“Why, because they’re making Sairy sound like a hussy and a traitor,” Cicely burst out, “and she’s not, she’s sweet and pure and good! She couldn’t help it if she fell in love with a Gregor, she couldn’t!”
“No, of course she couldn’t,” Alea soothed. “Where did they meet, then?”
“Down by the stream. Sairy told me that she went to drink where he was standing sentry—go on the bank across from her, but they saw each other and leveled their rifles and shouted at the same moment. Then they stared at each other and both burst out laughing. When they stopped, they both looked at each other and felt something magical happen.”
“So that’s how it began,” Moira said softly. “And they kept meeting there?”
“There, or wherever they’d been told to stand guard,” Cicely said. “They’d each volunteer for the night watch and the worst place, the gully where it’s so harsh and lonely; just to be near enough to talk.”
“And after a while, they started wanting something more than talk?”
“They never did more than kiss!” Cicely said fiercely. “He swam a nighttime river to hold her in his arms, and finally they couldn’t keep from it any more and kissed, but that’s all!”
“I’m sure.” Alea thought of the consequences of having a baby out of wedlock in this culture and shivered. “But they did decide to run away together.”
“Well … yes,” Cicely admitted. “But that’s not… you know…”
“They’re going to find a Druid first,” Moira filled in for her. “After she marries them properly, what they do is nobody’s concern but their own.”
Cicely eyed her suspiciously. “How’d you know our Druid’s a woman, Moira?”
The seer smiled. “You forget how long I’ve been tramping this countryside trying to persuade folks to listen to reason, Cicely. I know every clan and outlaw band—so a strange seer I’d be if I didn’t know the Druids, too. How did they really run away?”
“Why, down a ladder from her bedroom window, just as they told you,” Cicely said in surprise. “Malcolm left it there, after all. He wasn’t about to carry it with them.”
“But Sairy climbed down of her own free will?” Alea asked. “Free and eager.” Cicely nodded emphatically. “Scared of what they were doing, but eager to be with Malcolm for good.”
“How did Malcolm manage to slip past the sentries and silence the dogs?”
“Why, because Sairy told him where the sentries were stationed and what time their relief would come,” Cicely said. “He knew to creep through the woods during the last hour of their watch.”
“When they would be most sleepy.” Alea nodded. “What about the dogs?”
“Sairy mixed the sleeping potion in their food that night.”
“So it wasn’t an abduction, but an elopement.” Alea smiled. “I wondered how Malcolm managed all that by himself.”
“You won’t tell on me, will you?” Cicely asked anxiously. “Of course not.” Privately, Alea didn’t think there was much to tell—they couldn’t have been the only ones who had noticed her grief. “But you’ve given us another reason for wanting to bring peace.”
“Why’s that?” Cicely asked, wide-eyed.
“So Sairy can come home,” Alea said, “if only to visit.”
“They’d never have her!” Cicely exclaimed. “She’s their shame and their horror!”
“I think a mother’s love is stronger than that,” Moira said with gentle sympathy. “She works hard at not showing it, but Sairy’s mother is grieving even more deeply than you.”
“Do you really think so?” Cicely asked.
“Yes, I do,” Moira said, “and if we meet Sairy on our travels, I’ll tell her that I think so, too.”
“Meet Sairy! Oh, miss!” Cicely clasped Moira’s hands. “If you do, you’ll come back and tell me how she fares, won’t you?”
“Yes, we will,” Moira assured her. “Come, now, and help us seek herbs.”
“No, I daren’t.” Cicely stood with an anxious glance at the sun. “My heavens! Is it that late? They’ll skin me alive if I’m not back in time for my watch.”
“Go, then,” Alea said with a smile, “but try not to feel badly if they speak against Sairy again.”
“I won’t, if I can think of you finding and talking to her. Thank you, ladies, thank you!” Then Cicely hurried back to the house.
“That helped her a little,” Moira said as they went on toward the woods.
Alea nodded. “I’m glad we could cheer her that much, at least. What do you suppose was the truth about Hiram’s killing?”
“That Colum tracked him through the woods, caught him when he was alone, and shouted some insult before he fired,” Moira said. “The more fool he, giving his victim a chance to turn and shoot.”
“Hiram must have been very quick and very accurate,” Alea said doubtfully.
“Have you seen my people shoot?” Moira asked. “When they hunt pheasants, they shoot for the head, so as not to have to worry about lead in their dinners.”
Alea shuddered. “Do they always hit their marks?”
“More often than not,” Moira answered, “and a man’s a much bigger target than a bird. But as to Hiram’s speed, well, I’ll admit he’d have to have been keyed up, on edge, to be able to spin about so quickly. I wonder what he was hunting—a bear?”
“Or Colum?” Alea asked grimly. “You don’t suppose she encouraged them both, do you?”
“Not as far as engagement, no,” Moira said. “Of course, that wouldn’t have mattered to some men. They’d think they should have whatever they wanted—and if she were a true beauty, one look at her would be enough to make Colum love her.” Personally, Alea didn’t think any of the clanswomen were terribly attractive, but she asked herself who she was to judge and resolved to ask Gar when she found him. “So you don’t think Colum was really in love with her.”
“Only in the way that a man’s in love with his rifle or anything else he owns,” Moira said. “If he’d really loved her, he’d have wanted her to be happy, wouldn’t he?”
“So he wouldn’t have tried to kill her fiancé. Yes.” Alea lifted her head and sighed. “I always thought it would be romantic to have men fighting over me, that it would make me feel important, desired. But it doesn’t, does it?”
“Doesn’t and isn’t,” Moira said, and the dryness of her tone made Alea wonder if she knew from personal experience. Why had Moira started wandering, anyway?
For all her bulk, Evanescent the alien could move as silently as a zephyr when she chose. Nonetheless, she knew dozens of eyes watched her as she prowled the woods, for she could hear the thoughts behind them. She smiled with complacency at the consternation of the fairies and elves, alarmed because they couldn’t hear her thoughts. Well, they would soon enough, when she found a place to make her stand.
There! A huge boulder jutted from the soil, slant-sided and flat-topped. Evanescent padded up its side and sat at the summit, looking down a dozen feet at the forest below her. It was a decent podium; it would do. She unleashed a thought at the Old Ones.
Panic, anger, and horror swept through the clearing. Evanescent frowned and spoke aloud. “Come now! If I’d wanted to hurt you, I’d have done it. Why not come forth to parley with me? I won’t eat you, I swear it.”
“Try, and you’ll choke on your meal,” said a grim and buzzing voice.
12
An elf rose from the mold of the forest floor, fists clenched, glaring straight into Evanescent’s eyes. “There now!” the alien said with a smile. She kept her lips closed and her shark teeth hidden, though. “Am I so horrible as all that?”
“You’re large,” the elf temporized.