At each star point there stood another tall candle-holder, so that the wax cylinders so supported were on a level with Ursilla’s shoulder, well above my own head. The candles at the head and foot of the stone block were red, but those in the points were yellow.
In the corner of the room itself were braziers of the same silver as formed the candlesticks, each putting forth scented smoke, which curled up to the ceiling overhead where it gathered in a blanketing cloud.
Ursilla had put off her usual robe of dull gray, the coif of pleated linen that always wreathed her thin, sharply featured face and hid her hair. Now she stood, arms bare to the shoulders, hair dark, threaded with silver, lying loose over a robe of blue that drew the light of the silver moon overhead, until the fabric rippled with dazzling color.
On her breast lay a great ornament, also of silver, set with moonstones, the gems deeply milky, with about them some of the blue one sees in winter’s ice. And this pendant was fashioned in the form of a full moon.
My mother was also differently clad, though she was wont to go richly dressed always. Unlike Ursilla, she did not now appear more finely garbed than usual, but rather more simply. Her robe was orange, owning something of the orange of fire flames, across which her hair hung like a dark cloak. And the ornament she wore was not a moon, but rather an oval fashioned of copper, plain and un-gemmed.
She had led me into the chamber. Now she stood just beyond the edge of the star, her hands tightly gripping my shoulders as I stood before her, almost as if she feared that I might wish to escape. I was so overawed by what I saw that I did not think of what part I might be called upon to play here.
Ursilla moved about the block of stone, and, as she pointed her finger at each of the waiting candles, a small burst of flame answered her gesture as the wicks caught. At last, only the one directly before my mother and me remained unlit.
Now I was urged forward until we both crossed into the floor star. My mother, moving swiftly, caught me up, to lay me prone upon the stone of the table. As she settled me so, I felt suddenly drowsy, unable to move. Nor was I afraid.
The last of the star candles was crowned with flame. Now Ursilla lighted those at my head and feet in the same manner. While above, that waiting cloud of soft gray smoke began to descend. I felt the need to close my eyes. Faint and very far away, I heard a chanting rise. But the words had no meaning as I slipped into sleep.
When I awoke, it was early morning, and I lay in my own bed. I did not even have traces of dreams following me out of that strange sleep. However, the memory of its beginning clung. Again I sensed, young as I was, that I would not be told the meaning of what had happened to me. This was a secret thing about which it was best not to talk.
Commander Cadoc, my uncle, Lord Erach, and the main portion of the forces within the Keep were absent. They had gone with the Harvest gift of wine and grain to the holding of the Redmantle Clan Chief. So it was an older man who came to claim me that morning, one Pergvin whom I had seen many times before, since he was the outrider whenever Lady Eldris chose to move beyond the walls of the Keep.
In appearance, he was a man of middle years, and never a talkative one. Among his fellows he had a well-established place, as he was an expert swordsman and a good rider. But it would seem he had no ambition to climb higher in Erach’s service and was content with his life as it was. I was a little wary of him, for the one dark promise that lurked behind the excitement and small triumph of being promoted at last to the Youths’ Tower was the knowledge that there I would be largely at the mercy of my cousin Maughus. And since Pergvin was deemed of the Lady Eldris’s household, he would also be ready to favor my tormentor.
“Lord Kethan.” He spoke formally, sketching a gesture such as men used to an officer. Then he looked beyond me to where my mother stood, straight-backed, no shade of any emotion on the smooth face, which always bore a youthful glow as if she were still a young maid, with only the glitter of her eyes betraying the mind that was very old indeed in many ways.
“My Lady, Lord Erach has given me governorship over Lord Kethan for the while. All will be well with him—”
She nodded. “That I know, Pergvin. Son—” Now she spoke directly to me. “Bear well what lies now before you, put aside childhood, and reach for all that shall make you more speedily a man.”
My excitement had ebbed, my apprehension grew. For in those moments I felt myself far from a man, rather more and more of a child without any security in which I might trust. This Pergvin would take me from the safe cover that had sheltered me all my life, deliver me directly into another world in which Maughus had power and I no defense. That I could stand up to his bullying, I did not believe, having tasted too much of his sly trouble-making during the short visits when I had not been able to escape his company. But that I should ask for any aid, either from that stern person who was my mother, or from this stranger who had come to fetch me, that I would not do. For young as I was, I determined within myself that no one, above all Maughus, must ever guess I felt fear. That was the deepest shame, one I dared not allow myself to sink to.
“You will have a lonely time of it, Lord.” Pergvin had not taken me by the hand, I noted thankfully, as if I must be drawn reluctantly to a waiting doom. And when he spoke to me it was with the tone of one addressing an equal in age, not one trying to force awkward conversation with a small boy. “Lord Maughus has gone with the gift party, we shall have the Youths’ Tower mainly to ourselves.”
I hoped that my relief at that news was not openly manifest. At least some kind fate had given me a space of time in which to learn a little about this new life without having to be on guard against the spite of my cousin. I longed to ask questions, but my fear of being thought too much a child kept me quiet.
We had crossed the wide courtyard and were near the door of the Tower that was to be my new home when there was a sudden loud barking. A great, spotted hound flashed out of nowhere. To me he looked very large, and, as his lips drew back in a warning snarl, his fangs showed threateningly. But, just as he might have been about to leap at me, he flattened to the ground, his snarls changing to a whining. Though I knew very little of dogs, having seen them only at a distance, this behavior was not natural, of that I was sure. Whining, saliva dripping from his jaws, the dog faced me for a long moment. Then, with a loud cry, he backed away, snapping and snarling, as if he faced some enemy too strong to attack, before he fled, tucking his tail tight against his haunches.
I watched him go in dumb surprise. When he had first appeared I had known a flash of fear. Now this abject terror in the hound’s flight was utterly puzzling. Had Pergvin in some way caused that to protect me?
However, when I turned to gaze at my companion, I saw amazement as open as my own mirrored on his face. He studied me oddly, as if, before his eyes, I had somehow grown some monstrous form. Then he shook his head slightly, as if he might be trying so to brush off some confusing fog.
“Now that be a queer happening—” he said slowly, though I believed he spoke his own thought aloud and was not addressing me. “Why should Latchet do so?” He was frowning a little, though the puzzlement was still to be read along with that frown. “Eh, a queer thing that do be. Ah, well, we’d best step out briskly, my Lord. It be close on the nooning and this afternoon we must get you a mount—”
I found the food brought me by Pergvin much plainer than that served at my mother’s table, being mainly a round of cold meat, some cheese and bread. But all tasted good, and I left very few crumbs. When I had washed my hands in the table basin, I was willing enough to face my new lessons, which were to begin with riding.
My mother’s life had been strictly within the Keep walls, and the one or two times I had been beyond them were to walk through field or garden with one of her women. Neither she nor Ursilla had encouraged or allowed outside exploration. But if I learned to ride, then I, too, could see the wide world, perhaps next year accompanying my uncle on such a journey as Maughus this time shared. So eagerly I followed Pergvin to the stable that afternoon.