Crown of Renewal(202)
“Well,” Kieri said, surprised by her vehemence. “If that is so, then my worries are over. And it feels like it’s going to rain all night. Now I can sleep.”
“If that’s what you want to do.”
“Oho. You have something else in mind?”
“You are the last of your grandmother’s line. I am the last of my father’s. Now my grandfather thinks elf-lords should have more heirs … and I agree.”
“Every child,” Kieri said, “can be hurt.”
“Is that really your concern? Everyone can be hurt. Every living thing—even stone—can be hurt. But you and I are on the side of life, of beauty, of honor … and so you risk, as that man who set you free from Sekkady risked his life for you, and I risk, as my father risked for the Lady.”
“Then let us move these two back into the nursery—without waking them if possible—and risk what pleasure we can find.”
All that night the rain fell steadily.
The next day, Falki came to Kieri and hugged him. “Father—that was a bad man.”
“Yes, he was.”
“You said I was brave.”
“You were.”
“Did you kill the bad man? Will you dig up his bones and put them in the bone place?”
“His bones will not be here,” Kieri said. “And as for killing—I am not sure what happened. But we have friends, Falki, who are stronger than either of us, and they helped me. I think they killed him, and his own evil made him … disappear.”
“Was Tilla brave?”
“Yes. She was quiet, remember?”
“He didn’t touch her.”
“No, he did not. But you are both brave children; I have seen that before. And now—” Kieri had seen the arrival of the Council members. “And now it is time for you and Tilla to have a run in the gardens in case it rains again. Lieth will take you. If it starts raining again, you can visit the stables.” A rare treat he hoped would put the recent past out of mind.
“Grown-up talk?”
“Grown-up talk. We will meet at dinner.”
“Thank the gods for the spring rains,” Sier Halveric said.
“As long as it doesn’t delay planting.” Sier Belvarin looked out the window. “We don’t need another flood.”
Sier Davonin ignored them. “Why did all the elves come running this way yesterday?”
“We had a little problem with iynisin,” Kieri said. “It’s over.”
She gave him a long look, then shrugged. “As the king says.”
“It is a time to rejoice,” Kieri said. “Yesterday a great evil was defeated, though at great cost. Let me tell you.” They listened, shock and horror at first on every face, fear passing to relief, even as he had felt it when those things happened. “The bane of my life that I thought long dead … is now finally certainly gone. Falki lives, unharmed, and—judging by this morning—has taken no lasting hurt. Tilla had a restless sleep at first but woke happy. There may be more iynisin, but we have elves now who do not dispute their existence and are ready to fight with us, to defend us.”
“Perhaps we need not consider those things we came to discuss,” Sier Davonin said. “At least until tomorrow. By the king’s leave, I would suggest a day of thankfulness.”
Others nodded.
“Then,” Kieri said, “let us do exactly that, Sier Davonin. With my thanks for your good sense. Unless someone has urgent need …” None did. “Let us be as extravagant as the good fortune shown us,” Kieri said. “We will meet three days hence, and in the meantime—feast and be merry.”
“Three days,” the others said, and dispersed.
Kieri went in search of the twins and found them in the kitchen gardens, wet to the knees and not a little muddy, trailed by a half dozen hens. Lieth stood at the end of a row, grinning.
“They’re turning gardener?” he asked her.
“Not exactly, though they are picking caterpillars off the vegetables and feeding the hens. The hens were already doing that, but—”
“Da!” That was Tilla. “Caterpillars come out of eggs, Lieth says.”
Kieri cocked an eyebrow at Lieth.
“They do,” she said. “My gran showed me. Moths and butterflies lay eggs; caterpillars come out of them.”
“Lieth knows,” Kieri said.
“So … if a hen eats a caterpillar, will the hen’s egg hatch caterpillars and not chickies?”
“No,” Kieri said. “Only chicks come out of hens’ eggs.”
“Good.” Tilla plucked a caterpillar from a leaf and handed it to a speckled hen. “I like eggs, but I don’t want to eat caterpillars.”