“I do,” he said slowly, rolling back and pulling her head onto his shoulder. “But then I was in their realm.”
“Well, I do not intend to deny their existence. After all I spoke with one twice, even if I have not been where you have gone. But I cannot believe they have any power ultimately, or that we mortals should do anything to serve them.”
“Valmar has gone to serve them from what you tell me. Why should we be so determined to save him, if he is doing exactly what he wants? Especially,” kissing her forehead, “since his being gone means no one can possibly try to persuade you to marry him.”
She shook her head, the hair sliding across his face. “No, Roric. If I return to my father’s kingdom, handfast to you and with Valmar gone forever, the war between my father and Hadros will break out again.”
“And we will win it this time,” he said agreeably. “Hadros is an old man now. For that matter so is Gizor- chasing us should finish breaking his strength. And Dag and Nole will be but little help to Hadros. I saw your father’s castle; I would be able to defend it nearly single-handed.”
“You were not there when Hadros took our castle,” Karin said quietly. “I was. Even as a little girl I understood why my father had to surrender. It was either that or starve in a few weeks anyway-after seeing our fields burned and our tenants killed.”
“This time I will bring the tenants inside the walls,” he said, still in a voice that was almost light-but not quite.
“So that is your plan?” she asked in alarm, “double back, find a way to cross the channel, fight Hadros in open battle?”
“It is you, not me, who is so concerned about seeing your father again, about behaving as a future queen should behave. Or else you can stay up in the north country with me as my queen after I win a kingdom single- handed, as Hadros seems to think I can.” She could not tell if he was merely joking or again fighting deep bitterness. “If the Wanderers prefer a king’s son to a man without a father-leaving him instead for the trolls-then I shall have to win my fortune in mortal realms.”
“You realize, Roric,” she said, pushing herself up on an elbow, “that in trying to learn who your father is, you have never asked who your mother might have been.”
She felt him shrug. “Some girl from one of the manors-probably not even a royal manor. Hadros lets his serving-maids keep their babes, but on some of the poorer manors they dread an extra mouth to feed-or even a bastard child growing up to challenge the rightful heir to the inheritance.”
“But you weren’t just any baby. The queen herself raised you as an infant. Do you think you might have been hers?”
Roric sat up abruptly at that. “The get of Hadros’s queen and-whom? Another of the Fifty Kings? One of the warriors? Gizor? He may have been a more handsome man in his youth. But no, Karin. Hadros would never have raised another man’s son as his own.”
“But you weren’t raised as his own,” she said reasonably. “Valmar is the heir. And if he is your half-brother as well as your foster-brother, then there is even more reason to rescue him.”
He flopped back down again. “If Hadros learned his wife had been gotten with child by another man, he would have killed first the baby, then her.”
“Maybe so,” she said uncertainly. “But I, the last few years, have usually been able to talk Hadros around. Perhaps his queen could do the same.”
“You have not been able to talk him around on marrying me instead of Valmar.”
Karin did not answer, thinking glumly that he was right. Roric’s father, whom he so wanted to find, was doubtless a housecarl somewhere-except that the child of a serving-maid and a housecarl would not be expected to be found with a little bone charm.
“And do not be so sure,” added Roric, “that Valmar himself would have no intention of marrying you if he came back alive. He is not like you and me, Karin. We grew up as outsiders in the only castle we considered home. For years I had nothing and no one I could trust. For the last two years I have had my stallion, and the last few months you-even if you do insist on stealing ships without consulting me,” giving her a squeeze, a smile in his voice. “But Valmar has always known that he is heir to a kingdom, and had, whenever he was hurt or frightened, the support of his big sister-you. He grew up with the knowledge that he had a high destiny waiting. Little surprise then that he should go to find adventure with the lords of voima, to seek to do something glorious to win your love, so that when he is king he will still have you beside him.”
“I never felt I could count on Valmar the way you seem to feel you can count on Goldmane,” Karin replied somewhat stiffly, “because he is just a boy. But if he needs me I have to help him. I do intend to go to the Wanderers’ realm to rescue him, and I would feel much better if you were beside me. ”
“I was going to suggest you and I go solve the Wanderers’ problems for them,” Roric said quietly, “then live on together in their realm of endless summer, but you do not seem interested.”
“In the meantime,” she said, “let us stay here through tomorrow to rest Goldmane, before we decide if we are going on or doubling back.” She stroked his forehead and began to kiss him again, wishing that they did not have to run, wishing there were other options than the ones they had, that it could be only she and Roric together.
She spent the next day helping with the chores on the manor while Roric spent much of the day asleep.
It felt surprisingly comforting to be doing again the tasks that she had always done at Hadros’s castle, cooking, milking, drawing water from the well, sweeping, weaving, churning the butter. And her work drew a compliment. “Your manor must have been well regulated, since your mother taught you so well.” The woman smiled as she spoke; she had been smiling all day.
Karin remembered that she was supposed to have had a mother until a few days before. “Yes. We were a smaller manor than this one. It’s nothing but ash and scorched timber now.” There were only a few maids and a handful of housecarls here, yet the woman and her husband seemed to farm an enormous number of acres, with flocks scattered across the distant fells.
“I do not think you will be troubled by those raiders again,” said the woman quietly, looking out across her lands. “If anyone pursues you, they will find much to impede them.”
“Do you ever have trouble here with raiders?” asked Karin.
“Not since I came to live here. But then almost no one travels these roads, because we are far from the sea and not on the way to anywhere that could not be reached more easily by ship.”
Karin thought that she and Roric would doubtless have to cross several more kingdoms before reaching the Hot-River Mountains. “Isn’t it lonely here?”
“Only occasionally. I have my children, my husband, and those who serve us. It is enough.” The women paused for a moment, then added quickly, “But I have been very happy to have you here today. I would like to make you a guest-gift before you leave-would you accept a mare to ride, so that your warrior’s stallion need not carry you both?”
“Why yes!” said Karin, flustered. “I mean, that is too generous! I could not promise ever to return your horse to you.”
The women gave a faint smile, as if in reaction to something Karin had not said. “I would be honored to have you take a mare from me. And do not worry-her pace will not slow your journey.”
Karin lifted the lid from the churn and reached in carefully to take the new butter from the buttermilk. “Your warrior,” asked the woman casually, meeting Karin’s eyes for one second, “is he also your lover?”
She found herself blushing. “Yes, he is,” she said, turning away to wrap the butter in cheesecloth. It was pointless to lie.
“I thought he might be,” said the woman without any particular expression in her voice, neither satisfaction at having her guess confirmed nor condemnation. “Otherwise you would not have dared flee alone with him, raiders or no raiders.”
Karin held her breath, wondering what else this woman with the sky-blue eyes had guessed.
“If even a high-born woman needs to take a warrior to her bed to earn herself a little safety in this world,” the woman continued, staring off across the hills where her own husband and the sheep had gone, “do you not think it time women found a source of strength of their own?”
Then she did not doubt the story of the raiders on the coast after all, Karin thought. “Women have strengths, certainly,” she answered, thinking of Queen Arane. “We can manipulate men, use their own strength against them,
