unknown?
Her elation faded, leaving the weariness. She picked herself up and started for home, at a slower pace, sure only of her uncertainty.
Go-or stay? Each step asked the same question. And none of the echoes brought back an answer. The road was empty this time of the morning, with no one sharing it but her and the occasional squirrel. A cool, damp breeze brought the scent of fresh earth, and growing things from the forest on either hand. It was a shame to reach the edge of the village, and see where the hand of man had fallen heavily.
The inn, with its worn wooden siding and faded sign, seemed shabby and much, much smaller than it had been when she left yesterday. Dust from the road coated everything, and there wasn't even a bench outside for a weary traveler to sit on, nor a pump for watering himself and his beast. These were courtesies, yes, but they cost nothing and their absence bespoke a certain niggardliness of hospitality. She found herself eyeing her home with disfavor, if not dislike, and approached it with reluctance.
Prompted by a caution she didn't understand, she left the road and came up to the inn from the side, where she wouldn't be seen from the open door. She walked softly, making no noise, when she heard the vague mumble of voices from inside the common room through the still-shuttered windows.
She paused just outside the open door and still hidden from view, as the voices drifted out through the cracks in the shutters.
'. . . her bed wasn't slept in,' Stara said, and Rune wondered why she had never noticed the nasal, petulant whine in her mother's voice before. 'But the fiddle's gone. I think she ran away, Jeoff. She didn't have the guts to admit she couldn't take the dare, and she ran away.' Stara sounded both aggrieved and triumphant, as if she felt Rune had done this purely to make her mother miserable, and as if she felt she had been vindicated in some way.
Maybe she's been telling tales to Jeoff herself, the way I figured.
'Oh aye, that I'm sure of,' Kaylan drawled with righteous self-importance. 'Young Jon said she been a-flirtin' wi' him day agone, and she took it badly when he gave her the pass.'
So that was how he explained it, she thought, seething with sudden anger despite her weariness. But how did he explain his swollen tongue and bruised crotch? That I hit him when he wouldn't lay with me?
'Anyways, she's been causin' trouble down to village, insultin' the girls and mockin' the boys. Think she got too big fer her hat and couldn't take it t' have her bluff called.' Kaylan yawned hugely. 'I think ye're well rid of her, Mistress Stara. Could be it was nobbut spring, but could be the girl's gone bad.'
'I don't know-' Jeoff said uncertainly. 'We need the help, and there's no denying it. If we can find her and get her back, maybe we ought to. A good hiding-'
I'd turn the stick on you, first! she thought angrily.
'Well, as to that,' Kaylan said readily. 'Me da's got a cousin down Reedben way with too many kids and too little land-happen that he could send ye the twins to help out. Likely ye're goin' to want the extra help, what with summer comin' on. Boy and girl, and 'bout twelve. Old 'nough to work, young 'nough not to cause no trouble.'
