Andre Norton - The Key of the Keplian

Her head hung in shame as she talked, but the younger girl smiled. “Don’t look like that, Mayrin. I guessed there was a favor you needed. Whatever it is, I can promise to try if it not be against honor.”

“It is not, I promise it is not.” Mayrin ran lightly from the room to return with a small package. It was wrapped in a piece of fine cloth which she unwrapped gently.

“I’ve talked about Romar, my brother. He went from us into the lands to the east many months ago now. Nor has he returned. I fear for him.” She stared sadly at the palm-sized painting she now displayed to Eleeri. “This was done before we left the Valley of the Green Silences. I have one of myself and my lord also. But this is dearer by far. It may be all that is left to me of Romar.”

“The favor?”

“Wherever you go, wherever your home is, let you seek, let your eyes be ever busy searching, looking for one like this. I would give all I have to bring him safely home.” Her eyes were desperate.

The woman she addressed nodded slowly. “I do indeed wander, as did your brother, sometimes to the east. I will watch for him, free him if he be trapped, bury him if I find his body, bring news to you if I have any. But only as I can. I, too, have those who rely on me. I cannot risk them for one unknown who may already be dead. But I sorrow for your grief. I will do what I can.”

Mayrin flung her arms about the slender body. “That is all I ask. Come back. With news or without it, a welcome holds for you ever.”

Eleeri turned away, but Mayrin’s fingers seized her arm. Eleeri turned, brows raised questioningly. A small object was pressed into her hand.

“Here; you did not look truly. Look now, study the face. He may have changed a little if he has been treated ill by those of the Dark. Please, remember him, find him for me.”

Eleeri looked down. At her previous glance the boy had seemed nothing special. Now she looked closer as her new friend begged. She guessed that Romar would have been sixteen when the limning was done. The same age as— She stared suddenly. No wonder she had no more than glanced. Why should she look closer? The image of this boy stood staring imploringly at her.

“You know he’s alive somewhere, don’t you?” Eleeri said. “You’re twins.”

“That is so,” Mayrin said softly. “I feel him to be in great danger, but death has not touched him as yet. You are also right that we are twins. It is rare, very rare for those of the Old Race. Few there have been with any talent in our line, but Romar has an affinity with beasts. Horses in particular.” Her fingers twined and twisted frantically, although her voice remained calm and quiet. “But we have the gift of twins. I would know if he were dead; therefore he is not. Find him for me, Eleeri.”

For a long moment, Eleeri studied the portrait. Mayrin had changed, but not greatly since this was done. The boy here was young, untried. But there was strength in that face, pride without vice, power without the need to use it unjustly. The eyes were lonely, inward-looking. To an outsider he would have appeared as no great one to risk aught for. His face was thin, with fine bones and a determined chin. Eyes of a shade more green than gray, if the painter had not lied—but no. Mayrin’s eyes, too, were that hue. The mouth was clean-cut, modeled with almost a delicacy, but there was no weakness in the set of those lips. It was the mouth of one who acted as well as dreamed.

It drew her in a way she had never felt before. She was no child to be attracted by any pretty face. She would have shrugged off the feeling, but even that would have been to acknowledge it. Mayrin had been kind; her lord had traded fairly. They asked only that she be alert for traces of this one. It was not asked that she storm any strongholds of the Dark. She glanced down again. Hmm, a trick of the light . . . for a moment the painted eyes had seemed to implore, to focus on her. Her face came up, eyes measured Mayrin. Witchery? No, she did not think so. Just a trick of the light.

This likeness must have been made ten years ago or more. From what her friend had said during the past week, Eleeri could piece some things together. Romar must be about twenty-seven now, Jerrany some three years older. She bit back a sound of contempt. Mayrin’s father must have been an idiot. Fancy expecting a boy of sixteen to confront one who was older, more experienced, and his best friend as well. Twenty-seven—about six years older than Eleeri was now. She brushed that idea aside. His age was unimportant. Let him be a child or a grandfather, she had promised to watch for signs of him. That she would do, but no more than that.

She rode midmorning, with Mayrin and Jerrany at the bridge to wish her a good journeying. The women hugged a final time and there was a genuine friendship in that.

The keep’s lady wore her guest-gift proudly, the vest of rasti fur glistening in the sun. Now and again her fingers strayed to the pockets lining the inside. How clever, how cunning. She would have these made for every gown now that she had been given the trick of them. Jerrany, too, would find them useful, in his jerkins. Romar should, too—she felt a bitter pain. Romar might never know anything she would wish to tell him. She watched until horse and rider vanished around the lake edge.

“Find him, please find him, bring him back to me,” she whispered into the air.

Eleeri rode around the lake. With all her trade pelts gone, she could ride again, and it pleased her. The walk to the keep had been long and tiring. In a day or two she would be back at the canyon with Tharna, Hylan, and the others. But as the pony trotted on, a young face intruded. Well, she would keep an eye open for the boy—man now. The gray-green eyes seemed to hang in her mind, hopeful, waiting. With a determined effort, she banished them. Winter was coming. She had things to do other than looking for some fool who’d probably only gotten himself lost.

She slept that night in wards, but in her dreams she saw him. After that he was gone. Eleeri nodded. Her mind was her own; it would banish what it was bid. If imploring eyes watched her, after that they were ignored. So she told herself, and who is to say she lied?

But she did keep her promise. She raided less often into Keplian lands, but when she did, her eyes were always alert for the boy who looked like Mayrin. The Gray Ones watched her, but after several disastrous meetings, they tended to look the other way—unless they were in full pack as they were one bright spring morning after winter was banished from even the mountains about Eleeri’s canyon. They gave chase, but the tough fit pony carrying a light weight and the powerful Keplian mare stayed easily beyond their reach.

Eleeri reined in many miles later, laughing. “That gave them a nice run. Didn’t they look disappointed?”

The mare gave her whinnying laugh, then sobered. *Kin-sister, have you not noticed, this spring they have returned to chasing us again. Before the winter, they had looked aside if we were in view. Now they hunt again.*

“That was full pack,” the girl objected.

*They knew themselves unable to catch us, but they still gave chase. Something builds; the Gray Ones do not hunt where the prey is worthless.*

Eleeri grinned. “I wouldn’t say we were worthless, precisely.”

*Not if they could take us, no. But they have tried often in the past, failed, and ceased to try. So why do they try again now?*

“I see what you mean.” She sat her pony, looking thoughtful. It was strange. For most of the previous year the wolfmen had ignored them both. Tharna could be right. Something was building. But what—and why? Her mind made an intuitive leap. Romar! According to Mayrin, he’d ridden off in spring last year. They’d expected him back by late summer. Could the Gray Ones have taken him, found a use for him? But what sort of use, apart from food? Or torture? her mind added grimly. The pony had ceased to nibble at the grass. Now he lifted his head alertly. Eleeri gathered in the reins.