And late in the day, when the bit of sky visible through the little windows of the high arch had gone from sun to shadow, there was a stir at the door and hunters came, men in brown leather, armed with bows and swords.
And among them was one that Vanye knew would be close kin of his, even before the youth came forward and met them as lord of the hall: for he had seen high-clan Chya before; when he was a child, and this was the image of all of them—of himself as well. The young lord looked more like a brother than his own brothers did.
“I am Chya Roh,” he said, stepping to the center of the rhowa, the earthen platform at the head of the hall. His lean, tanned features were set with anger at their presence, boding
no good for them. “Morgaine kri Chya is dead,” he said, “a hundred years ago. What proof do you bear that you are she?”
Morgaine unfolded upward from her cross-legged posture with rare grace, smooth and silken, and without a bow of courtesy offered an object into Vanye’s hand. He arose with less grace, paused to look at the object before he passed it into Roh’s hand: it was the antlered insignia of the old High Kings of Koris, and when he saw that he knew it for a great treasure, and one that might have formed part of the lost crown treasury.
“It was Tiffwy’s,” she said. “His pledge of hospitality— should I need it, he said, to command of his men what I would.”
Roh’s face was pale. He looked at the amulet, and clenched it in his fist, and his manner was suddenly subdued. “Chya gave you what you asked a hundred years ago,” he said, “and not a man of the four thousand returned. You have much blood on your hands, Morgaine kri Chya; and yet I must honor my ancestor’s word—this once. What do you seek here?”
“Brief shelter. Silence. And whatever knowledge you have of Thiye and Hjemur.”
“All three you may have,” he said.
“Did Chya’s record survive?”
“The Ra-koris you know is ruin now. Wolves and other beasts have it to themselves. If Chya’s Book survives, that is where it lies. We have no means nor leisure for books here, lady.”
She bowed in courtesy. “I have a warning to give you: Leth is roused. We left them in some little stir. Guard your borders.”
Roh’s lips were thin. “You are gifted with the raising of storms, lady. We will set men to watch your trail. It may be Leth will come this far, but only if they are desperate. We have taught Leth manners before.”
“They are mightily irritated. Vanye’s horse is Leth-bred, and we quit their hospitality suddenly, in a dispute with lord Kase-dre and his counselor Chya Liell.”
“Liell,” said Roh softly. “That black wolf. I commend the quality of your enemies, lady. How much welcome do you ask?”
“The night only.”
“Are you bound north?”
“Yes,” she said.
Roh bit his lip. “That old quarrel? They say Thiye lives. It has never been in our imagination that you could survive too. But we are through giving you men, lady. That is done. We have none left to spare you.”
“I ask none.”
“You take this?’ It was Roh’s one acknowledgement that Vanye lived; his proud young eyes shifted aside and back again. “You could do better, lady.”
But then he went and bade his women make place for Morgaine in the upper levels of the hall, and separate place for Vanye by the hearth. This Morgaine allowed, for Chya was a proper hall, and they were indeed under its peace as they had not been in Leth. And after that Morgaine and Roh talked together some little time, asking and answering, until she finally took her leave and passed upstairs.
Then Vanye gratefully put off his armor, down to his shirt and his leather breeches, and prepared the blankets they had given him by the warm hearthside.
Taomen came, spoke to him softly and bade him come to Roh; it was a thing he could not refuse. Roh sat cross-legged on the rhowa, with other men about him.