Gate of Ivrel

“Let me stay with her,” Vanye pleaded. “They do not know how to care, care for her as needs be... At least leave her own medicines.”

‘The medicines we will leave,” said Paren. “But we have other orders with you.”

And they took him down the stairs and to a lower hall, into a hall that was home: for there upon the left was Erij’s room, and there the stairs that had led up to the middle tower room that had been his. But they took him instead to that which had belonged to Handrys: the door bolt resisted with the obstinacy of a lock long undisturbed.

Vanye glanced frightened protest at Paren. This was insane, this prison they meant for him. Paren looked intensely uncomfortable, as if he did not relish his orders in the least, but he ordered him inside. Must and mildew and age came out at them. It was cold, and the floor was covered with dust, for dust sifted constantly through Ra-morij, through barred windows and through cracks and crevices.

One servant brought in rush lights. Others brought wood, and a bucket of coals to start the fire. He scanned the room by the dim light, finding it as he had remembered. Nothing must have been disturbed since the morning of Handrys’s death. He saw his doting father’s hand in that morbid tenderness.

There were the clothes across the back of the chair, the muddy boots left by the fireside for cleaning, the impression still in the dusty bedclothes where Handrys had last lain.

He swore and rebelled at that, but firm hands kept him from the door, and men with weapons were outside. There was no resisting the insanity.

Men brought in water for washing, and a plate of food, and wine. All these things they sat on the long table by the door. There was an extra armload of wood, and this they unloaded beside the fireplace, that now blazed up quite comfortably.

“Who ordered this?” Vanye asked finally. “Erij?”

“Yes,” said Paren, and his tone said clearly that he did not approve of the business. There was a touch of pity in his eyes, for all that none was owed an outlaw. “We must not leave you your armor, either, nor any weapon.”

That was clearly the way things would be. Vanye unlaced and slipped off both leather tunic and mail and undertunic, surrendering them to one of the men, as they had taken his helm earlier, and endured in silence their searching him for concealed weapons. He had besides his boots and leather breeches only a thin shirt, and that was no protection against the chill that still clung to the room. When they left him alone he was glad to crouch down upon the hearth and warm himself; and eventually he found appetite enough to take the food and wine they had offered, and to wash, heating the water in the little kettle that was by the hearth.

And at last the weariness that was upon him overcame the rest of his scruples. He thought that he was probably meant to spend the night guilty and miserable, crouching at the hearth rather than sleep in that ghastly bed.

But he was Nhi enough to be contrary, and determined that he would not let himself be prey to the ghost that hovered about this room, angry at its murder. He drew back the covers and settled himself in, stripped only of boots, though it was the custom of men that slept in hall to sleep naked. He did not trust the hospitality of Morija that far. It was a weary time since he had had relief of the weight of the mail even at night, and that alone was enough to make him comfortable. He slept as soon as he had warmed the cold bedclothes with his body, as soon as the tension had passed from his muscles, and if he dreamed, he did not remember it.

CHAPTER VII

THERE WAS THE scrape of a step on stone, something hovering over him. Vanye in sudden panic turned onto his back, flinging his arm and the covers aside, seeking to rise.

Then a man in black and silver stepped back from him and Vanye stopped, one bare foot on the floor. The fire had almost died. Daylight poured wanly through the narrow slit of a window, accompanied by a cold draft.

It was Erij—older, harder of face, the black hair twisted into the different braid that was for hall-lord. The eyes were the same—insolent and mocking.

Vanye thrust himself to his feet, seeing at once that they were alone in the room and that the door was shut. There would be men outside. He had no illusions of safety. He put up a brave face against Erij and ignored him for the moment, going about the necessary business of getting his boots on. Then he went over to the leavings of last night’s wine and had a sip of the wretched stuff, returning to the fireside to drink it, for the chill crept quickly into his bones. All this Erij let him do without troubling him.