Nattie stepped up to the center of the kitchen and thumped the floor with her cane, drawing herself up in full Pronouncement Mode such as Fawn had very seldom seen, not since the time Nattie had so-finally settled the argument for damages with the irate Bowyers over the twins’ and Whit’s cow-racing episode, years ago.
Nattie drew a long breath; everyone else held theirs.
“I’m satisfied,” Nattie announced loudly. “Fawn shall have her patroller. Dag shall have his Spark. See to it, Tril and Sorrel. The rest of you lot”—she glared to remarkable effect, when she put her mind to it, the focused blankness making her eyes seem quite uncanny—“behave yourselves, for once!”
And she turned and walked, very briskly, back into her weaving room. Just in case anyone was foolish enough to try to challenge that last word, she gave her cane a jaunty twirl and knocked the door closed behind her.
Chapter 17
Dag woke late from a sodden sleep to find that his next duty in this dance was to ride with Fawn and her parents to West Blue to register their intentions with the village clerk, and to beg his official attendance on the wedding. Fawn was fussed and nervous getting Dag shaved, washed up, and dressed, which confused him at first, because she’d had the help down to a fairly straightforward routine, and despite his fatigue he wasn’t being gracelessly cranky this morning. He finally realized that at last they would be seeing people outside of her family—ones she’d known all her life. And vice versa. It would be the first view most of West Blue would have of Dag the Lakewalker, that lanky fellow Fawn Bluefield dragged home or however he was now known to local gossip.
He tried not to let his imagination descend too far into the disagreeable possibilities, but he couldn’t help reflecting that the only resident of West Blue who had met him so far was Stupid Sunny. It seemed too much to hope that Sunny was not given to gossip, and it was already proven he’d a habit of altering the facts to his own favor. His humiliation was more likely to make him sly than contrite. The Bluefields could well be Dag’s only allies in the farmer community; it seemed a thin thread to hang from. So he let Fawn carry on in her efforts to turn him out presentably, futile as they seemed.
The hamlet, three miles south via the shade-dappled river road, appeared peaceful and serene as Sorrel drove the family horse cart down the main, and seemingly only, street. It was a day for fluffy white clouds against a bright blue sky utterly innocent of any intent to rain, which added to the illusion of good cheer. The principal reasons for the village’s existence seemed to be a grain mill, a small sawmill, and the timber wagon bridge, which showed signs of having been recently widened. Around the little market square, presently largely idle, were a smithy, an alehouse, and a number of other houses, mostly built of the native river stone. Sorrel brought the cart to a halt before one such and led the way inside. Dag ducked his head under en excessively low stone lintel, just missing braining himself.
He straightened cautiously and found the ceiling sufficient. The front room seemed a cross between a farmhouse parlor and a camp lore-tent, with benches, a table, and shelves stuffed with papers, rolled parchments, and bound record books. The litter of records flooded on into the rooms beyond. In through the back hall bustled the clerk himself, who seemed, by the way he dusted the knees of his trousers, to have been interrupted in the midst of gardening. He was on the high side of middle age, sharp-nosed, potbellied, and perky, and was introduced to Dag by the very farmerly name of Shep Sower.
He greeted the Bluefields as old friends and neighbors, but he was clearly taken aback by Dag. “Well, well, well!” he said, when Sorrel, with determined help from Fawn, explained the reason for the visit. “So it’s true!” His stout but equally perky wife arrived, gaped at Dag, dipped her knees rather like Fawn upon introduction, smiled a bit frantically, and dragged Tril away out of earshot.
The registry process was not complex. It consisted of the clerk’s first finding the right record book, tall and thick and bound in leather, dumping it open on the table, thumbing through to the most recent page, and affixing the date and penning a few lines under some similar entries. He required the place and date of birth and parents’ names of both members of the couple—he didn’t even ask before jotting down Fawn’s, although his hand hesitated and the pen sputtered when Dag recited his own birth date; after a doubtful stare upward, he blotted hastily and asked Dag to repeat it. Sorrel handed him the rough notes of the marriage agreement, to be written out properly in a fair hand, and Sower read it quickly and asked a few clarifying questions.
It was only at this point that Dag discovered there was a fee for this service, and it was customary for the would-be husband to pay it. Fortunately, he had not left his purse with his other things at the farm, and doubly fortunately, because they had been far longer about this journey than he’d planned, he still had some Silver Shoals copper crays, which sufficed. He had Fawn fish the little leather bag from his pocket and pay up. Apparently, arrangements could also be made for payment in kind, for the coinless.
“There always come some here who can’t sign their own names,” Sower informed Dag, with a nod at his sling. “I sign for them, and they make their X, and the witnesses sign to confirm it.”
“It’s been six days since I busted the arm,” said Dag a little tightly. “For this, I think I can manage.” He did let Fawn go first, watching her closely.
He then had her dip the quill again and help push it into his fingers. The grip was painful but not impossible. The signature was not his best, but at least it was clearly legible. The clerk’s brows went up at this proof of literacy.
The clerk’s wife and Fawn’s mother returned. Missus Sower’s gaze on Dag had become rather wide-eyed. Craning her neck curiously, she read out, “Dag Redwing Hickory Oleana.”
“Oleana?” said Fawn. “First I heard of that part.”
“So you’ll be Missus Fawn Oleana, eh?” said Sower.
“Actually, that’s my hinterland name,” Dag put in. “Redwing is what you would call my family name.”
“Fawn Redwing,” Fawn muttered experimentally, brows drawing down in concentration. “Huh.”
Dag scratched his forehead with the side of his hook. “It’s more confusing than that. Lakewalker custom has the fellow taking the name of his bride’s tent, by which I would become, er… Dag Bluefield West Blue Oleana, I suppose.”
Sorrel looked horrified.
“What do we do, then, swap names?” asked Fawn in a tone of great puzzlement.
“Or take both? Redwing-Bluefield. Er. Redfield? Bluewing?”
“You two could be purple-something,” Sower suggested genially, with a wheezing laugh.
“I can’t think of anything purple that doesn’t sound stupid!” Fawn protested.
“Well… Elderberry, I suppose. That’s lake-ish.”
“Already taken,” Dag informed her blandly.
“Well… well, we have a few days to think it over,” said Fawn valiantly.
Sorrel and Tril glanced at each other, seemed to inhale for strength, and bent to sign below. The day and time for the wedding was set for the earliest moment after the customary three days at which the clerk would be available to lend his official presence, which to Fawn’s obvious relief was the afternoon of the third day hence.
“In a hurry, are you?” Sower inquired mildly, and while Dag did not at first catch his covert glance at Fawn’s belly, she did, and stiffened.
“Unfortunately, I have duties waiting at home,” Dag put in quellingly, letting his wrist cuff rest on her shoulder. Actually, aside from averting panic by beating Mari back to camp, till this blighted arm healed he was going to be just as useless at Hickory Lake as he was here at West Blue. It hardly mattered at which spot he sat around grinding his teeth in frustration, although West Blue at least had more novelty. But the disturbing mystery of the sharing knife was an itch at the back of his mind, well buried under the new distractions yet never fading altogether.