Spindle and Dagger - J. Anderson Coats Page 0,55
Just like you were blood.”
I told them to stay together. I told them I’d be back, that I’d always come back. David clung to my cloak-end and William pulled it from his grip, clear and confident and steady, and told him not to be afraid.
“All right,” I whisper, and under the covers Nest takes my hand and holds it tight.
It’s not like you didn’t come out of it well.
A clatter in the dooryard. Rhael and me shoulder to shoulder, her breath fast and shallow.
After Nest returns to the maidens’ quarters, I reach between the pallet and the wall and pull out Owain’s rucksack. I paw through his tunics and underclothes till I find his dagger with the hammered bronze sheath. I take it, as well as the silver torc that Owain was to give to Cadwgan upon his return, a gift from his old brother in arms. Then I pull out the heavy gold ring that was Owain’s grandfather’s and the plain leather purse that’s heavy with coin.
Four-and-ten-year-old me slowly unwinding the last bandage from Owain’s healed wound. Wrung out from nightmares. Perched stiff on the edge of the bed and reminding herself that this is what she asked for. This is a thing she can somehow do.
It’s not like you didn’t come out of it well.
Once I asked Saint Elen for my life and she gave it to me, but when someone gives you something, it does not really become yours. The giver still decides when and why and how. And a gift can always be taken back.
I bundle the knife, the ring, the torc, and the purse into my own rucksack, tight so they don’t clank and betray themselves valuable. Then I drink a whole wineskin of thrice-brewed ale, undress, and crawl under the bedclothes.
When you take something with your own hands, that’s when it becomes yours.
It’s the darkest part of night when I wake up needing a piss. Owain beside me lies asleep. Naked, sprawled, taking up most of the bed and all the bedclothes. Snoring like an elderly hound. Smelling faintly of spirits.
I think of the dagger. For many long moments.
I slip out of bed and dress, then sling my kitful of plunder over one shoulder. I leave my spindle, though. I’ve spun enough falsehoods to last all my life.
IT’S NOT MORNING YET FOR ANYONE BUT THE POOR scullions kindling the day’s first fires — and a single scarred graybeard pretending to fish leaves out of the common trough. Nest emerges from the maidens’ quarters, hooded like a leper, and heads toward the graybeard like she’s got nothing to hide. I pull up my own hood and fall into step beside her. Our feet pad in steady unison like a team of horses.
The graybeard squints at me, then Nest. He says something to her, measured, something about silver, and Nest pours out a string of syllables that ends in Gerald of Windsor. The graybeard sighs, low and long-suffering, but nods us toward the gate and mutters for us to keep our faces in shadow. As the sentries slide the heavy bar out of the notches, Einion penteulu stumbles out of the yard privy, staggers, and leans hard against the building like someone poured him there.
I face away. Too fast. Too sudden. I’ve drawn his attention. I can feel it.
There’s no way I can go back. No way to replace all the things I took exactly where I found them. Owain will notice. He’ll want to know why. He will come to conclusions that will be absolutely and unmistakably correct.
“What is it?” Nest’s voice is a calming murmur. A mother’s voice. I will not think of my mother.
“Einion ap Tewdwr. He saw us. He’ll tell Owain.”
“Shh. He saw nothing. It’s early. He’s tired and probably drunk.” Nest looks over her shoulder, though.
The gate creaks open enough to step through, and we’re outside and moving toward Waterford at a walk too fast to be seemly.
Barely a threemonth. I was still counting the days. At not-quite-dawn, I slid past a dozing sentry and fled in no direction. Just away. I stumbled through the dark until I fell over something and my ankle twisted wrong and I couldn’t stand up true for anything. Einion ap Tewdwr came upon me where I lay curled among the roots of a massive oak. I braced for the grab, hard to the ground can’t struggle, but he merely leaned down and whispered in my ear.
We killed them both and seized all the beasts.
It was