She cleaned up and headed for the table, to find Tarma, Jadrie, and the twins making serious inroads on Cook's latest creation. It involved finely-chopped meat and vegetables, cheese -- something vaguely like sheets of pastry -- and there Kethry's knowledge ended.
"Pull up a plate and tuck in," Tarma urged. "I haven't a clue what this is, but it's marvelous!"
The twins looked up with full mouths and slightly-smeared cheeks, nodded vigorously in agreement, and dove back in. All of the "home children" were used to eating things they didn't recognize and were prepared to enjoy them, partly because of their cheerful tempers, and partly because they had always been used to eating things they didn't recognize. They had spent their entire lives shuttling between the school-manor, with fairly ordinary fare, and the Dhorisha Plains. Shin'a'in cuisine was not something that most Rethwellans would be at all familiar with, and there often was not much choice in what they were offered when on the road.
Cook came in with a loaf of hot bread and a pot of butter, wearing a look of anxious inquiry on his face. "Tasty dead horse, Cook!" Jadrie called, and ducked as he mimed a blow at her. It was an old joke between them, since the time when Jadrie had pestered him as a toddler, wanting to know what was in each dish he made. He had finally gotten annoyed at her incessant questions and snapped, "Dead horse! Can't you see the tail?" From that moment on, any time Cook presented them with an experiment, Jadrie referred to it as a "dead horse."
"I wasn't certain, before, but I think this would be a good school dish," Cook said to Kethry. "It's easily made ahead and kept warm next to the ovens. Do you think the students would eat it?"
"If they won't, I'll eat theirs for 'em," Lyan said with his mouth full.
Jadrek laughed. "With that kind of enthusiasm before them, I imagine they will, Devid," he replied. "This is definitely one of your better experiments."
Cook beamed his pleasure, and hurried back to the kitchen to supervise the cleaning up. The rest of the meal proceeded in pleasant silence as the mystery dish and the hot bread and butter vanished away like snow in sunshine. Even Kethry, who normally wasn't all that hearty an eater, found herself unusually hungry after her work in the still-room, and was absorbed completely in the meal.
It wasn't until she had eaten the last bite that she could possibly hold and looked up that she realized not everyone had come to lunch -- or, apparently, were expected to.
"Estrel and Justin and Ikan went down to the village to meet the new Healer-Priestess and they took Jadrek Minor with them," Jadrie said, as Kethry noticed that the other three places weren't set. "Estrel put the babies down for their naps before she left, and Warrl is watching them. Cook said he'd save them lunch; they expected to be back by the time the babies' naps were over."
"Then I'd better supervise the nursery until they get back, and give Warrl a break," Tarma said, not only willing, but eager. "Jadrie, will you and the twins-"
Just at that moment, Kethry felt the room drop away from under her, a wash of anger threaten to overwhelm her, and a surge of nameless emotions hit her with a force that made her gasp. Unconsciously, she braced herself on the table, as her family turned to stare at her with varying degrees of surprise and concern.
And for a moment, she didn't recognize what had hit her, it had been so long-
"Need," she gasped, when she got her breath back. "It's Need! Something's wrong, something horrible has happened-"
"To whom?" Tarma demanded. "Can you tell?" Her face paled. "Dear gods, surely not Estrel-"
Kethry shook her head, both in negation and to clear the tears of shock from her eyes. "Not Estrel, it's not in the direction of the village," she managed to reply. At least in all the time she'd been soul-bonded to the blade, she'd learned to pick out which direction that "trouble" was coming from. "But it can't be too far away, not more than a day's ride at most, or it wouldn't be this strong-"
Jadrie and the twins stared at her with alarm and dismay. Of course, they've never seen me like this before, Need hasn't grabbed me like this in years-
"Should we send out a hunter or something-" Jadrek began, and Tarma snapped her fingers.
"Of course!" she said, then frowned in concentration. "Keth, what direction?"
"North, north and a little east," she replied, as sure of it as if she was the needle of a compass pointing to the source that was wrenching at her skull and heart.
A door slammed somewhere, as Tarma said, "Warrl's on it. He's faster in this weather than anyone, and he'll find out exactly where the trouble is. Can you hold out until he calls me or comes back himself?"
"I'll have to, won't I?" she replied grimly, for now the pull that the sword exerted on her had settled to a painful headache echoed by wire-tight muscles in her neck, shoulders, and stomach. "This isn't something we can delegate. We'd better get ready to ride. Jadrek-"
How do I tell my beloved that he'll only be in the way?
"I won't be of much use to you, dearest," he admitted without rancor, a fact that brought tears of gratitude to her eyes. "Or rather, I will be of more use to you here with the children. What can I do to help prepare?"
"Travel packs; you know what I need," she said immediately. The mere thought that she wouldn't have to try and think through this pain to select what she would require came as a profound relief.
"I'm on it, love." Jadrek pushed away from the table and left the room, as quickly as he could.
Tarma took over, as the three children stared, dismayed and frightened. "Children, you three get Hellsbane and Ironheart ready. Jadrie, you've had lessons in provisioning, you make up the packs for the horses. I'm depending on you to get it right. Boys, saddle and harness the mares, and when Jadrie's put the packs together, bring them to the riding arena. Go."
The children scrambled to their feet and sped out of the room like three hornets from a roused nest. Tarma turned to Kethry, who was taking slow, even breaths, and trying to get a little magical shielding between herself and the pain. "Keth, get to your rooms and get changed. I'll tell Cook what's going on, and he can handle the servants until Jadrek has time to deal with them, I'll get changed and collect the medical kit and traveling cash, and I'll meet you at the riding arena. Good?"
She nodded; in a moment or two she would be able to walk. "Right," she replied, and as Tarma left her alone in the room, she began a silent colloquy with the sword hanging on the wall of her sitting room, trying to persuade it that nothing was going to happen unless it gave her -- not freedom, but a long enough leash to act.
Old warriors never let their fighting gear get out of condition; that is how they become old warriors in the first place. Tarma's armor and weapons were always kept oiled, polished, and in a place of honor on the proper stands in her room. When the family made its annual summer pilgrimage to the Plains, she wore it religiously, even though in all the years she had done so, they had never once been set upon.