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in oiled wool that dripped onto straw and packed earth.
One of the horses chose that moment to sneeze violently, banging its nose on
the wooden feed bin chewed nearly to pieces by countless teeth. The horse was
startled by unexpected pain and jerked back abruptly, bumping into me so hard
that I was knocked off-balance. Staggering, I dropped the lantern altogether;
as I saw oil and flame spill out I immediately went to my knees to make sure
no fire was started. But the roof leaked, and the straw was too damp to
kindle. Oil hissed, and the flamelets went out.
A hand on my arm pulled me to my feet. With the lantern doused there was no
light, for rain-laden clouds obscured the moon and stars. I could find my way
back to the inn because I had countless times before, but surely the stranger
could not.
He released me then and turned to the horse, even in the dark urging it
toward the feed bin again. A few quiet words soothed it; though I didn't know
the language, the horse apparently did. It quieted at once.
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"Put your hand on my shoulder," I urged. "I will lead you to the inn. No
sense staying out here in the stormand the dark."
"In Tintagel," he said obscurely, "there is no rain."
I blinked. Likely not; the duke's castle was undoubtedly sounder than the
stable lean-to.
"Though a storm will come of it," he added.
Was he mad? He kept to the company of horses when the men he had rode in with
had already dried their cloaks by the fire. Fa had sent me out after the
straggler to light his way in; that he might prefer the storm had not,
occurred to anyone.
"A stormhas come of it," I said tartly, and winced inwardly; Mam, had she
heard that, would no doubt cuff me for it.
"Ah, but this one was not of my making," he said mildly, seemingly
unoffended. "Nor the one in Tintagel; that is merely a man's lust. But the
storm to come... well, that oneshall be mine."
Perhaps he was made to stay with the horses because he was mad. If so, then I
needn't remain. But I tried one last time. "Sir, it is too dark to see. Will
you come inside? I know the way even without light."
"Light," he said, "is what I have made this night. A lamp, a lantern, a
torch. A bonfire for Britain in the shape of the seed, the infant, the child
who will become the man."
Hewas mad. Sighing, I made to move past him, to go out into the rain, hoping
to think of an explanation suitable for Fa and Mam, but a hand came down on my
shoulder. It prisoned me there, though the touch was not firm. I simply knew I
must stay.
"Boy," he said, "what do you know of politics?"
"It's a spell," I answered promptly.
The grip tightened as if I had startled him. "A spell?"
"It makes men behave in ways they perhaps should not."
I had more than startled him. I had amused. He laughed briefly, but without
ridicule, and took his hand from my shoulder. "What do you know of such
spells?"
"What my uncle told me. He was a soldier, sir. He came home from war, you
see, and explained it to us. How men conjure politics to order the world the
way they would have it be ordered, even if others would have it be otherwise."
"Well," he said after a long moment replete with consideration, "your uncle
was a wise man."
"It killed him," I said matter-of-factly; it had been three years, and the
grief was aged now. "The wound festered, and he died. Of politics, he said."
"It is true," the stranger said meditatively, "that politics kill men. Likely
Gorlois will die of that same spell, after what I have done this night."
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The duke? But what could this man have done to him? "Duke Gorlois is away
from Tintagel," I said. "He and his men rode away days ago."
"Ah," he said, with an odd tone in his voice, "but he is back. Even as we
speak he is home in Tintagel, sharing his lady wife's bed."
"But he has not come this way," I blurted. "He always comes this way."
'Tonight," he said, "the duke found another way."
I did not see how. There was only one road from Tintagel, and it ran by the
inn. "A new road?" I asked; Fa would need to know. "Is there an inn on it?"
The laughter was soft, but inoffensive. "There is not," he answered. "You
need not fear for your custom."
Lightning abruptly split the sky. I squinted against the blinding flare that
set spots before my eyes, and steeled myself for the thunder. It came in haste
and hunger, crashing down over the lean-to as if to shatter it. Even knowing
it was imminent, I jumped. So did the horses. Only the stranger was immune.
"I wonder," he mused, "if that heralded the seed."
"The seed?" I was busy with the nearest horse, holding the halter as I nibbed
its jaw, attempting to ease it in the aftermath of thunder.
"A man's seed," he explained almost dreamily, though he spoke to himself, not
to me. "And the woman believing it of her husband's loins."
Even Fa would not expect me to stay outside in a storm with a madman. I
opened my mouth to take my leave, but the stranger was speaking again. And he
seemed to know what I was thinking.
"Forgive me, boy." His tone was crisper now, though still clearly weary. "It
takes me this way after a Great Working of politics. I am not always fit
company for others, after."
I ventured a question. "Is that why you're staying out here in the dark with
the horses?"
He answered with a question. "Do you fear the dark?"
"No," I answered truthfully. "But it is difficult to tend my chores when I
can't see ah!"
He had caught my hand in his own. "Forgive me," he repeated. "I did not mean
to startle you."
He touched the palm of my upturned hand with two cool fingertips. "Sir,
what ?"
And then light flared, a spark of brilliant blue that bloomed in my hand like
a fire freshly kindled. He cupped my hand in both of his and held it, keeping
me from leaping back. "It will not burn, boy. That I promise. No harm shall
come of it."
I stared at the light pulsing in my palm. It was neither flame nor lightning,
but something in between. It was the shape and size of a raindrop.
"Now you can see," he said, "to tend your chores."
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He let go of me then. His hands dropped away from my own. I stared at my
hand, at the light in my palm burning steadily, neither hot nor cold. I tipped
my hand, wondering if the "raindrop" would spill out and splatter against the
straw, but it did not.
I looked up at him then, seeing him more clearly than I had with the light of
my pierced-tin lantern. His eyes were black, but even as I watched them the
blackness shrank down. The color left behind was clear as winter water.
"Are you ill?" I blurted, for this light showed me the truth: the eyes were
gray, but the skin beneath them etched deeply with shadowed hollows, and the
lips were white.
"Not ill," he answered. "Rather, diminished. It was a Great Working, what was
done tonight."
"This storm?"
His pale mouth twitched in something like a smile. "Not this one."
"But you can?"
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