“But I know every creak and groan those stairs make…” he protested. It just didn't seem possible, but then, she had always moved differently.
She silenced him with a finger to her lips. “It doesn't matter,” she extended her delicate white hand. “Come with me. I want to show you something.”
Brand hesitated for a moment, then set aside the poker and took her hand. The look in her eyes told him she was serious about something. She led him up the steps to the old nursery.
“You're sleeping in here?” he asked.
She nodded. “It's the room I have the best memories of.”
Then he noticed the candle in the window. It was a single taper of waxy white tallow, not like the ones they had kept in the house.
“But the shutters are closed,” he pointed out. “You can't hope to signal Myrrdin with that.”
“Not Myrrdin, necessarily-”
“But it doesn't matter who you're trying to signal,” he said, still staring at the tiny flame. It bothered him, somehow. He couldn't put his finger on it, but there was something odd about it. “No one can see it through the shutters, much less the hedge outside. Only the hurricane lamps can be seen from the river, and then only if they are on lampposts at the shoreline. The River knows that a candle would just blow out if you opened the shutters, anyway.”
Telyn silenced him with a single finger touched to his lips this time. She gave him one of her knowing smiles. “How did you see the one in my window last night, then?” she asked.
His mouth sagged open. “Are you saying that-that your shutters were closed?”
She made no attempt to answer. Instead, she guided him out of the room with light touches of her hands. Hardly aware of it, he moved at her slightest touch, and soon found himself standing in the hall. “You should know better than to be caught in a lady's room this late at night,” she scolded, closing the door.
“Wait!”
“Good night,” she said sweetly.
He was left standing in the dark hall, at a loss. Later, when Jak and Corbin had returned from their work, stamping their boots and rubbing their hands, he went to bed. It was then, staring at the ceiling, that he recalled what was odd about that candle.
It had not flickered, even when in the window, where drafts and gusts always came through the shutters. The flame had been perfectly steady and still. Even in a light wind, much less a storm, it should have flickered and danced and perhaps even been blown out by the drafts. He fell asleep trying to remember if Telyn's hair had been tousled by drafts that should have affected the candle, but that just got his mind onto the subject of her face, and then it was hard to think at all. Wondering what it all meant, he slipped into troubled dreams.
Chapter Ten
Many hours into the night there came a loud hammering at the door. The storm was at its peak. It howled and clawed at the shuttered windows, seeking to slip in cold fingers and pry away the protective boards. Brand, who had been dreaming of owls and strange lights and Telyn's fine face, awoke with a start. Beads of cold perspiration were on his forehead and cheeks. It took him a moment to realize where he was and what had awakened him. Out in the hall he heard the boards creak beneath Jak's feet, then Corbin's heavier tread. The hammering came again, thump, thump, thump. He scrambled out of the bedclothes and pulled on his trousers, shivering in the cold.
Telyn, wearing a nightdress that would have set Brand's heart to pounding if it hadn't been pounding already, was the first to reach the door. She seemed in a terrible hurry, her cheeks were flushed with excitement as she lay her hands on the bar that held the heavy oaken door. Although most folk on the Berrywine River rarely barred their doors, Rabing Isle was close to the northern border of the River Haven and things had not been well this autumn. Jak had decided to bar the door tonight as a precaution.
“Hold it!” Jak shouted as she made ready to throw up the bar and open the door. He extended his hand, palm outward.
Telyn paused with a visible effort of will and stepped to one side. “You set the lamps out,” she said. “You wanted them to come, so why do you hesitate now?”
“Them?” questioned Jak. “I wanted Myrrdin to come, none other.”
Telyn crossed her arms beneath her breasts, looking cold and a bit cross. “Perhaps it is Myrrdin, his beard white with frost and his feet half-frozen in their boots.”
Thump, thump, thump. The door resounded with heavy blows.
Suddenly, Brand felt a bite of concern. Would Myrrdin's fist fall so heavily? It sounded as if a smithy's hammer were being wielded full force upon the door. Despite it's heavy oaken timbers, it shook and rattled with each blow. What kind of man would come to Rabing Isle on such a night?
“Who hammers on my door in the deep of night?” Jak demanded loudly.
Thump, thump, thump. The hammering was the only reply.
Jak scowled, his mood turning dark. Before Brand could caution him, he had thrown up the bar and swung open the door. Corbin raised the lantern he was carrying a bit higher so that all could see into the dark night. The figure that stood outside in the raging blizzard was not what they had expected. It was not tall like Myrrdin or a shadow man, nor as short as one of the Faerie.
It was clearly one of the Battleaxe Folk. Although he stood very tall for one of his race, almost as tall as Telyn, he was built along the lines of all his folk. The head was massive with crude, overlarge features and a heavy beard of coarse, red and gold hair. The arms were long and thick and the legs short and thicker. His powerful barrel-like chest made up the rest of him. Brand was taken aback, he had seen a few wandering traders of fine goods before from the Battleaxe Folk, but never one nearly as large as this. He had to weigh as much as Corbin, at least. Brand's eyes drifted uncontrollably to the heavy, doubled-bladed battleaxe that hung on a leather thong from his wide belt.
Jak crossed his arms and glared at the visitor. “Who disturbs our rest on such a night?”
“I am Modi of the warriors,” answered Modi, haltingly, but clearly. It was obvious that he was not used to their speech.
“I am Jak of the Clan Rabing,” said Jak, frowning less. “What can we do for one of the Battleaxe Folk on a night such as this?”
Modi's lips worked for a moment, his huge brows furrowed in concentration. “Gudrin-she is of the talespinners-she sent me. She saw your light.”
At this, Telyn took a half-step forward. Brand eyed her, thinking of her candle. Surely, Modi meant the light from one of the lamps set out to guide Myrrdin.
“There are more of you? Do you need shelter?” asked Jak.
Relief flooded over Modi's face. “Yes, shelter. There is only I… And the Spinner.”
“Why didn't your companion come up with you?” asked Telyn, slipping herself into the narrow space between Jak's shoulder and the doorjamb. “Is he sick? Too weak to walk?”
Modi eyed her critically for a few moments before answering. He seemed to see something that made him uncertain. “Gudrin is not sick. She is… Burdened. She rests in the boat.”
Donning their boots, cloaks and hats, the four of them followed Modi down to the docks in the swirling blizzard. The path was pitch-blackness streaked with white. The world lost its form only a few feet away in every direction. Only the stones along the path kept them from losing their way. Brand realized that the hurricane lamps would only have been visible from a few yards out on the river. He wondered if the Battleaxe Folk had keener eyes than did the folk of the River Haven.
Despite his short legs, Modi marched quickly down the hill. The others had to hurry to keep up, except for Telyn, whose light tread barely seemed to sink into the wind-fluffed powder. Brand was surprised to see that the snow had already piled up in drifts two or three feet high in places. Modi plowed through it all as if it was nothing,
