Before then, one of the two Heralds Gifted with strong Animal Mindspeech would have come back to spend a few moons at the Collegium and give him the benefit of an expert's teaching, but until then, Pol would do. Whenever there was a new trainee with a rare Gift, it was often Pol who was summoned to return to the Collegium once the youngster had settled in and his Gift was identified.
Pol was perfectly happy with any opportunity to help the young Trainees, however much Satiran might fret and long for "adventure."
"Adventure" is usually synonymous with discomfort, not to say pain, Pol thought to himself, as he reached the door of the Herald's Wing and opened it. "Adventure" is never the exhilarating experience that the would-be adventurer thinks it is.
:I heard that,: Satiran snapped.
:You were meant to.: Pol chuckled at Satiran's mental snort of contempt, and headed for his room to get a fresh set of Whites, the full Herald's constant uniform that identified him as the proxy of the King himself—dispenser, discloser, and adjudicator of the law of Valdemar.
Ah, yes, a fresh set of Whites—clean, mended, and ready for him whenever he needed them. That was another benefit of being here, and not on circuit. A packhorse could only carry so much, and he got very tired of wearing the same clothing for days on end.
And that assumed he was on circuit and not pulling messenger duty, which meant riding for days on end, sleeping and eating in the saddle. He'd only had that duty a few times, but it was definitely not his favorite. Thank the gods there are other, much faster riders than I! he reflected, feeling every one of his years as he walked down the dim, quiet hallway toward the men's bathing room.
He hadn't been the only one out on the obstacle course today; several of the other teachers had taken advantage of the empty Course to take some much-needed exercise. The Heralds had to take the times when it wasn't being used by the Trainees, who were, after all, the ones it had been built for. Pol was met at the door of the men's bathing room by a cloud of steam and the greetings of his fellows.
"Good run out there, Pol!" called Herald Isten, invisible in the steam hanging above his bathtub. "You ran that course like a man half your age!"
"And I feel like one who is twice my age," he replied, with a groan that was only half feigned, stripping off his filthy Whites and dropping them into a laundry hamper. "You haven't used up all the hot water, I hope?"
Isten laughed and fanned away the steam, so that his round, red face crowned with curling tendrils of dripping hair, darkened by the damp, appeared like a disembodied spirit in the mist. "I saved you enough, I promise."
"That's good, because if my old bones can't have a good soak, I'm going to have to thrash you." Pol eyed his colleague sternly.
Isten chuckled, knowing the bluff for what it was, and let the fog hide him again as Pol took a free tub and ran water into it from the copper boiler that served this bathing room. He checked the fire beneath the boiler, and added a stick or two of firewood while the tub filled. The boiler's supply of water was topped off from a reservoir on the roof of their wing, the same reservoir that supplied cold water directly.
Pol added some herbs and salts to his bathwater and climbed in with a sigh of utter content as the hot water soothed his aches.
And that is another thing entirely missing on circuit. Give me a hot bath, and I am a happy man.
:Deprive you of one, and you are intolerable.:
:That's because I care if I offend people with my odor,: Pol retorted. :You might not mind smelling like a horse, but I do!:
He was rewarded by Satiran's mental snicker.
There was, after all, another and equally compelling reason for Pol to spend at least half his time here at the Collegium, and her name was Elenor.
His youngest daughter Elenor.
He smiled at the thought of her, as he always smiled, as anyone who ever encountered Elenor smiled. She was a child who seemed to have been created to bring happiness to everyone around her. She was neither pretty, nor plain, but her personality sparkled so that no one ever thought her anything but lovely. Her sunny disposition brightened the gloomiest day; no one bent on a quarrel could sustain anger in her presence. As a Mind-Healer she was fulfilling every expectation of her teachers at Healer's Collegium. Her mother Ilea was every bit as proud of her as her father was.
Her mother, however, was needed elsewhere at the moment. Like Heralds, Healers had duties that superseded their own personal preferences, and the need for Healers to tend the wounded on the Border with Karse was of prime importance at the moment. Although the conflict between Karse and Valdemar had not erupted into open warfare lately, there was constant skirmishing and a constant stream of wounded. All the Healers of the Collegium took that duty in turn; Ilea had been excused as long as her youngest child was below the age of thirteen, but once Elenor was well into puberty, the duty could be put off no longer.
Neither Pol nor Ilea wanted to leave Elenor totally without a parent's presence, so Pol had been very glad when he was called back to Haven.
He wondered now and again, though, if she really needed him. Elenor at fourteen was as cool and levelheaded a girl as many twice her age. She seemed to have another Gift, that of good sense, and never got into the tangles and trials that the Trainees of all three Collegia of Heralds, Healers, and Bards, often found themselves embroiled in. In fact, Elenor was often found in the midst of a trouble, patiently sorting it before any of the adults realized that there was a problem.
My little girl is not so little anymore. Maybe when this last pupil was thoroughly grounded and it was time to hand him off, Pol ought to volunteer for field duty again. There were never enough Heralds for all the work, and eventually Ilea would be back again.
Time never stood still; both of Elenor's sisters had grown up and gone off on their own, after all. Kaika was somewhere north of Haven, a Bard making the same sort of rounds that a Herald did, but with the difference that she was the collector and disseminator of information and entertainment. Or rather, information disguised as entertainment. She'd gotten her Bardic Reds a good three years ago. Her sister Amaly had gotten her Greens three years before that, and a husband to boot. She and Ranolf were raising their own brood and tending to the hurts of a fairly sizable village in the southwest. Both of them had their own lives now, and in the not-too-distant future, so would Elenor. He couldn't guide and protect her forever, no matter how much he wanted to.
You'd think that after two of them growing up and flying away, I'd have gotten used to the idea that children never remain that way, he thought with a physical pang. He bit his lip to still the quiet ache in his heart. But, oh, how I wish they did....