I crawled inside.
“Avneanyi. Avneanyi,” moaned the crowd.
Auram joined me, Miros closed the door, and the carriage started off.
All the way to the common I had the priest’s triumphant eyes on me, the
cries of the huvyalhi ringing in my ears. At the Night Market I
stepped down into the grass beside a high tent. Its stretched sides
glowed, warmed from within by a lush pink light. All the moths of the
Valley seemed gathered round it, and before it sprawled the booths,
flags, and torches of the Night Market.
A great crowd had gathered about a wooden stage in front of the tent,
where an old man sat with a limike on his knee. One of his shoulders
was higher than the other, a crag in the torchlight. He cradled his
instrument and woke the strings to life with an ivory plectrum.
“I sing of angels,” he called.
Auram held my arm. “Look, avneanyi!” he whispered, exultant. “See
how they love angels in the Valley.”
The crowd pressed close. “Anavyalhi!” someone shouted. “Mirhavli!” cried
another; and the word was taken up and passed about the crowd like a
skin full of wine.
“Mirhavli! Mirhavli!”
The old man smiled on his stage. His face glittered, and his voice, when
he spoke again, was purified, strained through tears. That voice melted
into the sound of the strings—for though limike means “doves’
laughter,” the instrument weeps. In these resonant tones the old man
told
THE TALE OF THE ANGEL MIRHAVLI
Oh my house, oh men of my house
and ladies of my home,
come hearken to my goodly tale
for it will harm no one.
Oh fair she was, clear-eyed and true,
the maiden Mirhavli.
She was a fisherman’s daughter
and she lived beside the sea.
She sat and sang beside the sea
and her voice was soft and low,
so lovely that the fish desired
upon the earth to go.
The fish leapt out upon the sand
and perished one by one
and Mirhavli, she gathered them
and took them into town.
“Now who shall wed our maiden fair,
our lovely Mirhavli?
For she doth make the very fish
to leap out of the sea.
“Is there a man, a marvelous man,
a man of gold and red?
For otherwise I fear our daughter
never will be wed.”
He was a man, a marvelous man,
a man of gold and red;
he wore a coat of scarlet
and a gold cap on his head.
He saw the village by the sea
and swiftly came he nigh.
It was a Tolie, and clouds
were smoking in the sky.
Tall as a moonbeam, thin as a spear,
and smelling of the rose!
And as he nears the door, the light
upon his shoulder glows.
“Now see, my child, a bridegroom comes
from a country far away.
And wouldst thou join thy life to his
in the sweet month of Fanlei?”
“Oh, no, Mother, I fear this man,
I fear his bearded smile,
I fear his laughter, and his eyes
the color of cold exile.”
“Hush my child, and speak no more.
My word thou must obey.
And thou shalt be married to this man
in the sweet month of Fanlei.”
She followed him out of the door,
the maiden Mirhavli.
She saw him stand upon the shore
and call upon the sea.
“Mother,” he called, and his voice was wild
and colder than sea-spray,
“Mother, your son is to marry
in the sweet month of Fanlei.”
And straight his scarlet coat was split
and his arms spilled out between.
An arm, an arm, another arm:
in all there were thirteen.
“Oh Mother, Mother, bar the door
and hide away the key.
It is a demon and not a man
to whom you have promised me.”
They barred the door, they hid the key,
they hung the willow wreath.
He came and stood outside the door
and loudly he began to roar
and gnash his narrow teeth.
“Do what you will, for good or ill,
your child must be my bride,
and I shall come for her upon
the rushing of the tide.
“Do what you will, for good or ill,
ye cannot say me nay,
and Mirhavli shall married be
in the sweet month of Fanlei.”
And now the merry month is come,
the apple begins to swell,
and in the air above the field
the lark calls like a bell.
They barred the door, they hid the key,
they hung the willow wreath,
but the sea went dark, and the wind blew wild,
the sky with smoke was all defiled,
and the monster stood beneath.
“Now give to me my promised bride
or I will smite ye sore.”
The villagers stood about her house
and kept him from the door.
He rolled his eyes, he gnashed his teeth,
he stretched his arms full wide.
“I shall come again at the good month’s end
to claim my promised bride.”