It was signed with a scribble, as though she had started to write one word, then substituted another. “Bartelmy.”
“Everyone should be remembered kindly,” I said, perhaps a little bitterly.
“Being a Dervish is not easy. They sacrifice much.” This was Sarah, soft-voiced and sympathetic as always. “If the woman at Stoneflight had given you to them as she was paid to do, you would have been one of them, Jinian, and would have felt loneliness for its own sake, because you chose it, and the lesson of the shadow, because you would have had to know it. So, you felt it without choosing it and learned the lessons as you would have done anyhow. Do not think Bartelmy has not yearned over you, even though she is not allowed to show it.”
There were assorted other gifts. Including a book from Joramal on the history and geography of Dragon’s Fire Demesne.
“Then King Kelver cleaves to his bargain.” I sighed, wondering what I would do about this.
“He does. And his wife died not a season ago.” This from Cat.
“We have come to return you to Vorbold’s House. Queen Vorbold has agreed to say nothing to the King about your lengthy absence. Provided that you leave for Dragon’s Fire soon.” Bets Battereye, very busy making plans. “That is, ostensibly we came for that.”
“And what are we going to do about that? I have no intention of marrying King Kelver, you know.”
“We know.” Sarah sighed. “We haven’t decided yet what is best to do.”
So we talked, and plotted, and drank wine, and came to no conclusions. And I talked, and drank wine, and wondered what my Talent was. And night came on. They brought mattresses and blankets out of the wagon into my dwelling, and we built another little fire there and talked, still, into the dark hours.
And Cat Candleshy said, “Ouf, but that wine has made me thirsty. Where is the pool you drink from, Jinian?”
And I, deep in conversation with Murzy, said, “Ask the bunwit. He’ll show you.”
And then silence came down, with all of them looking at me, and Sarah trying not to laugh while Margaret did laugh.
“How would you suggest I do that?” asked Cat.
And my mouth came open, then shut, then open again. Because, of course, she couldn’t. No more could I, except that I did. Because it had not been the forest all along that spoke to the animals for me; it had been me, myself.
“What is it?” I breathed, afraid to say it out loud for fear it would go away. “What is it called?”
“Not in the Index,” said Murzy. “Nowhere. Reading, some, I should think. Perhaps some power of the Flesh. Who knows? Bartelmy thinks it has something to do with your being born Dervish, but not reared Dervish. One must be reared to Dervishdom with all its special rites and foods to become a Dervish truly. But your Talent is not like theirs. It is yours. No one else’s. Bartelmy says it is most unusual.”
“Why did she ask me, then, about having no Talent?” I shouted. “Why?”
“Shhh,” said Cat. “She probably asked you about not having a known Talent, Jinian. An unknown Talent might be, in some cases, like having none. What insignia would one wear? What is the costume of the type? Ah? We said to Bartelmy when she found us upon the road that it would not matter to you, for you had learned the first lesson well. She asked you only to satisfy herself.”
The first lesson. Of course. The lesson of invisibility. As the old dams were invisible. Their Talents mattering not, except when they needed them. So what was I? A Beast-talker. Jinian Footseer, Beast-talker. I said it out loud. Giggling.
Then we were all giggling, even Dodie, who had watched all this with wide, wondering eyes, and the night closed in around us peacefully, the fire went out, and we slept. During the night bunwit came in and snuggled next to me. In the morning he was still there. Wondered, just for a time, could he come along with us. Decided not. He would be easy prey for any hungry Gamesman, and his life was in Chimmerdong. Still, when I left him there, it was harder than leaving Grompozzle or Misquick had ever been. They had helped me little, but the bunwit had helped me much. I kissed him on his nose. I don’t know what he made of that.
Slow, the wagon in its way back to Xammer. A long road, that, twisting down from the heights to the ford of the north fork of the Stonywater. Down Long Valley, easy, among fields as bright as jewels with the horses muttering in their noses and I telling them what good, biddable beasts they were. Talking to geese. Talking to strange bunwits in hedges. Singing to birds in the air or on treetops, sometimes out loud and sometimes silently. Made no difference to the beasts. They heard me, either way. I was beginning to hear them back, more clearly every day. It was embarrassing to realize that bunwit and tree rat had been talking to me the whole time I was in Chimmerdong.
“I don’t suppose there are d’bor in Chimmerdong,” I had asked.
“Oh, yes, ma’am,” had said bunwit.
“Are there any?” I had asked, cursing him for not answering me in the first place.
“I told you, yes,” he would have said, hurt. “You never listen!”
Like one deaf, I. No longer. No, I sang and tweeted and muttered up my nose like any horse. Cat told me at last to cease making such noises, as it sounded like
