Sephtis

14. So back and forth I rock.

Later, as I enter the King's house, I pass Horiki and Taaroko on their way out. The healer gives me a look so completely filled with hatred that I shrink away. I dare not even glance at the priest. When they are gone Morag says: " They are coming back to cut off my King's foot. See now what your evil has brought upon us."

I look at Droug, my past father, and my king. He lies still, deathly white. An empty potion cup is near his furs.

"It is your fault, not mine, " I sign to Morag, "because you lied to him when he went out searching for me."

She comes over an strikes me hard across the face. I do not dare to strike her back for she is the king's wife, and Merikh is watching our exchange hungrily from the foot of the stairs. I go outside again, the taste of my blood is salty and metallic in my mouth as it rolls across my tongue; and I hurt more in my heart than my head where I was struck. I sit in the mud on the moat's edge, rocking back and forth in my despair. The rain beats down, drumming relentlessly against my skin and the skies cry with thunder. I hear Droug screaming, and cover my ears with my frozen hands.

After a long time there is silence, the rain has stopped, and I look up to see it is almost daylight. Across the swollen waters of the moat, just on the forests edge, Kavah sits in the last of the moons light, keeping vigil over me.

I go back to Droug's house, feeling weary and weighted down with sorrow. As I push open the great door I look back. Kavah is gone. It is Eleutheros who watches me as he paddles towards me over the moat, a young deer across the bow of his canoe, its antlers dragging through the water, its ripples fighting with those cast by the small vessel.

The night is warm, and the moist ground inside our house steams in the fire's heat. After scurrying silently up the stairs, I sigh as I lower myself into my few furs that make up my bed atop a bundle of damp straw. I listen to Droug's moans and sobs echo through the houses walls, and I am dismayed; it is as if he is a wee babe again, and not a man. I pull my furs over my head, but I can still hear his agony, and I cannot sleep for that and other miseries. Outside, water drips from the edges of our roof, and tiny raging rivers run down towards the moat and I hear the goats restless in their shelter. From deep in the forest comes the haunting howl of a wolf. I get out of my bed, place about my shoulders a dry fur cloak and bind up my leather boots. All those within the household sleep, and no one sees me go.

In the forest, mist from the warming earth rises all around me, though the air is still cool as the suns first rays struggle to chase way the cold and I see the stars slowly winking, an disappearing. It is getting lighter, but I do not care that I no longer have the shadows to embrace me. Far away I hear a wolf call, and another answers it. A madness comes upon me, and I too, howl. A comic howl it is, a scratch upon the morning compared to the swelling song that is their own. But how I long to call to them, so I do what I do best - I sing.

While I sing, I walk deeper into the forest, beyond the paths I know, beyond the places where I once gathered berries and the yam grows. Before me the forests shadows are fading to a grey and lessening, but the world behind me is still cloaked with darkness. Then I see amber eyes watching me from the way ahead. I stop a little distance away, not certain who it is and crouch down low, averting my eyes. The wolf walks towards me, her lips open in a grin, her tail wagging. She turns side on, not looking straight at me, then walks back a short way from where she came, watching me over her shoulder. It is Shamar.

"Have you come to lead me home?" I say, standing up again.

She lifts her nose and howls. It is a stirring sound, hollow and deep and echoing. When it dies I hear another howl, far away, in answer. I have the strangest feeling the wolves speak to one another of me; that Shamar says she has found me, and Kavah says he knows. I am in awe of them, that they can commune across such a great distance. Then another thought astounds me: they knew the moment I set foot into their territory, and Shamar had come to meet me, like an arrow through the suns rays. Even more then that: I think, with wonder, that the wolves knew my sorrow as I lay upon my bed in Droug's house, and they called me to them.