Her eyebrows went up. “Tavis did?”
“Yes.”
She looked relieved.
“I love you, Cresenne. Kiss Bryntelle for me.”
“I will. I love you, too.”
The gleaner opened his eyes, blinked against the brightness of the day. Their conversation had tired him, but as he hurried to find Tavis and the duke of Glyndwr, that seemed the least of his concerns.
Within an hour, he and Tavis sat astride their mounts once more and were riding forth from the Glyndwr gates bearing two large leather pouches filled with cheeses, breads, smoked meats, dried fruits, and several skins of wine. The sun already hung low in the west. They wouldn’t get far this day before having to stop and sleep, but Grinsa was glad to be riding again, closing the distance between himself and his family.
“I think he wanted to come with us,” Tavis said after some time.
“Who?”
“Kearney. He fears for his father, and he wishes to have some role in this war.”
“Did he say as much?”
Tavis shrugged. “I could tell. He and I aren’t so different.”
Grinsa considered this, remembering how sad and lost and terribly young the boy had looked as they bid him farewell at the castle gate. He shuddered to think of how quickly the young duke would have been killed in battle.
“You make it sound as though you’re eager to fight.”
Tavis glanced his way, perhaps thinking that the gleaner was baiting him. After a moment he faced forward again.
“I suppose I am.”
Grinsa said nothing, and they rode in silence for several moments.
“The assassin had me, Grinsa,” Tavis said abruptly. “He was on the verge of killing me. He’d knocked my sword away and was holding my head underwater. I tried to get free, but he was too strong. All he had to do was keep me there for a few seconds more, and I would have died.”
Grinsa stared at him, not knowing what to say.
“Somehow the woman convinced him to let me go. And while they were talking, I retrieved my sword and killed him.” He grimaced, looking like he might cry. But then he merely exhaled and went on. “He didn’t even try to defend himself. He just let me do it.”
“You couldn’t know that he wouldn’t fight back.”
“But I did. I sensed it from what he was telling her. And I killed him anyway.”
“Tavis-”
“It’s all right. Given the chance, I’d do the same thing again. I wanted him dead-I believe he deserved to die.” He looked at the gleaner. “But there was nothing heroic about it. I want you to know that.”
“Why?”
He shrugged. “I’m not sure. You said a moment ago that I was eager to fight. I suppose I want you to understand the reason.”
“Wars and battles have nothing to do with heroism, Tavis. If that’s what you hope to find-”
“No, that’s not it either. I just want to prove to myself that I’m not a coward. I thought I could do that by avenging Brienne, but I was wrong.”
Grinsa smiled, which, judging from the look on Tavis’s face, was the last thing the boy had expected.
“You’re no coward, Tavis. That’s been clear to me since Kentigern. You shouldn’t need a war to make you believe it yourself.”
“Maybe I shouldn’t, but I do.”
“You can’t think that way, Tavis!” he said, surprising himself with his vehemence. “You have to see this conflict for what it is! When the time comes, we won’t be riding to Galdasten simply to kill the emperor’s soldiers, or even to repel his invasion, though we will do that. This war is a deception; it’s a feint. You must remember that. Harel isn’t the real foe and neither are the Aneirans. I know that you hate them, and I know better than to try to convince you that they could ever be friends of your realm. But you must put that hatred aside, for the good of all the Forelands. Our enemy is the Weaver and his conspiracy. Every arrow we aim at the soldiers of Braedon, every sword thrust that we level at the men of Aneira, strengthens the Qirsi. If I can prevent this war, I will. Failing that, we have to end the fighting as quickly as possible. The Weaver wants war, so we have to seek peace. He wants the Eandi courts divided, so we have to find some way to unite the armies of the seven realms against him. That’s our best hope of defeating him.”
“I thought you were our best hope.”
Grinsa nodded. He remembered saying as much to the young lord during the snows, as they made their way from Mertesse back into Eibithar. “My time is coming,” he said. He thought of Bryntelle; he pictured Cresenne in his mind, seeing once more the scars the Weaver had left upon her face. “I’m going to destroy the Weaver. I promise you that. But he’ll have an army, and it will fall to the rest of you to defeat them.”
“You’re asking a lot of the courts. You realize that, don’t you? None of these conflicts is new. Most of them date back a thousand years, to the time of the clan wars.”
“I know. But the clans managed to overcome their differences once before, during the war against the Qirsi.” Grinsa shivered. “The first one.”
Tavis eyed him for another moment, but offered no reply.
They rode on in silence, nearing the edge of the steppe just as the sun dipped toward the western horizon. And all the while, Grinsa turned over in his mind what he had said to the boy. The realms of the Forelands could unite. He was certain of it. What choice did they have?
But another matter occupied his thoughts. Without intending to, he had, in effect, compared the coming war with the Qirsi Wars fought in the Forelands nine centuries ago. And having done so, he couldn’t help wondering at his own role in the conflict. Hundreds of years before, when the clans faced invaders from the Southlands, there had been no Qirsi fighting alongside the Eandi, for there had been no Qirsi living in the Forelands. Ean’s children had fought Qirsar’s children; one could distinguish friend from foe by the color of their eyes. That is, until Carthach betrayed his people and helped the clans defeat the Qirsi army.
In this war, Grinsa’s war, there was no such clarity. Or was there? He had just told the boy that the Weaver and his movement were the real enemy. By standing against the Weaver, Grinsa allied himself with the Eandi. Was he Carthach, then? Was he the betrayer of his people, the white-hair whose heart was more Eandi than Qirsi? He wanted to believe that this looming conflict had no precedent in the history of the Forelands. Never before had Weavers waged war against each other. Never before had the nobles of the seven realms had so much difficulty discerning their enemies.
Still, try as he might, the gleaner could not rid himself of the feeling that history had turned back on itself, that the Forelands were crumbling under the weight of conflicts as ancient as the land itself. And though he had resolved long ago to vanquish the Weaver and his movement or die in the attempt, he wondered if his people would judge him as cruelly as they had the traitor Carthach.
“Was everything all right in the City of Kings?”
Grinsa looked at Tavis. “What?”
“With Cresenne and your daughter.”
He nodded, trying with little success to thrust thoughts of Carthach from his mind. “Yes, fine. Thank you.”
“You’re looking forward to seeing them.”
“Of course.” Grinsa smiled, though he felt as if his heart were being cleaved in two. How will I ever find the strength to leave them again?
“Then why do you sound like a man in mourning?”
The gleaner shook his head. “It’s hard to explain.”
Tavis regarded him for a moment before facing forward again. “Actually,” he said, “you don’t have to.” And Grinsa believed him.
“We owe you a great debt, Grinsa,” the young lord went on after a brief pause. “Few realize it, but they will before all of this is over. I’ll make certain of it.”
“That’s not necessary.”
“But it is. You could easily have decided to stay with Cresenne, and no one would have thought any the worse of you for it. Instead you’re risking your life and your family in defense of the Forelands. I know of few men who would make the same choice.”