What? Dave thought. Uh-oh.
It was all he had time for. “Bring forth Tore dan Sorcha,” cried Liane, “and with him Davor, our guest, that we may honor them!”
“Here they are!” a high voice cried from behind Dave, and suddenly goddamn Tabor was pushing him forward, and Levon, smiling broadly, had Tore by the arm, and the two sons of Ivor led them through the parting crowd to stand beside the Chieftain.
With excruciating self-consciousness, Dave stood exposed in the light of the fires, and heard Liane continue in the rapt silence.
“You do not know,” she cried to the tribe, “of what I speak, so I will dance it for you.” Oh, God, Dave thought. He was, he knew, beet-red. “Let us do them honor,” Liane said, more softly, “and let Tore dan Sorcha no more be named Outcast in this tribe, for know you that these two killed an urgach in Faelinn Grove two nights ago.”
They hadn’t known, Dave realized, wishing he could find a place to disappear, knowing Tore felt the same. From the electric response of the tribe, it was clear that they hadn’t had a clue.
Then the music began, and gradually his color receded, for no one was looking at him anymore: Liane was dancing between the fires.
She was doing it all, he marveled, spellbound, doing it all herself. The two sleeping boys in the wood, Tore, himself, the very texture, the mood of Faelinn Grove at night—and then somehow, unbelievably, whether it was alcohol or firelight or some alchemy of art, he saw the urgach again, huge, terrifying, swinging its giant sword.
But there was only a girl in the ring of fire, only a girl and her shadow, dancing, miming, becoming the scene she shaped, offering it to all of them. He saw his own instinctive leap, then Tore’s, the urgach’s brutal blow that had sent Tore smashing into a tree…
She had it dead-on, he realized, astonished. Then he smiled, even through his wonder and stirring pride: of course, she’d listened in while they told Ivor. He felt like laughing suddenly, like crying, like some kind, any kind of articulation of emotion as he watched Liane dance his own desperate parry of the urgach’s sword, and then, finally, Tore’s hurled dagger—she was Tore, she was the blade, and then the toppling, like a mighty tree, of the beast. She was all of it, entire, and she wasn’t a stupid girl after all.
Ivor saw the urgach sway and fall, and then the dancer was herself again, Liane, and she was whirling between the fires, her bare feet flying, jewelry flashing on her arms, moving so fast her hair, short as it was, lifted behind her as she exploded in a wild celebration of dance, of the deed in the night wood, of this night, and the next, and the days, all of them, of everything there was before the hour came that knew your name.
With a lump in his throat he saw her slow, the motion winding down until she stopped, her hands across her breasts, her head lowered, motionless, the still point between the fires; between the stars, it seemed to him.
A moment the third tribe was still with her, then there came an explosion of cheering that must have rocketed beyond the camp, Ivor thought, beyond the lights of men, far out into the wide dark of the night plain.
He looked for Leith in that moment, and saw her standing among the women on the other side of the fires. No tears for her; she was not that sort of woman. But he knew her well enough after so many years to read the expression on her face. Let the tribe think the Chieftain’s wife cool, efficient, unruffled; he knew better. He grinned at her, and laughed when she flushed and looked away, as if unmasked.
The tribe was still buzzing with the catharsis of the dance and the killing that had led to it. Even in this, Liane had been wilful, for he was not at all sure this was how he would have chosen to tell them of the urgach, and it was his place to decide. It couldn’t be kept hidden, for the auberei would have to take word on their ride to Celidon tomorrow, but once more, it seemed, his middle child had gone her own way.
How could he be angry, though, after this? It was always so hard, Ivor found, to stay angry with Liane. Leith was better at it. Mothers and daughters; there was less indulgence there.
She had judged it rightly, though, he thought, watching her walk over to Tore and the stranger and kiss them both. Seeing Tore redden, Ivor decided that not the least cause for joy this night might be the reclaiming of the outcast by this tribe. And then Gereint rose.
It was remarkable how tuned the tribe was to him. As soon as the blind shaman moved forward into the space between the fires, some collective thread of instinct alerted even the most intoxicated hunter. Gereint never had to gesture or wait for silence.
He’d looked silly before, Ivor reflected, watching the shaman move unassisted between the flames. Not anymore. However he might look with eltor juice dripping from his chin, when Gereint rose in the night to address the tribe, his voice was the voice of power.
He spoke for Ceinwen and Cernan, for the night wind and the dawn wind, all the unseen world. The hollowed sockets of his eyes gave testimony. He had paid the price.
“Cernan came to me with the greyness of dawn,” Gereint said quietly. Cernan, thought Ivor, god of the wild things, of wood and plain, Lord of the eltor, brother and twin to Ceinwen of the Bow.
“I saw him clear,” Gereint went on. “The horns upon his head, seven-tined for a King, the dark flash of his eyes, the majesty of him.” A sound like wind in tall grass swept through the tribe.
“He spoke a name to me,” Gereint said. “A thing that has never happened in all my days. Cernan named to me this morning Tabor dan Ivor, and called him to his fast.”
Tabor. And not just named by the shaman after a dream. Summoned by the god himself. A thrill of awe touched Ivor like a ghostly finger in the dark. For a moment he felt as if he were alone on the Plain. There was a shadow with him, only a shadow, but it was the god. Cernan knew his name; Tabor dan Ivor, he had called.
The Chieftain was brought unceremoniously back to the reality of the camp by the high scream of a woman. Liane, of course. He knew without looking. Flying across the ring, almost knocking over the shaman in her haste, she sped to Tabor’s side, no longer a red spirit of dance and flame, only a quicksilver, coltish girl fiercely hugging her brother. Levon was there, too, Ivor saw; more quietly, but as fast, his open face flashing a broad smile of delight. The three of them together. Fair and brown and brown. His.
So Tabor was in Faelinn tomorrow. At that thought, he looked over and saw Tore gazing at him. He received a smile and a reassuring nod from the dark man, and then, with surprise and pleasure, another from giant Davor, who had been so lucky for them. Tabor would be guarded in the wood.
He looked for Leith again across the ring of fire. And with a twist in his heart, Ivor saw how beautiful she was, how very beautiful still, and then he saw the tears in her eyes. Youngest child, he thought, a mother and her youngest. He had a sudden overwhelming sense of the wonder, the strangeness, the deep, deep richness of things. It filled him, it expanded within his breast. He couldn’t hold it in, it was so much, so very much.
Moving within the ring to a music of his own, Ivor, the Chieftain, not so old after all, not so very, danced his joy for his children, all of them.
Chapter 12
Tabor, at least, was no baby. Ivor’s son, Levon’s brother, he knew where to lie in the wood at night. He was sheltered and hidden and could move easily at need. Tore approved.
He and Davor were in Faelinn Grove again. Their guest had, surprisingly, elected to delay his journey south in order to watch over the boy with him. Tabor, Tore thought, had made a strong impression. It wasn’t unusuaclass="underline" he liked the boy himself. Characteristically, Tore gave no thought to the possibility that he himself might be another reason for Dave’s reluctance to leave.