“Who’d come home at this hour, in this storm?” Elfwyn said. The horses were growing disturbed, and stirred and made sounds in the dark, treading on something they’d already broken. “If we have to, run out the door.”
“But we’ll freeze out there!”
“Never mind that! Just get out! Bandits live out in the borderlands. They may have gotten desperate for shelter.”
The door came open, and a shadow entered.
And stopped.
“Well,” the shadow said, an old man’s voice. “Well! Who’s in here?”
“More than one of us,” Elfwyn said aloud, as boldly as he could manage. He stood up, plotting his way to the door; but the old man’s voice gave him a little reassurance. “We needed shelter from the cold.”
“Oh, well.” The old man pulled the door shut, making it utter dark, and Elfwyn squeezed Aewyn’s hand. It still wasn’t hopeless. The man had worked the snow away from the door. It would give, now, if they ran for it. The horses would bolt. They might catch them, if they were lucky.
A spark showed in the dark, midway of the old man’s height. A wisp of tinder caught, and floated, held, doubtless, in a tinder pick, and flared into flame, showing the hint of a pale wax candle near it. It died. Once again, the old man tried the light, showing gray hair and the hint of an old man’s bearded face near that candle.
“There’s wood in the fireplace, sir,” Elfwyn said. Candles, especially old ones, were exceptionally difficult to light from a tinderbox. “We laid a fire.”
“Oh, indeed, did you?” The old man stumped over in the direction of the fireplace, a noise in utter darkness.
“We’re sorry about bringing the horses inside,” Aewyn said. “Whatever they broke, my father will gladly recompense. He’ll be very grateful for our return.”
Again the little light, lower, this time. The man might be running out of tinder, and they all would be in the dark. Elfwyn wished he might succeed. A little wish, given the makings and the right conditions, might help, so Gran always said.
The fire took, and blossomed, and the old man added more tinder, coming clear, with his white hair, his white beard, which came midway of his chest, and a ragged brown cloak. He fed the fire for a moment, and Elfwyn felt somewhat less afraid, seeing the man was quite elderly and frail. The voice had not entirely indicated that. But he still kept hold of Aewyn’s arm.
The horses were well awake now, and restless. The light showed they had backed into a set of shelves last night, and ruined a copper pot, which suffered worse damage now. The whole place was thickly coated in dust, and wind-torn cobwebs veiled the rafters.
“Horses and all, is it?” the old man said. “There’ll be grain in the bin, there.” He indicated the dusty bin by the door.
“That’s nice, but they mustn’t eat what’s moldy,” Aewyn said under his breath, leaning next to Elfwyn and speaking so only he could hear, but when Elfwyn opened it, the grain was as fresh as if it had just come in at harvest, and there was a good wooden bucket in the grain for hauling it out. He brought it to the horses and strewed it in a thick line along the floor, gaining the animals’ instant attention.
“Water in the barrel,” the old man said then. Aewyn lifted the lid, and Elfwyn looked, expecting ice. But it was water, for sure, and he filled the bucket and took a deep drink himself, and so did Aewyn, before they brought the bucket to the horses.
“We’re ever so grateful, sir,” Aewyn said, while his horse was drinking.
“Oh, well,” the old man said, and now there was a pot on the fire. “Use the other pail there, boy, and bring me water.”
“Yes, sir,” Elfwyn said, and indeed there was a second wooden bucket, in the corner. He brought water and poured it in the iron pot, which had already begun to heat on its pothook. The fireside gave off a fierce warmth, and the old man added more wood.
“Sack,” the old man said, and indeed, there was a sack by the door, where he might have dropped it coming in. Aewyn brought it, and the old man delved into it, drawing out a large loaf of bread, a half a sausage, and a round of cheese, which he laid out on the sacking on the fireside. And meanwhile, though Elfwyn had seen nothing but water go into the pot, a savory smell began to go up from it, and steam to rise.
“Bowls on the shelf,” the old man said, and there were three rust-brown glazed bowls, as clean as if they had come from the royal kitchens.
They had not been there a moment ago. Elfwyn would swear they had not. And despite his hunger, he conceived a reluctance to have any of that food in his belly.
“Food can be a bargain,” he said so Aewyn would hear him. “And I’m not sure it’s a bargain we should be making with a stranger.”
“Ah,” the old man said. “Be free of it, be quite free. That makes it safe, does it not?”
It ought to, unless there was something of more substantive harm in it. He had no enemy but the priests in Guelemara and his own mother, but he had something of value, something of wizardous value, next to his skin, and he began thinking that thatmight have drawn attention to them—attention far more dangerous than bandits.
“Sit, sit,” the old man said. “Bring the bowls, don’t gawk about, and sit down. You’re a scruffy pair, you are. And two fine horses. Might you be horse thieves?”
“I am no thief, sir,” Aewyn said in round, elegant, Guelen tones, and Elfwyn caught him by the arm and pulled him down by him at the fireside. In the other hand he had the three bowls, and set them down on the hearthside. The old man dipped up savory stew, and served it—could they, he wondered, possibly just have lost track of time, and dreamed the beginning, and forgotten how the old man had come here? But the wind blew, if anything, more furiously outside, and thumped away at the shutters. And he was aware of no gaps in his memory.
The old man had done them and their horses nothing but kindness. Elfwyn tasted the food very gingerly, and decided he took no harm of it. Aewyn supped it right down, with bits of bread, and Elfwyn found it so filling he had no need of cheese or sausage to go with it. Aewyn, beside him, had propped himself against the stonework of the fireplace, and nodded, but Elfwyn kept staring at the bowls, which he would swear had not been there before the old man wanted it, and the remnant of the broth, which could not have come from anything he had seen go into the pot.
The old man had worn a tattered brown cloak; but when he looked up, it was gray, and the old man wore a silver medallion, a design he had never seen before, a twisting thing, like a snake, or a dragon, and what had been grizzled gray hair streaked with black had become snowy white.
Worse and worse.
He would have run out into the night if he’d had a choice, but Aewyn snored away, beside him, and one of the horses had been indiscreet, right in the corner—it lent a touch of rural strangeness to the night.
“Excuse me, sir,” he said, and got up and went to clean up the problem with a ratty broom and some straw from a pile in the corner: he swept it out the door, not without traces, and a lingering barn smell. He could run, he thought. But he could not leave Aewyn helpless. It was impossible to run.
He set the broom aside, and went to sit at the hearth, arms about his knees, looking steadily at the old man, wishing desperately for the sun to come up.
“You push at the world itself,” the old man said, “but cannot budge it.”
“No, sir,” he said, more and more disturbed, distracted by dread. How had the old man known what he was thinking?
“The sun will come in its own time,” the old man said, and wove a little pattern with his fingers. The gusts of cold air, the drafts… all stopped, and the room was breathless.
“My name is Emuin,” the old man said, “and yours is Elfwyn.”
Emuin. The Emuin of Gran’s stories was dead. Surely he was dead. That Emuin had been an old, old man, even his whole lifetime ago.