"Milana of Pellinor."
She looked up at the sound of her name, eyes filled with dull hatred and bone-deep weariness. Long black hair framed a face starved and white, and lips twisted in a painful grimace, beading slowly with blood.
"Who speaks to me?" she rasped. Her hands rose of their own accord, trembling slightly with the strain. Dark veins stood out starkly against the white skin. "Who stands before me, knowing of my name? Reveal thyself."
The man who emerged from the shadows was neither arresting nor imposing, and walked with a slight limp betraying a long-unhealed injury. His hair was filthy and matted as her own, but might have originally been lighter in color than her jet-black locks. A similarly knotted beard obscured the lower portion of his face. Milana's gaze was drawn, however, to his eyes, watching her unblinkingly, dark and impenetrable. He watched her with an intense emotion, longing, and self-mocking.
"Milana of Pellinor," he repeated gruffly. "In Gilman's Cot. Far from home, are we not, Milana? How came thee to land in this most humble of fortresses?"
She did not answer this time, waiting. Her hands crept to her skirts, which she clutched convulsively.
"Mirlad," the man said at last. "Once of Desor. Pleased to make your acquaintance, my lady."
Then Milana withdrew her gaze and returned it to the mountains, gloomy and bleak. A shroud of pain descended to cloud her featured. She hardly took notice when the man approached further from behind, in small, hesitant steps. He stopped a foot away and made a motion as though to reach out, but quickly dropped his arm at his side.
"Mirlad, once of Desor," she whispered at last, without turning. "My home is no longer. Pellinor is burned."
She missed his sharp, shocked intake of breath, the widening of his eyes in disbelief, the involuntary jerk of his hands.
"Pellinor." Her voice floated in darkness, quiet and despairing. "Is burned." The weight of finality nearly brought Mirlad to the ground on his knees despite his slight relation to the sacked School. He perceived in the woman before him a veiled pain sharper than glass, consuming as the sea.
"By... whom?" he gasped.
Milana spun to face him, and she was suddenly radiating burning anger, forcing him to cower back. The venom in her voice was cold, unyielding. "By such as you, once of Desor, cast out for practicing the Dark. By such foul creatures of your own desire, by the haunts of our nightmares, by my friends long trusted... By Enkir... of Pellinor–" Her voice broke, a harsh sob racking her chest. She drew long, rattling breaths.
Now Mirlad did fall at her feet, unmindful of the dirt and grime. Speech failed him, and he merely stared, eyes bright. A bitter wind suddenly swept through the deserted courtyard, cutting through their ragged clothing and whipping dirt into the air, where it swirled gracefully and mockingly. There was nothing he could say. Pellinor, the stronghold in the North, had fallen to the Dark. It lay now under the first snow of winter, a ruin of ashes and blood and death. What might lay in store for the rest of Annar?
With a muffled shriek, Milana fell against the fence as in a trance, eyes rolling wildly. She did not weep. Her grief froze her face into a white mask, but she shook until the entire fence trembled beneath her, and Mirlad could only watch.
"My husband is dead," she croaked at last. "My son... And I–"
It was only then that he perceived the wound stretching beneath her skin. Black and deep, it ate her soul, bound her, and Milana of Pellinor was a broken figure of the past, kept alive by her own will.
"What–what is–what happened–" His panicked words tumbled over each other, horrified. His Knowing spoke of the mournful end, rapidly approaching for her, and for the Speech, and for Barding as they loved.
"Enkir."
The solitary world spoke volumes.
"You will die, my lady." Mirlad's words were soft, gentle. His eyes locked onto hers. "They have brought you here to die." In other circumstances, he might have sounded harsh, cruel, taunting.
But here there was only emptiness.
She did not reply.
•
It was many days before they saw each other again, for Milana took ill rapidly, and her weakening condition prevented her from partaking in the same menial tasks Mirlad was assigned. The weather steadily worsened. Mirlad was summoned to the Great Hall, a rough, unclean barn larger than the rest, to play multiple times for Gilman's men, and returned only in the early hours of the morning to his pile of straw, hoping to catch more than two hours of sleep. He moved through the days in a hazy slumber, unaware of his most base surroundings as he worked through pure reflex, but Pellinor's once First Bard was never far from his mind. Frail and broken, haunting his thoughts... He wondered, for the first time in longer than he could remember, what had become of the rest of the world. What was of Desor, his beloved home? And of his family, though they had cast him out, disowned him, vowed to never again besmirch their lips with his name... Where were they? How did they live?
And worse, whispered a voice deep inside himself that he had learned to ignore: Did they yet live?
These thoughts tormented Mirlad, and he unexpectedly felt his years as heavy weights, nerely unbearable. His existence now was so pointless... aiding the petty, brutish tyranny of a wildman, helping him maintain his wives and his whores... And Pellinor had burned...
He lost count of time.
•
Night fell on the Cot, and for once Mirlad was left alone as he stumbled wearily from his last task of the day. He glanced around, peering through the dark, but no men were in sight, and he hoped that maybe, at last, their master had decided to retire for bed early. Certainly, they made not a sound; no boisterous singing or drunken shouting floated on the night breeze.
But then again...
Mirlad stopped and cocked his head curiously, listening hard. A sound tickled the edge of his hearing, barely audible. Thin, rising and falling... It was the sound of someone crying. Mirlad almost started walking once more; crying in the Cot wasn't unusual. Women often wept at the brutal treatment they received from Gilman's men, slaves bemoaned their hardships, children sobbed their passionate grief and bitterness at the world. He almost started walking once more, on his weary way to bed and sleep, but something stopped him.
The sound reached his ears again, just faintly, and he found himself unexpectedly turning, moving to follow it. One foot followed the other, and he moved with purpose, though to what end he didn't know. Finally, he came upon a huddled shape, small and dark, curled into a ball in the corner between two walls. He stopped, suddenly uncertain. What could he do to comfort a child?
Despite himself, he took a step back, his feet scuffing the dirt.
And then the child looked up, straight into his face, with eyes as blue and piercing as her mother's.
He gasped and brought a hand to his mouth. Another, trapped forever, her spirit shriveling, but such Light, such Light, that shone in her...
"Who are you?" whispered the child. Tear streaks ran down her face, mixing with the dust and grime of hard labor. She could not have been more than seven years old.
Mirlad could not answer, and the child continued to watch him, her gaze too deep, too sorrowful, for one of her age. There was something about her... something different...
"My mother is dying," the girl said quietly. Her chin trembled, but her face did not crumple; she did not succumb to tears once more. She waited, as though expecting him to answer, waiting to hear what he might say.
"Not yet," he managed to murmur. "Not yet will she die, child." That much he knew. Though Milana was gravely wounded, struck fatally in a blow dealt so painfully, so horrifically, she would never recover, the physical aspect of Enkir's punishment would be slow to take its toll. She might live a year, or more, in agony every second. Yet her end drew closer, with the inevitability of black night.
But Mirlad could not speak thus to the girl. When Milana found them, a few minutes later or perhaps an hour, they were still motionless, staring at each other. His eyes were riveted on hers, his soul gasping at the glow of her own, taking in the pattern, the weaving darkness intertwined with coils of pure fire...
"Maerad," the woman called weakly in a trembling voice. "Come, it is late."
The child – Maerad – scrambled up awkwardly. "Yes, mother," she murmured. Though she kept her head bowed, her black hair obscuring her face, Mirlad could sense a sudden change in her demeanor, a jubilation that he knew was due to seeing her mother out of bed.
The two Bards watched the girl walk slowly, her feet dragging, to the barn where she slept, glancing back only once, and then Mirlad turned to Milana. She had closed her eyes and was leaning against the wall in exhaustion, seemingly uncaring of his presence. But he knew she was merely waiting, gathering herself, and finally she spoke.
"My daughter, Maerad." She waved unnecessarily at the barn. "Maerad of Pellinor."
Mirlad opened his mouth to respond, but found himself saying something very different from what he had planned. "It was not of my... I knew nothing, the people who did this were not of those I associated with before my banishment–"
And then she was cold again. "You who were cast out for actions of the Dark. You who have lived in drudgery and filth, you undeserving of the name Bard–" she hissed the word– "Dare claim I mistook those who murdered my family, struck down my School, burned and pillaged, raped, and destroyed, those–"
Mirlad was before her, his face white. "It was not we. And I–"
"You, once of Desor! Once!" she shrieked. He worried that someone would find them, but the dark swathe of wall remained empty. "Cast out! Akin to Jiren once of Desor! To Haresh once of Ettinor! Akin in crimes to Cadvan once of Lirigon, to Vorin once of Car Amdridh..." She covered her face in her hands. She was breathing hard through her nostrils, beyond fury, beyond grief as she named those who had also been exiled from the Schools for their associations with the Dark, names known in revulsion to every Schooled Bard. "You."
He waited until she was somewhat composed, then said, simply, "I am sorry." He looked into her eyes, and saw a flicker there.
The wind blew. The night deepened. A bell tolled in the distance. And somehow, she understood.
He regretted his life.
He regretted his mistakes.
He regretted the actions and desires that had led him to the Dark, if only briefly.
He felt small and horrible when he thought of those he had harmed, though never killed.
He was sorry for her home, and any part he might have indirectly played in its destruction.
He was sorry that she had had to watch her husband cut down and beheaded before her eyes, seen her fellows burning alive, flames licking up their bodies, their faces twisted as they screamed.
He was sorry that she now had to listen to them plead for mercy, every second of her life until eternity.
He was sorry that her daughter would be trapped here, her Light shrouded, perhaps to die.
He was sorry for... everything.
"Take care of her," Milana gasped. She was unguarded, fearful, her eyes wide with supplication. "Maerad, my daughter... She must live..."
"I will," whispered Mirlad.
"She is fragile... she must be protected."
"I will protect her."
"She is... everything."
Mirlad said, "I will guard her with my life."
There was a brief silence. Then,
"...and she will forget."
This time Mirlad only watched her, without speaking. "She will forget," Milana said, a whoosh of air carrying the words to him. "She will–"
"I will not let her forget."
"No!" Her eyes flashed terribly. "She must! But she must also be prepared..."
Mirlad was solemn as he faced her. "I will train her as a Bard."
"As a Bard..." Milana's cheeks burned hotly and her eyes were passionate and bright. "But do not awaken her powers. Maerad's day will come..."
Mirlad would have wondered if she was delirious with fever, were it not for the strange feeling he had gotten when he beheld the child, gazed into her clear, knowing eyes. Yes, her day would come... Indeed, it would come strongly for this girl...
She would be a child of the Light, untainted by Darkness. He would never breathe a word of Dark into her ears; in time she would forget Pellinor and the horrors she had witnessed there.
And someday, holding a bit of each of them in her soul, for she was everything, this child–
Maerad of Pellinor would be free.