Falnight 07 (of 14)

[mother_herbivore]

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We waited for hardly more than an hour, in truth, but it felt so much longer. I sat on the porch steps and prayed while Harlan leaned against the house wall, arms crossed, hat brim pulled down over his face. Neither of us said a word. My prayers were silent, almost incoherent, sentences half-finished before my thoughts hurried onto the next idea. I made appeals to the good graces of Wisleve and Umbrine, the strength and tenacity and love of Dovisle and Everise, Silverune’s blessings for us. All of it was frequently and randomly interrupted by my anxieties, and the more I tried to focus on prayer the more insistently I thought, what if she finds nothing? What if she finds death? What will I tell them? I could scarcely take the hour—how had I survived six long months without Falnight? I drew my knees up and rested my forehead against them, eyes closed, mind roiling. The sound of the door finally creaking open again was a welcome interruption.

Sadrian waved us back inside the house, now smoky and filled with the distinctly pungent scent of smoked herbs. It was a smell I knew quite well—the mixture was popular with the lodges and battlemages, and I have had close dealings with both. I was somewhat comforted by it, by knowing that the Dog and her magic were not so strange and different, even if I did not know the details of it all.

 

She was sitting cross-legged on her cushion, elbows leaned on her knees and a pipe still held languidly between her fingers. Falnight’s poetry book lay closed in front of her, a folded sheet of paper sticking up from between its pages.

 

“There is a house built at the foot of a mountain,” she said, once Sadrian had closed the door. She did not look at me, but straightened and picked up the book for me. “White shutters, a purple door. No one else around for miles. I looked from the moon’s morning view, and I could only see the house from the end of the garden path—it’s protected by strong magic. I only sensed your son faintly, but it was enough. He is not far. When I looked up, I saw three peaks. I imprinted the scene, but nothing else stood out.”

 

I held the book to my chest with both hands. “Thank you,” I said, as clearly as I could. I was nearly breathless.

 

“Is there nothing else you can tell us?” asked Harlan. The Dog shrugged.

 

Harlan simply turned and left then, without so much as a goodbye. I would have been more annoyed if I was not holding a map to Falnight in my hands. I only smiled at the Dog.

 

“Thank you,” I said again. “This means everything to me.”

 

She shifted uncomfortably, glancing at Sadrian. “Of course,” she said. Then, “Pay Sadrian on your way out.” And she closed her eyes, drawing deeply on her pipe. I went to Sadrian.

 

“You know,” I said, as I counted out the paper he asked for, “the most children I’ve ever known a moon elf to bear was thirty-one, by Whitbrine Laurid. I’ve only had eleven, myself, and only three of them half-elves. But, if you’re curious who holds the all-time record, there is a cultural center in Opera with a beautiful genealogy library—perhaps the elves there know.”

 

Sadrian stammered for a moment. I pressed the money into his hand, bid him a kind farewell, and left.

 

Harlan had not waited for me. He was already out of the garden, untying his horse from its post. By the time I reached him, he had mounted.

 

“The moon’s morning view,” he said, as I closed the gate behind me. “What is that supposed to mean?”

 

“It means we must look east,” I said. “When dawn nears, Silverune looks out at the land one last time, and that is east.”

 

“She should have just said, “look east.””

 

“She said it as she experienced it. Perhaps she does not know that the moon sets in the west.”

 

Harlan grunted. “Then it’s no wonder that she lost her way in the mountains,” he said.

 

“Don’t be cruel,” I told him. I tucked the book safely into my pack. “We need to find somewhere high, where we can see the mountaintops more clearly. A tall building of some kind.”

 

“Let’s go to Verible, then. The Metic Hotel has five floors,” said Harlan.

 

“Or,” I looked up at the sun, picturing a map of the valley in my head, “we can go north, to Upton. They have an old observatory.”

 

Harlan was silent while I thought, weighing the options. Upton’s observatory was larger and more sophisticated, but it was farther, nestled in the northern tip of the valley, and the view of the mountain range would be skewed. But the view from Verible, further east, would not be much better.

 

“We will have to go to Yuville,” I said at last. Harlan frowned.

 

“We might as well be returning to Sheaside,” he said. “We could reach Verible tonight, you know.”

 

“Yuville is not that much farther. The belfry of the Keepers’ house will be high enough. We will camp tonight and be in Yuville in time for lunch tomorrow.”

 

Harlan gathered his horse’s reins, stony-faced. “Well, if you’re done doing all the deciding, we should be on our way.”

 

I nearly chided him, nearly pried for whatever he was not telling me like I always had when he was young. Harlan had taught me patience through his many silent, stoic tantrums as a child, when I would have to guess and guess and guess until I finally found what he was upset about. This time, though, he was a grown man, and I was not going to chase him round and round again. We must be able to speak to each other as adults, I thought. I let him be, and we rode in silence.

We went for a couple of hours and then set up a plain camp, Harlan clearing a space for a fire while I staked the horses nearby. The nights were cool, but had not yet turned autumn-cold, so I did not set up a tent and laid our bedrolls out right on the grass. Sleeping under the moonlight is good for us, anyway.

 

Harlan was sullen as ever as we settled in, sitting hunched by the fire once it was lit and saying nothing while I heated a simple supper for us.

 

“Do I know this friend of yours?” I asked finally.

 

Harlan did not look up from the aimless patterns he was scratching into the dirt with the back end of his fork. “What friend?”

 

“The one you were with today, before we left.”

 

“No, you don’t.”

 

I waited. He did not continue.

 

“Silly of me to think you might tell me, then?” I asked. I held out his tin plate, and he took it without another word.

 

Several more times I tried to strike up a conversation, asking him about his horses or telling him of an amusing traveler I’d had at the inn recently, but each time I was met with silence, perhaps a grunt or a nod at best. I finally let it be, and only said “Good night” when everything else had been done.