Gathering the cloak more tightly about his shoulders he leaned forward and, upon an impulse, picked up the pewter tinder box, struck a flame, and applied it to the crumpled paper and wood shavings beneath the kindling in the fireplace. The paper caught first, orange flames licking out over the kindling. Gaise felt the first of the warmth touch him, and he shivered again, this time with pleasure. As the larger kindling accepted the fire Gaise added several chunks of wood and two of his precious coals.
Fire shadows danced on the walls around him and a golden glow filled the room. Gaise felt the muscles of his shoulders losing their tension, and he relaxed before the flames. It must have been thus for the caveman, he thought, safe and warm, free for a time from the many perils of the day. He thought again of Connovar and pictured him sitting before an open fire, planning the battles against the armies of Stone.
The dream came back to him then, the walk in the woods and the damp, musty earth, the woman crafting the bow. She was quite small, with long white hair pulled back from her face and tied in a single braid hanging between her shoulders.
‘How do you know that a beautiful bow is within the stave?’
‘The yew whispered it to me. That is why I picked it up.’
‘Wood cannot speak,’ he said.
‘It cannot speak to those without a name, young man,’ she told him, her voice low and musical.
‘I have a name,’ he had told her. ‘I am Gaise Macon.’
‘Not a name recognized by the trees that surround you. Not a name whispered in the valleys, or borne on the wind towards Caer Druagh. Not a soul-name.’
‘You are speaking nonsense. Who are you?’
‘I am the flame in the crystal, Gaise Macon. My mother was the shadow on the oak. Her mother was the sheltering cloud. You wish to hear the names of all my line?’
‘I note you do not mention the men involved in your ancestry,’ said Gaise. ‘Did they have no soul-names?’
‘Sadly they did not,’ she said. ‘My grandfather was a Varlish captain, my father a merchant from Goriasa, across the water, where they have robed the magic in stone, and thus imprisoned it. When this happens men forget the magic of soul-names.’
‘Why did you bring me here?’
‘I brought you nowhere, Gaise Macon. You walked to my fire. You will walk away from my fire. Or run or fly. Whatever pleases you.’
‘I am dreaming,’ said the young man. ‘You are not real.’
‘Aye, you are dreaming. But it is a real dream, Gaise. A dream of meaning. A moment of magic, if you will. Would you like to see a story?’
‘You mean hear a story?’
‘I know what I mean, Gaise Macon.’ Then, yes, I would like to see a story.’
The woman raised her hand and pointed towards a small stream, a little way to her right. Water rose up from it in a shimmering sphere as large as a man’s head. It floated some three feet above the grass and hovered before the astonished young noble. Then it swelled and flattened, becoming a circular mirror, in which Gaise could see his own reflection. He saw that he was wearing a patchwork cloak of many colours, fastened with a silver brooch. The brooch was the crest of his house, a fawn trapped in brambles. He was about to ask the woman about the cloak when the mirror shimmered, and he found himself gazing on a distant moonlit mountainside. Two men were there. The images came closer, and he saw that one of the men was wounded. The scene changed. Now a stag was at bay, a great and majestic beast surrounded by wolves. His heart went out to the stag. A black hound, blood upon its flanks, charged at the predators. They scattered, though not before three were dead.
The images faded away. Water began dripping from the circle, first as a few drops, then in a rush, falling to the earth and soaking through the soil.
Gaise sat very still, trying to make sense of what he had seen. A dying man, and a wounded hound. A brief battle with a wolf pack.