Grimenna Page 6

  “Is my father aware of this?” Ramsi asked heatedly.

  “If your father is Warden Lier, then no. I have only just arrived.”

  “He is the Warden in charge here,” Ramsi said. “He is the Warden of Birchloam. Unless there has been a complaint that our services are lacking, then you should not be here.” He looked accusingly at Viviel. Warden Yulin looked over the young man and sighed.

  “Ranger, you may not jump to conclusions. I did not come to displace your father. I came simply for the interest of Varloga.”

  “With a score of men? Why can you not use our Rangers?”

  Warden Yulin’s patience seemed to fray. He spoke with a sharper tone then. “How about you run and tell Father I am here, boy? I will talk with this gentle farmer now. Off you go, at once,” he snapped.

  Ramsi looked taken aback. There was a murmur of a chuckle from Yulin’s men that made Ramsi’s ears turn as red as his tunic. He turned angrily and marched away to find his horse. Yulin watched him go with a smug smile.

  “Pompous little twit, isn’t he? I’ll be sure to bring him out with us when we take to the woods. See if his back is as strong as his pride. Come now, Mr. Ibbie. We will have a chance to talk at last.”

  “Come inside and have a drink to wash down the dust of the road,” said Viviel. “I will send food and drink for your men.”

  — «» —

  Warden Yulin was a different man than Warden Lier indeed. Paiva had assumed all Wardens were the same, but Yulin scratched no notes into parchment. He kept his eyes level on Paiva’s face as she spoke, studying every muscle that moved and every emotion she tried to convey or hide. She sat at the table across from him, her hands folded nervously in her lap. Her father sat at the head of the table smoking his pipe while Kess went outside with a tray of food and drinks for the rangers.

  “So you say he revealed himself to you before the house, in the middle of the laneway,” Yulin asked when she had finished her story. His eyes skirted over the yellowing bruises on her arms.

  Paiva nodded and looked nervously to her father. Yulin stroked the dust from his beard thoughtfully. “Were there no more words that passed between you two before it happened? Did he give you no inclination as to why he was interested in you?” Yulin asked. His dark green eyes searched hers, his brow knitted together.

  “No,” she answered quietly. She felt her father’s eyes on her face but she did not dare look into them. “Mother had warned me not take my mask off, but I did. I was foolish.”

  Yulin smiled.

  “The only thing I can scold you for is walking home alone in the dark on Mummers-eve,” he said. “I know Varloga. Whoever he chooses for whatever reasons, he vanishes them. If they are ever seen again, they are changed.”

  “I am not changed,” she said. “Perhaps wiser now, but that is all.”

  “She has not been touched by him,” her father said.

  “It is a mystery to me why he is after you,” Yulin said. “And you have right to be concerned and fearful. If a Wilderman were ever to capture Varloga’s head, he would indeed be granted a pardon and perhaps even an estate. The bounty for Varloga is steep. I understand why Warden Lier would rather have kept it secret from me.”

  “Will I have caused problems by calling you here?” Viviel asked with a twinge of concern.

  “You did the right thing. Lier will have to accept it. If anything he should be reprimanded for not informing me at once, as I am his overseeing official. Varloga is of crucial matter to me.” He played with the handle of his mug for a moment as thoughts whirled through his head. His eyes were still and focused on the swilling cider, but Paiva knew he was coming to his conclusions about things.

  “There is only one hitch to the story,” Yulin said. Paiva felt her spine stiffen as he looked up to her. “I find it hard to believe that only one man with a dog and a shepherd’s staff managed to frighten off Varloga.” He tapped his finger to the rim of the mug thoughtfully.

  “I lost near a score of good rangers one night to him,” Yulin continued. “And they were all better armed than you were. I did not come all this way to be led on a merry chase. I want answers; I want the truth. How did you survive the night alone in your house with only a dog to defend you, all the way at the edge of town where no one can hear your screams?”

  Paiva looked to her father, who sighed a great cloud of blue smoke. With resignation he drew the pitcher of cider to his cup and topped it.

  “Very well Warden Yulin,” he said. “I will tell you. I had help.”

  “I think so,” Yulin replied.

  “But if Warden Lier were to hear I may as well forfeit my lands to him at once.”

  “I see.” Yulin was sharp, clever, undeceived. “There were Wildermen loose in the lowlands that night.”

  Viviel nodded and took a long swig of his drink. Paiva could not feel her fingers for clutching them so tight. “Varloga took Paiva up to the altar we leave filled with breads and wine,” Viviel said. “An offering to the good spirits on Mummers-eve, so they may watch over us in the coming season. It was there he changed, it was there he revealed himself and would have struck her down, if the Wildermen had not been about pilfering the altar.” She saw the look of dismay on her father’s face and hastily inserted her own thoughts into the conversation.

  “But one Wilderman said if we told the Warden, he knew where we lived and he would be back,” she said, hoping to blame the Wildermen for why they had not told the truth. Her father shook his head at her.

  “No, that’s not why I didn’t turn them in. They saved your life,” Viviel said. “They weren’t bad men, not at all. They were the ones who told me to notify you, Warden.”

  “Can I have their names?” Yulin asked, his voice and face expressionless.

  “They didn’t give their real names. There was one called Bear Jorn, another called Trapper Terg, and a third called Black Renn.”

  Yulin tapped his finger again on his mug, this time with an air of irritation. Paiva held her breath while she waited for him to speak.

  “I suppose it was Renn or Terg who told you about me then,” he said. “I do believe Terg Ramber was a smithy at the Keep.”

  Viviel nodded. “You know them, then. Will you mark their ledgers?”

  Viviel watched as the Warden sipped his cider in a suspended moment. He smacked his lips and set the cup down.

  “Ledgers? What ledgers? I thought we were talking about Varloga, what do Wildermen have to do with this?” The corners of his eyes crinkled into a kind smile. “Don’t let Warden Lier hear any whispers of Wildermen in his woods. He’s far too busy a man to be worrying about that right now. You’d only cause trouble for yourself.”

  “Rightly so, that’s what I thought.” Viviel returned his smile. Paiva blew out her breath in a sigh of relief.

  “But what about this girl? What is it about her that marks her aside from the others in this village?” Yulin mused. “Is it truly because she unmasked herself? It is because she was all alone, vulnerable, or is there something more to it than meets the eye?”

  “I don’t know. The rangers won’t guard this house forever. I thought it best she should go to her Aunt Bessil at the Keep, and stay there awhile and hope that Varloga is contended with.”

  “Ah Bessil, yes, your wife’s sister. Interesting. Well, if you’re willing, she can ride back to the Keep with us when we leave.”

  “How long will you stay?”

  “A few days, perhaps.”

  “That would sit very well with me. I would be hard pressed to leave my wife alone here while I travel down through the lowlands. Thank you, good sir.”

  “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I shall go to see Warden Lier and see what he has made of his investigation so far. Pleasure to meet you Mr. Ibbie, Paiva.”

  Paiva sat still at the table and watched her father escort the Warden
to the door. When he came back he sagged into his chair and poured himself another drink. He looked at Paiva with utter bewilderment.

  “I thought my heart was about to come out of my throat for a minute there,” he said.

  “Mine too,” she replied. “But he seems to be a good man.”

  “By my soul, I give my thanks again to those Wildermen. Warden Yulin does indeed seem like a fellow who knows how to go about his business.”

  — «» —

  Master Warden Yulin proved to be a man of his word. The following day he ordered Ramsi up on his horse behind a troop of men he sent into the woods. The Master Warden himself took a handful of his own men and headed up into the pasture towards the altar. He wasn’t seen again for another three days.

  Paiva spent the time that passed sitting on a boulder out in the pasture watching the sheep, waiting for him to return while Warden Lier’s rangers paced the perimeters of her father’s land. Ramsi returned with a squad of rangers first. He was filthy, his clothes torn and ripped. She had never seen him reappear from the woods in such a state. He was tired and had an edgy look in his eyes that he cast accusingly on the other rangers who were not nearly as dirty or tired looking as he. She could only imagine what they had done to him.

  Yulin returned with the rest of the rangers during the night. The dog howled an alarm at his arrival and both the Ibbies and the rangers went out into the yard to greet him.

  “Where have you been? What have you found?” Viviel asked. Yulin was dirty, his boots brown with mud and his neatly cropped beard was in disarray. He smelled of horse, woodsmoke and swamp. He was calm, his face unreadable.

  “Nothing,” he said. “No trace of any spirit. I will leave for the Keep tomorrow. If you wish for your daughter to accompany me, you had best prepare.”

  — «» —

  To Ramsi’s utter discontent, Warden Yulin seized his horse.

  “That is my horse,” he protested.

  “See that brand on its neck? That means it is property of the Keep. And it was given to you under commission of the Master Warden of the Keep. And I am the Master Warden of the Keep,” Yulin replied firmly. He led it out of the stables into the square where his men and Paiva were waiting.

  “You can’t just take a man’s horse,” Ramsi nearly yelled.

  “The young lady certainly cannot walk behind us all the way to the Keep.”

  “She can’t ride my horse, she can’t ride a ranger’s horse,” he protested loudly. “She’ll kill herself.” But even as he complained Paiva swung up in his saddle without any trouble at all. Her father adjusted her stirrups and handed her the reins, then tucked a small bundle of her belongings behind her, securing it for the journey.

  “Safe home,” he whispered to her.

  Yulin swung up in his own saddle, then delicately slipped on his leather gloves, eyeing Ramsi disapprovingly.

  “If you would prefer to contest my actions I invite you to send a complaint to the Lord himself. I am sure the Lord will be quick to respond.”

  “You chose my horse on purpose,” Ramsi spat.

  “I did,” Yulin frowned. “I like it. I’m sure you will find another.”

  Yulin turned his horse away, his men ranking behind him, Paiva in the midst of them. She looked back to wave to her parents, her heart tight in her chest. She had never left her home before; she had never even journeyed so far as the next town. She felt a mixture of anger and sadness towards her parents who were making her leave it.

  Her father held his arm tightly around her mother whose eyes were filled with tears. Then Paiva’s eyes raked across Ramsi, and for a fiery moment he held her gaze. He lifted his hand to his lips and blew her a kiss. She knew in that instant, his eyes she had once thought were so becoming, held a vindictive promise. She looked away quickly and didn’t dare turn back for a final glimpse of her home.

  — «» —

  They stopped in the neighboring Quarrytown, a good day’s journey from Birchloam. Quarrytown was a large and prominent township. There was a huge, dusty limestone pit that employed a good number of trades people from about the land; mostly masons, builders and laborers. The Quarry was also the place outcast women were sent to work, cutting and shaping the limestone that would be loaded onto oxcarts or sent down the river on barges to various destinations where stone was needed for building. Men were sent to the woods, and women to Quarrytown where they were treated like slaves. Just as the brand on a Wilderman’s hand marked him as a pariah, a woman who had spent years toiling in the pit had hands as calcified and hard as the stone she cut and she too would hide her hands in shame. The orphanages of the Goddish monks were overwhelmed with children whose mothers had been sent to the pit. Sometimes children were rescued by relatives or friends, the unfortunate ones by the monks.

  They passed through the dusty town, winding down long streets that were rutted and pitted from ox carts. The streets were filled with dirty, wild-eyed children and stray dogs that ran amok. They passed a beautiful stone Bethel House, a place for Goddish worship, and Paiva stared at it with naive eyes. She did not understand the symbols carved into the stone above the door, she did not understand how people could give their love and thanks to a god who had no face. The forest was all around them; the forest she could see and feel and understand. It was to the forest she offered her own thanks and love.

  They rested at the Quarters of the resident Warden where the men’s horses were taken into the barns. They were given rooms in which to sleep. They went to eat in a room called the Ranger’s Mess where on the walls hung with hunting trophies and paintings of famous Wardens and rangers of the past. There were wooden tables with pews to sit in and Paiva stuck close to Yulin, who invited her to eat with him. Paiva found many curious eyes on her from the resident rangers who ate and drank together in the mess. Yulin seemed very uninterested in the curiosity he had aroused.

  They were served hot suppers from a small kitchen and though Paiva was very hungry and weary from their travels, she found the food to be very bland. Potatoes and bread with a lean, unidentifiable meat were covered in a greasy, tasteless gravy.

  “Master Yulin?” she asked. He lifted his brow in question, chewing a bite of gravy-soaked bread. “Those three Wildermen,” she said in a low tone. “You know them.”

  “Yes,” he said simply, taking a sip from his mug of ale.

  “How?”

  “I was the very one that branded them. It is hard to forget a man you cast a brand upon.”

  “How did they cross the river?” she asked curiously.

  Yulin shrugged. “There are a few possibilities,” he mused. “Usually we begin to comb the lowlands in midsummer for trespassers because the waters run low and the Wildermen begin to plot ways of crossing it. All the ones that I have caught have either swum or built coracles or rafts or other floating things. Many drown, but then there are the ones that appear in spring or in fall, when the waters are too cold or too swollen for crossing with such primitive equipment. I used to think there were hidden tunnels running beneath the river, until I realized that some Wildermen tamed these wild horses called Bergs that can tow a bloody war ship across the river. Luckily there aren’t many Wildermen who can tame Bergs and the ones that do are too smart to be caught in the lowlands. Usually they cross for food, which is why they are sent rations, and don’t often prove to be dangerous.”

  “I’ve never heard of Warden Lier going across the Panderbank.”

  “He has. He’s supposed to bring the Wildermen in his domain rations, and tally them.”

  She frowned, remembering how the Wildermen had complained of not having rations since last autumn. She did not tell Yulin this.

  “Did you mark their ledgers?” she asked.

  He shrugged again. “If I marked their ledgers it would only come back to haunt your father. There was no point. They did no harm. Their ledgers are long enoug
h.”

  She frowned, stirring her eating knife through the gravy on her plate. “What did they do to get sent to the woods?” she asked quietly. It was a question that had been burning in her.

  “I think Jorn skimped on taxes. He was a farmer, if I recall correctly. He’s harmless. About as smart as a sack of nails.” Yulin frowned as he recollected. She was in awe of Yulin’s sharp memory. She assumed he probably did know every man and his ledger that was ever sent to the woods, for he would have been the man that branded them. “Tergis Ramber, he worked for Master Orif at the Keep. He’s a thief, a liar, and there was some sort of indiscretion towards Orif’s daughter.”

  “And Black Renn?” she asked.

  Yulin cleaned his trencher with the last of his bread. “Murderer,” he said, stuffing the last bite in his mouth. “Terrible supper this. You’ll find Bessil knows how to make real gravy.”

  Chapter 5

  They left the dust of Quarrytown behind them the next day and headed into the foothills, following the slope of the land southwards where eventually it became flat and filled with pastures and farm ranges. They took the high road that cut from Quarrytown to the next village, a small place called Grodalweir. They passed peasants and carts en route to various business and errands and all stepped clear of the road when Yulin marched his men past. The peasants kept their eyes lowered and their heads bowed, not even curious enough to look at the strange girl riding on a ranger’s horse.

  When they came to Grodalweir, they stopped only for one short hour while Yulin went to visit with the resident Warden. Yulin’s rangers tended to the horses while they waited in the muddy village square and ate stale bread from the dirty kitchens. For all they cared she was but an extra saddle bag to tow along. None ventured to speak a word to her, and even amongst themselves they were quiet and solemn.

  The rangers of Birchloam were different from this lot of men. There was a camaraderie and a carefree brotherliness amongst Birchloam’s ranks. When they left for the woods, usually headed off by Ramsi, they often went to it in a race through the village — their cloaks flying, their horse’s heels kicking up dirt and dust. Yulin’s rangers were entirely different. They were seasoned men, soldiers, not village boys who had earned a red cloak.