The Knight

Chapter 38. The Wind In The Chimney

It was raining hard by the time we reached the farm. One of the sons opened the barn for us, and we rode in and tethered our horses in a crowded herd. I told Pouk he had to unload the sumpter so it could rest while we ate.

“Ya won’t get no fancy meal,” the son warned me. “We’s plain folk here.”

“So am I, and so is Pouk.” I offered my hand. “I’m Sir Able.”

The son wiped his hand on his soaking trouser leg. “Duns’ my name, sar. ’Tis wet ‘n I begs your pardon fer it.”

“So is mine,” I told him. We shook hands, after which he shook hands with Pouk.

Uns joined us after that. At first I thought him only a shorter version of Duns; later on, when I got a look at him in a better light, I saw there was something the matter with his back.

I asked our hostess’s name, and Duns said, “Mother’s Nukara, sar, on’y she’s cookin’

‘n can’t come out ta talk ’til it’s ready, ‘n when ’tis we’ll eat.”

“I understand. If this rain keeps up, we may be begging you for beds as well as a meal, if you’ve got any to spare.”

“Won’t last ta moomrise,” Uns muttered. “Wind’s gonna die, rain keep a-goin’ awhile.” He was an excellent weather prophet, as I was to learn. Duns nodded. “We got da ’un bed ‘n that’s aw, sar, on’y I kin give ya mine.”

“I’ll sleep on deck, sir,” Pouk put in hastily. “You know I’m one what’s done it many’s a time.”

Seeing through him, I grinned. “At my door, to keep the ghost from killing me in my sleep.”

“Aye, sir. Try, sir.”

“Tomorrow we’ll have to ride back to Sheerwall, storm or no storm,” I told him. “I’m landsman enough for that. But we may stay here tonight, if our hostess is willing. If we stay, we must remember to unsaddle these horses and see that they’re fed. What do you think, Duns? Will Pouk and I catch sight of your ghost if we stay the night?”

“He’s no joke, sar.”

“Not to you, I’m sure. Maybe he shouldn’t be one to me either. When we were here before, your mother told me he crippled you for a year.” Duns nodded, his homely, sunburned face grim.

“Suppose I wanted a look at him. What should I do?”

Duns glanced at Pouk, saw he had finished unloading the sumpter, and motioned for us to follow him. “Get inna house first, sar, ‘n we kin dry off.” With Uns lagging behind, we followed Duns through the pelting rain to the front of the house, splattering ankle-deep mud at every step and ushered in by a roll of thunder loud enough to shake the walls. “Cap’n’s whistlin’,” Pouk said when we were inside and he could make himself heard.

I smiled and reminded him that most people would say that the Valfather was angry.

“Not at us he ain’t,” Duns declared. “We need this.”

Uns caught my sleeve. “If ya was ta sleep inna kitchen, mebbe.” He was answering the question I had asked out in the barn, but it took me a second to realize that.

Duns ran his fingers through his hair and shook water from them. “He’s a knight, ya coof! Knights don’t sleep inna kitchen. I’ll fetcha towel, sar. That way ya kin dry ya face, anyways.”

Pouk edged close enough to whisper, “Be a big fire in th’ kitchen, sir.” Shivering, and wet to the skin, I told Uns we wanted to say hello to our hostess, and promised we would not keep her from her cooking. He led us into the big, cheerful, tiled room, where we greeted her and warmed ourselves at the fire that was roasting our dinner.

As we ate it, Duns said,” Ya wanted ta know how ya could see it, sar, if ya was ta stay.”

I nodded, and added that I would gladly sleep in the kitchen if it would get me a glimpse of the ghost.

Nukara shook her head.

“All I kin tell ya’s what I done. I guess ma tolt what happent ta me.” I nodded again. “It seemed like it a very solid ghost.”

Duns nodded ruefully, and his mother eagerly. Uns only stared down at his plate.

“What I done was sit up da ’un night, sit up quiet ’til I heard somethin’.

Then I creept up quiet as I could. I kin show where I first seen it.”

“Maybe later.”

“’Twas hot ‘n da winders open, ‘n it jumpt out ’un, ‘n I caught up inna sout’ pasture. I’se a strong man.”

I said, “I know you are. I remember your grip.”

“I’se stronger den. On’y it’s stronger dan me. Lot stronger.” He was clearly shamed.

Nukara looked at me anxiously. “You’re not goin’ to wrestle it are you, Sir Able? The way Duns done? I thought you’d—I don’t know what.”

“I don’t—” I fell silent as the eerie howl of the wind filled the room, a ghost not nearly as substantial as the one I hoped to hunt down.

“Storm’s gettin’ worse,” Duns muttered.

“Yes.” I stood up.

Nukara looked surprised. “That was just the wind in the chimney, Sir Able.” I agreed, but I had recalled what Disiri had told me when we parted, and knew I had to go. Pouk rose too, but I made him sit back down and finish his food.

After that, I turned and went out, afraid that I would say or do something that would give my secret away. There was a covered porch at the back of the house, and I suppose I stood there for half a minute looking at the rain. That may have been why I missed her.

I do not know how long it took me to cross the fields and meadows and reach the woods on the other side. It was slow going and hard going, but I kept at it, head down, with the hood of my cloak pulled up as far as I could get it to give my face some protection. I started calling for her when I got close, and I was dumb enough to be happy that the wind had dropped and it seemed like she might hear me. The rain had slacked off by that time too, not stopped but not pouring the way it had been.

“If you simply want a woman,” said a soft voice at my ear, “I know one who would be honored.”

I jumped. It was a red Aelfmaiden taller than I am but as slender as a glowing poker.

“I am back, Lord,” she said, “and I am Baki. Possibly you have forgotten me.”

“To tell the truth, I’ve been wondering where you were,” I said. “You got Sword Breaker for me, and my bow, and put them under my bed.”

“After which you told me to go away and let you alone.”

I really did not want to talk to her, although I felt I had to. I said, “You wanted to get under the covers with me again. You and the other one.” She tittered.

“Has anybody told you you sound like a bat?”

“Only bats, Lord.”

“That was you, wasn’t it, in the armorer’s shop? I could hear you but I couldn’t see you.”

“Not I, Lord.” She smiled. She had big white teeth, and they looked sharp. “It must have been Uri. Or your precious Queen Disiri, perhaps.”

I sighed. “I ought to punish you for lying.”

“I? Whose blood glutted you? You have not the heart, Lord.”

“You’re right, I don’t.” I started calling for Disiri again, though I felt pretty sure I was not going to find her.

“I need not look like this, you know.” Smoke came out of her eyes. She shrank and faded, getting wider, white and gold. In about a minute, maybe less, there was a naked, shy-looking girl with golden hair and a big stick-out chest where Baki had been standing. Her eyes sucked up the smoke. “Do you like me better now, Lord?” Her head came as high as my chin.

I had thought only Disiri could do that, but I said, “I’m not exactly crazy about you either way.”

“Your guilty slave grovels.” The blonde bowed her head. “She would do anything to please you, Lord, and if you have no notions of your own, she can offer any number of exciting suggestions.”

“Aren’t you cold?”

“I am, Lord, and so are you. We can heat ourselves pleasantly by following one of my most exciting suggestions. First I will kneel—so! You—” As quickly as I could, I said, “Have you been following me all day?” The blonde shook her head, keeping her eyes down as she had the whole time. “Up here, Lord? Of course not. But I have watched you from Aelfrice. Will not you go there with me? It is not raining there.”

Something too deep-voiced for a wolf howled in the distance. I stopped to listen before I said, “I spent quite a bit of time in Aelfrice with Garsecg. I don’t remember seeing anybody I knew in this world then.”

“Because you did not know how to look, Lord. Put your head right down here.”

I shook it instead.

“You will not? Seriously, if you come to Aelfrice with me I will teach you to view Mythgarthr. It is not difficult. You can learn in a day or two.”

“And afterwards I’ll come back and find out I’ve been gone three years.”

“Not that long. Or I think not, Lord. It is unlikely. Lord, if you will not sport with me, may I change?”

I did not answer because she had begun to change while she talked, looking up at me for the first time so that I saw the blonde had Aelf-eyes of yellow fire.

Smoke poured from them, wrapping her in a robe of twilight and snow. When it returned to her, she was Baki again.

I said, “Are you really my slave?”

Still kneeling, she bowed to the rain-soaked fern. “I stand ready to serve my lord night and day, though night is preferable. He need only ask.”

“Who’s your lord?”

The white teeth flashed in that face of glowing copper. “You are. Who should be my lord but that most noble knight, Sir Able of the High Heart?”

“A knight,” I said, “but not noble.”

“I think otherwise, Lord.”

“The armorer seemed to know about you Fire Aelf, and he said you were iron workers. Is that true?”

“Metal workers, Lord. Iron and other metals. Would you like to see a sample of my own work? What of a silver chain with but one end? Whenever you needed money, you could cut off a piece and sell it.”

I shook my head. “Why did Setr choose metal workers?”

“You must ask him, Lord.”

“I will, next time I see him. Why did your people persecute Bold Berthold?”

“Persecute is a terrible word, Lord. We may have teased him. Was he worse for our attention?”

“The years, the Angrborn, and you all hurt him. Why did you do it?” A gust of rain hit us; the howl I had heard before came with it, deep but as lonely as the cry of a wounded bird.

Baki wiped cold water from the burning oval of her face. “Do you still care about this Berthold, Lord? Whom I have never set eyes upon, by the way. Or may we talk of something interesting?”

“I’ll always care for him.”

“Very well. It was not I. I was a Khimaira for Setr for a long, long time. It must have been centuries here. If Aelf teased him, I apologize on their behalf.” I was tired, and I knew by then that I would not find Disiri; but I was stubborn too. “I wish I knew why they did it.”

“Which you will not learn from me, Lord, for I cannot know it. I might speculate, if you wish me to.” Baki looked sulky.

“Go ahead,” I told her.

“We like to tease you upper people. You think you are vastly superior and we do not matter at all. So we tease you, and if you prefer to say torment, go ahead. Usually we do no harm, and sometimes we help, especially when we think our help is going to surprise somebody we have been teasing. We Fire Aelf like to help smiths and such mostly, people like your armorer. We like them because they do the same kind of work we do in Aelfrice.”

“Are you saying Disiri enjoys tormenting others? I won’t believe it.” Baki stared at the ferns around her feet.

“Well, does she? Let’s hear it!”

“Not she, perhaps, Lord. But the rest of us do. Mostly we choose people who are alone, because it bothers you more. You are not sure it is really happening.

Was this Berthold all alone?”

“Yes.” I nodded. “In a hut in the forest.”

“Well naturally then. That’s exactly the kind we like to play with.”

“I have met Fire Aelf, Water Aelf, and brown Bodachan.” I sighed, remembering Disiri. “Also the Moss Aelf, who have been very kind to me.” Baki stood, and suddenly she was so near that our cheeks touched. “I would be very kind to you too, if you would let me.” Her long warm fingers toyed with the cord of my cloak.

I smiled—bitterly, I’m afraid. “Now it’s my turn, isn’t it? I’m alone among trees, just like Bold Berthold.”

“You think I am going to pinch you and run? Try me, Lord. That is all I ask.” I shook my head.

“There is a great deal we can do without lying down on this wet ground, you know. But look at how soft this fern is. It is wet, but we are wet already. Let us make our own fire.”

I pointed. “I want you to go to the farmhouse I came from. Watch there.

Watch all of them, but watch the younger brother most closely. Don’t let anybody see you, and be ready to tell me everything they did when I come back.”

“As you wish, Lord.”

I waited until she vanished among the shadows of the trees, wondering whether she would do what I had told her, and whether I would ever see her again. Once she was out of sight, I called Gylf.