The Chaos Balance

XXVII

Nylan glanced from the white-orange sun that hung in the deepening green-blue sky, barely above the rolling hills to the west, to the group of houses-or hovels-that clustered on the uphill side of the road that stretched before them.

A dull rumble of thunder cascaded down from the hills, and the engineer-smith turned in his saddle. A line of white and gray clouds roiled above the Westhorns, headed westward and toward the travelers, clouds that swelled skyward and blackened as Nylan watched.

“We’ve been lucky,” Ayrlyn observed. “Ten days in the open, and no rain. You couldn’t have asked for better weather. We can find a shelter up there.”

Nylan looked from the hamlet ahead back to the storm, trying to sense the energy patterns. He failed, as he usually did unless a storm was almost on top of him. “It seems like it’s going to rain for a long time.”

He looked down at Weryl. The rain wouldn’t be good for him, or his still-healing wounds, and it wouldn’t be good for his son.

“It’s a big storm,” Ayrlyn confirmed.

As their mounts plodded down the gentle grade, and the gray gelding plodded after them, the smith studied the hamlet ahead. The walls were of crudely chipped stones, not so much mortared in place as stacked and chinked. The roofs were rough-boarded wooden planks, the joints covered with thinner strips of wood.

Even from more than a hundred cubits east of the village, Nylan could see the gold and brown chickens clustering behind one hut. “Chickens…they have chickens.”

“Everyone has chickens here. Even farther south on the flats, where it’s hotter, they have chickens.”

“It gets hotter and flatter and lower?”

“Of course.”

Nylan groaned. “It’s only spring.”

Behind them, closer now, the thunder rolled again. Weryl shivered in the carrypak, as if he could sense while asleep the order and chaos conflict in the storm as it bore down on them.

“How were you received here?” asked Nylan.

“They didn’t close all the shutters.”

“Oh?” Nylan shifted Weryl again, ignoring the twinges in his shoulder.

“They don’t have shutters-or much of anything else here, except food. Actually, they do have shutters. They don’t have glass for their windows, though.”

“Can we buy some food? Some grain would be good for the horses.”

“I have before, but it depends on how their harvests were.”

“We got some coins from the bandits.”

“Five silvers and a dozen coppers-not exactly fair compensation for the wounds and bruises.”

“And a gray packhorse and saddle.” Nylan took another quick look over his shoulder, but the storm was not that much closer. Then, distances tended to be deceiving in the clear air of Candar. The two continued to ride as the thunder rolled again out of the Westhorns.

“A solid storm,” affirmed Ayrlyn as they neared the hamlet. “Lots of chaos up there.”

“You can feel that?”

“You can’t?”

“No, not until it gets close,” he admitted. “You’re better with the winds, I think.”

“Fancy that…and you admitted I was better.”

“It’s hard.” He forced a grin.

He got a quick smile that faded as Ayrlyn turned her eyes back to the hovels ahead. There were no walks between the dwellings, just pathways worn in the soil by years of foot travel, and small structures to the side or rear of the main houses. Outhouses, Nylan realized, as a certain odor drifted in his direction on the stiffening breeze-outhouses not too carefully tended.

Cleared and turned plots behind the houses were clearly gardens, and their careful tending contrasted with the scattered debris piled beside the doors of several dwellings.

“It’s the trader woman! No one has hair like that…there’s a silver-haired one with her.” The youth darted inside the second dwelling.

“They’ll be disappointed to see I’m a man.” Nylan shifted his weight in the saddle and Weryl yawned. Of course, the boy was waking up. They were about to stop.

“The men will be. I don’t know about the women.” Ayrlyn grinned. “You’d better not try to find out, either.”

“With my friend here?”

“Are you saying you would if Weryl weren’t here?”

“No…” stammered Nylan. “That’s not what I meant.”

“That is not what you said.”

Nylan wanted to wipe his forehead. Why was he always saying dumb things? On the one hand, Ayrlyn wanted him to be more forthcoming. On the other, being forthcoming meant being less cautious, and less cautious meant…He sighed.

“Why the sigh?”

“Later,” he temporized as an old woman stepped out from the first hovel.

Ayrlyn slowed, then stopped the chestnut, and Nylan reined up beside her, glancing around. Three houses farther along the road a man appeared at the door, bearing a staff, but the bearded figure did not move, just watched.

“Trader? Where is your cart?” asked the gray-haired woman.

With a start Nylan realized the woman was not that old, possibly not much older than he was. Behind her, in the doorway of the stone-walled structure, stood a child, perhaps waist high, with a twisted leg that dragged as the girl limped out onto the rock stoop.

The gray eyes beneath the gray hair turned to the smith.

“A silver-hair bearing a child.”

“He is a man and a smith,” Ayrlyn said.

“He has no beard. Are all the silver-haired men such as that? A man with no beard? A silver-haired man with a child. No man of Lornth would carry a child.”

“A beard is too hot,” Nylan said quietly as Weryl began to squirm. He winced as heels jabbed into his diaphragm, but he didn’t want to get his son from the carrypak until he knew how friendly their reception was going to be.

“Waaa-daa.”

He compromised by unfastening the water bottle and letting Weryl drink-and drool water over his left trouser leg. A gust of wind whistled through Nylan’s hair, and a roll of thunder rumbled across the hamlet.

“A smith, you say…well…the angels are different.” She laughed, almost a cackle. “And with those blades and the fires of Heaven, so I’ve heard tell, I’ll not be one to question. Need you any chickens, lady trader?”

“No chickens. We are traveling, not trading.” Ayrlyn paused. “Who might share a roof with us?”

“Hisek might have room, and he has a large shed that would shelter your mounts.” The woman pointed. “At the other side, just beyond the burned hut. That was Jirt’s place. Not much, and since Hisek’s consort died, Jirt and his woman live with Hisek. Hisek’s his sire. They have a large common, and even a separate room for the two. Imagine that. Hisek built it for Gistene. Said it was what they did in Lornth. Much good it did her.” The eyes sharpened. “Why be you traveling so early in the year?”

“Because it would not have been healthy for me or my son to remain on the Roof of the World,” Nylan temporized.

“That place be not healthy for many, so I’ve heard.” The lame girl tugged at her mother’s arm, and the gray-haired woman nodded. “The pot’s boiling. Go see Hisek.”

The brown-bearded man merely watched as they rode past his house, his eyes flicking from Nylan to Ayrlyn and then to Weryl. Nylan nodded politely, but the man did not respond. Then they rode past the burned home-little remained beyond the blackened stones and the charred remnants of roof timbers.

“That must have happened this winter,” Ayrlyn remarked.

“Winter…” Of course-winter was when people had fires for heat, and when few were outside to see if a spark had caught something.

Ayrlyn and Nylan reined up outside the larger stone house-it even had a rudimentary covered porch, and there was a long shed to the side of the dwelling. A long, lowing sound indicated that at least one ox was in the shed.

“Greetings!” called Ayrlyn as she dismounted.

Nylan watched as a heavyset, white-haired man stepped out under the porch.

“You might be Hisek,” Ayrlyn began gently. “I am Ayrlyn-”

“The angel trader. I have seen you before.” A puzzled look crossed Hisek’s face. “I have naught to trade.”

“We seek a roof for the night. We were told you had a large common.”

“Aye.”

“A few coppers,” suggested Ayrlyn.

“I do not know…a flame-hair and silver-hair…two angel women…” The squat Hisek pulled on a straggly white beard, and his eyes turned to Nylan, who was struggling with Weryl’s efforts to reach the water bottle.

“Nylan is my consort. The angel men often do not wear beards.”

Nylan looked at Hisek. “It would be good if Weryl had a roof over his head in a storm.”

“A man carrying a child-”

“I’m also a smith,” Nylan said. He could tell the business of explaining that he was a man would get old. Still, he was stubborn enough that he didn’t intend to grow a beard. Even though he hadn’t shaved every day, his whiskers were so silver-transparent that they weren’t obvious from any distance.

“And a warrior, I would wager, with the ease you bear those blades. Cold iron weighs heavy.”

“We only fight to defend ourselves,” Ayrlyn said.

Another roll of thunder cascaded across the valley, and the wind whistled, gusting enough that Hisek looked to the east and squinted. “Quite a storm coming out of the east. Quite a storm.” He pursed his lips. “Three coppers, say, and you share our stew.” His eyes twinkled for a moment. “Course it’d taste better if a trader could add something-”

“Some dried meat, that’s about it,” Ayrlyn said with a smile in return.

“Let me show you the shed. Wouldn’t want your mounts out in this, and old Nerm, he likes company. Never knew an ox that didn’t.”

Nylan dismounted, carefully, to avoid squeezing Weryl against the mare, and followed the others to the shed.

“See…like a stall if you tie them at this end.”

The ox looked up placidly, then lowed again.

“Told you, Nerm, he likes company. Oxen better for tilling than horses. Smarter, too.”

“You take Weryl,” Ayrlyn said, turning to Nylan. “He needs exercise, or we won’t sleep tonight. I’ll get the mounts and the gray.”

Nylan carried the bags off his mare and lugged them up to the house, and a squirming Weryl in the carrypak as well. His shoulder had begun to throb before they were halfway to the house.

“Must be a smith. You’re a slender fellow, but don’t know as I could haul two heavy blades, a rollicking child and a stone’s worth of baggage.” Hisek panted as he walked beside the smith.

“Iron is heavy, but working the hammers was the hard part,” Nylan admitted. “There were times when I felt my arms would fall off.”

“My sire-he always told me-yes, he did, never to mess with a smith. ‘Hisek,’ he said, ‘any man who makes his living beating iron won’t have much trouble beatin’ you.’ That’s what he said.”

Nylan didn’t feel that ironlike, not at all, and he wondered again how long before the shoulder would heal completely.

More thunder, closer, rolled out of the east. Overhead, the sky was covered, except for the western horizon, with dark clouds.

“Best check the supper,” puffed the white-beard as he stepped onto the narrow porch and then into the house through the open door. “Just set your stuff in the corner, there.”

The common room had a hearth at the west end, with coals over which a large iron kettle was hung on an iron swivel mortared into the side wall. An oblong trestle table filled the center part of the room, with a bench tucked under each side. In the hearth corner at the back of the room was a narrow pallet bed. A kitchen-type work table stood wedged into the other hearth corner, with pitchers and boxes on it, and several kegs and small barrels underneath.

Nylan unloaded the gear in the corner away from the hearth. Then he eased Weryl out of the carrypak, carted him out to the front porch and set the boy on the stones. Weryl immediately crawled for the front edge of the porch. Nylan scooped him away and set him down by the door, but Weryl started for the edge again. The smith moved him.

“They be determined…young ones.” Standing in the doorway was a heavy young woman, scarcely more than a girl, perhaps not much older than Niera, the orphaned girl at Westwind, whose mother had died in Gerlich’s attack.

“They can be,” he answered pleasantly.

“I be Kisen. Jirt is my consort. He has the flock in the low meadow.” Kisen sat on one corner of the stone porch, letting her feet dangle.

Nylan set Weryl back down. This time, the boy looked at Kisen, his eyes wide.

“Boy?” she asked.

“My son.” Nylan realized that the brown-eyed girl wasn’t really heavy, but pregnant.

“He has hair like you, not like…the other angel. Do the angels all have silver or flame hair?” She shifted her weight, as if uncomfortable.

“No. Some have black hair, or brown hair, or blond hair. Even among the angels the silver and flame hair is not that common.” Even as he spoke Nylan wondered. Only one of the angels with the flame-red hair or the silver hair had died in the first two years, one of six. Only four of the other twenty-seven had survived. Was that luck? Or did the traits tied to hair color…he shook his head. All those with the strange hair could sense the order/chaos/fields, and that had to help with survival.

“First, thought you were another woman angel. Hard like the others. How come you don’t grow a beard?”

“Beards are uncomfortable. Hot.”

Kisen nodded. “They say you folks like things colder. That true?”

“That’s true, mostly.” Nylan lurched to recover Weryl again.

Another gust of wind carried a few raindrops under the porch roof. Ayrlyn hurried around the corner and onto the porch, carrying the saddlebags, her bedroll, and Weryl’s second bag.

“I put them in the back corner,” Nylan said.

“Both of you carry two blades…?” asked Kisen.

“That way you can throw one,” Ayrlyn said dryly, as she stepped into the dwelling, banging the door with one of the shortswords as she did.

“You throw them, too?”

“Yes.”

“Killed anyone?”

Nylan winced, then nodded.

“Lots?” pursued the girl.

“Too many,” Nylan said.

Another gust of wind brought more rain, and Nylan scooped up Weryl. “Time to go inside, Weryl.”

In the common room, Ayrlyn was breaking off a number of chunks of dried meat and easing them into the iron kettle that hung over the hearth. “They should cook for a time longer.”

“Be a while ’fore Jirt gets back anyhow.” Hisek looked at Kisen. “You make some biscuits, Kisen?”

“Can try, anyhow.” Kisen headed toward the table in the corner.

Nylan sat on a three-legged stool by their gear and set Weryl on the floor-rough planks laid edge to edge and smoothed by feet and boots. Weryl grasped Nylan’s trousers and pulled himself up, tottering on short legs for a moment before plopping down in a heap. After a moment, his fingers grasped the leather trousers again.

“He’ll be walking sooner than you think,” said Ayrlyn, taking the other stool and setting it beside Nylan.

“Looks that way.”

After another attempt, and another, Weryl gurgled and smiled.

Nylan sniffed and reached for the boy. “Is there a well or stream?” he asked more loudly.

“Use the well by the shed. Bucket’s there,” said Hisek.

Nylan grabbed a clean cloth undersquare from Weryl’s pack and carted the boy out through the light rain to the well. While the well water was warmer than the icy stream water of the Westhorns, his hands were still red and raw by the time Weryl and the soiled undersquare were clean and they were back at the house.

Another figure stood inside the door, and Nylan had to stop suddenly to avoid running into the shorter man.

“This be my son, Jirt,” offered Hisek. “These are angel folk, travelers, ’cepting that the flame-hair’s also a trader at times. Silver-hair’s a smith.”

“My sire’s guests are welcome.” Jirt frowned as he looked at Nylan, obviously confused at the lack of whiskers until he saw the stubble.

“The flock?” asked Hisek.

“They’re in the corral. No cats-so the lambs are all there. Cats be out later.” Jirt was square like his sire, but brown-haired and brown-bearded.

“Good! We can eat now. You brought the meat, trader lady. You serve,” said Hisek. “Sit.” Hisek indicated that Ayrlyn and Nylan should take the end places on the benches.

As the others sat at the trestle table, Ayrlyn ladled out the stew. Another crash of thunder seemed to rock the house just as Ayrlyn served herself, and the rain splashed down in sheets.

“We’re very thankful to be here,” she told Hisek.

The stew wasn’t bad, neither as awful as the messes that Kadran had made in learning to cook nor as good as Blynnal’s cooking. It was plain and filling, and the dried venison helped a lot. Kisen’s biscuits were heavy, but the one that Nylan offered Weryl seemed to keep the boy busy, half as food and half as a teething ring of sorts. At least, Nylan managed to eat a good dozen mouthfuls before he went back to alternating spoonfuls between Weryl and himself.

“You have a lot of trouble with the cats?” Nylan asked Jirt.

“Depends. Last year was bad. Lost half the lambs,” answered the herder, his mouth full. “This year…not so bad. Yet. Cold winters make easier springs.”

“Why is that?” asked Ayrlyn.

“The deer. Cold winter, the deer have it hard. They get weaker, and that makes it easier for the cats. Cats are smart. Rather go after a deer than a sheep and a herder that could kill ’em.” Jirt reached for another heavy biscuit. “Solid biscuits, sweet. Like ’em that way.”

Kisen smiled.

“True what they say about the angels,” ventured Hisek, “that they-you folk-destroyed all Lord Sillek’s armsmen and some eighty score of Lord Karthanos’s folk?”

“That’s about right. We didn’t want to, but when you have two thousand armed men trying to kill you-” Ayrlyn shrugged.

“Idiots…” mumbled Hisek through his food. “Can’t live there. Can’t even pasture up there’less you’re a rich lord. All it’s good for is bandits, and been a lot less of them since the angels showed. Got more from you, trader, than from the folk out of Lornth.”

“Peace, now,” said Nylan. “Both Karthanos and the regents of Lornth agreed to let Westwind be if Westwind keeps the roads safe of brigands.”

“Some sense after all,” noted Jirt.

“Only one who gets killed is the common man,” said Hisek. “Golar was a levy. Lucky to come back alive. Brother didn’t. That grassland lord of Jerans killed him. Him and his bitch consort.”

After more small talk and after all the biscuits were gone, and after Nylan changed Weryl again-thankfully he was only wet-the three men dragged the table to one side of the room.

“There’s the best we can do,” offered Hisek.

“That’s fine,” said Ayrlyn.

“Much better than outside in this weather,” Nylan agreed.

Jirt and Kisen retreated through the mishung door to the small bedroom, and Nylan rolled out his bedroll in the corner away from the fire, letting Ayrlyn have the closer space. After easing Weryl onto the side closest the fire, he stretched out, glad to get the weight off his feet and buttocks. For a time, he felt better. Then he began to notice that the plank floor was hard, as hard as if it were made of the rock that comprised the walls.

Plick! A raindrop splatted on the floor behind his head.

The engineer turned his head toward Ayrlyn. Her eyes met his, and she gave a half-shrug with the shoulder she wasn’t lying on.

“Better than being outside,” she said.

Plick! Plick! As if to emphasize her statement, the hissing of the rain became a heavier splashing, and another set of thunder rolls echoed outside.

Nylan turned slightly, careful not to roll onto or into Weryl, or to put his weight on the healing shoulder.

Plick!

Across the room, the older man began to snore, like a crosscut saw that rasped across Nylan’s nerves.

Plick! Plick!

He closed his eyes again.

Plick!

The engineer opened them and turned, whispering to Ayrlyn, “Tell me how it’s better than being outside again.”

In the darkness she smiled, and her hand reached out and squeezed his. “It is. You’re dry.”

He was dry. He was also tired, and his wounds and muscles ached.

Plick!

He took a deep breath, trying to relax.

Beside him, Weryl turned, but Ayrlyn squeezed his hand again.