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‘Dalla, Dalla, you pour out your life for us, don’t you?’
She could see genuine concern in his dark violet eyes, a compassion far different from his usual romantic longing. When he laid the back of a gentle hand against her cheek, she let it rest there for a moment before she turned away.
‘I’ll be all right,’ she repeated. ‘We have to go tell the prince.’
Ever since his father’s death some three years previously, Daralanteriel was technically a king, the overlord of the legendary Seven Cities of the far west, but since their ruins had lain abandoned for over a thousand years, everyone referred to him as a prince. It seemed more fitting to save the title of king for a man who had something to rule. Even so, Daralanteriel tran Aledeldar, Prince of the Seven Cities and Ranadar’s Heir, travelled with a retinue these days. Along with a hand-picked group of sword warriors, Dallandra with her dweomer and Calonderiel with his band of archers kept the royal family constant company. If the Horsekin should raid, they’d find the prince well guarded.
Daralanteriel’s tent, the largest in the Westlands, dominated the centre of the camp. The deer hides that covered the wood frame had been cut into straight panels, laced together, then painted. On the tent flap and around the opening hung painted garlands of red roses, so realistically portrayed that it seemed one might smell them. The rest of the tent sported views of Rinbaladelan in its days of glory. One panel portrayed the high tower near the harbour, another the observatory with its great stone arcs, a third the temple of the sun, so detailed that it seemed one might walk among them – not, of course, that anyone alive had ever seen the actual city to judge the accuracy of the paintings. The artist had followed the descriptions in a book belonging to Daralanteriel’s scribe, Meranaldar. While the book was a copy of a work saved from the destruction of Rinbaladelan, some twelve hundred years previously, it lacked any actual drawings.
Even though they were royal, Dallandra found Dar’s wife and daughter sitting on the ground in front of their tent like any other Westfolk family would do, sharing a meal of roast rabbit and flatbread. Dressed in a loose tunic over doeskin breeches, Princess Carramaena of the Westlands knelt by the fire and poked at the coals with a green twig. Some few feet away, her eldest daughter, Elessario, sat with her knees drawn up and her arms clasped around them to allow her to rest her head upon them. Superficially the two women looked much alike, both of them blonde, with pretty heart-shaped faces. Their eyes, however, differed greatly. Elessario’s eyes were a dark yellow, and cat-slit like all elven eyes. Her mother, a human, had blue eyes and the round pupils of her kind. At the sight of the banadar, Elessario grinned.
‘Cal!’ Elessario said. ‘Where’s your son?’
‘Maelaber?’ Calonderiel said. ‘Taking his turn on horse guard. Where’s your papa?’
‘Doing the same thing.’ Elessi giggled, then hid her mouth with one hand. She was a changeling, or so the People called the wild children who’d been born to them over the years. Although she was the most normal of them, her mind had stopped developing when she’d been about twelve years old.
‘Then I’d best go fetch him.’ Calonderiel glanced at Carra. ‘We’ve had some bad news.’
‘I’ll come, too!’ Elessario scrambled to her feet.
‘Say please,’ Carra said.
‘Please, Cal? Can I come with you?’
‘You may.’ Calonderiel gave her a smile. ‘But you’ll have to be careful around the horses.’
They hurried off, Elessario talking all the while. Carra shook her head and sighed.
‘My poor little changeling! To think we thought she’d be the queen of the Westlands one fine day.’ Over the years Carra had become fluent in Elvish, though one could still hear Deverry’s rolled R’s and Rh’s in her accent. ‘I’m so glad we’ve had other children.’
‘So am I. You must be looking forward to seeing the girls. I’m assuming they’ll come to the festival.’
‘They’d better, or I’ll have some harsh words for them. Perra must have had her baby by now, too. I can hardly wait to see them both.’
Dallandra smiled and sat down near her. ‘Some news – I’ve heard from Salamander.’
‘Has he found Rhodry?’
‘Not to say found him, but he did see him, flying over the Melyn River. He’s not sure whether or not Rhodry saw him, or heard him, either. Dragons make a lot of noise when they fly.’
‘I remember Arzosah, yes, flapping those huge wings of hers.’ Carra paused, suddenly sad. ‘Dalla, is there anything anyone can do for him? Rhodry, I mean, to change him back again. I can’t bear it, thinking of his being like that forever. He would have died for us, after all.’
‘In a way, he did. Unfortunately I don’t have the dweomer to bring him back. I honestly don’t know if anyone does.’
Carra bit her lip hard.
‘Well, he may be perfectly happy,’ Dalla went on. ‘In a way, he’d stopped being human long before Evandar gave him dragon form. You saw him after battles. That berserker laugh!’
‘I can hear it still, yes, whenever I think of him. If only Evandar were still alive! Do you think he could turn Rori back?’
‘Oh, undoubtedly, but he’s gone. I don’t know if any other dweomermaster will ever match his power.’
‘Probably not.’ Carra reached up and touched her cheek, still as smooth and unlined as a young lass’s. ‘It’s because of Evandar that I’ve not aged, isn’t it? He told me once he’d give me a gift, and it’s this, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, indeed, you’ve guessed his riddle.’ Dallandra felt her voice waver. ‘He did love riddles, and his elaborate jokes.’
‘You still miss him, don’t you?’
Dallandra nodded, fighting back tears. Over the years the true mourning had left her. Whole months would pass with never a thought of Evandar, but now and again, she would remember some detail of their time together, and the grief would stab her to the heart.
Fortunately a distraction arrived in the person of Carra’s youngest child. Followed by a pair of big grey dogs and a stream of Wildfolk, Rodiveriel came running. Laughing, he threw himself into Carra’s lap. The dogs flopped down, panting, displaying wolfish fangs. They had white faces and a black stripe of coarser hair down their grey backs like wolves as well, but they were, or so Carra assured everyone, merely dogs, descendants of the loyal pet that had guarded her when Elessi was an infant.
‘What’s all this, Rori?’ Carra said, smiling.
‘Nothing.’ He slid off to sit on the ground near the dogs. ‘I’m tired, but I don’t want to go to bed yet. It’s not even truly dark.’
‘All right, then, but when it’s truly dark, in you go.’
He made a face at her but said nothing. He’d inherited his father’s raven-dark hair, but his eyes, though a pale grey like Dar’s, were human in shape. His name was a hybrid – Carra had wanted to honour Rhodry, the man who’d saved her life all those years past. And yet he was also the Marked Prince of the Seven Cities, assuming of course, that the kingdom ever came back to life. If the cities did become a prize worth fighting over, would the People accept a man with human blood as their ruler? Dallandra doubted it. There’s trouble enough to worry about without that, she told herself. If the Horsekin murder us all, no one’s going to care about a dead kingdom anyway.
Late into the night the men talked of war. Dalla left them when the stars had completed half their wheel of the sky and went to her tent to sleep. Yet an omen-dream woke her in the grey light of dawn. She sat up and stared at the tent bags hanging on the wall, but in her mind she was seeing the omens.