Morningstar by David Gemmell Read Free Book Online Page B

and I had seen the return of the village men. And now, as the winter sunlight faded, I was standing outside the hut staring out over the cold lake.
    An old woman came walking across the mud flats. She was tall and thin, her bony body covered with a long woolen gown, her shoulders wrapped in a plaid shawl. Upon her head was a leather cap with long ear pieces tied with thongs beneath her chin. She was carrying a sack, and she walked with the long strides of a man. I took her to be more than seventy years old.
    “Do you not bow in the presence of a lady, Owen Odell?” she asked, stopping before me.
    I was shocked and did not move for a moment; then good manners reasserted themselves. “My apologies,” I said, extending my left leg and bowing low, sweeping my left arm out in a graceful half circle. “Have we met before?”
    “Perhaps,” she answered, smiling. Her face was lined, but good high cheekbones prevented the skin from sagging. Her lips were thin, and her eyes, deep-set beneath shaggy brows, were bright blue. Forty years before she must have been a handsome woman, I thought.
    “Indeed I was,” she said brightly. “Thank you for looking beyond the crone and seeing the true Megan.”
    “You are a magicker, then?”
    “Of sorts,” she agreed, walking past me to her hut.
    Jarek was asleep on the bed. Megan carried her sack to the rear of the room, tipping the contents onto a wide table. All kinds of leaves and roots had been gathered, and these she began to separate into small mounds. I moved behind her, looking down at the first mound. I recognized the flowers instantly as eyebright, downy leaves with white petals tinged with violet and with a yellow spot at the center of the bloom.
    “You are a herbalist also, madam?” I inquired.
    “Aye,” she answered. “And doctor, meat curer, midwife. You know this plant?”
    “My nurse used to make an infusion of its leaves for winter colds,” I told her.
    “It is also good for preventing infection in wounds,” she said, “and for relieving swollen eyes.”
    I cast my eyes over the other plants. There was wild thyme, figwort, dove’s foot, woundwort, sanicle, and several others I could not recognize.
    “Your magick is strong, Megan,” I said.
    “There is no magick in gathering plants,” she muttered.
    “Oh, but there is when it is winter and none of them grow. You have a spell garden somewhere, and your enchantment works there even while you sleep.”
    “You have a long tongue, Owen Odell,” she said, a short curved blade hissing from the leather scabbard at her waist, “and I have a sharp knife. Be advised.”
    I looked into her eyes. “An empty threat, madam,” I told her, keeping my voice low.
    “How would you know?” she asked. “You cannot read my thoughts.”
    “No, but I like you, and that is purely on instinct. My magick may not be strong, but my instincts usually are.” She nodded, and her eyes lost their coldness. Smiling, she slipped the skinning knife back into its sheath.
    “Aye, sometimes instincts are more reliable than magick. Not often, mind! Now make yourself useful and build up the fire. Then there are logs to be cut. You will find an ax in the lean- to behind the house. After that you can help me prepare the hanging birds.”
    I learned something that evening: Physical labor can be immensely satisfying to the soul. There was a stack of logs, sawn into rounds of roughly two feet in length. They were of various thicknesses, and the wood was beech, the bark silvery and coarse but the inner bright and the color of fresh cream. The ax was old and heavy, with a curved handle polished by years of use. I placed a log upon a wide slab of wood and slashed at it, missing by several inches. The ax blade thudded into the slab beneath, jarring my arms and shoulders. More carefully I lifted it again, bringing it down into the center of the log, which split pleasingly.
    As I have said, I was not a small man, though I had little muscle. I was