The Truth-Teller's Tale (15 page)

“I don't feel like living.”

“How long have you been in love with Micah?” I asked.

Now she looked away, but she didn't try to lie. “Forever. As long as I can remember. Except when we were children, it didn't feel like love. It just felt like—” She made a small gesture and then instantly stilled her hand again. “It was just that we were friends, and no one else was such a good friend. It's just been the past few years that I've thought—that I've known—that I knew to put the word to it.”

“How does he feel about you?”

She gave me a quick look, for the tense I had used, I suppose. “The same.”

“Does his father know? Does Roelynn?”

She shook her head, then shrugged. “Roelynn has guessed, maybe, by now. Neither of us ever told her, and we wouldn't think of telling Karro. There was never any chance that Micah would be allowed to marry me. I knew that. His father would have made a grand match for him, as he is trying to do for Roelynn. I never thought we had any future.” She dropped her head in her hands, and her blonde hair spilled across her cheeks to cover her face. “I just didn't think the future would be so completely empty of everything,” she whispered.

I moved over and put both my arms around her. I could feel her shoulders shaking. The imperturbable Adele was sobbing.

“I know,” I said, whispering into her hair. “I know. I know.” Useless words, of course, but at least they were true. I couldn't think of anything else to say.

CHAPTER TEN

I didn't tell our parents what Adele and I had discussed under the kirrenberry tree, but perhaps our mother, at any rate, suspected some of it. Over the next few days, I noticed her gazing at Adele with a narrow attention, making sure she had an extra piece of bread on her plate at dinner or a cup of hot chocolate before we went to bed. It was possible she took her cues from me, for I watched my sister all through the day and at random intervals through the night for the next ten days.

Adele tried very hard during that time to get better. I can't say she succeeded particularly well, but at least she got no worse. She ate a little more; she slept a little longer. If I insisted she go for a walk with me, she obediently got to her feet and followed me out the door. She did not recover to the point that she was lively or amused, but I didn't expect that.

I found myself hoping that Melinda would come to Merendon soon, for I knew what I would wish for if she did. Some way for my sister to be happy again. Something to take away the heartache. While I was at it, I would wish the same things for Roelynn, who had grown just as haggard and waifish as Adele.

It was not a dream that I could expect to come true. So, in the absence of miracles, I made a great but human effort to see that my sister and my best friend survived their grief. Mostly this meant spending as much time with them as my duties at the inn and classes at school allowed—but I would have done that anyway. Perhaps I did nothing to ease their lives at that point except exist and remind them that I loved them. Perhaps that's all anyone can do at such a time.

One day about six weeks after Micah had disappeared, Adele and I went over to Roelynn's house as soon as school let out. Karro's rules had grown lax in this past month and a half. He didn't care so much these days that an innkeeper's daughters ate in his dining room or played in his orchards, and Roelynn liked to have us over to fill up the empty days. The three of us went directly to the kitchen, where we snatched hot pastries straight from the pan and made the head cook smile. She was a kind, ample, older woman who had clearly been doing her best to take care of Roelynn during this bitter time, and she always greeted Adele and me with heartfelt welcome.

“Don't burn your tongues now,” she admonished. “That filling is hot! It's good for you, though. Each of you eat two or three of those.”

“Don't you have to save some for dinner?” Adele asked.

The cook shook her head. “No company tonight, and there's plenty here for those who have any interest in eating.” She looked meaningfully at Roelynn and then glanced up at the ceiling, where Karro's office was one floor above us.

“I'll have another, then,” I said.

The three of us withdrew to a small table in the corner to consume our tarts and drink glasses of fresh milk. Karro's kitchen was an inviting place, huge and high-ceilinged, with three stoves and two fireplaces and all sorts of interesting pantries and cabinets. Hanging from the exposed beams of the ceiling were copper-bottomed pans and sprays of dried herbs, and jostling between the tables and the stoves were usually three cooks and two or three assistants. And nothing—not the fancy restaurants of Wodenderry, not the streets of Merendon on Summermoon Eve—smelled as wonderful as Karro's kitchen on baking day.

“How's your father today?” Adele asked eventually.

Roelynn shrugged. “About the same.”

“Is he getting any business done?” I asked.

“A little. He met with a couple of ship captains yesterday, and I think he signed another contract. I only know what the steward tells me.”

“Your father doesn't talk to you?” Adele asked.

Roelynn shrugged again. “He never talked to me much. He really only talked to Micah.”

We were all silent a moment. “What about Summermoon?” I finally said. “Is your father going to do anything?”

Roelynn shook her head. “I don't think he'll be able to summon the strength. And I think—I can't either. I can't help plan a dinner or a ball, and greet people at the door, and laugh, and pretend I'm happy.” She looked out the window. “I don't even know how I'm going to get through the day,” she whispered.

“You can come to the Leaf and Berry on Summermoon,” Adele said. “We can always use extra hands in the kitchen. You can put on a plain white apron and serve dinner to the guests.”

I was scandalized, but Roelynn was smiling. “Can I wear a little lace cap and speak with a country accent?”

“I'm sure people will expect it,” Adele said.

“I hope Melinda comes for Summermoon,” Roelynn said. “She doesn't always.”

“I heard a story the other day,” Adele said. “That Melinda had been in Tambleham shortly after a woman there had a baby girl. And the woman was moping around the house because she was so depressed. She had wanted a baby boy instead. And then Melinda passed through town. And the next time the woman went to change the baby's diapers—” Adele paused for effect. “—the girl had changed into a boy!”

“No!” Roelynn exclaimed.

“Yes! That's what I heard, anyway,” Adele said.

They were both smiling—the first time in weeks—so I didn't bother to point out that the story was patently false. I had heard the tale, too, from a traveler who'd had one too many glasses of ale in the taproom, and I hadn't believed it for a second.

“I heard that when Melinda left Thrush Hollow, a troupe of mimes and jugglers came to town,” Roelynn said. “And they'd never been to Thrush Hollow before. And some little boy—ten years old—had wished for that every day since he was five years old. No one else cared that they were there, but he was the happiest boy in the kingdom.”

“I think maybe we should ask Melinda about some of these stories,” I said dryly.

“Why?” Roelynn said. “She'll tell you herself, she doesn't have the power to choose which dreams come true and which ones don't. She just has this—magic—in her body that sometimes works and sometimes doesn't.”

Roelynn fell silent. We all knew what she would be wishing for right now, and what Melinda would most decidedly grant, if the Dream-Maker had the power to make such decisions.

“So!” I said, just to be saying something. “Do you think your father will be taking you to Wodenderry anytime this year?”

“I don't know. He hasn't mentioned it. I know he wants to renew his shipping contracts with the queen, though, so I expect he'll have to go to the royal city sometime.”

“Would you want to go?” Adele asked.

Roelynn made an indecisive gesture with her hands. “Maybe. I don't know. A trip like that would be good for me—give me something to think about.”

“Maybe you could come to school with us,” I suggested, trying to come up with practical distractions. “We're studying foreign history right now.”

“Thank you, I'd rather be trampled by horses from a runaway carriage,” she answered politely.

“Work in the dress shop,” Adele suggested, getting into the spirit. “Wait on haughty and indecisive customers who always ask you if you can give them a better discount.”

“Or the stables,” I said. “You're good with animals.”

“And you like the grooms and the coachmen,” Adele murmured.

That actually made Roelynn laugh. “All excellent ideas,” she said. “I have to come up with some kind of activity, I suppose. I haven't wanted to do much of anything since Micah died.”

“He's not dead,” I said absently. I was trying to think of an even more outrageous pursuit to suggest.

It was a moment before I realized that Roelynn and Adele were staring at me in utter, shocked silence. It was another moment before I realized what I had just said. I put my hands across my mouth, as if to check for untrue words, but my lips were blameless. I felt that pressure against my chest, diamond-hard and just as precious, that always signaled absolute certainty.

“He's not dead,” I whispered. “You know I can't say the words if they're false.”

“How do you know?” Roelynn whispered back. I had thought she was pale before, but her face was completely bloodless now. “Please don't—if you're not sure—please—”

“I just know,” I said. “I don't know where he is. But he's alive.”

Roelynn put her head down on the table and started sobbing. The cook bustled up, concerned and motherly, and put her arms around Roelynn's shoulders. The look she split between Adele and me said she would never welcome us back in her kitchen to upset her darling again.

“I'm sorry,” I said, my tongue tripping over my words. “I said something—I didn't mean to make her cry—just give me a few minutes to explain. . . .”

“I think it's time for you and your sister to go home now,” the cook said in a severe voice. “I think I'll just put Miss Roelynn to bed now. Maybe you'd better not come by tomorrow.”

“But I—” I started, but Adele grabbed my hand and rose to her feet. “Tell her to come to the inn if she wants to talk later,” I called over my shoulder as Adele towed me past the stoves and tables and out the back door of the kitchen.

We had walked through the vegetable garden, past the orchards, and down to the street before Adele relaxed her grip on my hand. She hadn't said a word since I had made my startling pronouncement, though her face had looked as pale as Roelynn's. I glanced over at her now, as we wove through the pedestrian traffic on our way back to the inn. Her face was composed and unreadable as ever, but flushed with a delicate color. She looked pretty, and she hadn't looked pretty for weeks. She looked happy.

“It has to be true,” I said, “or I couldn't say it.”

She gave me a radiant smile, then leaned in to kiss me on the cheek. I swear she actually skipped a few steps down the street. “I know,” she said. “I believe you.”

 

 

Every morning for the next week, I woke to find Adele lying on her bed, watching me. Every day, as soon as she saw me open my eyes, she said, “Micah is coming home today.”

Every morning for the first six days, I replied, “That isn't true.”

The seventh day, I said, “That's true.” I felt an insistent tension in my heart, an excitement and a conviction both impossible to ignore.

We were both on our feet and dressed within minutes. It was a school day, so we left a vague note for our parents saying that we had had to leave but would come back later with good news. We ran through the streets to Roelynn's house, slipping like ghosts through the early morning fog. At the kitchen door, we managed to convince the cook that we really had to see Roelynn, it was terribly important, and she assigned a young abigail to lead us silently upstairs to the room where Roelynn slept.

She wasn't sleeping. She was watching the door, as I imagined she might have been watching it every day for the past week. “It's today?” she said, sitting up in bed.

“It's
now,
” I confirmed.

Soon the three of us were racing toward the harbor as fast as our feet would take us. We could see the ocean from almost every vantage point, count the tall masts of the docked ships—and spot the potbellied white sail of the small merchant vessel that was coasting toward land on a die-away breeze. We ran even faster, till our lungs burned and our legs ached and our cheeks were red with exertion. We arrived moments after the anchor had been let down, and the gangplank had been lowered to the pier. We were there in time to see a tall, thin figure come limping off of the deck and make its way carefully, painfully, down the swaying surface of the wooden walkway.

Roelynn shrieked and flung herself at him with such force she almost carried both of them into the water. Adele and I were only a few steps behind, but we hung back once we had reached them, not wanting to intrude on their reunion. I could hear Roelynn's voice, sobbing into his shirt, “You're alive, you're alive, you're alive,” and Micah's voice in astonished counterpoint, “But how did you know I would be here? This morning? On this ship?”

And then he looked up, and he saw me, and by the expression on his face, I knew that he understood the role I had played. He thanked me with his eyes while he kissed the top of his sister's head. I was shocked at how emaciated his body looked, how drawn his features were. Wherever he had been, he had suffered greatly. I felt a sudden great wave of affection for him, this man I had always thought so dull, so uninteresting. What a tale he must have to tell of terrors he had survived! And what a good man he must have been all this time, though I had never known it, if two of the people I loved best in the world had been made so happy by his return. I found myself studying his face and finding in it all sorts of virtues I had never realized he possessed—strength of will, and courage, and kindness. It was the face of a decent man, I realized, one who could be trusted never to fail you. His face was lovable, even if it would never be handsome.