Page 9 of The Summer Pass

“You’re a good host,” said Shan, as if to hammer the point home.

The hillside was steep as they approached the forest that bordered the meadow, and Lill slowed his pace when he noticed that his companions were out of breath and had stopped talking. They stopped to rest at an outcrop of grey rock just below the eaves of the forest.

“It is a beautiful view,” said Shan.

“Magnificent.” Zaraz sighed, leaning back on her hands where she sat on the rock.

The breeze moved across the meadow, rippling the grass in shimmering green waves. Lill looked across at Tagra Degra; they were almost level with it here. The brown banner flapped from its nearest tower.

“Lill, we’ve been wondering something,” said Shan.

Zaraz made a soft noise as if she might interrupt, and some silent communication passed between them, too subtle for Lill to catch. But she said nothing.

“We wondered about your husband,” said Shan. “Is he all right?”

“Is everything all right between the two of you?” Zaraz added quickly, and Lill thought they had two competing theories.

“He’s well,” Lill said, although he didn’t know that. It was just a fervent wish. “He’s at home. He’s fine. I had to leave for a while—had to travel here … ”

It felt so true when he said it. For a while. As if he was going back, as if he’d always intended to go back. But he hadn’t, and he wasn’t.

“I miss him,” he said, and that at least was true. “I think about him all the time.”

Zaraz and Shan smiled at him with such warm sympathy that it made him want to crawl under a rock with shame. It made him want to tell them the truth.

“What’s he like?” Zaraz asked.

“Oh. He’s one of these huge blond mountain men. Um … he’s very handsome. But I guess I would think that.” He tried to think of a detail they would like. “He has to bend down to kiss me, even if I stand on tiptoe.”

“You said he gave you your name in hand language—so is he deaf?”

“No, he can hear, but his daughter is deaf—well, two of his daughters, his daughter by blood and one of his adopted daughters. Oh, but he didn’t have a wife before me or a mistress or anything—he’s strictly, what they call it up here is a matchmaker’s ruin. Same as me.” How had that come out of his mouth?

“We were a little worried,” said Shan. “The way you grabbed that wooden bowl, when I was going to give it to Firuduna to eat out of, and you said, ‘My husband made me that.’”

“It’s nothing really,” said Zaraz. “It’s natural you’d not want him using your special bowl. It was just something about the way you said it. Made us think maybe … ”

“I have an overactive imagination.” Shan grimaced.

No you don’t, Lill thought. He tried to smile reassuringly. “It’s the only thing I have—that I have with me, I mean—that he made for me. I just didn’t want it to get broken if Firuduna didn’t like his breakfast and threw it at the wall again.”

Zaraz laughed melodiously and got up from her seat on the rock.

“What’s going on down there?” she asked suddenly, pointing down the valley.

Lill couldn’t see what she was pointing at until he climbed up to stand on the rock. Down in the bottom of the valley, the bridge spanning the Rakhiri was swarming with tiny figures. Not crossing it, Lill realized as he watched.

“They’re repairing the bridge,” Shan said, when he had climbed up beside Lill to look.

“Are they?” Zaraz sounded doubtful.

“I don’t think so,” said Lill. “I think they’re dismantling it.”

“Why?”

“To prevent the Great King’s men crossing the river, one assumes.”

“They think the Great King’s men are coming here?” said Zaraz. “To that castle up there?”