Sun in Glory and Other Tales of Valdemar

But when the man dismounted and unstrapped the bags from the side of his Companion, she knew, she just knew that they had been brought solely to be offered to Riverend. And she didn't like it, although she couldn't say why.

'Your pardon,' he said, dipping his head slightly, 'for my manners. My name is Carris.'

'And her name?' She asked, staring at his Companion.

The Herald smiled. 'Her name is Arana. She is a queen among Companions. And knows it,' he added ruefully.

Kayla nodded quietly and turned away. 'The hold is dark, even at this time of day; there is only one room with good windows. Shall I send for the mayor?'

'No. No, that isn't necessary. It's really an informal visit.' Anne frowned. 'And yes, I did know your mother. She was a very, very stubborn woman.'

'You know that she died.'

Anne nodded, and there was a very real weariness in the movement. 'Aye, I know it.'

But she added no more. Instead, she turned to her Companion and began to unstrap her saddlebags as well. They were equally heavy.

* * *

'I won't lie to you, Kayla,' Anne said, as she took a seat while Kayla set to boiling water for the tea and herbal infusions that the Southerners often found too thin or too bitter. 'I did not know your mother well. This has been my circuit for a number of years, and although we're often sent out on different routes, we become familiar with the villages along the King's roads.

'Your mother wasn't the mayor, but she was the center of Riverend. I never met a woman with a cannier sense of the dangers of living in such an isolated place-and I grew up a few towns off the Holderkin, so I'm aware of just how dangerous those fringes can be.

'But your mother had a great love for your father, and for the lands that produced him.

And she had a gift, as well, a...clear understanding of people.' She hesitated, and Kayla felt it again, that low current beneath the words that seemed to move in a different direction from their surface. 'A clearer understanding than perhaps most of us have.' She waited.

Carris said nothing, but he did clear his throat.

'We've brought a few things that the village will find useful,' he said at last, looking to just one side of her face, as if his dark and graceful gaze had become suddenly awkward.

'Magda often asked for aid for the rough times, and-and-she made it clear what was needed. There are medical herbs and unguents here, there are potions as well; there are bandages and cleansing herbs, as well as honest tea. There's salted, dried meat in the second bag; a lot of it, which might help. The harvest in the mainland has been...poor this year. There's also some money in the last bag.'

'You shouldn't be telling me this,' Kayla said quietly. 'You should talk to Widow Davis; she's the mayor hereabouts, or what passes for one. She'll know what to do, and she'll be very grateful to you both.'

They exchanged another glance.

'Well, then, maybe you'd better call for the Widow Davis after all.'

Kayla smiled politely. 'If you think she isn't already on her way, you don't know Riverend all that well.'

* * *

But Kayla knew something was wrong.

The Widow Davis did, indeed, arrive; she scattered the children with a sharp inquiry about the current state of their chores, and an even sharper glance at the children who had the temerity to tell her they wanted to stay with the Companions, and then eyed the saddlebags the Heralds carried with an obvious, and deep, suspicion.

'Kayla, go mind the children. If you can't teach them to heed their duties, no one can. I'll deal with the strangers.'

Kayla felt her jaw go slack, but she hid the surprise that had caused it as she nodded to the widow and retreated. These were Heralds, not medicants, and she had never heard the Widow Davis be rude to a Herald before. She was glad that the children had been sent back to their work.

She did not see the Heralds leave, but when she had time to glance outside again, they were gone, the white of their uniforms, and the white of Companion coats, little glimpses into the heart of winter, a hint of the future.

And when she at last tucked in for bed, she fought sleep with a kind of dread that she hadn't felt since she had slept in the arms of her own mother, at a time of life so far removed it seemed centuries must have passed. The nightmares had been strong then; they were strong now.

Many of the village children dreamed. They found a place in her lap when they wished to make sense of all the things that occurred only after they closed their eyes, and she had spent years listening, with both wonder and envy, to the hundreds of broken stories that occupied their dreamscapes.

Not so her own.

* * *

She had two dreams.

There was a black dream and a white dream, set against the mountain's winter.

As a child, the black dreams were frightening, bewildering; she would wake from sleep to search for her mother; it never took long. Her mother would come, precious candle burning, and sit by the side of her bed.

'What did you dream of, Kayla?'

'The dragon.'

She had never seen a dragon; the stories that the old wives told described them as terrible, ancient beasts who had long since vanished from the face of the free lands. Books in the hold were so rare they were seldom seen, and books with pictures tipped in were rarer still.

But there was something in the shape of shadow that reminded her of those pictures.

'What was he doing?'

'Crying.'

'Ah. Try not to listen too carefully, Kayla. Dragon tears are a terrible thing.'

'I think...he's lonely.'

Her mother's smile was shallow, even by candlelight. 'Dragons are lonely; they sit on their cold, cold gold, their hard jewels, and they never come out to play.'

'He would,' she would tell her mother, 'if he could find us.'

'I think it best that he never find us, Kayla. Riverend is no place for such a creature.'

* * *

The white dreams were different.

The snows were clearer and cleaner, and the pines that guarded the pass stretched beyond them to cut moonlight and hide it. But the light was strong enough to see by, and she always saw the same thing: the white horse.

He was the color of snow, of light on snow. And in the hold, in this place just one edge of rock and mountain, where spring came and went so quickly and summer's stretch was measured in weeks, snow was the color of death. Even as a child, she had understood that.

He did not speak to her until her father died.

'You can talk?'

Yes. A little. It is difficult now. But... :I heard your voice, little one. I heard your singing.:

'Singing?'

:Aye, song, a dirge, I think, to break the heart for its softness. I heard you sing years ago, and your song was so light and so joyful, I waned all of my compatriots to stand, to listen, to feel. There was such love in that song. And in this one. In this one, too.: She knew what he spoke of, and said nothing, but looked down at the back of her hands. They were child's hands; smooth and unblemished by calluses and dirt. Because it was a dream, she did not ask him how he had come to