And Pamarchon, in the company of Antros and Catherine, had to wait, pacing up and down, constantly sending in messages to ask how she was.
‘Anyone would think he was in love,’ Catherine remarked to Antros quietly as they watched him. He laughed softly.
‘It seems you did very well back there,’ she added.
‘I followed instructions.’
‘I suspect you were given none.’
‘Perhaps.’
Antros, though, had other things on his mind.
‘Pamarchon?’ he asked. ‘What about Ossenfud?’
He nodded. ‘After I see Rosalind, I will go. I’ll have to hurry; I need to get ahead of Gontal’s party. I’m sure he must have dispatched people already but he is still here. Catherine, could you make sure he doesn’t leave until tomorrow morning?’
‘I will smother him with kindness and hospitality. If that doesn’t work, then I’ll break open some of Willdon’s best barrels of brandy. By the time I’m done he won’t even remember what Ossenfud is.’
‘Thank you. Antros, you must return to the camp, say what has happened. Keep everyone calm. Tell them I will explain on my return.’
Pamarchon returned two days later, exhausted, but satisfied. He had done everything he needed, raced ahead on one of Catherine’s finest horses and intercepted his troop of men some fifteen miles outside Ossenfud. The expedition, he said, was no longer needed. Wonderful things had happened in Willdon...
They had camped, and he had regaled them with a tale such as no man had ever heard before. He told it well, from their march to the Shrine to the appearance of the spirit, the trial, the unmasking of Jaqui as the murderer.
‘The spirit moved Catherine to end this feud. Those who wish can take up their lives, with land and in freedom. Those who do not will be rewarded, pardoned for any crime, and will be free to go as they wish.’
‘What about you?’ It was Djon who asked.
‘Ah, my dear friend! I will marry my fairy and I will help settle my people. Then I will get a ship, the finest ship ever built, and I will set sail.’
He looked at their faces in the flickering flames, saw how he had astonished them with every part of his narrative. ‘I will need a crew, of course,’ he said. ‘A job for the adventurous, the daring, the reckless. Do you by any chance know where I might find such people?’
Aching and tired, dirty, hungry and thirsty, he arrived back at Willdon and slid off the beast which was as exhausted as he was. Was Rosalind recovered? Had they lied to him or made a mistake? What if she was in a coma, infected, even dead?
He hurried across the beautiful gardens as the sun set to the west, and saw a slim, youthful figure running out of the healing rooms, waving at him.
He felt a surge of relief that banished all tiredness and began to run as well.
‘You must be very nice to me, Pamarchon son of,’ Rosalind said, when each was finally prepared to let the other go. ‘For as long as we live. You know that, I hope. I cannot go home now. Not ever. I made my choice and it was you. I hope you haven’t changed your mind.’ It was three days since the tumultuous events of the Shrine, and already it felt as though it had never happened. Already she could feel a difference in the way that people were opening up, looking about themselves. She had heard people talking differently. ‘I will go... When I went... Next year... Many years ago...’
‘I am more certain than ever.’
‘Did you tell me the truth about voyaging? Or do you plan to settle down on a farm with pigs in your yard and chickens in your bed?’
‘I will be ready when you are. I would go tomorrow if you would come with me, or stay here for ever if you changed your mind.’
‘Silly,’ she said. ‘I won’t change my mind. Seeing the whole world will be easy in comparison to what I have seen already.’
She smiled her sweetest smile at him and he took her in his arms once more.
‘Lady Rosalind,’ Catherine said, when the girl had finally left Pamarchon and gone into the house. ‘I am glad to see you rested and recovered. Are you well?’
Rosalind nodded. She had been in bed for three days — two days longer than she thought necessary, in fact; her wound was on the mend and even the fussiest of the nurses had reluctantly conceded that there was no reason she should not be allowed to dress and leave the healing rooms. She had put on fresh clothes brought over from the house, and walked into the gardens just as Pamarchon had arrived. Now she was in the room of records where she had first talked to Catherine after her arrival. She no longer had any idea when that was; sometimes she thought it was only a week, sometimes it seemed like years.
‘I am very well. It looked much worse than it was. It was kind of you to come and visit me so often.’
‘I had to deploy all my authority to be allowed in. The nurses are tyrants in their domain. We were all very anxious for you.’
‘Where is everyone?’
‘Henary has gone to Ossenfud; he wants to mend fences with Gontal by proposing they collaborate on the Shelf of Perplexities. He is hoping that you will help him there. Bait, if you see what I mean. Gontal is rather afraid of you. Jay is still here, striking up awkward conversations with Aliena which are a joy to overhear, and that splendid young man Antros has disappeared back into the forest. Pamarchon, as you are well aware, has just returned.’
Rosalind blushed and smiled shyly.
‘Do you really plan to voyage?’
‘Soon enough, although I can’t refuse Henary’s request, and one of the nurses pointed out that spring would be a better time to set off. So in about nine months’ time we will leave, I hope.’
‘And see the world in all its majesty.’ She smiled. ‘Rain, fog, snow, danger.’
‘That’s it,’ Rosalind agreed happily. ‘And beautiful, wonderful things as well.’
‘Until then, I hope you will stay here as much as possible. I could use your assistance too.’
‘With pleasure, my Lady.’ Rosie curtsied, and Catherine laughed.
‘Ah, no. You do not call me that. You of all people. In fact, it occurs to me that we have never actually been introduced. Not properly.’
‘Then let us do it properly. I present myself to you as Rosalind, betrothed of Pamarchon, son of Isenwar. But I think I know your name already.’
‘Do you indeed?’
‘I think so. It was what the Professor said, how you became a major character in his story all on your own, a bit like I did. That made me think that perhaps you are not from here either.’
‘Go on.’
‘I think,’ here she paused for a moment, a little uncertainly, ‘I think you must be Angela Meerson. It is the only explanation which makes sense to me.’
Catherine smiled. ‘Good try. But I am not.’
‘Oh, what a pity! I was certain that you had to be.’
‘You were very close. My name is Emily Strang. I am Angela’s daughter.’
‘Now that I did not expect,’ Rosalind said with a hint of disappointment in her voice. ‘But then I didn’t know she even had a daughter. I never met her, you see.’
‘Nor I.’
‘Really? Your own mother? Poor you.’
‘She has looked after me in other ways.’
‘How on earth did you get here?’
‘Now that is a whole story of its own, and a very great one. It will take many hours to tell, but it is worth hearing. I hope you will stay long enough, because I will tell you of my mother and her work, of the Exile and the Return, or at least what I think it must have been. I have seen extraordinary things and would like to tell the one person who will understand, and perhaps help me unravel more of the truth. There is much I do not know.’