‘Oh, maybe “Jaer Ravnor.” Spring life returning.’
‘Or, “Winged life returning.” Or “Winged joy.” ‘
‘Any of those,’ said Ephraim, drily. ‘Good names for a hero. Maybe he’ll grow up to be a great cultic hero and find the Gate for us.’
‘Ephraim, do you still believe in that sort of-’
‘Oh, no, no, no. I’m too old to believe. Still.…
They took another look at the baby, closed tight in sleep, fists curled like fronds. Ephraim pulled down die blanket, then stirred, uneasily.
Nathan gasped. ‘I thought you said it was a boy.’
‘It was a boy.’
‘It’s not a boy now!’
The two old men stared at one another. In Nathan’s mind was the thought that Ephraim was very old. In Ephraim’s mind was the thought that Ephraim was, indeed, very old. They went off toward their beds in considerable disquiet. In the morning the disquiet changed to disbelief. Jaer was a boy child once again. Sometimes Jaer remained a boy for as long as a week or two at a time thereafter.
That first morning, very early, Jaer woke wet and hungry. Before his eyes were open, before he drew a deep breath, he cried. Down the coiled corridor, a distance away, Ephraim and Nathan woke, startled at the unsounded lamentation of separation and loss. Only then did they hear the thin, reedy voice of the newborn and stumble toward that sound as quickly as they were both able.
Thereafter, Jaer slept with one or the other of them, a sugar tit ready at the bedside, milk warm beside the fife, and when he was old enough to be taught anything at all, they taught him (her) not to cry in that way. They told him that it could possibly be heard at great distances by those whom it might be better not to disturb. Jaer learned this. And to walk. And to speak. And began to learn to read.
Jaer was five.
CHAPTER THREE
MEDLO
Year 1158
In the rounded tower above the castle garth at Rhees, beside a diamond-paned window which peered at green lawns pimpled with peacocks and gardeners, the Lady Mellisa lay upon her chaise in earnest conversation with her said-to-be brother, Pellon. The object of their conversation was stretched upon the lawn beside a pool, a young man of indolent appearance, one arm thrown listlessly across his upturned face and the other trailing into the sun-warmed water.
‘He’s a flower,’ repeated Pellon with a sneer.
‘You mean, he’s a sissy.’
‘Not to put too fine a point on it, he’s a flower, a lily, a rose, a florist’s shopful. He’s a what-you-call-it.’
‘Well, what do you call it?’
‘I wouldn’t spoil my tongue with it.’ Pellon waved his hand before his mouth as though waving away the odour of the unspoken word. A tall man, with voluptuous moustaches and oiled muscles, he strode pridefully to and fro in the lozenged sunlight, making fists so that his glistening chest and arms bulged. He wore the Thyllian-vor, the honor vest, its polished hide inset with basilisk badges and studs of silver culminating in the silver chain which joined it across his naked chest. At his back swung the shining half cape without which no noble of the peninsula would have appeared in public, its folds swinging gracefully as he posed. ‘And while you are far from old, my lady, and thus far from thought of that departure which must come, alas, to even the loveliest of ladies of the land, and while –’
‘You mean, I might be struck by lightning, or fall ill of the plague, and Medlo would inherit,’ interrupted the lady restlessly.
‘Not to put too fine a point on it…’
‘That’s what you mean, really. You object to Medlo inheriting. Though why should you, rich as you are? Our father settled enough on you to found a kingdom….’
‘It isn’t the money, Lady. Not the money, the lands, the keeps, the fields. Damn it, woman, it’s the name!’
‘ “Lord Methyl-Drossy, Earl of Rhees”?’
‘What other name is at issue?’
The lady laughed, a tinkling laugh of no humour. ‘It would seem your own lack of issue is at issue. Had you a son of your own, we would not now be so overwrought upon the stem and leaves and petals of poor Medlo. I say, with laughter, had you a son of your own …’
Pellon scornfully waved her silent. ‘Since I have been unable to get a child on any woman else, Lady, it is unlikely I got that one upon you, long though you have accused me of it. You would know better than I what nameless soldier or courtier or gardener’s boy fathered him. Do not lay that one at my door. And do not waste the name of Rhees upon it.’
‘What would you suggest? A bit of midnight murder? Poison in his porridge?’
‘Unnatural woman. No more a mother than a snake which leaves its eggs in the dungheap.’
The lady waved his bluster away, reclined more comfortably into the long, cushioned chair in which she lay, drew her brocades and furs more gently around her rounded and perfumed person. ‘I presume you have something in mind?’
‘I do. A quest. In his present state the boy is not fit to inherit the glory-gifted name of Rhees, not fit to keep the black-robed Gahlians at bay, not fit to fend their acolytes and minions off the Marches. A quest would mold him, change him, harden him, grow him into manhood has he manhood in him. And, if not…’
‘Yes, my lord.’ she purred. ‘If not?’
‘Well then, he would fall seeking glory and power.’
‘And the name and house of Rhees?’
‘Might then fall to another, born or adopted into the house …’
‘Who would presumably be less floral?’
‘I think we might make certain of it’ The Lord Pellon laughed harshly, kicking at the base of an ornamental pillar which swayed dangerously under this attack. ‘With your first-born away, a certain strong man known to me might show his interest in the Lady Rhees. If, that is, he felt a son of his
