The Wanderer by Cherry; Wilder, Katya Reimann Read Free Book Online Page B

matter of laughter, a prince so cowed by his mother’s sins that he might swear himself to the celibate life.
    The Druda nodded. “It is a darker thing than you young folk can comprehend, if Prince Matten will cede to it. I have heard on the wind that Kelen of Lien has fallen ill, and Matten …” He paused. “The Prince is little older than your brother Bress. What say you, Gael? Is such a boy, even a prince, ready to make such choices in his own life?”
    Gael thought seriously, wondering at the Druda’s question. She thought of her own promise to train as a kedran, short months past, of the attack at Hackestell and all the things of the life to which she was now committed. “I am not sure if even one so old as myself would be ready,” she said. “But where the choice is so much bigger than oneself, there is no choice in truth but to rise to the occasion.”
    “That is a good answer, Gael Maddoc,” said the Druda. “An answer such as I am coming ever more to expect from you.” She did not know what he could mean, but with those words he smiled, and dismissed her to join her companions.
    II
    The work went on with the drills. Jehane and Gael trained with the bows, with the long, double-edged “kedran” swords, and finally, mounted, with the lance. Now the entire muster had settled into the Halfway House, the great inn for travelers, no more than twenty miles from the Great Eastern Rift. The folk who ran the inn were half-Shee, a populous family named Cluny. Druda Strawn received special treatment and a special rate for the recruits.
    The High Ground was the domain of the Eilif lords of the Shee, and mortal men continued to respect their tenure. Armies had marched over the plateau, and the precious metals and jewels had been mined out, but there were few permanent settlements and no garrisons south of the Halfway House. Before they rode out in the early morning Druda Strawn offered greeting and prayers to the Shee. Gael believed she sensed their
presence. She asked Jehane how it was to have the blood of the Shee, from her grandmother, but the dark beauty said she had no special powers. In fact it might make it harder for her to make a good match—or so her father teased her mother.
    In the evenings Jehane worked with Gael at her reading. Only Jehane and Prys Oghal and a weaver’s son they called Little Low could read. The Druda had a store of primer books on parchment and vellum, as well as slates and cakes of chalk, for the reading lessons. Gael worked hard, but her written script lagged behind the reading. Jehane praised her for knowing two languages already—Chyrian as well as the common speech, and swore that it would one day come in handy.
    The day soon came when they all set out from the Halfway House and rode down into the Eastern Rift, that long, fertile valley, and saw the manors of the Rift Lords and the thriving Rift villages. They rode as far as the eastern end of the valley to Cloudhill, the famous horse farm where Yorath Duaring and Knaar of Val’Nur had trained with Strett of Andine. Strett had been a man legendary in his own day for his honor, his generosity, his noblesse; overcoming the bastardy of his birth, he had built his holdings upon principle and virtue. His death at Silverlode had been a great tragedy for Mel’Nir and was still spoken of with sorrow in the Rift villages they passed through.
    In the village of Ochma, they met an old soldier, Captain Gorrie, who had served with the Red Hundreds of Ghanor the Great King and had survived both the eerie disaster of the Adderneck Pass and the betrayal at Silverlode before he had turned away from the King’s service. He recounted how he had pledged himself to the Free Company of Yorath Duaring, and his eyes shone when he spoke of this leader, so fresh were his memories. He shook his head and said, smiling, there was no one like him. No warrior so tall and bold, yes, but he had a noble heart as well and cared for his people.
    In this chance