Lelia wasn’t playing “My Lady’s Eyes” when Wil strolled up. She was sitting on a stump and playing, but the song she’d chosen was one from his own sector of Valdemar; a piece by the Bard Faber called “Seven White Horses.”
Vehs lingered nearby, a loose bit of rope around his neck. She’d tied him off to a dead sapling he could have snapped without breaking a sweat.
Her strings grew silent as Wil approached. She put the lute in its case, closed it with a snap, and walked over to Vehs, untying him and tucking the rope into her belt. She stood on tiptoe, whispered something in his ear, and then gave the Companion a kiss on one plump cheek.
Vehs looked away. To Wil, he seemed to be blushing.
Lelia approached Wil and looked up at him.
He steeled himself.
Be calm, he thought. Whatever you do, be calm. Be gentle. You’re a Herald, damnit. Act like one.
“I’m sorry,” she said. She patted him on the arm as she walked away.
Wil blinked stupidly, caught off guard. An ache started in his heart and throat, and grew the longer he stood there.
Damnit.
“Wait,” he said.
Her footsteps continued to fade away.
“Wait,” he said again, turning toward her.
She started to run.
Lelia didn’t want to know anymore.
She ran through the Grove like an arrow aimed at the Collegium. She’d write something—she had to—and it would be terrible—and unoriginal—and it would probably be about Sun and Shadow—and it would probably get her kicked out of the Bardic Collegium—and she would have to go back to juggling knives with her family—but she didn’t care—she didn’t care—she—
A white shape flashed to her right. Vehs leaped in front of her. She flailed to a stop, sliding in the grass and leaves, clutching her precious lutecase to her chest. She fell on her back and stared up at him.
Wil frowned down at her from Companion-back.
“Wait,” he said stubbornly.
She blinked, flinging tiny bits of tears from her lashes.
He dismounted and sat down next to her. “Just—wait.”
Crickets sang, nightingales warbled. Vehs’ white coat shone like moonlight, a silent challenge to the growing darkness.
“She didn’t die immediately,” Wil said at last. “It took a month. Her Companion—he carried her all the way to Haven, and then collapsed. He—died. She should have, too.
“But she didn’t. She held on. The Healers didn’t know why for the longest time. And then one day she woke long enough to Mindspeak something vital—some bit of intelligence she’d been holding on to. I was there. I saw her eyes when she slipped away—to the Havens.”
Somewhere, a frog gulped. Lelia said nothing and made no move except to breathe.
“The whole Heraldic Circle was in a fury,” Wil continued. “Everyone wanted the raiders who did it to her. It was a mess.”
He stared numbly into the darkness. To his surprise, he felt Lelia’s callused fingers close over his hand.
“She fought going,” he said, “because of duty. She had to fulfill it.”
“And to say good-bye.”
He looked at Lelia, startled. “What?”
“To you. To say good-bye.”
“To me? Why?”
She gave him a confused look. “Havens, Wil, she loved you. Why wouldn’t she want to say good-bye?”
Wil blinked stupidly, thunderstruck by the obviousness of her statement. In ten years, the thought so simply expressed to him now by a Bard-trainee had never once occurred to him.
His shoulders tightened and the aura of a headache threatened. He’d avoided it for so long—the memory of that moment when Daryann’s eyes had opened. The clamor of the Healers—the shouts for a Herald—Daryann’s head had turned toward him, like a north-needle gravitating toward its inexorable position—
He pushed past the pain of the loss, and allowed himself to finally, really remember that moment.
She had seen him.
“She winked,” he said slowly. “She winked at me.”
Something inside him broke free. He felt as if an old weight—one he’d forgotten was there—had been lifted away.
Lelia’s hand slid off of his. He heard the lutecase open and the hum of the disturbed strings as she pulled it out. Notes—bittersweet and haunting—rose from the belly of the instrument, hanging in the air.
Lelia sang.
“Bring them home,” she began, directing the lyrics at Vehs. “White guardian . . .”
And it just kept going from there. She knew, as it bubbled out of her, that it wasn’t a six-verse piece of genius. The lyrics weren’t terribly clever. The melody had none of the flash of “My Lady’s Eyes.” But it came straight from her heart, the truest expression of what she felt. It was exactly the song she could write at that moment, it was complete, it was hers, and it was enough.
The Grove had fallen into silence by the time she finished.
“Not really about her,” she said at last. “More for her than about her. I think the bridge needs work. And—”
“It’ll do,” Wil said.
She rubbed her lute’s neck. “You think so?”
“I do.”
She nodded. “Me, too.”
The morning of her performance, Lelia got up at dawn and wandered down to watch as Lyle put the final touches on saddling Rivan.
“Where are you headed?” she asked.
“West,” he replied. “Not quite Evendim, but close. Forst Reach. Don’t know if you’ve heard of it—”
“Ashkevron holdings.” Her eyes flashed. “I’ve always wanted to see the famous manor.”
He smiled. “Ah yes. I forget that I speak with the Kingdom’s greatest authority on dead Heraldic heroes.”
“Only the pretty ones.” She eyed her twin critically. “You’ll say hello to Mother and Father?”
“Oh, hellfires. Are they out that way?”
“Lyle.”
He grinned. “If I can.”
“You’ll stay away from trouble?”
“Of course.”
“And at the first sign of danger, you’ll ride straight back to Haven and let the Army handle it?”
He nodded solemnly. “I promise.”
She smiled and stood up on tiptoe, throwing her arms around him. “Be safe,” she whispered in his ear.
“If we meet not in this Haven,” he whispered back, “we shall meet in another.”
She let him go, and then turned toward Rivan.
“Bring him home,” she sang to him.
The stallion tossed his head in a Companion’s nod.
Wil strode in, decked out in riding leathers.
“Are you two ladies going to stand around clinging to each other all day, or are we going to leave?” he asked, glowering.
“I believe my instructor is not what one might call a ‘morning person’,” Lyle said in a mock whisper to Lelia.
“Surely,” she “whispered” back, “he could take lessons in charm from Alberich.”
“Bright Lady.” Wil rolled his eyes. “I’ll have to ask the Dean what I did to deserve this.” He nailed Lelia with a look. “I need to have a word with your sister, Lyle. Alone.”
“Yes, m’lord Herald,” Lyle said, bowing his head and beckoning to Rivan. The two walked out, leaving Wil and Lelia in the Stable.
“Yes?” she asked.
He took a step forward, extending a fist. His fingers uncurled, revealing a silver necklace with the shield of Valdemar hanging off it.
“For you,” he said. “For luck.”
She blinked, reaching out and taking it gingerly.
His fingers closed over hers.