Guret crouched over that small form—my breath caught painfully. It was Nita I had pulled from beneath the water. One of the women massaged her ribs fiercely, then stooped to blow her own breath between the child’s blue lips. There was no sound save for those rhythmically breathed puffs of air—once, twice, thrice. I lost count, and still the woman worked…
A gasp from that soaked bundle, then another. An excited mutter from the grouped Kioga strengthened into a muted cheer as the girl on the ground began to breathe normally again.
Long moments later I turned away, realizing suddenly that if I did not sit, I would fall. Obred’s arm encircled my shoulders.
“Once more we owe you a debt we cannot possibly repay. You went after Nita, with full knowledge that your own life might be forfeit in the doing. I have never seen such courage.”
I sat, shaking my head in negation of his words. “Give me no such credit, Obred. I reacted before I could think—if I had thought, then I might well not have been able to summon the will. One cannot name that courage.”
“You will never hear otherwise from my lips, Lord.”
“What happened?” Now that I sat in the full light of the sun, with no sound but the rush of the river and the murmur of the others, the whole incident seemed unreal. Were it not for my soaked clothing, I could well imagine it had never happened.
“Nita’s horse slipped on a stone and fell, throwing her into the river. None of us were close enough to catch her.”
I heard a tread behind me but was too exhausted to look up until I heard Guret’s voice addressing Obred. “She is still sick from the water she swallowed, but she will be fine.”
The boy dropped to his knees beside me and, before I could naysay his action, took my hand between both of Ins and pressed it to his forehead. “Lord, I am in your doubt. Accept me as your liegeman, as is right.”
“I will accept you as friend, Guret, and be honored in the doing.” I found my voice, still rough from the rawness of my throat. “More than that, no. I am only thankful that Nita will recover.”
We talked a bit more, then I slept, while Obred oversaw the river crossing. When I awoke it was time for me to cross again, thankful that there had been no more mishaps. We camped that night on the opposite bank. I sat leaning against my bedroll, listening to one of the women recount a long story-song, about the spirit of the river, in the shape of an otter, playing tricks upon two would-be Kioga trappers. It was a funny telling, and I found myself laughing with the others.
Something touched my shoulder. Turning, I saw Guret, IMS arm around Nita’s waist. The girl looked weak and shaken still, but there was something of the old glint in her eyes. “You should be story-telling, Lord Kerovan. Everyone has heard of Otter and his trick, but only Guret and I have heard of the gryphon ’prisoned within a crystal globe, worn about a lady’s neck, and she all unknowing it was a live creature.”
“Nita!” I made haste to seat her beside me. “Where have you been?”
“I was the last to cross. Obred strung a rope, and I came through the river like a basket of rocks, with a loop tied around me. I told him I would cross with my horse, like any other, but he would not hear of it. He told me that you were already gone across, and I should not tempt the river to recapture what it once had within its fist.”
She paused, then looked once more straightly at me, her voice trembling. “I owe you my life, m’lord. I—” She swiped impatiently at her nose and eyes, tried once more. “I thank you…” Then she began to sob, and I touched her shoulder, dismayed to see brash Nita so undone. Her body quivered with convulsive shudders.
“It is the reaction to near death,” I told her brother, feeling helpless. “I have seen men taken so, after battles.” Clumsily I put an arm around her, drew her to me, wondering a bit if she would protest. But she did not, and we sat so for a long time, the only sound Nita’s quiet sobbing.
Finally Guret spoke, his voice pitched for my ears alone. “Lord? Are you truly a man? Or are you one of the Dream Spirits Nidu speaks of when she drums herself into a trance and walks other worlds?”
I looked over his sister’s head at him. “Truly a man, Guret, naught else. Though at times”—the youth’s dark eyes seemed to compel honesty from me—“I have been filled with the presence of another, from the past. One who is not of… this world. Although that was a long time ago.”
“Yet you have these.” The lad gestured at my hooves, curled beneath me as I sat.
I felt the old chill sweep through me but fought to keep my voice steady. “I was… born so. There was… other blood in my family, so say the tales. We are linked to the Old Ones.”
“And that is why you have the Power.”
“Who told you that?”
“Everyone can see that you are different, and the night you came, Obred spoke of the warning you gave that helped ward the rescue party from one of the deadly Shadowed places. You wear that.” He nodded at my wristband. “One not having the Power could not do so.”
“Perhaps you are right,” I admitted reluctantly, “but I have no lessoning in such. Nor want any, if truth be so known. I have no desire to be different inwardly, as I already am outwardly.”
The dark eyes glinted in the firelight. “Perhaps it is as you told me this morning. One who does not worry about holding responsibility—or Power—is not one who should have it.”
I smiled, albeit a little grimly. “My own words return to haunt me—but perhaps we should both consider them…”
That night, with the silent camp sleeping around me, I found myself wakeful as I lay in my bedroll. Memories of Nita’s rescue played themselves over in my mind, in a slowed-down manner, against my will. I saw, as if from outside myself, the spinning current, Nita’s small form, my own movements—seeming incredibly clumsy and ineffectual. Sweat sprang dank and clammy on my body at the realization of just how close death had come to claiming me—and Nita—beyond all rescuing. And against death, I thought, shivering though the night was balmy, man has no defense at all…
Not so, responded another part of my mind. Most men have those of their blood to follow them, and so, in a fashion, live on. I thought of Guret’s clear-eyed gaze, of Nita’s pert friendliness, and felt a pang of envy for their parents. What would it be like to have a son or daughter of my own to counsel, to comfort, as I had done today with Guret and Nita?
Joisan and I had been truly wed for three years, now. To my knowledge she had never used her Wisewoman’s learning to prevent conception, yet we had no children. This must mean that she could not conceive by me—once again I was too different from pure humankind.
I thought of my own boyhood when my father, though offering me all any son and heir was entitled to in the way of food, clothing, and training, had nevertheless held me at arm’s length insofar as any closeness, any sharing, was concerned. That his distance was partly due to my mother’s ensorcellment in her effort to turn him against the “monster” he had fathered, I had discovered only after his death—when it was too late. I remembered my childish vows, when, hurt by Ulric’s rejection, I had sworn that if I ever had a son I would never behave so… and then I recalled the soft, longing note in Joisan’s voice when she spoke of Utia’s child…
I took a deep breath, realizing that my hands were balled into fists, nails gouging my palms. Opening my eyes, I willed myself to relax, looking upward at the moon, once again waxing, and at the bright, bright stars. Here on the plains, with no trees to interrupt their sweep, they arced overhead in such brilliant profusion that it made one dizzy to look upon them. I seemed to shrink within myself, my sorrow to become a silly, maundering indulgence in the face of such eternal indifference.