Lois Bujold - The Sharing Knife - Beguilement

He tried not to let his imagination descend too far into the disagreeable possibilities, but he couldn’t help reflecting that the only resident of West Blue who had met him so far was Stupid Sunny. It seemed too much to hope that Sunny was not given to gossip, and it was already proven he’d a habit of altering the facts to his own favor. His humiliation was more likely to make him sly than contrite. The Bluefields could well be Dag’s only allies in the farmer community; it seemed a thin thread to hang from. So he let Fawn carry on in her efforts to turn him out presentably, futile as they seemed.

The hamlet, three miles south via the shade-dappled river road, appeared peaceful and serene as Sorrel drove the family horse cart down the main, and seemingly only, street. It was a day for fluffy white clouds against a bright blue sky utterly innocent of any intent to rain, which added to the illusion of good cheer. The principal reasons for the village’s existence seemed to be a grain mill, a small sawmill, and the timber wagon bridge, which showed signs of having been recently widened. Around the little market square, presently largely idle, were a smithy, an alehouse, and a number of other houses, mostly built of the native river stone. Sorrel brought the cart to a halt before one such and led the way inside. Dag ducked his head under en excessively low stone lintel, just missing braining himself.

He straightened cautiously and found the ceiling sufficient. The front room seemed a cross between a farmhouse parlor and a camp lore-tent, with benches, a table, and shelves stuffed with papers, rolled parchments, and bound record books. The litter of records flooded on into the rooms beyond. In through the back hall bustled the clerk himself, who seemed, by the way he dusted the knees of his trousers, to have been interrupted in the midst of gardening. He was on the high side of middle age, sharp-nosed, potbellied, and perky, and was introduced to Dag by the very farmerly name of Shep Sower.

He greeted the Bluefields as old friends and neighbors, but he was clearly taken aback by Dag. “Well, well, well!” he said, when Sorrel, with determined help from Fawn, explained the reason for the visit. “So it’s true!” His stout but equally perky wife arrived, gaped at Dag, dipped her knees rather like Fawn upon introduction, smiled a bit frantically, and dragged Tril away out of earshot.

The registry process was not complex. It consisted of the clerk’s first finding the right record book, tall and thick and bound in leather, dumping it open on the table, thumbing through to the most recent page, and affixing the date and penning a few lines under some similar entries. He required the place and date of birth and parents’ names of both members of the couple—he didn’t even ask before jotting down Fawn’s, although his hand hesitated and the pen sputtered when Dag recited his own birth date; after a doubtful stare upward, he blotted hastily and asked Dag to repeat it. Sorrel handed him the rough notes of the marriage agreement, to be written out properly in a fair hand, and Sower read it quickly and asked a few clarifying questions.

It was only at this point that Dag discovered there was a fee for this service, and it was customary for the would-be husband to pay it. Fortunately, he had not left his purse with his other things at the farm, and doubly fortunately, because they had been far longer about this journey than he’d planned, he still had some Silver Shoals copper crays, which sufficed. He had Fawn fish the little leather bag from his pocket and pay up. Apparently, arrangements could also be made for payment in kind, for the coinless.

“There always come some here who can’t sign their own names,” Sower informed Dag, with a nod at his sling. “I sign for them, and they make their X, and the witnesses sign to confirm it.”

“It’s been six days since I busted the arm,” said Dag a little tightly. “For this, I think I can manage.” He did let Fawn go first, watching her closely.

He then had her dip the quill again and help push it into his fingers. The grip was painful but not impossible. The signature was not his best, but at least it was clearly legible. The clerk’s brows went up at this proof of literacy.

The clerk’s wife and Fawn’s mother returned. Missus Sower’s gaze on Dag had become rather wide-eyed. Craning her neck curiously, she read out, “Dag Redwing Hickory Oleana.”

“Oleana?” said Fawn. “First I heard of that part.”

“So you’ll be Missus Fawn Oleana, eh?” said Sower.

“Actually, that’s my hinterland name,” Dag put in. “Redwing is what you would call my family name.”

“Fawn Redwing,” Fawn muttered experimentally, brows drawing down in concentration. “Huh.”

Dag scratched his forehead with the side of his hook. “It’s more confusing than that. Lakewalker custom has the fellow taking the name of his bride’s tent, by which I would become, er… Dag Bluefield West Blue Oleana, I suppose.”

Sorrel looked horrified.

“What do we do, then, swap names?” asked Fawn in a tone of great puzzlement.

“Or take both? Redwing-Bluefield. Er. Redfield? Bluewing?”

“You two could be purple-something,” Sower suggested genially, with a wheezing laugh.

“I can’t think of anything purple that doesn’t sound stupid!” Fawn protested.

“Well… Elderberry, I suppose. That’s lake-ish.”

“Already taken,” Dag informed her blandly.

“Well… well, we have a few days to think it over,” said Fawn valiantly.

Sorrel and Tril glanced at each other, seemed to inhale for strength, and bent to sign below. The day and time for the wedding was set for the earliest moment after the customary three days at which the clerk would be available to lend his official presence, which to Fawn’s obvious relief was the afternoon of the third day hence.

“In a hurry, are you?” Sower inquired mildly, and while Dag did not at first catch his covert glance at Fawn’s belly, she did, and stiffened.

“Unfortunately, I have duties waiting at home,” Dag put in quellingly, letting his wrist cuff rest on her shoulder. Actually, aside from averting panic by beating Mari back to camp, till this blighted arm healed he was going to be just as useless at Hickory Lake as he was here at West Blue. It hardly mattered at which spot he sat around grinding his teeth in frustration, although West Blue at least had more novelty. But the disturbing mystery of the sharing knife was an itch at the back of his mind, well buried under the new distractions yet never fading altogether.

Three people jerked away from the Sowers’ front window and pretended to have been walking up the street when Dag, Fawn, and her parents made their way out the front door. Across the street, a couple of young women clutched each other and bent their heads together, giggling. A group of young men loitering in front of the alehouse undraped themselves from the wall and went back inside, two of them hastily.

“Wasn’t that Sunny Sawman just went into Millerson’s?” Sorrel said, squinting.

“Wasn’t that Reed with him?” said Fawn, in a more curious tone.

“So that’s where Reed got off to this morning!” said Tril indignantly. “I’ll skin that boy.”

“Sawman’s place is the second farm south of the village,” Fawn informed Dag in an undervoice.

He nodded understanding. It would make the West Blue alehouse a convenient haunt, not that it wasn’t a gathering place for the whole community, by the descriptions Dag had garnered. Sunny must realize that his secrets had been kept, or his standing with the Bluefield twins would be very different by now; if not grateful, the relief might at least render him circumspect. So, were any of those loiterers the friends Sunny had threatened to persuade to help slander Fawn? Or had that been an empty threat, and Fawn had merely fallen for the lie?