So we went on to Trevamper, that town set at the meeting of highway and river where all merchants in the north show their wares upon occasion. Even the Sulcarmen, who are sea-rovers and seldom come far from wind and wave, travel to Trevamper. For there is the ulterior trade. And by chance we met there also my Aunt Islaugha, her son Toross, and her daughter Ynglida.
She came to pay a call on Dame Math, but I felt it was one of duty only and there was little liking between these sisters. However the Lady Islaugha presented a smiling face and spoke us fair, congratulating me on the fine marriage that had united me to the House of Ulm.
Yngilda pushed closer to me when our elders had turned their attention back to their own concerns, and I thought she stared rudely. She was a stout girl, bundled in rich clothing down which her braids rippled, their ends bound in ribbons hung with little silver bells meant to chime sweetly as she moved. Such a conceit did not suit her broad, flattish face, with its too-small mouth always pursed a little as if she chewed upon a spicy secret she debated over sharing.
“You have seen the likeness of your lord?” she asked almost abruptly.
I stirred uneasily under the probing of her eyes. I knew her then for unfriend, though why she should be so when we hardly knew each other, I could not guess.
“No.” As always when such uneasiness with others was in me, I was wary. But the truth is better than any evasion which may later trip one up. And for the first time I wondered a little at a matter I had never considered before. Why had Kerovan not caused to be sent a likeness of himself? That such was done in axe marriages I knew.
“A pity.” Her gaze seemed to have some manner of triumph in it now. “Look you here – this is my promised lord, Elvan of Rishdale.” She brought out of her belt pocket an oblong of wood with a face painted on it. “He sent it with his bride gift two years ago.”
The painted face was that of a man of middle years, no boy. And it was not a pleasant countenance to my thinking, but perhaps the limner had either not been skillful or had some reason not to flatter this Elvan. That Yngilda was proud of it was plain.
“He would seem a man of authority.” I did the best I could in way of praise. My disliking for the pictured face grew stronger the longer I regarded it.
She took that, as I had hoped, as a compliment to her promised lord.
“Rishdale is an upper dale. They are wool people, and the trade is rich. Already my lord has sent me this, and this – “ She patted an amber necklace which lay above her tabard and thrust her hand out to me that I might look upon a massive thumb ring of a serpent with eyes that were flecks of red gem-fire.
“The serpent is his House badge. This is his own ring, sent for a welcome gift. I go to him next harvest tune.”
“I wish you happy,” I answered.
Her pale tongue swept out over her lower lip. Again she was in two minds over some speech to make. At last she brought herself to it, bending her head even closer, while I had all I could do not to withdraw at her approach, for her close company did not please me.
“I would I could say the same to you, kinswoman.”
I knew I should not encourage her now, yet something made me ask, “And why not, kinswoman?”
“We are not so far from Ulmsdale as you. We have heard – much.” And she strove to give such a dire accent to that last word that she did indeed make an impression on me. For all my prudence and distrust, I could not now deny her this confidence.
“Much of what, kinswoman?” My tone made a challenge of that, one she was quick to note and that pleased her, I am sure.
“Of the curse, kinswoman. Did they not tell you that the Heir of Ulmsdale lies under a double cursing? Why, his own mother has refused to look upon his face since his birth hour. Have they not told you that?” she repeated with open relish. “Alack, that I should spoil your dreaming about a brave young lord. He is a monster thing, they say, sent to live apart because all men shrink from – “
“Yngilda!” That saying of her name was as sharp as a whip crack, and under it she flinched as if indeed some lash had bitten into her body. Dame Math stood over us, and it was plain in her face she had heard those words.
So open was her wrath that at that moment I knew Yngilda had indeed spoken the truth, or at least come so close to it as to shake my guardian. Only the truth could have aroused her ire so greatly.
She said no more, only eyed Yngilda menacingly until the girl edged back, her full cheeks blanching a little in her fright. She gave a kind of squeak and scrambled away. But I sat where I was and met Dame Math eye to eye. Within me the cold grew, setting me to shivering.
Cursed – a monster whom even his mother could not bear to look upon! By the Heart of Gunnora, what had they done to me, to give me in marriage to that? I could have screamed my terror aloud, but I did not. For in that much I kept my control. I only said slowly, forcing my voice to be level, determined to know the full of it here and now, “By the oath of the Flame you serve, Lady, tell me now the truth. Are her words that truth? Am I wed to one who is not like other men?” For I could not bring myself to say “monster.”
I think up until that moment Dame Math might have covered with fair words. But now she sat beside me, her face grave, as the flush of anger faded.
“You are no longer a child, Joisan. Yes, I will give you what truth I know. It is true that Kerovan dwells apart from his kin, but he is not a monster. There is a curse laid on those of the House of Ulm, and his mother comes from the up-dales, from a family rumored to have inter-wed with Old Ones. Thus he has such blood within him. But he is not monstrous – of this Lord Cyart made sure before he would consent to the marriage.”
“Yet he dwells apart from his kin. Is it true that his mother will not look upon him?” The cold within me was such now I could hardly control myself.
Still she was frank with me. “That is true because of the manner of his birthing, and she is a fool!” Then she told me an unusual tale of how the Lord of Ulm had taken wives and had no living heir because of the curse. How he wed a third time with a widow, and how she had been taken on the road before her time with birth pains and had borne her son within the walls of one of the Old Ones’ buildings. And of how thereafter she had turned her face from him because she was so filled with fear that the babe was of the Old Ones’ sending. But he was sound and no monster. His father swore to that by the Great Oath for which there can be no breaking.
Because she told it all so plainly, I believed her and was less shaken.
Then Dame Math added, “Joisan, be glad that you take a young lord. Yngilda, for all her prating, goes to one already wed once, a man old enough to be her father, and one who will have little patience with any youthful follies. She will find him far less indulgent to her whims and laziness than her mother, and she will perhaps rue the day she left her own keep for his.
“Kerovan by all accounts is one you will well company with – for he is learned in rune scrolls as well as in swordplay, which so occupies the minds and bodies of most men. He has a liking for searching out old things, such as you have also. Yes, you have much to think right in your wedding, and little to see of shadows. You are a maid of good mind and not easily shaken. Do not let the envious words of this foolish wench overset your reason. I swear, if you wish it, by the Flame – and you well know the meaning of such an oath for me – that I would not stand by without protest and see you wed to any monster!”