Legacies (6 page)

The wagon rolled northward on the eternastone road under an afternoon harvest sun. A light breeze carried the faintly astringent mintlike scent of quarasote. Alucius sat in the second seat, the one that he'd bolted in place in the morning. His mother sat beside him, while his grandparents sat in the front seat, where his grandsire guided the team.

“I'm glad you decided that you'd come to this with us,” Lucenda said to her father.

“Not as though you left me much choice,” grumbled Royalt. “Wouldn't get much besides a cold shoulder to eat, no help with anything.”

“Dear, it's not as though Kustyl has a gather every week,” Veryl pointed out.

“No…but now we'll have to give one sometime next year.”

“That won't destroy us. Besides, Lucenda and Alucius need to see other folk more often.”

Alucius squirmed in the seat, then looked at his mother. Lucenda grinned, then bent over and whispered in her son's ear, “He just likes to complain. He'll enjoy it as much as any of us.”

“I don't complain, daughter. Much good it would do to sulk and waste good ale. Besides, you'd be put out if we didn't go, and when you get put off, you cut like quarasote.”

Alucius didn't always understand the by-play. He knew his grandfather could hear a quarasote spine rustle a vingt away, and he knew his mother knew that. And he knew that his grandfather knew that his mother knew. So, instead of trying to puzzle it out, he looked to his right, at the great plateau, where, under a cloudless silver-green sky, some of the quartz outcroppings at the rim were sparkling, reflecting the sunlight with a green-tinged silver.

“It'll do you good to see other herders, Royalt,” Veryl continued. “You can all complain together, and then you'll feel better. You always do.”

Royalt laughed, and half turned in the seat to address Alucius. “Never argue with a woman, boy. If you're right, and you won't be often, they'll never forgive it, and if you're wrong, they'll never forget it.”

“Royalt,” snorted Veryl, “don't be giving the boy ideas.”

“I don't have to give him ideas. He's got more than enough of his own. Needs to understand something about women, though.”

Veryl turned in her seat to face her daughter and raised one eyebrow.

Lucenda grinned for a moment.

After more than a glass on the ancient eternastone highroad, Royalt turned off onto a lane heading west, a much rougher ride, one that took nearly a half-glass to travel a vingt, until they neared a stead, similar to the one where Alucius lived. Although there was no ridge like Westridge near the stead, the rolling quarasote plains were much the same, treeless and with the red sandy soil. The main house was longer, and lower, without an upper level or loft rooms, and the eaves were longer and hung out over a wide covered porch that ran around the entire dwelling. But the walls were of the same reddish stone and the roof the same split slate. The stone-walled outbuildings seemed lower than the ones at his own stead, but there were more of them.

As the wagon slowed, a grayjay squawked from one of the posts by a lambing pen, and then took flight. Alucius watched the blue and gray scavenger until it landed on the ridge of the stead house's slate roof, clearly waiting for any scraps that might come from the gather.

“Over here, Royalt!” called a thin and wiry man, one who definitely made Royalt seem stocky, even though the older herder was not.

Royalt slowed the wagon and eased it toward the open shed beside the stable, where the wiry man stood.

“Royalt…glad you all could come. Mairee was hoping you'd be here.”

“Wouldn't have missed it for anything, Kustyl,” replied Royalt as he set the wagon brake.

“You mean your lady wouldn't have.” Kustyl grinned.

“That, too.” Royalt vaulted down from one side of the wagon as Kustyl offered a hand to Veryl to help her down on the other side.

“You can put the team in the shed there. Got water and some grain.”

As the two men talked, Alucius offered a hand to his mother, who took it with grace, although she did not need it to descend from the wagon.

Lucenda looked at her son. “You be careful with that clean shirt, Alucius.”

“Not that careful,” Royalt added with a laugh, interrupting his conversation with Kustyl. “Have a good time, boy.”

Alucius looked toward the long porch, and then to the three boys on the far corner who were playing shoes.

“Go on,” urged his grandfather. “The shirt be sanded.”

Alucius grinned and began to run toward the three, although he only recognized Vardial. He heard—and ignored—the words behind him.

“Father…”

“He is a boy, daughter. Let him be one before he has to be a man.”

Alucius slowed as he reached the end of the long porch.

“Here's Alucius,” called Vardial, perhaps a span shorter than Alucius, but far broader. “That makes it even. Alucius and me against Jaff and Kyrtus.”

“Fine,” called the tallest youth, “Kyrtus and me, we'll make it quick.”

Kyrtus's eyes lingered on Alucius, focused on the newcomer's dark gray hair, for just a moment. “That we will.”

“No, you won't,” Vardial predicted.

Alucius and Jaff took the pit closest to the porch, a sandy circle with an iron rod pounded deep into the ground and projecting about a third of a yard above the sand.

“Odd or even?” Putting one hand behind his back, Jaff looked at Alucius.

“Odd—on two. One…two.” Alucius thrust forward two fingers.

“Even, it is.” Jaff had offered two fingers. “You start.”

Alucius picked up the pair of black-painted horseshoes, and shifted one to his left hand. Standing to the right side of the iron rod, he pitched it toward the opposite pit, where it landed two spans short of the rod and skidded perhaps a shoe's width past.

“Not bad for starters,” Jaff said, taking his place on the left side, and tossing a green shoe toward the other pit. His shoe skidded past the rod, touching it enough for a brief
clang
.

“Jaff's within a shoe,” Vardial called back to Alucius.

Alucius tossed his second shoe. While it struck a glancing blow to the green shoe, it didn't knock it away from the rod. Jaff's second shoe struck the ground just short of the pit and bounced sideways.

“Too short…wanted to slide it in,” explained Jaff.

Kyrtus began from the other end, but his shoe skidded well past the rod, as did Vardial's first throw. On the second pitch, Kyrtus got his shoe close to the rod, but Vardial knocked both away.

Jaff started the second round, with a pitch that ringed the rod, and then spun off, landing nearly half a yard away. Alucius slid his first shoe almost to the rod, deep enough into the loose sand that Jaff's second shoe bounced off. Alucius tried to slide his second shoe to the rod on the second side—and did, but not quite close enough.

Over the next glass and a half, the four played five games, and, as Jaff had predicted, the two older boys won, but not easily, with all games being decided by less than four points, and with Alucius and Vardial winning two, if each of those by only two points.

“Wind it up, young fellows!” called Kustyl. “Ribs and chicken'll be ready in a bit. Wash up and get yourself some punch.”

“Good game,” offered Jaff.

“It was,” Alucius replied. “You and Kyrtus are good. Thank you.”

“…he always that polite?” murmured Kyrtus to Vardial.

“…his grandsire's strict…”

As Alucius walked up the steps to the porch, he glanced toward the other end where a girl in pale blue trousers and a white shirt and a brown leather vest was helping ladle out the punch. She wasn't as slender as Kyrtus's sister Elyra, and her hair was straight and brown. But there was something about her. Alucius looked away for a moment.

“That's Wendra,” whispered Vardial. “She's Kyrtus's cousin. Her father Kyrial is the cooper in Iron Stem. He never had enough Talent to be a herder, like his brother Tylal. Father says he's the best cooper Iron Stem ever had, though.”

Alucius glanced back at Wendra, watching as she smiled and then laughed. He looked away quickly when she lifted her eyes in his direction. Then he crossed into the house, following Jaff to the washroom. After washing, and patting his hair back into place as best he could, Alucius eased through the large kitchen, not that any stead had a small one.

Vardial slipped up beside him. “I saw that.”

“Saw what?” Alucius kept his voice even, stopping himself from turning to go back and help his mother and another woman who were wrestling a kettle off the iron stove.

“You were looking at Wendra.”

“I was also looking at where the punch was.”

Vardial laughed, but softly. “Just be careful. Kyrtus is sweet on her.”

“They're cousins,” Alucius pointed out.

“That makes it worse.”

Alucius could see that. “Thanks.”

“She is nice. I like Elyra, though.”

The two slipped onto the porch, and Alucius eased up to the punch table behind Jaff. When the taller youth had taken his punch and walked along the railing, Alucius stepped up and smiled pleasantly. He hoped his smile was merely pleasant.

“Do you want the lemon or the berry?” Wendra asked.

“The berry, please.”

“You're Alucius, aren't you?” She handed him one of the tumblers, three-quarters filled.

“Yes, and you're Wendra?” Alucius looked directly at her.

“Yes.” She smiled, not quite meeting the directness of his eyes.

“Vardial said you lived in town.”

“We do, but Grandfather Kustyl always insists we come to the summer gather. He says that no one can make ale like Father, and he won't drink it unless Father's here.”

Alucius made the slightest of gestures toward the one empty bench. “Everyone has punch.”

“I shouldn't…”

“Go ahead, Wendra,” interjected the older Elyra. “You've been serving everyone. I can get a glass for Vardial.”

The slightest flush ran up Wendra's long neck.

“If we sit there,” Alucius nodded to the bench, “you can see if you need to help Elyra.”

“I suppose that would be all right.” She slipped onto the bench gracefully.

Alucius sat down and turned to face her, careful to leave space between his leg and hers. “I've never seen you in town.”

“During the week, I'm in school.”

“I get lessons from there, but they come in a package, and it's usually for a month.”

“Your mother goes over them with you?”

Alucius shook his head. “Mostly, my grandsire does.”

“Vardial said he was strict.”

Alucius shrugged. “He's fair, and he wants me to learn.” He could see that Wendra's eyes were a greenish gold, or maybe a gold flecked with green. He wasn't quite sure, because they seemed to change. “How do you like school…I mean, learning with all the others?”

She grinned. “I like it, especially the mathematics. Madame Myrier is going to start teaching me bookkeeping next month. That way, I can help both Mother and Father.”

“Your father's the best cooper…”

Wendra's laugh was musical. “You sound like Vardial. Everyone he likes is the best.”

“He's my friend.” Alucius flushed. He flushed even more when she touched his hand, even fleetingly.

“I know.” Wendra grinned.

“What about your mother?” Alucius asked quickly.

“She's a seamstress. She has a special machine that makes flour bags, too, so that Amiss can sell flour in smaller lots than just the barrels…”

“The food's ready! Don't let it get cold!” called Kustyl, stepping onto the porch. “We've got tables on the side porch and in the big room and in the kitchen.”

“Would you like to eat—” began Alucius.

“I promised Mother I'd help her.” Wendra smiled once more. “I really did. After supper…?”

“After supper,” Alucius affirmed.

He didn't really remember much about dinner, except that he didn't see Wendra, but for when she served him, and that he thought the ribs were better than the chicken. And that Vardial kept looking at him and grinning.

Alucius finally managed to draw Wendra aside in the late twilight, and because the porch was crowded with the older folk, they walked out toward the low ridge to the east of the stead. The air was warm, and the scent was that of sand and quarasote and the lingering odors of chicken and ribs. Alucius had to blot his forehead with the back of his forearm. At least, he thought it was because the air was warm.

The last sparkles of light were fading from the quartz-studded western rim of the plateau, and the three-quarter orb of Selena hung in the greenish purple sky above the plateau—appearing as a massive stone rampart that marked the eastern borders of the Iron Valleys. They stopped at the top of the low rise, a good hundred yards from the main house, far enough not to be heard, and visible enough not to worry anyone, Alucius felt.

For a moment, neither spoke.

“Have you ever wanted to climb the plateau, just to see what's there?” Wendra asked.

“I've dreamed about it, and once I asked Grandfather about that.” Alucius smiled wryly and briefly. “He said that there were more than enough mysteries in the Iron Valleys, and that anyone who wanted to climb more than six thousand yards straight up was a sanded fool, and anything but a hero.”

Wendra laughed. “From what I've heard, that sounds like your grandsire.”

“He's very practical. He's a good herder, and I've learned a lot from him.”

“Are you going to be a herder?”

“What else would I be?” He frowned. “I wouldn't want to be crowded in with other people. There's something about the valley, and even about the plateau.”

“Nightsheep can be dangerous. That's what Grandfather and Uncle Tylal both say…”