Coll talked to Master Androv that very night (which didn’t give Ciare much time to cozen the old fellow). “I know nothing of playacting,” he said, “and I don’t think I can learn. But I can help set up the stage and I can take tickets and quiet the rowdies in the audience—and I might come in handy if bandits attack you on the road.”
“To be sure you would!” Androv said heartily, and clapped him on the shoulder. “You’ve been a stalwart member of this company already, Coll, and I’ll be delighted to have you stay with us for good! Be sure, though, that even if you rarely go on stage, you’ll earn your living in hard labor, just as you’ve said!”
Coll was amazed at such ready acceptance. “You’re sure I won’t be in the way?”
“In the way! Why, we’ll wonder how we ever did without you!” Privately, Master Androv was also delighted to know that he wouldn’t be losing Dicea, who was showing promise as a player and would have taken Enrico with her if she had left. But he was even more relieved to know that he’d be keeping Mama, who had turned out to have great skill, both with the needle and in keeping other people’s spirits up.
So Coll announced their engagement over dinner that night, and the whole company cheered the couple and drank their health. Then Androv announced that Coll and his family would be traveling with them forever more, and they all cheered and drank again. One drink led to another, and before they knew it, they had a full-fledged party going.
Gar slipped away early, though. He went out into the fields and waited as a large parcel came floating down from the sky. The next day, he presented Coll with his wedding gift—a stack of playbooks printed out by his ship’s computer, the best dramas, comedies, and tragedies that human playwrights had written since people learned to write. He and Dirk also presented Coll with enough gold coins to make both his eyes and his money belt bulge.
They stayed long enough to watch the wedding, three weeks later. Ciare insisted on being married in a church, which meant the company had to stay in one town long enough for the priest to read the banns three Sundays in a row. Gar knew they could never pull an audience that many weeks, especially since everyone in town had already seen every play in the company’s repertoire while they were waiting for the war to end—so he paid the landlord for three weeks’ room and board for everyone, and the whole company settled down for the first vacation they could ever remember.
It lasted until Coll gave Androv a copy of one of the plays Gar had given him—Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure. He read it in one electrified sitting, then shouted all his players back onto the stage and made them begin rehearsals. By the time the Church was satisfied that no one in town knew any reason why Coll and Ciare couldn’t marry, the play was ready to perform.
Even then, the priest would only marry them in the portico in front of the church, because they were players. But the other players costumed the bride in splendor and decorated bride and groom both with flowers, not to mention the pillars and, nearly, the priest. Finally falling into the spirit of the occasion, he smiled and prompted them.
“Do you, Coll, take this woman, Ciare, to be your lawfully wedded wife, to have and to hold, for better or for worse, in sickness or in health, till death do you part?”
“ ‘I do,’ ” Dirk muttered behind him. “I do!” Coll gasped.
“And do you, Ciare, take this man Coll to be your lawfully wedded husband, to have and to hold, for better or for worse, in sickness and in health, until death do you part?”
“I do!” Ciare declared, her face radiant.
“Then I now pronounce you man and wife.” The priest lowered his voice. “You may kiss the bride.”
Coll did, and Dicea cast a shy but speculative look at Enrico, who beamed back at her while the rest of the company erupted in cheers and led the bride and groom away from the church to a festival in the innyard where they had set up their stage. Everyone drank deeply and danced wildly, then with gay hilarity and many ribald comments ushered the newlyweds to the best bedroom the inn had to offer.
They emerged as the morning shadows stretched long across the grass of the village green, and Coll sobered at once, seeing the looks on the faces of Dirk and Gar. He hurried over to them, Ciare on his arm. “What troubles you, my friends?”
“Only that we have to leave,” Gar told him. “We’ve waited to say good-bye to you, but the time has come.”
A sudden void seemed to open inside Coll, and panic filled it. “But how shall we manage without you? What if the lords rise against us?”
“You know what to do.” Gar laid a hand on his shoulder. “We’ve taught you all you need to know. Just remember to be cautious always, and suspect every deed any lord does.”
Dirk nodded. “You can manage it. Have a good life, you two.” For a moment, his gaze rested on Ciare, and his face seemed gaunt with longing. Then he shook himself and turned back to clap Coll on the shoulder. “You lucky peasant!” he said in a husky voice. “You lucky, wealthy man!” Then he turned and strode away toward the forest.
They watched him go, and Ciare asked, mystified, “Why did he call you wealthy?”
“Because I have you.” Coll clasped her firmly against his side and lowered his cheek to rest against her hair. A great peace, an amazing sense of contentment, rose to fill the void where there had been only panic minutes before. “You are wealthy indeed, in all the ways that I wish I were.” Gar lifted Ciare’s hand to kiss it, then looked straight into her eyes. “May you have healthy children and a long life, my friends—and may the memory of these days of love sustain you whenever hard times come, all through your life.”
“They will,” Ciare whispered, her eyes filled with tears. “Farewell, O my friend!”
“Farewell,” Coll whispered.
“Fare well through all your days.” Then Gar bowed and turned away, striding fast to catch up with Dirk.
“I hope they find their loves,” Ciare said, nestling closer against Coll.
“So do I,” he breathed, “but I thank Heaven all the more that I have found mine!” He turned to kiss her, long, lingering, and lasting.
When darkness fell, Dirk and Gar stepped out of the trees into a wide forest meadow to watch a small black circle form overhead, one that grew steadily larger and larger still, until it blotted out all the stars. Then, abruptly, it was no longer a circle in the sky, but a huge circular spaceship that lowered itself into the meadow, nearly filling it, with only twenty feet or so between ship and trees. A boarding ramp lowered, leading up to light, and a voice said, “Ready to board, gentlemen.”
“Thank you, Herkimer.” Gar led the way up the ramp. They came into the lighted lock. The ramp closed behind them, and the voice said, “Welcome home, Magnus. Welcome home, Dirk.”
“Home it is!” Dirk threw himself down into a lounger. “Ah, the blessings of the modern world! You can have the shower first, Gar. I think I’ll just sit here a while, and soak up some sybaritic luxury.”
He knew very well that there were four showers aboard. Gar took a drink from the dispenser and handed it to Dirk. “You might want to try this with it.” He headed toward a shower cubicle, calling, “Lift off, Herkimer.” He felt no change in weight as he shucked his clothes and stepped into the shower, but he knew that the spaceship was rising again into the night, up and up into orbit.
He came out of the shower to find Dirk’s glass and lounger empty. Magnus pulled on modern clothing, took a drink of his own, sat down in the lounger, and watched the planet Maltroit grow smaller and smaller in the viewscreen.